We've been cookin'

Since my schedule has been fairly unpredictable, I've taken to making LOTS of food on the weekends, and since it's been so cold, it's been a whole lotta soup.  Each time I make one of these, it's about 6-8 servings...my freezer overfloweth with soupy goodness :)

veggie beef

mushroom, beef and barley

 I got the crazy idea to try to make my Grandma's homemade noodles.  These things are VERY finicky, but my hopes were high.

The hardest thing is rolling out the dough so thin.  It's very elastic, so it takes a lot of work to get it this thin.

So the whole point is to let these noodles dry out, cut them into strips and then cook them.  Here's where things went wrong.  I let them get too dry before I tried to cut them, and when they were crumbling instead of cutting, I tried to get them a little damp.  Epic fail.  I have no pictures of the disaster that occurred after.  Needless to say, I learned a lesson.

I've had this ridiculous fascination with Tom Yum soup lately.  I find that there's nothing better for a sore throat, and I've had a few, but the Thai restaurant where I get it is rather unpredictable when it comes to the chili oil they add.  The last time I asked for the most mild soup they could make, yet it was still painful to eat. It was because of this that I decided to learn how to make my own.  It calls for some rather exotic ingredients (kefir lime leaves) but thank goodness you can find nearly everything under the sun on Amazon.com, so that's what I did.

Tom Yum soup WIN!!!

The soup turned out AMAZING.  No, seriously..amazing.  I think I had 6 cups of it yesterday, and 4 today. I'm strangely addicted.

Last night it was fajitas.  I've got a freezer full of meat, and have been slacking when it comes to cooking it.  It seems so much easier in the summertime, but Joacim suggested fajitas, and I was all over it.

the peppers look so pretty in the cast iron skillet

chicken from our meat CSA...a special treat having boneless chicken breasts

and the lovely ensemble, made ever so much more wonderful with pico de gallo (courtesy of The Pioneer Woman)

and one of my favorite dishes...Penthouse Pasta (you can guess where the recipe came from....don't ask)

About 2 months ago, I got about 10 pounds of chicken bones from our meat CSA to make stock with.  I really had no idea what to do with it...it just seemed so intimidating.  But after talking it through with a co-worker, I felt I was armed with enough info to be dangerous (and hopefully to produce a stock that I'd eat).

This process seriously took 2 whole weekends.  With roasting the bones and aromatics, and letting it cook for 5-6 hours, plus time to cool..well, it left little time for anything else.

But I did it, and ended up with about 10 quarts of chicken broth.  And I think it's going to be delicious!!!