First soup is a Cream of Mushroom that I love. It also makes a great base for other soups ( add spinach for florentine )

Ingredients:

1/4 cup butter

1 lb thinly sliced mushrooms

2 shallots (fine chop)

1 tablespoon flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

2 teaspoons tomato paste

2 cups beef broth ( veggie works great too)

1 tablespoon lemon juince

2 cups half-and-half

Method:

melt butter on medium high heat, add mushrooms and shallots and cook, stir often, until mushrooms are browned and most of their liquid is gone

add flour, salt and pepper, tomato paste and stir mushrooms to coat. remove from heat and slowly blend in the broth, return to heat and bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

Puree mushroom mixture with stick blender until smooth.

Mix in lemon juice at end, return to heat and add in the cream stirring until steaming hot – don’t let it boil though. the recipe I started with calls for two tablespoons of vermouth to be added right before serving, but I don’t even like vermouth in cocktails so that doesn’t work for me, try it if you like That sort of thing

For starters, using the free item means you aren’t using something up that you paid for. And very often, those free samples come with coupons, so if you watch for a sale, you can get a great deal on it (this should go with out saying, but I’ll say it anyway – if you can’t get a great deal on it, and you wouldn’t have bought it normally, DON’T BUY IT just because you have a coupon ).

Secondly (or maybe firstly, depending on whether your household is like mine) – getting a package in the mail, even if it’s small, is pretty exciting. Super exciting if it isn’t a bill. And triply exciting if it’s something to play with or eat.

Vocal Point is a great site for samples and coupons.  If you don’t already have an account, I encourage you to sign up, especially right now, since they are offering a free Swiffer Duster. The registration is short and doesn’t require a ton of private information, and the samples usually come in very creative packaging.

We’ve been so busy since this year started that I’ve been relying almost completely on PeaPod grocery delivery via an iPhone app for grocery shopping. I’m sure there is a way to use them and not spend as much money as we have been, but the method of using a saved grocery list and fast select shopping has led to a ton of waste. Wasted food that gets bought but spoils before we can cook with it and wasted money since I never take the time to comparison shop or look for coupons (which PeaPod does accept.)

So! Time for a change. But this time the key to success is learning from my big sister. She has developed a system of grocery shopping that is the perfect mix of coupon collecting, bargain hunting, smart shopping and self control. Those of you who know me will get right away that my plan is to add some technology into this mix to make it work for our family, but I’m on board. Time for a change that also saves us some change.

The first year of the food related entries in this blog were so filled with fat and high calorie concoctions that we came up with (heavy cream added to chocolate milk? You bet!) that it was borderline obscene. My own waistline is a testament to the fact that you can’t have heavy cream and butter in your mashed potatoes without needing to buy bigger pants.

Within 6 months Both girls had passed the amazing mark of a 40% body weight increase (just imaging gaining half again what you weigh now! (I don’t think they make pants big enough for me to do that!). The girls systems finally started to trust on regular nutrition coming in and growth spurts of 11 inches (mostly legs!) happened during the first year. Their hair has grown in thick and healthy and Z even has a tiny bit of a tummy now.

But even after two years now (next week marks the date, two years ago that we brought the girls home from Siberia) E is still no wider than my hand, at age 4 she is often confused for a two or 3 year old and we are still shopping for 3T pants and then having to cinch them in since her waist is so small. Her lips turn blue almost immediately in the tub or swimming pool (no fat layer means being cold) and yesterday she squeezed herself through the dog door our 15lbs Westies use.

She is healthy and strong, and in just this month she grew another inch (the pants she is wearing in this standing on tiptoes picture were long on her when I bought them three weeks ago) she just isn’t gaining weight as she fast as she is growing. So, we are back on a higher calorie/high fat diet with a little encouragement from the doctor to see if we can’t help her catch up a bit as winter sets in.

The catch? When we did this the last time she was 2 and all food was magic so we could get her to eat anything. Now at the ripe old age of 4 she has real opinions about food and the include assessments like “no mommy that is mushy” or “I don’t like that color food” most of you who have small children recognize this as something that happens around age two. In a way, since she has on,y had this lifestyle for two years thAt is exactly what we have, a child with two years of eating experience. Only the terrible two with the added power of reasoning and language of a four year old is making for some real hilarity in our household.

Guess it’s time to pull out those recipes and see what we can do to appease the tiny critique.
I’ll post successful ones for this of you on this same track, with the fair warning that just reading them might cause weight gain.

After almost two years of being primarily focused on helping the girls gain weight it’s not just the numbers on the scale for the wee kahunas that have increased. I’m afraid that cooking with heavy cream and real butter was just beyond my personal threshold for willpower. So, it’s fully summertime, the girls are nicely on the growth charts and bigger and stronger than I think we had even dared to hope, and mommy needs to clear out the pantry (both literally and figuratively) with a renewed focus on eating healthy and taking advantage of the lovely farmer’s market produce we have here in the Midwest.

As an added bonus and extremely positive life change Jordan has agreed to move back home and to take on several roles (big brother/nanny/personal assistant/errand runner and now we”re taking advantage of his culinary school education. Which equates to us having a live in personal chef who can whip up everything from the girls favorite turkey meatballs to some of the most amazing grilled dishes and sauces I’ve ever had. (That big smile on my face? It’s just pure gratitude. The girls love all the extra attention and with business doing so well, the extra help around the house is truly making the difference for us)

So, going forward the recipes are a collaborative affair but I can’t take credit for the implementation. We’re going to try to use the month of August to get back to eating really good food cooked from fresh ingredients that take advantage of the season. And who knows, maybe if I can get away from my computer and camera long enough I might even throw caution to the wind and add some exercise into the routine!

It’s my hope that having all this help will mean being able to post more regularly here and on the food buzz site (many of you have sent requests for recipes and updates and I just wanted to say thank you for understanding that life and work had to take the front seat until we got the help we needed. It still amazes me to find that there are readers beyond my family and closest of friends-we started this blog as a way to share the news surrounding the adoption process and then the transition home as a family.) I hope you will let me know what you’d like to see now as we make this more solid transition to just regular life. Well, as “regular” as life can be while managing a family and small business, that includes traveling around the world, can be.

Tonight? Grilled salmon with couscous and Harissa seasoning

Grind up 4 dried chili peppers, 1/4 teaspoon caraway seeds, 1/4 teaspoon cumin seeds, 1/2 teaspoon coriander and two cloves of garlic (we use an old coffee grinder) set aside.

In a big Dutch oven or similar pan heat 1 teaspoon light olive oil (I know. I miss the butter too, but I promise the spices make up for it and this whole meal has only a tiny bit of fat in it) fry 2 thickly sliced onions for about a minute then add two cloves of diced garlic. After a minute toss in multiple colored bell peppers (3 sliced into thick pieces) a chopped jalepeno, a 1/2 teaspoon of fresh chopped thyme and a large zucchini chopped into cubes. Stir it all and cook for about five minutes. Then add 2 cups of instant couscous (our local market has tomato and spinach couscous that is wonderful). Pour in 3 1/2 cups of veggie or garlic stock, 2 large tomatoes that have been diced and then bring to a boil. Cover the pot, remove from heat and let sit for 5 minutes.

The sauce for the salmon is pretty simple: (this works with tofu as a vegetarian meal quiet nicely)

Bring 2 cups of veggie or garlic stock to a boil, add about a teaspoon of the Harissa spice mixture you made. Grill salmon to just slightly underdone, with just salt and pepper then place in the pot of the still hot sauce, cover and remove from the heat and let stand for about four minutes.

After you take the salmon fillet(s) out you pour the remaining spice mixture into the liquid and serve on the side as a sauce.

The process of getting the girls US passports was far less painful than we expected, even though we did have to run around like crazy people to get certified translations of their birth certificates and adoption decrees. (Note that there were already certified translations of these done while we were still in Russia so that US immigration would let us bring the girls home and make them citizens….those translations were good enough for that process but the same US immigration offices wanted a USA certified translation for the passport process.)  I would complain or get grumpy about all that paper chasing and crazy double rules stuff… but we are such pros now after the actual adoption process that now I just ask what I have to do twice and in different colors and wait for the answer.

Mark will be shooting for the first few days, and I’ll be working at nights to keep up with post production on images for two clients and several web sites that we are working on, but seriously? Working from a beach front condo, 10 days with my little family, on an island filled with french food and shops and ummm rum?  ok.. Our great friend Swank Kahuna will be staying at the studio/house and keeping the four legged kahunas and things loved and happy and running while we are gone (she’ll also be studying her ass of for her Medical boards so SHHHH be quiet!) Remind me to use the word GRATEFUL as often as possible.

Beyond the obvious things like the girls getting to play in the ocean for the first time, a real family vacation for the 5 of us, the hope of a slower pace each day….I’m super excited about the food.  The combination of Carribean flavors and spices with French Supermarche living seems just about perfect to me.  The bonus of Chef Kahuana (AKA our son Jordan) being with us to help experiment with the foods and cooking options both on the beach and in the little condo we are renting just puts me over the top.   Did I mention the word grateful yet? (did I spell it right? sheesh I never do!)

So, now the mad rush to get everything in order and projects launched so that we can really enjoy ourselves once we get there.  I’ve been trying to prep the girls about the trip since our last flight with them was the trips from Chita to Moscow then Moscow to Chicago. Elena (almost 4 years old now) has recently announced that she is actually a polar bear.  She approves of the plans for the airplane trip but pointed out that she’d need lots of water to swim in. (Lots of water on an island vacation? CHECK!) Zhanna (turning 5 in a month) was mostly concerned about what shoes she might wear on the plane.  I’m not sure I can do the conversation she and I had justice, but at some point I actually said “Yes, Zhanna…if you want to bring the sparkly pink shoes to wear just on the plane that is fine.” (She wanted to only bring them and I pointed out that they weren’t so much meant for the beach and 20 minutes later I was agreeing to a wardrobe change for a 4 year old during travel.)

The girls start summer camp in one week, and now with Jordan helping us here at home and in the studio as both a personal chef and assistant life is really smoothing out.  In some ways I can hardly remember our lives before we started the process of adding to our family..and in others it seems like only yesterday.

This summer we’ll be doing some major garden experiments and farmer’s market gathering for putting into the pantry to make the next winter a nicer place to live through.  I’ll be posting recipes and photos from all of that in the coming weeks.  Nothing funnier than a city girl with a bent toward tech nerd trying to figure out how to preserve/jar/can in a manner that will keep the food worthy of actually cooking with once the frost comes back.

best wished to everyone for a great summer!

Keep in touch!

Ingredients:

2lbs cut up chicken

2 stalks celery sliced thinly

2 medium carrots, chopped

2 onions, slivered

3 large cloves garlic, minced

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp dried oregano

2 green chilies , roasted and chopped

1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

1 large avocado, thinly sliced

Method:

Fill a large stock pot with chicken, celery, carots, onions, garlic, cumin, oregano, chiles and enough water and enriched broth to cover. Bring slowly to a boil then cover and reduce heat, and simmer until veggies are very tender. Skim if the broth needs it, then gently stir in cilantro and avocado slices.

Serve with lime wedges to squeeze into each portion.

Method:

Heat the butter in a stock pot, caramelize the onion. Toss in the rest of the veggies and then the roasted garlic.  Add in the broth and de-glaze the pan (scrape the bottom with a wooden spoon to get the bits of browned butter and onion to incorporate into the broth.)  Add in the spices and simmer, then add in the heavy cream and bring back to a simmer and cook on low heat until the all the veggies are tender.  Mix in the chopped parsley before using a stick blender to blend to a smooth consistency.

Saturday started out as just a morning to slow roast a chicken (my original plan was just to roast it and turn it into two or three meals that needed diced or shredded chicken in them.) Then the snow started to fall..and when I took the chicken out of the oven the wonderful smells filled the house and all I could think of was soup! So I routed through the pantry and freezer and fridge to see what my options were.

• Black beans, Avocados, Cilantro, Green Chili, diced chicken? Jackpot! That plus the the drippings from the roasted chicken (meant for gravy but oh so much better when used to make an enriched broth) equals Mexican Chicken Avocado Soup
• Crushed Tomatoes, Garlic, Shallots, Dried Pasta, Basil (a stash I froze at the end of the harvest season) and shredded chicken – equals Italian Garlic Pasta Soup
• Potatoes (I ordered too many for our Thanksgiving meal), Roasted Garlic, Enriched Broth, Heavy Cream (yeah, we still keep a steady supply in the house to help the wee kahunas keep gaining weight), Nutmeg, Onions, and the handy dandy stick blender equals Creamy Roasted Garlic Soup

Add in a stash of restaurant containers that I keep in the back of my pantry because they are perfect for freezing liquids in and it’s Saturday becomes Saturday Soup Day!

Freezer is now full of meal options for the next week – with enough left over to share with Jordan and Mark’s father. with the bonus of a nice toasty warm house.

I’ll be posting the recipes and methods I used in the next day or so.

It’s not that I don’t see those dates as important,  it is that from the moment we saw the tiny pictures, and read the brief medical documents and background information about the girls in the referral packets that our adoption agency sent us, I have felt like the girls were part of our family.

It wasn’t like we flew all the way to Siberia to go meet them and see IF we wanted them. We wanted the girls to be part of our family, and our only fear was that some part of the adoption process, as affected by the incredible number of diverse and often times overlapping agencies, would grind to a halt and cause us to be unable to bring the girls home.

International adoption is not for the faint of heart and each adoption is as individual in it’s process and experience as the children are themselves.  I learned very quickly to ignore any book, “expert”,  web site,  or blog that started any advice  with the words  ”The rules are…” or “In Russia….”  There is no such thing.  Much like the USA, each town, hamlet or burg of Russia has judges who interpret laws and process in their own way.  There may be standards, and rules, guidelines and even laws to follow – but to be certain our experience in Far East Siberia would not be the same if we went back and adopted from Moscow or Tver or any other of the 100′s of regions. So I’m not going to take time here to write down tips or guides on adoption.  We were extremely fortunate to have the stars align in so many important ways, which enabled us to go from the first act of submitting our paperwork to boarding that last flight home in less than 10 months time.

What I can speak to is the incredible amount of adjustment and change and well, life,  that our little family has experienced this past 12 or so months. These are the milestones we sweat over, and memories we will celebrate. Perhaps when the girls are older, and want to know more about how we became a family, the date we stood in front of a judge in Siberia will be marked on our calendars, for now I choose to use the holiday season to be thoughtful about memories and changes like this:

Like starting off trying to parent a 3 year old who spoke only fluent Russian and a 2 year old speaking baby Russian and having them both completely replace that language with English in the first few months of being a family to the extreme of now not even recognizing words or sounds from their first language. We still have some funny syntax things that I think are remnants of the way Russian is structured, and the order of the alphabet continues to allude our older daughter, but if you didn’t know they used to speak another language you would never guess.

Coming home with both girls so underweight they didn’t show up on any growth charts. Their bodies had been conserving nutrition for their brains (a magic plan that nature puts into effect in times of emergency) so they hadn’t been growing, or having teeth come in, at the pace you’d want to see in small children – to now trying to keep up with our two robust little girls who have each had more than a 40% weight gain and grown more than 6 inches in one year (nothing like nutrition, sunshine, fresh air, and love to act as miracle grow for tiny ones.) Our youngest daughter is still really small for her age, and is working on catching up on those teeth coming in even now, but she is strong – really really strong.

The trials and tribulations of inserting myself as the mother to a child who for the first few years of her life was actually mothering her tiny sister.  When we first met Zhanna, even though she was obviously hungry and needing attention,  she wouldn’t take a snack or a drink from us without first insisting that Elena be given her own portion. She led her around the room and watched over her in a manner that let us know she had taken on the responsibility of caring for her sister and we’d have to earn that right.  I have used the phrase “you are not the mommy” more times than I care to admit, but it’s less and less often now, and the issues we deal with now are about being a bossy big sister and nothing more.

Memories of that first moment when we opened our front door and the girls began to scream and climb up as high as they could get on our shoulders to get away from our two tiny westie dogs. (At the orphanage the only dogs they saw were wild ones who came into the yard looking for scraps of food – the girls had obviously been told dogs were mean and scary and would bite you, as a way of being protected by the caregivers.) Now we have to beg the girls to stop hugging the dogs and give them a moment of rest, and both girls pretend to be puppies on a regular basis as they scamper across the floor.

The trauma of  having to put the girls through the battery of medical tests and blood letting and multiple vaccine injections so soon after coming home and then a few months later having to stay  in a hospital with Elena after they attached electrodes all over her head to try to rule out seizure activity as the cause of her suddenly loosing the ability to speak in multi-word sentences (a symptom that went away as fast as it showed up and has never returned.) For Elena’s part she was far more interested in the temporary tattoos that i covered her body with to keep her busy, than the electrodes and doctors and temporary confinement in the hospital.

Acknowledging that for our older daughter the extra time she spent in the baby hospital system while waiting for placement in the orphanage has at least slightly affected her ability to easily attach, to trust, to control impulses, and even to process information.  But seeing her face light up when her Daddy comes into the room, getting to share in her honest joy at every new discovery and chance to help, witnessing how excited she is when her big brother comes for a visit, watching her absorb new information, marveling at how fast she can grasp a new concept, and knowing that every day she gets a little better at taking a moment to think before she acts, at letting me actually be the mother to her small sister, and at letting me be her mother as well, makes it all fade away.

Realizing that there are some regular life things that the girls have never experienced so even the most mundane of chores or sights might still seem like magic to them. Sometimes overloading their senses at first experience – the first time we turned on the television, the first taste of ice cream or of COLD milk for that matter, playing in the snow (I know, you think since they were born in Siberia that snow would be a part of their world, but it turns out that the caregivers begin to bundle the children up in layers of clothes when the temp dips below 70 and once it gets really cold the children aren’t allowed outside at all.) Getting to be part of the shock and awe that they experience, the wonder and delight,  helps remind me to take moments, to value the getting there as much as the destination. Children do that naturally, getting to re-learn that skill has been a great gift.

Knowing that the incredible leaps of growth, knowledge and emotional stability of this past year are just the beginning of our life-long adventure in parenting.  Making the transition from approaching everything as a recently created/adoptive family to just family…  The adoption was an act, an event, a moment in time, the worrying effects of starting life in an orphanage diminish with each new day. Now it’s time to just be…

So during this  holiday season with the  chaos of cooking, gifts, tree trimming and family gatherings, and before the year ends, I just wanted to take a moment to remember what 2009 brought with it,  how far we have come – how much we have learned – and to try to keep the ideal of not taking these moments (especially the hard-earned ones) for granted.

We are truly fortunate, our little family….for my part, I’m looking forward to 2010 and all the promise and opportunity to make new memories the new year brings.

Sourdough Starter

• 3/4 cup white bread flour
• 1/4 cup whole-wheat flour
• 7g dried yeast
• 1 cup warm water

Mix together and  and cover tightly.  Leave at room temperature for 2 days or in the refrigerator for 1 week.

Sponge

• 1 3/4 cups rye flour
• 1 cup lukewarm water

After the waiting period for the sourdough starter, mix the rye flour, sourdough starter and water together, cover tightly and leave at room temperature for 10 hours or in the refrigerator for up to 2 days.

Ingredients

• 12 cups bread flour
• 7g of rapid rise dried yeast
• 1 cup warm water
• 3 tablespoons caraway seeds
• 1 tablespoon salt
• corn meal (to keep bread from sticking to baking pan)

Method

• mix flour the sponge mixture, yeast, water, caraway seeds, salt and mix to form a soft dough (it will be sticky at this stage)
• put the dough into a clean bowl and dust the top with flour, cover with a towel and let rise for 2 hours or until it doubles in size
• put dough on a floured cutting board and punch it down then knead until smooth and elastic, divide into two  large loaves or 10 individual sized “rolls”
• dust baking sheets with corn meal and place loaves with enough space to let them double in size after scoring each one with a sharp knife.
• cover loosely with a clean towel and leave in a warm place until they double in size (about 45 minutes)
• cook in a 425 degree oven (put a large pan of hot water in the bottom of the oven to help make the crust crunchy)  Bake the large size loaves for 35 minutes or until golden brown and sound hollow when you thump them. The smaller size cook in about 25 minutes.

Ingredients:

• 3 Zuchinni
• 2 potatoes (peeled)
• 2 onions
• 2 yellow squash
• 1 tsp curry powder
• 1 tsp cumin powder
• 3 tablespoons tomato paste or puree
• 1 tablespoon fresh parsley (chopped fine)
• 1 tablespoon fresh cilantro (chopped fine)

Method:

Bring a pot of salted water to boiling and add first the peeled and halved potatoes, then after 2 minutes add the onions, 2 minutes later add the zuchinni and squash. Continue to boil for 4 more minutes then remove from water and set aside to cool. (save some of the cooking water for the baking dish)

Once everything is cool enough to touch, scoop out the middle of each vegetable (leaving about a 1/4 at the bottom of each one) mix the scooped out veggies with the spices and tomato paste and fresh herbs then spoon back into each preppared vegetable shell. Drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper  and pour into your backing dish about 1/4 cup of the water from the boiling step and roast in 375 degree oven for 30 minutes or until tops are browned.

You can add in any combination of flavors to this recipe – eliminate the curry and go italian spices, or mexican and add black beans and rice, you can also top with cheese if that seems like a good thing.

Course grated veggies

Please allow me to introduce an update from the egg noodles, oil, all the eggs you own, and heavy cream  kugel of my childhood – a dish so entwined in sense memories that I can’t make it without thinking of my Grandmother Eva and feeling warm and happy:

Ingredients:

• 2 zuchinni
• 2 carrots
• 2 potatoes (peeled)
• 1 onion
• 3 eggs
• 1 tablespoon fresh parsley (chopped)
• 1 teaspoon fresh basil (chopped)
• 3 tablespoons matzo meal
• 6 tablespoons vegetable or olive oil
• pinch of sugar/ salt and pepper to taste

Method:

350 degree oven – heat baking dish for ten minutes before using

Coursely grate all of the veggies, finely grate the onion. Add the matzo meal (don’t use bread crumbs it just isn’t the same thing) lightly beaten eggs, parsley, basil, sugar, salt and pepper and mix well.

Pour half the oil into the already heated baking dish, then spoon the veggie batter mush into the pan (don’t tamp down too hard) then drizzle remaining oil on top.

Bake for 50 minutes or until veggies are soft and the top is golden brown. (I like the crunchy bits, so i stir it half way to get a second layer of browned top.)

We are beyond fortunate when it comes to the Wee Kahunas and cooking/serving veggies. Both girls would happily trade a plate of sweet foods for one filled with broccoli. When we first returned home from Siberia with them we actually found ourselves bribing them to eat the calorie dense and high fat foods by saying “If you’ll take one more bite of cheesecake I’ll give you some more peas.” It was like opposite world for a while there, and altough the recent exposure to the world of Halloween candy has gone a long way to developing a real appreication for all things sticky, chewy and sweet, veggies are still the first thing eaten at most dinners.

I’ve started doing most of my cooking on Sunday’s.  It gives me a chance to get a bit ahead of our hectic week and to prep items that take longer to cook than I might have on any given day. It also seems to be giving me a chance to really slow down and just enjoy the process, and the experience of cooking.  There aren’t many slow down moments in our lives so I’m more than grateful for the time.

With all the veggies spread out on the kitchen counter it was pretty easy to pick some favorite recipes to start with, and even to give a try to updating an old family favorite that used to be veggie free. So for this week I made/prepped (click on the images to see the full recipes for each):

1. Vegetable Kugel – an upgrade/update to a family recipe that although scrumptious, contained so many eggs and so much oil and noodles that it needs to be saved for those special holiday meals.

2. Curry Spiced Stuffed Veggies – a savory dish that can be used as a main course or an excellent side to most any main course. Much easier to make than you think, and the veggies don’t get cooked so long that they become mush and loose flavor.

3. Split Pea Fritters (falafel wannabes) (recipe and photos coming later today)

4. Hearty Vegetable Stew (recipe and photos coming on Thursday)

5. Sourdough Rye Bread (because stew without it is just sad) (recipe and photos to be posted on Wednesday – the starter needs two days to ferment)

6. Pumpernickel Bread (because making one kind of bread seems silly) (recipe and photos to be posted on Thursday)