This One's For You

Since my sister asked for the recipe and because it's a favorite in our house, I had to post my recipe for egg rolls.

I don't have the heart to deep fry anything in our house, so these rolls are baked in the oven. The texture is not the same, you won't be fooled, but the filling is so tasty that the rest won't matter much. The filling is simple, so if you're feeling jazzy, feel free to add onion, garlic, or ginger in fresh or powdered form.

Baked Egg Rolls
1 pkg. egg roll wrappers
1 lb ground pork sausage (I use Jimmy Dean reduced fat, the stuff in the roll)
1 pkg. coleslaw mix
2 tbsp. soy sauce
Salt & Pepper
water or 1 beaten egg

In a large skillet, brown the sausage over medium heat. Add the coleslaw mix and soy sauce. Turn the heat down to low and cook until the coleslaw has softened, about 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Drain the mixture of all liquid and let cool.

To form the egg rolls, place a wrapper in front of you so that it looks like a diamond. Lay about 1/4 cup of filling horizontally in the center of the wrapper. Then wrap it up like an envelope. Bring the bottom tip up towards the middle, fold in the sides, apply water or beaten egg to the top edge and roll to shut.

At this point you can (if you have the heart) deep fry these in 375 degree oil or bake them in the oven. If they are going in the oven, you need to generously spritz them with cooking spray until all the exposed areas are covered. Bake in a 425 degree oven on a parchment lined baking sheet for 18 minutes or until brown. I usually flip them about half way through as the bottoms will otherwise brown more than the tops.

How My Garden Grows

Now that we've got the garden set up to water on an automatic timer, I don't get out there as much as I would otherwise. I did go out this morning, though, to see how everything was doing.

The sungold cherry tomatoes are starting to gang up.

The regular tomatoes are right behind them.

I've got a few small bell peppers growing, but they're getting a little crowded out by carrots next door.

My glorious peas are diseased! The leaves are covered with a white, moldy looking powder. I don't know if I can bear to pull them out of the garden.

Here are a few of the carrots I pulled for dinner...not bad looking, huh?

From The Kitchen

For dinner last night I made a recipe that I found here on a new online cooking community website. It's called Guyanese Chow Mein, but it's basically the same thing as my beloved Chicken Noodle Hold the Soup recipe from Rachael Ray, but with ground beef instead of chicken. It has ground beef, shredded cabbage, carrots, celery and egg noodles.

I thought it was pretty tasty and so did Tyler; he ate his right up. I'll probably be making this one again real soon...I've never seen Tyler eat a heap of vegetables so quickly. Rick looked at the leftovers this morning and thought it looked like inside out egg rolls. He's pretty close on that one. My filling for egg rolls is almost the same, although I use ground pork and add soy sauce.

Then this afternoon I finally got around to trying the scone recipe that Susan recommended. I'm not huge on the idea of scones. I usually go with muffins....way easier! I didn't have any oranges or dried cranberries as the recipe calls for so I substituted a touch of cinnamon and some cinnamon chips.

They came out alright, but a little flat. But you know me and butter...what else would you expect. I'm going right back to muffins, they're more reliable for me and a little more child friendly.

Week 6

I can't believe it's already here....the last week of art in the park for the summer. I hope that doesn't mean that summer will be over soon because I'm not quite ready for that. I wouldn't mind if the temperature dropped a few degrees though.

Today the kids were making mobiles. Tyler decided to do his with a park theme. He drew pictures of things that you might find in a park, like a butterfly, a tree, a flower, and a duck.

After he was done drawing all the pictures, I helped him tie them onto some wooden sticks that were crossed in the shape of an x.

His mobile was blowing around a bit in the wind, but you get the idea. Afterwards, we tried to stay around in the park for awhile, but it was just too hot. We did, however, catch a glimpse of the new resident in the pond.

It's that turtle sitting on the log next to the duck. It's one of those with a red stripe along its neck. I'm not sure where it came from, but it's been hanging out for the last couple of weeks. I hope it belongs there and that someone didn't just drop off their unwanted pet...it gets cold in the winter!

Weekend News

Yesterday morning I took Tyler over to Lowes for the Build and Grow project. Usually Rick goes with us and works with Tyler, but he stayed at home this time. So that left me in charge of deciphering the instructions and putting my fingers in the line of fire when it came time to hammer.

The project for the day was helicopters and for a moment (I have to be honest) I was wishing Rick was there to give us a hand. I was taking so long to figure out the instructions that Tyler started getting impatient. He would say, "C'mon Mom, what do we do next?". But we finished it soon enough and decorated it with stickers, making it a news helicopter. It's probably my favorite project so far, even better than the pirate ship.

Later in the afternoon, we made another trip to the nursery. Rick is still looking for a few more trees for the backyard, but the stock at the local stores is dwindling fast. There wasn't that much to pick from.

He ended up picking a few maples, but is going to hold off on planting them until the curbing is finished. That'll probably happen sometime next week.

Today was my normal grocery shopping day for the week, so I took care of that earlier in the morning. Then this afternoon I set out to make a Whopper Cake....another recipe out of one of Tyler's library books.

I usually get his help when I bake, but I was a little red hen on this one. The desire to nap must have outweighed the desire to measure flour. I don't blame him...I get those kinds of days sometimes too.

I halved the recipe and it still filled up an 8x8 baking dish and make a pretty good sized "Whopper Cake". The cake itself was delicious and the frosting wasn't bad either. I had to use a recipe I found on allrecipes for the frosting since the book didn't include that.

Said The Little Old Lady

Who was telling me recently that I was on the road to "Oldsville"? Oh yeah...my older and wiser sister. As I found myself in the Chiropractor's office for the first time this morning, I started thinking to myself....you know, she might be right on that one.

I've been having an ongoing problem with my arm going numb at night when I sleep. Maybe a pinched nerve? Hopefully the doctor can pinpoint the source of my unrest and get the kink out. Lord knows I've tried. Heating pad, massage, stretching, sleeping differently...no luck.

I had my consultation which involved a lot of bending, twisting, pushing and pulling. Then I got to put on some humorously large scrubs and take several x-rays of my neck and back. The doctor didn't show me the x-rays today. I guess he's saving the goods until tomorrow when I go back for my adjustment.

That means I'll have to wait to see the black and white evidence of my impending old age. Heck, I didn't even think I was that old, but maybe I should listen to the ones trying to give me a hint. The other day I was making dinner and Tyler exclaimed, "Mom! 9 out of 10 women reversed their bone loss with Boniva". Oh, is that right, I said. "Yeah! 9 out of 10 women....they only need one more", he replied. Oh, you mean like me!?

Tuesday Morning Art

Today was art in the park day, so I tried to get us out the door a little earlier so maybe we could beat the heat. It was supposed to be near 100 degrees today and I wanted to make sure we were finished up at the park before noon.

This morning's project was a paper-cut collage inspired by the work of Henri Matisse.

Tyler used a mix of pre-cut shapes and a few that he traced and cut out himself. Afterwards, we hung out at the playground for a while until it was time to come home for lunch.

This afternoon, I baked up a quick batch of blueberry muffins. I bought an 18 oz container of blueberries this weekend with this recipe in mind.

Sour Cream Blueberry Muffins

2 cups reduced-fat biscuit/baking mix
1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 cup (8 oz) reduced-fat sour cream

1 cup fresh blueberries

In a large bowl, combine the biscuit mix and sugar. In a small bowl, combine the eggs and sour cream; stir into dry ingredients until combined. Fold in the blueberries. Fill greased muffins cups and bake at 375 degrees for 2o minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Yield: 1 dozen