Camp food

Our camping background is a little different from what we experienced on the coast a few weeks back. I have only been backpacking, except for the one night that Jackie and I spent sleeping on the side of the Grand Canyon and the one night we slept out in New Mexico and then the one night we slept in the van in a rest stop along the highway heading west for our new home. Oh, and the night Jackie and I were in West Virginia and we tried to cook corn-on-the-cob in a fire pit, and we tried to cook whole, raw potatoes in a fire pit and all we ended up with was a single Jiffy Pop of popcorn. There may be a few others like that as well, but moving on...

When backpacking, I nearly always survived on lots of water and gatorade, trailmix, hot cocoa, honey nut cheerios, and instant chicken noodle soup (just add water). But, that was just for me, and I certainly didn't have the luxury of a cooler in my pack. Even the girls would bore of that diet quickly.

When Charley was a young pup (before the girls), Andy and I decided to take her camping - just to see if she would do well, so we picked a site on the Salmon Creek Trail that we could hike to, but also quickly get to the car should she be crazy. This one night trip is when Andy introduced me to "foil packs". A hamburger, some sliced potatoes, onions, mushrooms, and peppers and seasoning is wrapped in foil. To cook, you literally just put it on the fire - the hotter the better. It really works, and it was delicious, especially in reference to my sketchy camp food background. I always considered this to be an Olson original, having never heard of it before. So, yesterday when I came across this article - this one - well, I was a bit surprised! It has all the ingredients and it even includes Andy's favorite seasoning - Tony Chachere's.

Needless to say, our first meal at the campsite was a dinner made of foil packs. Just like the one's described above. Then, since our only campstove was intended for backpacking and not for cooking for a whole family, we made everything else on a stick. The girls had hot dogs, s'mores, even breakfast sausage the next morning. It was fun enough, and low maintenance (there was very little for us to clean) - but I think we need to do better next time. So, we are borrowing our neighbor's fancy grill with burner and intend for everyone to eat more than one great meal (obviously, the foil pack on our last trip).

Emma in the kitchen...

She likes to be a helper in the kitchen. She loves to clean and cut strawberries. She uses a butter knife, so they come out all mushy. She makes everyone a big bowl and then we all devour. Delicious!!!

Aprons for advent

Today was fun. It snowed, and snowed and snowed. It's still snowing and nearly all of Portland is cancelled for tomorrow. They have yet to mention N. Clackamas school district (which is how preschool is determined for Emma), but I think we will be stuck regardless. Stuck in a good way. We discovered that our neighborhood is hilly enough in so many places that the sledding was fantastic. Andy and the girls made a few runs together, Charley chased them down something fierce too. We are baking some more cookies today (sugar cookie cutouts from the Martha Stewart cookie book), and I decided that it would serve as a good theme for todays' advent goody. So, I ran upstairs and whipped out a couple of cutie little aprons and the girls are thrilled. We are on the second batch in the oven - although the frosting will probably not happen until tomorrow. It's likely to be a snow day, so why not?!

cookie baking Sunday

Emma knows that you should always look your best. Even when you are baking. I'm pretty sure that is why I am not in the picture with her - I was still comfortably snuggled in my pj's covered in black bears. But, not Emma. She spent some time twirling then quickly switched gears to help me bake these delicious little beauties. Oh, and we have moved on. Tollhouse is no longer our favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe. We have become big fans of the recipe in Martha Stewart's cookie book. Love it. We also use the 68% cacao chips from Ghiradelli. They are so rich and amazing. Andy (who isn't fond of messing with good recipes) has praised these everytime I make them. Martha sure does know her stuff. I love Emma's sense of style.

shoulda read the recipe...

Yes, I certainly should have.

I recently had a lovely wild rice salad while at the cabin, asked for the recipe from Andy's aunt and received it as well. Last week when we were planning to have guests over, I decided I would make it and hoped for a little leftover. Well, the recipe calls for 1 1/4 cups of wild rice. This just didn't seem like much, so I doubled the recipe. Seriously, I was feeding four adults and two boys who eat like adults too. Made sense to me - but then - as I was mixing the ingredients for the dressing I finally noticed something important. It says "Makes 10 servings". Yipes! So yes, we had a huge bowl of wild rice salad which was good the first serving, okay the second serving, and not so great by the third serving. Oops! I do still like it though... but maybe I will make a 1/2 recipe next time.

Last weekend...

We got up Saturday morning and decided that if we were planning to make jam this year, it had to happen then. So, we headed out to Albeke Farms in Oregon City and picked some berries after breakfast. We all picked raspberries together, then Andy and Emma headed off to the marionberries while Sophie admired the baby peaches on the trees (she wanted to touch them all, and really wanted to hold them). Then Sophie and I picked a few blueberries to add to our yogurt while we waited for Andy and Emma.

Sunday morning after breakfast, Andy introduced Emma to the fun of homemade jam. She definitely had a good time and today she is appreciating the hard work with her first piece of toast with homemade jam. Delicious.

Homemade is best

Sometimes, it's not practical though.
In this case, it is.
A friend shared a sample of hers, and it was great.
I checked Craigslist and found a new one for $15 (how could I resist, it sells for $50?).
We now make our own yogurt. It's divine.
Ours is plain, for the sake of smoothies. We then add agave nectar for sweetness, some raspberries and a few mini chocolate chips and commence enjoying. It's really good. And so simple to make. Unbelievable. I think it costs less than one dollar to make seven servings.
So worth the $15 investment. Yummy.

Hey, I have lots more to share this weekend. We have had a really busy week with no time for computer play, but soon. I am making a couple of things right now, for the girls and Emma is in Zoo Camp all week. More details coming soon...