Tea Cups in the Garden
• Mar. 12, 2008 - Belated Birthday
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A few weeks ago my husband celebrated his birthday. He usually wants to eat out at one of two restaurants: either Texas Land and Cattle for the steak or the Gristmill for the salad. This year he is so tired from the long commute to work and back, he really wanted to stay home and eat. However, he didn’t want to add one more thing to my list right before I go to Dallas. I told him if it were a regular night, I’d have to cook anyway. Besides, I knew exactly what he wanted and it wasn’t difficult to prepare.
Grilled steak, medium rare, with gorgonzola butter sauce
Baked potato with the works
Spinach salad with feta cheese, kalamata olives and house vinaigrette
Followed by carrot cake and tin roof ice cream. ;)
www.bluebell.com
This is an extremely easy carrot cake that I’ve somewhat modified. The biggest change is that the amount of confectioner’s sugar in the frosting. I reduced it considerably because at the last minute I realized I didn’t have enough. LOL Then I realized it is a bad carb for me and would it really be needed? The cake may not look like much, but the taste is incredible. And it’s full of lots of healthy carbs! Unless dh reads this blog, he may never know I didn’t put enough sugar into the frosting. He loved it just the way it was! ;)
Carrot Cake
2 1/4 cups flour
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon allspice
2 cups sugar
1 cup olive oil
3 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups carrots, shredded
2 cups coconut, flaked
1 cup pecans, chopped
1 cup raisins
8 ounces pineapple, crushed in juice
12 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 tablespoon skim milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup confectioner's sugar
Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour 2-9.5" round cake pans (I purchased mine from Wilton). Whisk dry ingredients in small bowl. Set aside. In large bowl, with mixer at medium speed, beat sugar, oil, eggs and vanilla until mixed. Add whisked ingredients. Combine. Add carrots, coconut, pecans, raisins, and pineapple. Pour the mixture into the prepared pans and bake 30-35 min until a knife inserted in center comes out clean. Cool on wire racks.
Cream Cheese Frosting: In large bowl with a mixer at medium speed, beat together the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla until smooth, adding about 1T milk to make it spreadable. Spread frosting between cake layers and frost top and side of cake.
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• Feb. 23, 2008 - On Wearing Many Hats...And Wearing Down!
I've not been able to blog regularly for a few months now. A few major projects have come my way. My normal wardrobe of hats is plentiful enough, as I know it is with most moms. I'm usually able to somewhat juggle all of them. Recently a few of the hats I wear extended themselves into deeper projects. As I have been wrapping some of them up neatly into their respective hat boxes, my dh has told me no more new hats! He wants me to excel in my normal milliner's apparel. ;)
I don't know that I will be able to excel, but I do want to honor my husband's wishes. It means a lot to him and as I accomplish various tasks around the house, it translates into hugs of love to him. ;) In the meantime, how do I keep up with it all? That is probably the most asked question of the wearer of many hats. First and foremost, my time with God daily gives me a vision, a hope, and endurance. Also, looking after my health helps me to endure. After all, our bodies, being God's temple, needs to be maintained by God's provisions: healthy food, exercise and rest. Although I know this in my head, I am constantly having to regroup and apply myself to endurance to take care of myself. Last week I spent 5 hours in the emergency room and finally got home before midnight, with a bladder infection of all things. If only I had been drinking more liquids, I'm certain I could have avoided that trip. And I do have uneaten cranberries in the house! Now I have been enduring meds with side affects. I am hoping for a clean bill of health this week.
I am not a super woman who meticulously schedules healthy food and exercise time. I go in waves of success to wimping out. For me, the need for health maintenance takes on a new meaning, because I have Impaired Glucose Intolerance (pre-Diabetes). My mom is diabetic and can control things with her diet. Her father was an insulin dependent diabetic. I'm at high risk. Even now if I don't eat properly or at the right times, I get sick and irritable. Then exercise tends to wear me out more than energize me. But after a period of perseverance, I find that I gradually build strength and endurance. However, I tend to get so busy with the putting on of hats, that I neglect myself.
Last weekend, this article came into my e-mail inbox, from fitness expert, Denise Austin.
Start Moving, Stop Diabetes
If you are at risk for (or have) type 2 diabetes, here's some news that should get you moving! Researchers from Syracuse University say exercise is one of the best ways to reduce the amount of visceral fat stores in the body. High levels of visceral fat — more commonly known as abdominal fat — are directly linked to a decreased ability for your body to use insulin properly, leading to diabetes.
In the study, researchers divided 33 women with type 2 diabetes into three groups. One group simply dieted, the second ate their regular fare, but started walking and biking, and the third group did both. Those who dieted — or dieted and exercised — both lost about the same amount of weight after 14 weeks (around 10 pounds). Those who only exercised lost about 5 pounds. But what differed between the active and non-active groups was where the weight loss came from. Those who only dieted lost subcutaneous fat — the fat just below the skin — but not visceral fat. Those who exercised lost visceral fat, and those who did both, lost both!
This news was actually encouraging to me! It helps me to know why I need to do what I need to do! And yes, I do have abdominal fat. In the pictures of myself I look slender. But when I gain weight, it all goes to the tummy and hips. I was exercising before the infection hit, then I got sore and slowed down. I need to pick up the exercise pace slowly yet consistently. I can definitely feel the difference in my blood sugar levels when I do exericise!
As far as diet, I don't like what's considered "healthy" for the most part. I met with a dietician when I was first diagnosed and learned that packaged foods that say low fat or fat free can be a killer to a diabetic. When taking out the fat, flavor is reduced. So to reintroduce the flavor, packagers add salt and sugar. Ugh. As a result, I buy few prepared foods. I may opt for something high fat, like butter, instead of substitutes full of chemicals. However, I limit the butter use and I am actually using olive oil more. I don't grind whole wheat. (I don't have a grinder. This is a hat my dh does not want me to get; where would be the time? I don't even know where the nearest health food store is to buy whole wheat pastry flour, etc.) But I am dabbling in recipes, I try to start with what I know. We are all picky eaters in our family. I try to find really good recipes that are easy, healthy and full of flavor. I have found that by starting with where we are, we learn to like a little bit of healthy stuff, then I can add something new.
I thought to encourage myself, I might start posting some recipes now and then, of how I cook for us. There are lots of recipes I am dabbling with, but there are some winners we have found! I am mainly interested right now in time saving recipes....so I have time to put on hats! ;)
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• Feb. 18, 2008 - President's Day
For the last several years, we have celebrated President's Day by eating some of George Washington's favorite food.
 He liked fried chicken. Because of the cherry tree legend, I make a salad with dried cherries in it. Because Abraham Lincoln was a big fan of George Washington, I have some hasty pudding (aka polenta). George Washington probably ate a lot of that too. Then both men probably had a lot of chicken gravy, so that tops the hasty pudding. Afterwards, to top it all off, we have cherry pie, in honor of the cherry tree legend.
But one of George Washington's favorite foods, which seems to be a staple of Virginia, is Peanut Soup! That is in the bowl in the first picture. If you ever visit Mount Vernon, you can eat at their restaurant, and order Virginia Peanut and Chestnut Soup from the menu.
www.mountvernon.org/visit/plan/index.cfm/pid/3/
A visit to Colonial Williamsburg also offers many restaurants with this regional soup. One is the King's Arms Tavern.
www.history.org/visit/diningExperience/kingsArms/
The King's Arms Tavern even provides the recipe for you to try yourself!
www.history.org/visit/diningExperience/kingsArms/images/kat_recipe_book.pdf
This soup is now one of my husband's favorite soups. President's Day would not be the same for him without it. ;)
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