No More Four Foods on Friday?

Am I missing something? We haven’t had a Four Foods on Friday meme for over a month. Was it canceled? Did I miss the announcement?

Maybe Val is renovating her kitchen, eh? That’ll keep a lady busy. It’s keeping me crazy busy, anyway…. so much so that I don’t remember the meme for a WHOLE MONTH, lol, only to find out that no one has been doing it!

So… what’s going on? I know summer is a great time to sell books and have garage sales, and rip apart your house walls and ceilings and all…. I kinda miss the meme… even though I hardly have time to do it…

What a crazy summer. Soon I will have my kitchen back! And then, I will be cooking like a FIEND, I tell you that!

Terrific Strawberry/Green Smoothie

I can’t believe how expensive those “instant” smoothies are, in the freezer section. Holy cow. I think they are $3 a package?!

We got a blender, a very nice one, from a dear friend. My daughter has taken it upon herself to create smoothies (mostly because I have been busy reviewing electronics and renovating the kitchen). She’s been experimenting with all sorts of ingredients (almond milk, cucumbers, bananas, etc). I’m not very fond of smoothies in general (I prefer to either eat my food or drink my drink, not have something in between), but my daughter’s strawberry smoothies are superb. They are especially terrific when chilled or iced just a little. YUM. Here’s her recipe for strawberry smoothie.

TIP: You can use either frozen strawberries or fresh. We use frozen because the fresh are usually too expensive. Fresh is best tasting, though. She also sometimes adds rice milk or soy milk to the mix, which makes the smoothie something like a milkshake.

Strawberry Kale Smoofie*

About 5 cups or so of frozen or fresh strawberries, washed and stems removed
2 handfuls of fresh kale, washed and stems removed
Water or rice milk

• Fill the blender about 3/4 with strawberries
• Add water or rice milk up to about an inch from the top
• Press “stir” on the blender for a few seconds to get the frozen fruit moving around
• Switch to “beat” until the strawberries are about all chopped up
• Then switch to “blend” for about 30 seconds or so, till it has the consistency of thick applesauce, and flows easily through the blender
• Add two handfuls of kale, and go back through the “beat” and “blend” cycles
• Add a packet of stevia, or in my case, Sun Crystals
• Set to “liquefy” until it has the smooth consistency you want
• Ready to serve!

“Smoofie” is our endearing term for “smoothie.”

Eating on the Run…

Whoooooaaaaa. I am busy these days. No kitchen has really caused a lot of disruption in the house. You really never know HOW important the kitchen is until you lose it… I knew the renovation would be tough, but wow. This. Is. Tough. Who needs quickweightloss.org when you’re too busy to cook and eat? I’ve lost about 10 pounds so far, I think. I eat on the run most of the time. Unfortunately, I also find myself ordering pizza or Chinese food because I’m too busy and exhausted to cook after a long day of renovating or working. I really, really can’t wait until this is over.

Anyway, on the bright side, I am building the kitchen. The project is taking so long because we are also building the dining room, redoing the plumbing, wiring the house, and installing a new heating system all at the same time. We really have to do it now, now that the walls are open. So that causes a delay.

I went to the store to choose my cabinets. Haven’t ordered them yet, as they tell me the cabinets are all in stock. I would get them NOW if I had the space to store them, but I don’t. Everything is in great disarray here… I have yet to find places to store the drywall, the flooring, and the paint. UGH.

But these are the cabinets I have chosen.

Believe me, they are not that yellow. They are more of a light brown. They are solid wood, inexpensive, and easy to assemble. *sigh* I can’t wait until I have it all done, so I can blog about cooking again!

A Little Sparse on Recipes

Yeah, no kidding. Who has time to cook when you have no kitchen?!

Most of my meals are cucumber slices and American cheese slices. Sheesh. Cucumbers are wonderful, though. I hear they are good for the skin. So I won’t be needing any wrinkle remover cream for a while, eh?? LOL

One of the best appliances I have right now is an electric skillet. That thing cooks FAST. And it’s so so so easy to do– just dump stuff in, and turn on the dial. It uses a god amount of electricity, but probably a lot less than my electric range! I have been toying with getting rid of my electric range, actually. It uses up a lot of power and too much space… and I don’t really use it much anymore. Although, I do like to roast turkey from time to time…. I would miss that aspect. Maybe I should just get a gas stove… :-p I don’t know.

ANYWAY. I’m sparse on recipes because I’m not cooking! And I have no interest in food right now! Ugh! Summertime is mostly about vegetables, anyway, right? Back to the cucumbers….

A Good Kitchen…

… is everything to a cook. Really. I have had some really, really bad kitchens. Most of my apartment kitchens either had no countertops, or had a tiny one of 3 feet long. I can’t believe I was living in an apartment with FOUR young children and using a kitchen with a 3-foot countertops and two cupboards. Wow, lol.

Well, we’re redoing our kitchen in our home, at last. And while it’s SO GREAT to be finally renovating the kitchen, it’s very hard to be living here without a kitchen while doing it. We have no kitchen sink. We have no storage space in the house (the basement floods and there is no attic in the house)… it’s surprisingly tough. I’m a pretty tough gal, I can take a lot, so I thought. But having no kitchen is really, really disruptive. And it’s not disruptive just for cooking– it’s hard emotionally on the family. Basic stuff like morning coffee or dinner together is totally turned on its head. Wow. I thought I was prepared for this, knowing how renovations can cause stress, but this is pretty wild! Even my blogging is severely affected– my posts are more terse, less humorous, less frequent.

Still, I’m so happy to finally be getting this done. All this demolition and construction work is quite the abs workout!! Once the plumbing is in and the electricity is in, and the first floor is insulated, all the hard stuff is done. All that will be left is the upstairs– the simple stuff like walls and floors. Whew. I can’t wait til it’s all over.

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