Warm up with these dishes and soups!

In Texas, we wear shorts one day and then have to cancel school a day or two later.  We're quickly approaching the "cancel school" stage and I'm ready to get into the kitchen to whip up something WARM!

Here are a few of my favorite foods that are guaranteed to warm you up (and I bet you have most of the supplies in your kitchen!).  Just click on the name of the food and it will take you to the recipe.

Soups

• Chicken Pho

• Tortilla Soup

• Tomato Soup

Other Dishes

• Barbecue Casserole

• Flatbread Pizzas (you could use tortillas, pizza dough, naan...)

• Use-What-You-Have Pasta
   
• 

Stay warm!

Adi

Laissez les bon temps rouler!

Did y'all have a good Mardi Gras?  I never paid the holiday much attention until we lived in Louisiana.  To the residents of that state it's right up there with Thanksgiving and Christmas.  A different krewe hosts a parade each weekend (there's even one for the pets!).  You pitch your tent along the road early in the morning and brave the cold and rain for a good spot.  Boiled peanuts are consumed.  Beads are caught.  New friends are made.  Good times!

There's a tradition I learned that I still celebrate, despite the lack of parades and festivities in my part of Texas.  People leave their Christmas trees out (fake, I presume) and decorate them for the next big holiday:  Mardi Gras!  I don't commit all the way with a full tree but I definitely put out my mini Mardi Gras tree!  Here's the whole layout:

I even have a strand of Mardi Gras lights in purple, green, and gold.  (People complain about Christmas decorations going out in the summer?  The craft store in our town would put out Mardi Gras decorations starting in AUGUST!!)

I like to use the holiday as an excuse to make some yummy Cajun food for our friends.  We hosted a group over the weekend and I made Jambalaya, French bread, and King Cake.  (I usually buy the king cake but this year I used cinnamon rolls and cream cheese with sugar I dyed in Mardi Gras colors.  You can use two cans of Pillsbury cinnamon rolls and break them apart, twisting them together to make one outer ring and then another small ring on the inside.  Bake according to instructions on the label, then pour the cream cheese over the top and sprinkle on the sugar.  There's a good tutorial for the cake here and for coloring the sugar here.)  I don't have any pictures of the food because we were hungry!  Here's the full table, though--complete with themed napkins:

Laissez les bon temps rouler!

Adi

Tomato Soup

With some cold days coming up in this week's forecast it's the perfect time to think about tomato soup.  I found a copycat recipe for La Madeline's Tomato Basil Soup but I cut out the basil because it's not really my thing...but I DID add homemade croutons!  Let's get started.

You will need:
-two of those really big cans of crushed tomatoes (about 4 cups in all)
-1 cup of heavy cream
-1 stick of unsalted butter
-salt and pepper
-one loaf of bakery bread (Italian or French, just not a baguette)
-olive oil for drizzling

Start by pouring the cans of crushed tomatoes into a stockpot or Dutch oven and let it come to a simmer.  Let them simmer for 20-30 minutes. 

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and get out a cookie sheet.  Cut the bread into rough one inch cubes and arrange on the cookie sheet.  (Does this remind anyone else of the beginning of bread pudding ?) 

I use my Misto sprayer but if you don't have one of those you can drizzle the olive oil over the tops of the bread cubes.  Then, season the cubes with salt and pepper or Italian seasonings.

Leave the cubes there and turn back to the soup.  Toss in the stick of butter so it can begin to melt. 

Then go back to bread cubes and put them into the oven for about 15 to 20 minutes (but start checking them at 10 because all ovens are different!).  The butter should be on its way to melting and once that has happened pour in the cream.

Stir this in along with the salt and pepper and maybe some of those Italian seasonings that you used on the bread?

Continue cooking until you're back to a simmer so all elements have a chance to come back up to a good, warm temperature.  While this is happening your croutons should be coming to a perfect toast.  Pull the croutons out of the oven and let them cool slightly before handling. 

Scoop the soup into bowls and top with croutons. 

Enjoy!

Adi

Quick DIY Valentine gift

Is it just me or is everyone feeling crummy lately? There are a lot of bugs going around this time of year so here's a Valentine that may help with that:  a Lovebug!

This is a quick way to show you care that may keep the germs away AND won't run the risk of getting them off track when it comes to those New Year's resolutions.  

I found the idea on Pinterest but then put my own spin on it.  I went to Dollar Tree and got a bottle of hand sanitizer, a couple of packs of glittery foam heart stickers, and a package of heart-shaped beads.  Start by peeling off the front label.  Take out the pump and pour in some heart beads (I made 10 of these so I divided the package 10 ways), pushing them down with the stem of the pump to make them all fit.  Screw on the pump and wipe off any spillage.  Decorate with the stickers and you're on to the label. 

 

I found a cute trail of ladybugs through Google and used it to outline a little message I typed in Word.  (By right clicking and formatting you can send the image to the back, which frees up the blank area in the middle so your words show through.) 

Cut out the label, sign your message, punch a hole, and attach it to the pump using some curly ribbon.  Voila!  Easy, useful, and cute!

Adi

Who's falling down now???

Aww, my little old mailbox:

                                     

 









It was such a cute idea:  a little house to mimic the storybook house we live in.  Unfortunately, by the time we got it the poor thing was tilted over to the side and falling apart.  We left it alone for a month or so before we pulled the front of it off and, lo and behold, there was a giant wasp nest up in the top of it...where I had been blindly reaching in to grab the mail...GULP!

Despite its quirks I found it charming, even with the teasing from anyone else who saw it.  It was sturdy enough, right?  This reasoning was okay until we started to notice that cards were getting opened before we could get to them.  Someone was viewing our fragile little front door-less house mailbox as fair game, and that's where I had to give in and bring in something a little more substantial. 

We went to Home Depot and Lowe's and tested out all of the locking mailboxes, and by test I mean I stuck my hand down into all of them pretending to steal mail.  There was only ONE that I couldn't get my girly little hand down into so that's how we chose the winner. 

Adam put most of it together by the time I got home from work the next day so all that was left was to drill the holes into the post and secure the box.  He even painted the post white and offered to put a roof onto this box to make it cute like the old one (or least as cute as it must have been back in the day).  We'll see about the roof thing.

                                

                                 

Much more secure, and not nearly as slanty!

Adi