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Easy Vegetable Cream Cheese

November 24th, 2009 Comments off

GetImageI dunno about you, but I love cream cheese.  On stuff.  In stuff.  By itself.  Cream cheese is so incredibly yummy.

The only thing better than cream cheese? Flavored cream cheese.  Especially veggie cream cheese.  But the chunks in Philadelphia are too small and Dunkin Donuts uses light and Breuggers is way too expensive.

So what does Rayne do?  Why, I made my own! And it’s really simple so I don’t want to hear any grumbling!

2 boxes Philadelphia Cream Cheese (8oz. each)
1/3 Red pepper
1/3 Green pepper
1/2 Carrot
1/2 Green onion (chive, scallion.. whatever you wanna call it)
Garlic salt to taste

Let the Philly soften.  Lots of people will tell you to toss it in the blender, but it’s really not necessary.  Just let it sit on the counter for a little while.  Not long.  Just till it’s soft to the touch and easy to work with.

I don’t have a food processor, so I finely diced everything, tossed the cheese, veggies and garlic salt in a mixing bowl (I made sure to use one with a lid so I could just pop the top on and stick it in the fridge.) and stirred.

You could probably chop the veggies in a food processor no problem.  And if you’re really not interested in mixing, use a hand mixer with a paddle on it instead of those spinny things that look like they could take off a finger if they’re going fast enough.  That way, you don’t puree your veggies.

You can serve right away, but for the best flavor, let it sit in the fridge a couple hours (overnight is best) first.

You don’t have to use Philadelphia Cream Cheese, but believe me when I say it’s well worth the price.  Philly is, without a doubt, cheesier than any generic brand I’ve tried.

Have everything but the green onion? Chop up about a quarter of a white, yellow or red onion instead.  And the different colored peppers are more for show than flavor, though red peppers tend to taste slightly different.

I’ve seen recipes with radishes and leeks in them, too.  I’m not so hot on radishes and I’ve never had leeks, so I promptly ignored them.  But if you try it, let me know!

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Cooking Up a Storm

November 23rd, 2009 Comments off
First dinner in our last apartment

First dinner in our last apartment

M decided it’s time for us to start eating healthier.  Cut out as many preservatives as possible.  Cook from scratch.  Stuff like that.

Thanks to His raise, our food budget can handle it, now.  Buying healthy and cooking from scratch can be so expensive.  Especially when you’re cooking for four or more.  That’s where the junk food companies get you.

No… I don’t have to cook for four or more.  I could probably halve the recipes and just cook for two.  But knowing my luck, the one time I do that will be the one time He’s still hungry and I’ll have nothing to offer Him.  So instead of making enough for both of us to have seconds, I make enough for one of us to have them.  And we eat a lot of leftovers.  When I remember to put them away.

One of our New Year’s Resolutions (Can you believe we’re talking about New Year’s Resolutions already? Where did this year go??) last year was to waste less food.  I remember a time when M would refuse to eat leftovers.  I’d have to cram a week’s worth of leftovers into a week’s worth of lunches for myself.  Something always got thrown away.  We’ve been doing so much better.  Pretty much everything we prepare or buy gets eaten before it goes bad.  But once in a while, we forget it’s in there.

I prepare less food, when I can.  We only make two chicken breasts, instead of three, and sometimes even that’s too much.  I make fewer potatoes and more meat and green veggies.  We don’t have pasta as often, and when we do, I don’t prepare near as much.  If there’s no extra, we can’t eat it at 11pm when we’re supposed to be sleeping.

I don’t know that it’s doing any good.  I certainly haven’t lost any weight.  We’ll see, I guess.

We went shopping yesterday, and I had a list and a menu and everything.  I forgot one or two things, but nothing I can’t buy at the corner store.  No biggie.  For working on it by myself, and Him not having a chance to double check my work, I did pretty damn good.

He was… shocked when I started telling Him when I was making what.  It’s been ages since I’ve made an actual menu.  And then there’s the fact that I’m doing serious prep work.  Like, right this minute, in the slow cooker, there’s cheddar broccoli soup for tomorrow’s lunch.  And a little while ago, I made veggie cream cheese for bagels.  Wednesday, I’m making a quiche for breakfast on Thanksgiving.  And probably the cranberry sauce.  I might even prep the green bean casserole so Master only has to pop it in our tiny ass oven for a little while.

We’re having pot roast the night before Thanksgiving.  And you know, it’s funny.  I know a bunch of families that do the same thing.  Usually, someone just tosses everything in the slow cooker first thing Wednesday morning, and off they go.  That way, they don’t have to worry about dinner.  It’s already done.

Lunch today was my version of Sicilian Escarole Salad.  Tonight is M’s version of steak parm subs.  With the absolutely delicious sub sauce we get from the meat market up the road.  Talk about perfect.  Okay, okay, so it’s cheating.  But it’s so damn good it’s worth it.

I’m so excited about the cooking part of fall and winter.  Time for soups and stews and roasts and all kinds of other slow cooked goodness.  I just wish I had more counter space.

<3
~Domesticated pig whore

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A Spoiled Slut I Am w/ a Breakfast Recipe

July 3rd, 2009 4 comments

breakfast-burritoThe other day I was chillaxin with a friend of mine.  We were babbling about all things life-related, as us girls are wont to do, and I asked her if I’m a negative person.

She said I tend to ramble on about the shit and forget to mention the good stuff.  I told her I need to work on that and she laughed.  She said, “People don’t want to hear the good stuff, Rayne.  All they care about is the drama.  The stuff that keeps you down.  When you start talking about how good you’re doing, people get jealous and don’t want to be around you anymore.”

The sad thing is sometimes that’s true.

When I worked at the mansion, I had a coworker who only ever talked about good stuff in her life.  She didn’t share the negative.  And half the staff was always complaining about it.

“Must be nice to always have it so good.” they’d say.  “Does she ever shut up?” Read more…

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Traditions

June 20th, 2009 Comments off

img_9949Every family has traditions.  Even if their tradition is to not follow any traditions.

We’re still working on ours.  It seems time is never on our side.

One of our best traditions is planning to buy a tree the day after Thanksgiving.  Notice I said “planning”.  We plan for it.  We tell each other adamantly, “Don’t forget, we have to go tree shopping the day after Thanksgiving.” at least once a week starting about the middle of October.

Last year, we didn’t even buy a tree.  We just weren’t into Christmas.  The year sucked and October and November sucked and December consisted of us trying to pull ourselves back together again.  Licking wounds and clinging to each other for dear life.

But we’ve never actually bought a tree on the day after Thanksgiving.  Not once.  Something always prevents us from doing so.  And we laugh about it every year.  How we planned to start a tradition and every year something got in the way.

Master’s trying to start a new tradition.  Each of us cooks a big dinner on the weekend.  Tonight, He decided, is His night.  Chicken curry, vegetable curry and rice.  Read more…

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