Pot Roast Success

I consider myself a pretty good cook. I'm no gourmet, but my husband has mostly liked everything I've ever made except that one horrible Buffalo chicken sandwich experiment in 2001. No recipe intimidates me, and no ingredient scares me off. But....I've never been so good at pot roast. I've been told over and over how simple it is, but it never turns out as tender or flavorful as I want. Until now.

I have seen several versions of the Three Envelope Pot Roast on Pinterest and intended to try it out. Yet, did I take the recipe or a list of ingredients to the grocery store with me? NO, of course not. So, I am standing in the spice isle trying to figure out which three packets of seasoning I'm supposed to use for the Three Envelope Pot Roast, and I'm getting nowhere. Due to my aging and overwhelmed brain, the best I could do was a brown gravy mix and au jus mix. I knew there was a third, but looking at my options, none of them made sense.

Arriving home, I discovered several different versions. Some using au jus. Some using brown gravy. Several using other things I had not brought home from the grocery. So, I decided to use what I had. I put it all in my slow cooker, turned it to low for about 9 hours and hoped for the best.

It turned out the most tender, flavorful, delicious pot roast I have every had. Not just made, but HAD. And I'm going to share it with you. I'm nice like that.

I ended up serving it on Hawaiian rolls with a slice of provolone cheese and a little squirt of horseradish. HOLY YUM. It would be equally as good next to a pile of real homemade mashed potatoes. Or some lovely egg noodles.

My Favorite Pot Roast

1 large onion (a sweet one is nice, but whatever you have)
1 chuck roast (3-4 lbs)
1 packet of au jus mix
1 packet of brown gravy mix
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup salsa or picante sauce
1 cup Italian dressing

Chop onion and place in bottom of slow cooker. Place roast on top of onions. Mix remaining ingredients in a bowl until seasonings are combined and pour over roast. Cook on low for 8-10 hours. When you shove a fork in it and twist, it should fall apart. If it doesn't, cook a while longer.

Taste. And die of bliss. I warned you.

Getting Ready for Summer Weekend

I am still in my pajamas. At 10 AM on a Saturday. It feels delightful and odd all at once. The last ten  weeks worth of Saturday mornings have been filled with early risings, frantic searches for shin pads and soccer jerseys, and sitting in alternately sweltering and swampy fields watching children chase a ball back and forth.

We had strawberry pie for breakfast. Additionally, there are 21 jars of jam and mounds of sliced berries awaiting the top of waffles or shortcake in the freezer, made from the 34 pounds of berries we picked over the last week.

My sweet children, who would normally be absorbed in mind-rotting Saturday morning TV, are upstairs playing school together (in other words, reading to each other) so they can earn points for our library's summer reading program. They have declared it a no-screen weekend so that they can get a jump on everyone else who is hoping to win the grand prize iPad.

My vegetables are glistening in the morning sun, drenched from yesterday's rain, soaking up the rays so fast I feel like if I just hold still enough I can see them growing. The middle child and I picked and shelled the spring peas earlier this week, and broccoli is ready to harvest.

Yes, summer is upon us. There are three more slow but bittersweet days of school left for the kids. Slow because the real work of the year has been done for over a week now. Sad and sweet because next year the schools are changing, and they won't be in the same building together. Plus, a whole new group of students will be joining them both making all of us anxious. But that's another story.

While the kids have declared a no-screen weekend, I am declaring it Get Ready for Summer Weekend. I am doing some cleaning--as if it will last past bedtime on Sunday. I am doing some cooking. Some things to prepare now and tuck away in the freezer so I won't be forced to drag myself out of the pool and into the kitchen to worry about dinner every afternoon. I am getting the kids summer supplies ready. (More on that later.) We are all going to sit down together and make a list of the things we must do this summer.

With three kids and a mama, if everyone comes up with two or three things they really want to do this summer, we will have plenty to keep us busy until fall. The kids usually pick one thing that I just can't accommodate at the moment, like "I want to go Australia."  Um yeah, you and me both, kiddo. But generally, their picks are a lot more simple than I expect. Things that are not expensive or difficult to do but I wouldn't have thought of because I was planning something much more extravagant.

My crazy, over-the-top mama mind says, "Plan a virtual trip to a different country each week, cook foods from that country, and get a book on the country from the library to read each day." Their youthful wisdom says, "Make popsicles and invite our friends over to have some with us. Then run around the yard chasing each other," or "Find some worms."

It reminds me how important it is to ask them. Our summer go so fast, our school year is so busy, that I want our short, precious time together to be memorable to them, to include the things that are important to them, to be relaxed and carefree like summer should be. And I am so much less stressed out about making it meaningful when I use their ideas instead of mine.

I love summer. 

Memories

It's strange how suddenly a crystal clear memory of a time you haven't thought of in months or years will suddenly come rushing back for no good reason.

Like the elderly man at the garage sale who gave my younger boy the money clip he had been admiring. I offered him a dollar for it, and of course he turned around and gave the dollar to Aiden so he would have something to put in his money clip.

His rough, nobby hands, his generosity, his unhurried way of talking to the children brought me right back to moments with my Grandpa pulling out his wallet to hand us a $20 dollar bill for our latest report card. That poor man at the garage sale probably wondered if it was safe to let those children go with the crazy lady who couldn't seem to stop crying over a dollar.

He's been gone 20 years, and yet there are plenty of moments when I can feel him around me, reminding me of the kind of person he expects me to be, encouraging me to be the mama he knows I can be, to nudge me in the direction I know I should be going.

Mommyhood Gratitude

Like everyone else, I have some days when I feel more competent at accomplishing all of the things I am responsible for and some days that I feel less competent. Usually, I feel pretty competent. Lately, I've had quite a few less-competent feeling days in a row. I was grousing (is that really a word? well, let's say for today that it is) to myself that I wish I could sit on the couch all day (who am I kidding? I meant all week), watch daytime TV and eat a whole bag of Devils Food Donettes.

But instead I have these three children who require food. And bathing. And car pools. And clean laundry. And picking up after. And permission slips signed. And on and on. But tonight, as I was brushing my teeth, scowling at myself in the mirror, and wondering where all those wrinkles came from, I had the thought that perhaps I am not burdened by the requirement to pull myself up off the couch and take care of my children. Instead, I am blessed by presence of a reason not to wallow in my self-doubt.

It doesn't really matter if I feel like it; these children need raised. And it's not going to wait until next week when I may or may not feel like opening another bag of donuts and plopping down in front of Rachel Ray and Dr. Oz.

There's only going to be one chance to give my goofy, grinning eight-year-old boy the Harry Potter birthday party of his dreams so I better get to crafting, shopping and cooking sooner rather than later. There's only going to be a few more months to have my darling four-year-old tell me about her preschool day in her baby-like lisp before she has grown out of it for good, so I better sit up and listen right now. There is only a small window when a sweet six-year-old boy will want to sit on my lap and read me a story with his newly discovered skills before reading starts to happen all in his head and before he outgrows my lap all together, so I best pay attention to it right now while I can.

Parenting is hard work and exhausting, but is there anything better? Is there anything more worth it? No, of course not. And even more, it is a reason to get moving and do what I know needs to be done. To be more than I want to be on some days. To be a better person than I think I am.

Marriage

Marriage is so weird sometimes. There are those couples that you look at and wonder, "How in the heck do they hold it together? They clearly don't like each other one bit." There are the other couples who seem perfectly content and shock the heck out of you when you hear they're splitting up. I've got some friends of both kinds. Being one of the couples that seemed perfectly happy and who then separated for a while, I know we caused some confusion, curiosity, questions, plenty murmurs of gossip. Probably some more of the same when our "trial separation" ended in a reconciliation, which according to our therapist never happens. (I asked him why they call it a "trail" then, and he said to make everyone feel better about not giving up too soon. How sad.)

So, I often wonder what it is that keeps those couples who I think should be teetering on the brink of divorce together, and what keeps those who suffer pain, or just indifference or frustration or loneliness, in secret from throwing in the matrimonial towel. Of course, there's the kids. Some of us have school age kids now, but a whole load of our friends are still on the exhausted, confused, never-ending, no light/only tunnel baby-toddler train. While you are amazed every single day that your heart can feel such love for these tiny beings that didn't even exist a couple years ago, you also wonder if you can really live your whole life like this--no sleep, no free time, no relaxing, no sex, no meaningful conversation, no intimacy with your spouse. Was that just me? Well, it might not have been you, but I know it wasn't just me. There's a whole bunch of us out there.

So, some of it is the kids. Some people stay together for the kids, to give them the image we have in our head of a family, but also because if parenting with a partner so hard, we wonder how could we possibly do it on our own. But it's not just the kids. Some stay together out of our fear of failing. How could I tell my friends and my parents and my children that I have failed at this most basic, most important role of adulthood? Some stay because the thought of being alone is even worse than the thought of being how we are even if that isn't very good. Some stay because two households are more expensive than one, not to mention lawyers and child support and such.

I think many of us stay simply out of commitment. And I don't just mean the vows we said--we promised to always stay together no matter what, and that's what we're going to do even if we're miserable doing it. No, that's not what I'm talking about. Commitment to me means making choices every day to love each other and move toward one another instead of away.

It's the way, when I am feeling completely unlovable and uninterested in talking, touching or being near anyone, my husband says the goofiest thing he can think of to make me smile anyway.

It's the way, when even that doesn't work, he takes the kids to another part of the house and plays a quiet game with them without making a big deal about the fact that he's doing me a favor.

It's the way I've learned to stop throwing a fit when he's two hours late because that's just how late he's going to be pretty much every time, and instead ask if he had a good time.

It's how he, even thought he sleeps later than me about 95% of the time, gets the coffee maker all ready before he goes to bed so it's one less thing I have to do while getting three kids ready for school in the morning.

It's making his favorite meal instead of the kids' favorites.

It's taking a few minutes away from chatting with the girls at a party to sit next to each other and hold hands.

It's stopping at the bar to see him and his buddies and hear about how they played in their "big game," when all I want to do is go home and curl up in bed with my book and fuzzy socks.

It's to sitting together to watch a movie (or browse the Internet on our laptops while sitting on the couch next to each other) instead of falling into bed like feel like doing while he watches it alone.

So, maybe that really is the commitment we made in those vows, and I'm just now figuring out what they really meant. They said, "for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, as long as we shall live." But it also means in crankiness and joy, in loneliness and connectedness, in youth and old age, when surrounded by chaos and amidst the calm. It means, not just fidelity, but choosing each other over the kids or friends or work or personal interests. It means choosing to move closer instead of away every chance we get.

Menu Planning Monday 1/9-1/15/2012

This weekend I finally felt like cooking again. During the holidays, there's way too much that I HAVE to cook, either as gifts or family tradition or whatever. I was pretty burned out on the whole cooking thing. Plus we had enough leftovers to feed a small country. Finally they're all outta here, and thanks to Pinterest (you have heard of Pinterest, haven't you? More later, I'm sure) there were several new recipes I wanted to try. Chicken breasts and pork butt were on sale last week, two things I find hard to resist, so I got some of both--about 8 lb. of chicken and a 7 lb. of pork. I probably have enough food in my house for two or three weeks.

However, this week I will be getting my kitchen ready for a semi-remodeling--we're getting new floors and some cabinets where we didn't have any so far--so I had to get a jump start to have time to clean everything out. So, before a day-by-day meal plan, I'll explain what I made on Sunday and how I did kind of a bulk cooking day to make this week easier.

I made Chicken Gyros, Broccoli Cheese Soup, Pulled Pork, and Goat Cheese Quiche with Hash Brown Crust. It was a busy day, but well worth it. First, I started with the pork because it had to cook the longest. I use a variation of my girl PW, otherwise known as Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman. We're tight. OK, not really. I have ea bit of a girl crush on her. More like I want to trade lives with her. I mean, who wouldn't want her hunka hunka burnin' love cowboy husband AND seemingly unlimited shopping budget that allows for $300 blouses she later decides she doesn't really like and gives away on her blog AND living on a gorgeous ranch with two houses in the country AND homeschooling her four beautiful babies. Just sayin.... Anyways, a la PW I put my giant pulled pork in my brand new giant slow cooker on a bed of onions with  some salt, pepper, crushed red pepper and Dr. Pepper. Yes, you heard right, Dr. Pepper. Turn that baby on low and let her go for a good 10 hours. I have enough pork for three meals, at least one of pulled pork BBQ sandwiches and another of pulled pork tacos.

Next, I started on the Chicken Gyros from Bitchin' Kitchen.

Yummalicious, no? First the marinade, then the tzatziki sauce. We love tzatziki around here. Mmmm...

While the chicken marinated, I worked on the broccolii cheese soup like Panera's. I had picked up a couple heads of broccoli that were on sale and searched online for a recipe using fresh broccoli and real cheese, not processed cheese product. :/ This imitation is what popped up first. http://www.food.com/recipe/Panera-Broccoli-Cheese-Soup-150384   It looked yummy and easy to make. It was both. I will never make a single batch of this recipe again. Double for sure, maybe triple, from now on.

                                           

Last up was Martha's Martha's Goat Cheese Quiche with Hash Brown Crust. I've made quiche a lot, but this was a little different with the hash brown crust and the goat cheese and looked scrumptious.

So with all of this yummy goodness already prepared, planning the meals for the week is pretty easy.

Day #1: Chicken gyros and broccoli cheese soup. All that was left to do for the gyros was bake the chicken, chop some tomatoes and onions and warm the pitas. I also just gently reheated the soup, and dinner was on the table in a flash. Plus, there's some left over for lunches later in the week.

Day #2: Goat cheese quiche (sliced and reheated in the microwave), tossed salad and zucchini bread that I made in the summer and retrieved from the freezer for dinner.

Day #3: Chicken fried rice and soy braised bok choy. I will share with you my own personal recipe for fried rice later this week.

Day #4: So, have I mentioned Pinterest yet? Well, I found this AM-A-ZING looking recipe from Kayotic Kitchen for Country Club Chicken. I can't wait to try it.

 

Day #5: Leftover night since with all this cooking we will have lots of them and my stove is not going to be accessible.

Day #6: Pizza night. Again, stove, floor, kitchen, blah, blah, blah....

Day #7: We've been invited to dinner with some friends, and since the kitchen will surely be pure chaos, I'm all in.

I share my recipes on Organizing Junkie's Menu Planning Monday.

Someone should have warned us

NEWS FLASH: Adulthood is hard.

I remember when I was a kid--all kinds of rules, someone always bossing me around, watching my little sister all the time while my parents worked, grounded again, not allowed to go out on a Friday night, no cable on our TV, limited to ten minutes phone calls with my friends since we didn't have call waiting, forced to do chores like the laundry and dishes, refused stylish new shoes because they cost as much as my mom made in a day.

I couldn't wait to be an adult. Making my own decision. Spending my money however I want. Going out with whoever I want. Talking on the phone as much as I want. Staying out as late as I want. Sitting on my couch eating chips whenever I want.

Yeah, right. That's not what being an adult is like. That's what college is like. Maybe. If you're lucky. I was really lucky, and I didn't have to worry too much about bills or other responsibilities as a college student, got to do mostly what I wanted to all the time as long as I went to class and got good grades. Even a part-time job didn't infringe too much on the whole doing-whatever-I-want thing.

But we all know that's not real adulthood. College is just a tease. It's a lot of fun, but it only lasts four short years. Well, more like six and a half short years if you are my husband, but I digress.

Lately adulthood has been smacking me around more than usual, and I don't like it one bit. Nothing major really. Sometimes my list of things to do just seems insurmountable. Positively endless. With no time for any fun. Who doesn't feel like that? The house, the kids, the business, the family (as in parents, siblings, grandparents, etc.), an empty rental house that needs work, insurance claims to follow up on, unexpected bills to manage, time for hair appointment, nail appointment, and dress shopping to make this middle-aged body appear party-ready, a holiday dinner for my hubby's office, cookie baking, adopt-a-family gift buying/wrapping/delivering, preschool craft projects, field trips, Christmas shopping, holiday parties, crafting homemade Christmas gifts, wrapping, parties. I got overwhelmed. Which is probably much more a result of who I am than anything out there in the world because I know it's like that for all of us. Like I said, who doesn't have all of that plus a job and their own craziness?

Nonetheless, it's put me in a funk, and since I like to appear to the world as a confident, capable, I've-got-this-all-under-control kind of woman, I tend to keep to myself a bit more when I'm feeling like that. It's also why I haven't so much been writing lately. I'm still writing in my head, but when I start to put it down in print it sounds all whiny and bitchy and petty to me so I delete it. So, if I sound whiny and bitchy and petty and you don't like that, you might want to come back in a week or so. I hope to be over it by then. But I am also hoping that if I write it out, I can kick off the funk and be back to my usual perky (yeah, go ahead--laugh; I can't hear you anyway) self.

My mind is much the same as my to do list--rambling on and on--but I'm going to stop there for now. Despite the craziness that is my life, I have so so so much to be thankful for. And I'll take my crazy life over someone else's any day. That's not to say this is the end of the "adulthood sucks" theme. More soon. Promise.