Crock Pot Arroz con Pollo (Chicken with Rice)

 (This dish looks like it took all day to cook, no?  But it didn't!  My crock pot strikes again!)

School has started for the year.  I'd say this begins my busy season, but I was pretty busy all summer long.  However, I was home more this summer and will be home less this school year.  So this year will see heavy use of my crock pot!

To start the school year I thought a fairly spiffy dinner would be in order.  I had made this Arroz Con Pollo dish a little while ago on the stove top and it turned out really, really good.  I wanted to do this in the crock pot too, so here's my take on it.  I love this dish with big stuffed green olives but left them out this time in deference to the girls.  They already whimper about little tomato bits in their food - why provoke them further with big green olives?  I really do recommend the olives, though, they add a nice touch.  I got something green into the girls in the end...sliced avocado on top of the rice and roasted broccoli on the side!

 (So easy, so lovely, cooked without intervention or supervision...a sight that makes this busy mom smile.)

Crock Pot Arroz Con Pollo (Chicken with Rice)

3 tbsp. olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/4 cups long grain brown rice
1 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup dry white wine
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes (I like salsa style!)
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. smoked paprika
1/4 tsp. black pepper
1/4 tsp. oregano
2 tbsp. olive oil
2 - 2 1/2 pounds chicken pieces, bones in and skins on, fat trimmed, rinsed and patted dry
several whole green pimento stuffed olives, if desired

Heat the 3 tbsp. olive oil in a heavy pan or dutch oven over medium-low.  Add the rice, onion and garlic, stirring until the rice is browned and the onion is beginning to soften.  Scrape the rice mixture into a crock pot.  In a bowl, combine the chicken stock through the oregano and stir to combine.  Reserve 1/2 cup of this mixture, pour the rest over the rice in the crock pot and stir to combine.

Return the pan to the heat and add the 2 tbsp. of olive oil.  Brown the chicken pieces on all sides.  Place the chicken pieces, skin-side up, on top of the rice mixture in the crock pot.  Pour the 1/2 cup of reserved chicken stock mixture over the chicken.  Scatter several olives over all.  Cover and cook on low 6 - 8 hours or on high 3 - 4 hours, or until the juices run clear when the chicken is pierced with a fork.

Fried Okra (Gluten Free & Vegan)

I know.  I swore I would never eat okra, and here I am posting a recipe for fried okra.  But I am a practical person, and this weekend found freshly picked okra on the counter, staring at me.  Daring me.  DH went to a friend's community garden plot to help harvest veggies and came home with the long green pods.  They were fresh, organic and free.  So I swallowed my pride and cooked okra for dinner.  

Turns out, fried okra is pretty good as long as the coating is crunchy!  I was able to achieve a fabulously crispy coating with coconut milk and millet flour that a fried okra eating friend said was really yummy.  She and Anna liked theirs plain, Megan liked hers with ketchup, and DH and I liked ours with hot sauce.  To each their own!

Fried Okra
fresh okra, stems removed, chopped into bite-sized chunks
lite coconut milk
lemon juice
millet flour
salt
cayenne pepper   
a few cups of canola oil

First, heat the oil in a fryer (oil level should be to the fryer's specifications) or a dutch oven over medium heat to 375 degrees.  Meanwhile, stir together the coconut milk (about 1/2 can) with a splash of lemon juice.  Working in batches, toss the okra in the coconut milk mixture and let it sit for a couple of minutes.  The coconut milk will get thick thanks to okra's thickening properties - no egg needed here!

In a separate dish, whisk together about two cups of millet flour with some salt (about 1/2 teaspoon) and some cayenne pepper if desired (about 1/4 teaspoon).  Toss the coconut milk-soaked okra with the millet flour mixture, coating the okra well.  Fry the okra in batches in the hot oil until it looks crispy and golden brown, about 4 minutes.  Drain the okra on paper towels, sprinkle with a little salt if needed, and serve hot. 

Fresh Fig Jam

 

 Fresh fig jam on gluten free bread...so yummy!

I have a friend who has two enormous fig trees.  She hates those trees, does not like figs and does not harvest the fruit.  When she told me she wanted to rip her fig trees out of the ground to make room for something else I nearly had a cow.  You want to do what?  Do you know how expensive fresh figs are in the stores, and you have them for free in your yard?  I will harvest your figs!  Don't rip down your trees!  

So I got my rear end over there with a big bucket and picked as many fresh figs as I possibly could, and then I got my rear end into the kitchen and made fig jam.  Do you know how expensive fig jam is in the stores, I asked my friend, and I just made scads for practically free?  She is still not convinced.  If she does choose to cut down her trees, I will take a cutting or two to plant in my yard.  Fig jam is wonderful stuff and this year, friends and family will be getting some for holiday gifts.

We enjoy fig jam on sandwiches, but you can make fig bars with it too!

For this recipe I mostly followed my tattered but trusty Ball Blue Book of Canning and Preserving, but I also took tips HERE on the preparation of fresh figs.  I also went HERE for a refresher on the rules of canning - if you have never canned before, I highly recommend you read that and get yourself a Ball Blue Book too.  This recipe here is also an excellent guide with pictures to making fig jam.  My Ball Blue Book specified using 6 cups of sugar, but I cut down on the sugar by two cups because 6 cups makes the jam just too sweet to my taste.  I think 4 cups of sugar makes it plenty sweet.  Maybe because of the decreased sugar, I had to add a little pectin** to my recipe.  In the end, my jam came out perfect - thick, smooth and beautiful.  Tasty, too!

Fresh Fig Jam

5 pounds fresh ripe* figs, stemmed and peeled

4 cups sugar

3/4 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 cup water

**1 tsp. Pomona's Universal Pectin plus 2 tbsp. sugar plus  1 tsp. included calcium water, if desired

1/4 cup lemon juice 

Prepare your jars and lids (I used 12 jars).  The jars need to be clean and sterilized and kept hot - the lids do not need to be sterilized, but they do need to be washed and to be kept hot.  I have a sanitize option on my dishwasher, so I just run the jars and lids in the dishwasher - I have to time this correctly so the jars are hot when I am ready for them.  Or you can wash your jars in the sink, then put them in a pot of water.  Bring the water to a boil, and boil the jars and lids for 10 minutes to sterilize them.  Keep them in hot water until you are ready to fill them with jam.  You can keep the lids in a smaller pot of hot water until ready to use.  If the jars are not hot when you put hot jam into them, they could break, and that is no fun.

In a large pot, combine the sugar, cinnamon and water.  Add the figs.  *You don't want figs that are so ripe they are mushy or bruised easily.  And it's okay to throw in some almost-ripe figs, as the slightly under-ripe ones have more natural pectin.  Cook and stir until mixture comes to a boil.  Reduce the heat and simmer.  Skim any foam off the top if necessary.  Cook, stirring frequently to prevent sticking, until mixture thickens, about an hour.  You can mash the figs a bit to break them up into smaller bits if you wish.

Meanwhile, fill your canner with water and get the water hot.

If after an hour of cooking down the jam has gelled to your liking**, add the 1/4 cup lemon juice.  Return to a boil and boil for 1 minute, then turn off the heat.  

**To see if your jam has gelled, keep a spoon in the fridge.  Scoop a bit of the jam onto the cold spoon, and let the jam on it cool to room temperature.  If it is thick to your liking, that's that.  If not, then keep cooking to the gelling point.  I cooked my jam for an hour and a half and it still was not gelled enough for me, so I added some Pomona's pectin to help things along - not as much as suggested on the recipe sheet inside the pectin box, but that extra teaspoon of pectin turned out to be just perfect.  To add pectin to the jam, thoroughly mix it with the 2 tbsp. sugar and then whisk the sugar/pectin mixture and the calcium water vigorously into the hot jam.  Bring the jam to a boil and boil for 1 - 2 minutes.  Turn off the heat and stir in the lemon juice.

Fill hot jars with hot jam, leaving 1/4 inch of head space between the jam and the rim of the jar.  Wipe the rim of the jar clean with a damp cloth or paper towel (debris on the rim will prevent the lid from sealing).  Adjust the two piece caps (not too tight) and place the jars on the basket that comes with the canner.  Lower the basket into the water.  The water should only cover the jars by 2 - 3 inches.  Bring the water to a boil, then cover the canner and boil for 10 minutes.  Turn off the heat and lift the jars out of the canner.  I put them on a towel on the counter to cool - the jars should not touch one another to allow for circulation.  Sometimes the jars seal in the canner and sometimes they will seal after you take them out of the canner - I love to hear the popping sound the lids make as they seal.  If after 12 hours you have any jars that do not seal (the bump in the center of the lid has not gone flat), store those jars in the fridge.  For all jars that seal, store in a cool dark place for up to a year.

Our Car Is Dead. Long Live Our Car!

 

Actually our car is not dead yet that we know of, but it was on its last legs.  But it's not our car anymore, so it's dead to us.  It's an incredibly sad situation, and I'd like to write a eulogy of sorts for our beloved 10 year old Saturn Ion.  

DH and I really, really loved our Saturn.  We loved the Saturn we had before that one, too.  That Saturn was a wagon, and we got it for a very good price after DH's dad rebuilt it after it had been in an accident.  It served us well for 5 years until Anna was born.  And then a family member asked, now that we had a new baby, how safe was she in a car whose frame had been rebuilt?  In a car that had no airbags?  DH looked at me as I was looking at an infant Anna, and he knew we were buying a new car.  I didn't even have to ask.

We decided our next car needed to be new, since we'd be moving far away from our fathers who could (and always did) fix our (old beat up) cars.  DH is not much of a car person, so we'd need it to last a long time without much intervention at all from a mechanic.  We drove to the Saturn dealership in our old Saturn.  We tried to play it cool, but we were a shoe-in.  We fell in love with our Ion almost immediately - the fact that it was the only standard transmission left on the lot only heightened the pressure we felt to make a decision.  We test drove a Hyundai Elantra at my dad's insistence (fabulous warranty, he said!) but we were smitten with the Ion.  To my dad's great consternation, we bought the Saturn.  It was fun to drive.  And Anna looked wicked cute in the back seat.

Before the year was out, we had moved far, far away from family.  For the next several years, we had no problems with the car at all.  First Anna, and then Megan, looked adorable in the back seat.  What was not to love, we thought?  My dad visited one Thanksgiving and he and DH spent the holiday replacing the back struts and the brakes.  We had to replace the tires a couple of times.  But it was all good for while, until things started failing with regularity.  First the battery died, then the spark plugs failed while I was away from home with the girls.  A nice man was able to start our car and I drove it home with no power steering.  The driver's side power window stopped working and the bell always dinged  with the driver's door open whether or not they keys were in the ignition.  Then I heard metal snap underneath and right beside me while I was driving, and then noticed the armrest was loose and wobbly.  Our car was slowly deteriorating.

Things were okay for awhile.  And then last November, the clutch died.  The car was 9 years old.  I tried driving it, starting out in second gear and being extra gentle, but the gears ground and would not slip into gear.  I was so afraid of the car dying in rush hour traffic far from home, with the girls in the back seat and DH not able to get to us.  We finally limped the car to the dealer for repairs.  Nobody else would touch our Saturn - by this time, the Saturn brand was dead and everyone we called said parts were not available.  Only GM could order the parts - expensive parts, and the labor was more expensive than that.  Just under 2 grand later, our clutch was new but our car was old.  My dad told us we should cut our losses and get a new car.  DH and I could not let go.  We loved our Saturn.  It was a part of the family. 

A few months after the new clutch, our car died again, stranding DH and the girls way from home. AAA towed our car to the dealer.  Our starter was dead.  Several hundred freaking dollars later, our car was repaired.  A month after that, one of the ball joints went.  Another several hundred dollars later, that was repaired.  We put more into repairs than the car was worth.  We listened to my dad not say "I told you so".  We started listening to every creak and groan.  Every time we turned the wheel, we listened with dread to a telltale crunching sound.  The other ball joint was about to go.  The front shocks were shot - every bump in the road was a BANG!  The brakes squeaked and squealed.  The air conditioning was not keeping up like it used to anymore.  We wanted to repair our car and keep it.  But it was not practical for us to do so anymore.  In the span of three months, we went from insisting we'd try to fix our old beloved car to being afraid it'd break and we would not be able to afford repairs when we had not paid off the previous repairs.   We felt the car was no longer safe for our kids.

I think my dad breathed a sigh of relief when we finally told him we'd be test driving a Hyundai, the car he wanted us to get so long ago.  We ended up buying a new car in a whirlwind.  Like before, it was the last standard transmission on the lot.  The back seat is roomy and the girls have room to grow.  I think we ended up getting a good deal, but that did not help alleviate our sorrow in letting the Saturn go.  Anna actually sobbed when we told her.  And I was right there with her.  Our Saturn had seen our two babies grow into big girls.  You know those sappy Subaru commercials?  That was us with our Saturn.  We felt like we were betraying an old friend.  Nobody will love our Saturn as much as we did.  We can only hope it goes to someone who treats it well.

We are now the owners of a Hyundai Elantra.  Well, the bank technically owns it until we pay it off, which is for sure not going to be anytime soon.  That 10 year/100,000 mile powertrain warranty sounds awfully good after that horribly expensive experience of replacing the Ion's clutch.  We fully intend to keep this car for 10 years, and hopefully it will treat us well.  We will learn to love our Elantra, but we will always have a special place in our hearts for our Saturn.  Our Saturn is dead.  Long live our Elantra!

Cinnamon Raisin Bread for the Bread Machine

The other day it occurred to me that I have not made cinnamon raisin bread in years!  How could that have happened?!  There's almost nothing that smells better than baking cinnamon raisin bread (unless it's apple pie).  As hot as it is right now, it is almost time for school to start and that means that autumn is just around the corner.  My mind is beginning to fill with all things autumn, including the memory of the way this bread smells just out of the oven.  This past weekend memory and reality met in my kitchen and smiled.  This bread is heavenly. 

Cinnamon Raisin Bread (Gluten Free, Casein Free, Egg Free)

2 1/2 cups GF flour blend (I use Bob's Red Mill All Purpose GF Flour Blend)
2 tsp. xanthan gum
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
3/4 cup raisins

6 tbsp. warm gelatin egg substitute
1 cup warm rice milk or other non-dairy alternative
3 tbsp. canola oil
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp. apple cider vinegar

2 tsp. rapid rise yeast

In a large bowl, sift together the flour through the cinnamon.  Toss the raisins into the flour mixture, coating the raisins completely and making sure they are separated and not in clumps.  Set aside.

Pour the gelatin egg substitute, warm water, oil, honey and vinegar into the bread machine pan. Pour the flour mixture over the water mixture, covering the water mixture completely. Add the yeast on top of the flour. Set the bread machine to the gluten-free setting, medium crust. Help the mixing with a spatula, if needed. Add a tablespoon of water if the mixture is too dry.  When the machine has stopped kneading, take out the kneading paddle and smooth the top of the loaf with your fingers. Replace the lid and let the bread machine do its thing.

 

(Lumpy but beautiful bread chock full of raisins)

Immediately after the baking cycle has finished, run a soft spatula around the sides of the bread to loosen the loaf from the bread pan.  Turn the pan upside down and gently shake to turn the bread out of the bread pan and onto a wire rack to cool completely. Allow the bread to cool completely before slicing. Store on the counter for up to two days. After two days, store in the refrigerator.

Perspective

Anna is turning into a rip roaring Aspie.  It has happened almost overnight. My 9 year old went from a girly, quirky, idiosyncratic elementary aged schoolgirl to a raging, fervent and impassioned pre-teen. 

No longer wanting to be seen with me, she trails behind me instead of holding my hand in public.  She rolls her eyes at me and she runs off without saying goodbye, like I never existed.  Like I never breathed her in and out every moment since she was born.  This is killing me.  For too long I felt disconnected from her, and then we connected.  I basked in her smiles and drank in her eye contact like a flower soaks up sun and rain.  I made up for lost time, and learned how to hug her without fearing that her arms would push me away.  I learned how to have back and forth conversation with her and engage her in her interests.  And then all of a sudden a few months ago, something changed. 

It seems like there's something about Anna's prepubescent turmoil that tripped a switch.  All the descriptions in the books I read about Aspie girls and women are coming to life before my eyes.  One day she loved getting her toenails painted, the next day she declared that she hates painting her nails. She loved dressing up in frilly clothes (as long as they were soft and not scratchy!) but now she hates "fashion" and she no longer wears anything "fancy".  All those pretty dresses she loved to prance in sit in her closet unworn.  She insists now on wearing comfortable clothes - t-shirts and sweats.  She rails against "beauty" and says she'll never shave her legs (which is tantamount to saying she rejects society's demands upon the way she looks).  Every time I brush her hair she yells that she does not want to look perfect and she grumbles when  I tell her that having good hygiene is not the same as looking perfect.  She is distancing herself from people, even friends, more often than I like to see.  She, on the other hand, likes nothing better than to stick her nose in a book for hours on end.  She reads encyclopedias for fun.  Her pretend play is elaborate if restrictive, and includes mythology and cosmology, geology and zoology.  If she had a way to express it, I know she'd tell me that she wants to think about bigger, more important issues than her typical peers care to dwell on at this age.  The list of Aspie quirks can go on and on.

What is important, I think, is that she feels different - she has always felt different and she is now acting on that, making it obvious for others to see.  She feels different.  She is choosing to look different now too.  She is projecting her difference in ways she knows how.  "I want to be myself, Mom!" she tells me.  I can't argue with that.  Herself is all I want her to be.  I just don't want her to isolate herself in the process of becoming herself.

To try to address my concerns about Anna isolating herself, at the start of the summer I took her to a friend's church, to try out their Sunday School.  I was trying to see if I could expand Anna's circle of friends.  It went very badly.  When I picked her up at the end of class, she was beside herself with agitation and disdain.  "I hate it here!"  she said in a raised voice.  "This is boring!  There's too much chit-chat!"  I was mortified.  At first I thought it was the teacher doing too much talking during the lesson, but no.  It's the children talking that she can't handle.  Not only do they talk fast and talk a lot, which is hard for Anna to follow, they also talk about things she doesn't care about.  She can't keep up with the conversation, she's not invested in it in the first place, she can't break into the conversation by herself and she feels left out of the loop.  No wonder she was miserable.   

In the middle of all this, I decided to send her to the social skills summer camp she went to last year....and the year before...which is associated with her ASD preschool and speech therapy intervention.  Anna has a long history there.  She has never complained about going until this year.  She insisted that the lessons would be boring.  I told her, "too bad, kid.  You need this.  You're going."  She went.   She was the only girl in the middle of like, 14 boys.  And she did not complain once....not about the lessons, not about being the only girl, not about anything at all.  In fact, she had a great time.  I was the one having slight conniptions.  It's wrong of me, but I just want the PECS to be finished.  I mean, Anna is so smart.  Why does she need pictures and prompts?  She's high functioning and 9 years old now.  When does this fade into her past?  When does she integrate the pictures she needs into the library in her head she can flip through at will?

Why am I dragging my heels in the mud?  Why do the pictures bother me?  I mean, on one hand they don't bother me at all.  They are a proven system that works.  Anna responds to them.  She does not complain about them.  She does not call them "babyish" like she calls so many other things lately.  In fact, she seems to thrive on them.  But on the other hand, they bother me.  So what is my problem?

Maybe it's the fact that for a few months, Anna and I wanted different things.  Up until now I have been fully in her court.  Then I stepped out of that court, and looked around at all the things I want for her.  Friends.  Social interaction without awkwardness.  Peace within herself and with her surroundings.  I allowed myself to see the things that other people see.  Her social and emotional immaturity.  The way she holds her body stiffly (even though she has hypotonia, go figure).  The way she talks so maturely like a little professor, and yet has a hard time connecting to her typical peers (or even typical adults).  Why does that hurt?  It shouldn't.  She is who she is and I love her exactly how she is, quirks and all.  I got sidetracked looking outward, distracted by what other people think.  What do I care what other people think?  I don't.  I never have, and I'm not going to start now.

I'm back in Anna's court, where I should have stayed this whole time and saved myself some grief.  I have been looking too far ahead.  I need to focus on the small steps.  The lead speech pathologist at her social skills camp, who has known Anna for years, told me that Anna has made great progress in the past year.  It was something I needed to hear, a perspective I needed to see.  Year to year, things improve.  I need to focus on that, and not on years ahead of now.  I need to follow Anna's lead.  She is not ready to be thrown into a cauldron of neurotypicality.  That's okay.  I will respect her needs and not push her to do something she is vehemently opposed to.  She has her reasons...she might not be able to express them to me now, but someday she will.  And when she does, I will be grateful that I followed my gut when it told me to follow my daughter.

Rain!

It's raining!  Whoot!  I LOVE RAIN! It's been weeks and weeks since we've had rain last, even though areas all around us have had some rain, all those rainclouds collapsed as soon as they got to us. I'm just so excited - please indulge me as I share my favorite rain song.

Fresh Black Eyed Peas

It is hot, hot, hot!  The grass is dying, trees are losing their leaves like it's autumn, and the sun on my skin really hurts in only 15 minutes.  Nothing moves around outside past noon, even in the shade.  Our one-eyed yard squirrel, affectionately named "Chomper" by the girls, has been seen laying in a crook of one of our trees, languishing in the heat, not bothering to move away from us when we approach her, mouth wide open with a look that begs us to put her out of her misery.  Poor Chomper, I wonder how she gets water when it has not rained in weeks.  I hope she comes out tonight when I water the lawn to get a good, long drink.

About the only thing loving the heat and the relentless sun are our black eyed peas.  We got them started late, but they are one of the only things our garden is producing right now.  One of our friends who got them started much earlier has more black eyed peas than he knows what to do with, and we were recipients of so many black eyed peas that we ended up giving some of them away! 

 Shelling fresh black eyed peas on the porch, waiting in vain for a bit of rain

Surprisingly, the girls really like to shell beans.  They think it's fun to sit on the porch and chat together for an hour at a time, laughing at the way the more mature pods open up like zippers.  Sitting with them, shelling beans together, made me feel like we had been transported back in time.  I felt very old-fashioned, like the only thing we were missing were petticoats.  I marveled at the way the conversation seemed to flow effortlessly and how Anna did not get tired of cackling every time a black eyed pea jumped down her shirt.  Shelling beans seems to be good "therapy" - it inspires conversation and social interaction and it is a good tactile fine-motor activity as well.  Black eyed peas also happen to be tasty and good for your health, which makes them an all-purpose legume in our house.

I have never been a fan of dried black eyed peas or the way they turn mushy when you cook them.  However, I could be a slave to fresh black eyed peas!  Their taste is delicate and fresh and I love their texture - when they are cooked to just tender the skins pop in your mouth.  Shelling fresh black eyed peas is a lot of work, but it's so worth it!  So far, the recipe below (based on this recipe here) is my favorite way to cook fresh black eyed peas.  I make them with chicken broth and smoked sausage, but you could substitute vegetable broth instead and leave out the sausage for  a vegan version of this dish.

I like fresh black eyed peas served over sauteed greens, such as spinach or chard.

Fresh Black Eyed Peas

1 medium onion, chopped
2 large cloves garlic, minced
about 1 pound fresh black eyed peas
chicken broth
1 tbsp. lime juice
1 tbsp. hot sauce (I like Tabasco Chipotle)
smoked sausage, cut lengthwise into 2 inch chunks
1 tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro, plus more to garnish
salt and pepper to taste
2 large scallions, white and green parts sliced thinly

Place the onion, garlic and black eyed peas in a pot.  Pour in enough chicken broth to just barely cover the peas - you want this dish to be thick, not soupy.  Stir in the lime juice, hot sauce, cilantro and smoked sausage.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Bring to a boil, then turn down the heat and simmer about 45 minutes until the peas are tender, stirring often to prevent sticking.  Turn off the heat.  Adjust the salt, pepper and hot sauce to taste.  Stir in the scallions and garnish with chopped fresh cilantro, if desired.  Serve hot over rice or cornbread.