Spaghetti Squash soup

By Elizabeth Prata

I like spaghetti squash. I need to eat gluten free, lactose free, low FODMAP, and watch the carbs. It is quite limiting. But spaghetti squash is one of those veggies that ticks all the boxes, AND I can eat a lot of it. Win!

There's only one problem, even a small spaghetti squash yields a ton of squash. I usually search for the smallest one in the grocery bin, but even that smallest one gives me a lot of squash to handle. I often have to eat it aggressively to ensure I consume it all before it goes bad.

I poke some holes in the rind and pop it into the crock pot as is, adding a bit of water. Setting the temperature on high, it cooks in just an hour or two. I take it out when the rind is good and soft when I insert a knife, and I cut it in half (using a towel to protect my hands from the hot squash). This lets it cool faster with the two sides open.

The recipe called for putting the pulled strands from the squash rind into the blender. I did that, but I put only half into the blender and simply chopped up the rest. I believe this was a mistake. It made for a funny texture and also the dripping spaghetti squash strands make a mess while I eat it.

I also used coconut milk in addition to the chicken broth. I omitted the onions from the recipe since I can't eat them. I added carrots and celery and half a green pepper. It came out good and with next time I'll just blend all of the squash instead of blending half and putting the other half into the soup.

There's something comforting about cooking a pot of soup. It's satisfying to know that I have a container of soup in the fridge. And I can eat a lot of it. It is a low calorie, low carb soup. Only 9 carbs in a 1-cup serving. That means I can have a cup of soup and a sandwich for a meal instead of having to choose one or the other. Soup's on, enjoy!

Spaghetti Squash soup 9 carbs per cup

Five Minute healthy soup!

My eyes were bigger than my stomach last week at the grocery store. I'd bought three, count-em, three, veggie kits. One was a veggie stir fry ("Cooks in five minutes!") and the other two were cold salad veggie kits.

I have gravitated to these kits because they contain a variety of veggies, kinds of veggies I do not usually buy.  They also have neat tasting sauces or dressings, again, kinds I don't usually buy or make. Admittedly, they're convenient too. They are very expensive though. I restrict myself to buying the marked down ones, usually half price, which means usually around $1.89 or $1.99 per package. I get several salads out of each. That solves the frugal problem.

However, they are marked down because their expiration date is upcoming, usually within a week or so. I have to eat a lot of salads to go through three packs of salad or stir fry kits! I was looking at the stir fry kit this morning and the date had passed two days ago. It'd probably be good for another day or two, but what to do? I know! I will stir fry them up and then pour broth over it and it will be soup!

No chopping veggies, no cooking in stages (hard veggies like carrots and potatoes first, then softer like zucchini, and then softest like mushrooms. It's a lot of standing around. I really liked the idea for cooking a bunch of veggies in 5-minutes, with no chopping. I dumped the whole pack into a pot, added oil and spices, and voila!

Meanwhile, bouillon cubes were softening into broth. Soon I combined the two, after the stir fry had softened and absorbed the spice flavors. I added some tomato sauce I had in the fridge for good measure. One and done! Soup! (I can always add tofu or another protein like quinoa later if I want).

I did not use the stir fry dressing included in the packet when sauteing the veggies for soup so the bonus is, I now have an extra packet of dressing I'll use on my salad this week.

A great price for a lot of healthy veggies. This can be stretched to several meals.

I just dumped them in.

I added oil and salt and some spices to taste.

That's it! Done.

Helvetica, moms, soup, and cities

I enjoyed this visually graphic post about Ten Fonts that Designers Love to Hate. I am with them on Comic Sans. That particular font evokes a visceral reaction in me every time I see it, I hate it that bad. Unfortunately, most teachers love to use it, so I'm surrounded, lol. I had never heard of Bleeding Cowboys font before, go figure. And I was sad to see Helvetica dismissed, solely due to ubiquitousness. I prefer to stay loyal to the things that last and last. Try life WITHOUT Helvetica.

Helvetica lives! They even made a movie about it!

It's a quiet Saturday around here. It has been raining for a few days so the air is cool and the ground is muddy outside. I got a first wind, lol, and cleaned and vacuumed and did dishes and did laundry and even polished the furniture before 9am today. It feels like I have the whole day ahead when my chores get done early.

My friend is going to FB message me when she is ready for me to meet her and pick up my Bountiful Basket she has gotten in the city. She picks up at the site and I meet her halfway to grab it from her before she heads home. I am looking forward to some fresh and good produce. For a change of pace, I will probably make soup.

Here is a UK Daily Mail article about a Utah mom who sang to the tune of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah song but changed the lyrics to share her feelings about being a mom. She has a great voice and the lyrics are dead-on. The video she posted of herself singing it has garnered millions of hits on Youtube and Facebook. It's nice to see there are moms who love being moms. Hallelujah to moms who unashamedly love their job!

Utah woman with the voice of an angel sings her own version of Hallelujah with lyrics being about a mom... and now she's rightly famous

A Utah woman with the voice of an angel is a viral sensation after her version of ‘Hallelujah’ with lyrics about being a mom racked up more than two million views. Shannon Christensen Abbott posted a clip of herself singing Leonard Cohen’s famous song on her Facebook page recently. But she changed the lyrics to reflect her hectic lifestyle as a mother to young children, including: 'It's a dirty job but someone's gotta do it.'

I'm going to play with my photos today also. I have pictures of just about everything. Except...a cityscape. All the times I was in NYC or San Francisco or Miami or Fort Lauderdale or London or Montreal and all the other cities I've visited, even Portland Maine where I lived near for thirty years, I'm shocked I do not have ONE cityscape picture. I have a sunburst one of the street in NYC where the NYC Public Library is, and one top of the skyscraper pic of San Francisco, but that is about it. I'm amazed at the oversight. I'd wanted to play with cityscapes and light but I guess not.

Here are my city pictures and you can see that I took them with a different theme in mind and not the city landscape I now wish I had.

I was fascinated with the heavy door and the gilding, not the city.

I liked the colonial-ness of this Portland street

The closest thing I have to a typical cityscape,
but Portland Maine is a small city and so are its buildings

I framed this to show all the funkiness of San Francisco, contained in one shot

The County Fair is finishing up tonight. It is a very big deal around here. This fair is actually mainly an agricultural fair, given that our economy is so heavily based on agriculture. Of course there is a fairway and funnel cakes and rides and music to go along with the cows and the tractor sales and the sheep show, too. I have some old fair pics I'll probably noodle around with later.

At school we received a bulletin sent from our Superintendent (who is one of 4 finalists for State Superintendent of the year!) regarding the dangers of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI). As the State Coordinator at Georgia Emergency Management Agency-Homeland Security (GEMA) said, and I paraphrase his bulletin, given that poultry farming is a multi-billion dollar industry within the state of Georgia that touches either directly or indirectly every Georgian, and given that there are now many avian enthusiasts who won birds (especially chickens) in their backyard, a case of HPAI will significantly impact our beautiful state. This is something we want to avoid. If you own chickens, turkeys, or other birds please heed the warnings. I am told by farmers and state officials that there have been many meetings in GA lately about the increased risks. The reason the GEMA Coordinator sent the bulletin to the Superintendent is because the school systems are an area where information has been lacking, yet many teachers are also farmers who own birds of some kind in micro-farming endeavors.

So that is my Saturday morning. I hope you all have a great weekend yourselves and enjoy the time, but better yet, redeem the time. (Ephesians 5:16).

I'm revealing secrets here

It is a cold day, and we are supposed to get over 2 inches of rain this afternoon into tomorrow. It is a good day for making soup or something else equally warm and comfy. I just put on sweat pants straight from the  dryer. AHHHH.

A few days ago I'd made a pumpkin-angel food cake with chocolate chips and that sure does taste good warmed up with a cup of chamomile tea. I plan to make split pea soup tomorrow. At the store today in addition to the split peas, I also got a bag of shredded cabbage-slaw mix and chicken tenders. They both were reduced in price. So naturally I bought them. Naturally when I got home I googled recipes with both chicken and slaw in the title and found a good one that also uses chick peas. It will be a chicken slaw taco with chickpea-mayo sauce. I don't have chickpeas but I do have hummus, and the recipe calls for grinding the chick peas up with the mayo and lemon anyway.

So that's how I roll. Whatever is on sale goes into my basket. Ask no questions first, google later.

I took this snap as I was driving:

The sky often looks very pretty over the fields in that spot. Today the sky was pinker than it looked in the picture, even though it wasn't dawn or dusk, and the streams of light were glinting down between the small openings in the clouds.

Here is a shot of Luke and one of Bert. Luke typically is next to me when I'm active, "What's going on? Is something happening? I want to be a part of it!"

Here is Bert, typically laying down. "What's going on that woke me up?! Is something happening? I don't care, I want no part of it."

My backyard before the rain hit:

My dinner, cream cheese-craisin-lettuce wrap!

Things you may or may know about me:

Secret: I like country music
Potentially embarrassing secret, hereafter named PES:
I still like Billy Ray Cyrus' "Achy Breaky Heart"

Secret: I don't like ice cream.
PES: Sometimes I eat it anyway.

Secret: I have no children.
PES: I never wanted any.

Secret: Babies are cute
PES: I feel obligated to say that, whether they are or not

Secret: I love to read novels
PES: I dislike sentimental or romantic books

Secret: I like cowboys
PES: I like cowboy yodeling

OK, that's enough for one day. I've spilled my guts, told all about making soup and my cats and my secrets. Now it's time to watch a documentary or two and drink more tea. Life in the fast lane, I tell ya.

Rainy day black bean soup

This is Saturday in December in Georgia,

Cold, rainy, dark. That's OK. It's a lot better than Saturday in December in Maine, where I used to live. Where the sun is deceptive,

And the snow never ends,

Nevertheless, it is a dreary morning so I decided to make soup. That always cheers me up! This time it will be black bean soup with roasted chilies, green peppers, and rainbow carrots. I think black beans are pretty. So I took a picture of them.

I know, I'm weird. Call me weird, geek, strange ... just don't call me late for soup.

Papas con queso fresco, yum!

I finally decided on this week's soup: Mexican potato con queso fresco.

Queso fresco is fresh cheese. Wise Geek explains,

"Queso fresco is a traditional Mexican cheese which is a common ingredient in a wide range of dishes. The cheese is a quintessential part of Mexican cuisine, and is often available in Mexican markets and grocery stores. In Mexico, queso fresco is often a raw milk cheese, but in the United States the cheese is made from pasteurized milk, due to concerns about bacteria in raw milk. Both cheeses behave slightly differently, with the American cheese being more prone to melting."

"In Spanish, the name of the cheese means “fresh cheese.” Classic queso fresco is snow white, very soft, moist, and mild in flavor. The cheese is also rather crumbly, making it ideal for crumbling over dishes like salads and enchiladas. The creamy cheese is also used as a filling in many Mexican dishes. True queso fresco will soften and become creamy when heated, but it will not melt. This unique property distinguishes queso fresco from similar cheeses."

It is similar to goat cheese, feta, and ricotta but not as acidic as feta or as pungent as goat cheese (my favorite cheese). Once my husband and I made paneer, an Indian cheese, which is made in much the same way as queso fresco. it is really easy. You take milk and acidify it, using lime juice or vinegar, and leave it to curdle, and then strain in cheesecloth and press. It is a fresh cheese so it won't last long in the fridge after the cryovak package is opened. That's why I used half the package in the soup.

I was googling potatoes and queso fresco (I had potatoes on hand) and found this recipe. It is a cold, rainy weekend so a heartier soup seemed to be just the ticket. Don't you love to have a pot of soup on hand in the fridge? I do.

Queso fresco is light, and crumbles but won't melt completely. It is very creamy so the potato soup is like a creamed potato soup. I didn't have chilies on hand so I just used red and black pepper. Photos of food never come out as appetizing as the professional photographers do it, and never as appetizing as the items really tastes, but here you go:

It tastes wonderful! I didn't use the cumin, garlic, or jalapenos. Instead of the tomato sauce I used a can of vegetarian tomato vegetable soup.

From Food.com
8 potatoes, peeled and chopped into squares
6 -8 fresh jalapenos
2 large tomatoes
1 onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, peeled
1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
2 tablespoons of knoor chicken bouillon powder (consomme)
1 teaspoon cumin
12 ounces mexican queso fresco, chopped into cubes
2 -3 cups water
oil (for frying)
salt

Directions:

1. Bring jalapenos and tomatoes to a boil.
2. In blender add water, onion, garlic, cumin, chicken bouillon powder, can of tomato sauce and blend well.
3. Add boiled jalapenos and tomatoes and pulsate the blender 2 or 3 times just so that the tomatoes and the peppers are still chunky in the sauce. Set aside.
4. In skillet fry the potatoes until they start to look translucent and remove from fire. It is very important you do this. Don’t fully cook them or else they will end up like mulch latter.
5. Transfer the semi cooked potatoes to a bigger sauce pot and pour the sauce.
6. Add cheese and stir well. If needed at salt to taste and bring to a boil.
7. Serve hot and enjoy with warm tortillas!

I also made a peach cobbler today.

And last in a minute I'll make a fruit salad with grapefruit and craisins. That will complete my cooking for the weekend and take me into the first of the week for lunches. Buon appetito!