Recipe: Key Lime Pie

Tonight I made my first key lime pie! Well, it isn't really key lime as I couldn't find a single key lime in the three stores I went to so I guess it is just a lime pie, but still, I can't wait to try it! Tomorrow is Easter. My dear, sweet aunt is battling a very hard journey with cancer and in an effort to help her gain some weight, I am making this light, refreshing pie in hopes it will settle well on her stomach and help fatten her up. This was quite honestly the easiest dessert I've ever made. I read no less than 20 different recipes on-line and in recipe books before deciding to just throw them all together and make my own version. I have yet to taste this pie, but so far it looks nice and it smells darn good. Tomorrow will be the true test!

Ingredients:
3 eggs, separated
1/2 cup of fresh squeezed lime juice
1 tsp lime zest
14oz sweetened condensed milk
graham cracker pie crust

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Separate eggs into two clean glass bowls.

2. Whisk egg whites until stiff peaks form. I whisked by hand and it took about 5-6 minutes to start to see the peaks. Once the peaks form, set it aside.

3. Beat the yolks well. Stir in the sweetened condensed milk, lime juice and lime zest. Mix all of this well.

4. Slowly mix the lime mixture into the egg whites and then pour the entire mixture into the pie crust.

5. Bake the pie on 350 degrees for about 25-30 minutes. Remove from oven, let cool on counter. Chill in fridge until served.

I'm going to garnish this with a dollop of whipped cream.

The little flecks in the pie is lime zest. If I had time I would have made a homemade pie crust, but we were also dying Easter eggs while I baked this! Maybe next time...

Butterfly House

Despite the fact that it is technically spring, winter has decided to set up shop and stay in town a bit longer. I am so sick and tired of cold weather!! It is about 20 degrees today, gag. I am longing for warm weather and sunshiny days. I decided we needed a trip to the tropics so after donning our winter coats, we headed out to the Butterfly House where we could pretend we were somewhere toasty and beautiful, even if it were only temporary.

The Butterfly House is another wonderful local attraction in our city. It is literally a house full of butterflies, about 3,000 at any given time. As you enter the house you are greeted by not only warm and humid temps, but your senses are overwhelmed by the beauty surrounding you. Butterflies of all shapes and sizes and colors flutter around you. Tropical flowers adorn the entire facility and gentle waterfalls can be heard in the background. It is a truly magnificent experience. In addition to the actual butterfly house you can also view a variety of insects such as hissing cockroaches and millipedes and other creepy crawlies that freak me out, but totally entertain my boys. It is an afternoon well spent! Enjoy the beautiful pictures!

This is one of the 250 birthday cakes throughout the city in honor of our 250th birthday. 

Blue Morpho on a flower.

I don't know this species, but its markings were gorgeous.

Do you see the blue butterfly in flight?

Blue Morpho Butterfly

I love this little waterfall!

Another Blue Morpho Butterfly, I love her colors!

These are all Blue Morphos inside a little tree "cave". 

A Blue Morpho with his wings closed. 

Enjoying a lunch of rotting fruit, yum?!

See if you can click on this picture to make it bigger, the details on the wings are amazing.

Hibiscus Flower

No clue what this flower is, but it is so pretty!

Please do not copy or use my photos, thank you!

With a Chick Chick Here and a Chick Chick There

It's a girl! Times six! We are official chicken owners as of yesterday afternoon. If you had asked me 15 years ago what I would be doing with my life I can say with certainty that playing chicken farmer was NOT on that list! How things have changed.

Our friend, Greg, lives on three acres not too far from us. He enjoys wildlife and is a country boy at heart. He approached us a few weeks ago, asking if we'd like to get some baby chicks. We'll keep them in our home in a brooder until they are ready for the coop he is making (which is quite the coop!). We have six chicks here and our other family friends have six more chicks. Together we'll have 12 chickens to lay eggs. You know my stance on animals therefore none of these babies will ever been harmed or used for meat. They will live a long, happy life eating an all natural diet and will have access to sunlight and clean water and they'll be free to roam when they want and of course they have access to lots of love (hehe!). Yes, I realize how hippie that sounds, but if you have no idea of the horrid conditions chickens are exposed to in mass farming, please educate your self right away. The deplorable conditions are not only inhumane, but they pose a serious health concern to both the animal and the consumer.

Here are my sweet girls: Shelly, Sandy, Emily, Lola, Hippie Chick and Betty White. Aren't they precious?! They are so sweet and love to play with us. I have a feeling we'll miss these little darlings when they graduate to the coop, but luckily we are close enough that we can visit a few times a week.

Not Just a Snow Day

This winter we've been hit HARD with bad weather. I don't believe we've had this many snow days in quite sometime. Kids are restless, parents are scrambling to find sitters for their kids so they can go to work and schools are trying to figure out how to juggle a multitude of school related issues that are effected by these lost days. I bet many of you didn't realize that one of these school related issues is food. I'm not talking about food budget or what to plan for lunch, I am talking about the children who will go without a meal or two when school is not in session. For many students, school is the one place they will receive breakfast and lunch. School is the place where they are guaranteed access to milk, protein, grains, fruits and veggies. Sure school lunches may not be the best source of nutrition, but that food sure does feel good to a hungry belly. I was absolutely blown away when I popped on the computer tonight and read this article:

 http://www.ksdk.com/story/news/2014/02/17/school-lunches-st-louis-cold-weather/5567571/

Children should be playing in the snow or building forts out of blankets on their snow days, not walking the frozen streets in hopes of scoring a meal or money to buy food! Imagine this scenario: a child ate breakfast and lunch at school on Friday, February 14th. He was off school Saturday and Sunday and again on Monday for the holiday/snow day (many schools were going to use this holiday as a make up day). Who knows and what this child has eaten since Friday afternoon. His first real meal may very well be Tuesday morning when he walks through the school doors. No child should ever have to worry about when and what he will eat. No parent should ever have to wonder how they will put food on the table. Hunger is a social issue that not only pisses me off, but it saddens to the core. There has to be something we can do to help this innocent children. I give regularly to the local food pantry and I also hold several food drives in my preschool, but I can't help but wonder what else we can do to to help. The next time you are at the store, pick up some extra cans of food and donate it to the local food pantry, help make a difference!

Is It Worth It?

It is 11:11pm on a Saturday night. The house is silent and still. I sit here by the glow of the computer going through my paperwork, trying to place 77 preschool students into prospective classes for the upcoming school year. I have already physically worked a 40 hour work week in my early childhood program. As the teacher and director, I work a double load. After my kids go to bed each night I sit up answering emails, writing lessons, going over employee needs, all of the things I couldn't do while teaching. I am tired and wearing thin, yet I love my job. My sweet Alex claimed to have a bellyache earlier so he is sprawled out on the couch next to me. I look at his little face as he slumbers away and I wonder if this is all worth it. Sure, my salary double this year and I've been able to provide my boys with so much more. Yes, I have job security as far as I know. True, I work in a very positive, healthy environment as opposed to what I walked away from. I love my staff, my students, my families and the foundation of what has become in my program. I can say with 99% certainty that I "heart" my job. Yet, I cannot help but wonder if my kids are suffering. They are in school full time now so working makes sense. I miss a lot of special events like last Thursday when Brennan read a petition at the all school Mass. Or the days when they had a noon dismissal and I needed our college aged sitter to get them from school. Part of me thinks, "They love Danielle and had fun, it was ONLY three hours!" The other part of me thinks, "You should be the one they come running to each day, not a babysitter!" I look at Alex's sweet features and wonder if I am screwing up my kids. Is this job and all the work all worth it in the end? One day they will be all grown up and won't need me when they have a bellyache at 10:00pm. That really pulls at my ol' heart strings. How do I know if I am making the "right" choice for my family?

Recipe: Quiche

Around here we call quiche "breakfast pie" because it is just a kid-friendly word. I make this quiche at least one a month because the boys will gobble this up and it is so easy to make. I serve this easy meal with whole wheat blueberry muffins and fresh fruit.

Ingredients
Deep dish pie shell
5 eggs
1 cup half & half OR skim milk
3 sliced green onions
1/2 cup chopped spinach
Bacon, cooked and crumbled (you can use any breakfast meat, but the kids like bacon)
1 cup shredded cheese (we like cheddar, but you can use your favorite)
Salt, pepper, garlic, dry mustard (to your liking)

Directions
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.

2. In a mixing bowl, whisk eggs well. Add in half & half (or milk), salt, pepper, garlic and dry mustard. Sometimes I even add in a few dashes of hot sauce (shhhh!).

3. Pour the egg mixture into the pie shell.

4. Add in bacon, onion and cheese.

5. Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes or until set.

When I make this I keep the green onion and the spinach on one side of the quiche and place all of the bacon on the opposite side, this pleases the vegetarian and the meat eaters alike! We never have any leftovers. You could add in any ingredients of your liking such as sliced tomatoes, diced ham, Swiss cheese, etc. I've served this for both breakfast and an easy weeknight dinner.

Recipe: Pot Pie

Our dear friends had their first baby a few weeks ago so I decided to make up some easy to freeze meals for them. When I had the boys the absolute best gifts were prepared dinners. I didn't have to worry about going to the store, cooking or cleaning up a big mess. It was so nice to just sit down and eat, especially when I was trying to juggle a newborn and a toddler. I decided to make double batches of the meals so we could have quick homemade dinners this week. Today I made stuff shell pasta, pot roast with carrots and potatoes and pot pie. I have to share this pot pie as it was so darn easy and it tastes pretty darn good! I didn't bake this pot pie, I just popped it straight into the freezer. Tomorrow night I will throw it in the oven and let it bake while I enjoy a clean kitchen! Note: I didn't measure much of anything, I just kinda threw a bunch of ingredients together based on what I thought sounded and looked good. Adjust as needed to fit your dietary needs.

Ingredients
1/2 stick of unsalted butter
Diced onion (I used about half of a small yellow onion)
Diced potato (I used four medium sized potatoes)
3.5 cups frozen veggie mix (I used green beans, sweet peas, carrots and corn medley, you can always use                                               fresh veggies, but I was strapped for time)
1/2 cup all purpose flour
2 cups low sodium chicken broth
1 cup low fat half and half
Chicken breast, cooked and diced (I boiled 3 large boneless skinless breasts & cubed them)
Pie crust (I used a Pillsbury pie crust because I was too darn busy to make one!)
Salt, pepper, minced garlic to your liking

Directions
1. Melt butter in a large, deep skillet or pan. Toss in onion, potato and veggies. Sprinkle with salt, pepper and minced garlic. Stir often so they do not burn or stick to the bottom of the pan. You'll want to cook this a good 15-20 minutes or until tender.

2. Sprinkle flour into veggies and mix well.

3. Slowly pour broth into the veggie mix. Slowly add in half & half. Mix often until mixture is thick and bubbly and heated all the way through. Then add in the chicken and heat all the way through.

4. Pour mixture in a large round casserole dish OR pour into two smaller dishes (I used two 8x8 pans).

5. Unroll pie crust and place on top of mixture. I used two 8x8 dishes and one crust fit perfectly on top (I fluted the edges). Cut a few slits on top so the steam can escape while baking.

6. This is where I just placed my dishes into the freezer to eat one night this week. You can pop this right into a preheated 350 degree oven for about 30-45 minutes. If you notice the edges of the crust getting too dark, you can wrap it in foil.

Serve this with a salad for a super tasty, easy dinner!