Kansas Day Snack Mix

Recipe:
2 T Butter (more if you like)
2 splashes Worchestershire sauce
2 cups Corn cereal
1/2 cup (or more) Mini pretzels
1 cup Sunflower kernels
seasoned salt
1 cup M&Ms


Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Melt butter and add Worchestershire sauce. Put cereal, pretzels and kernels in a gallon sized zippered baggy. Pour in melted butter sauce and shake to stir. Add seasoned salt to taste and shake again. Spread out on a baking sheet and put in the oven for ten minutes. Turn over and bake an additional ten minutes. Take out of the oven and pour into a bowl. Allow to cool. Add M&Ms.

Adventure:

I love holidays and I absolutely love my home-state of Kansas. And what better way to celebrate an incredible place to live than with a delicious treat? For snacktime we were at my mom's house and she helped us put together this fun little treat. Now Kansas is the Sunflower State, hence sunflower kernels. We're also known for the grains we grow, which is why we used the corn cereal (wheat was out of the budget). Kansas also has quite a bit of German heritage which is why we used pretzels. And M&Ms are just yummy! So Gary helped hold the bag open for me to put the ingredients in.  Then we added the butter sauce and Grammy helped Gary stir it all up.

Then it was time to put it in the oven to bake. My poor little guy has a cold right now and didn't make it to the last beeper. He was fast asleep on the couch as we took the mix out of the oven. After letting it cool for a while, it was time to add the M&Ms and mix it all together. 

 Now it's sitting on the counter waiting for Gary to wake up. If you live in Kansas, this is a fun way to celebrate our 152nd birthday. If not, personalize this mix to fit your state and enjoy it for your state's birthday!

Happy Kansas Day!

Fried Cereal

 Recipe:

2 T Butter
Appr. 2 cups Toasted Oat cereal
1-2 splashes Worchestershire sauce
Seasoned salt to taste

Melt butter in a frying pan. Add Worchestershire sauce and stir together. Add cereal and keep moving until all butter has been absorbed. Move cereal into a bowl. Sprinkle with seasoned salt and enjoy.

This recipe is a really good popcorn substitute and you can use just about any popcorn seasoning on it. Play around with it! :)

Adventure:
My favorite snack growing up was fried cereal. I'm not really sure how or why Mom came up with it, but she did and it was an instant hit in her house. Now when Gary wants a snack, we enjoy this childhood favorite together. Today while Abigail was napping, Gary said he wanted a snack. Before we got started, I told him that only Mommy could touch the pan and mix the cereal. "It's very very hot and I don't want you to get hurt. Can you just watch?"
"Yep."

So I got out the pan and all the ingredients that we would need and set them out ready to go. I started the butter melting and Gary obediently watched without touching. After I poured the cereal into a measuring cup, I set it on the stove top. Gary promoted himself to quality control and began testing the cereal to see if it was good enough. It passed the test.

                                         

Soon it was time to put the cereal into the melted butter sauce. Gary put only a few in at a time and then finally poured the whole cup in. He watched as I stirred the cereal around. "All done?" he asked

"Almost," I said. When the butter was finally all absorbed into the cereal, I put Gary down on the floor and poured the cereal into a bowl so that Gary could put the salt in. (My seasoned salt has a very slow pour. If yours is fast I would not recommend letting a small child put the salt in.) Then it was time to enjoy our snack together. Gary wanted to play in his room while eating. Since it's an easy snack to clean up, I let him. So together while letting Abigail rest, the two of us enjoyed our snacktime.

Garlic Lemon Chicken

Recipe:
1 lb Chicken (we used bone-in breast this time)
2 Lemons, sliced
2-3 Cloves garlic, finely minced
1 T Dried tarragon leaves (or more or less to your taste)
Salt and pepper to taste

Butter sides of crock pot. Place chicken inside. Mince garlic and slice lemons. Sprinkle chicken with garlic, tarragon leaves, salt and pepper. Set to low and cook 6-8 hours (if cooking from frozen, set to high for 2 hours and then to low for 4-6 hours). Enjoy with your favorite sides.

Adventure:

I always love it when Jonathan decides to help with dinner. Abigail was having a rough day Thursday, which is when we were scheduled to feed the missionaries. With her feeling especially needy, I was running out of morning to start the crock pot in. Jonathan volunteered to help out and Gary wanted to help too. Gary watched as his daddy minced the garlic and then helped sprinkle it on the chicken. He also helped crunch the tarragon leaves in his fingers as those to went into the crock pot.

As Abigail calmed down, I handed her to Jonathan and sliced the lemons before having Gary help me arrange them on top of the chicken. Once all the lemons were in the crock pot, it was time to put the lid on and get it started. Gary helped with both.

  

 With the crock pot turned on and everything set up, we started preparing to have Steven over to celebrate his eighteenth birthday. Throughout the day we could smell the lemon and chicken simmering in the pot. Despite all the busyness of the day we were able to have dinner mostly ready when the missionaries arrived. They helped out with getting the salad made and then we gathered about the table. Then with garlic toast and fresh salad, we enjoyed the chicken we'd been smelling all day. And it was another successful cooking day for my littlest chef.

Black Forest Brownies

 Recipe:
Box of brownie mix
Eggs, vegetable oil, water (see back of box for exact amounts)
Cherry pie filling
Cream Cheese frosting

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 13 X 9 baking pan. Mix brownie batter according to directions on box. Pour into pan and bake for ten minutes. Pull brownies out of oven and pour pie filling over the brownie. Spread evenly (because the brownie is not fully baked, the pie filling might mix into the batter; this is perfectly okay!). Bake for another 30-35 minutes. Allow to cool completely. Spread frosting over cooled brownies. Cut and enjoy.




Adventure:
Monday nights are family home evening in our house. That means a short lesson, lots of games and laughter and, of course, treats! Gary loves treats of all kinds, but he especially loves anything that has fruit in it. So he was really excited to help me start the brownies. He stretched his arms up to touch the countertop. "Up, county? Up?"
I picked him up and put him on the counter. "Are you going to help Mommy with the brownies?"
"Yep."
"Can you count eggs for me?"
"Yep."
"Okay, here's one egg." Crack.
"One. Two!"
"Good job, Gary," I said as I put the last egg in the brownie batter. Then I measured the water we would need.
"Mine, mine!"
I handed Gary the measuring cup and helped him pour the water into the bowl. Then we measured the oil and he put that into the bowl.
After that it was time for Gary's favorite part of baking: stirring. Once I got it started for him, he took over. It didn't take him long at all to get the brownie batter completely mixed together.

  

               

Then I poured it into the pan and Gary helped smooth it out. Once it was all ready, I put it into the over and set the timer for ten minutes. It seemed like a long wait for the beeper to finally go off. As I opened the oven door, I was greeted with the pleasant aroma of baking chocolate. I pulled the half-baked brownies out of the oven and put it onto the stovetop to pour the pie filling on top. Because the pan was very hot, Gary wasn't allowed to help with this part of the process. Instead he went with his uncle John to play in his room.

Once back in the oven, I set the timer again and we waited. The sweet smell of chocolate and cherry wafted through the apartment as we waited again for the beeper. Luckily we had dinner going while it was baking so that our growling stomachs could be soon satisfied. The brownies finished and I pulled them out of the oven and placed them on the counter to cool. We finished our dinner and I frosted the brownies just before starting family home evening with the boys. Our lesson was on continuing to learn throughout our lives. Each of us picked five things we want to learn throughout the year and wrote them down on pieces of paper as we enjoyed the gooey brownies.

Gary didn't have to write his down, but I bet one of his goals is to keep learning how to work in the kitchen.

Caramel Apple Cupcakes

Recipe:

Spice Cake mix (yellow is also yummy)

Eggs, Water, and Vegetable Oil (Check the back of your mix box for the exact amounts)

1-2 Granny Smith apples, diced small

Chopped nuts (I like pecans)

Melted caramel (a good homemade recipe is 2 T butter, 2 T corn syrup, and 1/4 cup brown sugar. STir together over medium heat until just before boiling.) 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease muffin tins or use muffin liners. 

Prepare cake batter according to the directions on the box. Fold in diced apples. Fill muffin liners appr. 2/3 full. Pour a spoonful of caramel on top of the batter. Sprinkle with nuts. Bake for 20 - 22 minutes. Allow to cool and enjoy!

Adventure:

I love it when my son decides that he wants to bake something. Especially when he starts jabbering and I know the jist of it is, "Mommy, I want to bake now. Not in a little bit. NOW!" We love to bake cookies, brownies and cakes. He especially loves it because there's so much that he can do. He may be just under two, but there are things that even the smallest child can help with. Abigail's job at the moment is to observe and smile when appropriate. She's very good at it. Gary's job is to force me into the kitchen and help add ingredients and stir.

After watching a movie together, Gary turned to me and said, "Cu-cakes?"

"We don't have any right now."

"Bake cu-cakes?"

I tried getting him interested in something else, but he persisted until finally dragging me by my pantleg into the kitchen and pointing to the box in the pantry. "Cu-cakes?"

"Alright, Gary, you win. Do you want apple cupcakes?"

"Yep." He walked to the fridge, pulled the door open and pointed to the crisper. "Appy?"

"I'll get the apples, Gary. Do you want to sit with Daddy or help Mommy?"

"Yep. County?" he asked, pointing to the countertop.

After having my husband get the camera and Abigail, I picked Gary up and set him down on the counter. I put the cake mix into the mixing bowl and then started cracking eggs to put into it. "Can you help me count, Gary?  Here's one." Crack. "Here's two."

"Free," Gary beamed. "One, two, free yay!" He clapped his hands as the last egg was put into the bowl. He watched me measure the water and put it in the bowl and then started reaching for the measuring cup.

"Do you want to put the oil in for Mommy?"

"Yep." 

He grabbed the cup as soon as the oil was measured and dumped it into the bowl. Mommy's job was to get the stirring started so that Gary's stirring would be easier. He made it clear when it was his turn to stir. "Poon? Poon?"

After getting everything stirred well (Mommy helped when Gary lost interest), it was time to put the apples into the batter. At first Gary only put in one apple at a time, but when I put a big handful in, he got the idea. Then he put the liners into the muffin tins.

 Once that was done, I started pouring the batter into the cups. Gary isn't quite ready to do that yet. Then I made the caramel sauce and spooned it onto the batter. After that was done, Gary and I started sprinkling nuts over them. When the last cupcake was caramel-ed and nutted, I put the tins in the oven to bake. 

Soon the whole apartment smelled of spicy cupcakes and baking apple. Mouths watered as we waited for the beeper to go off. It was a long twenty minutes. 

Finally the cupcakes finished and we were able to enjoy the delicious treats. Gary enjoyed his while listening to his daddy read him a story before naptime. As he fell asleep, perhaps he was dreaming of his very own bakery where caramel apple cupcakes would be the star.