Secret Sauce

Laura went to "play" with a friend of hers and when she came home, she asked what I was making. I told her stir-fry because it was on the menu. She stopped me and said she had a special recipe for the stir-fry. What could be so special about stir-fry? The answer is the sauce! The same friend she was out playing with is where this sauce recipe comes from, so thanks Kate (no, not Kate from OBB).

Stir Fry Sauce1/2 cup Yoshida's sauce (I buy it from Costco in a huge bottle)
1/2 cup pineapple juice (or whatever you can drain from a can of pineapple)
2-4 T brown sugar (alter to how sweet you like things- I used 4 T)
1 T freshly grated ginger
and the "secret" ingredient- lemon gelatin, about 1/2 of a 3 oz box (I used a generic brand)

2 T cornstarch

Create your stir fry by sautéing the vegetables you prefer (broccoli, carrots, peppers, celery, etc.). Add some cooked chicken if you'd like.

Stir all the sauce ingredients together and pour over vegetables when the carrots are tender (but not soft). If the sauce needs to be a little thicker for your preference, mix one more tablespoon of cornstarch in a little water and add to the sauce, stirring over medium-high heat. Serve over cooked rice. Get ready for yummy in your tummy.

This picture is only related to this post because Nora says I can't post without a picture, so here is a picture of Nora's daddy. Isn't he the cutest?

Sunday Activities

This must be her favorite pose. Even though it looks like the same day, it's not.

Sunday a week ago...
And yesterday...
Look at how gorgeous Laura did Agnes' hair. Love it!
Side view-
And sweet girls together.
Other happenings from yesterday was that we went to a missionary farewell. Senior missionaries, actually. They are going to Africa, so they decorated stuff in animal prints, etc. Here we have cake in a jar. Awesome.
Great favor to give away. It was pretty tasty.
I left my camera in the car, otherwise I'd show you a picture of Taylor and Jean with Bud and me. Good luck in Africa, my friends.

On A Break

I'm sorry to leave you with meatballs- but I'm having so much fun with my grandkids being here that I don't have much time to spend at the computer. I'll try to post from time to time, but for the most part, I've got to let this go for a bit while the babies are visiting.

Sweet and Sour Meatballs

Are you tired of my talking about OBB's cookbook? No? Well, in either case, they're back in stock at the Murray Costco, in case you've been wondering. LynnEl, I bought you two more because I couldn't bear to part with my six spare copies. Oh wait, I gave one away last week at a wedding reception, so now I only have five spare copies!
These meatballs are fairly basic as far as recipes go, but the sauce was really tasty, especially the next day when Laura cooked up some bowtie pasta to go with the leftover meatballs.

And in completely unrelated news, I just thought I would show you how much fun we were having at our last game night. Those of you who weren't there...and you know who you are, we missed you :)

Sweet and Sour Meatballs (from Our Best Bites Cookbook)

1 lb extra-lean ground beef

2 T dehydrated onion (way to use your food storage stuff!)

1/4 tsp pepper

1 tsp kosher salt

1 egg, beaten

1/4 cup bread crumbs (I used Panko)

Sauce-

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

3 T flour

1 1/2 cups pineapple juice or water

1/4 cup white vinegar

3 T soy sauce

In a medium bowl, combine all meatball ingredients. Shape into 1-inch balls and place on a baking sheet lined with foil which was sprayed with Pam. Place under the broiler for 5-7 minutes or until the meatballs begin to brown.

In a large saucepan, whisk the sauce ingredients together and bring to a boil. Add the meatballs and simmer (covered) for 20 minutes, stirring often.

I didn't cook mine under the broiler because I didn't want to heat up the kitchen (we were actually having a warm day for a change), so I just cooked my meatballs on the stovetop. I added some chopped green pepper (because Samuel wasn't coming to dinner) while the meatballs were cooking. Then I added the sauce ingredients together and poured it over the meatballs. In the final couple of minutes, I added some pineapple tidbits and served it over rice. Yum.

Pretty Girls

No time to talk, just wanted to show you these pretty girls! I love them being at my house!!

Breakfast Food?

By now you must know my favorite food blog is Our Best Bites. The other day, Sara posted this cake which originally came from Cook's Illustrated, but I'm not going to link you over there, because you have to have a membership to check out this recipe from Cook's Illustrated. Yesterday, since Blogger was down and I couldn't post anything, I got busy in the kitchen instead.
I made the chocolate cake and accompanying frosting and asked my sister and b-i-l to come over and have some.
The cake was divine. I think we decided we would have preferred a more substancial frosting. This one was very light, like eating chocolate whipped cream (stands to reason since that's basically what it is- and it was very good, we were just in the mood for a little more "umph").

Now I'm wondering if I can eat if for breakfast. After all, it has four eggs and 2 extra yolks in the cake. That counts as breakfast food, doesn't it?

Click over to OBB if you want the recipe. You won't be sorry.

Two More Quilts

Here are two more quilts we were impressed with. This one won best Holiday quilt. LynnEl says she has this fabric, or at least the fabric on the edge.
What I loved about this was the border. I've never seen anything like it.
This was the big winner of all the marbles. When you first look at it, you don't really comprehend what you are seeing, except just an oriental-looking picture. But when you take a closer look...
...you realize the intensity and amazement of what makes this quilt so special. Look at all these stitches!
See all that gold? It's all thread. That's a lot of stitching!
We had a really good time. I'm glad I went :)

A Stitch In Time

Last weekend I went to the quilt show with my sister. Here she is with her quilt entry. It was a wedding gift for her son and daughter-in-law.
and the quilting detail-
It was interesting to see the differences in these quilts. They all look the same from a distance, but the quilting choices were all very unique.
People are getting so creative with quilts. Here's the big picture...
and a close-up. Amazing.
Quilts aren't just two dimensional anymore either.
Look how the flowers really pop out.
After we wandered for a couple hours, it was lunch time. One guess as to where we are!
I really loved the embellishment detail on the plate.
I think I can figure that out for my next party!

Here's the group- such a fun day, ladies!
I have a few more quilts to show you later- including the one that won best of show. It will knock your socks off, unless you aren't wearing any socks.

Bread and Jam

Saturday was jam-making day. Costco has the nicest looking berries, and I found them completely irresistible! Because my brain has gone quiet spacey these days, I knew that making five batches of jam was going to get me in trouble when it came time to add the sugar if I didn't come up with a system. Here's my system. I first used my measuring cups to weigh out 4 1/2 cups of sugar and poured all that sugar onto my food scale. It was 2 pounds exactly. I poured that into a ziplock and repeated the weighing process for the other four batches. No more thinking involved.
Deliciousness. Cheryl, since Kim has given all your jam away, you may have some of mine.
My assignment for Mother's Day dinner was to bring the rolls. I wanted to try a new recipe. You know Samuel's rule- the one I always seem to ignore? Don't try a new recipe when company is coming. Go with tried and true! Um, yeah- new recipe here. So far, they look pretty great. This is just before I popped them in the oven.
And this is what they looked like when they came out of the oven.
This recipe made 4 dozen rolls! That's a lot of rolls!
Everyone told me they tasted as good as they looked, so I got lucky! Whew.

Since I posted a less than stellar picture of my mom for Mother's Day, I thought I'd show you how great she looked yesterday.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom. I think she looks great for almost 80!
The roll recipe is from a book that my mom was throwing away re-gifting. I adopted it, but I don't think it counts that I have to get rid of one of my books to make room for it since I didn't purchase the book (that's justification, right?).

Sharon's Rolls (from "Five-Star Recipes from well-known Latter-Day Saints")
Submitted by Sharon G. Larsen

1 cup butter (or margarine- I used butter)
2 pkg. dry yeast (I used 2 T instant yeast)
2 T sugar
2 cups lukewarm water
1 cup sugar
6 eggs, beaten
8 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp salt

Melt butter and cool slightly. Mix yeast, 2 T sugar and water; make sure your yeast is going to get happy and bubbly before proceeding. Add butter, sugar and eggs to the yeast mixture. Mix well. Stir in flour and salt; let rise about 2 hours. Stir down the dough, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.
Remove from refrigerator and place on floured surface. separate dough into four equal hunks of dough (no the recipe didn't say hunk). Roll each piece into a large circle. Spread circle with butter. Using a pizza cutter, cut circle into twelve equal pie-shaped pieces. Roll each wedge up, starting from the outside wide end to the point. Place rolls on parchment-lined sheet, with the point underneath so it won't unroll when it rises.
Let rise 4-5 hours. Bake at 375°F for 10 minutes. Brush with melted butter as soon as you take them out of the oven.

This is what it looks like if you don't "tuck your tails." This was from a previously posted recipe. I learned my lesson then to tuck my tail!

Happy Mothers Day

I want to wish my sweet mother a very Happy Mother's Day today. I love you, Mom. You are wonderful!
For some reason, I had very few pictures on my computer to choose from of my mother. I guess I'll have to get some updated photos later today!

"Children and mothers never truly part,

Bound in the beating of each other's heart." -Charlotte Gray