Unstuffed Crockpot Cabbage

I promised to deliver some easy, versatile meals to help you in your busy life. Here's a favorite my husband asks for weekly which only requires three ingredients for the basic version:

Start with one small cabbage. Wash, core, and cut into wedges. Pile it into a greased crock pot. 

Brown a pound and a half of lean hamburger in a nonstick frying pan over med/hi heat. You may add onions and garlic to this step. Salt and pepper to taste. Spoon the cooked, drained meat over the cabbage chunks in the crock pot.

Open two med/lg jars of spaghetti sauce and pour over the meat. (We prefer Prego to all other brands and nobody pays me to say that.) Cover the crock and cook on low/med all day. That's it! Serve over hot, cooked white or brown rice.The above recipe makes a lot and tastes just like stuffed cabbages without all the work. I can't tell you how it freezes because we can't leave it alone long enough to need to extend its Fridge Life.

Now, for the variations: You might like to toss on some cheese a few minutes before serving. This may pacify children who could be suspicious of the cabbage. Anything would work--mozzerella, parmesan, even cheddar. I like to slice up one or two peppers and add them the last hour. This makes the dish resemble stuffed peppers--again, without the fuss. I would imagine that sliced zucchini or mushrooms would also be fabulous. Last, experiment with what you serve the cabbage over. Pasta, quinoa, and couscous come to mind as possibilities. Enjoy!!!

 

Chicken Salsa

Some of you may be mildly interested to know that I have decided to include some recipes/cooking tips in The View From Here. Not that I think I am the end-all in advice about diet and nutrition, but I have fed a lot of people in the past 33 years and I think that qualifies me. Also, if Prairie Woman, or whatever-her-name-is, can blog about her ranch AND her cooking, surely I can.

I will start with a loose recipe that I posted on Facebook a couple weeks ago. I say LOOSE recipe because that pretty much defines how I cook--loosely, usually with few or no recipes and with simple things that are hanging around my fridge/pantry. As a mother of five and grandmother of seven, I know that feeding people can be a daunting affair and not all of us can get snooty about gourmet food when the children are little. All day long young mommies wipe noses, trip over toys, soothe owies, and referee sibling conflict. Suddenly, it is five o'clock. They hear the husband's car in the driveway and think, "Shoot! I forgot about dinner!" And while cereal and frozen pizza certainly have a place in anyone's menu rotation, it should not constitute the norm or it loses it's specialness. Food is my Love Language and nothing says, "I LOVE YOU," like an intentional, hot meal set on the table at the end of a long day. So, here is the first of many? installments and stay tuned for future food blogs:

CHICKEN SALSA
-3 large whole skinless/boneless chicken breasts
-1 large jar of salsa

Place chicken, frozen or thawed, into a crock pot. You can use more chicken or less depending on how much you have or how many you're feeding. Dump salsa onto chicken. You can use as much salsa, and whatever potency, as you like. (The beauty of this recipe is--it won't MATTER!) Cover and slow cook for a few hours. Okay, all day, probably.  I always start the dial on high to get things going and then reduce to low when I leave the house. And then I forget about dinner until I walk in the back door after work, inhale deeply and query, "Who has been cooking for me?!!!"*

At this juncture, I give the chicken a stir--somethings chunking or shredding it with a fork. The dish is now ready to eat--as is--over rice or in buns or tortillas. HOWEVER don't miss the charm of the myriad variations on this theme. An hour before you want to serve it, add sliced veggies (peppers, onions, zucchini) and/or drained beans/corn. The plain or fancy version can be piled onto fresh greens for a salad, tortillas for chicken tacos/burritos, or onto chips topped with shredded cheese for macho nachos. If you add chicken broth (water and dissolved boullion) you can call it Soup and serve with tortilla chips on the side. For an extra creamy kick, add cream cheese or sour cream to the chicken before you do any of the above. Finish with a garnish of cilantro, black olives, or chopped fresh tomatoes if you want to get really fancy. You might even feel motivated to light some candles and post a picture of your food to FB and I would applaud you as the Super Mom you, indeed, are.

Helpful Side Note: If you make enough of this loveliness, you will have enough for more than one meal/variation and it is seriously good enough, and versatile enough, to make once a week.

*Warning: If you are home all day with small children, this will make their saliva glands run continually and they will be all primed for supper long before the food is ready, probably. You might need to go to the park after naps to kill time and keep them away from the table.

Love at First Bite

In his best-selling book The Five Love Languages, Gary Chapman outlines five ways people communicate and understand love. They are: Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Physical Touch, Quality Time, and Gifts. My daughter Amy, however, has identified a sixth love language (or perhaps a new dialect combining several of the above) and it is called simply, "Food."

Those of us fluent in the Food Love Language (FLL), know that food is never really just about food. Food represents so much more--the giving of your creativity and energy, the actual presentation and fulfillment of your most basic physical needs, and then quality time as we eat together. What we want to hear back are Words of Affirmation--not necessarily about how great the food is, though certainly welcomed--but more how much you are enjoying the food and how loved you feel that we are feeding you.

I have blogged endlessly about eating as a child and my rocky beginnings, about feeding animals and the pleasure it brought me. But I really began to notice food when I got married and began making it myself. Early attempts at cooking were disastrous. I remember a whole chicken I roasted upside down that was dry in spots and raw in others. It bled when I tried to carve it and I cried. I had no understanding of how to get multiple dishes done and on the table at the same time. That night we ate potatoes and veggies while we waited for the meat. I also didn't understand portions. I made two gallons of scalloped potatoes for my young husband and myself and was distraught when, after two solid hours in the oven, the potatoes were still crunchy. I threw out more food than we ate in those days--blatantly refusing to consume my mistakes. The one dish I succeeded at was spaghetti, and I made it for every single person who came to my house for two years.

Dating back to earlier times, I have stunning recall of meals I was fed. I remember eating bagels for the first time that friends from New York fed us in Florida in 1983, homemade deep dish pizza at Stan and Cheri Balgaard's in 1985, and roast beef on homemade buns that Charlotte Lueders brought over after the birth of our son in 1987. We were introduced to home canning and brussels sprouts at the Lowe's in Missouri (1986), chicken parmigiana at the Savocas and creamed spinach and hot German potato salad at the Sybesmas in Philly (1995), grilled swordfish at the Sheets' (1988) and homemade egg rolls and jiodza by the Waldrons--missionaries to China--in 1997. My cousin Bill King bought me my first Whopper in Washington in 1979. It was the first time I ever ate tomatoes on a hamburger. And liked it. The first Sunday we visited a brand-new church in Pennsylvania in 1994, the Hackenbergers invited us to their home for sandwiches and they were the best we'd ever eaten because we weren't eating alone. Right here in town our friends, the Moneys, introduced us to wild game and the Abrahams to Indian cuisine. My sister, Kathleen--aka the Soup Fairy, and our pastor, Ned, opened my eyes to the splendor of fresh herbs...and baklava. I could list dozens of friends and relatives who have fed us over the past 30 years and even tell you what was on the menu, in most cases.

Before you scoff--think! Doesn't a sandwich that someone else makes and cuts on the diaganol just taste better? Or coffee that someone else pours? Or even canned soup that someone else heats on the stove? Why is food such an expression of love? I think eating appeals to us all on a very basic level. We eat, at first to survive. But once our lips taste ice cream, it is all over. We continue to eat because we love food. And we love to enjoy the experience with others. It is a social event, a hobby, a way of life. When we feed people, we are tapping into a selfless, nurturing side of ourselves. When we are fed, we feel loved and cared for.

I wish I had been in the wilderness the day that Jesus was confronted with 5000 hungry people. The disciples wanted Jesus to send the crowds away because it was late and the mob was hungry. And Jesus said, "YOU feed them." Feed them! Feed them what? Five loaves and two fish fed 5000 that day with 12 baskets of leftovers. Who was the most amazed when it was over? The crowds who didn't know where the food came from? Or the disciples who knew full well? Five thousand bellies were filled. Five thousand grateful hearts were satisfied. And 12 stunned men who got to witness firsthand the love of God expressed.

My friend, Christie, also fluent in FLL, has told people, "If you want to be in my inner circle, you must let me feed you." I like nothing better than people I love, sitting at my counter or table or on my porch, eating. If I offer you food or drink and you refuse, you offend me. Just know that going in. I will watch you eat. I will listen to what you say and even what you don't say. If you praise the food, I make mental note to prepare it again, only better. If you say nothing, or don't take seconds, I record that as well, and will serve you something different next time. I take notes as you discuss other foods you have eaten--what you liked, what you didn't--and it all goes into a file in my head. If you really want to respond to me in a way that will communicate love, you will say something like this to me:

Me: Stephie, how do you like the egg/ham/cheese croissant sandwich that I made for you on this, your last day home for the summer [before you head off to the godless college cafeteria]?

Stephie: Oh, Mom, this is the best sandwich I have ever eaten in my whole life. You must love me a whole lot.

You see? Wisdom out of the mouth of my own babe.

I made blueberry muffins this morning...now, who can I feed them to?

Food, Glorious Food!

I come from a long line of finicky eaters. My Gram told me about how, when my dad was a baby, she worried herself sick because all he ate for a solid week was oatmeal. And when she was a little girl she was so fussy she would hold her bread up to the light hoping to find a speck in it so she could refuse to eat it. So why was anyone surprised when I balked at the dinner table?

I remember sitting for an eternity at a deserted table staring at a plate of stone cold liver and fried cabbage: Organ meat and a vegetable that smells like dirty socks. Sometimes I could slip little pieces of the liver to my dog under the table, but what do you do with a vegetable that the dog licks and walks away from? Feeding Fritz was risky at best. Then my parents came up with the brilliant idea of offering my sister and I a spoonful of Cod Liver Oil in place of our unfinished dinner. Cod Liver Oil, for the uneducated, is just what it sounds like; the oil from a codfish’s liver. It is fishy, and livery, and oily and you taste it for days. Having to choose between eating liver or drinking the oil from the liver of a fish is like being asked if you’d like to die by fire or drowning.

I got artistic with my food, cutting it into small pieces and rearranging it on the plate. I hoped it would look like some of it had been eaten. I also tried stuffing my mouth and then excusing myself to the bathroom to spit in the toilet. However, it is hard to excuse yourself with a stuffed mouth and not appear guilty.

Part of the problem was that I was never really hungry. I pictured myself as someone who could Live Off the Land and had numerous hidden resources. Endowed with a mere smattering of genuine Iroquois Indian blood, I knew how to provide for myself. I learned to whittle very sharp arrows from skinny branches and fashioned working bows to launch them from. The homemade arrows could travel an impressive distance, albeit inaccurately, but I practiced tirelessly in case I ever ran across any unsuspecting game. My stomach rarely complained as I was cunning enough to find sustenance from the bounty of Mother Nature, snacking all day long like a vagabond beggar.

I began first thing in the morning. Right after my own breakfast of Raisin Bran and orange juice, I’d head over to the Barry’s next door. Their clan of five always tumbled out of the house around 9 AM, still in their jammies, carrying the most tantalizing food of all—peanut butter toast. And not just any peanut butter toast either. This was undercooked toast, more like warmed bread; spread first with butter, then peanut butter. Drooling, I would watch them eat, lick the dripping peanut butter from their fingers and beg for just one bite. No toast at my house ever tasted like toast on the neighbor’s back step.

On the other side of our house lived an old widow, Mrs. Nelson. Early in the day we children would conspire what time was best to approach her door as we knew it would be impolite to go too often. All we had to do was knock and wait on her step, smiling. She was quite hard of hearing so we had to knock a few times, and loudly. Eventually she came to the door to greet us. I don’t remember that she spoke English. She’d say something in Norwegian, smile at us, and disappear only to return minutes later with a single lemon drop for each of us. We’d pop the candy in our mouths, wave, and be on our way. Every day was like Halloween with this nice lady next door.

My grandpa was always good for a handout, too. Mid-morning, my sister and I would pedal our bikes down to the Equity station where he worked, pumping gas and washing windshields. On a good day, he’d notice it was coffee time and would take us to the City Restaurant across the street. We’d shinny up the high stools at the lunch counter and watch him slurp his hot coffee from a saucer while we drank bottles of orange pop so fast we got fizzy mustaches and could belch impressively. Then we’d spin on the stools until we were dizzy and Grandpa said it was time for him to go back to work. Some days, he was too busy at the station to go to coffee. When we looked sad, he’d reach into his gray work pants and pull out an oblong rubbery coin holder with a slit that opened when you squeezed the ends. He’d hand us “two bits” and tell us, “Don’t spend it all in one place.” Grandpa was full of sayings like that which made no sense to a kid.

When the noon whistle blew, I knew enough to be home for lunch—which I also picked at half-heartedly before I’d rush back outside for an afternoon of foraging. I stuffed myself on green apples, unwashed carrots plucked straight from the garden, wild plums, and some kind of seedy green berries that must not have been poisonous because I’m still alive to tell you about it. Mid-afternoon, it was time for Renee and me to visit our Gram. If she was at home, she’d let us raid her copper cookie jar, “Have all you want!” And there was always the red glass candy dish that sat dead center on her oak coffee table. Year around it was filled with all our favorite candy and we could eat as much as we wanted. And we wanted a lot.

If it was a day that Gram was filling in at the Ashby Federal Credit Union, so much the better. First, we’d keep her company between customers by helping her type on the old manual typewriter. She gave us carbon paper so she could keep a copy of our work and we had one to take home. Before long, she’d pull out her purse and suggest we go get ourselves a treat. We’d act all surprised like the thought had never occurred to us then skip off to Buddy’s or Capper’s and debate what to get. Renee liked candy that lasted a long time.My favorite was a little box of pretzel sticks that cost a nickel—I wanted to get the most for my money. Sometimes, we put up our whole quarter for a paper sack of bing cherries. Then we’d sit on the Credit Union steps under the big cloth awning eating cherries and spitting the pits into the street.

Before we knew it, it was suppertime again [sigh]. My folks did all they could to coax me to eat. They tried calling ordinary beef stew “Daniel Boone Stew.” I’d picture myself sitting on a sparse wooden bench beside a fire eating from a tin plate. I’d even hum a few bars of “Daniel Boone was a man, was a b-i-i-i-g man…” But even my vivid imagination didn’t help when I got to the carrots. I would chew and chew and chew and the carrots would grow and grow and grow inside my mouth. Why did they taste better raw with a bit of dirt still on them?

As the years passed, I overcame my aversion to conventional meals. In fact, I grew extremely fond of food and there is very little that I will not eat—even without the imminent threat of Cod Liver Oil. I’ve spent much of the past three decades honing my cooking skills and feeding others. As I’ve gone along, I’ve noticed something: People like people who feed them. I have also come to realize that Food is my Love Language. If I was at your house five years ago, I could tell you what you fed me. If you were at my house five years ago, I could tell you what you took seconds on and what you passed up so I’d know what to make for you the next time you come over. I watch cooking shows and read cooking magazines. I view dining out as a Spy Mission. I analyze what I am eating to see if I can make the same thing at home. With all this interest in food and eating, it was only natural that I would seek a profession in which I could use my gifts. I am happy to report that, at the tender age of 45, I found my life’s calling: I became The School Lunch Lady.

These past three years I’ve been able to combine my love of kids with my love of feeding people and it’s truly a match made in heaven. Every day I get to feed dozens of kids and I never make them clean their plates. I don't threaten them or even make them try a bite of everything. (I figure that is what their parents are for.) I give them seconds on anything they like and applaud those who return for veggies. I cheer when they drink their milk. They hug me when they see me in the hallways.

I was recently reminded of the time when Jesus miraculously fed the 5,000 with two small fish and five loaves of barley bread. People flocked after him because he fed them. (What did I tell you?) But Jesus later said harder things to swallow like, “I am the bread of life,” and “Take, eat—this is my body which is broken for you.”

Jesus didn’t come just to fill people’s stomachs and make them feel good for a moment. He is able to make much out of what little we offer to him—multiplying it so it’s pressed down, shaken together, and running over when it comes back again. But better yet, he came to give HIMSELF to satisfy an appetite we didn’t know we had—a hunger for some meaning in life outside our own day-to-day scavenging for significance. He has prepared a table for us…no gimmicks, no bait and switch, no distasteful surprises. He’s promised Goodness and Mercy to follow us all the days of our lives. Where is my fork? Let's eat!

Dispelling the Myth: You Can Never Have Too Much of a Good Thing

Fiber is good for you. Everyone says so. Some of fiber's claims to fame are its ability to flush cholesterol out of your bloodstream and toxins from your intestinal tract. Every single manufacturer in the free world is wanting to capitalize on what Grandma always preached about roughage by adding it to each and every product on grocery store shelves.

On Monday, I bought one of each.

I am not a big fan of dieting. I like flavor. I like butter. I like to be full. However, I have realized, since the passing of the holidays, that Something Has Got to Give. And it needs to not be the seams in my jeans. Early in the week, while most people were not even out of bed, I filled my grocery cart with $200 worth of highly nutritious, high fiber foods. Over the next two days, I dined on double fiber bread (5 gms/fiber), high fiber oatmeal (a whopping TEN gms/fiber per serving), high fiber tortillas, high fiber English muffins, high fiber pasta, high fiber yogurt, even high fiber V-8 juice--you can DRINK your fiber--yes! All were consumed in addition to the naturally high fiber fruits and veggies I crammed into my refrigerator. (Of course, I knew enough to wash all this down with quarts of water. I'm not stupid.) I reported to my daughter Amy that, "I'm not even a tiny bit hungry...in fact, I feel a little...bloated."

I'm sure it didn't help that Monday was also the day I initiated my new vitamin regimen, chewing two Flintstones Vitamins Plus Iron each morning--totally disregarding the fact that all iron supplements have historically had an adverse effect on me.

When I became sick on Wednesday with a fever and chills, all suspicion turned to my fiber-laden larder. "I feel like I have ingested the equivalent of a small Redwood tree," I lamented to anyone who would listen. "What is IN this crap--sawdust?!" I have spent the past five days sipping chicken broth and eating plain white saltines--also excellent diet choices, btw. For future reference, I would highly recommend you not eat a lot of fiber just prior to getting the flu. You CAN have too much of a good thing. Trust me.