A Recipe of Thanks

Yes Thanksgiving has come and gone. My husband and I always have quiet holidays just because I realized that when I was my children's age it was always so hectic to run from in-laws to parents to other grandparents etc. So it isn't easy giving up my children and grandchildren for holidays but you readjust and you see them in calmer circumstances. You get off of the pity party of not being with them and you just enjoy the day of not having to be at work, not to have to work to entertain others and just enjoy your day. It actually turns out a little selfish when you think about it.

Well this is the first year that I really had to think what am I going to eat for Thanksgiving. Two of our friends and us would go to a local bar in town that had 5 star rated Thanksgiving dinner for free. It was the Bar's way of thanking the community for supporting them.

During Thanksgiving we all live in a state of "you should be thankful for the things you have." Even though in so many ways I have shown through this blog the ways I have thanked God for different issues in my life, you still do think, what am I thankful for on this particular day.

Yes I could go through all the traditional thank yous, my husband, my kids... and undoubtedly they are thank yous in my life, but I am not going to.

You know what I am going to thank God for, is the knowledge in cooking and baking. After taking a few cooking classes and listening to my youngest the fact she doesn't know how to cook, I am amazed that people do not know this. Didn't their mothers teach them how to cook. Truly, but when I think about it my mother even though she cooked every day, she really didn't teach me either. Of course I dabbled a few times in baking cookies or other things, but my mother really didn't teach me, she just did it. I guess she figured I would learn by osmosis. My first husband stupidly said he loved rice and gravy that he use to make while he was on his own, and so guess what he got for at least several months after we got married, Rice and Gravy.

It took many years and several children and circumstances for me to feel you need to learn and so I guess I just started reading recipes and of course like any great cook, I burned a lot of dishes.

Still to this day I don't think I cook or bake real well and I am always amazed when something I actually cooked comes out really good.

Since this year I can't go out and enjoy 5 star food without picking through the dressing made out of bread, I will stay home and make my own dressing. I will make my own gravy, and desserts. It didn't take the celiac for me to learn how to at least try to cook and bake something good. It took a life time of trial and error.

So God, thank you for helping me along that path, I might not be the greatest cook, but I am okay and that's good enough for me.

Back To Normal

I have been having blood tests run about every six months just to check my celiac level and my fatty liver. I intentionally made sure I was very aware of my intake of any kind of flour prior to having the tests. With a few mishaps which always seems to happen when it comes to doctors, I had the tests run and yes "I AM NORMAL." Everything is down to normal. I am so excited. If I could just get my stomach to get better I would feel perfect. I don't think normal people realize how big of deal this is. My count was 120 and now it is down to 20. That is a big deal and a lot of work.

Now if I could just give up all of the sugar I would happy.

Oh Whoops

The stomach is still one of those, did I eat something wrong or different, did I drink to much, did I exercise in the wrong way, to almost to the point of did I sleep the wrong way. Somedays it can be just down right miserable. Everyone asks if it is the celiac or the wheat and I have to keep repeating myself "no, it is when I ruined the lining of the stomach by eating to much pain medication. You wouldn't think it would be that big of a deal. Ask anyone that has done the same thing, and they are still having and will always have problems.

Well one quick way of throwing your whole system into a whack is to drive out of your garage in the dark, with a very dirty car, with no garage lights on, with your husband's car in the driveway. Now you wouldn't think those things would make your stomach sick, well all those scenarios is a perfect storm. Crunch, I don't remember that snow behind my car, then you realize, oh whoops, you just hit your husband's car. Now this wouldn't be such a big deal to some, especially to a husband that has a car that has 250,000 miles on it and has a few scratches on it already. My husband takes every little ding to his cars, no matter how many miles it has, very personal. Knowing also my husband he wouldn't really care about my car, the brand new one, just his car and what he will be seen in. Now mind you we also have a perfectly good Tahoe in the garage, that no one drives, with no scratches on it. Hmmmmmmmmmm, what's wrong with this picture.

So in the dark I am driving to work horribly upset, not only for my husband's reaction, but what did I do to my new car. By the time I got to work my stomach was about to explode. After several pills later, and trying to calm myself down and several hours later, my stomach wasn't perfect, but it was a lot better.

I think I need to get rid of my stress.

Freezer Floweith Over

I have especially realized over the last several months that my freezer is getting way to crammed. I have two fridges with two quite large freezers and both of them are ready to burst.

When you become gluten free, you realize if you are ever to eat again, it won't be in a restaurant, but of the results of your own hands. Well with the life span of certain flours and especially the cost associated with each one of those flours, you don't want to take the chance of one of them going rancid. So what do you do is put each one of them in a freezer container to be stored in your freezer. With several different containers you have at least 1/4 of your freezer taken up just with mixing ingredients for future baked goods.

Thanksgiving has just come and gone and with the leftovers, I have become more creative. I think in the past I would have froze some for future sandwiches, but with the lack of interest in bread, I had to come up with ways of saving for inventive taste buds. So what came out of it, was turkey pot pies with a cornbread/Parmesan top crust and a white turkey chili. I think both of them are going to be great for the future.

The other part of my cooking for the season turned out an abundance amount of different kinds of cookies. Some with wheat and some without gluten. I knew I wouldn't be able to eat 2,000 cookies and I really didn't want to save them already cooked so I froze a lot of dough, and I mean a lot of dough.

The other big thing that is taking up my freezer is soups. With the cold weather around us, I thought what would be great for quick but hot meals. It turned out about 10 different kinds of soups, but when you make a whole recipe of each one of those soups, it turns out several cups in different size containers totally taking over your freezer.

Sometimes I wish there was a good will for frozen foods, because right now I could donate a ton of food that I am sure someone would appreciate.

At least we will be good for the winter.

Separation Between Heaven and Earth

Now before you think I have lost it, and I am giving my predestination of going to the other world, I really am not. I also can't see to the other side either, so believe it or not I am not a psychic. After watching a numerous amount of shows I am not sure I want that power, but it would be interesting for a day, maybe that is how I would win the lotto.

I have to drive up and down a canyon to go to work and sometimes, especially with the change of the seasons, I will be in the canyon at the right moment when the sunset or sunrise aren't quite a sunset or sunrise. It will have this iridescent hue on the walls and I feel like I have gone into the Twilight Zone and no one else is quite there with me. My surroundings seem so unreal and even though there might be cars and activity around me its like I am living in a movie that really isn't real.

I know that this must be that mere, maybe 5 minutes of the day that God really wants us to wake up and he'll say "yes this is what I created, pay attention." I am sure God wishes we woke up more times than just the 5 or 10 minutes each day to really realize of all the beauty on this earth, including ourselves was created by him and that we should take care of it.

Since I got sick I have realized not only the advantage of how healthy I really was before, I could eat anything and never have a problem, until now where some days I am not sure I can make it through the day in some of the pain I am in. God created us and this earth so we could know the difference between good and bad in all things. I definitely know when I am feeling really good. I am definitely not advocating suicide or even the intention of suicide, because I truly believe that we must live out our time here on earth to know the good, you may have to go through the hell to get there, but there is good around us. But can you imagine that mere 5 seconds that it will take to pass from this world to iridescent heaven above, where there is no pain, where there is no thought of wondering if I am going to come on to evil or suffering anymore, but only joy and a peace.

I bask in that 5 minutes in the canyon when the opportunity hits, because I know God is watching and telling me "wake up and appreciate it."

Where has all the Summer gone?

It has been one year since I was diagnosed with several of my ailments. I swear it was just yesterday. I look back at this last year and I realize so much as gone on. From throwing up constantly, wondering if something was extremely wrong with me, to taking a multitude of tests, to thinking am I going to live on this diet, to traveling and eating, to now.

The winter is now coming in, most of the leaves at our house have gone off the trees, and the color of gray has transcended on our house. There is a mere month between fall and winter that really isn't anything. I know it is one of those seasons, but for me it is a state of hibernation. The ground has no snow on it to ski with, but the skies are always threatening. That is when the fireplace comes alive, the books come out, the movies are played and the blankets become a welcoming comfort.

I use to hate that month, it seemed so nothing, so daunting, but as I grow older I have found that I am not physically able to keep up with everything. I am not old enough to sit in a chair, but I am not young enough to keep up with everything, which in the end makes me feel guilty of not physically doing more. This month allows me to just do whatever I want and not feel guilty at all since the weather is dictating to me that it is uncooperative.

But what happened to this last year. When your life is so busy, it just passes so quickly. Old people say life goes so fast, and I can now believe.

RECIPE HORSE

Some women are Clothes Horses, they obsess over having clothes and the variety of clothes. I have become a Recipe Horse. I kind of hate cooking, I kind of hate looking through endless recipes in cookbooks, but I started a new fetish out of mere necessity of being gluten free.

This weekend is going through two things in my house (since it is bad weather), one, my closest, since I haven't had time to keep up on the maintenance of my clothes and the weather has turned cold, I need to go through it and check to see what I have to wear for the winter, plus discard all of my old clothes to good will. Two, my recipe folders. I truly need to go through it and throw away recipes that I have collected, either the ones I have tried and they were bad, or I haven't tried and they just need to go away.

I have also become frugal, not to the point that I couldn't throw away old food, but I feel so bad that I wasn't paying enough attention in my kitchen to either eat the food I made or at least save it in the freezer. I had a huge freezer once and it turned into the freezer burn Mecca of my cooking kitchen. I learned having a huge freezer is subconsciously waisting food that you don't pay attention to. It is like having a file box that you use but never do the filing. Everything gets lost and then obsolete or misplaced. No one should have either one.

We have two fridges. If I ever build again, I will definitely have two fridges and two ovens, plus a warming tray in my kitchen. Two dishwashers sound really good too, but sort of impracticable for two people. An installed deep fryer sound pretty good too. Back to the fridges. We have two fridges that have a third of the appliance as a freezer. I try to cook and shop to keep a good supply of meats and baked goods in case I need them. You never know when someone is going to drop by and you need to entertain. But they are small enough that I tried to go through the entire freezer before I start stocking it again. It's amazing the cookie dough that gets placed in the back, or the appetizers someone brought to your last party that never got ate.

Okay, okay, back to the recipe thing... A friend of mine told me once she was having the same problem so she will think of an ingredient that's in her fridge, google only the ingredient in some of these recipe sites and it will pull everything you can make with that one ingredient. Since my necessity and frugality have hit a crossroads, this has become a new thing everyday at work. I think I have a quart of cream I bought out of thinking that sounds really cool to have in your fridge, and then truly what do you do with heavy whipping cream. It's amazing how many things cream goes in once you start googling it. This weekend is corn tortillas. I absolutely hate throwing out old tortillas, guess what TORTILLA SOUP.

The moral of this story, don't get carried away with recipes due to one ingredient sitting in your fridge that will end up in your freezer with freezer burn on it, because you are going to have to throw it away in six months anyway.

The Freezer's End.