Seconds......food and otherwise

One of my internet friends decided to blog about her dinners this week. She also mentioned that she finds it fascinating to see what normal, non-food bloggers are eating for dinner. And since I am finding her posts to be very interesting....I figured I would go ahead and document a pretty average week worth of dinners from my family's perspective.

So tonight for dinner we had Chicken and Veggie Chowder with Whole Wheat Bread.

This is the time of year that I get pretty serious about eating down our freezer. My main chest freezer in the garage needs to be defrosted before I get the pig and cow that I purchase from the ranch back from the butcher in May. So I have an inventory of what is in there and try to plan meals to use up at least one thing from the freezer and keep the veggies we get in our CSA from going bad. (Because nothing is more irritating than paying to throw away vegetables.) Today we got rid of a bag of frozen corn that was looking a little freezer burned, some frozen homemade chicken stock and celery, leeks, onions and broccoli that had been hanging around my fridge long enough that I was starting to worry about the leeks going off. And just so you know, I do realize that it is a little crazy pants to keep a running inventory of your freezer. But only a little.

I don't really do a soup recipe but it essentially goes something like this: Grab the garlic, celery, leeks and onions and cut them up. Sweat them in olive oil (or you can add bacon slivers and do it in bacon grease if you really want to have a rich meal) in a big pan until they are soft. Pull them out. Cut up the chicken and cook it in the same pot in olive oil. When it is mostly done, throw the veggies back in. Dump in a bunch of chicken stock (Until it is covered but not by too much). Add herbs. (Bay leaf and thyme.) Bring to a simmer, and you can leave it there for awhile. About 1/2 an hour before eating, add a couple of cut up potatoes. Cook until the potatoes are soft. Add corn (frozen or canned) and broccoli florets. (If you don't have broccoli, you can leave it out or add spinach or chard instead.) Bring it back to steaming and let the broccoli cook. Right before serving add about a cup of milk and 1/2-1 c of cream. But don't let it boil after you add the milk products. Enjoy, and maybe have seconds. A declared it "delicious" even though it didn't have pasta, which is among the highest compliments she can give.

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And now to a real blog post.

Someone posted a link to this story on Facebook and it definitely resonated with me.

I can't tell you how many times as a single mother I have wondered about leaving A alone. Is it ok to run to the neighbor's house to borrow something while the 6 month old is napping? (It is less distance than if I had a big house and put the kid to sleep upstairs and walked to the family room.) How old does she have to be before I can leave her alone for a few minutes to go to the unattached garage and change laundry? And more recently, Can I leave a 4-5 year old at a table at a restaurant while I pee (very quickly) by myself, especially since her insistence that she DOESN'T NEED TO GO is about to break over to the loud and obnoxious state, and I don't want the waitress to think we are running out on our bill? (I do take my 4 year old out to eat with just the two of us, and it is great fun. Mostly.) When is it ok for her to play unattended with an older friend in the front yard in our, pretty darn safe, suburban neighborhood? When staying in a hotel, can you safely leave a sleeping kid to get a soda and ice from the machines at the end of the hall?

Sometimes I really wish kids would just come with a rule book. But then about 1/2 of the internet might go belly up......just look at the comments in the section for that guy who shot his daughter's laptop.