Failures and Successes

Normally Thursdays are our library days.  I make sure we finish with school before lunch and then we head out as soon as we get lunch cleaned up.  That way I can get the books I need for #3's school for the next week and everyone trades out their books from the week before.  I would say on average we check out between 50 and 75 books every week.  Thank goodness the oldest three have their own library cards or we wouldn't be able to check all the books out that we want!

This week was a little different.  Our suburban broke down last weekend and threw off our plans to go to the library so we had to wait until Tuesday to go.  We were very excited because we got to go to the brand new library that is only about a mile from our house.  We've been looking forward to it for a while, but I was really disappointed.  Everything is new and it is certainly beautiful, but their selection of books is so small.  And their children's section is probably 1/3 the size of the one at the library we've been going to.  The girls didn't seem to have a problem finding anything though.  And fortunately all the libraries here are connected so I can look for the books I need for #3 online and have them send them to the new library.  I feel a little bad about requesting 20 books (some were for #1), but since they didn't have a single one I needed I have no choice!  Hopefully it won't take too long for the selection of books to expand.

This is how we check out a new library

 So since we had just gone to the library on Tuesday we didn't need to go again on Thursday which left me with an entire afternoon where I didn't have anything planned.  So I decided to try a couple of new recipes I had bought ingredients for.

First up was homemade fruit snacks.  I've been wanting to make these for a while because 3 of the girls love them.  I would probably spend $30 a month just on fruit snacks if I bought them as many as they wanted.  Since they have zero nutritional value and don't fill them up at all I rarely buy them.  But when I saw the recipe that only involved jello, gelatin and water I decided to try it out.  I couldn't find any molds to use so I ended up just putting them in a pan and cutting them into small squares.  I thought they turned out pretty good and the girls all approved.  It was actually very easy to make.  I'll be making them again, although I might try sugar free jello next time.

I pulled that thing out of the pan in one piece!

 I also attempted to make banana chips.  We had a couple of bananas that were starting to turn.  Not one person in this house likes bananas if they have any spots on them so instead of just tossing them I decided to try drying out the bananas in the oven.  The recipe I found said to just dip them in lemon juice and put them in the oven for four hours on 200 degrees.  I think I might have sliced the bananas too thin.  Whatever I did, they turned out awful!  The good thing was that I hadn't bought anything extra so I didn't feel too bad about the fail.  Other than the pan being a pain to clean!

Going in the oven

Fail!  Makes me laugh just looking at it!

Lastly I made some energy/granola bars.  These turned out awesome!  The only problem was that I only had old fashioned oats instead of instant oats so the bars aren't staying together very well.  I'm glad these turned out well.  We spend more of our grocery budget on snacks than I would like to. Which is why I tried these in the first place--trying to make something the girls would like that would replace some of their snacks they eat in the afternoons.  They were a hit with everyone so I'll be making them again. 

Yummy!

So 2 out of 3 tries isn't too bad.  I won't mention how two of the new dinners I tried this past week were major flops.  They weren't complete disasters because the girls liked them, but I didn't, so they go down as a flop in my book.  Considering how many new recipes I've tried since we've moved I guess I'm lucky I haven't had more failures.  As long as I have more successes than failures I'll consider myself to be ahead!

If you would just tell me...

My Hubby is very good about eating whatever I make and never complaining about it.  I have watched some husbands who snarl their noses at what their wives put in front of them or just flat out refuse to eat it and I'm shocked every time.  Especially when most of those husbands don't even think about helping in the kitchen.  I think it is incredibly disrespectful for anyone, man, woman or child, to complain about food that other people have made for them.  My own children aren't even allowed to make comments about the food I make unless I ask them for their feedback, and even then they are to be respectful if they tell me they don't like it.  And heaven help them if they complain about something someone else makes for us.

OK, sorry for the soapbox, it's one of my pet peeves.  Anyway, the only time I actually remember Hubby not wanting to eat something I made was about 2 months ago when I made something that had sweet potatoes in it.  He had pushed them all over to the side and when I saw them in his bowl I raised my eyebrows and asked if he really wasn't going to eat them.  He rolled his eyes at me and proceeded to eat them all.  After which he tells me that he HATES sweet potatoes.  Not just doesn't like them, but that thinking about eating them actually makes  him kind of sick to his stomach.  I was beyond shocked.  After being married to this man for 12 years I had no idea he felt like this about sweet potatoes.  If I had known I wouldn't have cooked with them and I certainly wouldn't have questioned why he wasn't eating them.  I asked if there were any other food preferences I should know about.  He says no, but I have to wonder what else he hasn't told me.

OK, stick with me, that was just the intro to the story.  A few months ago I found a recipe on Pinterest for sourdough bread.  I enjoy making bread and rolls, especially since it is much cheaper than buying them, so I figured I would give it a go.  Well first of all, it is a pretty involved recipe.  And by involved I mean that I had to read it several times just to understand what it was that I was supposed to do.  Sourdough bread evidently involves a starter.  Some of you may know what I'm talking about.  I had no idea what it was or what I was supposed to do with it.  I finally figured it out and made the starter.

 This is from the blog where I got the recipe

So after two weeks of getting the starter going I made my first two loaves.  They weren't that impressive.  I figured out I let them rise too long.  The thing with a starter is, once you have one you just keep it in the fridge until you make more.  So I tried again a couple of weeks later and the loaves turned out pretty good.  However, I decided that since it actually takes 2 days to allow the loaves to sit and rise the way they are supposed to, and I have a hard time remembering to get them started the day before I need them, that I was going to just dump the starter and forget about sourdough bread. 

I pulled the bowl out at lunch to dump it and told Hubby what I was going to do.  He was like, "Well, OK.  If that's what you want to do."  But it was said in that "I guess that's OK, but I really don't want you to" voice.  Turns out he really likes the sourdough bread.  He told me I should know that because he's told me both times he ate it how good it was.  Apparently I'm too used to him complimenting me on my cooking.  He said I could go ahead and dump the starter if I really didn't want to mess with it anymore.  The thing is, when I know Hubby or my girls really like something, I like to make it for them.  I find satisfaction in cooking and baking things my family enjoys.  All I'm asking is for them to tell me when they like or dislike something.  Because I am apparently terrible on picking up the hints!

Homemade Crackers--Are They Worth It?

I spent all of yesterday afternoon baking.  And by all afternoon I mean that I started when lunch was over and cleaned up, around one, and had to leave the last pan in the oven as we were walking out the door for church last night at 5:45. 

I wasn't planning on baking.  In fact, I was looking forward to an afternoon with not much to do.  But when we started getting lunch stuff out the girls informed me that there was no more bread in the house.  Which reminded me that I didn't buy much bread last time we were at the store because I had planned on making my own.  So I figured since we had no plans to go anywhere and I had nothing pressing to do, I would bake a couple loaves of bread.

However, once I started thinking about baking I remembered that I had two recipes that I wanted to try for home-made cheez-its and homemade goldfish.  The cheez-its I had already made and we all liked, even Hubby.  Again, I figured I had the time and the ingredients, let's get it all done at once.

I started with the bread.  I've made my own bread before, but I tried a new recipe that didn't involve having to let the dough rise twice before baking.  You make it and let it rise in the loaf pans for about 30 minutes and pop them in the oven.  I like this much better than the two-three hours it was taking with my other recipe.  After I get the dough in the loaf pan I realize that I also need dough for the pizza rolls I am making for dinner on Friday night.  I read somewhere that you can freeze this dough and use it the day of and it still works great.  I figured, why not?  Get it all done now and not have to worry about it on Friday.

Looks good right? And made with whole wheat flour!  Who gets Mother of the Year now?

 Then I get to work on the crackers.  Now, these don't necessarily take that much effort.  They are just time consuming because I have a tiny oven that only holds one baking pan at a time.  Seriously--why are there no homes with full sized ovens anymore?  I could have done 4 pans at once in a full size!  So all told with the crackers I have 10 pans that need to be baked. 

In the middle of this project I start to really question if this is worth my time or not.  I have one friend who I know would tell me that they make cheez-its in a box for a reason.  I have another who would applaud every effort I make to make everything we eat homemade.  I'm somewhere in the middle.  I'm a math person so I decided to figure out actual costs for these crackers.  Just for the cheez-its it ended up that if I were to make these twice a month I would save about $8. 

Part of the cheez-its.  They don't look all that appealing, but they're actually really good.

 My immediate reaction was that there was no way this was worth $8!  But then I remembered that $8 would buy a bag of chicken that would probably get us through two meals.  Or if we were having tacos, which we do about once a week, that $8 would cover the entire meal for us.  Once I realized that I felt pretty proud of myself and decided that the time spent was worth it. 

Until 4 little minions came through and devoured about half of the cheez-its in one snack time.  I'm not kidding--they ate almost half in one fail swoop.  The pride I had in myself quickly diminished into faint annoyance.

Now, I do have to admit, the goldfish (which taste nothing like goldfish, by the way) made a lot more and will last longer.  They also took FOREVER to get them all in and out of the oven.  The blog I read for this recipe actually had the Mom making her own little fish cookie cutter out of a soda can and punching out a million tiny fish.  There is no way!

Triangles are as fancy as I was willing to get!

So my final decision?  Bread is worth making.  The total cost per loaf is way less than a $1 and I know exactly what is in it.  And not really that time consuming.  Homemade crackers on the other hand?  I'm going with friend A and saying, "Those things come in a box for a reason!"