broccoli cheese soup

I made broccoli cheese soup the other night and we ate it with some crusty sour dough bread. Brett loved it and the leftovers were just as good if not better then the first night.

INGREDIENTS
• 2-3 T of butter
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 (16 ounce) package frozen chopped broccoli
• 4 cups chicken broth – set aside ½ cup
• ½ a “loaf” of Velveeta
• 2 cups cheddar cheese
• 2 cups milk or half and half
• Some minced garlic - I used a lot :)
• 1/3 cup cornstarch

DIRECTIONS
1. In a stockpot, melt butter over medium heat. Cook onion in butter until softened. Add the garlic and cook a few minutes.
2. Stir in broccoli, and cover with chicken broth. Simmer until broccoli is tender, 10 to 15 minutes.
3. Reduce heat, and stir in cheese cubes until melted. Mix in milk.
4. In a small bowl, stir cornstarch into ½ c chicken stock until dissolved. Stir into soup; cook, stirring frequently, until thick.

merry christmas

I know it is a couple of days after Christmas but oh well. Things have been going pretty well in our lives lately. We are very much enjoying the holiday festivities. Christmas Eve we went over to Brett's parent’s house for dinner. Then Christmas morning we walked over to some friend’s apartment for brunch and fellowship. Afterward Brett and I came back to do our own little gift exchange. A couple of months ago we had bought each other coats for Christmas, so we limited our Christmas morning giving. Brett bought me a book that I had been wanting and a fun wall hook I liked at Urban Outfitters and I gave him Guitar Hero One so he now has them all. That afternoon we went back over to Brett's parent’s house to do gift with his family and all the exchange girls. We got many fun goodies including lots of food and cooking stuff - they know us so well :).

Last night we went out for a very international dinner. Mary T's (the Brazilian) family is all in town visiting and Lena's (the German) sister and sister's boyfriend are also visiting. So we joined all them along with Brett’s family and a former exchange student from Ukraine for dinner and ice cream after. It was chaotic and fun. I will try to post pictures from that soon.

Today is Brett’s and my 6-month anniversary. We had a relaxing morning of sleeping in and then brunch with some popovers I made. (Check out my other blog for the recipe). Now he is at work and I want to try to figure out what I can make for a special dinner tonight.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!

popovers

Today marks 6 months of Brett and I being married. I thought it would be fun to make something special for breakfast and stumbled across a recipe for popovers. Being me, I then had to go brows for a couple more recipes to compare before starting the cooking process. The recipe I ended up using if from Allrecipes.com but with a couple of twists on my part (of course). They sell popover pans but since I don’t have any I just used large muffin tins. If you have a popover pan by all means, use it instead.

INGREDIENTS
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Grease a 6-cup muffin tin. I sprayed mine with pam.
2. In a medium bowl beat eggs slightly, Beat in flour, milk and salt until just smooth; being careful not to overbeat.
3. Put a dab of butter in the bottom of each muffin tin and set the pan in the oven to preheat for a moment before filling with batter. Be careful because your butter will burn if you leave it in the oven to long.
4. Remove pan from oven and fill cups ½ - ¾ full.
5. Bake at 450 degrees for 20 minutes. Decrease oven temperature to 350 degrees and bake for 20 minutes more or until dark brown. (Mine took 17 more minutes) Immediately remove from cups and serve piping hot.

I added about ¼ t onion powder and ½ t Italian seasoning to the flour before mixing in. These popovers turned out perfect and were amazing just by themselves.

A couple of recipes I found make a sweeter version by adding some vanilla and sugar to the mix and then spreading the popover with jam or dipping in cinnamon an sugar. I hope to try that soon and will report on how they turn out.

a beginning

I am always telling my husband that I want to blog. Both about life and about food. Well I recently started a joint blog with him (that he has yet to write on :P) about life but it just did not seem the appropriate place to post recipes and such. So here is my second new blog just in time for the New Year. Lets hope that this be one of the rare resolutions that I stick with.

I love to cook. Actual I just love food in general. I love to read about it both in recipes and by food bloggers that I follow. I love to look at pictures of it. I love to hear about other people’s food adventures. I love to eat it. And last but not least, I love to cook it. Food is one of those things that allows creativity while bringing people together and is a simple happiness.

I use to say that I love to cook but not bake but these past few months I have started to try new things in the baking department and have enjoyed them as well.

So this blog will hopefully be filled with all kinds of recipes both sweet and savory. I must warn whoever may read this blog that I tend to be one of those people who does not really fallow a recipe or measure ingredients very much. Which is kind of ironic that I want to make a recipe blog. In reality, I tend to read 2-3 recipes about what ever it is I want to make and then take that base to create my own concoctions. So here goes the new blog and the New Year - almost.

blessed

Brett and I are extremely blessed in our lives. The past few months have been really tough financially for everyone including us. There have been some problems with Brett's job which has lead to him not getting paid for the past two months with no light in the near future. We had planned on going to Kansas for the Christmas holidays so I could see my family and we could drive down to Oklahoma to see all my friends. I was so excited which I think right now is the biggest disappointment. I can live without the Christmas tree or the expensive present but family and friends are just one of those things that are hard to not have for the holidays.

Through all this there have been so many blessing poured into our lives. Brett was able to find some work at a high end men's clothing store. His boss is an extremely gracious man who has basically told Brett he can work when ever he wants. Along with this Brett was also able to pick up a couple hours a week working for Banana Republic. This is extra money and gives us a sweet discount which also includes Gap and Old Navy. Because Brett was able to find temporary work so quickly we are managing to scrap by. We are lucky to be young and healthy and be able to work hard.

We have also been immensely blessed with continual friendships up here. So many people have been brought into our lives lately who we have really connected with and truly enjoy being around. It is so nice to once agian have plans and people to meet up with on a regular basis.

This has been a week of blessing both big and small and Brett and I are truly thankful.

serving and snow

Brett and I have had a lot of fun these past two weekends. Last weekend we volunteered as leaders for an outreach thing that Liquid, our church, was doing. They are opening a new campus in New Brunswick and as a way to reach out to the community, they gave away coats to the homeless and underprivileged of that city. They ended up giving away over a thousand coats that day and there were still people waiting in line. The groups that Brett and I helped lead went to different neighborhoods around the church location and handed out backs with info about the church and encouraging notes. We had a blast and got to serve with another young couple here for a few months from Australia.

This weekend was another great weekend. Bek and Sim, the Australian couple, joined us Friday night and we all went to a Christmas light display. It was one of those drive through things and at the end had a light show set to Christmas songs. They also had a little shop where we picked up some Christmas ornaments and found some candles with funny names.

Saturday was a gloriously lazy day. I made banana bread, adding the coconut and pecans left over from a pie I made for Thanksgiving, watched a couple of movies, and had the rare opportunity to just relax. That evening we went over to some friends' apartment for Chinese food, a movie, and good conversation. Then to top everything off it snowed last night and everything was wonderfully white this morning.

the group that led bag distribution


coats

me - trying to stay warm

brett with the funny candle

smell my nuts?

you have to start somewhere

Since we are so far away from many of our friends and family, I decided a blog may be a good idea. This way we have a place to update everyone on what we are up to, or any random thoughts we care to share. :P

Since this is the first blog, I should probably just get everyone up to date with what is happening with us.

We got married almost 6 months ago, which just seems crazy! It doesn't feel like it has been that long. We were blessed with the opportunity to go to Italy for out honeymoon. It was beyond amazing. We got to see all of the sights, go on a wine tour in Tuscany, and take a cooking class.
After Italy, we moved into our apartment in New Jersey. Brett had a job lined up working with his dad on property management, but it took me a couple of weeks to find a job as well. I now work for an online picture frame company doing graphic design work as well as other random tasks.

We were able to find a church right away that we both really like and have started connecting with people and making friends. That was probably what was hardest about moving up here was not really knowing anyone. Brett and I both really missed our friends and having people to hang out with. Through our church, we were able to join a small group of other young couples and have really started connecting with them.

We have added another member to our family in the form of a (not so little anymore) kitten named Snooks. I love cuddly cats and since our apartment wouldn't allow dogs for Brett, Snooks has been a great compromise. He is currently curled at my feet while I type this but loves to play as well. Brett has taught him many tricks and even gets him to play fetch. It is crazy because we will actually throw a toy and Snooks loves to go get it and bring it back for us to throw again.

So with work, small group, friends, and a cat we have been enjoying our new life together. I have been teaching Brett how to cook and he has even found some new foods that he had never tried or liked before. As anyone who knows me knows I love to cook, so even when Brett is not cooking with me I have been enjoying cooking new things and having someone who loves to eat around.

So yea, that is our life so far in a nutshell. Hopefully we will both be more disciplined to maintain this blog than I am with my other one.