Sugar and spice . . .

. . . and less than 5 ingredients.  That’s the name of the game for me.  As we all eat our way through the holidays and hope that no one notices that we are wearing more and more elastic pants, I thought I’d share a few recipe ideas I got these last couple of days that were really helpful.  Plus, it’s been a slow news day and I have to keep up my 12 days of cranberries.

So Monday I had Bunco and it was pot luck.  Of course, the event started at 7pm and at 6:30 I had an “oh sh*t” mommy moment and realized that I was bringing the only salad and I had NONE of the ingredients.  My mom had shared a quick and easy salad recipe and by 7:15 I had gone to the store, made the entire salad and was at my friend’s doorstep with a fantastic salad and homemade dressing.  Of course, if you do this you may not want to enlist your father to shell the pistachios on the salad – he MAY play the "one for the salad, one for me" game which explains why I only ended up with half the bag in the salad.  Following are 3 great recipes that are easy and sure to be a hit.  And, most importantly, won’t make mommy insane!  Starting with the cranberries . . . .

I want my mummy . . . meatloaf

So before I dive into today’s Halloween family fun, a couple stories.  Tonight I was driving home from a charity function (which I’ll mention more later) and it occurred to me . . . I missed a HUGE opportunity with yesterday’s post.  The title of the post should have been “Give ‘the finger’ to school lunches”.  I have never had so many people comment to me about how much they too hate packing school lunches.  My favorite comment came from my mother-in-law.  Here’s what she wrote in an e-mail to me:

I too hated to make school lunches - choosing to have them buy instead.  I never felt creative about lunches.  There was a time when [my son]* couldn't remember to take lunch money and I finally had to tell the teacher "No more lunch loans!"  She thought I was really cruel!

(* “my son” has been substituted for my husband’s name so as to protect the guilty).

The best part about this little story, at the very moment that I received this e-mail I had just hung up the phone with the school district’s automated system that said “Dear Mrs. Dugdale – the Superego (yep, the automated system calls her that too) has a school lunch account balance of negative two dollars and fifty cents”.  Now isn’t it interesting that we have three children at that school, all three of whom always have the same lunch scenario, and yet only one of them has exceeded her account balance.  Apparently the school lunch account apple doesn’t fall far from the tree!

Ok, on to family fun.  Today it was mummy meatloaf.  Here’s what I learned about making shapes out of an otherwise mundane dinner:

When life hands you lemons, make lemon cupcakes!

My Family Fun Shenanigans have apparently inspired some of my friends to embrace their inner creativity.  So, I decided to post other people's family fun on the blog today.  If you've got a great family fun suggestion, please send it to me.  I'd love to post it!

Following is a story from my friend Laura who also has her own all girl Trifecta.  The difference is that hers are 5 years older than mine, so now I know what to look forward to (i.e. when your make-up somehow disappears, hair supplies are no longer your own, or when boys come to your door with roses and ask your child to homecoming – EEEK!).

Last week Laura woke up to a flood in her kitchen and this is what she shared:

My goal throughout this experience is not about being environmentally friendly, but rather making my life easier.  How long can I go before I have to wash dishes in the bathroom sink?  Tonight's dinner consists of kabobs, salad, and lemon cupcakes- all made on the grill.   I even managed to not drip any batter on the cupcake pan because that would mean I would have to wash it.   

Here’s what Laura learned about her flood/grill experience:

Pumpkin in the oven . . .

Below are the recipes that I used (and slightly modified) for the pumpkin pies yesterday.  In blue are my “between the lines” instructions.  Thanks already to my stay at home mom friend Becky for her helpful suggestion to follow the instructions on the canned pumpkin, but use pureed fresh pumpkin instead of the can.  I’m going to try it!

Fresh Pumpkin Pie (modified from www.allrecipes.com) – 4 ½ stars on All recipes – 0 stars from the Dugdales

1 medium sugar pumpkin (at my pumpkin patch they were called “trickster” pumpkins – maybe this should have been my first clue – they “trick” you into thinking they will taste good and in fact they do not!)1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 pastry crust (I used G.F. recipe below)
½ teaspoon of ground ginger
½ teaspoon of ground cinnamon½ teaspoon of nutmeg (I added this)1 teaspoon salt
4 eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup honey, warmed slightly
½ cup milk (I used whole milk)
½ cup heavy whipping cream

Cut pumpkin in half (use a saw to cut the d*#& thing or you will completely dull your knife) and remove seeds (use an ice cream scoop). 

Lightly oil surface and place cut side down.  Bake at 325 degrees until flesh is tender when poked with a fork (about 45 minutes – even when it feels tender, give it a few more minutes to make sure – this part can be deceiving). 

In case my family or close friends questions whether I actually did this.

Cool until just warm.  Scrape the pumpkin flesh from the peel.  Either mash or puree in small batches in a blender.  (Yes, a blender will work for this part if you don’t have a cheap one like mine.  All my blender did was push everything out to the side and almost burn out the blade – DO NOT USE A BLENDER to puree – use a food processor).

In a large bowl blend together 2 cups of the pumpkin puree, spices and salt.  Beat in the eggs, honey, milk and cream.  Pour filling into pie shell.  Put pie on a baking sheet (this is a secret that no one tells you in a recipe, you just have to know this because your momma tells you.  Also, be sure to not overfill the pie shell because it will go all over the counter and your baking sheet and will smell like burned tar when it overcooks in the oven).

Bake at 400 degrees for 55 minutes or until knife inserted 1 inch from the edge comes out clean.  Halfway through cooking cover the pie with an aluminum foil tent.  Otherwise you will completely burn the crust.  Yep, this is another one of those “mommy” tricks.  I even had to call mine.  Cool on wire rack.

Anyone who can tell me what I might have missed in baking this recipe, or what I can do differently to change the taste, I’m open.

Pamela’s Gluten Free Crust – I made no modifications to this one.  It was very good other than the burned parts that were completely my fault.

1 bag Pamela’s Gluten Free Bread Mix (do not use the yeast packet)
8tbsp unsalted butter, chilled
8tbsp shortening, chilled
7-8 tbsp ice cold water

In a bowl, cut chilled butter and shortening into Pamela's Gluten-Free Bread Mix with two knives or a pastry knife until small pea sized pieces form. (Just mash it together as much as you can take – there may be some pea size pieces, and there may be some bigger ones.  It will all bake out).  J

Slowly add water until dough comes together, not sticky. Add 1 tsp additional water if dough is too dry. Do not over handle dough. Roll out half the dough between two sheets of parchment paper or plastic wrap. Peel off top paper and invert into a lightly greased pie dish.

Yeah, I added a photo because it would be helpful to see this.  I read it wrong the first time!  :)

Peel off second sheet and fix crust edge. Bake on lower rack in oven. Bake unfilled crust in a 350° oven on bottom rack for 35 to 40 minutes. Or, bake filled with your favorite filling. Dough can be frozen for later use, wrap in plastic and freeze. Thaw completely to use.

Pumpkin Pie . . . Martha Stewart Style

Here’s something that finally dawned on me.  Family Fun is usually NOT easy, and sometimes it’s not even fun.  Actually, sometimes it’s a downright pain in the @$&.  The reason family fun is such a pain is that you actually have to plan something and planning takes time . . . time that we don’t usually have.  “Fun” also usually means trying something new and that means that we don’t really know how to do it well the first time, and it was such a bad experience that we don’t try it ever again.  Well, here’s what I’ve also realized, family fun IS memorable.  Memorable for you, your kids, your spouse, your friends, your extended family.  Good, bad or ugly, it’s memorable.  And THAT is why I keep doing it.  No matter what, we have a story to tell; and today’s “fun” falls in the @$& ugly category.

Today I attended a pumpkin patch field trip with the Id (the baby).  While we were on this field trip the woman at the pumpkin patch held up the pumpkins you can use to make pumpkin pie, and that’s when I had a stroke of genius.  I’ll make a fresh pumpkin pie . . . from actual pumpkins. 

Here’s  what I learned about attending field trips at the pumpkin patch and trying to be Martha Stewart: