Everyday Organics with the Kroger Co

Our local flavor of the Kroger Company is called Fred Meyer, and they've been one of the main stores I've shopped at since I was a kid. The Kroger Co. recently started a program called the MyMagazine Sharing Network, where participants who "qualify for missions" can receive free samples in exchange for sharing about the products. Free food is always helpful to our grocery budget, so I was quick to sign up! We just received the box for my first mission, "Organics Everyday." So here's what we tried, and what we thought of it!

In the box were individual-sized bags of Garden of Eatin' ranch and nacho chips, a full-sized bag of organic Tostitos, and a can of Bush's organic chickpeas. There were also coupons for free items that wouldn't have shipped well, like drinks.

We portioned out the Garden of Eatin' chips over several lunches. "So, healthy Doritos?" Matt laughed when he saw them, and yes, that's pretty much what they are; my kids have never had Doritos, though—any chips at all are a rare treat in our house—so I can't say whether they would have preferred one over the other, but they did enjoy these. Little Bear and Kit both liked the ranch version, and Kit enjoyed the nacho ones. Baby deemed the nacho ones non-offensive as well, which was a pleasant surprise, because lately I've had trouble finding anything to eat that doesn't make me feel sick.

The Tostitos taste like Tostitos... They're fine; like I said, we don't usually eat chips, so it's been a bit of a conundrum figuring out what to do with them all. I'm hoping that the baby is up for some fresh salsa, because I'm planning to run by the farmers market this afternoon and see if anyone has tomatoes. That sounds like a good accompaniment for tortilla chips!

The kids love helping me make hummus, and helping me eat it, but they run and hide in the other room when I turn on the food processor. One of these days, I'll manage to convince Little Bear that it's not that loud; he would have more fun helping in the kitchen, I know, if he wasn't scared of the noise it makes. We made up a quick batch of hummus with the chickpeas we received, and everyone has been enjoying it with raw veggies.

One thing that frustrates me greatly is how most brands that sell canned goods use BPA in the linings of their cans. When was the last time you saw a plastic container intended for food prep or storage that didn't say "BPA-free" on it? "BPA-free" is practically synonymous, in public perception at least, with "safe for use with food/drink." But how many brands of canned goods do you see the BPA-free label on? Hunt's, the tomato company, is one. I think I saw it recently on some Del Monte fruits, too. But most beans, vegetables, and canned meats, even organic varieties, are still being packed and subjected to high heat/pressure in cans lined with BPA. 

So when we got organic chickpeas in a can that didn't say BPA-free, I called the customer service line for Bush's to ask about it. And it turns out that they are now using cans with BPA-free linings for all of their beans! The lady I spoke with wasn't sure why they don't advertise the fact, but assured me that there was no BPA. I'm so glad! I try to use dried beans in my cooking anyway, but I usually keep a few cans of pre-cooked beans around for just-in-case times, and up until this point the only BPA-free beans I'd found are a bit more expensive and are only stocked by stores that are inconvenient for us to shop at. And I grew up eating Bush's baked beans, and have not yet managed to find a recipe for homemade baked beans that we like better.

There were coupons for a couple of types of teas and a soda? Carbonated lemonade? I'm not sure. I couldn't find them at the store, but honestly, they're not things we would buy anyway. That's true of almost everything we received, other than the chickpeas, though the kids were excited about the chips. But the "most appreciated item in the box" award goes to a sheaf of coupons for free/discounted items from Horizon Organics, which among other things sells half gallons of milk. I wish I could say that I tasted a difference between conventional and organic milk, but baby didn't like the granola I poured it over yesterday, so the best I can tell you is that it's good milk. At the rate we use milk, given that the baby isn't currently letting me make/eat yogurt (why, child?!?) and doesn't love granola, I shouldn't need to buy milk again until mid-August, at least!

If the Kroger Company was trying to use the "Organics Everyday" mission to encourage people to eat healthy or to show off the healthful options they offer, I think they missed the mark a little with their selection of samples; the chickpeas and milk are great, but everything else... organic junk food is still junk food, you know? But they do offer a lot of other healthy and organic options in their stores, and I'm so glad to have had the opportunity to learn about the Bush's cans, and grateful to not have to pay for milk for a while! 

Little ones

We've been seeing a lot of babies lately:

This cow and calf moose hung around the yard eating willows for a couple of days.

Here are two of the seven young ruffed grouse that have been strutting around our woods and yard. I have never seen seven grouse all together before!

I haven't been able to get a good photo of more than one at a time yet, but we have at least three juvenile American kestrels hanging out on our roof, deck, and treetops as they learn to fly. The kids and I have had a blast watching the kestrels' nesting box this summer, and now that the babies are out and flapping around, it seems like we're always running to a window to see them.

And... we're expecting a new little one of our own in the spring! Kit and Little Bear are so excited about their new sibling; they change their minds several times a day on whether they think they're getting a baby brother or sister. We'll see!

Kids

When you suddenly remember, at 9:42 pm, that you were supposed to bake hamburger buns tonight... it's time to find something quicker-but-still-productive to do instead. Or go to sleep, I suppose, if I were being sensible. 

How about a kid-update? I thought about doing one on Kit's birthday, and halfway between her birthday and Little Bear's birthday, and on his birthday, but somehow it seems like I'm always too busy. How busy am I? I tried to start using Facebook again, and I could never find time to check it and gave up again. Summer. Kids. Something. There's always something else to be doing.

Kids! So Little Bear recently turned 5, and a few weeks before that Kit turned 2. They keep us on our toes! Kit copies everything Little Bear does, and wants to play with him constantly. He's generally very happy to play with her, too: they are always building forts, dishing up pretend meals, running around outside together... Now that he's reading, Kit is hearing many more stories per day than when I was the only reader! Today, they played and he read to her for a solid hour and a half while I ran on the elliptical, showered, and made supper. Each time I stuck my head in to check on them, they were having a blast and didn't need anything from me. (Days don't usually work like that! But it sure was helpful today.)

Both kids are signed up for our library's summer reading program, and more often than not, Little Bear's weekly tally of books read is over 100! He discovered the nonfiction section at the beginning of the summer, and now, in addition to 8-10 fiction books, we come home from the library with two or three nonfiction kids' books on some random subject each week. 

Little Bear at 5:

Favorite book/series - Frog and Toad

Favorite show - The Pioneer Woman (Food Network)

Favorite song - For All The Saints

Favorite game - Hi Ho Cherry-O

Favorite color - "I can change my favorite color whenever I want to!"

Favorite food - salad

Favorite outdoor activity - riding his bike

Never stops... moving. Even when he's reading, his toes are usually tapping.

Little Bear is a great help. He takes care of loading/unloading the washer and dryer, helps with the dishwasher, sets the table and fills water glasses, and so many other things. Sometimes he can get stubborn, especially if he already has an idea in his head of how something is going to happen or what he's going to do and we tell him it needs to happen differently, but we're working with him on that. He loves to help in the kitchen, and knows where most of the commonly-used ingredients are and how to measure, whisk, etc, so he's actually able to be substantially helpful with a lot of recipes. He takes such good care of Kit, and definitely sees her as his best friend and playmate. And he's constantly surprising me: this afternoon, he grabbed a broom to help me sweep out the garage, and made a comment about how he "wish[es] we had a chore chart for me and Kit." Um, okay! I can do that. :-) He has just discovered Legos, and very much enjoys sitting down with a pile of bricks and either following the instruction booklet or else coming up with his own design.

Kit at 2:

Favorite book/series - Maisy

Favorite show - n/a

Favorite song - How Far I'll Go (Moana)

Favorite game - Chutes and Ladders

Favorite color - yellow and purple

Favorite food - watermelon

Favorite outdoor activity - sidewalk chalk

Never stops... talking! Seriously, her vocabulary is comparable to Little Bear's, and she uses it constantly.

At least once a week, Kit will come up to me with shiny-eyed excitement and say, "I have a great idea! Let's make a fox den!" She loves building blanket-chair-pillow forts with Little Bear, typically "fox dens." With refrigerators that basically double the size of the "den," because where else would she put the teapot and cupcakes and other toy food? She tries to do everything Little Bear does, occasionally frustrating him when she neeeeds to be up on that step stool that he's already standing on so that she can help with the job he's already doing. She likes to help me dry and put away silverware from the dishwasher, and if I don't catch her in time, she'll start unloading plates and trying to pass those up to me as well. She likes the Disney princesses, though she hasn't actually seen any of the movies; we like the versions of Disney princess songs that Evynne and Peter Hollens have done on YouTube, so that's how she learned about them. 

The kids and I spend a lot of days at home, and I'm grateful for that as I see how close they are, how they go out of their way to do things together. I feel so blessed to have these two; they each bring so much joy to our family! 

Homemade Tortillas

I promised to try out tortilla recipes and report back a while ago, didn't I? Like, somewhere around spring break? I may have passed the acceptable "better late than never" threshold here, but... at least I have a well-tested recipe for you? The last time I made them, Matt said, "You can make these any time you want to!" So I think we have a pretty good recipe here.

Well, I'm making another batch tonight, so I figured I'd get some photos and finally post the recipe. It takes a few steps, so it's certainly not as quick as using store-bought tortillas, but it's not all that complicated. And in my opinion, there's a world of difference in flavor between a store-bought tortilla and a homemade one fresh out of the skillet; I came down with an awful headcold today, and despite feeling like staying sprawled on the couch all afternoon, the prospect of having to eat store-bought tortillas for supper was enough to get me into the kitchen.

Flour Tortillas

3 cups flour*
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup lukewarm water
5 Tablespoons coconut oil (solid)

Mix together flour(s) and salt, and cut in the coconut oil until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add the water and knead several times until the dough is smooth. Divide into 16 to 20 balls of equal size and let rest at least ten minutes, up to two hours.**

Heat a skillet or griddle to 400 degrees F. Place one ball of dough on a lightly-floured counter and roll out to a 6" to 8" circle-ish shape, as thin as you can easily get it without the dough tearing. (If you only made 16 balls, you should be able to get larger tortillas.) Lay tortilla on the hot skillet and cook for 30 seconds on each side. While it cooks, roll out the next tortilla; repeat process. (If you have a large enough skillet, cooking two at a time really helps speed the cooking along.) Stack cooked tortillas in a towel. Serve immediately.

Once cooled, leftover tortillas keep well in the refrigerator in a ziptop gallon bag for at least a week. Reheat in the microwave before trying to roll them; they'll tear if they are cold, but they roll up perfectly when warm.

*I've used straight all-purpose flour, straight spelt or whole wheat flour, and blends of the two, and all of them have worked fine. I prefer at least one cup of whole grain flour, but use whatever you prefer.

**I have not found any particular advantage to a shorter or longer rest time, but as you get up to the two-hour mark, the dough starts to dry out, so letting it go longer than that would make it harder to roll thin.

Roman-style gnocchi

Yesterday was my birthday, and to celebrate I made bolognese and gnocchi alla romana for supper. They're very different than what I think of as "regular" gnocchi, baked instead of boiled, but they're so good!

The kids aren't fond of any form of gnocchi—something to do with the rich+creamy texture, I think, since risotto is also firmly in the (very small) category of foods they don't like—so I can't make these often, but last night we had my sister and brother-in-law over to share them with us and gave the kids Italian bread to go with their bolognese instead.

Gnocchi alla Romana

3 cups milk

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 cups semolina flour

1 cup freshly grated parmesan or pecorino cheese*

2 egg yolks

3 Tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cubed

3 Tablespoons butter, melted, for the top

more grated parmesan for the top

Line a large baking sheet with plastic wrap, enough that it comes up the sides if not overhangs. 

In a large saucepan, combine milk and salt over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally. As soon as you see bubbles forming on the top, stir in the semolina. It will thicken up quickly. Once it's thickened, stir in the cheese, egg yolks, and cubed cold butter. 

When the "dough" is homogeneous, spread it flat on the plastic-lined baking sheet. You want it to be no more than 1 centimeter thick. Cover with more plastic wrap, and chill for at least half an hour.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F and butter the bottom and sides of one large or two medium-sized baking dishes (we always use two). Removing the top layer of plastic, cut the dough into 2" to 2 1/2" diameter squares or circles.** Place them, overlapping, in the baking dishes. Brush with the melted butter, and sprinkle with shredded cheese.

Bake 25 minutes, or until edges begin to be golden.

*I accidentally bought pecorino instead of parmesan this last time, so I can confirm that pecorino does work okay; it just didn't melt as smoothly as parmesan does.

**Circles seem to be the traditional shape, but squares are much easier (you just divide up the pan into a grid, instead of cutting out circles and rolling out the scraps to cut again), and it's not like circles taste any different than squares, so we just make squares.

School year wrap-up

I know it's a little early yet, but Little Bear finished the last few lessons in our books for the year last week, so here's a look at how our first school year went.

This year Little Bear was 4, and we were doing preschool. Although looking at these books, I'm realizing that at least half of our work was labeled as kindergarten this year. Regardless, he was 4, and we did school. (We're on paper as doing kindergarten next year, so I'm going to stick with the past year having been preschool.)

What we used:

Handwriting: Catholic Heritage Handwriting, Level K, from Catholic Heritage Curricula (CHC)

Phonics/Reading: Little Stories for Little Folks, from CHC

Science: Earth Science & Earthquakes: Hands-On Activities, from Ring of Fire

First Encyclopedia of the Human Body, from Usborne

Math: RightStart Mathematics, Level A

Religion: Who Am I?, teacher's manual and workbook B, from Ignatius Press

Plus a subscription to Raddish kids' cooking class, which included science, geography, world cultures, and other lessons along with the cooking lessons

What worked, and what didn't:

The handwriting book was on the short side, just 16 weeks; I think it was intended to be started partway through the year, after the students had spent a while working on letter recognition. We didn't need that practice, so I had Little Bear do half-pages each day instead of full pages, and in the last month or so we stepped up to 2/3-pages and full pages. He was almost always enthusiastic about starting out the school day with his handwriting, and I really liked that it's spiral-bound at the top, so the pages lay flat and there isn't a binding on the side getting in the way.

Little Stories for Little Folks is awesome. I'm so, so happy with it: we went through the first two levels of phonics readers in it this year, and will be doing the other two levels next year. (It's marketed as a two-year program, K-1.) Little Bear is now reading well enough that he can pick out Level 1 I-Can-Read books from the library, etc., and read through them all by himself, maybe needing help with one word every other page or so. We were looking at books at the thrift store earlier, and he was so excited to be able to find Level 1 books on the shelves and know that he'd be able to read them.

This was the second year that I put those two "hands-on activities" science books on my list of "things we're doing this year," and the second year that we stopped using them after one or two lessons. There's nothing wrong with them, necessarily; they just weren't a good fit for us. I'm going to find someone else to pass them on to, because I know I won't use them.

The Usborne encyclopedia on the human body, though: Little Bear picked that off a shelf of free books a couple of weeks ago, and has been SO INTERESTED in it. We're reading a two-page spread a day, and he makes sure that I don't forget! We've since found a copy of Usborne's First Encyclopedia of the World, and Little Bear is excited about starting to read that as soon as we finish the human body one.

Oh! I also picked up a DVD on Alaskan wildlife at last year's curriculum fair with the idea that we'd use it for science. It's just instrumental music with a collection of photographs and short video clips of animals and some plants from around the state, separated by region. We've mainly wound up using it once a month or so for times when the kids are making me crazy as I'm trying to make supper, so I turn it on and ask them to tell me all the animals they can identify. Little Bear can name a lot of them now, and while Kit doesn't usually sit still to watch, she'll come running whenever he tells her there are squirrels or bears or puffins. I should look for some Alaskan bird and animal guidebooks, so that we can look up the different animals we see and learn something about them.

The RightStart Mathematics book is another I'm certain I'll use again with Kit, because it worked so well for us. After finishing Level A, Little Bear can quickly solve simple math problems in his head, has a good understanding of coin values and adding with coins and dollars, can explain halves and quarters, and can read an analog clock (with a little prompting if the minute hand isn't right at :00, :15, :30, or :45). Matt was recently driving home with Little Bear from a trip to town, and Little Bear, apparently hungry, informed him: "Dad, it's 2:00. That means that it'll be supper time in four hours!" We didn't actually have the full set of math tools that goes with it, so I wound up using whatever we could find that was close enough, and it usually worked okay. We did have the geoboard and abacus, and couldn't really have done it without either of those; there were some learning games that we couldn't do because we didn't have the right equipment, but he seems to have gotten the concepts well anyway. We'll move on to Level B next year, and this time we'll be able to get everything that goes with it! I'm looking forward to that. 

The religion program worked really well for us, too. I was impressed by the content, the way it engaged the kids, and how Little Bear learned the material each week. Kit loved the action rhymes with each lesson, and was excited to be able to participate in those. Little Bear liked the workbook (partially because it was a little bit too easy for him, I suspect), but did a good job of paying attention and answering questions during the actual lessons, too. I'm planning to stick with this same program for kindergarten-level religion lessons next year.

And lastly, Raddish. The Raddish program is going to have to get its own post, because this one is getting long, but for now suffice it to say that Little Bear has learned a lot from Raddish this year and we'll definitely be continuing our subscription. In addition to making both kids even more interested in helping in the kitchen (and actually able to help), it also took up the slack for me on science, geography, and "social studies."

We're coming up on the annual curriculum fair here in town in another week or so, and I'm so happy to already have a handle on what curriculum I want to use with Little Bear next year for math, reading/phonics, and religion. I do need to put thought into science/geography/history/etc., and I'm hoping to find another kindergarten-level handwriting book with a spiral-binding at the top; hopefully there are other publishers doing that! I suppose I could also go with a PDF version, which I could take to the local print shop and have bound the way I want it. 

If you've homeschooled a kindergartner and have any suggestions for me, I'd love to hear them! Especially if you have any advice for doing so with antsy toddlers... Kit was all over me every time I sat down to do a math lesson with Little Bear this year, and I expect it'll be even more of a frustration for her next year.

Blueberry Almond Granola

Little Bear's at noon Mass with Grandma, Kit is napping, and I'm all caught up on the non-noisy items on my to-do list, so here's a quick recipe!

Kit helped me mix up a batch of our current favorite granola this morning: with blueberries, whole grains, and coconut, it has something for everyone in our family! It's dairy-free, and easily gluten-free as well.

Blueberry Almond Granola

3 cups seven-grain cereal blend (or rolled oats, gluten-free if necessary)
3 1/2 cups almonds, chopped
1 Tablespoon sugar (I use evaporated cane sugar, but brown sugar or coconut sugar would also be good)
1/4 teaspoon salt
5 Tablespoons coconut oil
1/2 cup maple syrup
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup desiccated coconut (not the sweetened kind), divided
2 cups freeze-dried blueberries

Preheat the oven to 340 degrees F. In a large bowl, mix together seven-grain cereal, almonds, sugar, and salt. In a small pot over medium heat, combine coconut oil, maple syrup, and vanilla. Heat, stirring occasionally, until the coconut oil is melted. Pour liquids over dry ingredients, stir until it's all thoroughly moistened, and spread the mixture over two ungreased, unlined sheet pans.

Bake for 20 minutes. Remove pans from oven, and stir 1/2 cup of coconut into each pan. Return to oven, rotating pans so that the one that was on the upper shelf is now on the lower, and bake about more 5 minutes, until the coconut is turning golden. Allow the granola to cool completely before stirring in the blueberries. I've found that it works best to pour the granola off both pans into the (cleaned) bowl I mixed it all together in, add the blueberries, and stir it up again in there rather than trying to stir in the blueberries on the pans.

(Recipe adapted from Minimalist Baker's Strawberry Coconut Granola, which also looks delicious, but no one in town carries freeze-dried strawberries so I haven't been able to give it a try!)


I started using seven-grain cereal in all of my granolas because I had a 50-lb bucket of it that we weren't going through quickly enough as hot cereal, but we've discovered that we really like the variety of flavors and textures that it adds to the granola; the last oat-only granola I tried tasted kind of boring in comparison! We use a blend of wheat, rye, oats, triticale, barley, spelt, and flax.