Positively Rich Paleo Chocolate Torte (aka flourless, nutless, like a slice of chocolate heaven)

I first made this almost a year ago.  It has been a staple ever since.

If you don't have a springform pan, go out and get one.  Seriously, this can wait.  This one is good, if you can wait until it ships to you....

Ingredients:

1 bag of Ghiradelli 60% Cocoa chocolate Chips
8 ounces Ghiradelli Semi-sweet Chocolate Chips (OR you can use another 8 oz of the 60%, if you like your chocolate to be very dark..)
2 sticks of butter
2/3 c grade B Maple Syrup
2 T water
6 eggs
3/4 tsp vanilla extract (do NOT use artificial)
OPTIONAL: a pinch of cayenne pepper OR a pinch of sea salt

Preheat oven to 275.

Grab a hand mixer, plug it in, and have it ready to go.

Grease a 9" springform pan.  Wrap the bottom of the pan with a sheet of aluminum foil and place it in a roasting pan.  (The foil is to protect the pan from having water leak into the pan as it cooks.  It will cook in a water bath that goes about 1/2way up the side of the pan)

Mix the water and maple syrup in a small cup and set aside.

Melt the chocolate and the butter in the microwave - Follow the instructions for melting the butter on the bag.  BE CAREFUL not to let it burn!  (I use a thick 8c glass measuring cup for this step- you could melt it in a double boiler on the stovetop, if you have the time and patience...   I do not.)

Use the hand mixer on a low-medium speed to mix in the water/syrup mixture.

Add the eggs, ONE AT A TIME, mixing them in completely before you add the next egg.

Add the vanilla and optional ingredient of choice, mix well.

Pour the batter into the springform pan.

Pour water into the roasting pan (being VERY careful not to get any water into the batter).  You want the water to go about halfway up the side of the cake pan.

Put it in the oven and cook it for about an hour. (could be a little longer - until it is done in the middle).

Cool the torte to room temperature (at least an hour)  before placing it in the fridge to chill (at least 6 hours).

Serving suggestions:
raspberries, whipped cream and fresh mint leaves
homemade caramel sauce, sprinkle of sea salt, and vanilla ice cream
strawberries and almond whipped cream
all by itself

Enjoy!

BEST ever EASY Slow Cooker Beef Bourguinon (Gluten Free)

Oh!
My!
Wow!

I have made THE Julia Child Beef Bourguinon.  Thrice.  It is our new Christmas traditional meal.  We had it the last two Christmases and once before that - when I made it for the first time for a wonderful dinner party....   I slaved- quite literally - ALL DAY LONG on the Julia Child version.  No way I would make it on just any day.  But....   Sometimes you just want some foodie decadence.  So, I made this once before, and promised the recipe.... Better late than never, right?

Ingredients:

2.5 - 3 pounds beef stew meat
1 pound bacon
2T melted butter
1 pound pearl onions, peeled (frozen ones are pre-peeled, easy peasy!)
1 pound carrots, sliced (or baby carrots)
8 cloves garlic, minced
1T tomato paste (tomato paste is so thinck, I usually let it heap somewhat on the measuring spoon)
2 1/2 cups red wine
spices:
1T Herbs de Provence (I did a medium heap in the middle of my palm)
1t sea salt (I just toss in some Blessed salt - smallish pile in palm)
1t black pepper (I think I did about 15-20 twists of a pepper grinder)
sprinkle thyme (I used about as much thyme as I did salt)

Ingredients for the last hour of cooking: (which can be prepared ahead of time and refrigerated until needed)
2 pounds white mushrooms
2 T butter
dash of herbs de provence

1 pound baby red potatoes (steamed/cooked)
2T butter
1T Extra Virgin Olive Oil
rosemary
salt (sea salt or table salt, whatever your preference...)

What to do:

Put the melted butter in the crockpot and coat the bottom of the crockpot with it.
Put half your bacon on the bottom of the crockpot.
Put your onions on the bacon.
In a bowl, combine the tomato paste, herbs de provence, salt, pepper, & thyme.
Toss the beef in the tomato herb mixture until evenly coated, add in the garlic and mix again.
Dump meat on top of the onions in the crockpot.
Put the rest of the bacon on top of the meat.
Put the carrots on top of the bacon, and pour the wine over all of it.

Cook on low 8-10 hours.

IN THE LAST HOUR OF COOKING:
Saute the mushrooms in 2T butter in a skillet.  If you have never done it before, what you want to wait for is after the mushrooms soak up all the butter, they will start to 'sweat' in the skillet.  That is when they are done - or at least, close to it.  You can usually saute them for another 5 minutes to make sure they are all evenly done.  Preheat the skillet and melt the oil on med-high heat before you add the mushrooms.  Once you add the 'shrooms,  stir them almost constantly for even cooking :)  Once they are cooked, add them into the crockpot and stir them in.

Cook/Nuke your potatoes.  Using the same skillet you cooked your mushrooms in, saute the potatoes in the 2T butter and 1T olive oil, a few dashes of rosemary and some salt and pepper.  When they are browned to your liking, you have 2 choices: either serve the beef on top of the potatoes, OR mix the potatoes in the crockpot with the beef...

Suggestions for making it even better:
1.  If you have time, pat the beef dry with paper towels.  After patting the beef dry, brown it in a skillet - on high heat, just for a minute on each side.  You only want to brown 3-4 pieces at a time, do not over-crowd the pan.  If you do this, you will need to brown it in a bit of fat, the preferred one here is bacon fat....
2.  If you want the sauce to be more like a gravy, take out some of the sauce with a ladle and thincken it using cornstarch (+cold water) or potato starch, or arrowroot powder....
3.  Best wine to use is a French Burgandy or a Pinor Noir from a Northern winery (Northern California, Oregon)  I always use a Pinot from a northern area, they tend to be less expensive than French wines, and honestly, I NEVER spend more than $10 for the bottle.
4.  Drink the rest of the bottle of wine with someone you love as it is cooking.
5.  It is a VERY rich meal.  If the sauce is a little too buttery for your taste the first time you make it, decrease all butter amounts by 1/2.  (I keep thinking I need to decrease them, until I cook it again because it is so long between times when I make this!  Of course, if you just LOVE butter and bacon drippings and want all the trappings, go light on breakfast and lunch and have at it :)  )  You could also decrease the amount of bacon by 1/2 OR precook the bacon so the drippings from the bacon as it cooks are not ALL left in the recipe.  The important thing with the bacon is to have 1/2 on the bottom of your crockpot and 1/2 on top of the meat...
6.  Watching carbs?  Skip the potatoes all together and opt for a healthier mashed cauliflower, or spaghetti squash to serve this dish atop.
7.  You may be wondering what side dish would work with this, or even if one is needed at all.  A nice green salad is always a good bet, but if you want to "save plates" - and your hands - from washing later, basic cooed green beans or asparagus with toasted almond slivers is a fantastic complement to the dish...  If you opt for salad, I tend to prefer something with a spring mix, maybe some walnuts and bleu-cheese...
8.  If you are entertaining, parsley makes a pretty garnish, and serve it with the same wine you used in cooking.

With exactly the ingredients I have listed, my crockpot was full, and we counted 28 heaping-ish ladle-fulls....  With 2 ladles per serving (if you serve it as a stew like I did), you get about 14 servings.  If your ladles are not quite so heaping, you could get upwards of 20 servings - especially if you skip the potatoes and serve it on pasta or spaghetti squash and some good, healthy green veggies on the side.

Bon Appetit!

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - A Modern Fairy Tale - in 1900

I am so fascinated by Frank Baum's original introduction to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz for a couple of reasons......

In the second paragraph, Mr Baum asserts that, "Modern education includes morality; therefore the modern child seeks only entertainment in its wonder tales and gladly dispenses with all its disagreeable incident."

And the final statement, "It aspires to being a modernized fairy tale in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the heartaches and nightmares are left out."

These are the sentences that have caught my attention.......

I shall discuss the latter one first......

I am now almost 40 years old, with 4 children of my own.  I can hardly say that the Scarecrow losing his straw was not alarming.  Similarly, the attack of the wolves, the attack of the bees, or, most especially, the attack of the flying monkeys.  And the one-eyed wicked witch - I had imagined her good eye, the one described as allowing her to see as through a telescope - as an actual telescoping eyeball....  I had nightmares.  Nightmares are normal.  Nightmares do not make one a homocidal psychopathic (or sociopathic) lunatic.  They just don't.

I cannot help but wonder what the story would be without the "disagreeable incident" - certainly not the classic that it is now.  I believe it would have been doomed to the same fate as other books from the period, written for children, written without moral, written only to entertain.  I know of none of those books - do you?  We all know of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

My second point of rumination, or the former sentence of the two mentioned, is that "modern" education - in the 1900s, included morality.  Wow.  It certainly does not anymore....  When morals were taught in school, writers decided that youth did not need moral tales anymore - they needed simply to be entertained, they sought "only entertainment", and we all know that anything a child seeks should be granted them....

Once the morals were out of the books, they gradually began leaving the schools.  Don't get me wrong, we have "anti-bullying" and "tolerance" rules, all the politically correct niceties are in play, but no real morals.  But we do not have ANY moral direction anymore.  What we do have, however, is lots and lots of (what I am now going to be calling forevermore) "written entertainment!"

My last thought (regarding this, for now) is this - really it is a question for some self-discovery for you, dear reader.

Think of the most exceedingly popular series of books being read, right now, by your children - or their peers.  Two series should do.

Now, answer the question, how many books are in each of those two series?  It's ok if you don't know specifically, guesstimate.

If you were to substitute book for book, or series for series, giving up the pop 'entertainment' and choosing a selection from the lists below, I can almost guarantee that your child would have more 'understanding' - I can guarantee they will have a somewhat improved vocabulary - AND, they are great stories!!  These books also have characters your child can love, hate, and relate to.

Here are a couple of recommendations in good literature to expand horizons and give cause for thought:

If you have a child in upper elementary school:

The Little House on the Prairie Series
Chronicles of Narnia Series
Kidnapped or Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson (especially great for boys, those ones are!)

If you have a child in the middle grades:

Padraic Colum's Children's Homer, The Golden Fleece and the Heroes who Lived Before Achilles (I would not necessarily have this one read unless said child loves mythology and also reads the Children's Homer - there is an INCREDIBLE opportunity for comparison of character between Jason and Odysseus - but if only one, definitely read about Odysseus, his character is beyond reproach)
Laddie
Little Britches: Father and I Were Ranchers
Carry On, Mr. Bowditch
The Hobbit
Journey to the Center of the Earth or The Mysterious Island
Johnny Tremain
Pyle's, or Green's, adaptations of Robin Hood and King Arthur Stories
Little Women series
Anne of Green Gables series
Horatio Hornblower series
Tales From Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb


If you have a child in high school:
(disclaimer, my eldest is only 13.  However, she has read the first 5 books in this list, and has enjoyed them all. )

Uncle Tom's Cabin
Tale of Two Cities
Animal Farm
The Ransom of Red Chief
Prode and Prejudice
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (this is a family read-aloud, but still provides good discussion)
The Strange Case of Dr Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde
Hobbit, and the Lord of the Rings series
Redwall series
The Invisible Man; The Time Machine; and, The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

There are so many, many more....   For a better list, should you be interested, please check out Institute For Excellence In Writing's list here.  They are experts on this stuff.  I am just a very new acquaintance of philology.

Happy Reading!

Chores What?

I have been stressing lately about how to most effectively develop a chore-plan for the family....

I think I may have found one that will work - at least until we move in 5 weeks.....

I am going to write, on color coded index cards, the daily chores each child needs to accomplish.  Each child will have their own color, so they will know whether or not their chores have been done.  The daily chores will also have a time written on them....

In the morning, immediately upon waking (7am), the following chores/cards will be taken care of:
make bed
unload dishwasher  (this one is child-specific)
make/eat breakfast
take your vitamin
clear breakfast dishes and wipe the table where you ate - and the chair if necessary
get dressed
brush teeth (and make sure you clean the sink when you are done)
quick clutter check of your designated room (aka 5 minute power clean)
TP check (child specific - duty is to make sure each bathroom has either a mostly full roll on the holder or a back-up roll on the back of the toilet)
start a load of laundry (again, child specific)

Sounds like a lot, but can easily be done in a hour....  (Seems like that should say "an hour".  Any English majors out there can comment :)

8-11:50 morning session of school    (for mom.  11:50 mom makes lunch, kids finish up schoolwork until 12)

(10am - mom, put laundry into dryer, start second load if necessary)

Noon - 1:30 the following will be done:
pray the Angelus, examine conscience
2nd load of laundry into dryer, first load folded after eating (no more than 10 minutes to fold/put away)
set table for lunch, get drinks, utensils, etc.
eat lunch
clear lunch dishes, rinsing them and putting them into the dishwasher
run the dishwasher
wipe table (and chairs if needed)
sweep floors in kitchen and dining room
wipr counter-tops, stove and microwave
30 minutes of exercize
clutter-check / 5 minute power clean

1:30-3:30 (4:00 for students in grades 8+) school session #3

3:30 - 5 is free time for any child who has completed all of their school work AND house work, has put away their school books and had their work confirmed and has a clean bedroom

at 5:00 the following is done:
empty dishwasher
set table for dinner - get drinks, napkins, utensils and condiments
eat dinner
clear table

rinse dishes and put into dishwasher

hand wash any hand washables

wipe stove/counter-tops/microwave

wipe clean table and chairs

dishcloths to hamper

fold/hang last load of laundry

family walk

family reading

brush teeth

pajamas on

lay out tomorrow's clothes

10 minute clutter burn

Weekly:

take out trash: get trash from each room and put into trash container outside, then take outside container to curb

bring trash container back to garage

dust

bed linens

vacuum (more than once a week if necessary)

Monthly:

fridge

garage

change out air filter

dust windowsils and check windows to see if they need to be cleaned

wipe down around the handles of high traffic doors and railings

Quarterly:

flip mattresses

blinds/curtains

A Few of My Favorite (Lent) Things

First of all, if you have kids, especially young-ish kids...  You MUST check out Holy Heroes!
They have "Adventures" for Lent, Advent and Summer, and some pretty awesome products.

Catholic Icing has a cool Lent Roadmap (Calendar) that you can print out for Free :) and have the young ones fill out every day from Ash Wednesday to Easter.

Arma Dei also has an ongoing Lent Challenge that you can participate in for a Free product.

For a more "grown-up", check out the USCCB "10 Things to Remember during Lent" article:
In fact, the USCCB has many good resources.....

My plan this year is to get my "Spiritual Reading" on!  I am committed to reading "Holiness: A Guide for Beginners" by Dom Hubert von Zeller, "Unbound" by Neal Lozano, and to at least begin reading "Imitation of Christ".

I know that since today is Ash Wednesday it is a little late for this, but this blog post "101 Practical Fasting Ideas for Lent" is awesome.

Have a Blessed and Fruitful Lent!