Home fries are one of my staple meals, whether it's a weekend brunch or a weekday dinner. A plate of home fries plus a fried egg equals a delicious, easy meal. Once you know the basics, home fries are simple to prepare and take only about half an hour from start to finish, with very little involvement on your part.
Reporter Tracie McMillan has spent a lot of time analyzing what Americans really do with their food - how they get it, and where it goes. And she has come to some interesting, and occasionally counter-intuitive results.
My youngest daughter is obsessed with marshmallows. She literally goes crazy when she sees one. Instead of just handing her a few plain marshmallows, I look for ways I can make the marshmallows more exciting to eat. Here is what I have come up with:
Marshmallow kabobs: Take a bamboo skewer and slide a marshmallow half way down. Next, slide a strawberry and then another marshmallow. Follow that with a cantaloupe ball and another marshmallow. Finish up with a ball of watermelon and another marshmallow to top it all off.
Yogurt marshmallow pops: Place a marshmallow on the end of a popsicle stick. Dunk it in a cup of yogurt (whatever flavor you like) and roll it in graham cracker crumbs. Place it in freezer for a few minutes so that the yogurt hardens up a bit. Eat away.
I'm sure you have seen the headlines. "Americans Waste 40 Percent Of Their Food." It catches your attention, doesn't it? And it feeds perfectly into the image of the fat, wasteful American. But who ARE these people who are throwing away almost half of the food they buy?
Microwave popcorn is a Godsend, don't get me wrong. But if you want to avoid all the crazy chemicals, control the ingredients (I recently went gluten free, and while popcorn itself is gluten free, microwave popcorn often contains gluten), or make a delicious snack (okay… meal) for a fraction of the price, "real popcorn" is the way to go.
Looking for a delicious veggie side dish to munch on at lunch? How about a quick and easy cucumber wrap? My kids and I love this recipe, which is great because I don't have to fight with the girls to get their daily vegetables in.
You will need the following items for your cucumber wrap:
There are plenty of homophobia, racism, sexism and other 'isms' to go around (I always wonder why homophobia isn’t called homism or something instead, since these people are obviously full of hate rather than fear, although I suppose that’s where the hate stems from…), but if you’re expressing any of these things you’re likely going to get called out on it by somebody. They are slowly, slowly dissipating in this country, which I’m grateful for yet very impatient with, since this is two thousand bloody twelve and progress seems to take centuries.
But if you express hate for people who are fat, by George, you’re in good company. It seems like being fat is the one thing that everyone can agree is BAD in America—not using (or letting teens use) cancer-causing tanning beds, not smoking, not drinking, but simply being fat—and it’s the one thing people are banding together to hate in droves. I can be a feminist, an LGBT marriage supporter, a progressive activist for the environment and health care—but people from all of these groups and more will wrinkle their noses at me and ask me if I’ve thought about getting my stomach stapled.
Believe me, I have. Every fat person has, so why ask? Do you think we really don’t know we’re fat?
My kids are always begging me to make homemade French fries. Of course, the taste of homemade food far exceeds that of the prepackaged food so I can understand their desire. Making homemade French fries is quite easy once you have all the peeling and chopping finished.
First, decide how many potatoes you need. I use five Idaho or Russet potatoes for three people. I like to have a few extra French fries to heat up the next day.
Next, wash the potatoes under a faucet of running water. Then you can decide if you want to peel the potatoes. There are nutrients in the peels. I tend to peel some of the skin, but not all of it.
Cut the potatoes in the thickness that you like them. I try to make them look like skinny sticks just like they do at McDonalds, but my father prefers them more like steak fries.
It's back to school shopping for most of us this month. My youngest daughter attends a special needs school because she has a rare neuro-genetic disorder called Angelman Syndrome. Her school doesn't require parents to purchase or send in any supplies. The only thing I have to buy for her is a book bag to hold her diapers, extra outfit, school communication folder (that the school supplies), smock for eating and swim clothes if it happens to be swim day.
I choose to also purchase a lunch box rather than pay for my daughter to eat meals at school. I do this for several reasons, one of which being that her schedule doesn't match up with everyone else's. She often refuses breakfast, which makes her hungry again a little while after lunch. I end up sending in a breakfast and two lunches. All this food doesn't fit in standard lunch boxes. That is why I was so excited to discover EasyLunchBoxes.
