Comfy cozy then crazy crazy

A Sunday without football, so sad.

This was a nice way to start the day though.  Happy family 🙂

I didn’t feel like doing a real workout, which has been a problem for me lately, but I dragged my butt to the garage to do a very half a$$ Jillian DVD.  Something is better than nothing??  I don’t know…

I had leftover buckwheat waffles with nut butter for breakfast before church.  We haven’t been to church as a family in what feels like an eternity (I think it’s actually only been a week?) but both kids did awesome at child care and we got to hang out with friends and it was a super way to spend Sunday morning.

Is there a better way to lunch?  I mean really.  Is there???  No.

I’m not reinventing the (vegan) wheel with this one, since it’s basically a salad I’ve been eating since the birth of this blog, but it’s just so good I can’t stop right now.

People have been asking about my salad dressing, and the one I’m really into right now is loosely as follows (I don’t measure things, but this is what I generally aim for):

Champagne vinaigrette

• 1/2 cup EVOO
• 1/4 cup champagne vinegar (or balsamic)
• 2 T dijon mustard
• 2 T lemon juice or ACV
• 2 T maple syrup or honey
• salt and pepper

*If I’m making the dressing for a salad that we are going to eat as a family I will add 1 tsp of garlic infused olive oil and decrease the EVOO by a tiny bit (rather than use fresh garlic due to fodmaps)

The recipe I decided to use the beef in was the Cinnamon Beef Stew from the cookbook Well Fed.

I got this cookbook as a hand me down nearly six years ago when I was still vegan, and I always forget about it.  I’ve only made one thing from it (sunshine sauce) which was good.  Then I loaned it to a friend for a while, then I got it back and promptly forgot about it.  So here goes nothing!

Can you believe I got all this meat for only $10!  Score.

I adapted the stove top recipe for the instant pot because I’d rather not have to continuously check on meat for 90 minutes.

The idea of putting cinnamon sticks in a beef stew was…well…interesting to me, but what do I know?!

Turns out, it was delicious!  So so soooo delicious.  The broth was amazing and I could have slurped it straight without anything else even in the stew.  For reals.  Definitely a unique recipe that makes me want to try more of the recipes in the book.

I added noodles to the wheat eaters’ bowls, and everyone loved it.  It also made enough for 1-2 servings of leftovers, depending on who is eating it, so I’m pretty pleased with the cost of that dinner.  Aside from the meat, the rest of the ingredients probably cost $2 and I had them all on hand already.

I don’t know if I can or should blog about the drama that went down on Monday, but suffice it to say I am VERY glad I started the day with a quarter cup of nut butter.

I had leftovers for lunch – pulled pork and Brussels – which held me over wonderfully until dinner.

I made chicken Caesar salads for us all, which was easy peasy thanks to the tessemae’s dressing.  I bought another few when I was at WF.  I have a problem, I know.

I already had all the chicken from last week, so dinner came together fast.

I used two kinds of kale, dino and curly, and massaged it like crazy while the kids played happily ON THEIR OWN outside for a grand total of ONE HOUR.  It was amazing.  I think I only had to go out for crying once and it wasn’t fighting crying, but injury crying.  A minor injury, don’t worry.  Just before they went out, I did a craft with them where we made binoculars out of toilet paper rolls that I taped together.  I let them color them and decorate them and then attached a string to go around their necks and then sent them in the yard to explore and adventure.   They were way into it.

Kyle was supposed to be home late for dinner so I just set his plate in his place as if he’d be joining us soon.  Meanwhile, the kids and I sat down to start eating…which is when things went downhill.

I didn’t get to eat a single bite of dinner, because we zipped off to the hospital instead.  Everyone is fine now, but my heart was RACING for a solid hour or two.  We had to stay for a while while both kids were admitted and checked out and monitored, but the hospital staff was as awesome as ever and after what seemed like both an eternity and no time at all, we were back home eating dinner.  I brought the kids’ food with us to the hospital (they needed stuff in their stomachs) as well as Pattycakes’ peanut dose, so we just let them sit at the table with us while we ate.  I gave them some pears and then gave P his antibiotics for his ear infection and his dairy dose.  I can’t even keep track of everything I’m giving him these days.

This salad was great btw.  Kyle’s had parm, but the rest of us were dairy free.

I tried to do something mindless that evening but was so distracted.  My body never fully relaxed until the next morning, but we slept with P in our bed just to be on the safe side.  Probably my worst Monday on record.