Lori in PA

A very enjoyable blog, Kathy. Good luck with your move and getting settled in your new environment.

The power of suggestion strikes again -- I took one look at your cookies and abandoned the computer for the mixer. We're almost out of chocolate chips, so I made do with peanut butter cookies instead. Now I've cleaned up all the evidence and have packets of three cookies each freezing for "when did you make cookies?" lunch treats. :-)

It's the cook's snack, naturally.

Abra, those look veddy, veddy enticing. Beam some over, will ya?

This is my hands-down favorite timer -- I own two: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00004S4U...glance&n=284507

Oh, and I meant to add: I'd much rather do almost ANYTHING than go to Chuckie Cheese!!! (Thanks, Kathy, for supporting me in my mean-mommy-ness.)

I'm a huge fan of oven-cooked bacon. If you line the pan with foil, you don't even have to wash anything! It sounds like your new-foods method is working. I admit to being the meanest mommy in the world -- we've always insisted on a no-complaints-at-the-table policy (complainers were given an extra amount of the offensive food) and required to eat it. A child who suddenly felt too sick to eat was solicitously offered the choice of going to bed (no music, reading, etc.) or remaining at the table to finish the meal (my insurance against forcing a truly ill child to eat, but amazing how they perked up 99.9% of the time!). All eaters are always allowed to request a "no thank you" helping of foods they don't care for and are given a miniscule serving, but this must be asked for cheerfully and kindly.

Way back in the dusty recesses of my aging mind, I seem to remember reading somewhere that one could draw a "moat" to help the souffle rise evenly with a sort of top hat. As I had a too-small souffle dish, mine went in all directions. Or, perhaps it would have done that anyway. Most of my experiments of this kind are decidedly unscientific.

Re labeling spice jars (and other kitchen ingredients): You'll have a philosophical decision to make about this very soon, I expect. As you begin to teach your boys to cook, will you label everything to make it simpler or will you teach them to recognize and remember each spice? I teach kids' cooking classes in my kitchen every summer for our 4-H group, and find it a necessity to have everything labeled since I can't be watching every child at every moment. With my own, I've taught them to know a lot by just working side by side, but the labeling becomes convenient when they are old enough to cook when I'm away from home.

My grandmother used to say, "Some women can throw more out the back door with a teaspoon than their husbands can bring through the front door with a shovel." I'm a scraper -- I'd rather keep my money for other things rather than throw it in the trash.

Hi, Kathy, I'm looking forward to spending the week with you. Cinnamon toast is one of my favorite wintertime just-before-bed snacks.

Hi, Siobhan, Immediately above the body of your first post above, there's a grey bar and oriented from the right side of the screen it says "track this topic, email this topic...". If you choose "track this topic," you can have an email notification sent to you when someone adds a post to this thread. Alternatively, you can save this page in your "favorites" (that's what it's called by Internet Explorer) and just check it yourself from time to time. Welcome to eGullet!

I'm not sure whose souffles you mean -- mine or Klary's -- but I'll take the liberty of thanking you for both of us.

I have this vision of Klary's mother's beef in butter simmering happily in kitchens all over the world...

Amen to all the above. I think the current books on this subject change -- I got "Feed Me, I'm Yours" when my first child (17 yodd) was ready for food -- but the principle's the same. Take simple foods and transform into something that won't choke your baby. Figure out a way to preserve some of it so you don't have to prepare stuff for every meal. I did ice cube trays of stuff with the first darling and after than tended more toward blobs on cookie sheets with the other two dearies. I was more anal about potential allergies with the first one, too, but relaxed much faster with the other two. I didn't have a Happy Baby grinder myself, but I have a dear friend whose kids are even older than mine who still sings its praises as loudly as Susan.

We call it breakfast-for-supper and it is one of my kids' faves, too. We do it once every week or two -- it's cheap, relatively healthy, and fast. It might be eggs in any form and/or homemade pancakes/waffles/French toast and if bacon is on the side, so much more the glee. Re kids getting funny ideas about the meanings of words: When I started Kindergarten, the principal's name was Mr. Foreman. I knew what the word "foreman" meant -- the guy in charge -- so for at least the first two years of elementary school I thought "Mr. Foreman" was his title. When my teacher told me to take a paper to the principal, I didn't know what she was talking about. When we finally got the confusion cleared up, she laughed and laughed. We big people don't KNOW what those little people don't KNOW, sometimes.

Very, very nice, Klary. I'm so INTO souffles now!

(The crispy bits are really good.)

I'm eating lunch right now: vinegar-based coleslaw (leftover) and a strange-but-good concoction of browned ground beef and leftover rice pilaf stirred into leftover mustard/white wine sauce from a chicken thigh braise.

Sigh. Nice, very nice. I think I especially liked that you posted these a bit at a time, but regularly. It was a mini-treat every time I opened this thread. I guess that's it?

Courage to all!

Don't apologize -- hacking can be good. I don't care much for venison sausage either -- there's no fat on them thar bones, is there? My dh has totally gotten into making it, though, and the rest of the fam really enjoys.

Those look really appetizing, Pille!

I don't think this has been said yet: There's nothing at all wrong with getting comfortable with a few basic entrees, salads, desserts, etc. and using them often, especially when you are a beginner. These can become your "signature" dishes.

How about a progress report from our quitters?