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Soothing Tea Drops with Thieves – Giveaway 6/36

Posted by Carolyn on May 12, 2016 2 Comments

I sort of stumbled upon my new favorite way to drink tea with soothing tea drops with Thieves. This has been the worst winter with everyone in our family being sick over and over again. I started looking for recipes to make some natural cough drops when Alma had an especially bad cough. I found this recipe and made a batch of drops. I added in a few drops of Young Living’s Thieves Vitality oil to up the immune support that honey and coconut oil naturally provide.

Alma’s doctor suggested giving her a spoonful of honey to help her cough. In fact, it’s the only cough treatment that’s approved for the little ones. The honey coats and soothes their little throats, while coconut oil is shown to have antiviral and antibacterial properties. Thieves is also great at supporting our own immune systems as they fight off any bugs that might be getting us down.

I made a batch of the drops and put them in the fridge. A while later, I was thinking a cup of tea with honey sounded good. I’ve been adding a little bit of coconut oil to my coffee and tea, along with a drop of Thieves for a while. I remembered the little drops in the back of the fridge and realized that I could just drop one of them into my tea for an instant, ready made boost.

Here’s what I do:

Soothing Tea Drops with Thieves
(modified from The Coconut Mama’s homemade cough drop recipe)

1/2 cup organic, unrefined, cold-pressed , virgin coconut oil.
1/2 cup raw, organic, local honey.
5-10 drops Thieves Vitality oil.

Mix all ingredients together in a stand mixer, or with a hand mixer. Whip it all together until it’s smooth and well incorporated and fluffy.

Put a couple teaspoons into mini muffin tins. I’m sure there are molds that would make beautifully smooth drops, but I’m more about using what I have and what I have is a mini muffin tray. You could even just scoop onto a cookie sheet. Note: Since there are essential oils in here, you should use metal, glass, or silicone since oils and plastic don’t play well together.

Stick it in a freezer for about a half hour, just long enough for everything to solidify again. The drops should slide right out. Pop them in a jar and keep in the fridge for a long time.

When you’re ready to make the tea, start by steeping your favorite tea as you normally would. Add one soothing tea drop to your tea. Sometimes I add another drop of Thieves, just to enhance the flavor and immunity support.

Mix it all up. My favorite way to mix is with a few pulses with my immersion blender. It really gets it all blended together, and even makes it a little bit frothy.

For this giveaway, I’m going to give away this Mug Rug (or one like it). I’ve been working on a quilt for a while, and have lots of scraps left over. I’ve started making these fun, scrappy coasters and I’m planning on adding them to my Etsy shop later this month – along with some other oily accessories!

Head over to my Instagram account for a giveaway of a handmade, quilted mug rug! This is part six of my 36 Things for 36 Years project. I’m giving away 36 things this year, and this week will be a whole week of oily giveaways! Details on how to enter here!

Also, make sure you enter my other Essential Oil Giveaways this week! Essential Oil Sugar Scrub can be found here! Bath Bombs can be found here! Green Smoothie with a bottle of Citrus Fresh can be found here!

Whole30 – Halfway Point Reflections

Posted by Carolyn on September 16, 2015 1 Comment

Jesse and I, along with some friends, have embarked upon a Whole30 journey. I’ve been interested in Whole30 for a while, and when Elise did it, I decided to finally give it a try. I mentioned it to Jesse, fully expecting him to poo poo the idea, but he was on board. We planned to do it for September for a few reasons, mostly because we wouldn’t be missing any of the fun food holidays, and it’s a perfect time with the feeling of fresh starts that accompany Autumn.

The first few days were rough, I’m not going to lie. I had headaches, and basically felt incredibly hungover. I was grumpy and mean and unhappy. It was crazy to me that going without certain foods was making me feel so bad. It wasn’t that I missed the foods – it was that my body seemed to be rebelling against the new diet. How had I become so addicted to such crap? It really felt like I was going through withdrawals (though, I must admit that I don’t really know what that feels like…).

By the third or fourth day, I was feeling much better. I was letting myself eat whenever I felt hungry, trying to keep the temptations to a minimum. I figured that if I was never super hungry, I would never crave the things I couldn’t have.

We have been cooking lots of great recipes, and I don’t have any complaints about what we’re eating. I don’t even miss the things that are forbidden. Sure, sometimes I think that some chèvre or blue cheese would taste good, but everything is good and tasty enough without it.

I thought I would miss bread, but it’s the last thing I miss. I realized that the bread isn’t what makes a sandwich taste good. I’ve been eating tuna on salad and it’s just as good as on bread. No, it’s better. Last night we had people over for dinner and served bread with this amazing shepherd’s pie recipe. I looked around the table and realized I wasn’t jealous of the people eating bread. It just isn’t necessary.

One of the very best things I’ve learned is how to make my own mayonnaise. It’s seriously so amazingly good, I’ll never go back. It’s especially good knowing that the egg used to make it is under a day old. I usually go out, grab an egg directly from the coop and make the mayo that way. It has to be room temperature, so it’s perfect, and oh so fresh!

For the first week, I was snacking more, trying to keep the hangry away. I would eat fruit, almond butter, and Lara bars almost every day. Now, into my third week, I’ve noticed that I don’t need to snack as much. If I need something, I grab an apple – another great reason to do Whole30 in September.

As of right now, I’m planning on starting to add back foods on October 1st. I’m going to start with pumpkin beer. Beyond that, I think I’ll wait until October 8th to add anything else back in (that’s when most of our friends will be done with their 30 days). I’ll start with cheeses and see how I feel. Then probably peas and other legumes. Those are the only things I really feel like I miss, so I might just stop there for another 30 days or so.

If you’re thinking of trying Whole30 for yourself, I say go for it. Give it at least a week before you even start to decide if you’ll continue. The first days are hard, but worth it.

Having risen from the first week fog, Jesse put together some tips for our group that I’m going to share here, too:

I’ve been thinking of what I would do differently if we did this again…so I thought I’d share!

First off make/buy your sauces before you start, including:
-Mayo
-Ketchup/bbq sauce substitute
-Salad dressing
-Ranch

Make a plan for lunches when you won’t have leftovers. I often went out to eat when I didn’t bring something from home and this has been very difficult to find somewhere that has diet-approved stuff. Probably having a steady supply of salad stuff and protein on hand is a good place to start.

Figure out a good snack food. For us it’s mixed nuts (and I throw in raisins for dessert). Also have a decent supply of Lara bars for the emergencies (they’re expensive and pretty processed, but when it’s that or hangriness…)

Screw sticking to the “Whole30” only stuff! I’m eating fruit dammit! And I’m having a glass of apple juice when I want one! Even with a few raisins now and then, it’s still better than a bowl of ice cream.

To save you some time, I’ve looked at all the labels for some things and found these to be good:
-Sweet Creek Dill Pickles (Literally almost the only brand out of dozens)
-Applewood hot dogs (not that hot dogs should be considered healthy in any sense)
-Frank’s Red Hot Sauce

Coffee. Have plenty on hand and make sure it’s the good stuff that you don’t need to cut with cream and sugar. If you’re thinking of giving it up, wait. I tried the first day and was miserable, one thing at a time here folks.

Try not to think of the replacement things that you find as the originals. Any bbq sauce you make WILL NOT be as good as Stubb’s…it just won’t…BUT it still can be good if you just think of it as a sauce you put on your pulled pork, not a bbq sauce.

Try to limit going out or going to other people’s houses (if they aren’t doing the diet as well) for the first week. Watching Alma and Harriet eat corn on the cob, eat chips and salsa, and have dessert was tough, I can’t lie.

That’s all I can think of for now…I think I’ve already lost about three pounds of brain matter on this diet.

These are a couple of our Whole30 meals… see, not too shabby! Chicken nuggets with almond crust (way better than traditional!), sweet potato fries, broccoli and homemade ketchup and mayo. Smoked pulled pork, sweet potato slider ‘buns,’ green beans, coleslaw. Also, I don’t think I’ll ever figure out how to photograph food.

“A Good Food Day” by Marco Canora

Posted by Carolyn on January 27, 2015 1 Comment

I love a good cookbook. There are things that initially make me want to cook a new recipe- good ingredients, something that is new to me, a new take on a classic, and good photos. A Good Food Day by Marco Canora has all these things. Another thing that A Good Food Day has is fun, witty writing. Marco Canora presents his ideas for eating well in a creative, clever way. The English teacher in me loves the fact that the sentence “proper prior planning prevents piss-poor performance” is in the book. The breakfast lover in me loves the fact that the sentence “a slew of studies also show that eating breakfast increases mental clarity and the overall ability to get shit done” is also in the book.

Not only is this a book of recipes, but it also has sections describing various things. For example, there’s a section on pantry staples that everyone should have on hand. I love his list of 10 principles of a good food day.

Before every section of the book, Canora describes why certain foods are beneficial to our health. It’s wordy and wise.

The photographs by Michael Harlan Turkell are beautiful and inspiring. Photographs are very important to me when it comes to cooking a recipe. Food is inherently beautiful. It should be seen, smelled, felt, and finally tasted.

I’ve made three recipes out of this book, and all three have been excellent. The first were Oatmeal and Dark Chocolate Cookies. The recipe called for palm sugar (I’m actually a little wary about coconut palm sugar, because I’ve read that it isn’t sustainable, or good for the global environment…), and I just used granulated. I also used whole wheat pastry flour instead of spelt flower.

I had a helper. Alma is always motivated to help me in the kitchen – especially when cookies are the finished product.

The recipe is really unique and tasty – the molasses really adds something special, along with the coconut oil.

Here’s a tip: When you make cookies, save some of the dough. I know that we couldn’t (or shouldn’t) eat a whole batch of cookies at one time. We shape the remaining dough into a log on parchment paper, close it up, cover it with foil, and freeze it. Then, when you want cookies again, you can just slice off a few and bake them!

The next recipe I made was the meatloaf. We all love meatloaf, but we usually just throw things together, and it’s probably not very healthy. Just look at the ingredients that go into Canora’s recipe:

It’s colorful and fresh and tasty! The veggies kept the meatloaf moist and added some interesting flavors along with nutrition. The only complaint we had was it was a bit bitter, so I’d cut back on the lemon peel in the future.

I really loved this next recipe. It is pasta, cheese, and peas. Three of my favorites. Plus, it was quick and easy!

I need to say that I received this book from the Blogging for Books program in exchange for this review, but that the opinions, reviews, photos, messy kitchen, cute daughter are all mine.

Marinated Tomatoes with Chevre on Bread

Posted by Carolyn on September 24, 2014 2 Comments

We love to eat marinated tomatoes with chevre. It is such a great combination of flavors. We eat this so much this time of year. It’s so easy, you can’t even really call it a recipe. It’s just a great, tasty, simple way to use up all the tomatoes that are ripening, along with all the herbs in your garden.

Here’s how you do it:

Get a bunch of tomatoes, slice them into a bowl.
Grab whatever herbs you have – I love, love, love thyme in this. I also add some basil, rosemary, tarragon, chives, and a little sage. Whatever you have, and whatever you like! Chop them up, and throw them in the bowl.
Add some olive oil – I never measure this, but probably about a 1/4 cup. Just to give the herbs something to hold onto.
Crack some pepper on top.
Stir it all up and let it sit for about 1/2 hour or longer.
Take bread – thick, crusty bread is best. We found a bakery that has amazing sourdough, and have been using that.
Here’s where opinions can vary – Jesse likes to toast his bread first then add chevre, I like to spread the chevre on the bread then toast it (obviously this only works with a toaster oven, not a regular toaster). Either way, get some chevre on your bread.
Top with marinated tomatoes.
Eat with a glass of wine.
Yum.

Green Goddess Pasta

Posted by Carolyn on September 17, 2014 Leave a Comment

So far, we are doing really well with the monthly meal planning. It helps that we are trying out some new recipes (and still having some of our favorites!). This is one of the new recipes. It is inspired by a recipe I found on Pinterest – from Lauren’s food blog. We changed quite a few of the ingredients, so it’s almost something totally different.

My favorite color is green. Even in autumn, when I’m excited about all the new colors, green remains my favorite. I mean, come on:

This is pretty much just begging to be cooked into something delicious.

And delicious it was. And healthful (ahem, all the green). The avocado gives it a creaminess that Jesse described as “goopy and clumpy” – which I’m sure he meant well. The goopiness was quite lovely – almost cheesy. And if you wanted this to be vegan, I’m sure you could just make it without the yogurt and cheese and it would be fantastic!

Of course, we did add some Parmesan on top, because Parmesan.

So, here you go:

Green Goddess Pasta

1/2 package soba noodles
3 cups green beans, cut in 1 inch pieces
1 avocado
Juice of one lime
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1/8 cup taragon
1/4 cup chopped basil
3 garlic cloves
1/2 cup yogurt
1 Tbs olive oil
2 shallots, chopped
4 cups arugula
1 cup spinach
salt, pepper, and Parmesan to taste

Make the sauce. Put avocado, lime juice, herbs, and garlic in a food processor and blend until smooth. Add some olive oil if needed, to thin the sauce. It should be like a paste. Add yogurt and blend to combine.
Put green beans in boiling water. When about halfway cooked, add the soba noodles. Cook according to directions. Drain, and set aside.
In a large saucepan, heat oil and add shallots. Cook for about 5 minutes, until beginning to soften and carmelize. Add arugula and spinach and cook until wilted. Add pasta, beans, and sauce and stir to combine.
Serve hot, with Parmesan cheese grated on top. Don’t you love how when you cook arugula and spinach it basically disappears? It always seems like I’m adding way too much, and totally fill up the pan, then it reduces to nothing. It’s like magic.

Homemade Whole Foods Sloppy Joes

Posted by Carolyn on June 10, 2014 Leave a Comment

This is another favorite recipe in our house. We love to eat yummy food, and this recipe has the added benefit of having only whole foods in it.

Most sloppy joe recipes include lots of highly processed foods, like ketchup, brown sugar, mix packets, and barbeque sauce. I’ve taken a few recipes and tweaked them so it only has whole ingredients that we usually have around the house.

If you eat these on homemade whole wheat buns, they will still be whole foods – I will share my recipe for this soon! Of course, if you eat it with store-bought tater tots, it is no longer a whole foods meal. Oh well. It’s still easy, cheap, and incredibly yummy.

Ingredients

2 pounds ground beef
1 large onion, diced
1 large green pepper, diced
3 large garlic cloves chopped
6 oz can of tomato paste
1/3 cup honey
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1 cup water
3 tsp chili powder
2 tsp mustard powder
OPTIONAL: a couple dashes of Worcestershire sauce (not necessarily a whole food)
salt and pepper

Brown the ground beef in a large sauce pan over medium high heat. I like to use my dutch oven since it’s heavy duty and deep. Drain the fat.

Add the onion, pepper, and garlic and cook until the veggies are getting soft.

Add the rest of the ingredients, stir well, and simmer on medium heat for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. If needed, add more water a little at a time. You don’t want it to be too runny.

Grilled Ginger Hoisin Chicken Sandwiches

Posted by Carolyn on June 3, 2014 3 Comments

These sandwiches are based on something we used to eat pretty often in the summers. They are quick, easy, and incredibly tasty. I will eat anything with hoisin sauce on it, so I jump at the chance to eat these.

Ingredients

2 chicken breast, cut into long, thin strips

1 tsp chopped, fresh ginger
3 Tbs soy sauce
3 Tbs hoisin sauce
1 Tbs sesame oil
salt and pepper to taste

Buns
Cabbage
Mayonaise
Hoisin Sauce

The directions are really simple. Marinate the chicken in the next 5 ingredients for about 20 minutes. Heat up your grill, and cook chicken when ready. I usually cook the strips for just a couple minutes per side. Since they are small, they will cook quickly. Toast the buns in the last couple minutes.

When the chicken is done, spread some mayo and more hoisin sauce on the top of the bun. Put cabbage and chicken on bottom bun. Put buns together and eat.

I love the fresh crunchiness of the cabbage with the sweet tang of the chicken.

Banana Blueberry Mini Muffins

Posted by Carolyn on May 27, 2014 2 Comments

I’m always on the lookout for good muffins. Instead of trying to find a good recipe, I figured I should try to make one of my own. I scoured the internet, and all my cookbooks to try to devise a simple, basic muffin recipe. I think this one is it.

I imagine you could add many other ingredients, but this time I just added bananas (and one blueberry on the top of each muffin, just for kicks).

Here’s the recipe:

INGREDIENTS

1 3/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour (it’s the only flour I use, ever)
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
2 Tbs melted butter
3/4 cup milk
2 mashed bananas

DIRECTIONS

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Prepare your mini muffin pan. I like to grease mine with coconut oil, and I like to be generous about it.

Mix dry ingredients together. Beat eggs, and add melted butter, milk, and bananas. Combine the dry and the wet ingredients and lightly mix using a wooden spoon. Only stir for about 10 seconds. It should be really lumpy and not pourable. This will make for the best muffins.

Spoon into pan, filling nearly to the top. This is when I added my blueberries. I just let Alma drop one berry onto each muffin, and lightly poke it in.

Bake for about 12 minutes, or until starting to turn golden brown on top.

These are great! We ate them right up. In fact, I left of them on the counter, and after Alma’s nap, I kept finding her with a muffin in each hand. Definitely toddler approved.

Easy Homemade Beer Chili Recipe

Posted by andthenthey on December 18, 2013 Leave a Comment

This recipe is something I’ve eaten my whole life. My strongest memories of it are on winter days, sitting at the tile table my dad built, after my mom came home from teaching skiing. I’m not entirely sure of the accuracy of this memory, but that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that this is my comfort food. And it’s really easy.

Beer is key. I love the subtle beer flavor that this chili recipe has. It really makes it taste like chili to me. I’ve made it before when we didn’t have beer to add, and it just wasn’t right. This time, we had some Baltika 6 hanging around, so I threw that in. This is a fun beer because it is a throwback to our time in Peace Corps, Azerbaijan. I was even able to find all the ingredients to make this chili while we were in Azerbaijan. I digress… So without further ado…

Ingredients:

1 pound ground beef
1 onion, chopped
1 tsp cumin seeds
2 Tbs chili powder (more or less to taste)
salt and pepper to taste
Beer – 1 can, or bottle, or half a 20, or however much you want to use. I usually just use whatever we have around
1 cup beef broth (I use a bullion cube and a cup of hot water)
1 large can (28 oz) diced tomatoes
1 small can (14.5 oz) tomato sauce
1 extra-small can (4 oz) diced green chilies
1 small can (14.5 oz) red kidney beans, drained

Directions:

Brown and drain ground beef over medium-high heat.
Add onions and saute until they begin to get soft.
Add cumin seeds, chili powder, salt, and pepper and saute until aromas start to smell good.
Pour in beer and scrape up any browned bits on the bottom of the pot.
Add the rest of the ingredients except the beans, and simmer for at least 1/2 hour to let the flavors meld and develop. The longer the better on this.
Stir in beans when almost ready to serve.

When I was little, we would eat this chili with wheat crackers, so that’s what tastes right to me. My husband prefers cornbread, so we have that sometimes. Enjoy!

Eggnog Pancakes

Posted by andthenthey on December 12, 2013 Leave a Comment

Here’s a really good recipe for you to try! It feeds one toddler and one mommy. Maybe more if your toddler doesn’t eat spoonfuls of the flour mixture. You can double it if you have another parent or toddler who will be eating with you.

Here are the directions (more detailed directions and ingredients can be found at the end of the post):

Mix ingredients. These are pancakes, so it doesn’t really take a lot a skills.

Pour batter onto a hot griddle.

Flip pancakes.

Realize this would be easier (and safer) if you put the baby down in her bouncy seat. Put baby in her bouncy seat (that doesn’t look super safe on the table, but know if your heart that it is).

Finish cooking and eat.

Make sure baby falls asleep while you and your toddler enjoy your pancakes.

Done!

Now here’s how you really do it…

Ingredients:

3/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp sugar
3/4 cup eggnog (I used light eggnog, but I suppose you could use regular)
1 egg
1Tbs oil

Directions:

Get a toddler. You can skip this step if you want.
Mix dry ingredients together.
Try to stop your toddler from eating spoonfuls of flour and baking soda and salt. Gross. You can also skip this step, especially if you skipped step one.
Mix wet ingredients.
Mix wet ingredients into dry ingredients and stir well.
Cook pancakes on hot griddle until bubbles form and pop.
Flip and finish cooking.
Eat. We ate them plain, but I bet they would be good with your favorite pancake toppings. Especially whipped cream and a little nutmeg.

Enjoy!

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