Enjoying a Final Week of Fun!

The last week of Christmas Vacation is among us!  While some of my friends are racing to get their house back in order, I am still enjoying our decorations and now have every board game we own in the living room.  We have 22 board games to date, not to mention the game systems.  Although the wii is pretty cool, I still enjoy a good old-fashioned board game with the family.  My 10 year old is really good at scrabble.  I have officially stopped the holiday baking in our house to begin the cleansing at the beginning of 2011.  Family-time doesn’t have to involve eating at our house.  Before we know it the kids will be back at school and I will have a lot on my plate on the farm.  I’m already starting to plan for the gardens, I will have to have all of our seeds ready to start in the greenhouse by the end of January.  I also have one of my goats due to kid at the end of January to early February, and that will begin my milking process again; I have missed it so much.  Last year I lost my two oldest does, Grace and Hopey, they were my first losses since starting in dairy goats.  After I cried my eyes out, I got up and started again.  My daughter still gets sad for them and knows where to visit them, but she knows that when you adopt this lifestyle that things happen.  When one life ends, another soon begins.  I look forward to that in the coming year.  Our gardens will be bigger and better this year with a full seasonal rotation and we have made our orchard even bigger with the addition of more fruit trees.  The beginning of the year holds a world of work for us, so I will cherish this last week with my family.  I will still have our decorations up and our house a disaster for one last week of fun!

Post-Christmas

Christmas is over!  I’m happy and sad about it.  I’m happy that all the extra goodies are out of the house because I am not strong enough to say no.  I’m sad because it is a beautiful time of year, I love the holidays.  The generosity, family, and love of friends, neighbors, and complete strangers seem to be more noticeable during the holidays.  This was our family’s first allergy-friendly holiday; hence the blog abandonment.  With all of the classroom, neighbor, and family parties; I felt a bit overwhelmed.  Things turned out really, really good with the baking aspect of the holidays.  I also learned that not sticking with tradition in the food department turned out really good.  Instead of the traditional side dishes of our family with the array of casseroles; I opted out.  I did make the mac-n-cheese, my son and husband would have been thoroughly disappointed if I hadn’t.  I also made stuffed mushrooms and allergy-friendly jalapeno poppers.  Oh yes I did and I will again.  One of my new favorite recipes is for the chocolate fudge I made.  It was a lot easier than I expected and very handy for all of the parties. 

The Best Chocolate Fudge

Ingredients

·                                 2 bags of enjoy life chocolate chips

·                                 1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk.

·                                 1/4 teaspoon fine kosher salt.

·                                 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract.

Directions

In a heavy bottom saucepan over low heat, melt the chocolate chips with the sweetened condensed milk and the salt. Remove from the heat, add the vanilla. Spread evenly into a foil-lined 8 or 9-inch square pan. Chill for 3 hours, or until firm. Remove the fudge from the pan and place onto a cutting board. Remove the foil from the bottom of the fudge and cut into squares.

Getting Ready to Change-Up the Holiday Dinner

My plan for today is to finish my Christmas shopping, Yay me!  My husband is leaving the store early so that we can head out of town to where the larger stores are.  I’m hoping to finish up both of my kids and the grandparents.  Everyone else is getting gift cards!  Then I will be able to turn my attention to our Christmas menu.  I’ve decided to change it up a bit.  I felt we went a little over-the-top with Thanksgiving, I wanted to curve away from the traditional menu a bit.  I can’t curve away too much, though.  My husband’s family is very old-fashioned.  It’s one of many things that I love about them.  They have taught me so much about our hobby farm and the ways things were done “back then”.  I made a beautiful pork tenderloin the other night with a cranberry chutney, so good.  It was so good that it got me thinking, “why not have something like this for Christmas”.  Then the wheels started turning!  My husband, son, and I love mushrooms.  Daughter can’t stand them and the rest of the family haven’t really had them.  Why not make stuffed mushrooms?  To include a favorite of my daughter and some other family members I also plan to make cheese stuffed, bacon-wrapped jalapenos.  Are you as excited as we are?  I’m looking forward to changing it up a bit.  We plan to keep some of the more “traditional” menu items such as the baked ham, macaroni and cheese, and deviled eggs.  Those are a must for the brother-in-law.  I have a busy weekend ahead for wrapping presents and getting ready for the classroom holiday parties.  I’m lucky this year because both kids are having pizza parties.  Thanks to Udi’s frozen pizza crusts, It’s a snap!  All I have to do then is make sure she has a few sweet treats to match her friends.  Thanks to Enjoy Life candy bars it is much easier.  I’ve decided to include my recipe for the pork tenderloin with cranberry chutney.  Enjoy!

Pork Tenderloin with Cranberry Chutney

Preheated oven to 350 degrees

Cranberry Chutney

1 can whole cranberry sauce

¼ cup maple syrup

Dash of cinnamon

Over low heat to reduce and thicken.

Pork Tenderloin

Baking dish

Place pork tenderloin in baking dish.  Cover top with ½ cranberry chutney.  Pour 1-1/2 cups apple cider around tenderloin.  Bake uncovered for 40 minutes.  Take out and leave alone for at least 10 minutes to allow meat to rest.  Serve other ½ of cranberry chutney alongside pork tenderloin.