Happy Halloween and Soup Revisited

The ghouls and goblins are out tonight.....or they're supposed to be anyway. DH has taken the boys out to trick-or-treat and I'm sitting here waiting for the little ghouls to start arriving. I was told that we could expect about 40 or so trick-or-treaters, but here it is, 10 minutes past the start time (6-8) and no one. This will be a HUGE change from our last house. In our last neighborhood, we would typically get 300-400 trick-or-treaters! There would be a constant stream of kids, usually starting a bit before the official start time. You barely had time to do anything but plunk candy in buckets and bags as fast as you could. That was a little much. But hopefully things will pick up a little more than this........

Tonight's dinner needed to be quick and easy so that I could get my own goblins out there door. I ended up making a soup from Cooking Light that is part of our regular rotation and one that I've posted about before. I figure it's worth revisiting once in a while, those recipes that we tend to make on a regular basis. That, and now that I've figured out how to work my camera without the flash and without daylight, my pictures are coming out better than when I last blogged about this soup.

Old Picture.........

New Picture..........
North Woods Bean Soup

Hey, at least it's improving a bit, eh?

Okay, it's been 20 minutes now, no goblins. They have to come help me get rid of some of this candy!!!!

Happy Halloween everyone!

Tags: soup, Cooking Light, low fat, recipe

Cookbooks

Quite often, the subject of cookbooks comes up over at the CLBB. Recently, someone was trying to find the King or Queen of Cookbooks - the person on the boards with the most cookbooks. As I read over the responses, my jaw dropped. 100? 190? 250? 293? 500? The numbers kept growing!

The winner? Our own Sweetnicks who came in with 932. Nine hundred and thirty-two cookbooks! I can't even fathom a number that large! Never mind that I don't have room to house that many cookbooks, I can't imagine ever having the time to even appreciate each and every one.

The more I read about some folks' love of (or is it obsession with?) cookbooks, I've come to realize that I really am not a cookbook person. I'm much too fickle. I'm commitment phobic when it comes to investing in a cookbook.

It's not that I don't appreciate a good cookbook, I do! I loved Mollie Katzen's The Enchanted Broccoli Forest with all the little notes and instructions all penned in Mollie's own hand, no less. Some cookbooks are beautiful, like Martha Stewart's Hors D'Oeuvres Handbook. Gorgeous photos and so many lovely-looking appetizers. I didn't care if I ever made a recipe out of it, I just had to have it.

Thing is, I find that I make a handful of recipes from each one and then I seem to lose interest. Perhaps I need to go through my cookbooks more often, but sometimes that just seems plain tedious. It's one thing if I just want to see what's inside - it can be fun to just casually browse, discovering and rediscovering - but it's another thing when I want to make something with chicken and end up hauling them all out, thumbing through each and every one, only to find there's nothing in any of them that I really feel like making.

I find that the internet better suits my needs most of the time. I can try recipes from many different sources without really having to commit to any one. And there are so many recipes floating around in cyberspace, there almost isn't any need for cookbooks. Almost......

Except that it just isn't the same to click as it is to turn the pages in a book. You really can't get any feel for the author of a recipe or cookbook by simply looking at a recipe online. Kind of like buying the single without buying the whole album (Did I say album? I meant CD.) You can still enjoy the song on its own, but you get a better feel for the creator if you buy the album, er, um, CD.

So, I still like and value cookbooks, I just don't want to own very many. At some point it truly begins to feel like clutter. I'd love it if my library had a more extensive collection so that I could take them home, look them over and then give them back when I was done. And maybe now and then, even decide I like one well enough to commit to it.

One of these days I'll get around to listing the few cookbooks that I do own here on this blog. You may have noticed that I put up a new section over on the sidebar a few weeks ago - Kitchen Hardware. I've begun listing many of the useful, fun or just plain practical items that make cooking more enjoyable. I hope to expand these lists and include cookbooks too. Won't be tonight though. Blasted Blogger isn't letting me upload any pictures - I guess I was lucky to get the one.

Off to figure out my menu for the week so that I can get to the grocery store tomorrow or the next day. What to make, what to make, what to make............??

Tags: cookbooks

Comparison Shopping

So, yes, it's been a lot quieter in the kitchen this week, but I've still been cooking. I managed to spend only $34.06 at Wegmans this week, but that doesn't mean we're not eating pretty well. By having a pretty well-stocked pantry and freezer, we've managed to have Easy Layered Beans and Rice, the Chicken Sausage and Provolone Penne Bake, Laura's Lean Beef Burgers, and pork chops with Baked Triple-Bean Pot. Supplemented, of course, with various frozen and fresh vegetables. Not bad.

I will probably throw one or two new recipes on for next week, but will still be trying to cook from the freezer and pantry. We still have plenty of beans, tuna for tuna melts, Wegmans' pierogies and raviolis, meatballs and marinara, a flank steak, and leftovers of Garlic Harvest Soup and Black Bean and Chorizo Chili.

Last week I started my comparison shopping between Sam's Club and Wegmans and it turned out to be very informative. While Wegmans does have competitive prices when compared to other grocery stores in the area and especially to what we were paying in Indiana at Meijer, most of their prices just don't compete with Sam's Club. Especially when it comes to meats and cheeses. Here are a few examples (all prices are per pound except Boursin which is by the container):


These prices are based on the cheapest items available at Wegmans, including their own store brand. Quite often, even their store brand can't compete with Sam's. There are some exceptions such as boneless, skinless chicken breasts - they will often be priced at $1.99 at Wegmans, but more often I see them for $2.59 - the price seems to change on a whim, never actually published as a sale. I haven't quite figured that one out.

My list is a lot longer than what I posted above, but a few exceptions, Sam's Club is still the most competitive. Look at the difference in goat cheese prices! For some reason, Wegmans seems to carry only a very expensive variety with no lower-priced options. If I were to buy just one pound of each of the items listed above, I'd be saving $32 at Sam's Club over Wegmans. That's nearly the price of the yearly $40 membership right there.

Looks like I'll be holding onto that membership. There are quite a few items, however, that I will continue to purchase at Wegmans even if they are cheaper at Sam's just because the bulk size at Sam's is just too large or more than we need at one time. If you can't even fit the container in your cupboard or fridge, it's not really all that convenient........

This week I will be near Giant with some time on my hands, so I will be collecting some prices in their store to see how they compare with Wegmans.

Pasta

Chicken Sausage and Provolone Penne Bake

Last night I managed to find a new recipe to make that did not require the purchase of any new ingredients. It's a recipe that's been on my to try list for a while and it's from Cooking Light.

It makes quite a large portion - it can definitely serve 8 very healthy-sized portions. While it was good, it was not spectacular. A good, solid recipe that is nice for an uncomplicated weeknight meal. As I was making it, I realized that it really didn't go much beyond what you might think to throw together on your own, but I was hoping it might end up being one of those recipes where the sum is greater than the parts - that maybe the balsamic would add an unexpected dimension to the overall flavor. Nope - just your basic pasta bake. Don't get me wrong - I would make it again, it's just that for a published recipe, it's not really all that original or exciting.

For the record, I used Wegmans' spinach and feta chicken sausage and I used a combination of ziti and rotini (using up those half-used boxes of pasta sitting in the cabinet). In the future, I would up the balsamic and red pepper flakes - perhaps that would push it from good to very good.

While I was out...

If I'm not going to do much in the way of new recipes this week, my posts may get a little random! Like this one.........

Today I went to the mall and to Sam's Club. The main purpose of my trip out there was to write down the prices of the things I tend to buy at Sam's Club and compare them to Wegmans to see if my membership there is really worth it. Of course it would have been more helpful to have completed this before I renewed my membership last week, but nonetheless, it will help me decide if I should renew it next year or not.

Wegmans seems to be quite competitive with Sam's for many things, but not all. Tomorrow night I will walk through Wegmans while DS is at Tae Kwon Do and write down their prices and do a comparison once I've gathered all my information. Can you tell I have a lot of time on my hands? Well, I do have the time and I do need to keep us on a budget, so I may as well do a little research. Eventually I hope to get to Giant and do some comparing there too.

I showed great restraint and walked out of Sam's spending only $20. I really only needed Halloween candy. I got one bag of 120 pieces for about $10. In Indiana, we lived in a neighborhood where we got 300-400 trick or treaters. I usually ended up spending close to $40-$50 for candy (we didn't live near a Sam's Club), so spending only $10 was kinda nice! I asked around and this neighborhood gets about 40. So, for $10, we can give each little goblin 2 pieces of decent candy instead of handing out one teeny tiny Tootsie Roll at a time for fear that we'll run out.
The other $10 went to my one and only impluse buy - a bag of Hershey's Almond Solitaires. Mmmm...these are good - and I'm not even a fan of Hershey's chocolate. I've tried quite a few different brands and have never been happy with them - except for one brand I bought online, but the price and shipping made them too expensive to buy regularly. I've tried some from Fresh Market, but the chocolate was a bit gritty. I tried some from Wegmans, but the chocolate had an unpleasant, plasticky coating. I know I tried a few others - can't remember the brands - but they were only okay.

These are quite good. The almonds are big and crunchy and the chocolate is rich and dark - the kind of dark that has a hint of espresso. Yum. If you like chocolate-covered almonds (mine have to be dark chocolate, no milk chocolate) and have a Sam's Club membership, you might want to run out and get some - the sign said they are a seasonal item. If you don't belong to Sam's but want to try them, I did find them on Amazon.

My other purchase today was a pair of slippers. Whoopee. Now that my laundry and scrapbooking area are in the unfinished part of the basement with a cold concrete floor, I really needed a pair of slippers. While I was looking, I found some Isotoner slippers that looked and felt oh-so-comfy. I was considering the bright red pair until I saw a Breast Cancer Awareness/Pink Ribbon Store display and saw these:I'm not big on pink, but I decided what the heck. It's for a good cause and who cares what color your slippers are anyway? As I was buying them, I remembered that Sweetnicks has been doing a nice job of displaying pink items you can buy to help fund Breast Cancer Awareness. Check out her site for more ideas for Pink Ribbon purchases in her "In the Pink" series, there's Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3. The slippers above are available at department stores like Macy*s - I also found them on the Isotoner site.

That's it for tonight. Until tomorrow............