Slack as of late...here's an update (ha that rhymes)

Not that I have that many followers to apologize to, nor in the grand scheme of things do I consider this really really important, but to any who are reading, I do apologize for not keeping up over the past few days. Parenting is new to me and has kept me very busy over the last few days as I have a near 6 month old who I am convinced will be getting teeth very soon.

That being said, I have had a few frustrating meals; in addition to the fact that I have some new spots of eczema. Now, I have heard from a couple people that often when changing a diet like I am, that your symptoms may get worse for a little while. I would consider that to be my case at the moment. Not wildly worse, but I do have some new spots, and my hands are desperately itchy and the ezcema is creeping up my ring and middle fingers on my left hand. I am convinced though, that this venture is my only hope, so I will be sticking to it for a good time to come. I mean, practically the whole back of my left hand is covered in ezcema. It's really bad. And so I don't really have much choice.

Onward with some frustration, my bread seems to be touch and go in my bread making machine. It'll produce one lovely loaf, then a couple weird ones. The top of the last loaf (which is usually the glorious heel of the bread) came out looking more like brains than bread. Nonetheless, I didn't want to waste it, so this morning I had what you might call "bread nuggets and honey" for breakfast. McDonalds, eat your heart out.

I was keeping the yeast in the fridge since I opened it, and so I thought it might be a temperature thing, but alas, after a couple weird loaves and the yeast being brought to room temperature, I'm still wondering what the deal is. Granted, the bread maker is a little rusty, and sometimes I think the motor smells like it's burning when it's on knead cycle....it's either the motor or the bread's too thick? I don't know. If anyone has any wisdom out there feel free to pass it along. I think I'm going to try another flour. Someone suggested Speerville Mills flour...I have been meaning to get it but not able to get to the store to do so.

If you follow my Facebook, you'll see that I was wondering if I could make processed free sugar date squares. As a matter of fact, I did try it. They didn't turn out perfect, but they were deliciously yummy, just like date squares should be. I took the recipe off Jean Pare's "150 Delicious Squares" cookbook (you know Jean Pare...the one with the series of Company's Coming cookbooks, who as of late has stopped matching the color of her shirt to the color of cookbook). Hilariously, the date squares in here are called "Matrimonial Squares." I've never heard them called that, forgive me if that's common knowledge to you. I'm left wondering why I got proposed to over an Asian chicken recipe instead of a good batch of Matrimonial Squares.

Anyway, for the bottom and top oat layers, I directly subbed honey for brown sugar, and applesauce for butter. It came out a bit gooey. In hindsight, I think I would have decreased the amount of honey or applesauce, or a little of both. The bottom layer wasn't quite cooked, although the top layer turned out quite nicely. They were better the second day after having sat in the fridge. I'm sure you could take any date square recipe and sub what I did. Just be sure not to add any sugar to the date filling. Dates already have enough sugar in them anyway, that without the addition, it's plenty sweet.

I made this for dinner the other night. My husband thinks I have a woman crush on Lovoni. That's okay, he's got one on Donovan Bailey. I'm not sure why. He says he seems like a cool guy. Well Lovoni's a cool cook. That suffices for me wanting to make her dinners, does it not? Anyway, the fish wasn't bad. I didn't have chilies so I used hot red pepper flakes. I'm sure it would have been tastier with the chilies.

To polish my post off with one last frustrating moment. So in the past few months I have been making a pretty good chickpea curry. I've been using the canned chickpeas, up until yesterday (they have loads of salt in them). Well an email from the receptionist at my ND's office reveals you can buy chickpeas dry, and soak them for 20 hours and proceed as planned. Not true. I soaked my chickpeas from 10 pm the night before until 5 pm the next day, and they were totally hard. I mean, you could hear them plunking onto the plate. Phoned my mother in law. Truth is, they need to be boiled in the appropriate ratio of water to chickpeas, until the water evaporates. Not that this is any spilled milk to cry over, but everything in my kitchen feels like an experiment lately, and too-hard chickpeas are just not yummy. And there's lots of leftovers.

Until the next meal!