Second attempt at Homemade Pasta Sauce....

and it came out pretty good. I purchased some tomatoes from the Farmer's Market and used some cherry ones from our garden, added some garlic, salt, a little bit of sugar, oregano, and basil. I put some of the tomatoes in the food processor and others I just chopped up.

The sauce has started to reduce after a little while.

This was the amount that I got after the sauce was all done to our tastes.

I liked the sauce consistancy this time, as you can tell from the sauce for the breadsticks. It worked good for that as well as with the spaghetti. I used the Barilla veggie pasta with carrots and tomatoes, it was a healthier version instead of regular pasta.

Quite a Haul....

about two weeks ago at the Farmer's Market. We got a few items that were a little pricey, such as pickled carrots $8 and a habernaro sauce for $5, but we wanted to try something a little different. The pickled carrots are great and could even be eaten as a tangy/sweet snack. The potatoes I got were 0.33 cents a pound. The potatoes, tomatoes (I got about 8 good sized ones), green beans, zuchinni, and peppers together were all $9. The apples were a little more pricer, I think around $4-$6 for all of them.

Healthier Eating...

I love carbs, tons of creamer in my coffee and some junk food a few times a week. While this might not sound so bad, do to several different reasons I am not in the best shape. So, I am going to try to change a few things of how I eat. I will still eat pasta but (not as often) try whole wheat or some other healthier version such as quinoa, have less coffee, and trying to eat fruits or veggies instead of snacking on chips, etc. I will stillneat some items but in a lot smaller portions, and others perhaps only once a month. I still plan on participating on the King Arthur's Bakealong though. I haven't decided yet if I am going to be on a specific diet or lifetsyle plan. I have one that I am looking into, and I think it might be pretty good, but want to some more research. I have already scratched the idea of starting one diet mostly because of allergies or foods that interact with medications that are part of the main eating on the diet. So this was my breakfast last Friday, which is better than what I normally eat which is nothing.

Some new recipes...

I like to find some new recipes every now and then. Last week I found this pork chop recipe and then a potato and green bean salad (or what I might call a german salad). We had a few issues with the pork chop recipe, some of this might have been because I used a food processer and not a blender. The marinade ended up being more of just chopped ingredients, although I have made fresh pesto before and never had a problem. The recipe needed more garlic we thought. We both loved the german salad, however it needed a lot less of the olive oil and LOTS more of the mustard. Anymore, I realize that in recipes for marinades or dressing they use way too much oil, so I now always use less and then taste, gradually adding more if needed.

Pizza taste test...

Normally, I make my own pizza dough, just because it is usually cheaper and tastes better. However, the last few times the crust hasn't been light, so I saw a brand new fridge pizza dough at the grocery store and decided to try it out. The company Wewalka had two different versions, a family style and then a bistro one. I got the family style which at my grocer's was $3. I made a pepporini and added some fresh basil from the garden. We thought the crust was pretty good, however I did cook it a little bit longer than the directions. I think I added too much sauce and cheese, so just be careful depending on your oven or when it gets close to the time per the instructions.

Mini Carrot..

I know this carrot is more of a baby carrot, or what I have been calling so far is the mini carrot. This happened to be the biggest carrot from my garden. I have learned a few things, that I will definitely in a few weeks grow more carrots. I will plan on making them the baby size and full grown size as well. I have never grown carrots before, and not sure if the super sweet taste of them (which does not compare by any means from the store bought versions) was do to them being baby size or homegrown. Does anyone else know? Do you have a garden? Hope it is going well!

Joy of Bake Alongs...

I am sadly missing the Great British Baking Show (otherwise known as the Great British Bake Off) and wish we could get all of the previous seasons. Since I am across the pond it doesn't start at the same time, they just showed season three here (which is technically season 6). Anyways, I highly recommend this show if you love baking and enjoy watching competitions were the people are nice to each other. To my relief last weekend I found out about the monthly Bakealong that King Arthur's Flour company started this month. I saw the picture and thought of two things, it looked good and I had never heard of the bread which is called Pane Bianco.

Here is the picture of me allowing the dough to rise longer. This recipe had sun dried tomatoes, garlic, cheese, and basil for the filling. 

The end result of my bread. The bread was good, it had a little bit of a soft chewy crust. We ate this with some olive oil as a dipping sauce. If I make it again, it will need more basil, cheese and garlic. I wasn't a fan the sun dried tomatoes, which I figured I wouldn't be anyways, so I might leave those out in the future.