An Evening In The Life

Welcome to our kitchen. It's a cooking day, which means that I get back from taking Little Moo out or from work, put my apron on and multitask for several hours, both before and after dinner. It occurred to me that I never actually documented one of these insane evenings. So, here goes.

This is one of these days when I have NO food to eat, other than a soup that disappears soon after breakfast. Right after I got back from work I threw together these coconut muffins so I'd have something to eat between breakfast and dinner besides fruit (the sugar is just too much). This is one of two boxes. I also made a coconut custard with papaya and dates that's already in the refrigerator. I wish I could have included more protein in it, but I'm off nuts again. :(

The cauliflower is the first thing made for dinner. It's steamed, with a bit of salt and olive oil. Since it takes such a short time and holds up well after a while sitting out it went first.

The next thing I do, once I set out the rest of the dinner-makings, is to set up a few things for the next day or so. Here's a jar of dried navy beans that will be good in the braised lamb dish that's already started in the fridge (or if the beans aren't soaked enough by tomorrow it will go into a soup of some kind the day after). I soak the beans with brine (yep, red cabbage!) and put it up next to the coconut kefir I made earlier. 

Next, it's time to make a new batch of ghee. That takes roughly an hour of oven time, but nothing else is in there tonight, so it's okay.

Next I put on the entree, which is some very nice looking rockfish with ghee, dill and lemon. The non-GAPS eaters are having rice pasta, which is on the burner next door.

Here's the fish, all done and ready for eating. There's fermented veggies, and broth for everyone, too. The cauliflower is off to the side. Notice that the broth is made pink with brine - that's a technique I often use to get our resident pinkophiliac to drink at least some of it. (And, yes, for those of you wondering, Little Moo usually prefers to come to the table with as little clothing as possible.)

While Little Moo is in her bath I strain the ghee. This time, for some reason, it took forever. In the meantime, I start cleaning up and loading the dishwasher.

Then, while Little Moo is in the bath, I prepare her evening supplements. What a trooper. Not even a peep of complaint tonight. 

Then, the little person has to go to sleep. At the moment we're using the living room rocking chair and her daddy's lap, which means that the kitchen has to be dark. Here's the finished ghee about to go into the refrigerator. I still have stuff to do - the meat has to be browned for tomorrow's stew - but it's too dark, so I thought I'd start this entry...

Anyway, for what it's worth, here's a sample of an evening around here. Of course, tomorrow, I get to put the stew in the slow cooker right before we leave the house at 11:30 and then later I get to relax before dinner. :)

Peachsplosion!

FYI...use a nice, big jar...bigger than the one I used. Be sure to keep at least 1" open at the top and keep that top on loosely!

Luckily, I caught it just as it was expanding. There's just a small puddle of cleanup. :)

Summer Stonefruit Preserves

This started out as a chutney, then I thought twice about making it too spicy since it's also for Little Moo and there's a good chance that I will still be just as allergic to peaches as I was three years ago, so she and Snackboy will have to eat it all themselves...

I chopped up several small plums, three nectarines and three peaches, added some dried cherries, dried papaya and about 3 chopped dates. Finally I added a teaspoon of salt and the juice of one lemon (it was hot here for a few days...) I dropped in about 4 drops of stevia, then added 1/4 cup of coconut milk kefir.

It didn't fill up high enough, and I thought that perhaps the dried fruit might want to soak up some liquid, so I added about 1/4 cup filtered water and filled the rest of the jar up with the kefir.

It's been sitting for about 24 hours when these photos were taken. I tried a bit of one of the plums and it's quite delicious. Sort of sweetish, super-creamy, but with a bit of salt and tart. A nice balance. (If you were wondering, yes, that is an old-fashioned transistor radio leaning on the jar.)