Crazy, Busy December Begins!

 I am not entirely over the head cold from hell - my sinuses are draining, and my daughter reports that the cough lasts approximately forever - but I'm infinitely better than I was a few days ago. 

I have a four hour coaching session today, five and a half hours on Wednesday, seven hours on Thursday, and 4 hours on Friday.  Saturday morning I have a social thing, and Sunday I'm planning an open house so I need to do some door-knocking Saturday afternoon.   And that's just this week - and remember, those hours are in addition to the research and prospecting, etc., I need to do anyway.

So I've been pre-cooking a few things for quick meals this week.   Yesterday I took another stab at the loaf I'd made on Thanksgiving - the one I thought was tasty but turned out dry.  My method of assembly was to start the lentils cooking while putting all of the other ingredients - oats, nutritional yeast, etc. etc. in a big mixing bowl, then adding the lentils and bulgur when they were ready.  So, yesterday I'm assembling the dry ingredients and had a bright idea!  What if I added some boiling water to the dry ingredients?  

The recipe calls for a cup of boiling water to be added to the pot with the lentils at the time the bulgur goes in, and I was a bit concerned that an additional cup of boiling water would make the overall mixture too wet, but it had seemed SO dry last time, I decided to go for it.  I added a cup of boiling water to the oats et al., mixed it up, and let it sit while the lentils and bulgur cooked until softened. When I mixed the whole shebang together, it had a stickier consistency and was, duh, wetter than the original recipe.  The recipe calls for baking it covered with foil, but as my version was wetter to start with, I baked it uncovered. 

It turned out perfect!  Moist and full of flavor, and I think I have a new favorite recipe! It's a little labor intensive but not really - the lengthy list of ingredients looks intimidating, but if you assemble the "other stuff" while the lentils and bulgur cook it's actually a one bowl, one pot, one loaf pan production.  While it was in the oven I made the mushroom gravy in the recipe but couldn't get mine to thicken, so I cheated and used cornstarch to thicken it.  Deelish!   So glad, too, because I'll be reheating it and eating it all week, accompanied by an assortment of green veggies.

Yesterday our community held the annual Santa in the Park party for the kids. Santa made his entrance on a fire truck with sirens blaring. 

Delaney didn't cry, but wouldn't go near Santa unless Mommy and Daddy stayed right beside her.  To my amazement, Santa insisted they all sit on his lap for the photos!  That man must have knees of steel!  Note that Miss D will not even LOOK at Santa, and is trying to pretend he's not there.

She did get some time on the swings and ate a couple of bake sale cookies, so the afternoon wasn't a TOTAL loss for her.  But Santa?  Meh.