Tag Archives: food

Slow-cooked split pea and ham soup

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My husband’s favorite soup I make is split pea and ham soup. A funny thing happened  last week – my hairdresser and a close friend all started to rave about how they love split pea and ham soup. Next thing I know, I am making a batch of split pea and ham soup, and decided to try it in a slow-cooker. I got rave reviews and the other great thing it cost me $4 and it serves at least 8 people!!

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Ingredients

  • 1 bag of split peas (dried green peas ~450 g)
  • 2 Ham hocks (bacon hocks)
  • 1 onion (diced)
  • ~1-2 litres of water

Place all ingredients in the slow-cooker. Cook on low for 6 hours. The meat should be falling of the bone, take out the meat and bones. Pull the meat off the bones, shred and put back in the soup and stir. Throw the bones away. Place into containers and either store in the fridge and or the freezer.

When you reheat the soup, you may need to add water, also season with salt and pepper to your taste preference.

Baking with Citrus: Orange Lightening Muffins + Lemon Buttermilk Pound Cake

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This weekend,  I took two recipes I previously posted and made a couple of modifications. These modifications were so well received the boys have almost eaten it all in 24 hours.

Modification one was using the Orange lightening cake recipe and making Orange Lightening Muffins. I made the recipe exactly the same but instead of putting it in the cake tin, I placed it in a muffin tin. I baked them at the same temperature – 325 degrees F, for 30 minutes.

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The second modification was to the Vanilla buttermilk pound cake, making it a Lemon buttermilk pound cake. I switched out the vanilla essence using one lemon.

  • grated zest of 1 lemon
  • heat lemon for 10 seconds in the microwave and add to the mixture the juice from the squeezed lemon.

Everything else was the same including the Lemon icing.

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Weekly Meal Plan – week 9

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Let me start by saying, I hate daylight savings when you loose an hour, especially when you only realize it is happening a couple of hours before bed. Woke up this morning, had breakfast and now finishing my breakfast latte while writing this blog and it is midday already – I have not done a whole lot yet. Anyway, into the recap from the week and this week’s plan…..

This week was a much better week. I actually cooked a couple of meals in preparation for the week, and there was less stress at work which made it easier to come home and get things done. I got some brownie points as I was proactive and organized 2 days of walking at lunch with a friend starting this week.

We have switched to gluten-free pasta now for about 6 weeks and I will say everyone in the house (my husband, 5-year-old and myself), have found two great brands that we all love. In fact, we like Quinoa Gluten-free Pasta – Spaghetti Style and the Archer farms Gluten-free Fusilli Pastas better than the old stuff we were using. The price ($2.50-$4.00 range at our local Super Target), taste and overall cooked result are our main reasons for liking these two products. My son, who is a little fussy (not too bad, he’s jus not a vegetable person), asks for seconds and devours the spaghetti by the bowlful.

Gluten-free Pasta

Here is our meal plan for the week:

DAY BREAKFAST DINNER EXERCISE
Saturday ^Strawberry-Banana Whole Wheat Crepes Cabbage Soup (Slow-Cooked which differs from the recipe)*
Sunday ^Strawberry-Banana Whole Wheat Crepes Vegetable Frittata 3-4 Mile Walk
Monday Egg + Berry/Banana Fruit Salad with Flaxseed Vegetable Pasta Bake*
Tuesday Whole Grain Cereal+Soy Fish and Vegetable Pockets 3-4 Mile Walk
Wednesday Oatmeal + Banana and Almond butter ^Pizza @ zPizza (love the options at this place)
Thursday Berry + Banana + Spirulina Smoothie Hungarian Casserole + Quinoa*  3-4 Mile Walk
Friday Berry + Banana + Spirulina Smoothie Vegetable Chilli + Brown Rice + Corn Tortilla’s*

^ indicates my splurge for the week
* Pre-made and can be kept refrigerated or Frozen