Technological Dilemma

I'm pathetic. I abandoned my blog last year when I gave up on Pinterest-ing my way through breakfasts and dinners, though I did read a fair amount since I last posted. I had not, however, finished a book since the end of June (but I finished two during Christmas vacation!!) because we had a baby! I also changed jobs; I left the library and found myself in an 8th grade English class. 

Why did I choose to revisit my blog? I go back to work tomorrow, so God knows I probably won't have time after that. I'm a new mother, and no parent is perfect. I'm not coming from a place on a pedestal, but rather as someone expressing a dilemma regarding technology and health. I know we live in the technology dominated twenty-first century. Computers and iPads weren't available when I was a kid, nor when my younger siblings were growing up. Raising a baby in this environment is challenging. 

It is easy to give in to technology. Like moths to a streetlight, the television's glow entrances children, and hey, you can probably clean your kitchen while occasionally throwing glances towards the living room where your child sits in awe. My kitchen? It's a mess. Seriously, you would never know I spent hours cleaning my house just last week. Keeping our bundle of joy distracted while my husband and I watch tv is an ongoing battle. 

Put him in the chair, he flips around until he can see it. Just today I was watching a YouTube video on the Nuremberg Trials, and yeah, that's a black-and-white film induced grin a peek elicited while he sat on the couch next to me (at least it was educational??).

And, I, too, have given my child the iPad to hold his attention for a few minutes. Or at least for a cute photo op. 

If I'm guilty, then why does it bother me? I spent two years obtaining a graduate degree in Library Science---believe me, I understand that the world is turning towards tablets and apps. But is it healthy? The American Academy of Pediatrics would say no. In fact, they advise no screen time until at least the age of two. Babies need people interaction, and too much media in kids has proven to lead to attention deficit disorder, academic difficulties, and even weight problems. Okay, so the "be a perfect parent" part of me (amazing how that drive can develop overnight) wants to pull him from all glowing objects--the tv, cell phones, tablets, computers (night lights??). But how can I prepare him to be competitive with his peers in the future who do have a lot of experience with such devices? I've heard parents talk about their kids spending hours on the tablets they got for Christmas. There are products such as the iPad potty training chair on the market. More and more studies are produced showing that kids are spending record amounts of time on electronic devices (and the results of those studies aren't necessarily positive). 

 Since the iPad photo op, we've limited the only time W has with it to Face Time with his overseas grandparents. It's a daily fight to keep him from watching tv (I suppose you could tell me to give up my vices of Young and the Restless and competition cooking shows, but let's not take drastic measures just yet). He finds our phones more interesting than his bottles sometimes. Though I feel I'm doing the right thing, I worry that he'll be behind others who are familiar with the devices that are taking over the globe. 

I really just want my kid to play the apps like "go outside" and "read a real book" and "use your imagination." Is that so bad?

Little Pretzel Candies

Long time, no write, but we moved in my defense! 

Anywho, I made candy for the staff at work last weekend. It's a very easy recipe I got from my friend, Deb, a couple years ago and make on occasion. 

What you need:

Small pretzels (I use the square ones because they hold the chocolates better)
Small chocolates (Rolos and Kisses are probably the most popular choices)
Small candies or nuts (not pictured...I used candy corn and peanut butter M&Ms this time, but have used macadamias and pecans in the past)

The first step is the hardest. If you can get past the monotony of unwrapping, you're in the clear.

I made 200 of these suckers, so there was about 4 piles of trash like this.

Place your chocolates on top of your pretzels on a baking sheet. Bake at 300F for no longer than 3 minutes.

 After taking them out of the oven, squish your smaller piece of candy or nut on top of the chocolate to make sure it sticks to the pretzel. Voila, you're done! Easy peasy. And very tasty.

Hard Boiled in the Oven Eggs & Squash Casserole

So I saw this idea on Pinterest about how you can hard boil eggs in the oven at 325 for 25-30 minutes. Not that it's all that difficult to boil them in a pot of water...but I needed to take a shower, so this was more convenient. 

It worked. But the shells turned spotty!

You'd think the spots would indicate little burned marks, but there was only one burned place on this whole egg (and none on the one I ate this morning). So...I don't know why they're spotty. Chemists? Any ideas? Oh, and the burned spot would probably indicate that 27 minutes was too long in my oven.
 

The yolks turned out nice though. And they're spotless.

I also made squash casserole for the first time ever yesterday. I know, I know. How can I have grown up in eastern NC without ever making that? Well, kiss my grits, folks, I usually just saute squash. I used the recipe found here as a starter, but then changed things as I saw fit.

 I used the following ingredients:
3 squash
2 zucchini
2 eggs
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp vegetable oil
dash of rosemary
8 oz feta (I bought a block and crumbled it myself because it's cheaper that way)
5 oz sour cream
1/2 cup shredded parmesan
2 tbsp garlic powder
1 tsp black pepper

 Layer half of your squash on the bottom of the pan.

Beat your eggs.

Mix in all other ingredients.
 

Spread half of your mixture on top of the squash. Then layer the remaining squash and mixture.
I sprinkled more parmesan and pepper on top. Bake at 375f for 40-45 minutes.

 I did a spanking good job on this. Tobias got seconds on vegetables, so you know it was at least a step above edible.

Between the Lines

Between the Lines by Jodi Picoult and Samantha Van Leer

I read this book a few weeks ago, but am just getting around to writing about it (or maybe just putting forth the energy to write about it). Like I've said before, I'm a big Picoult fan. However...this one wasn't anything like her adult books, and I daresay YA isn't her forte. It'd be unfair of me to say it was a read that tweens and teens wouldn't enjoy, but as an adult, I thought it kind of dragged in some areas, and I wasn't really grabbed by the action in the plot. 

Delilah is a teen girl who doesn't particularly care for school, even though she loves to read. The book she's currently infatuated with, Between the Lines, is a fairy tale about a prince on a quest to rescue a princess. It's when the prince begins speaking to Delilah that the story introduces its conflict--how can Delilah rescue a prince from living a repetitive life within the pages of a book?

The number of times Delilah unsuccessfully tries to help the prince escape is what makes this book seem to drag. I thought she could have left out a time or two for the story's sake. It was becoming blatantly obvious that the task was hard. As in most modern fairy tales, there's a happy ending, and readers pretty much know what that ending will be.

Okay, so even though I didn't thoroughly enjoy this book, I can give kudos to the authors for writing a YA novel that is clean. There's no sex, no vulgar language, no inappropriate themes. Despite lacking the topics and language that run amok in today's YA lit, I can say that young girls will enjoy reading this book. It has a happy ending. It has the girl-meets-boy story that infatuates them. It even has color illustrations, which don't come around often in a novel of its length.

So even though I wouldn't recommend it for older readers, if you have a classroom, a library, or a teenage daughter of your own, I'd say it'd be worth it for them to read.

Target age range: 11-15 years

Beef Tips and Mushrooms

I love my new Crock Pot. It's been better than any other appliance in my kitchen these past few weeks. It's not that I've never owned one; this is just the first time I've used one for anything other than Velveeta cheese dip. 

The other day I took a recipe I found online that crammed cube steak, cream of mushroom soup, and Lipton onion soup mix into the slow cooker. Okay, I admitted earlier that cooking is pretty new to me (my dad used to say I could burn salad), so please excuse my stupidity ignorance when I wouldn't buy cube steak because I didn't know if it was steak or hamburger (for reasons I won't now get into, I'll eat the former, but not the latter). So I bought the beef tips. Then I forgot to buy the onion soup. So I had to work with what I had at the house.

I did add the curry powder that's in the picture; I mainly did it for color. Otherwise, it would have been...gray... and I don't think my husband would have found it too appetizing (although as my aunt says, you can roll anything in sugar, and he'd eat it). But considering this is what it looked like when I threw it in the pot, I felt doctoring was in order

About halfway through cooking, I did a taste test, and the sauce needed some spice. So I added some chili powder and black pepper to give it a little bite. After 5 hours in the pot (original recipe called for 4-6 hours), dinner was ready. 

I served it with green beans, black eyed peas, and quinoa. This was the first time I'd ever had quinoa, and the gravy was a nice touch. It tasted a lot like brown rice, so it needed something on top. The mister said he would prefer rice next time, and he did pick a lot of the mushrooms out (I thought maybe I could slide those by him), but otherwise, he did like it. 


Tonight I'm cooking Hawaiian BBQ chicken, so we'll see how that one goes.

Gorge Yourself

(Picture from nytimes.com, 2007)

After much consideration, I've decided to merge my reading blog with some cooking adventures. It's a newly discovered interest of mine (as in, I used to think anything more difficult than tearing cellophane off a box of food from the freezer wasn't worth any consideration), and I like sharing. I have a photo album on Facebook, but the caption boxes don't let you go into much detail. So even though I will still use this blog to review good (or not so good) books, I'll also use it as a path to culinary enlightenment. 

Hot dogs will not be involved in the making of this blog.

Edgar Sawtelle

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski

This is a must read for dog lovers. Before you fret and think this is reminiscent of Old Yeller and will make you cry, the animals are okay! 

The Sawtelles raise their own breed of dogs on their farm in Wisconsin. Gar and Trudy love the dogs, but eventually want to have children of their own. After struggling with pregnancies, little Edgar Sawtelle is born mute. [Let me stop here a minute. Because up until now I was kind of floating along in the book trying to decide if it was going to be worth 560 pages of my time. I've got a stack of books waiting for me, I need to use my time wisely here. Thank goodness little Almondine takes the lead at this point.] Almondine is one of Trudy and Gar's dogs who actually lives in the house instead of the barn. She has been trying to find her place in the world, and when she notices baby Edgar vying for his parents' attention, she knows exactly what she must do. She becomes his voice. Almondine is as much a part of Edgar as she is herself.

Skip a few years to an adolescent Edgar. He has learned to sign; his signs are part ASL, part Edgar's version. Not only does he sign with his parents, he communicates with the dogs in this manner. Edgar is excited to learn that he is going to raise his own litter of pups. While training one day, his father suffers an attack, and a voiceless Edgar is unable to help him.

Edgar and Trudy wallow through their days, and Uncle Claude comes back into the picture (much to Edgar's dismay). After an unthinkable turn of events, Edgar flees into the woods with three of his young dogs.  They must survive in the wilderness while trying to make their way to Canada. Edgar eventually needs to decide if he will return to Almondine, his mother, and unknown truths at home, or if he will stay away for good.

This book is a fine piece of drama. Though it is not your typical mystery, there is a one within the plot. The author pays attention to details, creating a story with rich settings and characters. It's not a book that you can skip a page and still be okay with what's going on--you really need to read the words to grasp the story. I liked it because it is a different sort of coming of age story. After reading the book, I found that it was supposed to be a modern retelling of Hamlet, and I guess I can see similarities between the two works. However, I wouldn't go as far as to say it's a retelling of that story, but rather a new story with "Hamlet-esque" features. 

I do wish, however, that I could see a picture of the fictional Sawtelle dog. At first, I imagined Almondine to be something along the lines of a greyhound. But then as the book went on, I thought the Sawtelle dogs were supposed to be similar to German Shepherds. Does anyone have an opinion on this?

Overall, a good story. If I could go back and do it over again, I would focus my attention on this one, and not be reading three others at the same time. So take that into consideration before you pick it up.

Target Age Range: Older Teens - Adults