February 28- fried rice

Last day of February 

How I make fried rice 

In a big nonstick pan or wok, Sauté a large chopped onion in just enough oil (maybe 2 teaspoons or 1 tablespoon)  to keep it from sticking and burning.  

Then add about 4 cups of cooked rice - I use cold leftover rice and I always use parboiled or converted white rice (like Uncle Ben’s) that was cooked in a rice cooker.  

I add about 1/3 cup or more water with the rice,  cook it on high, stir often until it’s heated through.  

Then I add low sodium soy sauce until the rice looks the right color (or to taste)  Ive never measured the soy sauce, I’m guessing 3 tablespoons or so. 

Now, add heated up vegetables -this time I used 2 cups of frozen corn and 2 cups of frozen peas and carrots that have been heated in the microwave. 

The meat was about 1 cup off finely diced leftover roast beef.  

Now stir and heat it all together.  

I add black pepper and don’t usually add salt as even low sodium soy sauce has plenty of salt flavor.  

I never add eggs like traditional fried rice. 

Sometimes I sauté diced carrots and celery with the onion. 

Sometimes I sauté diced bacon and use a bit of the bacon drippings to sauté the vegetables and then use the bacon as the meat.  

Sometimes I don’t put any meat in it and sometimes I use leftover chicken.  Roast beef is my favorite way.  

If you’re not using a lot of oil like restaurant fried rice,  your cold rice needs to not be sticky and clumpy.  That’s why I like converted/parboiled rice as the grains don’t stick together.  

I’ve been making fried rice like this for years.   

And it’s just as good leftover as it was the first time.  

❤️Rhonda 

February 27- cookies and books

Hello again

I bought a bag of black walnuts at Sprouts awhile back and I used them today to make these cookies.  

I got the recipe from my uncle Rex but I’m pretty sure he got it from his mom,  my grandma.  

I made them exactly like the recipe except I used vanilla instead of black walnut flavoring.  

  

I kept about dozen for us and shared the rest with our son and my parents.  

Black walnuts don’t seem to be too popular now but I grew up eating them- black walnut divinity is so good and so is black walnut ice cream.  

I’m sure this cookie recipe could be made with any other kind of nut too.  Also,  it did not yield 60 cookies for me,  more like 3 1/2 dozen 

Anyway,  we think black walnut pinwheels are just delicious.  

I’ve been reading this week.  

I really liked this one,  it may be one of my all time favorite books. 

I just started this one.  I think the kindle version is free on Amazon for a few days right now.  

You may know Kate from Youtube or her blog or her other Kindle books.  

Have a good weekend everyone 

❤️ Rhonda 

February 26- home things

Good morning everyone 

I spent a lot of this week cleaning and such around our home.  Things had just go out of whack for several reasons.  

I put the leaves back in the big dining table 

and put out a few Saint Patrick’s decorations 

  

Husband’s little garden plants are growing 

 

They seem to like our sunny bay window ☀️

Our living room 

I bought a vented storage wood box  to hide the antenna and roku boxes on the mantle,  put my assortment of birds on the mantle and on the shelf over the sofa 

and made a rag strip wreath for over the loveseat (some of the grands helped make the wreath) 

Cooking this week 

Smothered steak in the crockpot on a day I had a busy afternoon 

I cooked a hen and will make it into soup or more chicken and noodles this weekend 

And we had a new kind of frozen pizza that was really very good for a frozen pizza.  

   

During the cold spell, we ran our heater and our gas fireplace so much!  We did conserve when told to but that wasn’t until the middle of the 2 weeks when it never warmed up above freezing,  

I’ve heard natural gas prices increased astronomically too, 

I was concerned what our gas bill would look like and it came this morning.  

I’m not sure how it is so small and I’m very thankful we had heat during those very cold days.  

Ducky played with grandkids 2 days and spent 1 day at the doggy day camp and spa.  

It all made him so tired.  

But doesn’t he look clean and fluffy?  He smells good too! 

Hope you all have a good weekend 

❤️ Rhonda 

February 25- hello again 👋🏻

Good morning ☀️ 

Last week was nothing but rough!  It was so cold and snowy and icy.  

Thankfully we never lost power or water and the conservation things we did like keeping the water, gas and electric usage as low as possible, were not fun but we made it.

 

Melanie asked about our meals - before the coldest weather came,  I cooked several entrees and we reheated portions in the microwave as it used the least amount of power.  

We also had sandwiches.  

Below is a recipe we tried from Joanna Gaines.  

I divided it by 3 for just my husband and I.  But made as the recipe is written, it would be super family style meal.  

The salad was so good and so simple.  I made the salad a second time and we had it again last night with a different meal.  

The salad is a diced English cucumber, tomato and onion with just a little olive oil and lemon juice for the dressing.  

Apparently the weather got Walmart all out of whack and I could not get a grocery pickup so I went to the store Saturday.  

There were lots of bare spots but I found everything on my list except the caramel sauce. 

Walmart normally sells maybe 50 kinds of sliced bread but on Saturday, they had only 3 kinds.  We liked 2 of them so that is what we bought.  

And we ended up buying the ice melt at a local cleaning supply business.

Our house was very much in need of a good cleaning.  

I didn’t vacuum or steam mop when we were watching our electric usage and the floors were extra dirty because of tracked in snow and ice melt and grands being here.

I also didn’t do laundry.  

So I made my to do list on my iPad this week and I’m so happy most of it is done. 

Today, I’ll work on laundry.  

When we went to Walmart,  we also went by a thrift store.  I saw a vintage metal tole lamp on their Facebook page and I was so happy they still had it for sale,  

I’ve been changing the lamps in our home from lamps with cloth shades that get so dusty and are hard to clean to lamps with metal or glass globes that can be cleaned easily.  

Apparently I’m not the only one as these are listed at high prices on EBay. 

That’s the exact same lamp! 

Ours was $9.99 and my husband spent $17 on some new lamp parts to improve it.  

I’ll take some photos and show how nice it looks in our living room soon.  

I helped 3 grands with their virtual school the first part of the week and now they are in actual classes at their school 2 days a week. 

However 2 grands that have been going to in person classes most all this school year are back in virtual school because the town is have water problems, not weather related but a pump failure.  They should be able to return to school as normal next week after being out for 2 weeks.  

Seems like since the virus arrived, it’s always something, isn’t it? 

A holiday to plan for 😊

And I think this Instagram post sums up my feelings during so much of this last 12 months.  

❤️ Rhonda 

February 17- hard winter phase and bananas

First,  here is how the bananas are faring 

The bananas are pretty much fully ripe now.  The one I ate yesterday was a little riper than I prefer but it was still firm and not mushy like ripe bananas can be.

My unscientific results seem to say that bananas bought while green will keep a week and still be edible using this Rubbermaid box. 

I’ll keep using it and let y’all know it goes.  

In weather news,  it’s been so cold and we have about a foot of snow on the ground.

We’re having energy problems too. 

Our area has had to have electrical rolling blackouts and we’ve been asked to conserve all energy.

So we are keeping our heat turned lower than we prefer and we aren’t using any appliances like stove, washers, dryers, sewing machines, vacuum cleaners, etc: 

Some friends of ours that live just south of the Dallas area live in a town with a failed water plant, caused by the weather.  

First in their house, some water lines froze and then all water has stopped coming to their home.

To at least keep toilets flushed,  they are thawing buckets of snow for flush water. 

Above is part of what he posted on Facebook.  

Thankfully their 10 year old son is helping and thinks it’s all a big adventure.  


I’m ready for this winter adventure to end.  Thankfully above freezing temperatures are coming this weekend and maybe things will start getting back to normal.  

❤️ Rhonda 

February 14- White Valentine’s Day

First an update on the bananas 

I ate the ripest one at breakfast and it was perfect.  The bananas from the greenest bunch still have a little green to them but they are ripening too. 

Kim,  you are funny! But I couldn’t go buy bananas right now even if our roads were driveable.  

I didn’t need to buy much of anything though- just milk, eggs and onions.  

We’re getting the snow that was predicted.  It’s very fine and blowing so it’s drifting in places and bare in others.  

And it’s just getting started!  We won’t be done with snowfall until Wednesday I think. 

All holidays have been different since the pandemic started.  

We had a mini Thanksgiving meal for our Valentines lunch.  

  

It was delicious and there are leftovers for maybe 2 more meals. 

I had wanted to make some homemade pimento cheese to put in celery sticks but my husband was napping and I couldn’t get that tiny pimento jar open so I’ll make it  later this week.  

One of our grandsons made this Valentine for his mom.  

Sweet as can be, right? 

Happy Valentine’s Day

❤️ Rhonda 

February 13 - just bananas

Day 3 of the bananas in the Rubbermaid keeper

The bananas are ripening.  I ate the ripest one today and it was delicious 

But about the experiment.  I am not doing it right.  

I should have 2 equal banana bunches with one in the keeper and one on the counter to really tell how the box affects the ripening speed.  

Maybe after this snowstorm is over,  I’ll try it that way for a more scientific result.  

In case your wondering,  this box is different from an ordinary plastic food storage box.  

The lid is thick and kind of like a honeycomb 

❤️ Rhonda 

February 12 - just waiting on Snowmegaden

Hello everyone 

Our weather forecasts are just frightening-and it doesn’t matter which network I look at, they all say about the same. 

Maybe 15 inches of snow and very cold for a long time - this seems like a forecast for northern Alaska, not Oklahoma. 

Lejmom asked if I still keep a stocked pantry and yes I do. 

About the Great Value green beans,  the ones I’ve bought seem fine.  I’m sorry you had bad ones.  

 My husband had an early dr appointment today and I didn’t go with him.  He’s been scheduled for a knee replacement in March so will need to do a few things to get ready for that.  

Breakfast was some of the nut bread baked yesterday, toasted.  It was so good with my hot tea! 

Lunch was leftover soups and jalapeño cornbread.

For the cornbread,  I used our very favorite recipe and added a drained can of Mexican corn,  about 1/3 cup of diced canned jalapeños and some sliced jalapeños on top.

The jalapeños grew in our backyard yard and I canned them.  For jalapeños,  they are NOT hot,  they just have a really nice pepper flavor.  

Day 2 of bananas in the Rubbermaid keeper 

They’ve ripened a bit but even the yellowest ones are not yet ready to eat.  

🤷🏻‍♀️ I don’t know how they will do- we will see! 

❤️ Rhonda 

February 11 - food stuff and that new banana box

Hello 

It’s crazy cold so I’ve been home all day with plenty of time to cook 

Breakfast was one of our favorites 

Hash browns with an egg on top 

 

I sauté diced onions and bell peppers in a little olive oil spray and then add frozen hash browns (or leftover grated baked potatoes when I have them)

When they’re done,  push them to the side and cook your egg.  

Lunch was meatloaf (that was not photo worthy but did taste good) okra and nut bread 

  

This is the recipe for the nut bread.  It’s low sugar and has no added fat (besides the fat in the eggs and nuts) 

If you make this,  grease the loaf pan well so it will release after baking.  

Nut Bread 

I used pecans instead of walnuts and put in a good sprinkle of cinnamon sugar between 1/2 of the batter 

It’s very good,  just a little sweet and very nice toasted and with a mug of hot beverage of your choice - I like black tea ☕️ 

Lana asked about the Rubbermaid banana keeper.  It’s new so I’m not sure how well it works.  

My husband went to the grocery store and I asked him to get a few yellow and green bananas 

None of these bananas are ripe enough to eat and the ones on the right are much greener than the bananas on the left

I plan to check them and take photos daily and we will see how well it works.  

I understand it is “supposed” to keep fruit fresh longer  - we will see! 

I heard about these a couple years ago but it was about $32 on Amazon.  I did put it on my Amazon wish list. 

I checked my list last week and the banana box was $13 then so I thought I’d give it a shot.  

And putting things in your cart or wish list (but not purchasing them immediately) at many online sellers can be a money saver.  The sellers want to sell and if you check the price after a few days,  it’s quite possible the price may drop.  

❤️Rhonda