choo choo!

I picked up some new toys for the girls at our MOM rummage sale last night. My top finds included a Pottery Barn Kids dollhouse, wooden train set, and automoblox.

I have been on the hunt for a dollhouse for the girls for months now- in fact I even tried to order one from amazon when it was an amazing deal, but it never shipped. The PBK was on my radar, but to fully outfit it would cost a small fortune. Thankfully I was able to score a gently used one at the sale for a steal! We still need a few accessories for it (bathroom, living room, master bedroom, dining room chairs) but it will be another year until the girls play with it, so I will keep my eyes peeled for sales.

Next up was the wooden train set- this is the biggest hit of all! I think Justin and I will both have lots of fun playing trains. It is so adorable, the girls will both say "choo choo" as they push the train along the tracks. When it goes down the hill, they say "weee". I'm all about toys that can be added to- a few organizational tips I have read say to limit your kids' toys to a few really fun sets (i.e. kitchen, legos, trains, dollhouse, little people etc.) that you can build on vs buying lots of random smaller toys. I think this is a great idea! (The organizational gurus probably recommended only having 1-2 big sets versus all of the above, but I digress). I need to find some sort of train storage solution- we have an awesome play table that the girls received as a gift that is the perfect base for train tracks. I want to find some sort of baskets/bins that can be housed underneath the table.

The automoblox are super cool too- I hadn't heard of them before last night, but if you have kids you need them!

oh, thomas...

I am obsessed with Thomas Keller. I first heard of him about a decade ago (wow, that makes me feel old!) when researching things to do in Napa Valley (for those who don't know, the thing to do is go to The French Laundry in Yountville). Sadly, we did not make it to TFL, being college students and all (the prixe fix option would have likely exceeded my monthly income at the time).

Fast forward several years to cruising around Pinterest and I came across a few recipes. I pinned, but never got around to making them. 

I recently got my hands on 2 of his cookbooks from the local library- The French Laundry and ad hoc at home. I haven't attempted any of the TFL recipes yet, but as I type am working in recipe #6 from ad hoc (when Justin is away, I play. Better cooking than shopping).

My first creation was the roast chicken. It was delicious. And only required a handful of ingredients- stuff you should always have on hand!

First the chicken rests at room temp for 1.5. Don't skip this step. Then pay the chicken dry- both inside and out ( ps don't rinse the chicken, trust me on this one). Once you think the chicken is dry give it one more good pat down. Season the bird liberally with salt and pepper, both inside and outside the cavity. Throw in a few sprigs of thyme and truss that baby up. Rub a little oil on the bird ) use your hands) and top with 4 tablespoons of butter. While you are at it, throw on some more salt and pepper for good measure.

Gorgeous bird with minimal effort. I usually don't eat chicken skin, but I couldn't resist a few nibbles.

Next up I made chicken stock- a boring and straight forward recipe- worth the effort though.

I also made chicken pot pie- so delicious! I almost cheated and used store bought pie crust but you do not cheat on Thonad Keller! Spend the extra 15 minutes and make your own pie crust- my grandma always told me that things that are worth doing are worth doing well (not really, but that sounded like good grandmotherly advice I could pass down to the girls one day).

I even blanched the celery. True story.

Look at that golden goodness.

No cream of soup in this recipe- the sauce is a delicious bechamel. 

Today's meal was chicken soup with dumplings. The dumplings were made with pate a choux (cream puff dough). Right about now I'm wishing I took French in college.

The soup was straight forward, but time consuming. Simmer the broth and mirepoix for a good 20 minutes. Discard mirepoix (a mixture of carrots, celery, etc.). Apparently the veggies give all their flavor to the stock and are just a mushy mess not suitable for human consumption after that much simmering. Then a roux is added to thicken the soup and add a silky texture. Whilst the soup is simmering, make and cook the dumplings (not in the soup pot). The secret ingredient is stone ground dijon, don't skip this- I've spent years omitting ingredients from recipes if I didn't have it on hand (this is a trick I actually did learn from my grandma) but seriously, the mustard makes the dish. Chop up some carrots, season with a crushed garlic clove (whole), thyme, salt, pepper, and honey. Cover with cold water and simmer for 14 minutes. I didn't even think I liked cook carrots, but these are good! They get infused with garlicky goodness. Audrey couldn't get enough. I'm going to make these carrots as a side dish on the regular (one of the best parts of Keller's recipes is that they can be deconstructed and you can use portions). Full Disclosure: I did skip the step of peeling and blanching the celery for this dish. I ran out of pots. Keller says to clean up as you go, lesson learned. 

I also made his chocolate chip cookies. I think it is pretty impossible to mess up a chocolate chip cookie, but what sets these apart is using bars of chocolate (cut into chip sized pieces) and dark brown sugar. It does not call for vanilla, which is validating, as I spent most of my cookie making years omitting the vanilla. My cookies spread out a bit more than I would like- I will have to do some experimenting- the next batch I will cook directly on the baking sheet vs. on the silpat (silpats are amazing and have several applications though, so don't hesitate to buy one). 

Right now I am working on some brioche. Apparently brioche is a hybrid of bread and cake. It has 2.5 sticks of butter and 6 eggs. I've never made bread from scratch before, so I guess I couldn't tell you if that is a lot of product, but it seems like a copious amount of butter and eggs. The dough has 30 more minutes to rise, then it gets pounded a bit and goes back in its floured bowl to rest in the fridge overnight. My cousin and her little guy are coming to visit tomorrow, so after her arrival the dough can go in loaf pans (I only have one. Oops) and hang out for 3 more hours before baking. Then we are going to make the worlds most fabulous grilled cheese, with Gruyere. If I have enough butter (I've gone through 10 sticks in the past 3 days) I'll make some buttermilk biscuits too (to go with the leftover soup and for brunch). 

One of these days I will get around to making his buttermilk fried chicken- it just seems a bit intense, so I will build my cooking prowess with a few more beginner friendly recipes. Now back to his restaurants, I hope to make it to The French Laundry someday, but he owns several more pocketbook friendly restaurants (ad hoc, bouchon, addendum). I've told Justin that the next time we go to Las Vegas we are going to Bouchon and I am ordering the fried chicken and waffles. Not that we have a Vegas trip planned or anything... but I know what I am going to eat! Addendum is connected to ad hoc (just down the road from TFL)- it's not so much a full service restaurant, but more of a grab and go for lunch, so visit a local winery ahead of time and then save on corkage fees and have your wine and chicken al fresco. Hmm, I think it might be time to book that flight to California...

audrey's big news

Audrey has had some potty training success! A few weeks ago I tried the 3 day potty training method, but gave up on day 2 after Audrey came down with a cold and approximately 574 accidents (ok, maybe it was just 30 pairs of undies in 2 days but that adds a lot of laundry!) we put potty training on hiatus. Audrey loves to sit on the potty though, so I have given her ample opportunities to hang out there.

I've kept her in diapers for the most part, but have also been using her blueberry trainers. They are expensive, but are so nice!

I picked up an extra potty chair to keep at my moms house. The girls were fighting over who got to sit on it. You really can't tell from the picture, but they were both shrieking and quite upset.

I ordered a fancy potty from amazon for us to use at home and in the go- I'll give a review once it arrives (I'm sure you are just waiting with bated breath).

what's cooking

My favorite part about the temperatures cooling down is that I start baking again. We avoid using the stove and oven during the summer and primarily use the crockpot and grill. This past week I have made all sorts of things that have been waiting on my Pinterest boards. 

This morning the girls and I enjoyed Cheddar and Green Onion Grits (yum!). Justin refused to try them, but that just means there will be more for us tomorrow. I mean seriously, look at how happy Audrey is.

Earlier in the week we dined on Cheddar Stuffed Herb-Crusted French Bread (don't you just love my food names?) and Tomato Basil Soup. Claire was not impressed with the Bread (which was amazingly delicous) but she thoroughly enjoyed the soup. 

For a quick lunch, we had spinach and feta grilled cheese- Audrey was especially fond of this lunch. I'll have to repeat it again. I'm not a huge salad fan, so I will make Spinach and Parmesan Orzo in the next couple of days to finish up the spinach.

Last night I made Ham and Cauliflower Mac and Cheese- this was a big hit with the girls. It was good, but not quite as delicious as the Cauliflower Mac and Cheese with Prosciutto and Creme Fraiche that I made a month or so ago.

Later this week I plan on making Potatoes Dauphinoise (which from what I gather is a fancy name for scalloped potatoes). Sign me up for anything with copious amounts of heavy cream and butter.

I did have a flop though- I attempted to make pumpkin scones and it turned into a mushy mess. I believe that my main error was frosting it before it completely cooled down. I have pumpkin muffins that I have made several times with great success (and are much easier than the scones) so I may add the glaze and frosting recipe to the muffins next time.

19 months

The girls had their 18 month check up a little late. Here are their stats:

Claire- 31.5 inches tall (37 %), 20 lbs (16 %)

Audrey- 33 inches tall (78 %), 26 lbs (83 %)

It is nice to see Claire move up a bit in percentile- she has consistently been in the 10th percentile for height, so unless the measurement was inaccurate, she has had quite the growth spurt! They have definitely slowed down in their weight gain- it is neat to look at their growth charts. Claire weighs what Audrey did at 6 months, which helps explain why we have so many clothes ;) Audrey is wearing mostly 2t clothes with a few 18 months mixed in. Claire is in mainly 12-18 months, with a few 18-24 months and 2t.

Both girls love to read! It is interesting to see the differences though- Claire tends to flip through the pages and babble while Audrey spends time looking at each picture on the page and saying words she knows (i.e. puppy, hat, ball, etc.)

Audrey would definitely spend all day being read to though! She will grab a book and back herself right onto my lap. She also knows the name of some of her books- I've asked her to grab certain books from her room and she runs off and returns with the correct book!

It is harder to get good pictures of the girls these days! They are so busy and rarely stand still. Amanda took family pics for us recently and I've seen a few sneak peeks and she definitely got some good ones! I'm going to create some sort of photo gallery downstairs. Minted.com has some awesome photo art- last year they had some good Black Friday deals, so I think I am going to hold off on ordering anything until then.

The girls also love playing outside and swinging- I ask them if they would like to "go wee" and they run to the patio door. They also love playing kitchen.

In not so great tricks, Audrey has started climbing into our bay window. She uses a chair to get up and then scoots across the 5 feet or so to get to the "treasures" (remote, kleenex box, whatever). I've moved everything so hopefully that puts and end to her antics.

The girls have about 30 or so words- it seems like they learn a new word everyday!