Two Recipes and a review

Where has the time gone? I cannot believe it has been so many weeks since I last posted on my blog.  I have been busy cooking, taking my 2nd son to millions of doctors appointments, and trying to keep the peace.  My 13 yo has some sort of mystery illness. He has felt sick for the past six weeks with no dr knowing what he has.  He has missed tons of school, feels like he has the flu, has no appetite, cant sleep, feels lightheaded at times, and itches all over.  Does this sound familiar to anyone?  Every blood test comes back negative including celiac, lyme, strep, and mono.  The allergist we saw on Friday seems to think this could be a mycoplasma infection.  But that blood test will not come back for two more weeks, so we wait.
So on to happier things like cooking!!!

I was sent a great surprise in the mail to review.  A huge container of Jasmati Rice by Rice Select.  The best thing about this container is that it is so secure.  No bug or little hands can get into very easily.  It also looks very nice on the shelf, and is easy to find!  As soon as the Jasmati Rice arrived I decided to make one of our favorite dinners.  Vegan Seitan Stirfry over Jasmati Rice.  This is the easiest and healthiest dinner.  Take your favorite veggies, chop them up small and saute them in a pan with a little EVOO.  For our dinner I chopped up onions, broccoli, carrots, mushrooms, and zucchini.

After they saute for about 5 minutes, add in some chopped up seitan.  If the word seitan scares you, you are not alone!  I had seitan about 6 years ago and I hated it!  But once my husband went vegan I gave it another try and it is sooooo good! It seriously tastes just like pieces of meat.
So once your seitan is in, add in a little bit of soy sauce or any other sauce that you like.  Saute 2-4 more minutes so everything is nice and hot.  Serve it over your Jasmine rice and enjoy!!  Yum! Fresh, healthy, delicious!  I like to make my rice, steel cut oats, quinoa, wheat berries, or any other grain in my rice cooker.  It is so easy, set it and forget about it! No stirring, no checking. Comes out perfect everytime.
Here is how my Jasmine Rice looked in my rice cooker.

I quickly have time for one more cool recipe!
As I have written before, my kids love pizza.
So today I tried something new, pizza braids and boy was it a hit!
I used 2 loaves of Trader Joes white pizza dough, pizza sauce, shredded cheese, parmesan, and oregano.
It is a bit hard to describe how to make it and next time I do I will take step by step photos.
You stretch your pizza dough into a rectangle.  Cut little strips on each side of the dough so that you can make the braid.  Put the sauce and cheese, and any veggies or meat that your family likes in the center, then braid up your pizza. Once the braid is done, spray the top and sprinkle oregano and parmesan on top.  Bake at 325 for 15-30 minutes.  I thought it would be done at 15 minutes but I kept it in the full 30.  Just keep an eye on it.  I let mine sit outside the oven for 25 minutes and then it was easy to slice and the kids enjoyed it just a little bit hot, not burning.
Here is a picture of what it looked like at the end.

Next time I will be making a vegan pizza braid with sauce, veggie pepperoni and daiya cheese.  I am sure it will be amazing!
Have a great week everyone!
I hope to be back soon.

Best Pizza Dough Ever

I love to eat healthy.  My teens HATE to eat healthy.  My 15 yo told me he thinks he is allergic to healthy food.  So what do I do? I make healthy foods and the teens turn their nose.  Until today.
I made a new pizza dough that was healthy.  I did not tell anyone it was healthy though.  I added the ingredients, let it rise twice and then baked it up.  While it was cooking my 15 yo came upstairs saying, something smells amazing, I need to EAT IT NOW!  And then he did. 8 slices he ate, and when he was done, he would have had more.  But it was all gone. Every last crumb, slice, morsel of pizza was gone.
So if your kids are picky eaters I think you should try this recipe too!  No pictures were taken of this pizza because the kids ate it up before I could take out the camera,  Enjoy!!

Pizza Dough, makes six 10-12 inch pizzas
1 envelope dry active yeast
1 tsp sugar
2 cups warm water
2.5 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp coarse salt
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
Dissolve yeast and sugar in water in a large bowl and let stand about 5-10 minutes.  If yeast does not proof(get bubbly) throw it out and buy new yeast!  Add 2 cups of all purpose flour and salt.  Stir in slowly. (I use my dough hook on my kitchenaid)  Stir in whole wheat flour and wheat germ, then remaining all purpose flour 1 TB at a time.  Dough should begin to come away from the bowl but still be slightly sticky.
Turn out onto a lightly floured work surface and knead until smooth and springs back when poked (about 10 minutes).  Place in a lightly oiled bowl and turn to coat.  Cover and let rise in a warm place until it doubles in size, about 2.5 hours.  Cut dough into 6 pieces and roll into a ball shape.  Cover the balls and let rest 30 more minutes.  Stretch out each dough onto a pan or stone, add sauce, cheese and any topping.  Bake on a pizza stone or in a pizza pan at 450 degrees for 12-15 minutes.

One of My Favorite Websites, Jasmere

I love to do a lot of online shopping these days.  Dragging 1, 2 or 5 kids to the store is not my idea of fun!  So online shopping is where it is at.
One of my favorite sites is www.jasmere.com
At first, Jasmere looks like one of those typical, get your 12:00 noon email with the deal of the day sites.  But Jasmere has a really cool edge to it.  As more and more people purchase the deal of the day, the price goes DOWN!  How awesome!  So if you like the deal of the day, convince your friends to buy it too, and then you all get a better price.
Jasmere used to only offer each deal for 24 hours.  At 11:59AM the next day I would often scramble to remember to check the price of the previous day's deal. (There is now an email me if it gets to xxx price too)  But since many customers said 24 hours was not long enough to purchase the deal, Jasmere has extended many of its offers to 2-3 days.  One more thing you should know, no matter what price during the deal you buy at, you only get charged the lowest price that it ends at!  So basically we all win!
Another reason I love Jasmere is that everything is very clearly spelled out for each deal.  Many of these daily deal sites do not tell me how much shipping will be.  I hate to find out the hard way as I redeem my gift certificate that my deal was not so great since $20 shipping was just added.  If you click on the more shipping and info box for each deal, you clearly can see exactly how much you will have to pay.
Finally, the last awesome thing about Jasmere is that they are local to me!  I was able to meet the founders of Jasmere last month at a pizza place and we had so much fun.  They are such nice people and it only made me want to buy more Jasmere deals.
For you my loyal readers I have a special offer!  You can have 20% off one order on Jasmere using the code SF2017D30E1B.  This code only lasts until Spetember 17th.  So hurry, find your deal and with my extra coupon code, you will save at least 50% off, if not more  Today's deal looks really cool if you have ever wanted to whiten your teeth at home.
If you do not belong to Jasmere yet, please send me an email at cookwith5kids@gmail.com and I will send you an invite.
Or, leave me a comment below with your email and I will send you an invite that way.
I would love to hear what deals you buy.
I am buying the www.rewardtag.com, such a cool idea!! Especially if you have teens who often lose expensive items!

Chuck & Friends App & Giveaway

When I am trying to make dinner, do dishes, or clean up some mess that someone has made there are few things that keep the little ones busy and teach them at the same time!  One of our favorite new apps is Chuck and Friends by Ruckus Media.  If you have not heard of Ruckus Media it is really time that you check them out.
Ruckus Media Group has many apps that are geared to the preschool age child. Spot the Dot and Andrew Answers are two of our favorites.  Recently Ruckus Media Group teamed up with Hasbro and they now have a great app called Chuck and Friends.  I think this app would really appeal to little boys.  But my 3 year old girl keeps going back to it and enjoying it too!
Here is a quick clip of what the app looks like.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfL-0M9LW8g

Ruckus Media Group was nice enough to offer FIVE of my readers a code to get the Chuck and Friends app to try out for themselves!  I will randomly pick 5 comments using Random.org to win the 5 codes.
*******************
You can earn up to 5 entries
1. Follow me on twitter at www.twitter.com/cookwith5kids
2. Follow Ruckus Media Group at www.twitter.com/RuckusMedia
3. Leave a comment telling me your child's favorite app!
4. Tweet about this giveaway and leave me a comment that you did.
5. Follow me above on Google Friend Connect

Winner will be chosen on September 1st at noon.  Good luck!

Earthquake and a Giveaway

Today we had an earthquake.  It was a really big earthquake for an East Coast girl like me.
Today was a beautiful day, about 75 degrees, sunny, not a cloud in the sky.
My husband and I were both at home working on our computers at opposite ends of the house.  Our 5 kids were all playing happily running around the house as usual.  We had 2 neighborhood friends over too and all was good.  Until it happened.  I felt the floor rumble first and the wall start to shake and I immediately thought, OMG is this an earthquake and then it stopped.  I then decided I had imagined it all and maybe a big truck had just gone by.  My husband also thought maybe a big wind was blowing his windows.  Then after about 30 seconds of quiet it happened again.  This second time it was much harder.  The doors started to rattle, the windows were shaking, the pictures were falling.

I ran towards my husband, he started to run towards me and we both screamed EARTHQUAKE!!  I then had a brain drain and said, should we go down to the basement? NO he said EVERYONE OUTSIDE NOW!  All the kids ran after us into the front yard and then it stopped shaking.  One elderly neighbor also was outside and walked towards us and said, what the heck was that? We said, it was a pretty strong earthquake, are you ok?  I know a 6.0 earthquake is nothing for those of you who live in California but for us it is quite big.  We had a small earthquake last summer, a 3 or a 4 and I remember it clearly.  It was 5:30 AM and I was lying in bed awake reading a book and my bed shook a little and I went to Facebook and posted, Earthquake??? and then realized, yes, it was a small earthquake.  But today it was totally obvious and really scary.  I am still freaked out a bit.  I fixed all the pictures upstairs, picked up the things that fell down, but deep down I wonder, will there be aftershocks? will there be another one that is bigger??


On a happier note I have a local giveaway.
In a few weeks we have a very exciting week long event called Rockville Restaurant Week (September 10-18 2011).  You can read more about it here http://www.rockvillerestaurantweek.com/  Many different restaurants are participating.  It is a great chance to get out, take the night or afternoon off from cooking, and try some of our local places you have never been before.  Each restaurant will have a Prix-fixe menu for lunch and dinner.  Prices are $8 or $15 for lunch and $15 or $30 for dinner. I have a $25 gift card to Phillips Seafood on Rockville Pike to give to one reader who would like to go out during Rockville Restaurant Week.
If you would like to enter to win this $25 gift card please leave me a comment and tell me your favorite restaurant in Rockville.
For 3 extra entries:
*follow me on twitter @cookwith5kids and leave me a comment here that you do.
*and follow me on google friend connect above and leave one more comment.
*retweet or tweet about this giveaway and you will also got one more entry!
Winner will be chosen on September 12th at 6 PM and I will mail you the gift card.
Good Luck and lets hope for no more earthquakes!

Back To School Giveaway

I still cannot believe this summer is coming to an end. Where did the time go? I feel like the school year just ended. I am completely not ready for making lunches, homework, and washing smelly PE clothes.
We still have 12 more days of quiet left to enjoy.  So that is what I will try to do.

MyBlogSpark has a new giveaway for you.  My 2nd grader has fallen in love with this prize. He has claimed the cool whiteboard for his locker and might be the tiniest bit excited to hang it up in there.  He also loved the lunch bag.  The best part is that I have an identical prize pack for you, my lovely readers, too!



This prize pack is really cute.  One winner will receive

• One box of Lucky Charms^® Cereal Treats Bars
• One box of Golden Grahams^® Cereal Treats Bars
• Lunch bag
• Locker whiteboard
• Colored pencil set in a really cool round case with nice recycled colored pencils inside

We had a back to school food drive at our local grocery store so our 2 boxes of bars went to their local collection for snacks for kids when they go back to school.
But these bars look great!  They are new from General Mills.  The Golden Grahams treat bars have 130 calories, 4 gm fat, and 1 gm protein.  The Lucky Charms Treat Bars have 100 calories, 3 gms fat, and 1 gm protein.  6 bars come in each box and 2 box tops for education are also included on each box!

You can read more about these bars at the Betty Crocker Website http://bit.ly/BCtreats
and you can also become a fan of Betty Crocker on Facebook here http://on.fb.me/BettyCrocker

For one entry in this giveaway, leave me a comment telling me what you will send for your child as a snack this year.

You can earn 3 additional entries:

* follow me on twitter @cookwith5kids

* follow me above on Google friend follower for 1 extra entry

* tweet about this giveaway using hashtag #myblogspark

* please leave a comment for each entry, thank you!

If you already follow me on Twitter or Google just leave that in the comments as well.

Winner will be chosen on August 24th at noon, so leave your comments today!

Disclosure: My prize was provided by General Mills through MyBlogSpark but the opinions provided above are completely my own.

Peanut Butter Pie

I just read about Jennie's husband Mikey passing away earlier this week.
http://www.injennieskitchen.com/2011/08/for-mikey.html
and I feel so sad for Jennie and for her children.
I just put my peanut butter pie in the fridge and through my tears I will serve a piece to my family tonight.  Hug your loved ones tonight and every night because you never know when you will serve your last piece of peanut butter pie.

 Vegan Peanut Butter Pie
I bought a chocolate crust at Whole Foods
16 oz tofu, soft silken
1 cup creamy Peanut Butter
3/4 cup sugar (I used organic zero)
2 TB almond milk
2 tsp vanilla
I put all my ingredients in my Vitamix and blended it all really well.  I put it in the prepared chocolate crust and refrigerated it for 2 hours.