DASH DIET Crockpot Beef Soup

We've always eaten a lot of soup and stews during the colder weather, so I needed to come up with a low-fat, low-sodium soup recipe to replace the old tried and true recipes. This soup had a ton of flavor, despite being low-salt and low-fat. This one is a "keeper"! DASH Diet Crockpot Beef Soup 3/4 pound lean beef, cut into 1.5 inch cubes 6 cups low sodium vegetable broth 2 carrots, cut into chunks 2 onions, chopped 2 stalks celery, chopped 1 can (15 oz) lentils*, drained and rinsed 1 slice turkey bacon, diced 1 cup low sodium tomato sauce 1 tsp rosemary 1/2 tsp cumin 1/2 tsp black pepper 1 tbsp. Mrs. Dash salt substitute 1 tsp worsteshire sauce 1 large potato, peeled, cut into chunks Put all ingredients except potato into crockpot, cook on high for 4-5 hours, or on low 7-8 hours. One hour before cooking is done, add potato. *Lentils - I just happened to have a can of pre-cooked lentils on hand, but you could use any canned bean (drain and rinse to remove sodium) or even dried lentils, if that's what you have. I had leftover couscous with a small amount of peas and carrots, so I reheated that, and served the soup in a bowl, over a spooonful of the couscous, and with a tablespoon of no-fat cheese on top.

Martha Stewart let me down

A friend, Lynne, stopped over for coffee and chit-chat yesterday (and a bit of quilting show and tell), and amongst the many subjects we discussed was the subject of whether or not our husbands were fussy eaters. Lynne's is semi-fussy, mine is not fussy at all. I told Lynne that in 31 years of marriage, Jeff has only disliked two meals -- a fish meal, and a very very burned meatloaf. Considering how rarely we go out to eat (especially in the earlier years of our marriage), that's a LOT of dinners he's eaten without complaining. In fact, even after all this time, every single night when I serve him dinner, he says, "Thanks, Honey" -- like I'm doing him a favor! You have to love it. However... I now have to say last night's dinner was the THIRD meal he didn't like in 31 years. Thank you Martha Stewart. I looked on the web for a honey-glazed chicken recipe. On this DASH diet, I am for as little sodium and fats as possible, so honey is quickly becoming a good way to add flavor without adding fats or salt. I had boneless chicken breasts and thought a honey glaze would be good with the chicken. Off I went to Google, and saw a recipe on the Martha Stewart web site for "Easy Honey-Glazed Chicken". And easy it was - 1/3 cup honey, 2 tsp tyme, 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. Brush it on the chicken, cook in the oven, brush a few times more while it's cooking... and poof! Honey Glazed Chicken. It was SO bad. The flavor of the tyme had no business in the honey glaze. It was overpowering and just plain not compatible. Even if it was compatible, there was too much of it. We both ended up scraping off the glaze as best we could. I'd also made couscous with peas and carrots, and brussel sprouts, and luckily those were good. For some reason, I hear the name "Martha Stewart" and I assume whatever is associated with the name - recipe, craft, helpful household hint - is going to be good. Does anyone have a honey glaze recipe they'd like to share? No, not you Martha. You had your chance.

Time to start a "TV Project" - Cathedral Window Quilt

I decided I need a project to work on in the evenings while watching TV. I always think of TV time as such a waste of time, but there are shows that I love (Survivor, Amazing Race, So You Think You Can Dance, Project Runway, Top Chef, The Next Iron Chef, and more!) and it's easy to slip into TV-mode now that the colder weather is here. And, it's NASCAR's Chase season, which means 4 to 5 hours in front of the TV on weekends! The only way I can spend that much time in front of the TV is to be accomplishing some other task at the same time. Despite having a sewing machine in my family room (a wonderful old knee-pedal Majestic - my workhorse machine), I decided I want to do some hand piecing. I learned quilting by taking a 12 week class on hand piecing and hand quilting, but I'd gotten into the "faster is better" mode, and haven't done hand work in years. A quilt that's been on my "Want To Do" list for years is a Cathedral Window quilt. It's a wonderful way to use up scraps, plus I love the symmetry of the finished quilt. You can do it on a machine, but traditionally this quilt is done by hand. One block takes me about one hour to complete. It actually starts with a 10 x 10 inch square of muslin, which is folded twice down to a 3.4 inch square, then a center fabric added, and the musline pulled over the center fabric and hand stitche to create the rounded "frame". This is what I got completed over the weekend while watching the NASCAR race and Project Runway: Considering how many total blocks this quilt will take (250? 300? I haven't measured it out yet), I probably won't finish for a year. But that's OK. I'm in no hurry. I'm quite delighted to find out how much I truly enjoy hand piecing. It's the way I started making quilts, and the precision of the hand stitching and the concentration needed really appeals to me. I'm quite sorry I got away from it for as long as I did. Lately I feel like I lost my enthusiasm for quilting -- but could it be that I simply enjoy hand piecing far more than I enjoy the assembly line method of machine sewing? Interesting... Here's a photo of someone else's completed cathedral window quilt (from centralbucks55.com - found with a Google search), so you can an idea of what the finished quilt will look like.