What's for dinner?

I agree with Sue, Cathy.  I think it's especially important to allow yourself a little treat whilst (lol) you're trying to lose weight.  The key is to make sure it's just a taste or a small piece or just one.  Sometimes that's all it takes to take the edge off the craving.  Might be a bit difficult with homemade chocolate chip cookies, though.

Sue, my recipe doesn't call for freezing.  So you can eat it as soon as it's made, but it's better after an hour or two in the fridge.

Tonight we are going to have Celery and Leek Soup with fresh baked Herb and Crunch Bread. The crunch coming from sunflower seeds.

So an easy Monday meal as I have class at four.

Sue...do you use a bread machine to bake your bread?

I use a really good bread machine (Zourishi) and I also make it by hand.

I love to knead bread, I love the feel of bread as it get's smooth, and even with the bread machine, I can't keep my hands off of it, I have to touch it to make sure it's just perfect.

Todays bread is made in the bread machine.

I have a bread machine at home. It was given to me by a friend who got it as a wedding present. Problem is...there is no instructions!! LOL!!

I guess I'll try it by hand first. Sammie has a cooking class at school and she just made bread on Friday...she could help me too!!

You can sometimes get instructions online from the company. But I would imagine it's easy enough to figure out. Just make sure you put your ingredients in in the right order, always liquids first, followed by the fat (butter is best), put the yeast in last, I always make a little well in the flour and try not to let the yeast touch the salt (don't ask me why, it probably doesn't matter but I must have read it somewhere).

With hand made bread you can get disappointed really quickly if it doesn't turn out right. The key is to learn how the bread is supposed to feel, and that comes with experience.

I hope you do start to make your own bread, it really is worth it for many reasons. 

My all time favourtie bread machine recipe books are Betty Crocker Best Bread Machine Cookbook (they don't lie, it really is the best) and Better Homes and Gardens Bread Machine Recipes.

For Christmas one year because my daughter in-law was to deliver her second baby in January, she was tired of sitting and couldn't do much, we rented one the cabins at Mt. Hood Resort Village, with an outside private hot tub, fireplace and essentially bedroom and loft and an whole other room with nice thick folding sofa's..had all the "goodies"..we were greeted with an bread machine making bread and it was done, and an bottle of chilled champagne. One of the nicest Christmas's I can remeber, this particular cabin, more like an moblile home with an cabin outlay, was chock full of puzzles and simple games, and that's what we did all night long by an crackling fire, played games and built small puzzles that took maybe two hours at most. It was very homey...and the night was clear and we could see out the windows, I kept thinking how lovely it must be if it's snowing an bit. We brought us an take an bake pizza and ate it also. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and she was glad to get away from the house for an bit. We went out for breakfast the next moring so no one had to cook. My "thing" last year was listening to old Bing Crosby Christmas Songs and reading an book about "angels". Just that moment to really get "in touch" with the season I guess. I have no idea what this year will bring...if anything. I saw an magazine where some country folk took their back patio (built in) and with Scotch plaid ribbons on plain green trees of various small sizes up on barrels, they used Hay and somehow got themselves an "baby" lamb. They put an old time rocker in amoungst it all where they could feed that tiny lamb when guests came over with an bottle,and otherwise, it was with it's mom in the barn. It was just darling to see the photgraphs in this magazine. Kids could sit on bales of Hay while an adult told them stories also,they could sing songs, or just talked, as they had something warm to drink.They had little lamb "quilts" in read plaid also...so the wee kids could bundle up in them also. They managed to catch an picture with this wee little lad sneaking a "kiss" to the baby lamb...lovingly.