Darn Good Dinner Rolls

Dinner roll recipes are a dime a dozen.  As a self professed carb-junkie and frequent bread maker, I'm always on the look-out for the next best thing. Sometimes it takes more than a few mediocre attempts before I stumble upon recipe gold.  Other times, I can tell that a recipe has "good bones" but just needs a little tweaking to take it from ordinary to extraordinary.   I live at high altitude so baking bread can be a bit of a challenge. Often times, recipes that work fine at sea level flop miserably at 7000ft.  Over the years I've learned to adapt and overcome!

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a dinner roll recipe in an old Family Reunion Cook Book compiled by my mom's Amish and Mennonite side of the family.  The recipe was alright, but I re-worked it to make it successful at high elevation. As with most Amish recipes, there were hardly any directions. (They assume that everyone knows how to make bread already.)  I'll type the re-worked recipe below and try to be as detailed as possible with the instructions because you know what they say about assuming....

(The pan of dinner rolls I made tonight disappeared so quickly that I had to smack hands just to preserve one for picture taking.  I'm sorry that I don't have a photo of the whole pan.  They sure turned out pretty. You'll just have to trust me on that! My lousy pictures don't do them justice!)

Darn Good Dinner Rolls

3 teaspoons of Active Dry Yeast (Rapid rise yeast is fine. It'll take more than 1 packet so be sure to measure.)

1/4 cup warm water

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 cup salted sweet cream butter, softened

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup warm milk

1 large egg

4 cups bread flour

1 Tablespoon Vital Wheat Gluten

1 Tablespoon Dough Enhancer

Preheat oven to 375° F

In a mixing bowl, combine warm water and yeast. Stir.

Warm the milk up to around 105° (I microwave it for just under a minute). 

Test the temperature of the milk.  If it's too hot, it will kill the yeast!  Pour the milk in with the water and yeast.  Next, add the sugar, softened butter, egg and salt.  Stir. ( I use my Kitchen-Aid mixer paddle for this.)

Beat in 4 cups of  bread flour, vital wheat gluten, and dough enhancer until a soft dough forms.  

Knead the dough for a few minutes. ( I take off the paddle and put on the dough hook attachment for this part. I let the Kitchen Aid knead at speed 2 or 3 for about 3 minutes.) If the dough is really sticking to the sides of the bowl, adjust by adding flour a tablespoon at a time until a nice smooth dough forms.  Don't add too much or the rolls will be dense. Less is best!

Next, put the dough into a large mixing bowl sprayed with cooking spray and flip it once to make sure the top of the dough is covered with spray.  Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, or until doubled in size.

Punch the dough down and knead it a few times.  pull off small chunks of dough and make 24 rounded dough balls. 

(Because I'm a perfectionist, I cut the dough circle into 8 equal sized pieces on a cutting board with a knife, and then pull 3 dough balls out of each chunk.  That way they are more uniform. You can just follow your bliss!)

Arrange the 24 dough balls into a greased 13x9" rectangular baking dish.  Cover with a towel and let rise in a warm place for 30-45 minutes.

Bake @ 375° for 18-20 minutes.

After removing them from the oven, rub butter over the tops.

If you want to take these rolls over the top, and make them OUT OF THIS WORLD, then make this cinnamon honey butter to go with the rolls:

 Cinnamon Honey Butter

1 stick salted sweet cream butter, room temperature

1/4 cup honey

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon.

Whip the ingredients until combined.

Put the Cinnamon Honey Butter on a warm roll, fresh from the oven, and die a thousand delicious deaths.  Then repeat with two more rolls and stuff your belly.  Then decide that all you really wanted for dinner was rolls, anyway.

Intensive 5K Training Madness!

Hey! Guess what? I've kept my New Year's Resolutions for 3 whole days! It's got to be some type of record! Only 362 more opportunities left to break them.

Just Kidding.

Today, I want to talk about the moment of temporary insanity I had a few months ago when I somehow flippantly agreed to enter a 5K race with one of my best friends...and our husbands.

She sent me a message on Facebook that said:

Who wants to run in the Chinese New Year 5K with me? It's the Year of the Dragon, don't ya know? There's a colorful dragon t-shirt involved.  

 They're calling it the Chinese New Year Run and Wok. Get it? Wok?

That's all it took. She knows I can't back down from a challenge.  My competitive nature doesn't allow for it. It's like my Kryptonite. She knew I couldn't say no.

Plus, the race had a goofy name and it came with a colorful dragon t-shirt.  What cowgirl can resist owning a colorful dragon t-shirt in her wardrobe????

Once I commit to doing something...that's it.  I'm all in. Whole hearted.  110% Effort. No turning back.

The timing of this race is impeccable!

It's winter, and we live in the mountains 30 minutes from a ski resort. This means that we're training in heavy snow with sub-arctic temperatures.

I'm running on the frozen tundra with cinders, salt, mud, ice, and snow berms on both sides of the road.

Approximately 6 minutes into my daily jogging adventure I encounter a steep grade hill on my road that might as well be Mt. Everest when you're an out- of-shape 34 year old mother of 3 children.

I wear sweatpants, long johns, two layers of shirts, gloves, and an ear-warming headband.  Stylish, it's definitely not, but I feel like the look makes me totally hard-core. I'm like Rocky Balboa training in Russia in the dead of winter to fight Ivan Drago in Rocky IV.  I guess you had to see the movie to know what I'm talking about. But I digress.

Training in these harsh winter conditions is giving us all the black lung. After we inhale the cold, arctic air and the occasional exhaust from old diesel trucks passing us on the road, we get some type of smoker's cough for an hour.  It's just a small price to pay.

We're running at 7000 ft. elevation. There's practically no oxygen up here.  If I were in an airplane, they'd be dropping the breathing masks down from the ceiling right about now.

To add insult to injury, my husband can walk as fast as me when I'm jogging at full throttle.  Sometimes he just quits running and starts walking right in front of my face. If I had an ounce of breath left in my lungs, I'd cuss him out, but it takes too much energy. I just give him the stink eye and focus on the road ahead.  I can't help it that God did not bless me with a 38" inseam and a giraffe stride.  I take 3 steps for every one of his.

And when I get home from jogging, I'm ravenous!!There will be no weight loss from all of this training, so there's no incentive to run for loss of poundage.


NONE OF THIS MATTERS.

It's all a part of my strategy.  The race is in Phoenix at 1100 ft. in elevation.  It will be a balmy 75 degrees Fahrenheit, and the streets are paved with sunshine.  When we go down there, we'll shed off our snow suits and jog in string bikinis.  Totally kidding.  We'll wear jogging shorts with our fluorescent white legs to distract the competition.  We'll be able to breathe in the thick, oxygen-rich air and it will fill our lungs and red blood cells with life sustaining POWER!  Our legs will move like a roadrunner, and we will cruise through the streets at full speed to the finish line, where our colorful dragon T-shirts will be waiting for us.

The Chinese New Year Run/ Wok won't even know what to do with us, we'll run so fast!!!!

Kidding. Again.

The truth is, I'm an out of shape mom, who used to be a high school track star.  In my mind, I still run like the wind, but in reality, jogging kicks my booty.  I'm training everyday just so I can complete the race in one piece without doing any permanent bodily damage.  I'm glad it's called the Chinese Run/ Wok....emphasis on "Wok" because that's what I may end up doing.  I've got over a month of training left, so there's still time for a miracle. I may just be able to run the whole darn thing, and totally impress myself.


In it to win it,

Nell

Happy Moooo Year!

I'd like to introduce you to cow #711.  She's a real hoot of an Angus!

 Never one to shy away from attention, she loves to pose for the camera!


Here, she's gazing off into the distance with her raven fur shining in the sun.

As soon as she knew I was photographing her, she started acting like a dork! 

Here are the many faces of  #711

Finally, she decided to act like a lady, and give me one good glamour shot!

"Happy Moooo Year!"

Running the Race

"Being sensible that I am unable to do anything without God's help, I do humbly entreat him by his grace to enable me to keep these Resolutions, so far as they are agreeable to his will, for Christ's sake." -Jonathan Edwards


I just finished reading the 70 Resolutions of Jonathan Edwards, written in 1723. All I can say is, WOW. They put all other resolutions to shame.  You can read them here, if you want to be inspired.


I've always looked at the seasons of my life as a marathon race. There are easy stretches with the wind at my back where I feel refreshed. There are uphill climbs that burn my thighs and cause me to gasp for air, downhill coasts that allow me to catch my breath, and the occasional long, flat, boring lengths when the scenery never changes and my mind begins to wander.

This year, I feel like I tripped on my shoe lace, got hit by a truck, and rolled into the ditch in the middle of the race.  It took me a while to get back up on my feet again.  I've got some road rash, some band-aids, and I've shed a few tears, but I'm limping on towards the goal.

Today, my resolutions are more about getting back into the race.  I know what I've got to do, and I know that I can't do it on my own.  As Jonathan Edwards so eloquently put it,  I've got to "humbly entreat him [God] by his grace to enable me to keep these Resolutions".  Without the Lord's help, they're all just little wishes on a piece of paper.

Some of my resolutions are BIG! I think it's healthy to make long-term goals that take more than a year to accomplish, but I always break them down into small, bite sized pieces that I can chip away at... one year at a time, one day at a time, one step at a time.

My ultimate resolution is to glorify God in everything that I think, say, and do.  Whether my goal is to study my Bible more, take better care of my body, reach out to others, or save more money, it should be to the glory of God.  Otherwise, it's all for nothing.

I'm looking forward to the race in front of me.  I'm excited to pursue things that matter to God! I'm challenged to live each day to the fullest!


Lacing up my running shoes,

Nell

The Danger of Testing Out Your Children's New Toys

It's that time of year when parents are obligated to perform a rigorous trial-testing of all of their children's new toys...but purely for safety reasons, of course.

Not for pleasure.

No. That would be wrong. Very Wrong.

My kids got some new games for the Wii from their grandparents. The games were called, "Just Dance" and "Just Dance III".  After watching them dance to a few songs, we became concerned that the remotes were malfunctioning because their scores were very low.

We did what any concerned parents would do.

We ripped the remotes out of their tiny little hands and had a fierce dance competition!

Because of my competitive nature and my impetuous need to win at all costs, I hesitated to accept the challenge.  This is the one area that my husband could really kick my tail.  He's got moves. John Travolta moves. Patrick Swayze moves.  Twirl your partner 'round the floor moves. It's one of the reasons I married him....so we could dance in the kitchen with our socks on.

He selected a totally random song, "Eye of the Tiger".  It's the one from the Rocky movies, so naturally the dance we performed was full of boxing moves.

We punched, we shuffled, we shook our hips.  We even did "Jazz hands".

The whole song, our scores were neck in neck.

The dance meters were overflowing with bonus points!

The kids were cheering.  My husband was sweating. I was huffing and puffing.  It was intense!

In the end, my husband beat me by a hair. I'm telling you...he's got moves!

We were so exhausted after all of the boxing moves that we agreed to hand the remotes back over to the children.

Yesterday, we were so sore that we could hardly get out of bed. We could hardly bend over. We were sore in places we didn't know we could be sore in.

As soon as the muscle spasms and tightness go away, we're going to have a "Just Dance" re-match.

This time we'll wait until after the kids go to bed so we get the Wii to ourselves.
This time I'll choose the song.
This time, I shall be victorious!

MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

See? My Man is always taking every opportunity to "dip" me. I told you he's got moves!

The Best, Worst, and Funniest of Christmas

The Best of Christmas:

 My husband bought me a new American West Cowhide Handbag!!!!!!

Hello Gorgeous! I've been waiting sooo very long for you.

 I know that Cowhide isn't for everyone, but when it comes to purses, I like to walk on the wild side!

The Worst of Christmas:

My brother bought my husband this Michael Bolton Concert Shirt circa 1994 from the thrift store as a gag gift.  It's a women's size XL.  The worst part is that my tough, cowboy husband is secure enough in his manhood to wear it out in public with absolutely NO shame at all! When he lifts his arms up, it shows his belly button! I sent him to the grocery store early in the morning, and was completely mortified to see that he wore the dreaded apparel to the store, despite laughter and weird looks from strangers.

I don't even know what to say about this picture.

The Funniest of Christmas:

The annual Chia Pet exchange went beautifully. For those of you who are new to the blog, my brother and I have been exchanging an Elmer Fudd Chia pet back and forth for 12 years. 

 After surgically extracting the Chia Pet from last year's decoy, I wrapped it up in ordinary Christmas wrapping, and then put it in a Christmas gift sack. 

My brother had his "Chia Radar" tuned all the way up, and was leery of opening any gifts from me.  I secretly chuckled when he unwrapped his real gift because he was SURE it was the Chia. It wasn't. When the gift exchanging was over and the Chia hadn't made its appearance, Mega-Mind was flabbergasted! I didn't say a word.  I left the gift-wrapped package down at my Dad's house, and made my way back up the mountain.  

Here's how the whole thing went down: On Christmas day, while I was 220 miles away and enjoying the festivities with my husband's side of the family, my side of the family was gathering at my Dad's house for Prime Rib.  I knew that my brother would never open a suspicious gift from me, so I had to enlist the help of someone innocent. I had my grandpa hand the gift to my brother.  He conjured up some great story about it being a gift for the baby from one of his neighbors.  He bought it...hook, line, and sinker!  When the wrapping paper fell to the floor, he knew that he'd been hoodwinked! MWAhahahahaha!!( Evil laugh).

Mega-Mind, if you're reading this blog, I have a simple, heartfelt message:

This year, I'm starting a new Christmas tradition of "Hope and Change".  I "hope" you "change" your mind about your Christmas gift.  The Chia belongs to YOU.

(I owe my Grandpa another batch of Oatmeal Raisin Cookies for his help in my plot because the word on the street is that my brother ate his first batch as retaliation for the evil deed.)

Basking in Chia Pet Glory,

Nell

Not the Brightest Idea...

 When I woke up this morning, it was snowing outside. Again. I guess that's what happens when you live in the mountains above 7000ft. Yet, all of the locals agree that they can't remember ever having this much snow in December.

Even though it was snowing, it was also a mere 3 days until Christmas, and I just HAD to get to Walmart for some last minute baking supplies.

When I pulled out onto my road, I saw something in the trees.

Upon further inspection, I found a group of turkeys hanging out by my house! Did you know that the proper thing to say is that I saw a "rafter of turkeys" hanging out by my house...like a "gaggle of geese" or a "flock of pigeons"?

See? You can actually learn things by reading this blog.  Go ahead and say the word "rafter" the next time you see turkeys.

It will impress your friends.

Or, they'll think you're totally weird.

Anyway, I digress.  When I left the house, the snowflakes were teeny tiny. The weather reports said 1-2" of snow the last time I checked.

By the time I got to the highway, things were getting a bit hairy on the road. People were sliding off everywhere. Thank the Lord for 4 wheel drive.

(In the interest of full disclosure, my 10 year old son took these photos from the back seat of the truck. I was busy driving with both hands on the steering wheel...thank you very much. I'm always thinking about public safety.)

A few minutes later....White out.  This is about the time that I was thinking to myself, "Self, are Christmas baking supplies so important that you are willing to risk sliding off the road for them?"

I had no idea that the weather would turn so quickly. 

But I forged ahead in my big truck with the wipers going full speed.  I was in too deep. I had to complete my mission.  When I turned into the Walmart parking lot...low and behold.... all of north eastern Arizona, and half of western New Mexico was there too! It was like all of us were making a death defying journey to the promised land.  

The place was packed like an alleyway full of steers at the sale barn.  My husband always has the urge to start mooing like cattle whenever we're in a crowd of people.  I refrained.

I was prepared, though. 

 This ain't my first "Walmart at Christmas" Rodeo!

No sir! My six year old slid under the cart where the dog food goes, my 9 year old rode drag, and my 10 year old scouted ahead of the herd for openings.  Then I'd throw an elbow into the crowd and say,"Ho,Ho, Ho!"

Totally kidding about that last part. I try to be extra cheerful when I'm shopping in a crowd. I always wear festive pins and I tell everyone, "Merry Christmas"!

After checking out, my kids and I schlepped our purchases through the snow covered parking lot to the very back where we parked the truck.  Carts don't travel through heavy snow too well.  We made the white knuckled journey back home, and when I pulled into the driveway, I let out a sigh of relief and thanked the Lord for our safe travels.

From the time I returned from my death defying adventure, I've been inside my warm house, baking all evening.  First, I made these delicious Cherry Cheesecake cookies. They're a new recipe that I've been eyeing for 6 weeks. They have so many steps to them that they take hours and hours to make, so I had to pick a day when I had hours and hours of spare time.  Today was not the day, but I did the steps in between other activities.

I also made a batch of these peanut butter cookies for tomorrow.  I hope there are a few left by morning.  They're disappearing before my eyes!

I've got much more baking to do, so I'd better get to it!

Hope everyone is having a lovely Christmas week!

Nell