homemade french onion soup

This weekend I made French onion soup for the first time ever. It was time-consuming, but I'm so glad I did!

I've been wanting to make onion soup for quite a long time; I love it. Obviously the best part is the cheesy crouton on top, but I definitely love the whole package. I can make a meal of it. Not only because I love it, but because it completely fills me up (I am weight loss surgery patient, after all!). But I don't order it very often. Mainly because I'm always completely torn about whether I want an actual meal, like a burger or something, or I want the delicious onion soup. On the one hand, ONION SOUP! On the other hand, a complete meal with leftovers to take home. The meal almost always wins. I think, too, that I just can't get away from who I am: someone who craves food variety, and has a real FOMO (fear of missing out). What if I get the soup and I really miss having the burger? What if I get the burger and it isn't good? What if they stop making burgers or onion soup? And now that my stomach is so small, I can't have a meal AND the soup. And I hate wasting food. And sometimes I don't like leftovers. *sigh* The struggle is real...

I found this recipe online and decided to give it a try: How to Make French Onion Soup. It didn't seem overly complicated, most of the cooking time is hands-off, it didn't have any non-typical onion soup ingredients, and I have pretty good luck with recipes from The Kitchn. 

I had to buy a few ingredients to make this, but it wasn't anything I won't use again: crusty bread for the croutons (got some off the day-old bread clearance rack--it's gonna get toasted and dunked anyway!); gruyere cheese, which I got on sale in the deli; brandy; and wine (I got the little four-pack so I don't waste a bottle--I'm not a wine drinker). 

I set about slicing all the onions (lots of crying was done...). They went in the pot with the melted butter and olive oil and cooked for about 15 minutes. The you add the sugar, salt and pepper and cook for about an hour.

This is about three pounds of yellow onions. Close enough!

This is what it cooks down to. For whatever reason, I can never seem to get my onions to the "dark walnut" stage of color when caramelizing. I don't know if it's the recipe, me, my stove, or what. They still tasted great, though. To this you add the flour, cook for a minute, and then add the broth and wine and simmer for at least an hour.

This is after adding the broth and wine and then simmering for a little more than an hour.

I finished it off with about 1/4 cup of brandy. Then I sliced up the bread and toasted it in the toaster oven. After popping it on top of the soup, and then topping with a couple slices of Gruyere cheese, I put the bowls on a cookie sheet and broiled until the cheese browned. This is the only thing I did differently from the recipe. The recipe says to bake the bowls of soup in the oven for a half hour and then broil to brown the cheese, but my bowls don't specifically say "oven safe" on the bottom and I didn't want to chance them breaking. Still came out just fine, though.

The results? Divine!! I typically judge French onion soup by two factors: the cheesiness and crunchiness of the crouton, and the saltiness of the soup itself. Obviously, I can control the crouton very easily, so no problem there. It was kind of crunchy-chewy, with lots of melted cheese. I was worried that the soup would be very salty, as onion soup usually is, but it wasn't salty at all. As a matter of fact, I think I could have easily doubled the salt without an issue. Since I followed the recipe and used what was called for, I just added more salt and pepper at the end.

I would totally make this again, but I think I would add at least another pound of onions. It just didn't have enough onions for me, as I typically prefer onion soup to be a bit on the chunky side. Although this was pretty time-consuming to make, it was mostly hands-off cooking time.

(And yes, one bowl completely filled me up.)

cinnamon baked oatmeal

So, I made this while I was on vacation a couple weeks ago:  Cinnamon Sugar Baked Oatmeal. Just click on the name to go to the recipe.

This oatmeal was so yummy and the recipe was so easy! What I liked about it was that it came out more like an oatmeal bar. I'm thinking I could add raisins and pass them off as actual oatmeal bars. Yup, I think I need to try that!

I also liked that it calls for only one banana, as opposed to the three bananas in this recipe I made awhile back for peanut butter brownie oatmeal.  There are times when I forget I'm saving the bananas for a reason and then I end up eating them. So, I'm left with one overripe banana. What does one do with just one overripe, mushy banana? Make this recipe, of course. :)

If sugar is an issue for you, just omit the cinnamon sugar topping. Or you could use an artificial sweetener that scoops like sugar. I kept the real sugar, but was careful to test the waters before eating a bigger piece. The oatmeal itself has only one banana and 1/4 cup of brown sugar, so it has a bit less sugar that the peanut butter brownie oatmeal recipe, which uses three bananas. You could even sub in a different milk, like nut milk that's unsweetened, for even less sugar. I used whole milk this time around, but next time I might use my Fairlife milk, which is half the sugar of regular milk.

So, what baked oatmeal recipe should I make next? I'm thinking something with blueberries, since I have a bunch of fresh blueberries in the freezer. I've also got some unsweetened coconut in the fridge. I have cocoa powder galore. Maybe another batch using the cocoa and coconut. I'm sure if I scour the cabinets and freezer enough I'll find lots more that I can whip into a batch of baked oatmeal!

homemade turkey stock

I was on vacation from work last week. I actually had what people would call a "staycation," and a pretty productive one at that. Ick, I hate that term. "Staycation." Even though I was on vacation and stayed home, it's still a vacation in my book. Any time I don't have to be at work is a vacation.

Anyway, my plans were to go to physical therapy for my back issues, scan a ton of family photos, do some cooking, and do a little clothing shopping. I'm happy to report I did all those things! It was a great week, other than a neck problem cropping up, and even though I wasn't super productive, I rested a lot, had a leisurely week, and crossed some items off the to-do list, like dropping two more bags of clothing at Good Will.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I made a turkey. It was on my birthday, actually. I then used the carcass to make turkey stock. I had to cut the carcass up, because it was too long for my biggest pot. (As you can see, it still has a good amount of meat on it, which was used later for turkey salad.) I tossed in a bunch of vegetable scraps from my odds-and-ends bag I keep in the freezer for such occasions:  a couple scallions, some celery, celery leaves, and carrots. I also tossed in some fresh sage, parsley and rosemary from my garden, fresh onions, bay leaf, dried thyme, some peppercorns, and a little salt. I then covered it all in water and boiled it until the carcass started falling apart. There's really no set time I use. When it looks done and smells great, it's done. There's also no set recipe.  Whatever I feel like throwing in and actually have on-hand is what goes in; however, I will say that I typically use mostly the same things all the time.



Still lots of meat on that carcass!

Look at all those veggies! Everyone is going for a nice, long swim. :)

This is what I got when I was done:  five quarts of homemade, delicious turkey stock. You have no idea how good this smells (and tastes)! My intention was to freeze these jars, but apparently these canning jars are no freezer-safe; I had one casualty when doing a test freeze. I put the other four quarts into Ziploc bags and laid them flat on a cookie sheet to freeze. Kind of a bummer, because I really wanted to use the jars. I'll have to find another use for them since I have a dozen.



happy birthday to me!

Yes, today is my birthday.  I'm 43 years old. How the hell did I get to be 43??  It seems to have happened overnight. My mom always told me that once I hit 21 the years would fly by, and they have!

Anyway, I'm on vacation from work this week. This morning I put a turkey in the oven. It was hanging around the freezer for awhile and I decided I'll use it for various things: hot open turkey sandwiches, snacks for the kitties, and to make turkey stock. After I put it in the oven I took a little trip to Trader Joe's in search of pure vanilla extract. (Yes, I left the house with the oven on. Washer was on, too!) The price has skyrocketed this year, so I figured I'd check Trader Joe's, as I find their prices are lower than most places on many items. I found a 4 oz. bottle of bourbon vanilla for $8.99. That's not bad considering Price Rite--a discount store--wanted $4.99 for 2 oz. and Sam's Club had an 8 oz. bottle for $20.98. I also plan to make my own; however, I've noticed that there are no vanilla beans being sold in my usual haunts. I know there's a big shortage right now, so that's why the prices are so high and beans are scarce. If I find some beans and make my own extract, I'll post about it.

I bought these flowers for myself at Trader Joe's ($3.99!), along with some pineapple salsa, two bags of riced cauliflower, and a cat. A cat?? Just kidding! That's Leia and she was highly interested in my flowers. I had to put them on the fireplace mantle so the cats can't nibble on the leaves.

When I got home, I found the house hadn't caught on fire, much to my relief. Actually, the oven wasn't even on anymore. Upon further inspection I found that the microwave, toaster oven, coffee maker, laundry room and dining room were all without power. I headed down into the basement to check out the electrical panels (a scary prospect: heading to the basement, alone, in a very old house...). None of the circuits were tripped. I let Bob know and he called to tell me to check the sub panel. Turns out everything on the sub panel was without power, which means the sub panel is blown or the wiring is blown. Either way, not a good thing. Luckily the fridge and deep  freezer are not on the sub panel, so my food is in no danger of spoiling.

So, yeah. I came home to a half-cooked turkey and a half-done load of wash. I have a gas stove, which is great when the power goes out. But the oven is controlled by digital buttons. I grabbed an extension cord and was able to plug the stove in and finish the turkey (much to Leia's delight).  Unfortunately I can't finish the wash because I have well water, which requires a pump and that pump runs on power. I do have water at the moment, but I need to conserve it until the power is fixed.

I have to go to physical therapy later for my back. It seems to be helping a little; however, now I have a lot of pain in the base of my neck and left should blade, which is causing me a headache. It's been a week and isn't going away. I'll have to mention that when I go to PT later.

No big plans for the rest of the day, other than to scan some of the family pictures. I brought all the bins back from my parents' house and I've decided I want to scan as much as possible so we don't lose any precious memories. There are lots of scrapbooks, too, the my grandfather put together. I think it will be a fun, if very tedious, project for the remainder of the week.

update #2: the war on back pain

I have an update, but it's not as good as I was hoping for. Although, if I wrote this a couple weeks ago it would have been better.

I wrote earlier this week about my business/vacation trip I took recently. Right before the trip, I got my diagnosis from the orthopedic doctor. He prescribed me a steroid pack, which contained 21 pills to be taken over the course of six days. Since I can't take NSAIDs due to the gastric bypass, this was the next best option.

I debated back and forth as to whether I should start the pack right away, which would mean I would finish the pack while I was away, or wait to start it when I got back from CA. The reason I couldn't make up my mind was that the drug information pamphlet that came with the prescription stated that it could lower my immune system, which meant I could get sick while I was away. Since I'd be trapped on a plane with 150+ people for 6+ hours, I figured it would be likely I'd get sick. But then I started thinking about how much pain I was in and how much more pain I'd be in after that long plane ride, sitting in a conference room for several days, and then taking another plane ride home. That made up my mind:  I started the pack that Thursday before my trip.

I have to say, the steroids really made a big difference in my pain levels. The pain wasn't completely gone, but I no longer was waking up at 2 am already in pain. I also used my back brace for the plane rides, as well as long site-seeing drives and the business conference. I didn't need any of the Percocet that was prescribed "just in case." I managed with some occasional Tylenol.

When I got back to work after my trip, my standing desk had been installed in my office. It's pretty neat. My monitors are attached to the platform and it has a shelf for my mouse and keyboard. I can raise it so I can stand up whenever I need to without any fuss. Lowering it is just as easy. My boss said it looks like it belongs on the Star Trek Enterprise. It definitely helps alleviate some of the back pain.

My workouts are pretty limited at the moment. I'm the queen of lunges and body weight squats. I'm not supposed to twist; lift weights above my head; do anything that's high impact, like running or jumping; and no floor exercises.  The physical therapist says I can try some of the exercises I stopped, like kettle bell swings, but said to listen to my body and don't do anything that causes pain. I have to say, although it's very limited right now, I'm not sad that I can't do burpees, jump squats or flutter kicks.

Anyway, now that I'm home and back to work, my pain is back. It's not quite as bad as before I took the steroid pack, but it's still not good. Part of the problem is having to go out of town last weekend and then having to sit through several three-hour training sessions this week.  Even though I'm using the standing desk and I'm still using my back brace when I'm sitting at work, I find it's just not enough.  I bought myself a knee pillow for bed, which I just started using this past weekend. It's meant to put the back into alignment when sleeping on my side and take the pressure off the hips and lower back.  I've also started physical therapy, so I'll see how that goes.

Hopefully someday I will be pain free like most other people.  I can't remember what it's like to not feel some sort of pain on a daily basis.