Good Food

So sometimes I get excited for competitions, like when we heard of our ward chili cook-off. I instantly decided to yearn for that first place chili ribbon, despite the fact that I had never before made chili from scratch. Regardless, I spent a good five hours last Saturday making what I call Casaday's Extreme Chunky Chili! Although I didn't pay much attention to the quantities I was using, and never looked at any recipe, the chili included each of the following.

mild Italian sausage
1 green bell pepper
1/2 red bell pepper
1/2 yellow bell pepper
2 diced white onions, sauteed
about 20 garlic cloves, chopped by hand and slightly sauteed (only after did I learn the difference between cloves of garlic and bulbs of garlic)
pinto beans
chili hot beans
black beans
northern white beans
crushed tomatoes
crushed tomatoes mixed with green chiles
can of sweet corn
thinly sliced carrots
serrano peppers
chili powder
a generous amount of cumin
bay leaves (to make people think I know how to cook)
salsa
salt and pepper to taste

We took our approx 1 1/2 gallons of chili to the cook-off. Sadly, we arrived late and most everyone was on their second bowl when we got there . Needless to say, we brought home a lot of chili.

Also here's a beautiful picture of a beautiful pizza on a beautiful pizza peel taken by a beautiful Amy.

Happy Halloween from the Casadays

miscellaneous musings

1. Brian and I have been married for 6 months today. Wow! In some ways, it doesn't seem that long; in others, it seems longer (but only in good ways). I just love him. :)

2. I guess I never mentioned where I'm working. It's Yagööt, a frozen yogurt shop in the Easton mall. It's been fun so far. I trained for 3 days in Cincinnati and started at Easton last week. This week, I've been learning how to be a shift leader. I haven't done it on my own yet - tomorrow will be my first solo shift (as a shift leader). I'm nervous but excited to do the things that I've learned.

My uniform for work is khakis and a Yagööt shirt (plus apron, name tag, and close-toed shoes), but when I started I really only had one pair of khakis. They're nice ones too, and I didn't want to ruin them because we use a lot of bleach to clean around the store. Of course, my solution was to go to Goodwill (I miss DI) and get a couple pairs for work. I ended up with 3 pairs for $3.50 each - and they're good condition, name brand (one Old Navy, one Aeropostale, and one Gap)! I also got an OSU shirt for myself (I got Brian one for $5 a few weeks ago) for $2! I just love thrift stores. :) (I got a hideous dress there this week for my Halloween costume too.)

3. On Monday, Brian decided we would have a Halloween-y FHE, so we went to Halloween Express first to get stuff for our costumes. When we got home, we worked on carving the pumpkins we got last week at FHE (we went to a farm with a corn maze, hay ride, and other stuff - some people in the ward go every year and invited whoever wanted to come). Brian decided on a skull and did more of a 3-D carving than cutting it out. It looks pretty sweet. When I finally decided what to do, it was getting late, so I just drew it on the pumpkin and worked on it the next day. I wanted to do an OSU pumpkin (no one can accuse me of not being a Buckeye fan!), so I freehanded the official logo. It looked like this (the biggest one pictured):



Unfortunately, I didn't have the right tools when I was cutting it out on Tuesday, and I ended up breaking off pieces that were supposed to be attached. I gave up then but may go back today and start with a fresh design on the other side of the pumpkin.

5. We finally got callings! Last Tuesday, Bro. Boogard (ward exec sec) called to ask if we could meet with Bishop Nagle on Wednesday night. I was asleep on the couch while Brian was working, but I woke up a little when I heard him on the phone. Even in my half-awake state, I got excited about it. We were sustained on Sunday. Any last guesses? Drum roll please....we're ward missionaries! I must not have figured out this calling the first 2 or 3 times. ;) We're both happy about it though.

6. I made banana bread for the first time in my life this week. We had some very ripe bananas, and I figured that was a great way to use them. Brian approved too. :) It turned out quite well. I also made baked apples at the same time - we had a bunch of bruised apples that were going bad (because I didn't want to put bruised ones in Brian's lunch), and I didn't want them to go to waste. Mmm...I love baking (and its results). :)

I think that's enough randomness for now. We have a bunch of pictures to post (wedding, Disneyland, etc.) but I'm going to continue procrastinating that task.

24

It's funny how much your upbringing can change your perspective. I've been training in Cincinnati for my job the last two days. That means I've been meeting and getting to know some new people. I'm not exactly sure how old most of them are, but a few of them have asked how old I am when they've found out that I'm married (probably because I look a lot younger). All the reactions have been basically the same. I think my favorite one was "Aww, I've always wanted to get married young!" I guess because of the Mormon culture, I was starting to feel old when I wasn't married by my 24th birthday. Obviously, not everyone thinks that way. (And really, it's good for me to realize that I'm not that old.)

goodies

I'm not sure why, but last week I had this overwhelming need to bake. I was looking through some of our cook books for dinner ideas (meal planning is not my favorite) but ended up turning to desserts. Seeing Mom's recipe for lemon squares (her mom's recipe) set off my cravings. Then I noticed a peanut butter brownie recipe right above that on the page and couldn't resist. I also knew we had some apples that were pretty bruised, and I didn't want to give them to Brian in his lunch...so I decided on apple crisp too.

I made the lemon squares on Saturday, brownies on Sunday, and apple crisp on Monday. On Sunday, we decided to make friends by delivering some of the goodies to neighbors. We hadn't met the Stansburys and thought that was a good way to do it. We also made up "plates" - I had forgotten to get paper plates, so we improvised with tin foil - for the Beans and Patrick and BreAnne (they took us under their wings when we first rolled into town and had no place to stay and no food). It was so fun to see the Beans again! They had their baby a few weeks ago, and we just visited for a little while. The best part was that they had made cinnamon rolls for General Conference and told us it was perfect timing for us to stop by since they didn't have our address and wouldn't have been able to trade goodies with us otherwise. Not only that, but their neighbors knocked while we were there and handed them a plate of chocolate flan. Boy, was that good!

Needless to say, I should probably go running now. ;)