Afternoon drinks

I made myself my standard hot matcha latte... 4 ounces skim milk, 4 ounces hot water, about a teaspoon of honey and a tablespoon of matcha powder. Whisk.

I asked my ten year old if she wanted something and she said to surprise her.

So I made her a decaf coconut chai/chocolate latte. I heated the skim milk (4 ounces), mixed in about 1 1/4 teaspoons honey. I dropped the tea bag in (Celestial Seasonings Decaf Coconut Chai) and added 4 ounces almost boiling water. Next I added about a tablespoon of mini chocolate chips and stirred until they melted. I topped with whipped cream & fresh ground cinnamon.

Berry Banana Smoothie

For two:
(would be best with a handful of ice cubes but some child used all ours)
In a blender combine
- about one cup frozen berries (ours had thawed, they were leftover, frozen would have improved temperature and texture)
- 2 bananas
- 3/4 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 2 tablespoons vanilla yogurt

Sunday hot chocolate

This still tastes a tad soymilky but here's our recipe:

- 2 cups silk unsweetened soy milk
- 1/2 cup half and half
- handful of chocolate chips
- 1/3 cup Hershey's cocoa
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 peppermints

Bubble Chai

My friend Gayle went to a Chinese New Year's celebration and tried "Bubble Tea" which she enjoyed and thought I would enjoy too.

She found a basic recipe online and emailed it to me:

1/2 cup chilled, cooked large tapioca pearls (if substituting smaller tapioca, use 1/3 cup)*
1 cup crushed ice
1 cup very strong chilled black tea (or orange pekoe tea or Lichee tea)
1 cup milk or to taste
Honey or granulated sugar to taste

I bought precooked tapioca last night at Target so this and homemade pudding top my list.

In my blender, I soaked
- 1/3 cup tapioca
In
- 1/2 cup very vanilla soy milk
- 1/2 cup whole milk
- 1 teaspoon local honey (all I have left)

While that soaks, I have one
- organic chai tea bag by Tazo
Steeping in
- 1 cup boiling water

Now I'm going to add
- 1 cup small ice cubes
To my blender and crush the ice

Once the tea gets really dark, I'll combine them

Hot Chocolate

My daughter had to write "steps in a process" in her second grade class. She's only seven, but of course her selection for the assignment was a recipe! (beaming here!)

In case the photo doesn't capture it:

Making Hot Chocolate
1. First you get hot chocolate miks and milk, a ovon (ummm... Microwave oven, love Mom) and a cup

2. Then you put the milk in a cup.

3. Next you heat it up.

4. Next you put the chocolate micks in the oven (in the cup, dear, with the milk, love Mom)

5. Finally you ster it and injoy it

Ocean Spray Sparkling Juice

When I was in therapy (don't ask, it's a long story), my therapist pointed out that I tended to be cheap without allowing any splurges for myself. That I would treat my family but not myself. While Hurricane Irene shopping last week, I bought Ocean Spray Sparkling Pomegranate Blueberry juice.

Now in my house we mix 100% juice with seltzer and make a diluted juice beverage we call "juice with bubbles" and that Ocean Spray now markets as this product.

But it was a hurricane and the thought of losing power and still having something more refreshing than a juice box, more exciting than water and almost reminiscent of wine or beer... I decided to try it.

The four pack of 8.4 ounce cans cost $2.29 ON SALE at Target. Even with an employee discount and RedCard discount (23 cents for one, 11 for the other) that's $1.95. Rounding up that's 50 cents a can.

But it is yummy. I can mix it much cheaper at home.

Lemonade Smoothie

Are you sick of smoothies yet?

This morning:
- 1 Chobani lemon yogurt
- about 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
- about 1/4 cup very vanilla soy milk
- about 1/4 cup seltzer
- one heaping teaspoon orange juice concentrate
- pinch of [food grade] lavender

Dangerous concoction

The other night I mixed up a dangerous concoction: equal parts blue curaçao and sambuca, with a handful of sour patch kids. It was strangely interesting and I enjoyed it. Of course, I drank it too fast.

Rose tea

I love the Tazo Rest Tea. It's primarily rose, with lavender, lemon, and valerian. All sorts of restful herbs, but no chamomile which always overpowers everything.

I have been making iced tea with 50% green tea and 50% this rest tea, and it's good. Today I scaled back the amount of green tea.

The Tazo tea hot is yummy by itself so I don't know why I'm hesitant to make a full batch of Tazo rest iced tea.

Lemonade

I made myself a glass of lemonade by juicing two lemons, added five crushed spearmint leaves from my garden, water, ice, and 3/4 tablespoon sugar.

Iced tea and leftovers

Last week's green tea with berry turned awesome. This morning I'm making Stash vanilla nut cream decaf with a regular lipton bag, too. I forgot last week that I do have a glass jar to make sun tea. I bought it on clearance last summer at Wegmans.

For breakfast we had scrambled eggs and fresh blueberries.

For lunch we had leftover pasta from the restaurant last night (my dad took us out to dinner). Can you believe I ate pretty heartily last night, and still had enough of my meal leftover to split it three ways for the family for lunch.

That's when you know portion sizes are out of control.

Sunshine and iced tea!

I'm brewing some tea to ice to go with this lovely sunny day. First day of spring. Haven't been to the backyard yet for a post-winter assessment but I bet my chives are growing.

I have a big mug with four tea bags in it, ready to make 2-3 quarts of iced tea. The mix today is 2 teabags organic green tea (purchased a long time ago from the warehouse club in a big, big pack), 1 tea bag Celestial Seasoning Sugar Plum Spice, and one Celestial Seasonings Wild Berry Zinger.

How to trick the wee one...

Into drinking her juice.

• wineglass
• two gummy bears in the bottom of the glass
• grape juice
• one bamboo drink umbrella with a gummy bear impaled upon it
  

Orange (or Blue?) Metropolitan

So, I take the same approach with my home bar that I do with my groceries. I try to make things last. I like to cook with alcohol I also like to drink (wine, brandy).

One of my preferred 'manly' drinks is a Metropolitan. According to my bartender's guide that's 4 parts brandy, 2 parts sweet vermouth, 1/2 tsp bar sugar, and a dash Angostura bitters.

Now the bitters are supposed to have some sort of orange or citrus flavor. So when I noticed I was out of sweet vermouth, I thought it might work to use the extra dry and add some extra sugar. I opted against this and added blue curacao instead.

I mixed the following and served over ice to my husband and I:

• 2 ounces brandy
• about 1/2 teaspoon bar sugar
• 1 ounce extra dry vermouth
• 1/2 ounce blue curacao
• dash bitters

Almond Sunset 'Kid' tea

My daughter tends to get obsessive about drinks. Apple juice for weeks on end. Chocolate milk next. (Which is why I usually buy chocolate soy milk-- it doesn't have high fructose corn syrup.)

Last night my husband and I tried the new Le Creuset tea pot. It has the least obnoxious whistle of any tea pot I've ever heard. We had the organic black currant decaf tea that I survived on during my business trip to Pittsburgh.

Today apparently, my daughter could be bribed to eat her breakfast with a glass of 'dessert tea.' So, to the teapot I go. I believe I mentioned this tea once before, but it has become such a favorite (which I did not expect) that it should be mentioned again.

Mommy's special dessert tea is actually Celestial Seasonings Almond Sunset, a decaf herbal dessert tea of "roasted carob, roasted barley, roasted chicory, cinnamon, orange peel, natural almond flavor, blackberry leaves, and anise seed."

And this is how I make it:

Supplies

• one tea pot with water
• one expresso cup/ demi-tasse
• soymilk
• honey
• one teabag (Celestial Seasonings Almond Sunset)
  
• one baby or sugar spoon

and when pleasing children, scale and details are important.

As water heats, prep demi-tasse with about 1/2 teaspoon honey, either in the bottom or along the side. When the water boils, hold the teabag with one hand against the side of the cup and pour the water over the teabag into the cup. Fill the cup about 3/4 full, then dip the teabag several times into the water until it turns a rich orange-brown. Then remove the teabag. (This keeps the tea from getting too strong.) Stir with the tiny spoon to dissolve the honey. Add an ounce or two milk, in my case plain soy milk, and stir again. Serve with the spoon inside so little hands can stir and sip.

Pumpkin lattes

A friend forwarded a link to a gluten-free, crock pot cooking blog:
http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/search/label/gluten%20free

Quoted from the blog:
Skip the coffee house today and make pumpkin spice lattes at home. This recipe really does taste like the real thing----even though it doesn't leave a fluorescent orange stain when you dribble it down your sweater.

updated 11/23: I just learned that the coffee house Pumpkin Spice Lattes are not gluten free. Yet another reason to make them at home!


The Ingredients.
adapted from Taste of Home's Halloween 2008 edition

--2 cups milk (I used 1%)
--2 T canned pumpkin
--2 T white sugar
--2 T vanilla (not a typo. it asks for tablespoons)
--1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
OR: 1/4 tsp cinnamon, 1/8 tsp cloves, 1/8 tsp nutmeg, and a teeny tiny pinch of ground ginger
--1/2 cup brewed espresso or 3/4 cup strong brewed coffee

--garnish with whipped cream (optional)

The Directions.

This will make enough for 2 people to have a big mug with a bit leftover. If you are having friends over, adjust the recipe accordingly. I used a 4-quart crockpot, but as small as a 1.5 quart will work with these amounts.

Add the coffee/espresso and milk to the crockpot. Whisk in the pumpkin, spices, sugar, and vanilla.

Cover and cook on high for 2 hours if everything is cold. Whisk again.

Ladle into mugs, and garnish with whipped cream and additional cinnamon. I added a cinnamon stick to be fancy.
(if I rinse it off, can I re-use it? It seems wasteful to toss.)

The Verdict.

Adam and I really enjoyed these. We had them for breakfast yesterday, and the kids were jealous.

It would be fun to put this out for the adults at a Halloween party, holiday gift-wrapping party, or to serve guests while you're waiting for the turkey to cook.

I'm thinking of making some pumpkin cookies with the leftover canned pumpkin.

What I did:
Angel's pumpkin butterscotch lattes

In the crockpot, on high, whisk:

• 1.75 cups unsweetened soymilk
• 2 cups decaf coffee
  
• 5 tablespoons solid pack pumpkin
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1.5 tablespoons butterscotch
• 4 tablespoons pure vanilla extract
• pinch cinnamon
• pinch ground cloves
• pinch nutmeg
• pinch ginger
  

Fruity sparkling cocktail

I finally made my zucchini cakes tonight and wanted to serve a cocktail to go with it, something light for summer.

So I placed some ice, about one cup seltzer, about 1/3 cup berry juice, a splash blue curacao and a splash of grenadine in the shaker and mixed.

Breakfast meeting

I hosted a business meeting this morning. It's my web team for my book's web site. They like to barter instead of get paid.

So this morning I made/served:

• Three coffee cakes (blueberry, honey-pecan and plain)
• Diced potato with fresh parsley and chives
• farm fresh bacon
• creamsicle smoothies
• homemade granola
• local cherries
• blueberries and pineapple
  

Midday recount

For breakfast this morning... Oh, wait, I didn't have breakfast. Well, maybe I did if you count the graham crackers at 8:30. My daughter had watermelon at 7:30 and graham crackers and chocolate soy milk with me.

I'm concerned with her getting enough liquids in this hot weather, so I "made" her drink one of my bubbly cherry lemonades at 10. That's when I made myself the rest of the Dole salad from last night, though we ate all the good toppings so I just poured a bunch of grated asiago over it and then added the remaining ginger dressing. It was fabulous.

At 11, my husband and daughter had a real picnic on the college quad, with crackers and leftover lebanon bologna and port salute cheese, a banana and a 100% juice box. Then they played some quad golf.

When I got home from class at noon, I brewed some green tea to ice later. I then packed a glass bottle (20 ounces?) with ice cubes and water for the little one. AND I gave her the rest of the watermelon.

Now, I'm finally sitting down to eat some homemade bread and port salute cheese, with a glass of diluted lemonade.

Super Cherry Lemonade with bubbles

Any mom will probably agree that keeping your child well-hydrated can be impossible. I drink a lot of water. On my good days, I used to drink 90 ounces a day. So I always poured my daughter a drink when I got one. Nowadays, it seems like they get left all over the house more than they get drunk.

And if you give them too much milk or juice, then you worry about filling up little bellies with the "wrong" calories.

Plus, now my daughter's at the age where relatives have given her a root beer here or a cream soda there and she's starting to think bubbles are cool.

Here's my solution:
Super Cherry Lemonade with Bubbles
1/3 glass your favorite lemonade
2/3 glass seltzer
1 tablespoon maraschino cherry juice
1 maraschino cherry

And you tell child he/she can't eat the cherry until she finishes the drink. This also works with diluting any juice with "bubbles." Experimenting with different seltzer flavors can create some crazy combos. My daughter loves picking the "bubbles" because the seltzer bottles usually have big cherries or limes on them to show the flavor.