Day of cooking

We went to a few open houses yesterday and Crazy essentially worked most of the day so I cooked a bit last night and will cook today.

Last night I made clam chowder at 10 pm. My clam chowder starts a little like this. I sautéed some leeks in a big le cruset pot, then add chopped carrots, celery and potatos (I used multi colored potatos). This all gets cooked a bit before i start adding the liquid. Because I had a big can of clams I poured the juice in and put a lid on, then let it cook out until all the veggies were soft. I then added some milk and because I had some cream in the fridge, I added that and then pulsed it with the hand blender. When everything was smooth and to the consistency that I wanted, I added the clams, turned down the heat and let it warm the clams up. The reason why I am repeating this recipe today is because for lunch Ollie had some korean sushi rolls and ate almost an entire bowl of the soup.

He's off in nap land now, so I can finish what I wanted to cook today and prepare for the week. I marinated some boneless korean kal bi for dinner sometime this week. The marinade is really simple and given to me by Auntie's A's half Korean friend. It is minced garlic, soy sauce (low sodium is my preference), sesame oil, brown sugar and toasted sesame seeds. I sliced the kal bi thickish and pounded them thin so they will cook fast for a weekday dinner. I also promised Crazy I would make him his favorite butternut squash risotto this week. Tonight we will have green beans with pork belly and oyster sauce.

We went on some drive by's today in the neighborhood we first saw a house at. There was a little tiny kids park a few blocks away and was empty. So we stopped and gave Ollie some time in the swing and slide. He giggled with joy, but I think he is still too young to understand that he was supposed to go crazy there. Perhaps when he's older and we actually live in 'da hood.

We inquired about a house that was brought to our attention months ago for a reasonable price, however, its a total fixer upper and we would have to do EVERYTHING for the house, except the foundation. So we'll see what happens.

Can I just say that I love this little park? Not only was it completely empty, but the floor where the jungle gym and this swing set is like a big rubber mat so that the kids don't fall and get hurt. Or rather if they fall, they don't get quite as hurt.



Do you see the shoes that I had to take a loan out for? Please feel sorry for me. Donations are happily accepted. :-) I should set up a paypal account called giveolivershoes.

************** Update****************
Not a second after I finished this blog entry did we hear pounding on the wall. Apparently Ollie has learned that if he pounds on the wall, someone will come get him. So I went to peek in and I got a huge smile and baby babble. He's now busy shoving fistfuls of watermelon in his mouth and using my dining table as his extended food tray.