Hi my name is Lisa and I don’t cook. I am actually a disaster in the kitchen. I am (self admittedly) lazy, messy, dyslexic and kind of a flake. All of these positive attributes make me a total loser when it comes to cooking. I don’t read directions well, the abbreviations for tsp and tbsp makes my head hurt. I have poor spacial relations so I ALWAYS use a bowl that is either two sizes two mall or too big. I am a cooking dork. I love to eat though, and frankly drink.

That said I have cooked twice this week. Davy has been really grooving on beans over the last few weeks. She even starts singing the little song I taught her “beans beans the wonderful fruit…”. Which makes me laugh. Also all the protein and fiber are good for her little and ever -growing tiny body. Andy has been out of town and since Davy and I usually eat like college students when he is away (unless we have dinner at our friend Lori’s house- who gladly feeds us all the time).

Also my sewing machine is DEAD. DEAD. DEAD. I have been really into sewing and quilting lately and its been really frustrating. I have gone back to spinning yarn and embroidery, to fill the void, but its not the same. I think cooking and sewing (for me) use the same parts of my brain that need exercising. Sewing is a lot less messy though.

SO this week I cooked twice. That might be really a record. First I made Ethiopian lentils. It came out good and we have been eating off of it all week. We have a fairly large Ethiopian population here in Portland and the spices are really easy to obtain. I didn’t bother making rice (because I am lazy) and meant to get some injera but didn’t (because I am lazy). So we just ate it and it tasted good.

Davy was at daycare today so this afternoon I got more ambitious. I tried my hand at Peanut Butter Amaranth bars. There is a vegan bakery near our house that makes them. I am a little obsessed with them. I get them several times a week. Davy loves them too, and because they are a little pricy- I usually share mine with her. You know its good when you don’t want to share with your kid. So I went online and found a similar recipe. I didn’t look hard- it was more assembly then cooking. So i thought I would try it.

The recipe calls for puffed Amaranth. This is where the troubles began, because you have to puff it your self. You basically have to pop it in a pan like popcorn. However, in teeny tiny batches because once its puffed it burns. I found a recipe for Amaranth puffs here. They did it in 2 tbs increments but I actually did it a teaspoon at a time because they didn’t burn that way. Uh the recipe calls for 4 cups of puffed Amaranth, so it took like an hour to pop 4 cups of the stuff. Also the bag broke half way in and a bunch of it when flying all over the kitchen. I decided to get the new dirt devil out to sweep it up only to slightly melt the tip. I then had to open up the house and turn on all the fans so the smell of toxic melting plastic wouldn’t permeate through the house, thus killing us. Good times. Why I don’t cook.

The rest of the recipe was pretty easy. You had to boil honey, which was okay although i used a saucepan that was too small and it ALMOST overflowed, but not to much.

The bars are cooling now. They are a little too sweet, but if I should ever try them again (which I may not) I would add more peanut butter and less honey. We will see what the kid thinks.

As an update to my last post. Andy has taken to calling Davy “the Honey Badger” which makes me laugh. She is throwing her sippy cup less and while she isn’t hitting less, I think I have found a way of disciplining her that doesn’t make her laugh in my face (time in, no attention). So that’s good right?

Even though cooking is not my thing, I do have some mad clothes making skills. I made davy this poncho. She just got those boots and loves them. I think they are hilarious. I think she looks like an extra from The Hobbit in it. Jinkxy Hobbit. Jinkxy Toddler.