Today's Grab Bag of Thoughts

It's been cold here California lately - you know what I mean, cold by California standards - and it seems nothing sounds good for dinner except soup.  On Monday our house got hit with the common cold.  Well with sick people comes...you guessed it Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup.  Of course I could have just opened a can of Campbell's chicken soup, but really???  Nothing beats an old fashion all day 100% from scratch soup. Picture this:  I get off of work at 5:30 pm and drive to Whole Foods to pick up all of the organic items I need for this recipe: Whole organic chicken, organic eggs for the homemade noodles, organic onions, celery, carrots, parsley, garlic, etc.  Drive home, roll up my sleeves, take off my rings (I don't like to get gunk in them when I cook, strange I know ) and get the kitchen ready for some slow, leisurely chicken soup and noodles making fun. Let's speed it up a bit...Whole chicken in Rockcrok Dutch oven to simmer for an hour while I ...

I've never been a bandwagon type of person.  I'm loyal to my sports teams no matter how bad they are, and believe me they are BAD.  However, over the last year or so I kept hearing the hype of how wonderful the new pressure cookers are amazing.  The world was all a twitter (no not the site) over the InstaPot.  Honestly, I kept thinking why oh why would I need another appliance in my kitchen.  Flash forward to August and the pre-release of the Pampered Chef Quick Cooker.  As a independent consultant for the Pampered Chef I thought well, if they think it is great I should probably finally jump on the pressure cooker bandwagon.  I NEVER LOOKED BACK! When I say I love this thing, I don't even think that it expresses how much I love this thing.  I have the ability to totally forget to take out food for dinner AND still deliver a healthy dinner very quickly to my family.  I have used the Quick Cooker almost every day since I received it. The...