The Best Pumpkin Cookies Ever

These pumpkin cookies aren't the Best Pumpkin Cookies Ever just because they're giant enough to put a jack-o-lantern face on -- but they're also rediculously cakey and moist, full of chocolate chips, and did I mention that they're gigantic?!

My mom found this recipe on an M&M's magazine ad in the 1980s and we made them every year since as I was growing up.  Food (especially deserts!) is a great way for me to remember my childhood and pass on and create traditions for my son now.  Even though Nathan is too young to really participate in a meaningful way, I love making the things I made with my mom all those years ago.  These are one of my very favorites.  The recipe is below, including some tips of my own. Please enjoy!

Pumpkin Cookies

2 cups flour
1 cup oats (uncooked)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1 stick butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg, slightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup solid pack pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (you can even add a little more, up to a cup and a half total)
Assorted icings, peanut butter, raisins, M&Ms, candy corn

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Combine flour, oats, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. In the bowl of your stand mixer, cream butter and gradually add sugars, beating until light and fluffy.  Add egg and vanilla; mix well.

Alternate additions of dry ingredients and pumpkin, mixing well after each addition.  Stir in morsels.  For each cookie, drop 1/4 cup dough onto lightly greased or parchment paper-covered cookie sheet. Spread into a pumpkin shape using a rubber spatula and add a bit more dough to form the stem.

Bake 20 to 25 minutes, until cookies are firm and lightly browned. Remove from cookie sheet after 1-2 minutes and cool on racks.  When completely cool, decorate using icing or peanut butter and affix assorted candies, raisins or nuts.  Variation: Substitute 1 cup raisins in place of chocolate chips.

Cookies should be cake-like and moist.  Be sure not to over bake!

P.S. I'm eating one of these cookies now!
P.P.S. They freeze very well after baking, so you freeze half the batch and enjoy them at your own pace.
P.P.P.S. I wonder how many people still have this recipe from the original 1980s ad (if that even is the original one).  Whoever sold this recipe to M&M's or the marketing company who made the ad, I can guarantee they didn't get paid enough.  It's abosolute GOLD!

Wheaten Bread and Honey

Today I (we) finally baked wheaten bread, a whole wheat soda bread recipe from Northern Ireland.  The recipe came from Mrs. Kincaid, actually, the doctor’s housekeeper in An Irish Country Doctor!  lol  I love that a fictional character dictated her recipes to me from the back of the book.  I was going to post her recipe here (I’m sure Kinky wouldn’t mind), but I had thought there was a mistake in the baking temperature, and after doing some research I found that I was right.  (Sorry, Kinky.)  So I updated the recipe to what I think it should be (you’ll see where I made the change).

While doing my research I found that soda bread isn’t just eaten in Ireland—various forms hail from Australia, Britain and Serbia.  Some are sweet and some are savory—the one I made today was definitely savory, and I can tell it’s a mealtime staple, with the simple ingredients of whole wheat flour, baking soda, salt, sugar and buttermilk.  We ate it in the morning hot from the oven with butter.  This evening I reheated some and drizzled a generous teaspoon of honey.  I think if it hadn’t been over baked if would have been more moist and less dense.

This is what I think the recipe should be:

Wheaten Bread Recipe

2 ½ cups whole wheat flour

1 tablespoon granulated sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 ¾ cups buttermilk

Mix dry ingredients very thoroughly. Then add 1 ¾ cups of buttermilk to make a thick paste.  Turn it into a well-greased loaf tin.  Bake at once at 400 degrees F for 15 minutes until risen; then bake a further 45 minutes at 375 degrees F. If top gets too brown, cover with parchment paper.  Serve with butter or chicken liver pate.

(In the book, the 375 degree instruction says 400, which I think is a mistake.  Otherwise they’d say bake for one hour at 400 degrees.)

My mom visited today and shared the bread with us, and I found out that I may have some Northern Irish in me after all.  I’d assumed we were from the South of Ireland, since we’re Catholic, but I learned (or re-learned) some family history today and may have some Northern roots after all. 

Sláinte!

P.S. Don't forget to come back next week for a week's worth of blogiversary giveaways!  Creating a Family Home is turning one, and I have some fun, crafty, knitterly giveaways planned!!

Drying and Storing Herbs

If you haven’t been drying and storing herbs for use all winter long, you still have time!  Now’s the time to start, while herbs are still putting out new leaves (although barely) and it’s not cold enough out to damage them. (At this point, I’d hurry and cut some herbs to dry now.  As in, right now.  What are you waiting for?!)

I hang my fresh-cut herbs from the beam that divides my kitchen and family room.  I usually cut such large branches branches that I don’t need bundle them, but smaller branches can be loosely bound together with some jute twine for easy hanging.  The idea is to hang them in a dry place that has good ventilation, away from direct sunlight.  Note: It is not necessary to wash your herbs first, unless they are visibly dirty.

Once completely dry (it can take a few weeks), store the dried herbs in any kind of resalable container.  I like mason jars, but since I’m a spice-dropper (okay, I'm an everything-in-the-kitchen dropper), I use plastic containers, like Gladware or even Ziplock plastic bags.  This year I tried Ball freezer jars (for jam), which have screw-on plastic tops and are BPA free.  These seem like they’ll do a much better job of keeping my herbs fresh.  Or, fresh-er, since they’ll never be as fresh as they were the day I picked them from the garden.

I don’t know about you, but I love reaching into my spice cabinet during the winter months and pulling out herbs that I grew and dried myself.  I remember growing the plants and feel proud that I'm using what I've grown.  Drying my own herbs is resourceful and self-sufficient, easy to do and just tastes better.  There’s no good reason not to dry your own!

Tortilla Lasagna Recipe

So I know tortilla lasagna isn’t exactly a summer recipe, but with all the rain we’ve been having on the East coast, it felt right to bake something.  Plus, I’m not averse to turning on the oven in the summertime, with the advent of air conditioning and all.  As my Seasonal Recipes page grows and I categorize recipes by season, I’ll catalog this one under winter recipes.

If you love Mexican food—or even like it only mildly—you will love this recipe.  The ingredients list alone is mouth-watering…imagine all of these flavors combined!  When I first told my husband about this dish, he made a face, even though he likes Mexican food.  Well, I’ve come to find out a few years later, it’s his favorite thing that I make.  And I make some pretty good things.

It’s not my own recipe—it’s a free recipe published by Certified Angus Beef that I picked up at the butcher counter in our local year-round farmer’s market.  I doubt they’ll mind if I post it here.  If they do, they can just e-mail me and I’ll take it down.  (Please don’t sue me, okay?)  But I can offer some tips and suggestions not included in the recipe.  Recipe first, then tips.

Tortilla Lasagna

Serves 8-10

2 pounds ground beef, cooked and drained

1 package taco seasoning

¾ cup water

1 cup chopped green onions

1 ½ cups salsa

12 corn tortillas

5 cans diced green chilies

1 pound grated Monterey Jack cheese  

1 can mild enchilada sauce

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

Combined cooked ground beef with taco seasoning, water and green onions.  Stir in salsa.

Spray 9 x 13” pan with nonstick spray. Place a layer of tortillas in the bottom. Top with a third of the green chilies, ground beef, cheese and enchilada sauce.  Repeat layers twice, using the cheese on top. Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees F for 45 minutes. Remove foil for the last 10 minutes of baking.

Tips:

1. I don’t think this recipe can really serve 10 people, unless many of them are children.  I’d stick with eight.

2. That said, I halve the recipe for my little family of three and bake it in an 8 x 8” pan and still have leftovers for two the next day. 

3.  When I halve the recipe, I use about a pound to a pound and a half of ground beef (the 90/10 beef is great for this—save the fattier stuff for juicy hamburgers) and just half of the taco seasoning packet.

4. Use mild chilies unless you don’t mind some bites that are hotter than others.  Definitely mild chilies and enchilada sauce for kids (obviously!).  I also use mild salsa, even though I prefer medium to hot salsa on tortilla chips.  I can better taste all the great flavors in this dish without the heat to mask them.

5. I don’t usually keep green onions in the house and almost always forget to buy them for this recipe.  You can substitute regular white or yellow onions (cooked separately before added to beef mixture) or just skip them altogether with fine results. 

6.  I usually use cheddar instead of Monterey Jack because it’s what I have in the house.  You can nearly double the amount of cheese in this recipe with excellent results.

7.  To shorten time in the oven, preheat to 375 degrees F and bake for 30 minutes with foil and 5 minutes without it.  I take out Nathan’s portion when I remove the foil so his can start cooling down.  He’s a hungry boy and doesn’t like to wait!

I hope your family enjoys this delicious recipe as much as mine does.  Enjoy!

Togetherness is…Chocolate Chip Cookies

I’ve been on the lookout for ways to get Nathan involved in more of my daily activities and let him “help” me around the house with some meaningful tasks.  He’s been “helping” me sweep by holding the dustpan steady, using his own broom and stepping in and around my dust piles.  Okay, so I didn’t need help with that last one.  But I did need some help making chocolate chip cookies.

I mixed the wet ingredients in the stand mixer and Nathan combined and mixed the dry ingredients himself by hand.  I snapped some fun photos and learned a thing or two about making the best chocolate chip cookies ever.  Scroll down for my secrets to baking perfect, fluffy, tall, soft chocolate chip cookies -- the best ones you'll ever have!



After adding just his first ingredient he knew what we were doing here, and immediately reached for the other measuring cups I'd already prefilled.  He was on a mission!



I love how intent and focused he was.



We did a little tasting.

 

A nosy intruder joined us only to get grabbed at by a toddler.



See where the intruder is now?  (In the background, on the countertop!)



Uh oh.

 

Nathan knows something's not right here... See the little face peeking from the cabinet?

Ready for the goods?  Here are my secrets to baking perfect, fluffy, tall, soft chocolate chip cookies -- the best ones you'll ever have!   (I’m sorry to report that none of these involve a cute little boy with too-long-hair):

1. Start with this recipe from Better Homes & Gardens.  Or, at least choose a recipe that takes equal amounts of butter and vegetable shortening and uses more brown sugar than white sugar.

2. Refrigerate the dough for two to three hours before baking.  This gets you a nice, tall cookie that doesn’t spread out very much as it bakes.  (Better Homes & Gardens didn’t tell you that in the recipe, did they?  Who’s better now?)

3. Bake batches of cookies on one cookie sheet at a time, placing cookie sheet on the middle rack of your oven.  Put the dough back in the fridge until you’re ready to spoon out the next batch.  Make these cookies bigger than you think they should be – big, rounded teaspoonfuls (think almost ping-pong ball sized) are perfect for this recipe.

4. Line your baking sheets with parchment paper for easy cookie removal and even easier clean up. 

5. Let your cookies cool for one to two minutes before transferring them onto a cooling rack. This lets them set without overcooking them. 

6. These cookies don’t last more than a few days before going stale.  The good news is there are two ways to combat this, and one of them is not “eat them as fast as you can” – I’ve tried it, and although it works, I don’t necessarily recommend it! 

A)      You can freeze the cookies in batches with great results.

B)      You can bake about half of the dough and leave the other half of the dough covered in the fridge for no more than three days. Bake the rest when you’re good and ready—this got me two fresh batches of cookies in one week without all the extra time, energy and cleanup.  Needless to say, I like this solution the best!

They're best enjoyed with local, hormone-free milk.

The veggies are there because we were trying to be...healthy.  Yeah, that's right!

Enjoy!

The Basil Harvest and Pesto (and Giveaway Winner!)

Sunday was Basil Harvest Day.  That morning, Nathan and I headed out to the garden and I cut as much basil as was prudent from my three sweet basil plants.  That means I cut as much basil as I possibly could without killing the plants. 

After my early years of gardening and carefully picking just the leaves and leaving behind the stems to “keep growing”—they don’t—I finally realized that severely cutting down entire branches makes the plant grow bushier and more vigorously, ultimately leading to bigger, better harvests.

And because of that, I picked way more basil than I needed for two batches of pesto.  This is just a portion of the harvest.

I made the first batch of pesto while Nathan ate his lunch, and the second while he napped.  I used the recipe in Food Network Favorites: Recipes from Our All-Star Chefs—it's so easy!  In addition to fresh basil, it takes fresh lemon juice (not the bottled stuff), fresh garlic (not the jarred stuff), freshly grated parmesan cheese, olive oil, pine nuts or walnuts, salt and pepper.

The idea here is fresh, fresh, fresh, and it sure tastes it.  I know that when I'm making pesto it's the height of the summer and my garden is in full swing...and ripenening tomatoes are right around the corner.

I froze the pesto in my Beaba Multiportions babyfood portioner in two-ounce servings, since no one in this house eats purees anymore, even for strangely textured vegetables.  Really.  And then when that was full, I broke out a one-ounce babyfood portioner.  I’m really glad I did this, because I’m the only one who eats pesto around here, and freezing it in big portions is such a waste unless we're having friends or family over.

I hung the leftover basil from the rafter that divides my family room and kitchen to dry.

I did make a fatal error, though, in all this—I forgot to leave some unfrozen for fresh eating!  That afternoon I was jonzing for something to spread on a French baguette and I nearly smacked myself in the forehead like in a 90s sitcom.  PESTO!

I managed to get a small cube of half-frozen pesto out of the freezer and nuke it in the microwave for a few seconds to spread on my fresh bread.  And, MAN, was it good.  Summer couldn’t taste any greener.  Or fresher.  Highly recommended!

Oh, and I almost forgot to announce the winner of my awesome handmade notecards.  Random.org generated a lucky number 6 for W-S Wanderings.  Congrats, and I'll be in touch soon!!!  Thanks to all who entered.

Best Fried Zucchini Ever and Frying Tips

I know that fried zucchini isn’t particularly complicated to make, but it’s one of my favorite zucchini recipes so I wanted to share it here.  Plus, I have some good frying tips from years of experience and a husband with culinary skills. (And a heavy dose of trial and error, despite the skilled and experienced chef-husband who has a knack for telling me what to do in the kitchen).

I love making fried zucchini as a side dish, but it makes an even better appetizer.  I know this because we end up eating about half the fried zucchini while it’s coming out of the pan, before dinner’s ready and before we’ve made it anywhere near the table.  See all the empty spots on the rack below?



I made the batch that came out too light in color.  My husband finished up the too-dark batch.  Aim for somewhere in the middle.



They're so good they're impossible to resist.  With that said, here’s the recipe with my frying tips included.

Ingredients:

Two medium-sized zucchini, washed and sliced into thin rounds, less than a quarter-inch thick

Two eggs, beaten in a shallow bowl

Italian seasoned bread crumbs, about one cup

Extra virgin olive oil for frying

Kosher salt to taste

• Fill the bottom of a heavy frying pan with about 1/8” of olive oil and put it on medium-high heat.

• While the oil is heating, dip the zucchini slices in egg and dredge them in bread cumbs until they’re fully coated. Set aside until oil is very hot.

Tip: If you start frying before the oil is hot enough, you’ll end up with soggy zucchini slices that have soaked up all the oil.  You’ll know your oil is hot enough when a you toss a pinch of bread crumbs into the pan and the oil around them bubbles.  If the oil’s not hot enough, the bread crumbs will sink to the bottom without any fanfare.



See all the bubbling action?  Yay for fried zucchini!



Once all of your slices are coated and the oil is hot (but not smoking!), start carefully placing the slices in the pan in one even layer.  Be careful not to overload the pan, or else you can bring the temperature of your oil down too low and end up with said soggy zucchini.

• After 2-3 minutes, check to see if they’re brown enough to flip.  You’re looking for a medium golden brown color.
• Flip slices and let the second side get nice and brown.  When they’re about done, the oil will bubble less vigorously.  Remove from pan onto a wire rack and salt them immediately.

Tip:  Place your fried zucchini on a wire rack to cool instead of paper towels.  Paper towels cause the crispy crust to get soggy—and this goes for any fried food.  Instead, I put the paper towels under the wire rack to catch the oil drips.

Tip:  Salt the zucchini rounds while they’re still piping hot.  The salt will stick better.

• Repeat with the next batch of zucchini until all your rounds are fried and salted.

Tip:  Add more oil in between batches as needed, but allow the oil to get up to temperature before adding the next batch of zucchini.

ENJOY!!!!

** DON’T FORGET TO ENTER MY SUMMER GIVEAWAY for a set of delightful, customizable handmade note cards.  Click here for more information and to enter. **

For the Love of Chocolate

So, what do you make when you're dying for something chocolatey and the only form of chocolate in the house is cocoa powder?  (Did I mention that my car was towed to the shop tonight?  Yeah.)  Obviously, you make the best cocoa brownies.  Ever.

This is the first time I've baked something other than a potato in my new oven -- I can't believe I waited so long to bake!  And since I'll probably be home all weekend without the use of my car, maybe I'll finally make a cherry pie with all the cherries I picked on the farm a few weeks ago and was forced to freeze when the oven kicked it.

These really are the best brownies I've ever had, but if you make them, heed my warning:  Just eat one.  I greedily ate two (what was I thinking?!) and almost instantly regretted it.  All that richness... I just might have to spend all my free, car-less time exercising to work it off.

Summer Grilling – Rosemary Lemon Pork Chops

I love this recipe I adapted from a Martha Stewart one I found in her magazine four or five years ago.  I've been making this meal every summer for years, and through the experience simplified the recipe a bit and perfected it with the help of a foil packet.

Imagine beautifully charred diamonds on both sides of your luscious pork chops, seasoned lightly with fresh rosemary and served with onions soaked in lemon and rosemary, two of my favorites.  It’s light-tasting, tangy, juicy, satisfying and delicious all at once.  Is your mouth watering yet?  If so, scroll down for photos and my shortened (read: easier, faster-to-make and better) version of the recipe.  Enjoy!

Rosemary Lemon Summer Porkchops

Adapted from Martha Stewart’s Grilled Pork Chops and Onions

Ingredients:

Four pork chops

Three large onions

One lemon, plus extra for garnish if you like it like that

6 small sprigs of rosemary

salt & pepper to taste

olive oil

Directions:

For summer grilling, I try to bring everything I need outside with me on a tray so I don’t have to go back inside or make trips.  Inevitably I forget something and have to run back in (sometimes with Nathan in tow), but here’s what you’ll need to take with you in case you’re better at this than I am.

Preheat your grill to medium-high and gather:

• onions, thickly sliced
• salt
• pepper
• lemons, halved
• olive oil
• a brush for brushing olive oil on onions (or save time and brush them before you go out to the grill)
• one large piece of aluminum foil to make a packet
• rosemary sprigs (hopefully these are outside already, growing in your garden!)
• two sets of tongs (one for meat, one for veg)

When you realize you’ve forgotten something and have to go back inside, grab a clean plate to put the cooked pork chops on.

Directions:

• Brush onions with olive oil and place on the grill long enough to make grill marks, about two minutes, then rotate a quarter-turn for those lovely diamond markings and the good flavor they bring. Flip, mark, quarter turn and allow to get marked again.  You may need to do these in batches if you don’t have enough grill space. Be careful not to let your onion slices fall through the grill surface—I always end up losing a few rings in the process.
   
• Salt and pepper both sides of your pork chops and get them on the grill, rotating a quarter turn on each side to make grill marks.  Cook each chop with a sprig of rosemary on top of it (or underneath, but for just a few minutes—you don’t want the rosemary to burn).  Flip, mark, quarter turn and mark again.  Cooking time depends on the thickness of the chops.  They should be heated to an internal temperature of at least 165 degrees F.  Throw away these rosemary sprigs when done.  They’ll be too charred to eat, but probably not cooked enough to kill the contamination from the pork juices.
   
• While the pork chops are cooking, create a foil packet and place the onion slices (they’re not thoroughly cooked yet, just charred) inside the packet with salt, pepper and a drizzle of olive oil. Tightly close the packet, put it on the grill and cook for about 10 minutes longer, rotating often.
  
  (I think it's unrealistic to grill onion slices on the grillins surface until they're fully cooked.  By then they're too charred, shiveled up and dried out and there's not much left—that is, if you haven't lost a majority of them through the grill surface. The packet helps them cook more evenly and stay flavorfully moist while drastically reducing dead loss.)
   
• Put the remaining two rosemary sprigs on the grill for about 20 or 30 seconds, flipping once.
   
• Remove the chops from the grill when done and cover with foil to rest for 5-10 minutes. While the pork is resting, pick the rosemary leaves from the two freshly grilled sprigs. Remove the onions from the grill; carefully open the packet and squeeze lemon juice over the onions and add the rosemary leaves and toss.
   
• Plate your pork chops and top with the most flavorful onions you’ve ever tasted.

Forgive me (once again) for the obscene lack of food photos.  I had meant to plate up my chops and onions and take my plate back outside for a photo op.  But I was starving, and so were my husband and son, so there you have it.  You don’t need to see a photo to know these bad boys taste good!

I served this dish with grilled asparagus.  I put the asparagus on a foil-covered grilling tray and topped with a drizzle of olive oil, a squirt of lemon juice (bottled or fresh) and salt and pepper.  It’s easy and delicious!  And the best part, Nathan loves it.  ♥

Creating a New Room…with a Grill in it

This summer, I have plans to return our deck—misused, abused and cluttered over the past two years—to an outdoor room.  I want it to be an extension of our home, an outdoor oasis for relaxing, spending time together and grilling up some good eats. 

New umbrella, check.  Get rid of all the clutter and crap that’s been building up, check.  And pretty soon comes the fun part: choosing flowers and herbs for my planters and containers.  I love how they transform the space and change its feel; stark wood and metal are softened by texture and color.  The right plants really do soothe your senses.

The other night I grilled some chicken and summer squash and took pictures to document the deck’s early spring state (post clean-up, of course).  Just a few pansies; they’re not the most exciting thing I’ve ever planted, but they’re pretty.  The resk is just starkness.  It won’t be long until this deck is flowing with flowers and booming with life…and buzzing with butterflies and hummingbirds, I hope!

I can see the potential of this plain space... mostly because I remember how great it used to look in summers past.

The view of my kitichen garden from the deck.  It's ready to plant!  I love that it's so close by -- I like to run out while I'm cooking to pick tomatoes or snip some herbs.  How I can't wait for summer.  It's a shame the AC unit has to be in the garden, but I had no choice.

Are you hungry yet?  Here's the Italian dressing marinade recipe I used.  It was great as a marinade but too strong (both in vinegar and spices) to use as salad dressing.  I'll dilute it more next time.

Preparing for a Homemade Easter

As we count down the days to Easter, I’m gearing up for the family holiday.  Nathan’s knitted bunny is done, I have goodies ready to put in his Easter basket and last night I sewed the final seam on his spring cardigan to be worn to Easter dinner at my parents’ house. 

But now the real preparations begin: this year I’m baking a lemon cake (isn’t lemon such a light, fresh flavor for spring?), rolling out shortbread cookies in spring-inspired shapes and am making mac n’ cheese for the dinner table.  And, of course, it’s all from scratch.

So like any plan-aholic, I’ve devised a plan:

• Make cookie dough Friday night and chill overnight. 
• Roll out and bake shortbread cookies on Saturday. 
• Bake lemon cake Saturday night.
• Make mac n’ cheese Sunday morning.

Too much to handle?  Naaaah.  I’m looking forward to it!

The lemon cake is Martha Stewart’s recipe; lemony, light and fresh, I sprinkle it with just a touch of confectioner’s sugar right before serving. 

The shortbread cookies are a very special recipe to my family; I’m the third generation to make them.  My grandmother jotted down the recipe from a 1940’s radio show and sent away for her Christmas cookie cutters from a lady called “Aunt Chick.”  She made the cookies with my mom when she was young, my mom made them with me when I was a kid—such great memories—and I can’t wait to make them with Nathan when he gets a little bit older.  For Easter, my cutouts will be the spring-inspired shapes of a chick, a watering can and more, topped with homemade icing in pastel shades.

My mac n’ cheese recipe can be found here.  It’s standard, but delicious.  A friend told it to me off the top of her head years ago; she’d made quite the impression on me.  It wasn’t the only recipe she’s given me over the phone.  My post about my mac n’ cheese recipe gives a little extra detail on timing and temperature that will help you get the perfect cheese sauce.

I look forward to gathering with my family on Sunday and sharing a delicious, special meal together.  All the time, energy and care spent preparing will be well worth it.

I’m Losing It

I had put on a few pounds this winter, and I’m not proud of it.  Not enough exercise and near total abandon when it came to food has left me feeling fat and flabby.  After a winter—and a weekend—of gluttony, I’ve made a firm decision.  I’m losing it.



It was this set of photos that opened my eyes to my "situation," a.k.a. the back fat I was surprised to see through a bulky sweatshirt.  Don't worry, I didn't post the most offending photo.



The problem is, I’ve made this ‘decision’ several times during the past few months and I relapse within just a few days.  Too rainy to get out and walk?  Oh well, I’ll just have a few cookies.  Good intentions to eat healthy one day?  Out the window as soon as I crave a Cadbury egg.  (What are those things doing in my house, anyway?)  Things like cookies and Cadbury eggs shouldn’t even be here, but my willpower has gone from once-outstanding to meager at best.

And this is coming from an ex-smoker who quit smoking the old fashioned way—willpower, willpower and more willpower.

It’s amazing how quickly I’m able to make excuses for why I ‘deserve’ a sweet treat after dinner, or why it’s okay to slam a ton of Goldfish crackers after 11 p.m.  The excuses are fleeting, and in my current rational state I can’t even recount what they’d been.  But I can assure you they were lame.

I hope that, this time, by declaring my intentions publicly, I’ll gain some much-needed willpower and my declaration will actually mean something the next time a Cadbury egg is staring me down at the supermarket.  Let’s hope so.