u/mamaciabatta

My great grandmother immigrated to the United States from the Czech Republic. I am told she was a wonderful cook. Unfortunately my Granny, her daughter, is a truly abysmal cook, and never learned to cook authentic czech food. One of my dad's favorite foods growing up was tomato gravy. Granny's version more closely resembled ketchup (honestly it may have just been ketchup warmed up with some beef broth) than Rajská omáčka. This is my version made with fresh tomatoes from the garden. Traditionally this would be served with beef and bread dumplings, but I served it with mashed potatoes because that's how my dad likes it.

I combined two food marketing gimmicks for this one. Protein everything and limited edition flavors. I remember seeing everything churrp flavored a year ago. I actually have churro flavored coffee beans in my cupboard right now. I used Kodiak protein pancake mix and Greek yogurt in the muffins.

Recipe 46: Tuna Mayo Onigiri from Make it Japanese. I was really hopeful that I could get my rice loving toddler to eat some tuna with this one. He thought it looked cool but unfortunately refused to even try a bite.

Recipe 47: Tomato Soup from The Complete Guide to Pressure Canning. Garden season is in full swing. It's been a struggle staying on top of preserving the extra garden veggies but I did manage to get a batch of tomato soup done. Haven't tried it yet, but I am sure it will be a hit. We are a big grilled cheese and tomato soup house.

And some cabbage because it needed used up.

This one was a true test in patience for the little one. He was so excited that he got to try one of his candies today!

When I saw the theme this week was Wild West I decided it was time to introduce my son to the western movie genre. Friday nights are family movie night at our house and I serve a movie themed dinner. Tonight we watched An American Tail: Fievel Goes West.

Western Mouse Burgers: sliders with smoked Gouda, lettuce, sweet and spicy bbq sauce, bacon, and frenches fried onions

Licorice lassos (twizzlers pull and peel)

Tigers crispy smashed broccoli with a zesty mayo dip

And bell peppers slices because that is a current safe food for my two year old

I have slowed way down on my cookbook cooking and haven't posted for a while. Figured it was time to get caught up. I am also doing the 52 weeks of cooking challenge so a lot of these recipes were also made for that.

Recipe 41: Cream of Asparagus Soup - From Asparagus to Zucchini. Garden season and is in full swing. The layout of this book is so convenient when trying to figure out what to do with fresh vegetables. This was good but the next time I want to make a creamy asparagus so I will probably try something different. Recipe 42: Coffee Jelly - Make it Japanese my husband enjoyed this one a lot more than I did, but I am not a huge jello person. I made it with a cherry ice cream flavored coffee, which is delicious. Recipe 43: Zingy Navy Bean Dip-Home is Where the Eggs Are. I really liked this, and will definitely be making it again. A nice twist on classic hummus and used ingredients that I usually have on hand. I served it with a lion king inspired snack platter for a family movie night. This is the only thing I've made from this books so far. We are in the thick of an extremely picky eating phase with my little one. I feel this book has plenty of recipes that might help push him out of his food comfort zone. Recipe 44: Rice Noodles "Drunkards Style" with Chicken - Simple Thai Food. This one was delicious and a new favorite meal for my husband. I swapped the bids eye chili and Thai chili with Serrano and jalapeno peppers, and used sweet basil instead of holy basil. Those are not ingredients that I can really find where I live. I also used leftover rotisserie chicken. Recipe 45: Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Zucchini burger - The Bobs Burgers Burger Book. We harvested our fist zucchini last night so had to give this one a try. I am slowly working my through this entire book. I did end up adding salt and pepper to the yogurt sauce and seasoned up the zucchini. Without that it would have been pretty bland.

This little bowl packs about 10 grams of fiber. I ate it almost daily the last trimester of my pregnancy. I craved fruit and do to gestational diabetes this was the only way I found that I could tolerate it. Haven't had it in two and half years. Definitely doesn't hit quite the same now that I am not on such a restrictive diet, but still a nice healthy little treat.

Our garden is just starting to kickoff. Made our first harvest of lettuce and radishes tonight!

My original idea for this week was to serve an appetizers on cocktail swords. My husband picked The Lion King for family movie night this week. Since the lion is also symbolic in tarot I decided to make a lion king/tarot inspired snack board.

Marinated air fryer chicken tenders, roasted rainbow carrots, tricolor cous cous, with feta and a yogurt hummus sauce. Finally caught back up!

The French toast roll ups are filled with cream cheese and rhubarb jam and dusted with blueberry honey sugar. I really wanted to put strawberries in the roll ups but was worried that might be too much for my toddler to handler texturely, so served them on the side.

I had a couple different directions I considered taking this one. I couldn't make up my mind so I gave my list of ideas to my husband to pick. He chose the fluffernutter 😂. It is on my mom's bucket list to go to Salem, and the fluffernutter was invented in Massachusetts. We are planning to take her next summer!

I used brioche and added Nutella, and just in case it wasn't already indulgent enough I toasted it up with some butter and cinnamon sugar.

I think we just found a new favorite meal for the toddler. So simple and so delicious.

Served on fresh baked sour dough bread with cream of asparagus soup.