Semi-Productive Day

I woke up feeling more like 75% sick, so there was no going into work today. Of course this means I have to go in tomorrow. But, it seemed like a lot of it was sinus related and after being lazy until about 11, I was feeling much better. Time to make soup! I decided to make it in the crockpot. Most of the recipes I found were for the crockpot and I like cleaning glass better than pans. I made this soup- http://www.pipandebby.com/pip-ebby/2015/10/23/beef-barley-soup. I didn't make too many changes. I didn't have mushrooms, so I skipped them. I didn't use as much onion. I used frozen roast leftovers instead of stew meat. I also don't like tomatoes (tomato products are fine), so I just added a little bit more water to make up for the undrained tomatoes. It was more tomato-y then I expected. It was good, just heavy tomato taste. Since the recipe made a lot, I added a can of beef broth before I put it in the fridge.

My other kitchen project was making bread. As I mentioned the other day, I miss baking. I used this
recipe - http://bakingdom.com/2011/09/homemade-honey-oat-bread.html. I don't usually change too much in baking recipes, especially bread and especially the first time. I didn't knead it for as long as the recipe said. I do all my kneading with my mixer and most  recipes say to knead for 2 minutes, so 10 minutes seemed like a lot. After about 7 it seemed ready. It was a really easy bread to make. I didn't quite get the rectangle flattened out evenly so one end of the bread was fatter than the other, but it seems to have baked just fine. I think the only change I would make for the next time I make it, and yes I will make it again, is to skip the topping of honey and oats. The honey just gets kind of syrupy on the bottom and the oats got a little over brown (even though I only baked for 40 minutes). The bread is delicious. It really doesn't need that extra honey. I put the series of prep pictures below (you can see the unevenness). Now I'm planning the next kind of bread to make. I think something with sunflower seeds.

This is what the cat in the house was doing all day. That's a heated pad she's sleeping on too. I guess all the light in the house was making it hard for her to sleep though. But, she is getting older - almost 14 - so she can be lazy.

I think I'm going to sort of cheat on my budget tomorrow. I need to go to Aldi to restock on essentials and it will be much easier to go tomorrow after I go into work (since I'm hoping I won't be there all day). It's almost the last day of the month and it won't process on Mint until after Feb 1st so it's all good :) I won't eat any of it until after the 1st!