Darbie Dear

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Archives for June 2017

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The Lazy Way to Freeze Summer Peaches

I am going to show you the lazy/easy way to freeze your summer peaches. I am ways pressed for time. I’m sure you are too. I also want to eat as healthfully as possible; which includes eating what’s in season while also trying to minimize my food waste. With my busy schedule this can be challenging. Thankfully, I have found freezing can be the perfect remedy for eating what is in season without letting it go to waste.

Freezing peaches does not need to be complex.

My way of freezing can be done with the peach skin on or off. I usually do a batch of each.

First prep several cookie sheets or jelly roll pans with parchment paper or wax paper. I have found both to be equally effective.

Wash the peaches. Then you can go about peeling the fruit. For those leaving the fuzz on the peach, skip to slicing the peaches.

For removing the flesh, you can use the blanching method of peeling, which is very effective, but it does take a good amount of time. Or you can carefully cut the skin off. You may loose a little more meat with that method, but no boiling is necessary, no ice bathes either, which is a real time saver.

Next slice the peaches. I would slice to the width that you like to use when baking with them. This way they will be ready to use when the time comes. If chunks are your thing, go ahead and do it! These are your peaches!

After slicing the peaches, simply lay them on the wax or parchment paper covered trays. I do not add anything to them. No sugar. No ascorbic acid. Simply sliced fruit on a tray.

Pop the trays into your freezer. Freezing over night should guarantee they are frozen all the way through.

Remove peaches from the paper. They pop right off the papers easily. I like to separate my peeled from my unpeeled peaches. I find both are great for smoothies. For baking, I prefer peeled peaches. When I have a small batch, I put them into sandwich bags, then all of those will go into one freezer bag.

Lastly, write the date on your peach bag or bags. They should keep in the freezer for about 4 months.

Frozen peaches can be used in pies, sangria, Bellini’s, tarts, smoothies, and so much more. What will you be using your peaches for?

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Forgiving Yourself

Forgiving yourself for large or small things can feel overwhelming. Much like forgiving someone who has hurt you, forgiving yourself can take time.

I find I am someone who will beat herself up over the slightest thing, like not texting a friend back on time. I also have been working through the guilt of having not spoken with a dear friend for about a year before her untimely death. I should preface neither of us was mad at the another. We were both too busy to play phone tag as well as we could have. Nonetheless, the past year I have spent some time working through forgiving myself for not slowing down and picking up that phone.

My counselor, and most experts, all encourage forgiving yourself. Just as harboring the burden of unforgiveness toward another person can erode our health , so can our inability to forgiving ourselves. To our bodies the burden is the same. Plus, who likes beating themselves up all the time?

Some of the techniques used to help with self-forgiveness are identifying where one may have gone against their moral code or values, then start to act with in those values. Acknowledge that the past is the past. For me, it is also accepting that I did the best I could at the time. Move forward with new knowledge and self-awareness. Practice forgiving yourself and loving yourself like you do others.

For me, I went against how much I believed I valued my friend and our friendship by not calling her as often as I feel I should have. To change that practice, I have started reaching out to friends more often via text. I am still as busy as ever, so are my friends. Texting is still communication and communication actively lets them know that I value them.

Even though I have been going through this process for a while, there are days that I still need to remind myself that the past is the past. I cannot change the fact that we did not talk on the phone for some time. However, I was doing the best I could at that time in my history. I didn’t Facebook often, but when I did, I made sure I communicated with her via her page. The week and day of her death, we communicated over Facebook.

I am moving forward in the new things I have learned about myself and this situation. Going forward I make it appoint to communicate with the people I care about, even if it is by text. Letting others know they are important to me. I remind myself that I am a work in progress and these are the small steps in my journey. Each day and week I try to do better.

Forgiving myself is an active practice. When the gremlin of guilt tries to creep up, I remind myself that I am actively working to do better, I am not going to beat myself up anymore, my friend would not want me too.

Loving myself and giving myself, grace is an important part of this journey. There is a popular scripture that says, “love your neighbor as you love yourself”. There is also “do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. Basically, treat others as you want to be treated. What if you are someone that treats others BETTER than you treat yourself? Then you and I have a lot in common! For people like us, when we are learning to love and care for ourselves, it can be helpful to think of ourselves as the neighbor or our best friends. Speaking to ourselves with the same respect, love, patience, and kindness we would give them. We do this to help build our self-esteem and to help us complete our healing process. It reminds us that we are valued and worth forgiving.

We all screw up. We always will in some way or another. The most important thing is to learn and grow from the experience. Try not to repeat our mistakes again. Forgiving ourselves is one of the big steps in that process.

 

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Summer Strawberry Peach Crisp

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Strawberry Peach Crisp

A crisp ,or crumble, is a flavorful way to serve summer ripe strawberries and juicy peaches. Serve with a scoop of vanilla bean flecked vanilla ice cream ,or homemade whip cream, to make it a wonderful end to the meal. My personal favorite is to have it for breakfast too. It has fruit in it, right?  Whether you eat it as dessert or breakfast, your taste buds are going to thank you for it!

Course Breakfast, Dessert
Cook Time 1 hour
Servings 6

Ingredients

Crisp Filling

  • 2 Tbsp Lemon juice
  • 1 1/2 Tbsp Corn Starch
  • 4 Cups Strawberries, halved may need cut into forth's depending on berry size
  • 4 1/2 Cups Peaches, sliced
  • 1 tsp Cinnamon
  • 1/4 tsp Nutmeg
  • 1/2 Cup Light brown sugar

Topping

  • 2/3 Cup All-purpose flour
  • 1 Cup Old Fashioned Oats
  • 1/4 Cup Brown sugar
  • 1 tsp Cinnamon
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 Stick Unsalted butter, chilled, cut into cubes

Instructions

  1. Move oven rack to the middle. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. 

    Butter your 8 x 8 baking dish.

Filling

  1. In a bowl, whisk together the lemon juice and corn starch. Add the strawberries, peaches, cinnamon, nutmeg, and brown sugar. Gently toss the until the fruit is coated by mixture. Then pour the fruit into a buttered 8 x 8 baking dish.

Topping

  1. In a bowl combine flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Give it a light stir. Just to mix it up nicely. Then add the butter pieces. You can use a pastry blender, which is the weird hand held utensil in my picture, or a food processor to blend your dry ingredients with the butter. The important part is to get the butter/dry ingredients to clump together in pea size crumbs.

    Sprinkle the mixture over your filling. There should be enough topping to coat the entire surface of the fruit filling.

    Place the baking dish on a foil lined cookie sheet. 

    Bake for 60-70 minutes or until the fruit is bubbling and the topping is golden brown. 

    Allow to cool on a wire rack for about an hour.

  2. Serve with vanilla bean ice cream, homemade whip cream, or alone.

Recipe Notes

Frozen fruit can be substituted for fresh. Just make sure to thaw the frozen fruit first and include any juices.

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Growing in the Midst of Life Changes

How do you grow during life changes?

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I’m getting ever closer to the big 4-0, yikes! For some of us it does make you start to look over your life, where you are, where you are going, your children, relationships, I could go on. Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be about how I am going out and trading in the minivan for a Porsche. This is more about encouraging all of us to become our better selves when faced with change.

I went out for drinks with a good friend last week. I knew this spring had been tough. She is a mom of 3 and her second child was graduating. Despite her being very proud of her eldest for moving out of state with their career, something about her second child graduating was sending her into a tail spin. One she didn’t see coming. Even though she is a mom that feels her duty as a parent is to help guide her children to a path of independent, she was anxious and depressed. It was affecting her marriage and friendships. When she couldn’t figure out why she was feeling depressed and anxious she made an appointment with her counselor. With the help of her counselor she discovered the root of her anxiety and depression was not only due to her impending empty nesting, but she needed to say “No” more often. Also, She and her husband needed to find out who they are now as a couple, without children.

She said it all made sense. “No” was not something she said enough. She genuinely likes to help people but she takes on too much and it starts to fatigue her. So she has started to use her voice and implement boundaries for herself. When she feels guilty, she reminds herself that it is not selfish to practice self care. If she does not take care of herself she cannot be there for herself or her family, let alone friends. Unfortunately, her new-found voice has been met with resistance by some people. They aren’t yet comfortable with her new boundaries. But guess what? That’s OK, because she, her family, and her counselor are comfortable with her boundaries. It is alleviating her anxiety!

Her counselor helped her to see that she and her husband were at a new place in their marriage too. She had been a single mom when they married. They added a child to their family within a year of their marriage. They have never known each other without children! When they dated, she had a child. They did not have the typical dating relationship that so many of us take for granted. In fact, they had not given much thought to their nontraditional courting. However, once the kids were not the large focus of their day, the cracks in their relationship foundation started to show. With her counselor’s help, her husband’s open mind and willingness, they are dating again. They have always prioritized Friday date nights, but these are taking on a whole new meaning. They are in marriage counseling to help them with this new life change. This revelation of not having had the opportunity to experience traditional dating, the inability to know each other without children, was like a Duh moment for them both. For me too when she told me. It all made sense.

For my friend, forming a relationship with her husband where it truly is just the two of them and embracing boundaries is alleviating her depression and anxiety. She is embracing her life change, growing stronger as a person, and experiencing more emotional freedom.

My Aunt is two years into the empty nest faze of life. She and my uncle are adventurous and fun. On a recent visit, she shared that they have tried to do more things together, like spending time in their orchard, hosting dinner parties there, learning a new hobby together like bee keeping. During this conversation she said something that I found to be so poignant. She said that this phase of life is a good time to seize the opportunity of getting to know your partner again. She continued, you can decide to grow together or grow apart.

Life changes can be a time of self discovery, renewal, and revitalization in our relationships.

Maybe we will need outside guidance to see the light in the darkness. We may need someone to help us out of our cocoon. That’s OK! Then there are those of us who will see the path without much guidance, and that’s OK too. I encourage all of us to try to become people that bravely embrace personal change. Personal change can be the opportunity we need to create even better relationships. It can be the push we have wanted to become an even better version of ourselves. Let’s embrace this opportunity to grow.

 

 

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White Sangria, The Perfect Summer Drink

White sangria is probably my favorite summer evening beverage. While it does take a bit of prep work, it is totally worth the effort! The flavor is light and delicious. To me, the color looks like a summer sunset. I make it often for my friends, whether it is a girls night or friends over for a cookout. I hope you and yours enjoy it as much as we do.

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White Sangria

White Sangria is the perfect beverage to share with friends during a summer brunch or summer evening bonfire. 

Servings 6 People
Author Holly

Ingredients

  • 1 Bottle Pinot Grigio Trader Joe's 2 buck chuck aka Charles Shaw works well.
  • 1/4 Cup Rum Make sure it is the clear or white rum.
  • 1/8-1/4 Cup Simple Syrup
  • 2 Peaches
  • 2 Cups Strawberries Cut into 4th's
  • 1 Cup Raspberries
  • 1 Pint Blueberries
  • 1 Cup Fresh Pineapple
  • 1 Orange Sliced into half moons for sangria and glass garnish.
  • 1 Bottle Sauvignon Blanc Trader Joe's 2 buck chuck aka Charles Shaw works well.
  • 1/2 Cup Orange Juice Tones down the rum flavor and adds color.

Instructions

  1. This can be made about an hour ahead of time, but 24 hours before is preferred.

  2. In a pitcher pour 1 bottle of Pinot, Rum, 1/8 C. cooled simple syrup and gently stir.
  3. Add peaches, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, half of the oranges, and pineapple.

  4. Add 1 bottle of Sauvignon blanc, slowly. You will need to leave room at the top of the pitcher for adding the orange juice. 

  5. Taste the mixture with a spoon. This will give you a base to compare the mix before the OJ is added. This usually helps me decide how much of the OJ I will use and if I may need more simple syrup.
  6. Slowly add the orange juice. It adds a nice color back ground for the fruit. Taste it with your spoon again. Do you need more simple syrup? Do you need to add the rest of the OJ? 
  7. After all of that, give it a gentle stir. Make sure the fruit is all jumbled and beautiful. 
  8. Refrigerate until it is time to serve.

Recipe Notes

For fun, use the left over orange half moons to garnish the rims of the drinking glasses. Make a small slit in the middle of the half moon and gently place on the edge of the glass.

** As a side note, I am a huge fan of color. I like to use fruit that not only gives a pop of color to the sangria but complements the flavor or the wines too. Play around with it. It is a beautiful, forgiving cocktail.

Happy Summer!

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Cheap and Free Summer Fun For the Whole Family

I don’t know about you, but in the summer, I try to get the kids out of the house without breaking the bank. Cheap or free summer fun is the goal. For the most part, our summer splurge is a pool pass. We have a pass to the local Science Museum too. Even with those things my kids get bored! If left to their own devices they would play video games all day. Unfortunately for my kids they have a super mean mom that limits their tech and forces them to play outside! Gasp! I know, I’m a monster. Thankfully there are plenty of inexpensive ways to entertain the crew during the summer, sans tech.

  1. Local Parks. Local city and metro parks have free and low-cost programs during the summer months. Parks offer something for nature lovers of all ages. Some also allow geocache/letter boxing. Others offer a variety of sports too. Some may have free movie nights and a concert series. Parks aren’t just for hiking!
  2. Museum discounts. Check out the websites of your local museums. Many have a free or discount day. Also check and see if any of your credit cards or other memberships give you a discount to the local museums. A Bank of America, Merrill Lynch credit or debit card will give card holders weekend access to museums around the country. I know our science museum does the same with many museums and zoo’s around the United States. If you have one check and see if yours offers any additional perks.
  3. Cooking Classes. Williams and Sonoma and Whole Foods offer low cost cooking classes for children. Call your local store for classes and times. Also check your local YMCA and Recreation Centers.
  4. Spray Park or Splash Pad. These are free! Look at your local outdoor mall or city website. They will usually tell you if your area has free fountains and sprays for the children to play in.
  5. Outdoor Mall. Check out your local outdoor mall’s events page. They are usually filled with free family friendly concerts, movies, and activities.
  6. AMC, Cinemark, and Marcus theaters all have a summer movie series. Check eat website for days, movies, and start times. Some offer discounted snacks too! Fun tidbit, AMC, offers Sensory Friendly showings of select newly released movies.
  7. Crafting Classes. Michael’s Craft stores offers Creativity camp and classes for kiddos and adults starting at a nice and cheap $2! For crafting a little closer to home, JoAnn Fabrics has partnered with Creative Bug to bring crafting online. Hobby Lobby also offers a variety of crafting projects that can be accessed. Home depot also offers kids classes on the weekends.
  8. Reading times. If you haven’t signed up for the summer reading program at your local library, head there now! Summer reading programs are a great way to earn prizes while discovering new books. Many libraries offer summer classes and reading circles that go along with their reading program theme. Most classes are free. For those of you that have been there, done that, or simply want more reading fun, Barnes and Noble offers free story times. Scroll down and click on Visit Your Local Store and discover reading times and author events.
  9. Kick Ball. With summer upon us and the sun setting later spending time outside with the kids and other families can be a great way to take advantage of the season. Organize a kick ball game with several family friends and their kids. With school, out of session and elementary school open field or baseball field is the perfect place. Bring a cooler of Popsicle and you are set for an inexpensive night of fun that will be remembered. When my kids were younger, we did this every Wednesday all summer long with our group of friends!
  10. National Wildlife Refuges. Visit U.S. Fish and Wildlife service to find the wildlife refuge in your state. Use the website to put together a scavenger hunt to help engage the kids even more in what the wildlife refuges purpose.
  11. Bowling. Kids Bowl Free is a program that partners with area bowling alleys to offer two free games a day per child that is signed up. When the weather is too hot to play outside or too rainy, bowling is a fun way to say active.
  12. Apple. The Apple store has daily offering for kids. They also have a program called Apple Camp. Check your store for details.
  13. Pick Your Own. Picking your own fruit is one of our favorite things to do. With most of the United States having a warm winter many things are expected to be ready for harvest earlier this year. Prices for fruits will vary. Most of the U-pick farm websites I’ve used, tell the price per pound. On the rare occasion I’ve had to make a phone call.
  14. Feed the Ducks. There are many public ponds and water ways that ducks like to inhabit. You probably even know of a place. Instead of feeding them bread, which is bad for their system, grab a bag of cracked corn. The ducks will love it!