Thursday, June 30, 2011

Pizza Crust

I tried out this pizza crust recipe that I found on allrecipes.com.  It's called Quick and Easy Pizza Crust.  It got alot of good reviews.  The kids really liked the pizza crust.  They didn't care for the peppered beef pepperoni that I put on the top.  I've had a hard time finding good old fashioned sausage or pepperoni here in Jakarta. 

Here's the recipe for the crust.

1 pkg. active dry yeast
1 tsp. white sugar
1 cup warm water
2 1/2 cups bread flour (I used regular flour)
2 tbs. olive oil
1 tsp. salt

Preheat oven to 450F (230C).  Dissolve yeast and sugar in warm water.  Stir in flour, salt, and oil and mix until smooth.  Let dough rest for 5 minutes.  Pat or roll out dough to form round circle.  Transfer to greased pizza dish.  Spread with desired toppings.  Bake for 15-30 minutes or until crust is golden brown (mine took 10 minutes).  Cool pizza for 5 minutes before serving.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Green Onion Pancakes

I grew up eating green onion pancakes.  I love them, and my kids love them too.  We usually eat them for breakfast.  They are easy to make and take just a very few ingredients.  If you are not familiar with them, green onion pancakes are a kind of non-leavened flat bread.  They are not like the fluffy pancakes you normally think of that are made from a batter. If you google Green Onion Pancakes or Scallion pancakes, you will find all sorts of sites that will tell you or even show you how to make them.


This is how I make mine:


Green Onion Pancakes

2 1/2  cups flour
1 cup boiling water
1/4 cup cold water
salt
vegetable oil
1/2 cup of diced green onions

Mix 2 cups flour and boiling water.   Add 1/4 cup cold water and additional 1/2 cup of flour.  Knead until dough is smooth (maybe 5 to 7 minutes).  Put dough back in mixing bowl and cover with wet cloth and set aside.  Chop up green onions.  Put a little vegetable oil (maybe 1/4 cup) in a bowl.  Divide dough into 8 equal sized balls.  Flatten the dough...doesn't matter if it is round at this point.  Brush some vegetable oil over the top.  Sprinkle a little salt evenly over the top.  Add some green onions. 


Roll the flattened dough up like a jelly roll. It's okay if the oil and onions squish out a little.




Then start at one end and roll it up so that it looks like a wheel or a coil. Tuck the end under the bottom and pinch a little so that your coil stays together when you start to flatten it.



Flatten the coil slightly with your palm and then roll it out 1/4 inch thick with a rolling pin. You should be able to make roughly 8 CD sized onion pancakes.

Fry in a little bit of oil for 2-3 minutes on each side until golden and crispy.  I can fry about 3 in a large frying pan. I usually use a griddle and fry about 5 at a time.  My kids like their onion pancakes plain.  I like mine with a fried egg and warm soybean milk...yum!  How do you like to eat yours?


Saturday, June 25, 2011

More Fun with Boxes

My son came home from school one day with a little sculpture made from boxes.  There was an empty toothpaste box, a milk container, a butter box, and a crackers box to name a few.  He said that during "free choice" at school, he chose to make something from old boxes.  The teacher provided him with boxes and tape and he just had at it.

When he got home, my son asked if he could make another box sculpture.  I just so happened to have a collection of old boxes and toilet paper rolls. I gave him a roll of tape and he had so much fun putting together a couple of things.

I'm not sure if I should be worried or not, but everything my son made was for his army men to do battle with.  He said his creations were "cannons."  He also made a large robot.  The robot has yet to engage in battle so maybe there's hope and not everything has to be related to war :)

My daughter also taped together a bunch of toilet paper rolls and said that she made a "garbage can".  I'm not sure what happened to her creation so I don't have a picture of it.  Here are the things that my son made.



School creation

Another "cannon" creation


The firepower is increasing with each creation...ha ha.


Robot

My son showed DH his creations. He told DH that they were made from old boxes and that he was recyling! DH said our son was very proud of the fact that he was reusing old boxes. I love that they teach him at school to be a "Responsible World Citizen." That's what I am striving to be and hope that my kids will learn to do the same.

See how much fun you can have with some old boxes, toilet paper rolls, and some tape?

Friday, June 24, 2011

Tumis Kangkung

I recently learned how to make an Indonesian vegetable dish called Tumis Kangkung.  Kangkung is otherwise known as water spinach.  It is an Asian green leafy vegetable.  DH first encountered Kangkung while living in Malaysia and he loves the stuff.  He really liked the Tumis Kangkung after he tried it.  I liked it too.  Unfortunately, my kids are not fond of any leafy green vegetable.


Tumis Kangkung

250 g Kangkung
100 g bean sprouts
3 cloves of garlic
2 red shallots
2 red chilies
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. chicken powder (Knorr)
3 tbsp. oil

Cut the Kankung into smaller sections.  Chop the cloves of garlic, shallots, and chilies. Heat oil in pan and stir fry garlic, shallots, and chilies.  Add Kangkung and bean sprouts.  Stir fry for a few minutes until Kangkung is wilted.  Add salt and chicken powder. Continue to stir fry until vegetables are fully cooked. 




I didn't realize that the kangkung really shrinks down once it is cooked. I would probably recommend using 500 g of kangkung if you want to feed more than a couple of people. Other than that, we really liked this dish. 

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Banana Bread

My MIL has a really good banana bread recipe but I don't have it with me.  So, I looked up a banana bread recipe at allrecipes.com.  I looked through a couple of the "best" banana bread recipes and used a combination of a couple to make the banana bread from saturday night.  I thought it turned out well.  The kids loved it, and around here, that's pretty important.

Banana Bread

1/2 cup butter
1 cup white sugar (I used 1/2 white, 1/2 brown)
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups mashed banana
2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp, salt
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Cream butter and sugar.  Beat in eggs and vanilla and then add bananas.  Mix flour, salt, and baking soda then add to mixture. Bake in greased bread pan at 350F for 1 hour.

No Waste

We ended up with lots of bananas and one bundle of carrots from saturday's trip to Taman Safari.  Saturday night I made banana bread with the leftover bananas.  Sunday night I threw the carrots into a curry beef stew.  I thought it all tasted really good.  DH and the kids concurred. 

We had enough bananas for 2 loaves of banana bread. 



Curry Beef stew


I'll post the recipe that I used for the banana bread in another post and you can find it under the Recipes page.  I won't post the recipe for the curry beef since I used a sauce packet that I bought at the store. All you have to do is cut up the meat and vegetables and add the sauce packet plus water.  Not only did we enjoy some great food over the weekend, it was also a good feeling to know that there was no waste! 

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Sense of Wonder

While we were at the coast in May, my daughter found a toad.  She asked me to catch it for her.  I told her the toad would probably pee on her and that it would be scared and maybe we should leave it alone.  She insisted that she really wanted me to catch the toad for her.  I relented and caught the little fellow.  I put him in a little bucket and told my daughter that she could look at it.  She stared at it in the bucket and then decided she wanted to pick it up.

Here is what happend after she picked up the toad.











In retrospection, I am actually very glad that she insisted that I pick up the toad for her.  I was just mezmerized by how interested she was in that little toad.  She focused so intently on it, and I could tell that she was just fascinated by it.  I can't remember the last time I found something so interesting that it just captured all of my attention.  I honestly think that as adults we really have lost that sense of wonder.  Children just seem to naturally have it.  When was the last time you experienced a sense of wonder regarding something as simple as your garden variety toad?

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Happy Father's Day

So I thought it was okay to post about the Father's Day craft early since I was certain that DH rarely reads my blog.  Well, as it turns out, I was wrong about him not reading my blog regularly.  DH said that he had already read the blog and so he knew what the kids had made him for Father's Day.   I actually wanted to be mad at him that he actually read the blog and ruined the surprise, but really I couldn't possibly be upset with him.  My husband actually reads my blog!  I knew he checked our family blog regularly.  I just thought he wasn't interested in my Conservation blog. 

I must admit that I did think that he could have at least pretended that he hadn't read the blog so that it would have seemed like it was still a surprise.  You have to know DH though.  He's just very honest. Also, really, it is my own fault for making the assumption that he wouldn't see the blog before Father's Day.

Anyways, I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Father's Day.  I am so grateful to have a wonderful father in my own life.  He is also just the very best grandfather.  My kids adore their Yeh-Yeh (Grandfather in Chinese).  My dad is turning 71 this year!  I can't believe how the years have flown by.  I am also grateful for DH.  He is a good man, and a great father.  I am so blessed to have these good men in my life.

My Dad and the girls.

DH and our youngest daughter

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Thai Green Curry

Here's our family's favorite version of Thai Green Curry Chicken. 

  • 2 Tbsp. Thai Green Curry Paste
  • 1 can of coconut milk
  • 3 cloves minced garlic
  • 1/2 of small or medium yellow onion (chopped)
  • 3 to 4 small potatoes cubed
  • 1 cup of chicken cubed
  • 1 cup of frozen mixed vegetables
Saute garlic and onions in oil.  Add chicken and stir-fry.  Add potatoes and mixed vegetables.  Add 2 tbsp. of Thai Green Curry paste (more if you want it spicier) and continue to stir-fry.  Add 1 can of coconut milk.  Simmer until potatoes are soft.  Serve over hot rice.


Friday, June 17, 2011

Father's Day Craft

The kids wanted to make something for their Dad for Father's Day.  I was trying to think of a craft idea that would be relatively simple.  I came across a Silhouettes Craft online and thought that Silhouettes of the kids would be a great Father's Day gift from each of the kids.

I took profile pictures of the kids with my digital camera.  I uploaded it into Photoshop Elements 9 and made the background white and filled in the profile with black.  I didn't have any dark paper or cardstock otherwise I would have printed out the images, placed them on the dark cardstock, and carefully cut out the images. 


Profile image taken with digital camera.

Flipped the image in Photoshop elements and filled in profile with black.  After printing, I smoothed out the margins with a black marker.  I'm new to Photoshop Elements so I wasn't sure how to smooth out the edges.

I cut out the images and had the kids paste them onto backing cut from a cereal box.  Then I made a frame for each image also from the cereal box.  The kids pasted the frames onto their pictures and then decorated their frames.




 We also printed some online cards that the kids colored.  The kids will give their gifts to dad on Father's Day.  I love the silhouette images of the kids.  I think the silhouettes would be a great gift for Moms, Dads and Grandparents for birthdays and other special occasions.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Save a Wet Cell Phone

I saw this article on Yahoo! News today about saving a wet cell phone.  It reminded me of my own wet cell phone experience.  One morning, I threw a bunch of clothes in the wash.  For whatever reason, I decided not to check the pockets...I guess it's because I normally do and there usually isn't anything there.  My kids are actually really good about not sticking things in their pockets, and I am too. Anways, after a complete wash cycle, I discovered my cell phone at the bottom of the machine after I had taken all the wet clothes out to transfer them to the dryer.  I knew that I had left my cell phone on too because I rarely turn it off.  I wondered what the chances were that a wet cell phone could be saved.

I googled how to save a wet cell phone and found all sorts of crazy ideas from baking the phone in the oven to putting it inside a sock and throwing it in the dryer. I sheepishly admitted to washing my cell phone on facebook and my friends said they heard that putting the phone in a bag/container of rice might work to dry out the phone.  This was just before Thanksgiving last year.  I took the battery out of the cell phone and placed the battery and the phone in a container of rice.  I made sure the phone and battery were completely covered by the dry rice grains. 

We left home for Thanksgiving so I think my phone stayed in the rice for 4 to 5 days.  The article in Yahoo! News recommended leaving the phones in rice for 24 to 48 hours.  When I got back from Thanksgiving, I put the battery back in the phone and turned it on.  Nothing happened so I put the phone on the charger and it said the battery was bad. 

I called verizon to see how much a new battery would cost for my run of the mill LG flip phone.  They said roughly $50.00.  I sent DH to radio shack and they wanted $50.00 as well.  I didn't want to spend $50.00 if my phone wasn't functional so I looked online to see if anyone had the battery for cheaper.  I got a genuine LG battery off of Amazon for around 5.00 and I got free shipping.  I did have to wait a few more days to see if the phone would function though.

After I put in the new battery and charged it, I turned on the phone.  The phone worked exactly like it had before it went through the wash.  I tried out all the functions and everything worked...even the camera function. I was so impressed!

So let me give you one more reason to try the rice thing before throwing something like a cell phone out the door.  For Christmas, my kids got Zhu Zhu pets.  The first thing my 2-year old did at bath time was to take 2 of the new Zhu Zhu pets and throw them in the bath.  They stopped functioning of course.  My husband took out the batteries and the motor box in each Zhu Zhu pet.  He put everything in rice for a couple of days again.  After he reassembled the Zhu Zhu pets a few days later, I put in some fresh batteries and amazingly, the little critters came back to life.

So the moral of this story is, try to salvage the things that you can.  Only consider throwing something out as a last resort.  As far as cell phones, batteries, and chargers, the EPA has a page about ecycling cell phones.  Places like Best Buy and Office Depot will accept old phones.  They do not have to be functional.

Here's my run of the mill LG flip phone.  It's not on because I can't use it in Jakarta and haven't charged it in 3 months.  It really does work :)


One of the 2 resurrected Zhu Zhu pets that made the trip from the U.S. all the way to Jakarta! I can't seem to locate the other one...I wonder where the kids have stashed it?

Sunday, June 5, 2011

MaPo Tofu

My kids are not big tofu fans.  I grew up eating rice, noodles, seaweed, and of course tofu so I love the stuff.  The only tofu dish I have been able to get my kids to eat is called MaPo Tofu.  They generally don't like the kind that you might order at a Chinese restaurant.  This is the way I have to make it for them to eat it.  Personally, I really like this version of MaPo Tofu too.   It's really a very simple dish. This recipe is basically the one on the bottle of the chili bean paste so it's not my personal recipe.  I would post the actual recipe on the bottle, but my chili bean paste I bought here in Jakarta has the recipe written in Indonesian. The recipe is how I remembered making it when we lived in the U.S.

Ingredients:

2-3 cloves of garlic, minced
1-2 stalks of green onion, diced
3 Tbs oil
1/2 lb. of ground pork or ground beef (we prefer pork although pork is difficult to come by in Indonesia since many grocery stores do not carry it)
2 Tbs. Chili Bean Sauce (available at most grocery stores that have some kind of Asian food isle...in Texas I usually got it at H.E.B.)
2 Tbs. water
1 package of tofu cut into small cubes (my kids like extra firm...you can use soft, firm, or extra firm)

Saute garlic and green onion in oil to flavor the oil.  Add ground beef and stir fry until pork is cooked.  Add cubed tofu.  Add chili bean sauce and water.  Make sure tofu and pork are mixed and evenly coated with sauce.  Simmer for a few minutes.  Serve over rice.  I made it for dinner tonight, but I forgot to take a picture.  I'll try and add a picture the next time I make it.  Oh, in case the chili bean sauce didn't give it away, I forgot to add that the dish is mildly spicy.  Enjoy!

Friday, June 3, 2011

Roasted Chicken with brown rice stuffing




My friend has a neat food blog at http://whydiscovertheworld.blogspot.com/. She posts different recipes from different parts of the world. She also posts recipes that she has tried that are just good. Today for lunch I made the recipe she posted for the roasted chicken with brown rice stuffing (http://whydiscovertheworld.blogspot.com/2011/05/roasted-chicken-with-brown-rice.html). My 3 kids ages, 2, 4, and 6 liked the dish as well as my husband.


Ingredients:
whole chicken
1 cup cooked brown rice
1 clove garlic diced
3 green onions (chopped)
2 tbs butter
fresh basil, parsley, rosemary (I used dried and still turned out well)
salt/pepper

Mix all the ingredients together with the rice. Stuff inside the chicken.  Season the chicken with oil, salt, and thyme. Bake in the oven at 350F for 1.5 hours.  Basting the chicken every so often is a good idea so that it doesn't dry out.

I made a few other changes to the recipe. I omitted the chopped celery since my kids are not big on celery. I stuffed the chicken with 1 cup of brown rice, but I made extra rice stuffing and placed the chicken on top of the rice. Then, every half hour, I basted the chicken with some chicken broth since the rice in the bottom of the dish would absorb any juices from the chicken. I probably should have stirred the rice because it got a little crunchy but just on the edges. It took about 1.5 hours to roast the chicken. The rice had great flavor as did the chicken. I rubbed the chicken with some oil, salt, pepper, rosemary, and thyme.

We will definitely be making this dish again.

Basic White Bread

I have never been able to successfully make bread using a machine or otherwise.  Then I came across this recipe, and the bread turns out really well every single time.  I don't own a bread machine or a kitchen aid mixer.  The recipe can certainly be made using those kitchen accessories, but they are not a requirement.  I got this recipe from the simple dollar website.  He has pictures and step by step instructions on how to bake bread. 

Here is the recipe:

1/4 cup milk
5 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
5 tsp. butter
1 pkg. active dry yeast
2.5 to 2.5 cups all purpose flour


Dissolve yeast in 1 cup warm water.  Add milk, sugar, salt, and melted butter. Mix in 2 cups flour.  Add flour 1/4 cup at a time until soft dough forms.  Knead for 10 minutes.  Cover and let rise 1 hr.  Punch down.  Roll out into rectangle the width of the pan. Roll up and tuck ends under.  Place in greased bread pan. Cover and let rise another hour.  Bake at 400F for 30 minutes. Makes 1 loaf.  I've heard that it does not work to double the recipe for bread if you want to make 2 loaves so I just made two separate batches.  The final product has a slightly crunchy crust and a really nice, soft, moist middle.  I always have to make 2 loaves because 1 usually gets consumed right away :)

Chewy Brownies

We really liked the Betty Crocker original supreme brownie mix. It is not readily available here in Indonesia.  Once in awhile I'll see some cake or cookie mix that is imported from the U.S, but they are so expensive.  A boxed cake/cookie mix will run around $4 to $5 US dollars.   I wanted to know if there was a good from scratch brownie recipe that would be just as good.  I looked around on the internet and tried a few different recipes.  I found one that we like.  So far, it's our family's favorite brownie recipe.  We like our brownies to be fudgy, moist, and chewy.  This one delivers.  I don't know that it is quite as good as the Betty Crocker mix, but it is definitely close.

I've found that the baking cocoa in Indonesia seems a little darker and richer.  The sugar here is very coarse so I could still see sugar crystals in the brownies after they were baked. The brownies still tasted good but they definitely looked and tasted just a little different from brownies baked in the US.  It's amazing what different brands and the coarseness of the powder and sugar will do to the final product.  My kids still loved the brownies and we quickly devoured an entire 8x8 pan. 

Here is the recipe:

1/2 cup vegetable oil (I find that oil instead of butter seems to make for nice, moist, brownies)
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/4 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt

I mix the sugar and oil together first.  Then I add the eggs and vanilla and mix.  Finally I just dump everything else in and mix by hand using a whisk.  It is okay that the batter is lumpy.  I grease an 8x8 in. pan, pour in the mix, and put it in the oven at 350F for 20 minutes.  I wish I could remember which website I got the recipe from.  I didn't write down the name of the site.  If this is your recipe, thanks so much!  We love it!

Thursday, June 2, 2011

One Box-Two Projects

The kids had a Step 2 play kitchen and a Loving Family doll house that they really loved playing with when we lived in Texas.  Unfortunately, those were 2 items that we could not bring because of their size.  I even tried disassembling the doll house, but it would have taken 2 large suitcases just to accomodate the doll house.  We did not have the luxury of allocating 2 suitcases for one item so the dollhouse had to stay.

I told the kids that if we could find a large box, we could make a play kitchen and a doll house.  While we were visiting at a friend's house, I asked if she had a large box that we could have.  She happened to have one that she was nice enough to give us.

We were able to make both the doll house and the play kitchen from just the one box.  I was pleasantly surprised myself because I wasn't sure where I would be able to get another large box.  My kids had a fun time making both the kitchen and the doll house.



I cut out the inner flaps from both ends of the box.  Then my oldest daughter taped the box shut.  I cut the box basically down the middle although the kitchen might be marginally wider than the doll house. I cut out the faucet and made the knobs from one of the cardboard flaps.  My daughter taped the faucet and knobs with red duct tape that she had picked out herself.  I guess the red is a nice contrast with the brown :)

I made the oven door by cutting the front of the box on 3 sides.  The oven handle was made out of braided duct tape.  I cut two holes in the oven door, shoved one end of the braided handle on each side and taped them down. 

The back of the oven is open which doesn't matter since it is against the wall.  I taped in one of the flaps in the middle of the box to make a shelf.  Now when the oven door is opened, there is a place to put cookware.  The kids enjoy putting all sorts of things in the oven.

The burners are made from old cds taped onto the top.  The sink is made from a small oven pan.  I could have used a small bowl just as well.

Anyway, it didn't take that long to put the kitchen together.  The kids love to cook on their new play kitchen.  My daughter said it didn't look "that beautiful" but she still likes playing with it.


I actually did need a couple of extra smaller boxes for the doll house, but the main structure of the house is made from the original large box.  This time the closed side is against the wall.  The roof of the house is made from the inner flaps of the box. The verticle middle partition is also one of the inner flaps.  The horizontal middle partitions are made from a ramen noodles box.

The kids picked what they wanted each room to be. The furniture is made out of cardboard fragments from the noodle box and from cereal boxes.

Here is the bathroom.  The kids told me what they wanted in the bathroom...tub, double sinks, toilet. The kids did all the coloring.

Here is the kitchen. My daughter made the shelves on the wall and decorated the table.


Here is the girls' room.  My older daughter tried writing her name.  She wanted a picture on the wall and put up decorations. She drew pillows on the beds.


Here is another bedroom...my son claimed this one.  He decorated the walls. He drew bedding on one bed and made a pillow from cardboard for the other bed.

Here is an end table in one of the bedrooms.  My daughter wanted a rug in her room so I helped her draw some flowers.  She did all the coloring.

The kids wanted the people to represent our family.  I cut out the shapes and they decorated the people. I asked my daughter why I had blond hair (my hair is black)...she had no response :)  I made the dog and cat.  The kids love animals.  Sadly we had to give our dog away before the big move.  We never have had a cat because I am very allergic to those furry critters.

The kids really like the kitchen and doll house.  I had so much fun making it with them.  My son said that we were "reusing" the boxes.  He said he learned about that at school too.  I'm glad that these projects helped reinforce that concept.  I told the kids that we could always make different furniture or change out the people.

The girls were playing with the empty box before we even made the kitchen and doll house.  Boxes are just so much fun.  The kids love their new toys.  Who would have thought that you could have so much fun with one big box!

Living with Less

You know, moving to a new country with just a few suitcases is not a bad idea.  At first I was quite upset that we only had the option of storing our things or shipping them.  Having been here in Indonesia for 3 months now, our family has found that we don't really miss the things we left behind. The kids are actually quite happy with the few toys we brought.  We just brought the clothes that we wore most often, and everyone seems quite happy with that as well.

Being here in Jakarta has made me or actuallly all of us realize that we can live with much less and still be quite happy.  We actually didn't have much to begin with.  When the packers came to assess our things for storage, we found that we didn't even come close to filling up the 40ft. container we were allotted.  The lady that assessed our things said that our 2700 sq. ft. house would have to be bulging at the seams to fill up the container.  If we were shipping our things, we were allotted up to 40,000 lbs. of stuff.  They estimated that we only had about 10,000 to 12,000 lbs. worth of stuff and that was before we purged and got rid of couches, tables, dressers, etc.   We estimated that we definitely had much less than 10,000 lbs. by the time everything went into storage.

We arrived in Indonesia with 10 large suitcases weighing 40 lbs each.  That means we brought only 400 lbs. worth of stuff.  Deciding what to bring was a bit of an ordeal at first, but we are happy with the end results. 

For toys, we ended up bringing things like dress-up clothes, play food, play cookware, tea set, dolls plus clothes and accessories, legos, army men, a few little people sets, puzzles, and some card games.  These toys provide lots of room for imagination and creativity.  The kids have had endless fun with the toys even though what we brought was a fraction of what we had back in Texas.

We brought the kids' bedding because we wanted them to have something familiar.  They also brought a few of their special stuffed animals.  My youngest brought her 3 favorite security blankets.

We had a ridiculous number of books, but we narrowed it down to one small suitcase of favorites. The kids have been happy with their books.  We are also able to check out books from the International School's library.  The school has also sponsored book swaps and discount book sales so we have had additional opportunities to have some variety in our reading choices.

We brought a few other things like tylenol and vitamins.  We also brought some snacks for the kids to make their transition a little easier til we figured out where people shopped for groceries and what was available.  We also brought the kids' favorite cups and plates. We tried to allot most of the suitcases to bring things the kids would want and that would make their transition to living in Indonesia easier.

A lady came over to the apartment the other day and asked why we didn't have any things.  We told her that we just came with a few suitcases.  People always seem surprised that we would bring our entire family to a new country without shipping our things from home.  Honestly, I would have thought we were crazy too, but now DH and I have discussed how we really like the simplicity of living with less.

We are actually able to spend more family time here.  Instead of watching TV or watching movies, we go play tennis or swimming with the kids.  We take the kids out to ride their bikes or walk around the apartment complex.  The kids have play dates with other kids that live in the apartment complex.  Although we have less material things, we feel like the quality of our lives has actually increased.

My son had a project at school where he had to make a collage depicting needs vs. wants.  I was pleased to see that he had put home, bed, shoes, and food under needs.  He put junk food, Wii games, and toys under wants.  I guess even at age 6 he does know the difference between needs and wants.

I hope that if nothing else, the kids learn that we can be happy by spending quality time together and by making do.  Most importantly, I hope that they will learn that happiness is an attitude and choice and that it can come from being thankful for the things that we have.  It definitely does not come from having more things.

Indonesian Satay

My son asked to have satay for dinner tonight.  He helped me make both chicken and beef satay.  We used the same marinade for both.  I got the recipe from a site called http://rasamalaysia.com/.  They have really great Asian recipes...Taiwanese, Indonesian, Malaysian, etc. I am going to try more of their recipes in the future.

Marinade for the satay:

good sprinkle of garlic salt (I used quite a bit)
some ground paprika
some white pepper
2 tsp. coriander powder
2 tsp. nutmeg powder
1 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. olive oil
2 cloves shallots thinly sliced
dash of soy sauce
lots of kecap manis (Indonesian sweet soy sauce)

I did not make the peanut sauce that is normally served with satay.  Neither my son nor my husband are big fans of peanut sauce.  If you want to make the peanut sauce, the recipe is included at the Rasa Malaysia website.

I used chicken breast and flank steak for my cuts of meat.  I sliced the meat lengthwise in fairly thin strips.  The meat sat in the marinade for about an hour.  I put them on wooden skewers (skewers must first be soaked in water so that they do not burn on the grill) and my husband grilled them on our small grill.

The satay is generally served with rice.  Everyone really liked how the beef satay turned out.  Even though it was the same marinade, the beef satay was just delicious!  The chicken satay was good too...we just liked the beef better.