Sandwich Rolls

I was looking at some cooking blogs (I love cooking blogs) and I came across a fun thing to do with pancakes. They were called 'Rainbow Pancakes'. My kids were immediately hooked on that idea. Sundays after church is usually when our family enjoys a huge breakfast. More often than not it's pancakes and a sausage-egg scramble. This past Sunday they requested none other than 'Rainbow Pancakes'. It turns out that I am running extremely low on food coloring so for the color orange I make pumpkin pancakes. I only had two drops of yellow left, not enough really but it did turn the pancake into a deeper off-white.

The other two colors were blue and green. As is custom in our family, we added chocolate chips. The kids had as much fun making the pancakes as they do eating them. Next time I will have all colors on hand and have truly rainbow pancakes.

(This way does dirty alot more dishes.)Tonight for dinner we are having BBQ shredded pork sandwiches. I like to make my own sandwich rolls, they just taste so much better. I asked James if he wanted to help again ( since all the other kids were in school ). He is happy and willing, I love it!

He loves using the beaters.

He didn't want to mix the flour into the dough, "too messy" he says. He wanted to wait until I "had it in a ball". Then I let him try kneading it. I let him do it as long as he wants.


I set aside the dough to rise and by the time it was finished the other kids had come home from school and Rachel wanted to have a turn to help.

She greasing the cookie sheet so our sandwich rolls don't stick.


Now she is shaping the dough in to two-inch balls. She loves to do this part. Anytime I have to shape dough for something, she is there.

This was our dinner tonight. I steamed the broccoli in our food steamer that we have had since my husband and I got married 11 1/2 years ago.

The sandwich rolls turned out pretty good, as did the BBQ pork.

I

Traditional Pumpkin Pie

I know, I know, it's been so long since my last post. It's a challenge getting the kids to cook with me when there is so much other things they need to do. For example; homework. They are doing homework while I am cooking dinner. And sometimes my kitchen isn't as clean as I want it to be, so I don't want to take pictures in my messy kitchen.

My 4-year-old is going to have to do most of the cooking for this blog since he is the one at home and has all the time.

My 10-year-old came home with this pie crust that she made all by herself at an activity in our church. She requested Pumpkin Pie, her favorite pie.

I followed a "FAMOUS PUMPKIN PIE" recipe. I like simple. James only agreed to make the pie filling as long as I didn't make him take a bite when it was done.

He has already combined the sugar and spices in a seperate bowl.

In a bigger, mixer bowl, he broke two eggs all by himself. The first he basically crushed and we only had to scoop out two, small pieces of shell. I coached him through the second and he did perfect.

I think adding the pumpkin was his favorite part. I liked it, too. It took him so long that I had enough time to roll out and braid one french bread dough loaf and set it aside to rise.

Now it's time to add the sugar and spices mixture.

It's time for the canned milk.

Kids cooking does not come without messes. There are plenty of those. But that's okay, they can learn how to clean them up, right?

That filling looks so delicious. I did give him a hand with pouring, I didn't want to take any chances with this yummy filling.

And here we are! Baked, and already sampled. Well, sampled much later after I set it outside to cool off. My husband and I ate the first slices. The kids were in the dungeon (downstairs playroom) watching Looney Tunes.

James did such a good job on this pie. It was so good I had a half a slice more. I am getting hungry for another piece just sitting here blogging about it. But I can't or I won't be able to stop at just one piece. And Emma is expecting another piece when she gets home from school.