Aaron's love of Popcorn

I love popcorn. I have all kinds of popcorn seasonings that I like to use. It has to be cooked on the stove in a kettle or it just isn't the same. I recently made some caramel popcorn and everyone loved it so I'll tell you how I made it!
First, you have to have a bowl ready. The last thing you want to be doing when the popcorn is popping like crazy is having to scurry through the kitchen to find something to pour it into before it burns! So that's the easiest part if you do it first:) Second, you have to have a stove top kettle. If you don't have one....get one! So far this is pretty difficult, but keep up with me!! I call my creation, Chocolate Cookie Pecan. This is no recipe, I'm just telling you how I made it so you can follow along as well.

Measure the amount of popcorn you want to make and pour it into the kettle. pour in popping oil like vegetable oil to cover the kernels. When the oil is hot, slowly pour a mixture of sugar and cocoa, equal to half the amount of popcorn, into the kettle. I used a mix called "glaze pop" which is made up of: Sugar, Cocoa, Lecithin, and vanilla flavor. the sugar with give it a nice crispness. When the popcorn is popped, pour it onto a large pizza pan with Pam sprayed on it. Brake up small pieces of chocolate cookie and put them on the popcorn like you would put pineapple on a pizza! Break up some Pecans and put them on as well. You can add toffee or other nuts if you want. Then make up some of Judy's Caramel and drizzle it onto the popcorn evenly. let the caramel cool. Then drizzle on melted white chocolate to give it some style! You can add milk chocolate as well. The easiest way to melt chocolate is to buy some chocolate chips and put them in a cheap plastic bowl. Then you fill a slightly larger bowl with water and put it in the microwave for a couple of minutes. Put the bowl with the chocolate chips in the hot water and hold it there while you stir. It works great! Sometimes white chocolate will need a little oil. Whatever you choose, do not just put a bowl of chocolate in the microwave because it wont work! After everything is all cooled, separate the popcorn and put it into a bowl! If you want to make popcorn balls, use more caramel and put handfuls in a bowl until you can shape it with your hands. TA DA! Have fun!

IRON CHEF! date night

Our most recent date night was with Mike and Mari. We went to the store and picked out three "secret ingredients". For Mike and Mari, we picked out 1. dough 2. salad dressing powder, and 3. bottled red peppers. I forgot what they're called, but they made some awesome little casseroles. They were great!
For Chelsea and I, we got 1. A whole pomegranate. 2. Two cups of plain yogurt 3. Asparagus. We made a dish that we call "Chicken yogurt grenadine". The two condiment bowls are the sauce and blended cashews. The chicken is sitting on top of Mustard greens with pomegranate seeds on top. We wanted it to look good.
We made our asparagus as a side dish with shredded cheese melted on top. We put it on this red place to make the whole Christmas theme stand out. This will have to be a new Christmas dish each year!
I loved this meal! I even bought some pomegranate 7up to go with it! Here is our recipe. This is a rough draft so hopefully it makes sense.

CHICKEN YOGURT GRENADINE:
you'll need

2 chicken breasts
2 cups of plain yogurt
1/2 cup POM juice or juice of 1 pomegranate. (save some seeds for presentation)
1 tablespoon of Xylitol sweetener (can substitute sugar)
3 teaspoons of honey
1/2 cup cashews
1 1/2 cup of bread crumbs
1 Tablesoon of flour
2 drops of lime juice

Cut the chicken into strips to desired size. Using 1 cup of yogurt, dip the strips into the yogurt and roll them in the bread crumbs. Set this aside

Make a cup of flour and water mixture for thickening the sauce. Use about a tablespoon of flour. Set this aside.

Mix the pomegranate juice with the remaining 1 cup of yogurt in small blender. Add lime juice, honey, xylitol, and a handful of cashews. Mix well. Pour the mixture into a sauce pan and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Slowly add flour and water mixture until it reaches a desired consistency. Remember it will thicken as it cools. Turn off the heat. Put in a bowl and set this aside.

Gently saute the breaded chicken strips in a skillet over medium heat until thoroughly cooked.

Coarsely grind the remaining cashews. Place in a bowl and set aside.

Place any green leaves over a serving platter, Then place the two bowls of sauce and cashews in the center with the chicken strips on either side. Put Pomegranate seeds for decoration. If you would like, you can drizzle sauce on top and serve them on individual plates with the seeds and ground cashews on top. Remember, presentation is everything! Enjoy!

The Red Iguana Restaurant

Chelsea and I went to Red Iguana. We saw on Food Network that they make seven different kinds of mole. I love mole and so I wanted to try it out.
Here is a flattering picture of Chelsea eating her burrito. She thought it was really good!
Chelsea got me back with a great photo of me eating my Mole Negro. I thought it was great, but I'd like to try the other moles. The Cardenas Family runs this place and they put a lot of ingredients into their mole. I thought it was a fun place. I also got a chile relleno, which was good as well. I would like to eat there again. We are still on the look out for great mexican food!

Fall Hike

Before it got too cold Aaron and I went with my family on a hike. We did it the fun way: we drove up to the top in one car and left another car at the bottom. So we started our journey through the Butterfield canyon.
Aaron leads the way as we follow his behind:)
Aaron had fun taking some pictures. We held Ryanns hands so they wouldn't get too cold.
Here we are walking along the trail. This is by one of several cars down in the ravine. It's tradition when we go on this hike to hit one of the cars with rocks. It's simple fun!
We all had to enjoy a break with some scenery.
The leaves had all fallen and filled the trail with their light brown color. It was pretty. The only green was from the pine. Can you spot the red hoodie!
If you see our blog often then you know Aaron always has to do something crazy for fun. One of his favorite things to do in kindergarten was to balance on the board they had in the classroom. It's good to know he hasn't grown out of having fun!
Everyone is looking at Aaron walking over the trail. Boston has his cute little dinosaur beenie onHe's crazy.
I stole the camera from Aaron! Say hello! It started to get colder. If you can't tell what that white stuff is on the ground that is snow, you'll see a lot of it next week!
We ended the hike by having a fire that Aaron and Dave started with a spark and some bug repellent spray. We cooked up some s'mores, starbursts, twinkies (which didn't work very well). Ryan found a rock that she picked up and said, "look a hat rock!" So I said, "wow, let me get a picture. That's awesome!" She was so proud. It was great to be in the mountains, they are so beautiful. We hope to spend more time in the great outdoors next year!

Surprise Date

Aaron and I had to go pick up my car because we had to get it fixed. I hate when cars don't work like they should. So I wasn't too happy about having to pay another thousand to get it fixed. Aaron and I had a laugh as we were driving: We decided that putting a sign on the side of an old Suburban to advertise a limousine service wasn't the best idea, so we got a picture for fun.
Another thing that Aaron and I hate is those gravel trucks that get on the freeway with more rocks flying on the road than they have as their load. We got hit by about ten rocks by this lame truck so we got a picture so that we could scare him. Can you read his license plate number? The last time we got stuck behind one of these trucks we lost a headlight and had several rock chips everywhere. Watch out for these guys!!
Anyways, the day so far was very lame. We had to drive back home from the mechanic. Aaron had me follow him to go home. I was surprised to get off of the Lehi exit. Aaron knew I was not happy and so we went to Thanksgiving point and watched a movie. That made me happy.
After the movie we got some icecream. Aaron really likes rasberry sorbet!
mmmm, and I got smooth chocolate!
We had fun sitting and talking.
Later, we went on a walk around the grounds. Thanksgiving Point is beautiful!

They had glassblowing classes every week. There were a lot of blown glass art pieces in the gardens. They are so fun. We had a great time!

Aaron's Birthday

The Reimschiissel's had a party for Aaron on Sunday before his birthday. Look at that cake!!
Okay Aaron, now smile for the camera!!
Now, blow out the candles and make a wish!! Look how helpful:)Aaron turned 25 on October 23th. We went to the Star of India restaurant the night before, it's one of our favorites.

Before Aaron woke up I decorated the living room for his birthday. I had his presents ready to open, he was excited!He was most excited about his new journal.Later that night, we ate at Golden coral with mom and dad. The waiters sang him happy birthday and he got a rootbeer float with a candle to blow out:)

More Pumpkins. Giant Pumpkins.

Aaron has been carving pumpkins since he was 16 years old
At the Fall Festival Aaron met one of the people from the Utah Giant Pumpkin Growers association. He was invited to Hee Haws to carve a giant pumpkin. He had a choice out of a 750, 350, and a 150 pound pumpkin. He chose the 100 pound pumpkin this year. Here is the first few minutes into it.
Here is the table with Aaron's work in progress. You can see a couple of the giant pumpkins in the background. There is actually a kid climbing out of the one on the right. They were putting flour in it for the pumpkin drop later.
Here he is carving some of the detail on the mouth
He is finished. This pumpkin only made one small little girl cry:)
Any resemblance?
Aaron is waiting for the pumpkin drop to start and poses for a picture.
This is a picture of the two poor guys who had to move the pumpkin.
Here is a picture of the pumpkin that Aaron's friend Kyle Fox grew this year. It was on display at Macey's
Here they are loading a pumpkin on the crane. Channel 2 getting in on the action.
Up up up we go!
Way up high. They dropped several pumpkins.
They even dropped a couple on this car!! Aaron is so proud:)

Carving Pumpkins

Aaron had fun carving a pumpkin at the Country Farm Fest in October
He is happy to be half way done!!
Here he is as he begins to carve out the mouth.
They had a poster with a little about Aaron that people could read
..adding more detail
Here are a few of the tools he uses: mostly wood carving type tools and clay tools.
That looks painful!!
It's all stitched up!!
Look how proud. The pumpkin was auctioned off to the owner of Candies on main in Manti. It was a lot of fun.