The Sweatshop of Love Blog

My only real goal this past weekend was to finish my second Slouchy Beret for the Heather, the second blog giveaway winner. I mailed the first one out Saturday morning, well ahead of schedule, so I was confident I could knock the other one out.

I got some Lion Brand Wool Ease Thick N Quick and knit it all afternoon. I blocked it on a plate, put it on the radiator so it would dry faster, and in the morning I had a cute pink hat!

Pink Slouchy Beret

Or, that was how it was supposed to go. Sunday morning I checked on it and about died.

BURNED!

It got torched on the radiator!

My Poor Hat!

I have put projects on the radiator to dry since the beginning of time and this has never happened before! I throw my wet mittens, socks, hats, and scarves on the radiator when I come in from a snow storm. So what the hell happened?!

I told my mom, who said, ‘Oh man, the woman you are sending it to is going to be so disappointed to see that.’

New Hat

Don’t think I didn’t think of it! But of course I can’t send someone a hat that looks like I used it to clean up cat puke. The second hat, however, is going a little slower. Once you finish a project it is hard to get the motivation to start the same exact thing over again.

Have you ever had a similar knitting disaster?

But I’ll finish it this afternoon, NOT block it on the radiator, and hopefully it will be dry by Thursday.

Breakfast Makes it Better

I always turn to pancakes when I’m feeling sad/sick/like I want to kill someone, and these pancakes with my mom’s apple  butter and potatoes made me feel better.

Homemade Tuna Helper

So does Homemade Tuna Helper. I don’t know what it is about shell shaped pasta. It just makes me feel so good. And I love when my food pictures have yarn in them.

Cabled Belt

The yarn next to dinner is from the Cabled Belt from the 2008 Winter issue of Vogue Knitting.

Picture in the Magazine

I have been lazily knitting it because I don’t plan on wearing it until New Years Eve. How fun is it to plan an outfit around a belt?!

The only people on Ravelry to knit it have used gold or grey yarn, but when I saw the picture I knew it had to be in a bright color. The cable pattern is very intuitive and it is knitting up quickly despite the size 5 needles I’m using.

And yes, I’m keeping this belt as far away from the radiator as I possibly can!

Tuna Goodness

When I was little my mom always had to work late on Thursday nights, so my dad was in charge of dinner. He always said we could have anything under the sun. Sometimes we took advantage of his declaration and went to our favorite restaurant Sam’s Joint, a small chain of restaurants in West Michigan that apparently doesn’t have a website. But a lot of the time we just wanted Tuna Helper.

I did a little googling and they have like 12 different verities of Tuna Helper now! Different cheeses and seasoning flavors. I’m pretty sure we had one choice in the early ’90s, and that was Fatty Mc’Fat.

(A 12 pack of Fatty Mc’Fat on Amazon!)

So last March I got a weird craving for Tuna Helper and made some without the box, which has pretty much everything you need to make Tuna Helper but some milk, butter, and a can of tuna. Since then I’ve made it for PT and even dinner guests. And now you, too, can make Tuna Helper without the RIDICULOUS sodium, saturated fat, and cholesterol content. Yay!

Ingredients

Ingredients (for 2)

4 oz Whole Wheat Pasta, any shape

2 oz shredded cheese, cheddar or pepper jack are great

1/4 – 1/2 cup milk

1 tbsp margarine or butter substitute

About 2 cups of broccoli

1 can of tuna, drained

Sprinkle of cheesy popcorn seasoning

Fresh cracked pepper to taste

1. Get your pasta cooking as directed but set timer to go off three minutes before pasta will be done.

2. Chop your broccoli, grate your cheese, open and drain your tuna into the cat’s bowl while the pasta is cooking.

Tuna Helper Makes Happy Cats!

Pudge Rodriguez likes the tuna water and Velma likes the tuna, so while Pudge is chowing down I slip Velma a few tuna flakes.

3. Add the chopped broccoli to the boiling pasta when there is three minutes left of cooking time.

4. When the pasta is cooked turn off the heat, drain the pasta and broccoli, and return to pan. Add 1/4 cup milk, butter substitute or margarine, grated cheese, tuna, and, that is right, a sprinkle of cheesy popcorn seasoning.

Popcorn Seasoning

You still need a tiny fake cheese taste! When I first started making it I stole fake cheese packages out of packaged cheesy potatoes or something, but when I stumbled upon this popcorn shaker I knew it would be perfect! You obviously don’t use a lot, this stuff is a heart attack in a bottle, but a 1/2 tablespoon goes a long way.

Ready to Rock

The heat from the pan, pasta, and broccoli melts the cheese as you stir. Add more milk if you want it a little creamier.

Serve and LOVE!

Dish it out, crack some pepper over it, and you are done!

I can’t help it. I love this stuff. This version is a ton healthier than using real Tuna Helper, with the whole wheat pasta and the broccoli and the (mostly) real cheese. It is quick and simple and you can do the dishes while you are cooking it! Which is something I always look for in a recipe: small amounts of down time that forces me to clean my kitchen.

I knew things were looking promising when it rose so high before baking.

Second Rise

I covered the bread in spices, drizzled the last of the olive oil over the top, and threw it in the oven.

Gah! Perfection!

It’s breathtaking. This recipe couldn’t have been better. And with the spices on the top! With the Parmesan! Die.

(Please note my mom’s hand woven basket in the background, and her hot pad below the bread. My mom took one look at this recipe and was like, hell no! Too much work. Mommy? SO WORTH IT.

… I’ll just make it for you when I’m home next weekend.)

Tuna Helper and Focaccia!

PT and I thought we would whip up a batch of the homemade cheesy tuna helper for Chris, and that it would go well with the focaccia, and we were right. I’m pretty sure we could have served anything and it would have gone well with the focaccia.

... Chris

I think Chris enjoyed himself.

My rewards program totally worked for my brain. I didn’t know if I could knit 26 inches for that skirt, but I knew I could knit 10 inches, and rewarded myself with a sleeve.

Sweater Dress Sleeve One!

Now I’m back on the skirt. I’m at about 13 inches and want to get to 18 before I knit the other sleeve. It actually looks like something now! The sleeve got me excited…

Pudge Rodriguez

but it blew Pudge Rodriguez away! She just couldn’t handle how awesome it looks.

And that is about the position I took after the Mexican Feast PT and I made on Saturday.

Fish Taco+Burrito=Love

One of PT’s specialties is the fish taco. We got tilapia super cheap at Emilio’s, cooked it up, threw it in the taco with salsa (with added fresh mango!) and avocado. The burrito has become my specialty! This one was with black eyed peas, tomato, guacamole, some of that home made mango salsa, and spinach.

Plantains!

I even fried up some plantains in butter for a side, which I haven’t done in a long time but want to do every day for the rest of my life.

Raspberry and Blackberry Pancakes with Potatoes

Not to mention we started the day with raspberry and blackberry pancakes with potatoes. We ate well Saturday.

Sunday I just couldn’t keep my tuna helper concoction to myself anymore.

Allyson's Tuna Helper Creation

I made it for PT and he loved it! I traded out the cheddar for pepper jack and it was even better. A little crushed black pepper! Love.

Shrimp Fried Rice and Spring Rolls

We rounded Sunday out with shrimp and veggie fried rice and spring rolls. In retrospect, I would have slapped that leftover rice on another shrimp pizza, but it was good with asparagus, broccoli, carrots and green pepper, too.

The soup of the weekend?

Purple Soup

Red potato and back bean with carrots and onions. Served with a hunk of freshly baked bread, of course. It is purple and delicious!

Off to Lula for dinner. Reliving all this food has made me really hungry.

I’m doing everything I can to not start my second sock, even though that is all I want to do.

Big Big Big Smile!

And I’m really glad I shaved my legs before taking this picture. I’ve been toting this sock around all weekend, to bead class Saturday and Sweater Club this morning. I’m in love! And all I want to do is start sock number two.

K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1K1P1

I have hit a wall with the sweater dress. See those three inches of K1P1 rib? That is three of 24. I even took it to Slumdog Millionaire at the Logan last night and worked on it in the dark, it is that boring. I had to use my phone as a flashlight a few times but I had it under control otherwise. I was thinking I would try to knit half of it before starting my sock, but I think I’m going to knit 10 inches and do a sleeve. I’ve got to focus on this dress if I want to finish it!

I’ve had a pancake craving for a while, but I really think pancakes are food that need to be shared. I waited for PT and we made a delicious brunch of blackberry pancakes and potatoes.

Blackberry Goodness

I don’t know why people make plain pancakes. I just threw in some frozen blackberries. That is it! Would you rather have plain old pancakes or blackberry pancakes? Yeah, clearly no question.

Happy Corn Dog Day!

For dinner we celebrated National Corn Dog Day with some seriously amazing Morningstar Farms Corn Dogs and carrot fries.  PT is not a vegetarian but is just really nice to me. When we go out he orders steak, but on Corn Dog Day? Fake corn dogs do the trick, too.

Pumpkin Brownie Sundae

You can’t have a corn dog and an afternoon of intense basketball action without a sundae. I made pumpkin brownies – a box of brownie mix with a can of pumpkin at 350 for 30 minutes. Seriously amazing with hardly any added calories and no fat. That makes up for the fact that you are putting ice cream and caramel sauce on it.

Tuna Helper Allyson Style

So I’ve been having this weirdo craving for Tuna Helper. Remember Tuna Helper? When I was little my mom always had to work late on Thursday nights, and my dad would make us whatever we wanted for dinner, and I always wanted Tuna Helper. Thinking about the actual Tuna Helper makes me want to puke, but I made my own but cooking some pasta and broccoli, then mixing it with a little butter, milk, and cheddar cheese, with a sprinkle of fake cheese sauce mix I stole out of an old box of fake cheesy potatoes I have for some reason. Dare I say it? SO good. It is kind of like glorified mac and cheese, only substituting tuna and broccoli for sodium.

I’ve got to get ribbing my sweater dress. Sigh. The sun is shining, the windows are open, basketball makes a great background noise and I’m biking to Target later. Great Sunday.