I do not remember ever having a meal at home that included seafood when I was growing up. My mom made a lot of delicious meals, but I never recall having shrimp, salmon, cod… any of that. My husband, growing up on a cattle farm, was the same way. Everything was meat and potatoes. He never had seafood growing up except maybe during Lent and for that they would go to a little town nearby for some fish at a restaurant (Masonville, IA… the best fried fish around. YUM!).

My husband and I love seafood. In fact, if we are going out to a nice dinner, a seafood restaurant would top our choice of places to go. Cooking seafood is one of my favorite things to cook. My kids love it, I love it, hubby loves it. We have become quite the fish family.

Of course, living in the midwest is nothing like what some of you experience living on the coast. Fresh seafood is not something that is readily available at a price I can afford. A lot of the fish we buy comes frozen from Costco. Either way, we do with what we can get our hands on and enjoy to experiment with different varieties and flavors.

I am slowly but surely building up my seafood recipe repitoire. In fact, I imagine that a lot of the recipes my kids will remember when they grow up have something to do with seafood. That is what I love about family recipes… they can be from the past generations, the current generations and then what the future generations take and do with them. The family recipe box is ever expanding!

What is your favorite family recipe? Do you think it could win you a $1000 Williams Sonoma gift card? How much would you love it if your favorite family recipe won you that coveted KitchenAid mixer you’ve had on your wish list forever? The Viva Diva Family Recipe contest is going on now. Remember to enter your favorite family recipe and you could possibly be one of the big winners! Head over there now before the rush of the holidays gets the best of you… you can enter until December 15th. Good luck!

Side note - you have until tomorrow night to win one of two Taste of Home annual cookbooks from a giveaway partnership between Kate from Kate in the Kitchen and I. Go to this post to enter to win.

Parmesan Crusted Tilapia (from Recipezaar.com)

(OK - small world time… just found out that the submitter of this recipe on Recipezaar was a Zaar user named Mommy Makes. Mommy Makes happens to be none other than Katie over at Chaos in the Kitchen! All this time I never made the connection that the two people were the same.)

25 min | 5 min prep

SERVES 2

My heart is so heavy tonight and I just cannot seem to get past the emotions I am feeling. I tried to sleep but my tears won’t stop flowing and and the gut wrenching emotional pain is not letting up.

My 6 year old is the kind of boy I want with all of my heart to raise. He is the kid who when he pulls an opponents flag in flag football, he picks it up off the ground and hands it to the person he “tackled”. If one of his classmates forgets to bring an afternoon snack to school, he shares his snack with them. When his classmates are spending their reward tickets in their school store and one of them is short a bit of being able to get what they want, Jacob offers up some of his tickets to them. He is a kind and gentle boy with such a warm heart and I love him dearly for that. 

We had parent teacher conferences this week and it came to no surprise to us when Jacob’s teacher shared with us how quiet and shy he is in class. He is succeeding in all of the academic areas… reading beyond where he needs to be, scoring high in math, etc. He is, however, painfully shy at school. His Kindergarten teacher brought this to our attention last year and we knew before then that he was shy around adults. He is such a rule follower at school and does not want to take any chances with getting into trouble. At home and with our neighbors and family, we see a different boy. A boy who is outgoing, who laughs a lot and who likes being right there in the middle of the action. It is sometimes hard for me to believe that the boy the teachers talk about and the boy at home are even the same child. Jacob does love school, which I am so happy about. When we are out of school on breaks, he is often anxiously counting down the days until he gets to go back.

When we asked Jacob’s teacher about his friends and recess, she said “Jacob is such a nice kid. At recess he is what I would call kind of a tag-a-long… he isn’t aggressive like the other boys, but he always tries to fit in and do things with the other students.” The concerned mom in me said, “He is playing with other kids though, right? He isn’t a loner playing off in a corner by himself, is he?” She assured us he wasn’t and that he just wasn’t as aggressive about getting into the center of things as some of the other boys.

Today out of the blue I decided to ask Jacob this question… “Jacob, are you ever lonely at school?”. His response shocked me as he has never let on to feeling alone at school. “All the time. I am lonely every single day at both of my recesses. Some of the kids are mean to me and I hate going to recess.” I tried to get more out of him… he named a few names and indicated that part of it was because he isn’t any good at kickball, which is apparently has taken over tag, which was the popular thing to play at the beginning of the school year. My.Heart.Broke. Right then in there, I wanted to snatch him up in my arms and shelter him from this world we live in. I wanted to put a magic shield around him so that he never had to feel alone again. I wanted him to know that someday…hopefully soon… his kindness and warm heart will matter so much more to the world than his ability to play kickball. 

It is official…I hate recess now too. You can bet that each and every day, during those two periods in the day, my heart will be breaking all over again for my sweet boy and I will hope and pray that he is finding his way and is not feeling lonely.

Why does parenting have to leave us feeling so raw? I am certain that the pain he feels, I feel ten fold. I can only hope that he does not feel it as strong as I am feeling it. 

I know that this isn’t my family blog and I typically reserve this type of post for that blog, but for now they are being combined until my mojo returns! I appreciate you listening… I feel better having had the opportunity to get my thoughts out there.

With that, I will leave you with a recipe. A recipe that is so simple… I could only wish that life were the same.

Garlic Shrimp Pasta (from Recipezaar)

30 min | 10 min prep

SERVES 6 -8

My family loves fish. Well, I am not sure if that is exactly true. My family loves fish that does not taste like fish. If the fish has a fish flavor, the fish is not loved. However, if I can spice up and drown out the fishy flavor of the fish, then the fish is gobbled up. So, my family likes fish as long as it tastes nothing like fish. Make sense?

Last week I saw a tip that said “To capture the flavor of your fresh caught fish, soak it in milk”. So, is this to actually keep the fresh fish flavor of the fish then? For those people who actually want their fish to taste like fish? I guess for those of you who live near the coast and have access to fish fresh from the sea, then fish tasting like fish is actually not a bad thing? Here in Kansas, we can get fresh from the pond catfish, but trust me… you don’t want it tasting fishy. Deep fry and season the hell out of that sucker so it tastes nothing like the pond it came from!

Anyway, we have non-fishy tasting fish at least a couple of times in our house. Cod, because of the ease to make and the ability to simply get rid of the fishy fish flavor, is a favorite. If you like your fish to not be fishy then give this non-fishy flavored fish recipe a try. You won’t even know you are eating fish, which makes me wonder.. why not just eat chicken?

Lemon Baked Cod (from Recipezaar)

35 min | 10 min prep

SERVES 4

Kids change everything… they really do. We have three young kids and I would not change having them for anything. They are the brightest spots in our lives and I appreciate having the opportunity to be a mom each and every day.

I am not going to lie though… kids do change everything. Going to the bathroom in private? Doesn’t happen anymore. If someone isn’t in the bathroom with me, they are hanging outside the door with little fingers reaching under the door or questions being shouted through the door. Add to that my 2 year old clapping when I go and then shouting “bye-bye potty!” when the toilet is flushed. Oh - and how about getting to eat all of your dessert? Nope… it took me 30 some years, but I finally understand the concept of sharing to the fullest capacity. Gracefully sharing is giving up the last spoonful of your Death by Chocolate dessert because your sweet four year old is staring at you with those eyes. You know - those eyes that Daddy is going to have to learn to resist any time she asks him for something. And how about this one… how about something as simple as a conversation? My husband and I will attempt having a conversation and by the fourth interruption, we finally give up, vowing to talk about it later, and then collapsing into bed at the end of the day with no energy to converse.

My husband and I still do find time to rekindle that flame. Next month, we are planning a little trip to Wine Country (if any of you have any suggestions on places to stay, things to do, etc please let me know). Nothing gets that romance going again like a nice vacation away.. .without kids.

Tonight we rekindled the flame. Yep… in the kitchen, of all places! Oh c’mon… get your minds out of the gutter. We made Tequila Shrimp from the September, 2007 issue of Gourmet magazine and it required “burning off” the alcohol. Taking cover, I was prepared for a raging inferno, but all we got was a short little burst of flame. It still was enough to add some excitement to our evening!

If kids have changed your life some, and that flame is burning low, make it a priority to date your spouse. And, if dating is something you can’t do right now, then try getting hot in the kitchen. The Tequila Shrimp is just the little quickie to add some spark to your night!

Tequila Shrimp, Gourmet Magazine September 2007 (and another one gets marked off the list!)

1 1/2 pounds large shrimp in shell (21 to 25 per pound), peeled and deveined
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup white or reposado tequila
3/4 cup crema or sour cream
1 scallion, thinly sliced

Accompaniment: rice

Toss shrimp with kosher salt and 3/4 teaspoon coarsely ground pepper.

Heat butter in a 12-inch heavy skillet over medium-high heat until foam subsides, then sauté shrimp, turning, until pink and just cooked through, 3 to 5 minutes. Reduce heat and add tequila, then increase heat to medium-high. Tilt skillet over gas burner to ignite tequila (or ignite with a long match; use caution, as flames may shoot up high). Cook, shaking skillet gently once or twice, until flames subside. Remove from heat and stir in crema. Serve sprinkled with scallion.

Don’t forget to enter the Dine and Dish Giveaway #2 for a set of chic and fun notecards from Miss ‘N Nick Designs. All entries must be submitted by midnight on Sauturday, May 31st. For more information, and to enter, click here.

I came out of the closet about my office supply addiction on my last post, and felt the unity and support from my fellow bloggers. It wasn’t until then that I started getting real with how serious my addiction was. This addiction has been something I have been dealing with for quite some time.

When I started my first job after college, I was thrilled when our group administrative assistant came to me and said “We have a pen policy at this company and believe that everyone should have the type of pens they want. Here is the Office Depot catalog…. take a look and let me know what kind of pens to order for you.” Seriously? A whole catalog full of every type of pen possible, and I could choose any kind I wanted?  And the best part? You could change your mind as often as you wanted! She placed office supply orders often and if you wanted new pens then, she’d be happy to get them for you. Oh - and I always ordered pens that were different than everyone else’s… I was a pen hoarder and did not want anyone walking off with my special pens.

Several years later, I went to an Estate sale and stopped at the items everyone else was passing by. A box completely full of note pads, notecards and pens. A steal at $5 for the box.

I once had the genius idea of looking for pens and paper on Ebay, and discovered that apparently it is a very popular thing to sell.  I, of course, bid and won a set of notepads and really great pens.  A couple of years ago, my friend Julianne made my day by bringing me over a load of Pharmeceutical pens and sticky note pads. Her mom worked at a  doctor’s office and had a plethora of pens and sticky note pads from the sales reps that came into her office. I seriously thought about changing my profession at the time… free pens and sticky note pads just for going to work? What a great perk!

Obviously, I’m exaggerating just a tad (okay… not really), but my love for office supplies really does tie in to my love for cooking. If I didn’t have an office supply obsession, and was not prepared with pen and pad of paper in my purse at all times, then I can only imagine the number of fantastic recipes I would miss out on. This Cod recipe, for example, was found in a magazine when I was at my doctors office. Yes, I was able to find it online later, but with my memory, there is no way I would have been able to remember the name of the recipe when I got home. So, there you go… everyone out there thinking that I need to get some professional help for my office supply addiction. I may be addicted, but good does come from it! Let me share this recipe with you, just to prove it.

Nantucket Baked Cod