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Renny's Recipes: Spaghetti Squash Dinner

6/21/2018

You know that I am no stranger to swapping out pasta for veggies. Zucchini Lasagna anyone? Or how about this tasty zoodle recipe? Well, I am really trying to get back on track with my diet and exercise (because this baby weight is not going to lose itself, unfortunately.) Using Spaghetti Squash is a tasty and easy way to get more veggies, and less carbs in your diet. You can eat a ton of this spaghetti squash dinner and not feel guilty about loading up on all that pasta!

Additionally, PH has finally admitted he may have gluten sensitivity issues. There is gluten free pasta out there, and you can hunt down a quality brand that doesn't immediately taste like cardboard. Spaghetti Squash tastes so much better! Everyone loves Spaghetti for dinner, and with Spaghetti Squash pasta it is back on the menu in our house!

Cooking spaghetti squash for this spaghetti squash dinner is super easy. Follow the pictures below to see how!

With your squash all ready, you just need to cook your meat and sauce as you normally would for a spaghetti dinner. I used lean ground beef this time. You could also use turkey meat if you'd like.

Here is how I do it:

Spaghetti Meat Sauce
1. Brown 1 pound lean ground beef with 1/4 cup white onion in a skillet.
2. When meat is cooked add in one can tomato sauce.
3. Season with salt, pepper, garlic, and Italian seasoning.
4. Let simmer about 10 minutes.
5. Serve over spaghetti squash noodles
6. Top with Parmesan cheese

Your spaghetti squash will make a lot of noodles. You can eat more and fill up on veggies. We still had plenty of leftovers, so guess what I ate for lunch the next day?

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Coffee Free Tiramisu

6/20/2018

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Hey guys Alicia back with another international recipe. I have been MIA for awhile because I am dealing with sciatica pain. It makes it difficult to stand for very long, so my cooking has taken the back burner while I recover.

But I still wanted to go forward with our experiment, so June is Italy. My husband has an Italian great grandmother. We were very excited to hear this because Italian food is so delicious!

Coffee Free Tiramisu

I also have a sister-in-law who is part Italian, her mother is from Italy (born and raised). They kindly shared their recipe for Tiramisu with us. It is also a coffee-free version "for those Mormons." It uses hot chocolate and it's very delicious. They made a lot of individual servings for my brother and sister-in-law's wedding, it was so good!

My husband told me he loves tiramisu, but he likes the kind made with the fake coffee. So this led me on a hunt for a recipe that would work for his desires (since he wanted it for his birthday and Father's Day). Well all the recipes I found used coffee and liquor. In the end I adapted both recipes I had to create this tiramisu that still has the coffee bite without the coffee.

The drink I used is called Pero and is actually barley based. It comes in other brands as well such as Postum, Inka, Cafix, and others. It has a very strong flavor but is caffeine free. It's a very popular drink in other countries. My husband said he had it in Chile often when he lived there.

Tiramisu (without Coffee)

If Mascarpone Cheese is too out of your price range (I was blessed to find it on sale), cream cheese can be substituted.

I hope you'll enjoy this coffee-free tiramisu! It's pretty simple to make and really delicious! It was all eaten at the Father's Day dinner we went to. It would be a good thing to make and snack on while you check out our new podcast "From Cover to Reel." A podcast about books and their movie counterparts, where we try to answer the question of which is better: the book or the movie? We're live on iTunes and Stitcher right now. Or you can go to our webpage on this blog to listen to our first episode. You can also listen to us on Anchor and Buzzsprout. Happy listening!

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Summer Road Trips!

6/18/2018

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Red Rocks in Sedona, AZ

Living in Phoenix, AZ where the heat is already about 200 degrees hotter than where anyone else lives, one of the things we love to do to get out of the heat is take weekend road trips out of town into higher and cooler country! My husband and I will take off on our own and just take an all day drive or sometimes we get together with family members for camping trips or sight seeing trips. There are great places to visit in our beautiful state that are within just a couple of hours driving distance.

This was a great trip to Wet Beaver Creek, one of our favorite spots! There is always cool, refreshing water to play in. Our grandchildren had so much fun!

This summer, we have already taken a day and driven up to Prescott, AZ. We took in a folk arts festival with our son, daughter-in-law and little grandson. It was a great day. Prescott always seems to have something going on and is such a great place to visit.

This is a picture of the court house in Prescott. This photo was from another time when we had gone to visit up there during the holidays.

Trips up to Flagstaff and the south side of the Grand Canyon are also easy to do on a weekend, as well as trips to the Mogollon Rim or even over to the White Mountains. We have done all of these trips over the years with our children. As adults, the drive to these places were relaxing and beautiful. But, to kids, a couple of hours can seem like an eternity and it takes some creativity to help them have fun and make memories with you that will last for years to come.

Car Games are always a life saver.

My kids remember playing "A" My Name is Alice and laughing so hard over our choices of places and foods.
Another game we loved was a Word Association Game. It went like this: One person would start by saying a word such as "Pillow." The next person would have to think of an associated word like, "Bed." The next person might say, "Sleep", and so on until someone repeated a word and then it would be over and we would start all over with a new word.

Songs

It is second nature to me to sing in the car while driving. My dad always sang with us when I was a child when we drove places. It is one of my favorite memories. We would sing old songs like "I've Been Working on the Railroad" and "I've Got 6 Pence." I taught those to my children as well. With our kids, we would also put in tapes (in the old days) and now CDs and sing along to favorite oldies. Beach Boys and Beatles tunes were some of our favorites. Our kids loved having Mom and Dad join in singing with loud pizzaz and gusto as we drove down the road. Everyone laughed and had fun.

Maps

We traveled with our children before the days of GPS. So, we navigated using maps! It always surprises me to learn that people do not know how to read maps. It really isn't that difficult. My kids have GPS now, but they still look at maps as well. Reading maps is a very good skill to have and maps give you a better idea of the lay of the land and the area you are traveling in than simply by following a GPS voice.

Don't get me wrong, there are some really good benefits to having better technology when it comes to traveling though. For one thing, because of social media, we have a lot more access to tools and ideas that will help kids have more fun on trips and to help families create more memories together.

This Summer Road Trip Bundle from the Dating Divas would have been awesome to have when my kids were young. For THREE DAYS only you can snag this Road Trip in a Box kit and the U.S. Traveling Map for one amazingly low price! Just $6.00! Hurry! This deal ends Wednesday at midnight! I think it will be a great tool to use with my grandchildren now when I get chances to take road trips with them. I always try to put together little travel packs for them or to just get them something to keep them entertained when they go on long trips. But this bundle will take a lot of the decisions and just plain work out of the process. Plus, these prinables looks so great! It makes everything more exciting when it comes packaged in such a colorful, fun way!

When you get tired of playing the old standby car games, you can pull out this bundle and play Road Trip Bingo or Road Trip Truth or Dare! There are also good behavior rewards, Destination Activity Tags, and so much more!

That isn't all! Remember how I told you about the importance of maps? In this bundle, you also receive The Diva's U.S Traveling Map: a picture-perfect way to document all of your favorite memories from around the U.S., all in one beautiful, completely customizable map! With darling and modern flag embellishments to mark your favorite places that you have visited. (It kind of reminds me of this thing that I did for my son!)

You can add favorite photos to the places you go!

My husband and I were just settling down after his Father's Day festivities and we were talking about some short trips that we would like to take, as well as a couple of long ones! I'm starting to love the idea of his retirement coming soon and the time we can spend together. I as so glad that we still love being together and spending time doing things that we enjoy.
Are you planning any road trips this summer? We would love to hear your plans! What are your favorite ways to pass the time as you drive? Leave a comment and let us know!

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Renny's Recipes: Spaghetti Squash Dinner

Coffee Free Tiramisu

Coffee Free Tiramisu

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