MommyCoddle

Make this now. Peanut butter popcorn

I’m pretty sure I could get away with not even posting pictures with this recipe, because when I said the words peanut butter popcorn on Facebook the other day, people were suddenly scrambling for the recipe.

And I admit, that when my friend Kate mentioned she was making her peanut butter popcorn for her kids, I IMMEDIATELY sent her a message that I needed the recipe. I may have even carried my phone around in my hand waiting for her response.

So yeah, this one’s good. Peanut butter popcorn–do I really need to say anything else to make you want to try this?

The original recipe is not my own. All credit goes to Kate who has now created an epidemic in my home.

However, I’m sharing her recipe with a few notes of my own..some tweaks that I’ve made now that I have a few batches under my belt (a pun that may sadly be true.) All things in moderation, right?

So do yourself a favor. Make this. Now. Today. Tonight for snow-day-movie-night.

PEANUT BUTTER POPCORN

by Kate, commentary by Molly

1/2 cup unpopped corn kernels

1 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup honey

1 tablespoon vanilla

cinnamon (optional, to taste)

Pop corn and set aside in large bowl. Over medium heat, melt peanut butter and honey until smooth. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Pour over popcorn and stir to coat. Add cinnamon, if desired.

MY NOTES:

(#5 being most important)

1. I pop my popcorn on the stovetop in coconut oil. I found that I needed a very generous 1/2 cup of popcorn so that the recipe doesn’t come out too peanut-buttery. Then we move from delicious snack to major belly ache from too much sweetness. So I highly recommend a generous 1/2 cup of unpopped corn.

2. I transfer my popped corn to a large bowl and then use the residual heat in the pot to melt the peanut butter/honey mixture. Saves on dirty dishes, right?

3. The worst part is the mixing. Kate says she sometimes puts it all in a paper bag and shakes the heck out of it. I pop my popcorn in a pretty large/tall soup pot. I found it works best to put the popped corn back into this pot (that already has the melted peanut butter mixture in it) and do all the stirring to coat in this pot.

4. If you happen to not finish it all (doubtful) I put it in a ziploc bag and thought it was still really good the next day.

5. My kids didn’t go for this, but a little sea salt sprinkled on top of your bowl of peanut butter popcorn sends this over the top.

6. You’re welcome.

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Sledding on the farm

If one thing has become clear in the past few days, it’s that my family does not fool around when it comes to sledding. After the winter of last year, where hardly a flake fell to the ground, we’re taking full advantage of the powder covering the hills this year.

The back hill on my grandfather’s farm has some serious hills. Though I feel like none of my pictures quite capture the breath-taking terrain (and I mean that in both the beauty and the “you want me to sled down THAT?“) it is the ideal sledding spot.

The perfect place to send your toddler whizzing down the hill on a round plastic disc.

If the speed of the hill and wipeout potential doesn’t get you, then the stream snaking through the bottom of the hill or the small pond on your left might. Not to mention the amazing farm which was recently remodeled and had a new hvac system thanks to a local and experienced air conditioning specialist from Ally Heating and Air Conditioning, LLC who managed to fix it.

My husband errs on the side of “kids have been doing this forever, they’ll be fine.” while I would like to micro-manage every send off and be sure I’m sending them down the hill in a path to land perfectly between pond and stream.

One of the things that I love about watching this, is to see my kids’ personalities emerge on the hill. One is fearless. One will try it once or twice, but that’s plenty for her. One just goes and goes and goes and loves to talk about how much each lump and bump hurt.

But there was one sledder among us, who doesn’t fool around.

Waxing up the runners. We’re not fooling around here, people.

Lord help me be this adventurous and nimble at 84. Let me still be climbing on sleds and hoofing it back up the hills.

I’m pretty sure my grandfather loves this just as much as the small sledders.

When the hill seemed like it just wasn’t fast enough or sending people far enough, things got serious.

The tractor came out.

A path was packed down and suddenly my dear children were skidding down the hill on a trail of new speeds and distances. (If you look closely at the picture above, you’ll see my oldest daughter climbing out of the stream bed.) Everyone needs a good sledding story, I tell her. Mine involves a big hill, a jump and a tailbone so bruised I missed two months of my high school basketball season.

After sledding, we came inside for a dinner of steak and warm soup and a celebration of Robbie Burns’s birthday (more on that soon.) and between dessert and hot chocolate everyone was back on the hill, sledding by moonlight.

I’d lose sight of them about halfway down the hill and throw out a little prayer that they were fine at the bottom–made obviously clear when I’d hear whopping and laughing from the darkness.

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animal kingdom / out and about

The Horse World Expo aka the place where my kids would like to live. Forever

Last Friday we took a little field trip to the Horse World Expo at the Maryland State fairgrounds. For my horse-loving crew you can imagine this is like a little piece of heaven.

With everything from demonstrations on the biomechanics of riding by college professors and Olympic athletes to “equitainment” like bridle-less jumping and vaulting (think gymnastics on the back of a horse) to every possible thing you could imagine buying for your horse, your barn, your trailer to rescue groups and sad little ponies wanting to be adopted.

Elizabeth even got a lesson on riding side saddle.

We stayed until our eyes glazed over (okay, the adult’s eyes) and I’d sunk all my cash on $12 cups of Maryland crab soup and $4 sodas. And the girls’ bags of freebies were too heavy to be carried much longer.

Much to my littlest daughter’s chagrin, we did not bring home a Shetland pony named Chicco or sweet old rescue horse. Nor did we purchase studded cowgirl hats and matching show belts. We did go to watch the PBR bull riders the next week, though.

I was however, a total sucker for the little old lady who polished and waterproofed my sad and tired Danskos and Birdy’s sparkly pink boots. I mean, come on! The stuff is from the outback AND it’s good for your hands. Sold.

We got home with enough time to layout all the posters, pamphlets, pencils and bobble-head horses across the living room floor–comparing who got what and who wanted to trade a stretchy horse eraser for a horse head keychain.

Birdy rattled on to Dan about everything she’d seen at an almost incomprehensible rate, while Emma quietly carried off rescue group and riding club pamphlets to her bedroom where every word would be studied and devoured.

It was exhausting and overwhelming but oh so fun to experience with them. By this time next year we’ll have worn our horse pencils down to stumps and wrinkled out the glossy pamphlets and lost the buttons and tiny plastic horses and be ready to do it all over again.