Has it only been 5 days?

Early last week my son, K, came down with a cold.  Great.  That means my daughter, P, and I will soon follow.  My husband manages to get every 3rd cold so he's safe.  Since then K's come down with an ear infection and chest infection, I've caught the cold but am on the mend, and P is battling with the cold.  Hubby is still in perfect health.  So not fair.


Because a sick preschooler, toddler and mummy aren't enough, my parents stopped by for a couple of days on their way home from wintering in Florida.  It made for a busy weekend and fantastic food.  We had The Pioneer Woman's pizza dough and made Potato and Leek Pizza from her cookbook.  (I'm not crazy and I didn't post the wrong link.  It will go to a different pizza recipe but the pizza dough recipe is the right one.)  I made the dough on Wednesday and let it sit until Friday.  The pizza dough was fantastic but I didn't do a very good job of spreading it out.  Dough has never been my friend.  Ever. Nevertheless, the pizza was delicious. My dad and I may have made it too tall as the potato wasn't completely cooked through.  I still thought it was fantastic.  My kids had a different opinion.  K asked for "the other kind of pizza, the one with the pepperoni" and P only ate a few pieces.  I choose to believe that the goat cheese was too much for them.


Other foods of note were chicken and rice soup with homemade stock and The Pioneer Woman's Pico de Gallo and Guacamole.  About a month ago I bought The Canadian Living Slow Cooker Cookbook at Winners after having deciding against buying it when I saw it at Costco.  I'm so glad I did because it has the best recipe for stock.  I use the recipe for turkey stock with two or three carcasses from Costco roast chickens.  Twelve hours in the slow cooker and you have the most tasty and beautiful chicken stock ever.  Yum yum yum!


Costco roast chicken: In Canada they are $6.99 for a 2.5 lb bird.  If I were to buy the same chicken, but raw, it would be about $21 for 3.  Why waste my time roasting a chicken when I can buy a delicious one, with no additives, for the same price?  We buy approximately 1 chicken a week so I've got plenty of carcasses for stock.  I think there are 6 or 7 in the deep freeze right now.  Chicken stock here I come!