Chappell Family Potluck Dinner Extravaganza!

On Sundays I try to have One on One time with each of my kids. We generally spend 30-45 minutes together doing whatever game/activity/craft/project they want to do. Everyone always wants to do a cooking project. I'm really glad that they feel that way. I hated to cook until about 5 or 6 years ago which is when I decided to make it a New Years Resolution to make and try 20 new recipes. I stuck to that and went above and beyond. I think the reason I hated cooking was because I didn't feel confident enough. Now I love cooking and trying out new recipes. It's funny because if I make something more than a few times the kids get all excited and say "Hey, I've had that before!" So, anyway, I've tried to make sure that my kids get lots of experience in the kitchen so they will love it too. For our One on One time we finally had to start a rotation so they would know when it was their turn to cook and we wouldn't have to argue about it. But awhile back we talked about how cool it would be if they each made one thing on the same day to contribute to the family dinner. (who's idea was this?!) We finally put that plan into action yesterday. We decided on the following criteria:

1)It had to be a new recipe
2)We had to use ingredients we had on hand (so mom wouldn't have to go shopping!)
3)We had to use sweet potatoes and cream cheese in some way, because they needed to be used up.
4) Each recipe needed to take ~30 minutes so they got equal time with mom

Turns out it was a little more difficult to follow these criterion after all! Cue Pinterest to the rescue! After a little research we were ready to draw recipes. We're all about being as fair as possible around here and drawing out of the monkey cup seems to appease everyone.

Drake drew the main dish, Meatloaf. I make a pretty mean Cream of Mushroom Meatloaf (it's so good my kids have been known to tell their teachers about it at school when asked to describe the term "comfort food.") but this was my first attempt at a ketchup based meatloaf. We borrowed the recipe from the Pioneer Woman and after a few changes we came up with an absolutely delicious, incredibly moist meatloaf. It's definitely going to be one the kids will "recognize" sometime in the future! I have to say that it's really hilarious that Drake drew the meatloaf recipe. My one child who doesn't like to get dirty or touch anything gross and he had to be the one to mix the meatloaf with his hands. I'm sure it was good for him! At one point he had to run and get his brothers so he could show them the "disgusting" thing he had to do for his recipe. Yeah, they were downright jealous! You can find our meatloaf recipe on my food blog HERE.

Zac, our resident pasta lover, was lucky enough to draw the pasta dish. This recipe slightly violates criteria 1 listed above, but it's been so long since I've made it that we fudged the rules a little. This is probably the first time I've let Zac do a lot of the chopping himself. Zac has been leery of knives since he was just a little guy, but he's been practicing whittling with the pocket knife Grandpa Gerry gave him for his last birthday so he felt like he was ready. I let him decide which vegetables he wanted to include and he loved pouring the dressing. He was a little concerned that I kept adding salt but he was very happy with the finished product. He begged me to send pasta salad in his lunch today instead of a sandwich! You can find our Pasta Salad recipe HERE.

Garrett was put in charge of making the jello salad. We decided to try a Strawberry Fluff Jello Salad. He insisted we put in marshmallows and mandarin oranges even though the recipe didn't call for them. Now, I'm not such a stickler to the recipe that I wouldn't have added something anyway, but I let him think that it was creation and he could tinker with it at will (within reason!) It made him feel like a real chef! I think he has secretly been wanting marshmallows in a salad for awhile now, but I'm not a fan of marshmallows so I never do it. Of course, I think Garrett would add marshmallows to mashed potatoes, spaghetti, or tuna salad if I'd let him! Garrett's salad turned out really good. It was very light and fluffy as it's name implies. You can find the fruit salad recipe HERE.

Lexi got to be our dessert maker. Maybe because she's such a sweet girl so fate was on her side! She made a Sweet Potato Cinnamon Roll cake. It turned out really good too, though we had a few technical difficulties that I would want to iron out in future attempts (the topping didn't crumble so much as mush, and I would do a frosting rather than the glaze.) I'm glad Lexi got this recipe because it was a little more ambitious and I needed a skilled pastry chef for this one! I'm a huge fan of sweet potatoes so I would love this regardless, but I think anyone would like this recipe. If you want to try it go HERE.

Four Kids, Four Recipes, and Four Hours later and we had a Chappell Family Potluck Dinner Extravaganza! It was so fun to see how proud the kids were of their own dish. But it was more heartwarming to hear them repeatedly compliment each others recipe. Yes, this was very time consuming and I spent hours in the kitchen, and I washed the same dishes many times, but it turned out to be a pretty good family team building exercise. I wasn't expecting that! The kids are already asking when we can do it again. Hang on everyone, just let me finishing washing this mixing bowl for the billionth time today!