New Year's Eve

Yesterday both DH and I were not feeling well. One of the nephews that visited passed on a bug to us, and we have been down for the last couple of days. So for supper yesterday I wanted to make something that was comforting and not greasy takeout. We have been eating at a couple of places since we got here - Mama Fu's Noodle House and a chinese restaurant called Tai Pan. Mama Fu's has a pho soup dish that I am pretty fond of. Tai Pan has a good wonton soup that has bok choy and green onions in it that I am pretty fond of. So I decided to make my own Asian inspired soup to help us feel better. I've been reading through a Thai cookbook that I have also, which made me want to experiment with those flavors.

So here is the product of my experiment. The noodles from the dish are wonton wrappers that I cut into strips. Basically by taking a stack of 5 wonton wrappers and cutting them four times straight. I call it:

Rhonda Fu's Spicy Asian Noodle Soup
1 Tbs. canola oil
1/2 c. carrots, julienned or super thinly sliced
1 c. napa cabbage, coarsely chopped
4 c. broth - chicken or vegetable
5 wonton wrappers, cut into strips
1 Tbs. soy sauce (optional, taste before adding)
Black pepper to taste
1/4 c. thinly sliced green onions
1/4 c. fresh cilantro, coarsely chopped
Juice of 1 lime
1 Tbs. brown sugar (more or less, to cut the acidity of the lime, use as desired)
Couple of shots of hot sauce, or 1/4 tsp. ground cayenne (don't use Tabasco or other strong flavored sauce)

Heat a medium-sized saucepan over medium heat. Add the canola oil and the carrots, stir to coat them with the oil. Saute for a few minutes and then add the napa cabbage. Saute a few minutes more and then add the broth. Drop the wonton strips one at a time into the broth to make sure that they are seperate. Add the black pepper. Continue cooking over medium heat for about 10 minutes. Add remaining ingredients and turn off the heat. Let stand for a few minutes to let the flavors mesh.

Note: If it's cooked too long the vegetables will get mushy. It's better to have them slightly underdone than overdone. The quantities feed about 3 people or so, it's not a large amount.

The Cookie Monster

I've been a cookie baking monster for the last few days. Having people in the house to bake for makes me happy, and I've been taking full advantage. In the last week I have baked:

Chocolate Thumbprint Cookies with Cherry Filling

Cranberry Orange Cookies

Snickerdoodles

Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies

And finally today I baked:

ANZAC Biscuits (pictured above)

I haven't baked the ANZAC biscuits in a while, because hubby is not that fond of coconut. ANZAC biscuits are an Australian/New Zealand cookie, named in honor of the Australian/New Zealand Air Corps and I believe they are traditional on ANZAC Day there. I found some cane syrup at the store and figured I'd make some for our guests. They came out much better than the last time I made them - I love my new stove.

The houseguests are leaving early tomorrow morning, so we'll have a lot of cleaning to catch up on. :)

Wo0o0o0o0o0oT!!!!!!111one1

I thought it would never get here, but it's official :) 10 days off from work, woohoo! I worked my last second shift tonight. Before I went in to work, I made these Chocolate Thumbprint cookies to give to the people at work who have helped me so much. They were a really big hit, and I wish I'd made more because it wasn't nearly enough to give to everyone I wanted to. I only got to eat one of them. ;) My husband and I went to eat at our new Friday evening ritual, eating at a Chinese restaurant over by where I work. The waitress has our order memorized, and it's not busy even at 8:00 pm on a Friday night. Tonight was a bit annoying because they had a large party in the room in the back, and there were some really annoying loud teenage girls. But it didn't stop us from enjoying our food.

We will be very busy tomorrow, getting things ready for the family coming in. Our friends are going to stop by to take a look at the house, now that we have furniture in it. We have to get groceries, and finish fixing up the place.

Oh, and.......W0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0T!!!!!!!

Food Coma

Our second shift had a potluck luncheon tonight, and since I'm the firsunsecon supervisor I came back for it. In case you aren't familiar with that, that's a first shift supervisor who has to stay late and help take care of second shift issues until our new supervisor comes onboard. One of our guys is from Utah and had never had Southern food before. So we decided it would be a bring your favorite Southern dish potluck. I made a pot of black-eyed peas, some fried potatoes and a pan of cornbread. It turned out pretty good, and I thought I was doing good to stay awake for the drive home. But since my mind is always on either eating food, planning on what I'm going to eat for the next meal, plotting out what I'm going to cook the next day, and making menu plans for weeks in advance I decided to get a headstart on tomorrow.

I've seen some Ethopian recipes that intrigued me, but for most of them you need two particular ingredients: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berbere and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niter_kibbeh. So tonight when I got home and my latest order from http://www.penzeys.com/ was here, I got on the ball to make some. Berbere is the spice mix, and you are supposed to toast the spices after you mix them. Let me tell you, that's a good way to clear out your sinuses. I didn't even make it as hot as they call for in the recipe I used. The niter kibbeh is heating on the stove right now. Tomorrow I'm going to be making my first Ethopian dish, a recipe called Yetakelt Wat which is a cabbage stew. I'm hoping that it turns out okay, because I bought black cardamom seeds instead of the green pods. Somehow it reminds me of smoke and cough syrup. :)

Homestretch

There is exactly one working week until the long holiday break, and I can't wait. I can barely fathom 11 days off without working. The closest I have come to that is 10 days between when we left NC and moved here. But that was hardly a vacation. Of course we'll be busy this time too, with the In-Laws coming with the 4 and 5 year old nephews. But I won't be having to worry about work :)

To finish the banana marathon, I made the Banana Pineapple Snack Cake I posted earlier. I froze the rest of the bananas because I'm not really in the mood for more banana goodness. I think people at work are starting to hide when they see me carrying in a plastic container now :)

Tonight I created a new recipe, surprise, it is for a soup :) It came out pretty good. A bit of a change up from the bean and lentil creations I've been making lately, which is a relief to the spouse.

Cream of Cauliflower Soup
1 medium head of cauliflower, broken into florets
1/4 c. butter or margarine
1 stalk celery, finely chopped
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 Tbs. flour
1 tsp. ground mustard
1/2 tsp. smoked Spanish paprika
1 tsp. dried thyme
2 c. stock
2 c. milk, soy or dairy
Salt and Pepper to taste
2 Tbs. nutritional yeast (or use 1/2 c. or so of shredded cheddar)
Heat stock in a soup pot and bring to a boil. Add the cauliflower and then cook until tender. Remove cauliflower from the pot and mash. Retain 2 c. of the cooking liquid and set aside. Melt the butter or margarine in the soup pot. Add the onion and celery and saute until onions begin to brown. Stir in the flour and spices and toss to coat the vegetables evenly. Add the stock and milk and whisk to combine. Add the cauliflower and nutritional yeast or cheese and stir well to combine. Reduce heat to low and continue to cook until soup thickens to desired consistency.

The Banana Marathon

My friend's wife picked up a case of bananas or two when she went shopping today. Normally I like bananas okay, but I usually don't get them used up before they get too mushy for me to want to use them. So when I became the custodian of three bunches of them today I wasn't sure what I would be able to use them for and if I could stomach that much banana-flavored goodness. You see, I already have four containers of frozen banana mush that I was waiting to use for baking, and I don't have any more containers for it. The problem is that not only am I going to be eating all of my banana baked goods, she's going to be trying to pawn off hers on me too. Which is what I plan to do to her. I don't know if I'll be able to look at a banana after this. I wasn't sure if I was up for the challenge, but I've started the marathon.

My first entry is a recipe for Monkey Bars. It's a recipe that I veganized out of Cooking Light, my favorite magazine ever. I substituted the rice milk for buttermilk, and 1/2 cup of extra banana for the egg whites that the recipe calls for. Because of the extra banana, it's more flavorful, but a little sweeter than the original recipe. If you don't like sweet that well, then cut down the brown sugar a bit to compensate for the extra banana.

Monkey Bars
1/2 c. raisins
1 1/2 Tbs. apple juice
1 c. all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 c. packed brown sugar
1/4 c. margarine or butter, softened
1 c. mashed ripe banana
3 Tbs. rice milk, or buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Combine the raisins and apple juice in a microwave bowl. Microwave at high for 1 minute, and set aside. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl, stirring well. Set aside. Combine brown sugar and margarine in a large bowl, and beat until well blended. Add banana, milk and vanilla, mixing well. Add the flour mixture and mix until just combined. Stir in raisin mixture. Spread the batter into an 8-inch square baking pan coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until golden. Cool the bars completely on a wire rack.

P.S. I'm willing to start a betting pool on how long it's going to take the people at work to start hiding from me when I bring in a container of baked goods. :)

New Baby

We were out grocery shopping today when I saw this over in the florist section. I'm a sucker for orchids at any time, but since winter seems to have finally set in spring gardening season seems to be a long way off. It's been a pretty quiet day otherwise, I tried out a new recipe for a plum upside-down cake that turned out quite tasty but not very photogenic. It stuck when I was trying to take it out and the top got a little botched. ;)

We found out today that my in-laws and our nephews are coming to visit for Christmas, so we are going to be decorating and doing stuff for Christmas after all. We haven't had a tree or ornaments before, so I'm going to try to come up with some crafty things the kids can put together to decorate the tree with. And since we will have people to cook for it should be fun. :)

Holiday Party

Tonight is the company holiday party, which I'm not crazy about going to. But since I'm a supervisor it's one of those things that you have to do. I'd prefer to stay home and do other stuff, but oh well. We went out this morning to do a bit of shopping, and when I got home I felt like baking something. I saw a post earlier on the PPK forum for some Brown Sugar Shortbread and thought I'd try it out. I've had a shortbread pan for a long time and never really used it. So here's the outcome. :)

Recipe is found here:

http://www.postpunkkitchen.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=15863

Scroll down to the sixth post :)

Vacation

It's the third day in the four day weekend and I've started getting restless. :) We stayed home again, both of us had the blahs and didn't feel like doing anything. I made a pot of lentil chili and am slowly working my way through the stack of recipes that I have to try out. The original recipe didn't taste all that flavorful so I had to doctor it up a bit. Here's the recipe:

Lentil Chili

1 Tbs. canola oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 Tbs. chili powder
1 Tbs. paprika (I used half smoked Spanish paprika and half sharp paprika)
½ tsp. dried thyme
2 c. dried lentils
4 c. stock
1 14.5 ounce can petite diced tomatoes
½ c. ketchup or tomato paste
3 small potatoes, chopped

Heat the oil in the bottom of a saucepan. Add onions, garlic and spices and sauté until onions begin to soften. Add lentils and toss to coat. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer until lentils and potatoes are soft, about 20 minutes.

Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving today. We went to our friend's house and had dinner with him and his family. I made some stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy and some gingersnap cookies. The stuffing that I made was a bit different than the same old same old, and I really liked it. I made the recipe from combining elements of several different ones and this is what I came up with:

Black Eyed Pea, Fennel and "Sausage" Cornbread Stuffing
2 Tbs. Canola oil
2 regular or vegetarian sausage patties
1 small onion, chopped
1 c. fennel bulb, chopped
1 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced
1 garlic clove, minced
1 tsp. dried sage
1 tsp. dried thyme
1 tsp. smoked Spanish paprika
Salt and Pepper to taste
3 c. cornbread, crumbled
1 c. black-eyed peas, cooked (or 1 14.5 oz can, drained and rinsed)
2/3 c. broth
1 egg or egg substitute (I used 1 Tbs. ground flax seed whisked with 3 tbs. water)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Heat the canola oil in an iron skillet over medium heat. Fry the sausage patties until browned and then remove from the skillet. Let cool, and then crumble. Set aside. Add the onion, fennel, carrot, clove and spices in the skillet and saute until vegetables are softened. In a large bowl, add cornbread, vegetable mixture, black eyed peas, broth and egg and toss to combine. Return to the skillet and bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until browned.


The cornbread that I made was the maple cornbread from the Vegan Lunchbox site. It gives the stuffing a really deep rich flavor:

2/3 cup maple syrup
1/3 cup canola oil
1 cup plain soymilk

Stir above together. In another bowl whisk together:

1 cup flour
1 cup cornmeal
1 TB baking powder
1 tsp. salt

Mix wet and dry together and pour into a greased 9x9 square pan. Bake for 35 minutes at 350 (or in miniloaf or muffin pans for about 25 minutes), until tester comes out clean.

Lunch Lady Scoops

I've been in a baking mood again, and I baked the Pumpkin Muffins from the November Cooking Light tonight. I am still trying to figure out if I put an extra 1/2 cup flour in it, I lost count while I was making them. The batter/dough turned out stiffer than muffins normally are, so I used the first part to make mini-muffins and the second part to make in cookie form. I used coarse sugar on the top of the cookies and flattened them a bit. I have to say that the cookies won hands down over the muffins. I have to say that my favorite kitchen tool at the moment are lunch lady scoops. It makes cookies and muffins so much easier to put in pans.

We went shopping this afternoon and ordered my new reading chair and a bookcase. We weren't able to find any that stores had in stock around here that we liked, so we had a place order us some. Unfortunately it won't be in until January because the factory closes down for the last two weeks of December. But I'd rather wait for what I want to get delivered than to settle for something less because I can get it now.

The weather has been beautiful for the last few days, warm and sunny with just a bit of chill in the air. The nights have been clear and cold. It's perfect sweater wearing weather so I have brought all of mine out of the storage bin. I'm starting to make out plans for what to make for Thanksgiving, paging through all of my cookbooks. We are going to dinner at my friend's house, and I'm going to be bringing sides. Definately mashed potatoes and gravy (his wife likes to make instant), maybe some stuffing and some other veggie sides. A pie of some sort is definately going to be in order, I just haven't decided what kind.

Pearly Whites

I've had to have some pretty major dental work in the last month or so, for some reason about a month after we got here I started getting really bad toothaches. I ended up having to have a root canal and had stress fractures in my teeth so I had to have a crown put on one of them. Since the root canal was on a visible tooth, the dentist suggested to me that I might want to consider bleaching my teeth before they put in the permanent crown, so that they can match it to the new color. I haven't ever been a really vain person, not high maintenance by any stretch of the imagination. But I have been noticing over the last couple of years that I'm starting to see the consequences of that lack of attention, and one of the things was that my teeth were looking pretty dull. Not yellow or green or anything bad like that, just not very bright. So I decided to give it a whirl :)

Today was the big day, and I went in to have the procedure done. I have to say, it's one of the oddest things that I have ever been through. Two hours in the dentist chair with a heat lamp stuck in front of my face wasn't the preferred way to spend the day, but I can't argue with the results. My smile is much brighter, and that's only after the initial office treatment. I still have at home treatments to do to even out the whitening. I'm definately glad that I got it done, but maintaining it will be key. I don't want to have to fork out that kind of money again :)

Lazies

I seem to have a serious case of the lazies lately. Work has slowed down a bit and I'm not having to work as much overtime. It was getting pretty bad for a while and I was about burnt out. Now that it's slow though, I've been getting bored and don't feel like working. Go figure. ;)

I've been trying to have healthier lunches to take with me, so I don't end up hitting the junk machines and such. Today I had Tofu Dill Salad Sammiches which turned out pretty decent. For tomorrow I made some lentil soup tonight - Lentil Soup with a Hint of Fruit. It sounded a bit odd, but it turned out pretty good. The soup was sweet, savory and tart. Definately a change from the usual standby.

http://www.molliekatzen.com/recipes/recipe.php?recipe=lentil_soup

The Perfect Autumn Cookie

Tonight felt like a cookie baking night, and I've been wanting to try these for a bit. They are Pumpkin-Cranberry oatmeal cookies. They turned out really good. I like my new oven because it is very hard to burn things in it. Plus with my new cookie sheets and cookie scoop it makes baking them a snap. I was planning on bringing some in to work with me tomorrow, but the question is...will there be any left? :)

The Bean-Hater

I think that almost anyone should be able to see a trend with my cooking, and it is that I love cooking things with beans. When I was a young girl growing up in Arkansas, we ate beans at almost every meal. There wasn't enough money to go around, and beans are very filling. But not only that, they taste delicious and I could eat them every day. Unfortunately I married someone who does not like...nay, hates beans. To his credit, he likes lentils and black eyed peas but that's about it. So normally I make black eyed pea or lentil soups and stews. But every now and then I have to make something with beans.

One of my favorite things to eat when I was growing up was a stew that my maternal grandmother used to make, one that she called San Francisco Stew. It was similar to baked beans in a way, only it was a stew. I was thinking that she put sauerkraut in it, but my mom doesn't remember that and thinks that I added it myself when I was eating. Regardless, I have been wanting the recipe for a long time but she died a few years back and our family is estranged so no recipe for me. I have a vague recollection of it but it's been at least 16 years since I last had any. So below is my first attempt at recreating her stew. It is a sweet and sour soup, very filling and would be great with cornbread. :)

Wincel's San Francisco Stew

1 (14.5 oz) can Great Northern Beans
1 (14.5 oz) can diced tomatoes
2 Tbs. butter or margarine
1 small onion, chopped
1/2 c. molasses
2 Tbs. smoked Spanish paprika
2 tsp. ground mustard (not prepared)
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
1 c. stock
1 c. sauerkraut

Heat oil in a medium saucepan, and add onions. Saute onions until they become translucent. Add remaining ingredients. Stir to combine, and then simmer for about 15 minutes or until it begins to thicken.

Dal Makhani

It's gotten cold outside, and one of the recipes I've been wanting to try to make for a long time now is Dal Makhani, or Madras Lentils. I'd gotten a pre-packaged version from the supermarket a while ago and liked it but didn't like the butter related saturated fat and cholesterol. So I had been meaning to find a recipe and try to make my own. I searched the internet and found several promising ones, and combined elements of each to make my own. Here's the version that I came up with. If you haven't had it before, it's kind of like a lentil chili. Very flavorful but not hot.

Dal Makhani

1 c. lentils
4 c. stock
1 inch fresh ginger, peeled
2 garlic cloves
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 green chilies, finely chopped
¼ c. butter or margarine (I used Earth Balance margarine)
2 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. turmeric
1 tsp. chili powder
½ tsp. smoked Spanish paprika (optional,not authentic but adds a little depth with the smokiness)
1 (14.5 oz) can petite diced tomatoes, undrained
1 (14.5 oz) can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
Salt to taste
Juice from 1 lemon
1 Tbs. brown sugar (again option, not authentic but cuts some of the acidity from the lemon and tomato)

Combine lentils, ginger and garlic with stock in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer, cover. While the lentils are cooking, prepare the onions and chilies. Heat butter or margarine in a soup pot over medium heat. Add onions, chilies and spices to oil and sauté 5 minutes. Add kidney beans and tomatoes, stir to combine. When lentils are tender, remove ginger and garlic from pot, and add lentils to the soup pot. Make a paste from the garlic and ginger and return to the soup pot. Stir well to combine, reduce heat to low and simmer for 15 minutes. Add lemon juice and brown sugar, stir well to combine.

Pasties

I was recently reminded of pasties by one of my friends, who is from Montana and hasn't had them in a long time. Not the pasties that you wear, but the ones that you eat. :) They are a meat-filled pie, that was passed down from Cornish miners, and are very prevalent in most areas with mining history. The miners would take a pasty with them, and heat them up on shovels using a candle for heat. The area that I lived in Minnesota was on the Iron Range and mining is a big industry there. I only had pasties a few times while I was there and helped to make them once. So I didn't have a very strong foundation to go from. But the internet is a wonderful thing, and I found this web resource that had a bunch of recipes:
http://www.wideopenwest.com/~awesley5155/pastie.html

I combined elements from several of them, and used a picture from http://www.pasty.com/ to see how the pastry should be folded. Pie crusts have never been my strong suit, but Madelyne Lawry's recipe on the first link had a very good pie crust. It even survived my fumbling around with it, and for the most part turned out really good. This is in spite of the fact that I realized that I left my rolling pin up in North Carolina, so I had to use the bamboo utensil holder in the kitchen to roll out the dough. Just goes to show that you don't need to have a lot of high priced equipment to make good food. :) Needless to say I stopped by Linens N' Things and picked up a new wooden french rolling pin for future pasty needs. :)

A Time for Reading

Every year I re-read the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Almost every year anyway, I did get oversaturated while the movies were out and all of the propaganda was flying. But usually in the fall time of the year I get the urge to read them again. This year I plan on reading them all and then watching the movies when I am finished. It'll give me something to do in my free time anyway. I've been so tired on the weekends that I haven't been leaving the house except to get groceries.

I did get some cooking in this weekend though, made the above pictured Caribbean stew with maple cornbread. The stew turned out pretty good, very flavorful and smelled wonderful. I made some rice crispie treats using almond butter and brown rice syrup, they turned out really nice and nutty flavored. The best though was the pancakes that I made for breakfast yesterday morning, they were light, fluffy and had a wonderful taste to them. I got halfway through eating two of them and couldn't finish. Definately know which ones I'm making from now on. :)

Heaven on Earth

This is the first weekend since we've moved here that I actually had energy and wanted to do something. We have some plants to put out before it gets too cold, so we were wanting to check out one of the local nurseries that we've driven by a couple of times. I have been to some nice nurseries in NC, but NOTHING compared to this one. The name of the place is Bennett's Nurseries, and it is located right next door to a water gardening store called Across the Pond. Bennett's is a huge nursery, and the areas in between the greenhouses are almost like a botanical garden. They serve free drinks to their customers, and have live music on Saturdays. ;) Across the Pond was almost as good. They have a koi breeding facility and a huge variety of fish. They have everything that you would need to start a pond, pallets of stone that you can buy, and a very large section with bird feeders and garden statuary. I didn't want to go home, but we had plans for the evening!

I was having a chili cook-off with my friend last night, and we were going to have a bonfire. So I went home to start cooking. The recipe that I made was Tigua Indian Green Chili from James Villas' Stews, Bogs and Burgoos cookbook. It's a really hot and spicy chili that makes your nose run. It turned out pretty good, I was happy with it. We ate chili and then went outside to burn stuff. :) The evening was beautiful. It was really chilly out and it was clear so you could see all of the stars in the sky. We were there until late last night, so I'm still a big groggy this morning.

Today I think we are going to hang around the homestead til later, I brought some work home with me so that I wouldn't be so far behind on Monday, so hopefully I can make some progress. We'll see anyway. :)

Honey Bunny

I've been trying to figure out some healthier snacks to have around the house and to take to work. So I found a recipe that sounded interesting on one of my favorite food forums, and it was for Honeybee No-Bakes. Basically almond butter balls shaped like bees. I almost had a heart attack at the price of a jar of almond butter so I used peanut butter instead. I'd really like to try it with almond butter, but $13 for about 1 cup is a bit steep for me right now. I guess if I factored in how much I spent on other junk food though it could probably be justified. ;)

So here is a link to the original recipe. My bees ended up looking more like rabbits, so I have officially changed their title to Honey Bunnies. They tasted pretty good, they were a bit sticky so I have them in the refrigerator. They could use some more oat bran or something.

Recipe: http://shmooedfood.blogspot.com/2006/04/honeybee-no-bakes.html

I'm thinking that mine turned out a bit sticky because her recipe called for a honey substitute, and while they might taste similar they probably don't have honey's ability to stuck moisture out of the air and into the food. So maybe adding a bit more oat bran would do the trick. Not sure, but I was pretty happy with them. :)

Oh-Em-Gee

I've been wanting to start a new fantasy series for a while, but hadn't found one that caught my attention. We were at the book store on Friday evening and my eye was caught by a book with a very lovely cover, and the description looked very interesting. The name of the book was "The Iron Tree" by Cecilia Dart-Thornton. OMG. I ran a bath in the whirlpool tub tonight and settled in to a good read. I finished page one and was baffled...hubby came in and I started reading him some of the paragraphs and couldn't stop laughing. It has to be the most pretentiously written book that I have ever read. It's like she wrote the whole thing using a thesaurus or something, using words that just don't fit the story/setting at all. Things that might seem okay in a sci/fi book where a geeky scientist was talking possibly, but not a fantasy book with a young protagonist. Finally after reading the second page I threw the book down and vowed to take it back to the store tomorrow. I don't know that I have ever not made it past the first two pages before giving up, it's a new record. :)

First Meal in the New House

Tonight I cooked my first meal in our new house. Since I've been working late most nights since we moved in we've either eaten out or my husband has cooked. Tonight was the first time I've actually had enough time and energy to make anything. So since I've been craving it, and looking for an excuse to make my favorite gravy I made a veggie loaf and some mashed taters and gravy. It turned out pretty good except that it's hard to make the loaf with the correct consistency. As it is written it tastes really good, but is a bit mushy. I tried to make it a bit firmer by reducing the potatoes and adding more oats but that didn't win rave reviews from the home team. Maybe if the oats used were those that are cut finer it would have worked. Anyway, here are the recipes:

The meatloaf can be found at http://www.recipezaar.com/148722.

I've been experimenting with healthier mashed potatoes, and tonight I boiled the potatoes in vegetable stock, drizzled them with some olive oil and whipped it with some soy milk. I missed the tang that I have been getting by using buttermilk, so next time I make them I'll probably mix a tablespoon or so of lemon juice with the soy milk first.

The best part of course is the gravy. I adapted a recipe that I found in cooking light, which was for a Thanksgiving turkey with a molasses/sherry glaze and the gravy was made vegetables cooked under the turkey and the drippings. Since I don't really want to make the turkey I needed to figure out how to make it without. The result is a very healthy low-fat gravy that tastes nothing like a low-fat gravy. The way that I make it is actually vegan, but you'd never know it. Here is the recipe:

Harvest Vegetable Gravy

2 Tbs. canola oil
1 carrot, chopped in small pieces
1 celery stalk, chopped in small pieces
1/2 c. onion, finely chopped
2 Tbs. molasses
2 Tbs. cooking sherry
2 Tbs. soy sauce
2 c. stock (I use vegetable)
3 Tbs. flour

Heat the oil in a small saucepan over medium heat, and add the carrot, celery and onion. Saute until the carrots soften and the onion caramelizes and begins to brown. Add the flour and toss to coat. Mix the stock, molasses, sherry, soy sauce and stock. Add the stock mixture to the saucepan, and stir until thickened.

Diversions

When we decided to pull up stakes and move, we left a very comfortable and profitable lifestyle. We both had federal civil service jobs, very good paying, very secure. I was set to get a pretty big promotion in February, and hubby was set to progress pretty quickly too. We lived in a decent house that we bought 13 years ago, with very low payments. We still had quite a few debts to pay off left over from our previous free-spending early 20's. We had quite a few friends, a great church and I had tons of hobbies to keep me busy. I came to realize though, that as good as my job was it wasn't what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. My husband had the same realization.

Skip to now, I am in my fourth week on the new job. There have been times where it felt like a perfect fit, and times when I wondered what the hell I was thinking. Living in our spiffy new house with all of our debts paid off except a vehicle payment and the mortgage makes the whole thing seem more appealing. The downside of work is that I'm having to put in lots of hours at work, where we are straightening out a section that has been neglected for a long time. I'm up at 4:45 am and often don't come home until around 6:00 pm. I am constantly frustrated with myself because I'm not learning as fast as I want to.....I don't give myself much of a learning curve. ;) It's been very challenging, and is definately using all of my skills. If I can survive these first couple of months I'll be okay. :)

DIY Sucks

I have sworn many times in my life that I will NEVER buy another piece of put-it-together-yourself furniture. Throughout our married life we have built bookshelves, computer desks, tables, chairs, microwave carts and each time has left us nearly strangling each other. We needed to replace my computer desk since my old one was left in North Carolina. So we picked up a new one at Office Depot, and put it together today. I swear whoever designed it must have been smoking crack. The desk itself is very sturdy and looks very nice, but I have never put anything together that was such a pain in the arse.

On to good things! The picture above is my new kitchen, and I am in love with it. I can't wait to start cooking stuff, I can get in a lot of trouble in here. We did a stocking up trip to the grocery store today, and aside from cardiac arrest from the grocery bill we didn't do too bad. As soon as I unpack my cookbooks I will be in business!

Home Sweet Home

Yay! We're here, we moved into our new house yesterday. It still seems very surreal to me, almost like we're staying in a hotel. After staying with our friends and their teenage kids for the last month, being alone in our big new house made us feel like kids whose parents were out on vacation. We had a very busy day today, we went and bought blinds for the windows, and got most of them put up. We found the grocery store by the house, and also bought a new computer desk for me. We made our first supper in the new house, heated up frozen lasagna. Cheesy (literally) I know, but it was better than fast food. Tomorrow we're going to get the last of our boxes, a few household items and a couple of sets of curtains. Our DSL box came today, and our washer and dryer were delivered. So tomorrow will be laundry day, and our stock-up trip to the grocery store. Should be fun. :)

P.S. One of my favorite things about Alabama so far are the cotton fields. This is a picture of one that is right behind our house. It makes it look like snow drifts in September. ;)

Sunday Mornings

I got up this morning after sleeping in to 6:30 (hey, it's better than the 4:45 that I normally wake up now). I made some breakfast for everyone, the Spicy Autumn Hash recipe I posted earlier and some Tomato Gravy. My friends had really liked what I made for them a couple of nights ago, and said it would be good for breakfast so I made them some. Tomato gravy is now one of my absolute favorites, it's a really pretty one and it has a great flavor but isn't overwhelmingly tomato-ey. Here's the recipe:

Tomato Gravy
1 Tomato, diced
4 c. stock of your choosing (I use Maggi Vegetable Bouillon cubes)
2 Tbs. canola oil
4 Tbs. flour
Salt and Pepper to taste

Bring tomato and stock to a boil in a saucepan, reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. In a seperate saucepan, heat the oil at medium temperature and then add the flour. Stir the flour well to eliminate any lumps, and cook for a few minutes, stirring to make sure that it doesn't burn. Add the tomato/broth mixture and whisk vigorously to make sure that lumps don't form. Continue stirring until gravy thickens to desired consistency. Taste and see if more salt is required, and add some black pepper.

Today we are planning on running down to Best Buy to pick me up my new digital camera, and maybe stopping by for a bookstore wallow. I'm making some mashed taters for supper tonight, and I needed to pick up what I need to make my other favorite gravy. Four days until we can move into our new house, I probably won't be able to sleep soon. ;)

Shopping

I was really glad for the weekend to get here, it seemed to be a very long week. We have been going out to get stuff so we'll be ready to move in on Friday. We had to get the oil changed in the car, and then went for breakfast at Denny's. We stopped at Pier 1 and I picked up a new rug for the kitchen, a gray rag rug. I also got a neat candle with a holder. Next stop was Lowe's, where we stood and argued for a while over what blinds we wanted to get, and then gave up and decided that we could agree on curtains earlier. We went to look at some furniture stores for a nice bookcase and were gasping from sticker shock. Bath and Beyond yielded a set of curtains for the master bedroom, along with the rods that match the bathroom hardware, and a bamboo silverware holder. Next stop was Nothing but Noodles, a restaurant that specializes in pasta dishes. The final stop was Wal-Mart where I picked up a new cutting board and some bedsheets.

So the shopping list is getting shorter, we're getting very impatient to get moved in. The boys are out with another moving box bonfire, which is nice to do since it's getting chillier out now at night. I hang out for a little while, and then come back in. I get sleepy really early now that I get up so early, so I don't last too long. Other than that, I'm making more potato hash for breakfast tomorrow and probably some tomato gravy too. We need to get to Best Buy tomorrow so that I can get a new digital camera, and we're probably going to hit the bookstore. Definately a fun day, but also very tiring.

Homeless

So for a bit of an update, the house in North Carolina closed. I have been so worried that something would happen and the buyer would back out, and we wouldn't be able to get our new house. So now I am very relieved and can finally let myself get excited about our new home-to-be. We went out to eat last night to celebrate at TGI Fridays and unfortunately had a very mediocre meal with an unpleasant server. We did go to Best Buy and Linens and Things so that made up for it. I officially bought the first items for our new house, a couple of sets of kitchen towels and a painting. The original color in the new kitchen was a rust-red color, not really what I wanted. So one of the things that we wanted was for them to repaint it a color of our choosing. We picked out a moss green-gray color that I really liked. I think that it was a good choice because it made the room look lighter and more airy than it was before. So the kitchen towels and painting go with the moss-green look.

We have lots of things to get ready for next Friday, when the new house closes. We will be busy this weekend doing some shopping. We had a big bonfire at our friend's house tonight, burning the boxes from their move. My little firebug had a lot of fun setting them on fire of course. I made some supper for them tonight, some potato hash and tomato gravy, which was a big hit. Other than that, I'm kind of a drag to be around I guess, because my new pumpkin time is around 8 or 9 at night. Since I get up at 4:45 am every morning, I'm already starting to nod off around 8. The new job is going well, changes are slowly happening. It's hard to try to make changes and improve stuff when you have to keep the place going. On the downside, my digital camera seems to have crapped itself, so no new pictures until I get another one. Other than that, not much to report, looks like it will be a good weekend. :)

Back in the Salt Mines

So I started my new job yesterday, my vacation has ended. :) Our house in NC is still set to close next week, and our new house the week after that. Work is pretty interesting, definately different than what I was doing before. I hadn't really looked forward to being a supervisor, it was my least favorite thing when I was in the USMC. But I'm actually enjoying it more than I thought I would. Except for today when I got someone fired, but I digress. ;) Showtime is very early, and I will be working some Saturdays. But at least I get paid well for it.

So I probably won't be updating that regularly until we get into our new house and settled in, but I'll try to keep some updates going when possible. :)

Sweet Home Alabama

So we finally got back on the internet, I have been sitting with my eyelid twitching for the last week. We made it and are staying with friends while we wait for our old and new homes to close, in that order. It was very nice of our friends to let us stay with them, saved us from worrying about timing leases, making deposits etc. But I am going nuts...hard to be living with someone else and not have control over what goes on. I start my new job tomorrow, I haven't gotten too nervous yet but I'm sure it will come later tonight.

We spent the first few days looking at houses with the realtor, had a couple picked out and then we walked into one that "felt" like home. I haven't taken a camera with me yet when we've gone, but when I do I'll post a picture. I don't think I've ever had somewhere feel so right, even our house that we lived in for 10 years. So we'll see how it all goes, hopefully everything will go smoothly. Since we had so much trouble with our old house since we've had it, I'm somehow convinced that everything is still going to screw up somehow. But I'm trying not to invest too much emotion in it until the old house closes. Anyway, we are off this afternoon to go get some catfish at a restaurant by Lake Guntersville in NE Alabama. Sounds like fun :) We are looking forward to getting to know this area, seems like a neat place.

Signing off...

Things are beginning to move a bit more quickly now, and I haven't really had much new to say. I've just been switching between really looking forward to the move, and moping around all sad and stuff. So rather than try to come up with witty interesting things to say, I'm stopping with the blog update until we get set up in Alabama. See you guys then. :)

Reading

So I'm bored with moving news myself, and can't imagine anyone else is that interested. So today I'm going to talk about one of my major passions - reading. I've added a new feature to my sidebar of the book(s) that I am currently reading. I found Cultivating Delight by Diane Ackerman in the bargain book section of Barnes & Noble, and being unable to resist cheap gardening essay books I bought it. I've actually had it for a while now and have been reading it off and on, usually whenever I want to soak in the bathtub. The book is broken down into different essays in short chapters, so it makes a good one to dip in and out of without losing track of what you were reading.

I like the book quite a bit, although I do agree with some of the Amazon reviewers that think she gets to enamored with her prose. But overall the book is very readable and I'm enjoying it. I don't ask much of this sort of writing, but sometimes authors get in the way of what they are writing and I don't enjoy it very much. I read some of Bern Heinrich's nature books, and I kept feeling like he was trying to prove that he's a new Thoreau and it just got really annoying. Anway, I'm just enjoying the light reading because I am expecting another book that I ordered from Amazon tomorrow, and it's going to be a boring work related book. This one is on Inventory Management and is to study up for my new job, to have an idea of what I'm doing. ;) Hopefully it won't put me to sleep.

I've also added my Now Hear This section, that shows my favorite music finds. :)

Itchy Feet

No, I didn't get into poison ivy in the backyard, just getting tired of being in a holding pattern and waiting. We are waiting for our house to close, waiting for the last week of work to be over, and waiting before we can really get anything started down in AL. I am not a very patient person and it drives me nuts.

Our buyer came by with his wife today, and he mowed the yard (he has a lawnmowing business), while I visited with his wife. We are two kindred spirits, we spent a long time talking about gardening and other things. Since they are going to be using our house as a rental, they are planning on taking some of my (their) plants to their house. Other than that, nothing new to report on the homefront.

The way that I have been dealing with stress and worry lately is to bake stuff, so tonight I baked some blackberry muffins to help use up some stuff in the freezer. I wanted to make them eggless, and try using some milled flaxseed as an egg replacer (it would also add some fiber and make it even healthier) but I seem to have misplaced my flaxseed. It makes me nuts when I can't find things that I know should be there. Anyway, the muffins turned out very good. I am usually not that crazy about cooked blackberries, like in a cobbler. Their taste is very strong and overwhelming. It turned out just right in these muffins though. I've gotten hooked on mini-muffins, it is really so much better than the bigger muffins. You can really notice the texture of them, which would be lost in a bigger muffin. So the baking itch was scratched, and I've been munching on mini-muffins all evening. At least it isn't candy bars. ;)

Sad

I think that today more than any other day the realization finally set in that we are leaving. As in not going to be living here any more, and I won't see the people that I have gotten so close to. One would think that would have occured to me when we decided that we were going to move, but somehow even the trip to Alabama and signing with the realtor to sell the house didn't have that impact. McCrankypants and some of my co-workers set up a potlock luncheon for me today, seperate from the more elaborate luncheon at the Mexican restaurant next week. It was very touching, and really made me realize that I wouldn't be working with them anymore. Thanks again M, for arranging that. :)

So arrangements for our house are proceeding, and still waiting to hear what's going on with my job in AL. We came home today, ate supper and then headed over to Lowe's to check out the cost of trailers. We'd priced renting a moving truck from UHaul or Penske, and it was going to be pretty darned expensive. So we are thinking that we will just buy a trailer and hook it to the truck and we won't be throwing our money away. We had a town meeting at church so that the pastor and elders could solicit input on future plans for the church. Even though we're leaving, they asked us to attend and participate. So we stopped by expecting to spend maybe a half hour or an hour at the outside, and then head to Dunkin' Donuts for coffee and donuts. TWO HOURS LATER, we rolled out of there and then had to come straight home to get ready for bed. Oh well, will have to get the donuts later I guess. :)

Quilt Guild

Today was a home day, we didn't really go anywhere. I spent the afternoon getting the laundry room emptied of all of the recyclables that have been waiting to be taken to the recycling center. We are going to have a bunch of stuff to get rid of. I have been debating the idea of having a yard sale, but I'm really not interested. I don't really like them, but I would like the money. :)

We went to get Mexican for supper tonight, and then went to my quilt guild meeting. This is going to be the last one for me. It's the Croatan Quilter's Guild, and it's a great bunch of ladies. The guild symbol is the Pine Tree Quilt Block, see my poorly executed Powerpoint example above. The bad part about moving is that you have to say goodbye to so many people, it really sucks. This is my mom's last night here, she'll be flying back tomorrow. Sans water bottles and drinks of course, we don't want her to get tackled going through the security checkpoints.

Sightseeing

Today was a sightseeing day and the weather was perfect for it. Mama and I woke up pretty early (for me on vacation anyway), and headed out. Stop #1 for us today was the historic waterfront in Beaufort, NC. We stopped in at some of the shops and galleries, and enjoyed the atmosphere. We were going to get lunch there, but alas none of the restaurants were serving yet, so we headed over to Atlantic Beach.

We ate lunch at the 4-Corners Diner, and then headed over to Fort Macon. Fort Macon is a Civil War era fort that has been renovated. It's a really neat place, and the scenery in the area is fantastic. After puffing up and down the stairs and being in the sun for a while, it was time to go somewhere with air conditioning.

The next stop was the North Carolina Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores, NC. It has been closed for renovation for a while, and it's the first time I have been back since then. They did a really nice job on it, and they had lots of cool stuff. There is a huge display tank with a replica of a sunken submarine and some pretty big sharks in it. They do a live diving show that would have been fun if we weren't packed in like sardines with the other 100 people trying to watch the show. The girl who was doing the talking had a voice like a perky chipmunk and I couldn't sit around and listen for too long. So we headed out to view the nature trail.

The weather was still nice, though it was a bit humid and buggy. The nature trail takes you through woods and the salt marsh areas. It was a nice shady walk, and the bugs weren't too bad. We saw some herons and dragonflies, but not many other animals. We didn't make it over the whole nature trail because it was getting on into the afternoon and both of us were ready to go home.

So that was our day, I'm thinking tomorrow might be a home day, I need some rest. :)

A Quiet Day at Home

It was a bit overcast today, and rained a little bit. We had originally planned on going to the Outer Banks today, but we decided to stay home instead. We rolled lumpia today to take to our pastor and to a friend. My mom had fun learning how to make them, and now our house smells like a lumpia. :)

For dinner tonight, I created a new recipe to use up some butternut squash that a neighbor gave to us. I haven't ever been a huge squash fan, but I figured I could come up with something pretty good. So I settled on trying to make some ravioli. As a disclaimer, I haven't ever made real ravioli so there might be a better way than the way that I did it. End of disclaimer!

This recipe is using tofu in place of the ricotta cheese and eggs that the original recipes that I modified used (please don't let that scare you off, you can't tell its there). I actually merged together a couple of different ones to come up with my own. I served this with a bottled primavera sauce from the store. I had originally planned on making a creamy tomato sauce with this one but got lazy in the end. And we do need to use up some of the food from our pantry. ;) If you don't have the smoked spanish paprika, you could get the smoky flavor by adding some bacon or ham to the filling. If you like eating pigs anyway. :) Okay, enough disclaimers, here's the recipe:

Butternut Squash Ravioli

1 small butternut squash (about 1 ½ lb.)
½ c. water
1 box firm silken tofu (12.3 oz)
Juice from 1 lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
2 Tbs. olive oil
½ c. chopped onion
1 sprig rosemary
1 Tbs. minced sage
½ tsp. smoked Spanish paprika

Wonton wrappers

2 Tbs. olive oil
Salt and Pepper

To cook butternut squash, cut squash in half lengthwise; remove seeds and pulp. Place squash cut sides down in a baking dish, and add water. Bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes or until tender when pierced with a fork, set aside to cool. Scoop out the pulp and set aside.

Put tofu and the lemon juice in a blender, process until smooth. Heat olive oil in a skillet, and sauté onion, rosemary, and sage until onion begins to brown. Combine tofu, onion mixture, squash and paprika in a small mixing bowl. Lay a wonton wrapper on a plate. Add a spoonful of squash mixture in the middle of the wrapper. Wet down the edges of the wrapper, and place a second wrapper on top. Press edges to seal, trying to get out air bubbles as much as possible. Try to make sure that the squash mixture doesn’t get out to the edge.

When you are ready to cook the ravioli, heat a pot of water on the stove and bring it to a simmer. Do not boil. You can salt the water at this point if you want to. Add ravioli 4 or 5 at a time, and cook for about 3 minutes. Remove from the water and drain. When ravioli are done, heat olive oil in a skillet, and sauté the ravioli for a minute or two on each side until they start to brown. Remove from the skillet and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Yadda, yadda, yadda

Did more packing, did more cleaning, yadda yadda yadda. It's easy to fall into monotony with that part. :) I was working on getting the house straightened up for a realtor stopping by to check the place out. I got Box #2 packed and it is full of books, I'm either going to have to get a crane to move it or repack it to make it lighter. One or the other. ;) I used my home-repairwoman skeelz today and replaced the stopper in the bathroom sink. Go figure that I finally fix the annoying lack of a sink stopper when we are moving. Funny how you wait to fix things until you are selling to someone else. Okay, you may not but I do.

So I needed to cook something for breakfast this morning, and I decided to do a refrigerator cleaning out. It was kind of overcast and rainy today, so it put me in the mood for something fall-like. It would be pretty flexible, and you could add whatever you needed to use up. Here's what I came up with:

Spicy Autumn Hash

2 veggie sausage patties (I used Morningstar Farms, you could use regular pork sausage if you'd prefer)
1-2 Tbs. olive oil
1 carrot, peeled, washed and chopped
2 potatoes, peeled, washed and chopped
1/2 c. chopped onion
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 c. chopped cabbage
1 poblano pepper, seeded, and diced
1 tsp. smoked spanish paprika (adds a nice smoky taste, optional)
1/2 tsp. dried sage
1/2 tsp. dried thyme

Fry sausage patties in a non-stick skillet according to package instructions. Remove patties and chop up, set aside. Add 1-2 Tbs of olive oil into the skillet, and add carrot, potatoes, onion, salt and pepper. Toss to coat, turn the heat down a bit, and cover. Cook for about 10 minutes, or until the vegetables just start to soften up. Add the remaining ingredients, toss to combine. Re-cover and cook for about five more minutes. Remove cover and continue to cook until vegetables reach the desired level of tenderness. Add the sausage crumbles in the last few minutes of cooking.

Box #1

Today is a milestone in our move, I got Box #1 packed. :) We got up pretty early this morning, and went to Lowe's to get packing boxes/papers and got some groceries. I started packing up the kitchen and living room decorations, and got the first one out of the way. I've been taking my time and dusting and cleaning everything off before I pack it so that I don't have to do it at the other end. I also did some cleaning on windows and the kitchen area too. I have some repairs to start working on - replacing the stopper in the bathroom sink, touching up the master bathroom walls and doing some painting, but I'm more worried about getting the rooms emptied of stuff before I start in on all of that. We have a realtor coming by to take a look at the place tomorrow, to give us an idea of the things that we are going to need to do. It's pretty busy, but it's also been a lot of fun. My mom and I have been hanging out, the visit has been going well.

For dinner tonight, I made a quinoa salad, which turned out really good. Basically I just make a pasta salad and substitute the quinoa for pasta. The smoked paprika gives it a nice smoky flavor. The vinaigrette is one that I just eyeballed the measurements, but any of your favorite dressings will work. Here's the recipe:

Quinoa Salad

1 c. quinoa
2 c. vegetable stock (or water)
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 bell pepper, seeded and diced
1 cucumber, seeds removed and diced
1 small container cherry tomatoes, quartered
6-7 green onions, rinsed and thinly sliced
1 Tbs. fresh cilantro, finely chopped
Juice of one lime
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 Tbs. white wine vinegar
Salt & Pepper to taste
Sugar to taste (about 1 tsp or so is right for me)
1/4 tsp. smoked spanish paprika

In a medium-sized saucepan, add quinoa and stock. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer covered for 15 minutes. Check quinoa to make sure that it is done, it may need to be cooked slightly longer. Add the next 5 ingredients (black beans through green onions) into a large mixing bowl. Whisk the remaining ingredients in a small bowl. Add quinoa to the vegetables, cover with dressing and toss to combine. Can either be served chilled or at room temperature.

Scrubbing and Laundry and Dishes, oh My!

Today was a pretty busy day, I actually got up early (for me on a vacation day). I spent some quality time scrubbing down bathroom walls and removing mineral buildup. I also caught up on the laundry that I didn't get done while we were gone this weekend. What a great way to spend vacation time! My mom got here today for her visit, it was the first time that she has flown. She really enjoyed it, and made it through the flight just fine. The flight was delayed by 45 minutes and I was positive that she had gone nuts on the plane and they had to turn around to drop her off. But she made it through. :) Wasn't a very productive afternoon otherwise, but I have a full schedule planned for tomorrow. Lots of cleaning and starting to pack, should be interesting.

A Weekend with Jack Benny

We made it back in from Alabama this afternoon, just in time for the home inspectors to come. Results are still unknown, we're hoping to hear something by tomorrow on it. The trip was pretty fun, it was perfect driving weather for the most part. Northeastern Alabama is very beautiful, it reminds me very much of where I am from in Arkansas. Hills, lots of green and a nice big lake. Our friends had recently closed on their own house, and it adjoins a neighbors lot where Mr. Benny above grazes with a horse named Strawberry. The two of them provided lots of entertainment to watch.

So we are pretty pooped today, I wanted nothing more than to take a nap when we got home, but demands from the real world called. Looks like it is going to be an early night. :)

On the Road Again

It's been a pretty busy day today, I was down in Jacksonville and didn't get home until late (1 hour drive from home). We had to finish with the bathroom plumbing repairs, which had me crawling around under the house again. It really isn't too bad since we had the plastic vapor barrier put down underneath and don't have to crawl on the dirt. If it weren't for all of the dead bugs it wouldn't be too bad. :P Yummy chinese take-out tonight, we were both feeling pretty lazy with the heat and all.

We have been getting the house in order for our scouting trip to AL this weekend. McCrankypants is going to be kind enough to check in and feed my boys while we are gone. We are straightening up in case the home inspector comes while we are gone. When we get back Tuesday, my mom will be here for her visit the next day, so it'll be a busy time. Hopefully all will go well. Pictures forthcoming. :)

Roses

It has been really HOT here lately. So much so that you don't want to go outside anymore than you can help. It's like stepping out into a sauna. So when I get home I run out, take a quick look around to feed the fish, see if anything needs to be watered, and then run right back into the house. Today I had to do some watering, the pond in a box was drying out, and the potted plants looked pretty dejected. I do have some beautiful blooms on my roses though, and the garden area is looking pretty. It's kind of sad to be leaving behind roses again, I left some up in Quantico when we left there also. The ones here have been doing very good,and I have been inundating family and friends with pictures of the same rose bushes with slightly different flower positioning since spring started.

My mission tonight is to do some more decluttering (I've gotten a bit off schedule, so I have to hop back on the wagon). I've still been getting urges to bake like a madman, I think that doing domestic things like that gives stability in the middle of a bunch of change, which might be why I've been wanting to do it. Tonight I'm doing an experiment with some banana oatmeal cookies to use up the bananas that have been sitting on the table getting spotted. It didn't look too promising though, came out more like muffin batter than cookie dough. So I put it in mini-muffin pans and they are in the oven now. Not sure if they are going to need to get tossed or not.

Update: Okay, so I should have more faith in recipes, the muffins turned out okay so I made the rest into cookies. The cookies were very good, very chewy and yummy. The banana flavor isn't overwhelming, and it tasted butterscotchy. I like making new words. :) This recipe is adapted from the Aunt Bee's Mayberry Cookbook.

Banana Oatmeal Cookies

1/3 c. canola oil
1 c. firmly packed brown sugar
3 bananas, mashed (approximately 1 ¼ c.)
½ tsp. vanilla extract
1 ½ c. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. cinnamon
½ tsp. baking soda
½ tsp. salt
1 c. oatmeal

Grease 2 cookie sheets. In a large bowl, mix oil and sugar with a whisk until blended. Add the banana and vanilla, mix until well blended. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt, whisk to combine. Add the flour and oats to the wet ingredients, and mix until blended. Drop by the tablespoon onto the prepared cookie sheets, spacing about 2 inches apart. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 12 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

I usually make my cookies really big, so mine were dropped by the ¼ c. full. Make sure that you do grease the pan well, because they are not oily cookies.

Socks

I didn't get very much done this evening, because I've been taking a knitting class on Monday evenings. I admit that I'm a geek and was totally enchanted by a book of folk socks. Making socks is probably one of the most boring and mundane things that most people could think of making, but I think it would be awesome to be able to produce something useful out of a ball of yarn and two sticks. Okay, four sticks because you knit socks on four double-pointed needles. Tonight was the last knitting class for me, and I finally cast on my first pair. Okay, that's a lie, I actually tried to cast them on this weekend but kept having to rip them back apart because I have the attention span of a four year old and kept losing count of stitches. But this evening I sort of did better, and you see my effort thus far. We are driving down to Alabama this weekend and that gives me 13 hours of sock knitting productivity BOTH WAYS. Minus nap time of course. :)

P. S. The cake was a hit at work today, I brought home an empty container. Things don't last long once the engineers find them. I think that when the first one discovers food, they lay down a chemical scent like ants to lead the rest of them to it. I did decide that using the banana as an egg replacer does work, but the amount of sugar should be reduced a bit because it was just slightly too sweet for my liking. So maybe I'd try 3/4 cup instead of 1 cup.

Pond in a Box

I have really been enjoying my ponds, and one of the priorities that I have is to set up one at our new place. Aside from the liner, pond plants are one of the biggest expenses in your setup and I wanted to take some of my existing ones with me. So today I went out and divided them and have them wrapped up for their journey. Our smaller pond had gotten very overgrown, so it was a pretty mucky job. So this is going to be the seed for a new pond. Unfortunately I can't take my fish with me because of the distance. :( My box contains: butterfly ginger, horsetails, purple and yellow irises, pickerel rush, umbrella palm, and a water lily. The water lily is one that I bought on eBay, it has dark pink flowers and maroon lily pads.

Notice how I didn't mention that I had water clover in my box? I thought it was really cute the way that the little four leaf clovers floated on the surfact. And they are, but they send out runners EVERYWHERE. I tore out every bit of it that I could find, but I'm sure there are still scraps of it that will grow out. At least I won't be here to see it. >D

So tonight I baked a Pineapple-Banana Nut Snack Cake. It is part of my experiments with egg-free baking. It smells absolutely divine! I'm going to take some in to work tomorrow. Here's the recipe, adapted from the Aunt Bee's Mayberry Cookbook:

Pineapple-Banana Nut Snack Cake

1 ½ c. all-purpose flour
¾ tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. Cinnamon
1 c. sugar
½ tsp. salt
¾ c. oil
¾ c. crushed pineapple with juice
1 banana, mashed well
1 c. banana, diced
¾ tsp. vanilla extract
½ c. chopped pecans

Grease a 9-inch square cake pan. In a large bowl sift together the flour and baking soda. Add the cinnamon, sugar and salt. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and add the oil, pineapple, bananas and vanilla. Stir to blend, but do not use a mixer. Fold the pecans into the batter. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.


It came out really good, but make sure that your pan is 9-INCH. I used an 8x8 pan instead (it's not like it was marked), and when I pulled the cake out at the end of 30 minutes it still jiggled in the middle. If all you have is an 8x8, you can do what I did which is to cover it with aluminum foil and bake for an additional 15 minutes or so until a toothpick comes out clean.

Countdown - 28 days

We are 28 days out from our planned move to Alabama. Our neighbor across the street is buying our house, and everything seems to be going smoothly (knock on a sylvan's head). We spent the afternoon outside working on whipping the back yard into shape. It's been raining quite a bit lately, and it's been like a jungle out there. I did the weed whacking while D. mowed. It's been cooling off slightly in the later afternoon, so it wasn't too bad.

I agreed to help one of the ladies at church make a quilt for the fall harvest festival. Unfortunately I'd already committed to it before I found out about the move. So I got my required block rows put together earlier today. I am also working on a TOP SEKRIT project that I've been having fun with.

So one of my favorite dishes to get at the Mexican restaurant is one of their vegetarian platters with a potato burrito. I like them a lot, but they way that they cook it is not consistent from one visit to the next. Sometimes it is plain, sometimes greasy, and sometimes good. So I have been wanting to figure out how to make my own, without using dairy products. I made some tonight for supper and they turned out pretty good. Very spicy. I'm going to be making friends with my Tum's bottle tonight. :( Here's the recipe I used for the filling:

Spicy Potato Burrito Filling
1 Tbs. canola oil
1 onion, chopped
4 c. potatoes (plus or minus), sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 can Rotel tomatoes or other brand of canned tomatoes with green chiles
1-2 tsp. brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp. smoked spanish paprika
1 jalapeno pepper, finely chopped
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 c. green onions, thinly sliced
1/4 c. cilantro, chopped

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Place the skillet over medium heat and add canola oil. Add the onion and saute until onions begin to brown. Add the potatoes and toss to combine. Cover tightly and bake until potatoes are tender, 15-20 minutes. Remove skillet from the oven.

Uncover and add the tomatoes, brown sugar, paprika, jalapeno, salt and pepper. Add a little extra water if it looks too dry. Place on stovetop over medium heat. Cook, stirring often, for 10 minutes. Add green onions and cilantro, toss to combine. Remove from heat and serve.


I really tried to take a picture of it to post, because it makes a very pretty filling, but my camera doesn't take pictures well inside. My house is too dim and all of the pictures came out looking like baby poo. I'll have to make efforts to do better. :)

Goblins in my Garden

So most normal people have gnomes in their garden, helpful sorts that keep pests out and keep some order in. Not me, I have goblins in mine. They kill plants overnight, bring in ants and slugs, and set up tacky ornaments to ruin my reputation as a serious gardener. This isn't necessarily a gardening blog, but I do plan to bore people with my poor garden photography. We are getting ready to move soon and I want it to help me keep in touch with my friends. So, without further ado, here is my first ever attempt at blogging. :)

This is my lotus plant that finally bloomed this summer, my most impressive gardening accomplishment to date. ;)