Tag: food

Party Posts · Recipe Roundup

Party, Party!

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We had our Big Summer Blowout a couple of weeks ago and I have not had a chance to blog about it. We had some exciting times before it and I learned a good lesson about asking other people for help and actually getting things done ahead of time. We had water in the basement the night before the party and I hadn’t started more than one thing.

There were several panicked texts to friends and one of them even baked the Husband some lovely chocolate chip cookies!

Here’s the table pictures:

I think there are more, but the Husband took the pictures for me and I forgot to specify.

I made a couple of new recipes for the party and some older ones. I made an enormous bowl of pico for the Husband. The biggest Pyrex bowl we have was pressed into service and the Husband was super happy.

It was full of garden tomatoes and jalepenos! I had four kinds of tomatoes. Yellow tomatoes, Cherokee purple, Romas, and some cherry tomatoes. It was delicious and not too spicy.

I also made a fruit pizza! I used a couple of different recipes, one of which was the crust from this recipe: https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/fruit-pizza/

I used the Pampered Chef pizza stone and it was delicious! I did jazz up the cream cheese by adding orange extract and zest to it.

It does indeed look it was bitten… We’ll just pretend that I was going for the “monster ate it” look…

We also had vanilla cupcakes that were supposed to be toadstools, but turned into watermelon. What can I say? Cupcake decorating isn’t really my strong suit.

They had pineapple sage jam in the middle. I did use a really good buttercream recipe from this website: https://www.bakedbyanintrovert.com/basic-vanilla-buttercream-frosting/

It was pretty delicious frosting and I would definitely make it again. The cupcakes were a white cake recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens book.

We also had two different types of cheesecake bars, but I don’t have a good picture of them. One was Oreo Cheesecake and the second one was Chocolate Covered Key Lime bars. I can’t find the Oreo Cheesecake recipe, which I swore I put on my Pinterest. Hmm… I’ll keep looking about it. Here is the Key Lime cheesecake recipe though.

https://www.barbarabakes.com/chocolate-covered-key-lime-cheesecake-bites/

I made homemade pickles from one of the summer Food Network magazines and they were pretty good. Had to have a good pickle tray, after all!

We tried Puff Pastry cheese swirls, but I didn’t really like them. I just put cheese and spices in puff pastry and baked it for around 20 minutes. Perhaps you will have better luck with experimenting.

We had a meat and cheese tray, crackers, little pigs in blankets, and a friend also brought a veggie tray with hummus and pita chips.

It was a very fun party! We enjoyed our friends’ company and are looking forward to having more company in the fall. Fancy, of course, adored the company.

I’m attempting to get my blogging back in order. We have been very busy lately. Also, I have developed sewing related tendonitis and have been having difficulty keeping up with my responsibilities when they mean moving my thumb much. Wish me luck for a fast recovery. Maybe send the Husband Legos too, to help him deal with me not being able to sew!

Recipe and Cookbook Review
Life Posts · Recipe Roundup

Recipe and Cookbook Review

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I promise we have still been eating! It’s taking a little while to get back to normal. This week we will be having smaller meals because we have party leftovers and we’re going visiting at the end of the week, so don’t need leftovers for the weekend. We’re leaving Fancy with a friend who’s housesitting for us though, so she might be persuaded to eat some delicious leftovers if need be. 🙂

The featured picture is our Anniversary ice cream. 🙂 The Husband had a Cookie Dough Frostbite (Like a DQ Blizzard,) and I had the Margarita ice cream. They were both good and we were in the store where we took our wedding pictures. 🙂

I haven’t picked a new cookbook to focus on lately, but we did use The Joy Of Chinese Cooking by Lo Mei Hing a few weeks ago. I’ve used this cookbook before, but there were a couple of new recipes that I thought we could try. The book is older, so ignore the part of every recipe where it says to add MSG. It’s got good pictures and very detailed instructions. Oddly, there are only about 10 beef recipes in the whole book, I think. It’s quite a thick book too. We tried the “5 Color Shau Mai,” but only used three colors. We used imitation crab, bok choy, and mushrooms for the color toppings. The recipe also included instructions for scrambled eggs and seaweed, neither of which sounded good.

They were kind of bland and we liked our normal dumpling recipe better. We used chicken instead of pork.

We tried one of the fried noodle recipes and it turned out pretty close to the restaurant version, although we used different noodles.

It was pretty good and we would try to make them again.

We also used the “Beef with Green Peppers” recipe, but I added a bunch more veggies. Also only sort of, maybe, kind of followed the recipe?

It was a pretty good stir fry. We’ll keep the book, because it has some interesting looking recipes in it, but I will need to go with my instincts on when to change things around.

Rounding out our Chinese food journey was a Shrimp Stir Fry and an Asian Meatball recipe from Gimme Some Oven.

https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/saucy-asian-meatballs/

The Husband ate his plain, but I sauteed a veggie mix that I had in the fridge to go with mine. We liked them and might make them again. (So, we didn’t have these on the same night, despite having the same bowl for all three of them…)

We’ve also had some staples, like Tequilla Lime Chicken and Pico, Spaghetti, and Pizza. The potatoes in the first picture were thinly sliced and roasted with the Galena Street Rub from Penzy’s and some olive oil. The chicken looks oddly pink, but I think it must have been a little frozen when we put it in. It was cooked properly.

This pizza is a white pizza with chicken sausage, mushrooms, and onions. It was delicious! I didn’t used a recipe, just made a garlicky white sauce and slapped it on.

The spaghetti was the Husband’s suggestion when I had to go out of town suddenly. He ate for most of the week, so we probably won’t have spaghetti anytime soon.

I tried a couple of new breakfast items. Blueberry Banana Bread from the Pillsbury: Best Muffins and Quick Breads cookbook, and a Cinnamon Coffee Cake Recipe from Baking Unplugged by Nicole Rees. Both were yummy!

I would make both again. The Husband didn’t really care for either of them, so I might only make half a recipe in the future.

We have had a couple of good storebought meals too, which I do need to remind myself, count as actual meals as well. One of the things I’m working on is not beating myself up when I’m just not able, due to scheduling, illness, etc, to actually cook.

Two of those meals were these Panko Crusted Shrimp from Costco and Crab Cakes and a salad from Aldi. I think we had both of these during Shark Week!

Also pictured with the shrimp are Kung Pao Chicken mini egg rolls, cilantro rice, a pear, and a yellow garden tomato.

For a belated Shark Week recipe, we had “Shrimp and Scallops in a Creamy Garlic Sauce” from chef Robert Irvine on Food Network.

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/robert-irvine/shrimp-and-scallops-in-garlic-cream-sauce-recipe-2014083

It was good, although we used Bay Scallops rather than Sea Scallops. They are smaller and less expensive. I didn’t like it as much as I might have, but I am in a little bit of a food funk and didn’t really want to cook that night, which is probably why.

We did have a party on Sunday, but I am falling asleep, so will detail that post and the Husband’s birthday meals in a different post. For now, here’s a picture of my very alcoholic Shark Week drink, which I have lost the recipe for.

It was pretty much rum, blue carauco, and sprite, I think. Possibly orange juice as well? I’ll see if I can find the recipe. It was pretty delicious, but at one point the gummy shark had so much booze it flipped over upside down… Whoops!

Before I do the same, I will say goodnight!

Gardening Meals!
Gardening · Recipe Roundup

Gardening Meals!

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I love having a garden! I inherited some of that from both Grandpas and it was encouraged and fostered by my Mom. My Grandpa Ollie was a missionary Papua New Guinea who helped with agriculture. My Grandpa Ed was a fabulous gardener and I remember seeing his garden as a kid. I have very fond memories of gardening with Mom in the summer. Mmm… tomatoes fresh from the garden, pea pods off the vine, crunchy carrots, and raspberries! Now I have both garden plants and some very pretty flowers that I do absolutely nothing with. It’s a nice balance. The featured picture is our hydrangeas by our front door.

I have started to get some produce from the garden! I was getting worried, but went out to check and found some cherry tomatoes! I also have peppers to use in pico.

We’re talking about putting in another garden bed for next year, which I think will house the things with vines. I’ve gotten only two tiny baby zucchini this year from my plant. It doesn’t like being in a pot apparently.

Speaking of baby zukes, I had both of them sautéed in olive oil with some Sandwich Sprinkle with the rest of my garden haul tonight for dinner. We also had steak and mashed redskin potatoes.

It was delicious! I could have cooked the steak a tiny bit less, but I was distracted by apple recipes. I suddenly have a surplus, which will be turned into crockpot applesauce tomorrow.

I have officially used the Sandwich Sprinkle on a sandwich! I’ll give you a minute to absorb that information. 🙂 I even took a picture of it to prove it. It did add a bit of zing to the sandwich. I definitely need a bigger jar of it though!

I had fruit salad along with it. I’m a fruit monster in the summer and wanted all the fruit!

We had pizzas made with fancy things too. I used a pizza dough recipe that didn’t require a long rise time from The Kitchn. https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-pizza-dough-recipe-221367

It did rise for a couple of hours at least. The Husband had mushroom and ham with fresh mozzarella. I had a lovely Margherita Pizza with fresh tomatoes, fresh basil, and fresh mozzarella. The recipe was also from The Kitchn. https://www.thekitchn.com/easy-recipe-classic-margherita-pizza-recipes-from-the-kitchn-174103

They were both lovely! The crust for mine was baked on an upside down cookie sheet, which made it super crunchy. The Husband’s was also nice and crispy, but I used the pizza stone instead.

Here’s some pictures of the rest of the garden as well. Herbs, tomatoes, radishes, and carrots.

Oh! We have strawberries!

I’m excitedly waiting for them to turn red so we can get them before the squirrels! We don’t always have good luck with that. Things are growing pretty well. I have to re-stake some tomato plants. They’re falling over with the weight of the tomatoes. Next year, I will get some cages and will hopefully be better prepared.

For now though, I will leave you with this very relaxing picture of Fancy. I hope your night is as lovely as her nap was. Good night!

Recipe Review and Cookbook Spotlight
Cookbook Review · Recipe Roundup

Recipe Review and Cookbook Spotlight

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Hello! I have a new cookbook to feature along with some recipes for this post!

I used Michael Symon’s cookbook 5 In 5 a lot in the past couple of weeks with great success!

It has a lot of different sections, including desserts! The recipes are easy to use and pretty much all have only five ingredients. There’s a section at the front of the book that details flavor profiles for different proteins. The pictures are very clear and bright and look very enticing.

The only thing I noticed that can be confusing is that sometimes things like water, or salt and pepper, are only included in the recipe itself instead of the ingredient list.

The first section we used was the “Pasta” section. We had the Spaghetti With Olive Oil, Garlic, and Red Pepper Flakes. We ate it as a side with a marinated turkey breast from the store.

It was pretty spicy! I wouldn’t make it as a full dinner, but it worked well for a side. The turkey looked oddly like salmon, but tasted okay.

We also used a kebab recipe from the “On a Stick” chapter for a fun weekend with some friends. No pictures because we were too hungry to take them. We used the Sirloin with Lemon and Oregano recipe and enjoyed it. They were surprisingly good for only being marinated for a short amount of time.

We tried a steak recipe, Beef Tri-tip with Spicy Peppers, from the “Man with a Pan” section. It called for Tri-Tip, but the only one we could find was already marinated, so we used strip steak instead.

I got super confused thinking it was a stir fry and it was definitely not. It was quite tasty though, even with the wrong cut of steak. We would make this again maybe, but would reduce the peppers. We ate it with cilantro rice.

We used another steak recipe on the grill too from the book. Grilled Skirt Steak with grilled portobellos, corn, and a raw zucchini salad recipe, also from the book.

I wouldn’t make the zucchini salad again. I don’t know if my proportions were off or what, but I didn’t like it all that much. Too much oil, I think.

My favorite recipe was a Whiskey Caramel Sauce from the “I Scream, You Scream” section. I would like to eat all the sauces from this section. They all sound mouthwatering! I had underripe peaches for the 4th and 5th, so we couldn’t try the Grilled Peaches and Honey recipe, but it’s on my list. I stole this picture from a friend.

So those are all the recipes from this cookbook. There’s a lot of fish recipes, but also some shrimp and chicken ones. I’m excited to keep trying them.

In other food news, we had fried chicken from Fried and True. It was the Loveless Cafe recipe and we used boneless, skinless chicken breasts and thighs.

We also had Parmesan Chipotle potato wedges and a salad. Everyone enjoyed it. It has a very thin coating on it, but did end up with a good crust. We would eat it again. I might even remember to wear an apron next time!

We tried the Strawberry Cheesecake Pie with Raspberries instead and it didn’t set up as well. We will stick to the Strawberry version, but it was still tasty.

I was also homesick for my old summer camp and made Oreo pudding. Not very appetizing to look at, but delicious!

We’re looking forward to trying some new things this week too. Hope this made you hungry!

Tuesday Treats
Gardening · Party Posts · Recipe Roundup

Tuesday Treats

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We’ve had some exciting new recipes lately and a few older favorites. With my schedule stabilizing, I have been able to do a bit more meal planning, along with adding an “on your own” day permanently into the rotation. That has been super helpful for Wednesdays or Thursdays. The Husband has been requesting more dishes too, which helps. Today we had chicken pot pie over noodles, which we haven’t had in a while. I was hungry, so forgot to take a full picture!

I loudly and snottily announced that I was going out to the garden to pick fresh herbs and the Husband laughed at me, but then told me that I should probably be Instagramming the whole experience. I was the one laughing then. Silly Husband! I was not Instagram dressed! They did look really pretty cooking down with the onions though.

The potpie was made with leftover chicken from this dinner:

Herb Butter Baked Chicken Breasts with Stovetop Stuffing and roasted carrots. I used the Sandwich Sprinkle on the carrots (seriously, I need a bigger jar of it) and fresh garden herbs for the butter.

Rosemary, thyme, sage, basil, and oregano were all included. I actually used some lemon thyme and basil in my strawberry shortcake, which we had for dessert.

This was the lemon thyme batch. It needed a little more herb in it, but it had a subtle lemony taste. The basil one came out much stronger, but basil is a stronger herb in general. I’ve been eating that one over yogurt too and it’s delicious!

So why all the strawberry things, you might ask? I dragged the Husband (yes, dragged, he doesn’t enjoy it) picking with me on Sunday after a panic moment of “what if they run out?!” We may have helped with that. We picked in between 12-13 pounds!

We tried a new farm, but didn’t like it as much, so will stick with the old one if we go together again. I might go on my own one more time, but I can also just pick some up from the farm market. I have a back quartered for eating or jam, and a batch left whole in the freezer. We have some to eat fresh in the fridge and some as shortcake. The shortcake ones will probably be made into jam, as they need to be used up quickly.

I also made this:

Is your mouth watering yet? No? Here, try this picture instead:

MMMMMMM! This recipe is soo good! I found it online at Pumpkin Inn Spice. https://www.pumpkinnspice.com/strawberry-pound-cake/. There were lots of delicious looking recipes, but this one said it was one bowl and that was good enough for me! I finally used the Bundt pan that Mom got me for Christmas.

I have a Strawberry Cheesecake Pie in the fridge that I’m super excited about too. I tasted the filling and man, oh man! I could have eaten it like a pudding! I’m looking forward to trying it tomorrow after it has set.

I’m still plotting what to do with the jam strawberries. I know I want to make Strawberry Rhubarb and I want to try an InstantPot Jam recipe too. We’ll see how ambitious I get.

We had a mental health professional game night this week and I forgot to get any pictures! We were having too much fun! I did make some things for it. We had a Caramelized Onion dip (https://pinchofyum.com/onion-dip) and pico. K brought a Chicken Bacon Ranch Dip. Of course, we had a veggie tray for the hummus, but no pickles. It wasn’t a formal party, Mom! I didn’t need the pickles! I made sure to tell everyone that I had some though, if they wanted them… 😉 I also made Chocolate Fondue for a dessert dip. We ended up just talking instead of playing the second game, which I think says a lot about the group of friends we have. 🙂

Oh, I did get a picture of the drink I made for the party the next day. I used the basil to make Basil Lemonade from Southern Living: Little Jars, Big Flavors. I have wanted to make that since I got the book, but my basil did not do well last year. You make a simple syrup infused with basil and then make up the lemonade.

It was deliciously tart and then mellowed over the course of the day. I will definitely be making more. You could taste the basil, but it wasn’t super overwhelming, which can happen with basil. It was so good!

We had cream sauce over pasta this week too. Since the Husband has convinced me that I can use up the half gallon of cream from Costco, I have been using it a lot more to be my go to meal.

Mine had asparagus added, but the Husband had the plain one mushrooms and the Sandwich Sprinkle. Gosh, I might need a spice intervention here! It’s just so useful! It has Italian herbs, salt, pepper, and garlic! Basically everything that runs in my cooking veins, I think. Eventually, I promise to use it on an actual sandwich! Knowing how things go, I’ll probably end up hating it in a sandwich. 🙂

I forgot to share this recipe, I think. Pardon me, if I have done so before. This is Balela Salad from Reluctant Entertainer. https://reluctantentertainer.com/balela-salad/

I had this first at Trader Joes and liked it so much that I decided to make my own. Lo and behold, I had actually pinned a recipe a long time ago! I used fresh parsley and basil in this. I didn’t have mint, so left it out. I had this at my sewing day with a friend and it was yummy! I would definitely make this again.

We had slow cooker BBQ flank steak tacos this week. I had them the second time as tostados, but I think I really wanted puffy tacos instead. For the leftovers, I added green enchilada sauce in a skillet and rewarmed it basically. We liked the meat. It was nice and tender. I was at work the first night, so only have a picture of the tostados. The Husband stuck with tacos.

I didn’t use a recipe for either dish, just threw things in the slow cooker or pan and added a few spices. Surprisingly, not the Sandwich Sprinkle! 😉

I think that’s all the foods since the last food post. Stay tuned for more strawberry recipes soon. I still have a bunch to use up!

With that, I’m off to dream strawberry dreams! Have a sweet night!

Future Food- Garden Update
Gardening · Life Posts

Future Food- Garden Update

LSieh2 Comments

We have had so much rain lately that the garden is growing pretty much every time you look away from it. I also haven’t had to water it very much at all, but finally remembered to today. We are using the herbs pretty regularly. Tomorrow for our Game Night, we are using some of the basil for lemonade. 🙂

I have massive amounts of all herbs that I think I will start freezing to encourage new herb growth. I’m always a little afraid to harvest them because I might run out, which is, of course, silly. Here are the latest pictures:

The basil box. My purple basil is coming back nicely.

Parsley, rosemary, lemon myrtle, and oregano. I used the rosemary on the lamb rack this week already.

The Sages are growing well. I have plans to use a bunch of the herbs in butter for a big chicken dinner on Sunday. You can see the thyme in the picture as well. The lemon thyme has tiny purple flowers on it that are also edible.

I want to try drying the lemon myrtle, lemon thyme, and pineapple sage for tea mixes. Maybe Sunday will be an herb drying day!

The tomatoes are growing very well. I’m pretty sure one of the second batch of seeds I planted is growing, which is nice. The poor little yellow tomato plant on the end isn’t growing very well. I think the bigger plants are stealing all the nutrients. I gave it some tomato food and some crunched up egg shells. Hopefully that will help. The bigger yellow tomato is doing very well.

My beans and pepper bed is looking well. I have radishes, bok choy, rainbow chard, and carrots coming up as well. It sorely needs a weeding though, but I’m not entirely sure what is a weed and what’s not.

I saved the best news for last! (Although I’m sure I’ll get a phone call from my Dad saying otherwise.) The zucchini plant has five baby zukes on it! I couldn’t get a picture of all of them, but I’m super excited. I’m going to be harvesting these as smaller ones so that I can maybe get some more production this year. It seems to really like the pot, so I will plan on continuing to grow them this way.

I hope you enjoyed seeing our garden! I’m very excited to see that even though I kill houseplants, I can keep a garden alive at least. Maybe there’s hope for the houseplants yet! On that note, I should probably go check the one I have managed to keep alive!

Have a lovely night!

Monday Munchies
Gardening · Recipe Roundup

Monday Munchies

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Sorry for missing Simple Sunday. I had a very bad migraine and screens were making my vision double, so I couldn’t concentrate enough to pick a topic or see to find quotes. I’ll do a Wordy Wednesday post with some pictures and quotes later this week.

I was going through my food pictures though and realized that we have been having a lot of delicious meals. The featured picture is Fancy at our dinner tonight. She was very hopeful that she would get some and was very sad to only get her own dinner. We both seem to be out of our food funk, so even though meal planning has been haphazard, we have made it work.

Tonight, for example, we were supposed to eat yesterday, but the Husband had to go into work. Apparently bad things happen to electronics if the power goes out? 😉 He had to go make sure everything turned on okay. I knew there was no way I was going to make this just for me, so we had a very fancy dinner on a Monday. May I present Garlic and Rosemary Crusted Rack of Lamb?

Rosemary from the garden, olive oil, and garlic made up the crust. I completely forgot salt and pepper and neither of us noticed. Here is the recipe I used. https://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/garlic-crusted-roast-rack-lamb

It was very good. Sometimes I don’t enjoy lamb, but this one was much milder than normal and tasted more of herbs than the gamey taste it can get. I think I cooked it just to done, not overly done too, so that was good. We had cheddar biscuits from the Red Lobster mix and I had asparagus as well. I also tried mango sprinkled with Pico De Fruita from Penzey’s.

It’s a spicy seasoning for fresh juicy fruits like mango and peaches. It has a surprising bite, but did give another layer of flavor. I might try this in a fruit salad with mangos and strawberries and see how it is. I think it would be good on grilled pineapple too, which I do plan on making this summer.

Side note, how is it suddenly summer? I still haven’t managed to completely switch my heavier clothes out of my drawers and have realized how many tank tops I need, but don’t have! Luckily, I have a couple of patterns to try, but that’s another story. Back to food!

We have grilled again this last week, on the one day it didn’t rain! Now that I’m home earlier on Monday and Tuesday, dinner can be a little more fun. We had grilled steak kebabs!

I would say I followed a recipe, but my parents told me never to lie. 😉 I did use the cook time in a Food Network magazine, but used our own ingredients and spices. They were seasoned with Sandwich Sprinkle from Penzey’s, which I have used on approximately 10 things, none of which are sandwiches… It’s basically Italian Seasoning, garlic, salt and pepper, if you wanted to try to recreate it. My kebabs were the ones with tomatoes and peppers. The Husband had manly kebabs- no veggies allowed, just meat and starch. They were delicious! We will definitely be making them again. Kebab all the things!

We have had a couple of fancier breakfasts too, not just dinners! I made the sour cream muffins from a couple of weeks ago with blueberries instead of chocolate chips.

They were good, but I think I liked the chocolate chip ones better. The Husband tried the blueberry ones and did like them. He’s not a huge breakfast eater.

I made these egg cups this morning in an effort to eat more protein to ward off migraines. Newsflash, it didn’t work, but they were a good breakfast. They would be a good lunch too.

They are filled with chicken breakfast sausage, red peppers, green onions, mushrooms, and fresh parsley, oregano, and basil. I forgot to add cheese and any spices, including salt and pepper. My brain was having fits this morning. They’re still pretty tasty though. The Husband will hopefully help me eat them. I had them with cinnamon toast, but had eaten in stages this morning, so no pictures.

We had a few standbys: Shells and Cheese with veggies and chicken sausage, Creamy Shrimp Pasta, and Instant Pot Korean Beef.

The Husband had the Korean beef sauce on country style pork ribs in the crockpot, but they messed with his stomach, so I don’t think he ate them all. Too fatty, I think. We haven’t had them in forever, since it seemed like too much for him to eat on his own. He said they tasted good though, just regretted it in the morning.

We did enjoy lettuce wraps too and I had the leftover meat on a salad the next day, which was pretty delicious.

We discovered that the Husband likes Boston lettuce better that romaine, so we might switch to that. Chef’s salad is more appealing in the summer sometimes.

Another really fun new thing I tried was Pineapple Sage Lemonade!

My pineapple sage is growing like crazy and I know you can make it into tea, but the hot tea wasn’t sounding appealing in 80 degree weather, so I made lemonade instead. I looked at a recipe, which I cannot find, but in the end, just made something up. I didn’t think to grab fresh lemons at the store, so I mixed about an 1/8 th cup of lemonade concentrate with water and then added sugar to taste. I bruised and ripped up five or six pineapple sage leaves and threw them in and let it sit for a while. It turned out to be very good! There was a subtle taste of the pineapple sage and it went really well with the lemons. I am planning on trying some cocktails too. Here’s some websites if you’re interested!

https://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/pineapple-sage-tea-hot-or-iced-386388

https://punchdrink.com/recipes/pineapple-and-sage-martini/

https://www.fakefoodfree.com/pineapple-sage-bourbon-lemonade/

And some food recipes too!

http://theessentialherbal.blogspot.com/2009/05/pining-for-pineapple-sage-recipes.html

I have used the lemon thyme in my water too, which gives it a lovely flavor. I’m excited to investigate other ways to use the herbs this year, since they are all growing so well!

Fancy is being super weird about the windows. We think there’s a small animal out there taunting her, but we haven’t smelled skunk yet. I’d better go distract her before she attempts to exit the house through the window. Have a lovely (non-smelly) night!

Foodie Friday
Recipe Roundup

Foodie Friday

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Featured picture: Panko breaded shrimp with Asian sautéed veggies and berries.

Hello! We haven’t been very good about meal planning lately, so our meals have been kind of hit and miss. I tried to get pictures of most of them! My schedule at work is slowly changing for the summer and I’m going to be keeping it for the fall. I’m planning to work 10:30 – 6 on Monday and Tuesday and then 12 – 9 on Wednesday and Thursday. I’ve started scheduling actual dinner breaks at work, which has been helpful.

I brought this pasta salad for one of those dinner breaks this week. I bought sea creature and dinosaur themed pasta last week. Definitely not a reaction to the Husband getting a new used car and car payment at all… Obviously we need the sharks for Shark Week. Plus, they were on sale and we did need pasta.

I thought it was dino-mite! Ha! I made up my own recipe for it, which is basically chop whatever veggies you want, along with some cheese (gouda and mozzarella in this case,) cubed ham (but you could use sliced lunch meat,) and add a bunch of Italian dressing. I currently have Ken’s Steakhouse Italian Vinegarette in the fridge, but I will generally just use whatever I have that’s oil based. It made a very good and quick dinner.

Another quick dinner was my mushroom cream sauce pasta with fresh herbs from the garden. I used all the basils (sweet, purple, and cinnamon) and parsley. It was delicious as usual.

We’ve had steak a couple of times. Once in the broiler because it decided to pour that day, luckily after we had finished yard work, and one on the grill.

For the broiler steak we used a marinade Recipe from Food Network Magazine, July/August 2017, by Bobby Flay. It was the Rib-eye Marinated in Garlic, Oregano, and Chilis. We left out the chilis as my stomach was not having a good time at all and I thought spicy would be way too much for it. It looked super pretty while it was marinating with all the fresh herbs. Of course, I used our own oregano for it. 🙂

We had mashed red potatoes with garlic as a side and some fruit.

The grilled steak is from the same issue of Food Network as the Rib-eye. They had a whole section on grilling different cuts of meat in that issue. The recipe was Guy Fieri’s Grilled Tequila Garlic Lime Flank Steak.

It was pretty good! Sometimes steak and I do not get along, but this one worked out well. It was fun to try grilling it too. We had grilled bok choy and grilled/roasted red potatoes. We did not eat these back to back, there was about a week in between. It’s hard to remember when exactly we ate things sometimes, so I tend to just group them as they fit.

The grilled potatoes recipe was adapted from a Grilled Potatoes and Olives recipe from the same issue. I left out the olives and lemon juice. They were just on the edge of being done when we took them off, so I did finish them in the microwave. We used our own fresh rosemary. 🙂 We’ll definitely be making these again. They were very tasty.

The Grilled Sesame Bok Choy recipe was from another Food Network Magazine, the June 2017 issue. The picture was for baby bok choy and I used regular, as that was what I had. We didn’t really like this very much. The flavor was good, but I think there were execution flaws that brought the dish down. I don’t know if I would try this again, even with the baby ones.

For dessert with our grilled steak, we had strawberry shortcake with store bought angel food cake and ice cream. The Husband really likes berries this way and it turned out well.

Our other grilling experiment was burgers with fancy toppings. I used a burger recipe from the same Food Network- June 2017, because it had a whole booklet with burger toppings in it. The Husband had gouda topped caramelized onions and mushrooms and I had homemade bbq sauce, gouda, lettuce, and french fried onions.

They were both delicious! The burgers weren’t overcooked either, still nice and juicy. I had grilled asparagus too.

I forget how much I like grilled foods, especially since it generally means that the Husband does most of the actual cooking part. 🙂 He does do an excellent job grilling. I’m hoping to do some more of it this summer.

So that’s been our food lately. We’ve had a couple of freezer meals too. The Husband had pork wontons last night. I’ve also been eating Caprese salad for lunch because in the summer I can’t get enough of it with the fresh basil. The herbs from the garden are growing really well and I need to find some recipes for the pineapple sage. I should try some as a tea, since that’s the main purpose I bought it for. I’ll let you know how it goes.

I’ve got some sewing projects to do today. I had originally planned canning, but haven’t been able to sort out my canning equipment yet, so will do it next weekend instead. It seems a little early to start, but I have some fruit in the freezer that I’m going to use up. The husband has a work thing next weekend and has to be on call all weekend, so we can’t do much anyway. It’s the perfect time to take over the kitchen!

Have a lovely weekend!

Gardening Update
Canning and Preserving · Gardening · Life Posts

Gardening Update

LSiehLeave a comment

Hello! It’s supposed to rain here all week, so I had to hurry up and get the rest of the garden planted yesterday. The Husband pulled a bunch of dead wood out of the backyard jungle and it looks like we did nothing once again. The three yard waste bags and 3 full yard waste cans belay that notion though.

We haven’t found any other morels in the yard, but we have pretty flowers popping up.

As usual, I have no idea what they are. 😁

I do, however, know what plants I actually planted! I’ll start with the herbs.

Flat Leaf Parsley- I need to chop this back so it grows more evenly.

Garden Sage and Pineapple Sage-

The pineapple sage can be used in teas and is sweeter than the regular sage.

Greek Oregano and Lemon Balm-

Lemon balm for tea and you can make a tea with oregano too, I think. We used the oregano last night to marinate rib eyes and it was delicious.

Three kinds of basil. I just couldn’t stop myself, so we have Purple Basil, Sweet Basil, and Cinnamon Basil.

I’m excited for pesto and for caprese salad. Also, Basil Lemonade!

We also have two kinds of thyme- German Thyme and Lemon Thyme.

Lemon thyme will go in my tea mixes and the German thyme will be for cooking.

We have three containers of strawberries. The ones that I planted in a stacking container haven’t sprouted yet, so no pictures of that. The other two were ones that survived the winter and I separated.

Eventually we would like to have berry bushes in big containers near the garage, but we have a few stumps to dig out first and we’re going to put gravel down too.

The tomato plants all have trellises now out of twine, but it was starting to sprinkle after I had finished them, so imagine them all with twine.

I couldn’t find Mr. Stripey or the Indigo Rose tomatoes this year, which was a bummer. I do have a Yellow Canary Cherry tomato, a Lemon Boy hybrid, a Mountain something or other, 2 Romas, a Cherokee Purple, a Juliet grape, and a Husky Red Cherry tomato. I did buy one of the super fancy tomatoes, the San Marzano tomato plant. I seem to be missing a few, but I think I might have duplicated the cherry tomatoes too. I’m hoping the twine will help keep them in check. A couple of the plants have flowers already!

The second garden bed doesn’t look super exciting yet.

I planted bush beans in the spot with the trellis, and replanted carrots along the back. There’s also Swiss chard and bok choy along the sides. Radishes along the other edge. For peppers I have a purple bell, poblano, serrano, and jalepenos. I’m thinking of trying more pepper seeds in the ground, ut if it keeps raining, I may just have to go with this. Even though there should be a good amount of stuff geowing soon, I still feel like I could be planting more. Next year, I’m starting the seeds later so they don’t die. Also, I will be using bigger plastic pots to help keep them stable longer.

I also have a zucchini and two rhubarb plants in pots. The rhubarb hasn’t grown yet, but the zucchini looks nice and healthy.

The hydrangeas in the front have blooms. I don’t know if I’m supposed to pluck them to make them grow more leaves or not, but they seem healthy.

My flamingo flock is also coming along nicely. 😂

I bought this one at a city garage sale yesterday. It was made out of pvc pipe and affixed to a paver stone. I still haven’t named it yet, but the artist made sure to tell me that I could name it whatever I wanted. He also said that because it moves a little in the wind, it might work as a pest deterrent in the garden. I’ll try anything cor the squirrels, so it might be my backyard flamingo.

This year a bunch of the local cities are holding rummage sales in parking garages or other city areas and it’s very convenient. It’s a weird mix of vendors and items, but worked out for us yesterday. We found two Wii games, the flamingo, and I got some Lego pieces for work. There’s a couple more coming up, so we might go see what we can find. 🙂

Fancy has been excited about the warmer weather. She likes it when our windows are open and she can smell all the things happening. She’s also helpful when we are messing with sticks. This is her, after the kids across the street went back inside.

I’ve started my canning prep list and am going to try to start having at least one canning/freezer prep day every couple of weeks. The mason jars are taking over the house again. I have a few recipes that I can make whenever; Jasmine Tea jelly for my FIL for Father’s Day, pickled red onions, and pomegranate jelly. I will probably try to do some of these this Friday. I don’t think I have much else planned.

For now though, I need to start getting ready for work. Have a great day!