Nate and I spent a fun evening at his Dad’s house up in Lancaster. Their water filter was broken so we went out to buy some jugs of water at Turkey Hill. On the way back to his Dad’s house Nate was goofing off in the car and shaking his hand like he had Parkinson’s disease. I said to be technical he was afflicted by pseudo-Parkinson’s. Nate asked me to repeat what I said, I replied he would have PSEUDO Parkinson’s Disease and went into the definition of it only to be cut off. He told me I was mispronouncing “pseudo”. That’s crazy, I’ve used this term a million times and have always pronounced it the same way. Hell bent of finding the right answer we arrived at the Carr household and dug out the dictionary. I was pronouncing it FA-SUE-DO. Nathan insisted that the correct pronunciation was SUE-DO. We didn’t want to taint our mediator’s minds so we wrote the word PSEUDO on a notepad and asked Nathan’s Dad to pronounce the term to settle our dispute. He looked puzzled like he didn’t know the word and came up with the best response, SUEDE-OH. I said, this isn’t a Spanish word; it’s a real word. Luckily Lisa stepped in and solved the mystery. The p is silent and I have been talking like a fool for my entire life. Good thing I never used the term in front of instructors during nursing school.
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I am frugal to the point of almost being a cheapskate. I get this fine trait from my Dad. I have been extra creative with money while I am on this unemployment vacation. So when I ran out of deodorant I thought “ I can make that!” and I found a recipe on Pinterest. The supplies were chillin in my kitchen, all I had to do was whip up a batch. This took me about a week to muster up the enthusiasm. In the mean time I went au natural or I stole a bit of Nate’s manly Old Spice. MMMmmmmm. DIY Deodorant From How about Orange 1/4 cup baking soda 1/4 cup cornstarch 4 tablespoons unrefined coconut oil 10 drops/shakes grapefruit essential oil (I used some lemongrass essential oil that might have belonged to my roomie Sarah. Hope she doesn't mind...) A tin or jar with lid - In a bowl, stir together dry ingredients, then add oils gradually until you like the consistency, mixing with a fork. Store in a closed container at room temp. (If the mixture seems too soft, try refrigerating it for a bit to firm it up.) I slather a tiny tiny bit of this stuff on my pits. I hold it against my skin for a second to let the cocoa butter melt into my flesh. It hasn’t stained my clothes and it keeps me smelling fresh. Little bit of trivia, those yellow armpit stains you get on lightly colored clothes don’t come from your body sweat, they come from your deodorant. I also didn’t know the way antiperspirants work, something in the ingredients clogs up your pores so sweat doesn’t pour out. Crazzzay. Nate and I celebrated our anniversary by walking up to State Street in the heart of downtown Media and grabbing some snakebites at Sligo. It was our favorite place to hit up when we first moved to Media. We’ve dined there with friends and had some good times. It was a great Irish bar with great bar fare. Now they’re trying to make it fancy smancy. They’ve changed the menu 3 times in the past year and nothing is all that great. Half way through our drinks we decided to nibble on some wings and find a better place to fill our bellies. After the waitress discovered we were only getting beer and wings she changed her tune pretty quickly. Nate got all fired up with her lack of enthusiasm while delivering the rest of our order. NEVER GOING BACK. We keep on saying that but this time we mean it. Instead we hit up our favorite pizza joint, Pinocchio’s. It's a local pizza joint that has been there for ages, the food is reliable, they have 30 craft brews on draft and they’re always open. After pre-gaming at the apartment, drinking at Sligo and grabbing more drinks at Pinocchio’s before dinner arrived I was starting to feel a little tipsy. This jump-started some camera fun with Nate and I in the booth; we were feeling the vogue vibe. At one point I was feeling a Lady Gaga inspired moment and tried acting out the hit “applause” too bad it came out blurry. I will also point out the scarf I am wearing I crafted from Pinterest and found the super easy directions here. Only took my a day to make!!! Literally and figuratively my sister Heather is bringing home the bacon to her house. Since moving down to Carrboro, NC she has relished in buying her produce and eggs from the local farmers market and meat from the butcher in town, Cliff. Heather frequents Cliff’s Meat Market once a week for her protein demands. Since I have been visiting Heather and Anthony so frequently I have been able to enjoy some of Heather’s cooking. She has recently started making these fantastic eggcups for breakfast. I have seen this idea on Interest but never really got around to making them. I make a version of this but with ham and whole eggs cooked in muffin tins. The secret to making these cups taste so good is BACON. The bacon infuses an incredible flavor into the egg mixture. Heather gets her bacon from Cliff who cuts the skin off for her. We don’t understand why people would buy bacon with the skin on. Maybe Cliff will explain this the Heather one day. It seems that Heather will whip up a batch of these on Sunday while watching her new favorite treat, DVD collection of Julia Child’s The French Chef Cooking series. Ask Heather about the omelet episode. It’s her favorite. She showed me how to construct these yummy breakfast delights and now I am making them in my kitchen with the approval of Nathan’s taste buds.
Eggs Cups Makes 12 8 Eggs Red Pepper Flakes Garlic Powder Salt & Pepper Bacon (I like Trader Joes Apple Smoked Bacon) Chopped veggies/cheese Preheat oven to 350. Whip up the eggs and add seasoning to fit your taste. Spray your muffin tin with non-stick spray. This is essential. I tried skipping this step and spent a lot of time cleaning cooked egg out of each muffin tin. NIGHTMARE! The idea is to take a piece of bacon and line the edge of the muffin tin with it. It works out easier if you cut the pieces of bacon into thirds and then place them in. I have added the veggies in 2 different ways and don’t see a difference in the result. You can add them to your egg mixture and then pour into the muffin tins OR you can put your veggies into the muffin tins before your fill them with your egg mixture. Bake for 25-30 minutes until cooked. Remove from pan while still warm. *** Veggies I have used with success: Mushrooms, scallions, spinach, grape tomatoes, bell peppers. I have never been a huge fan of ketchup. I’ll dip my fries in it or make up some cocktail sauce when the mood strikes but rarely use it. Nathan on the other hand seems to be a bit more liberal with it. I try to buy food products that have ingredients that I can pronounce and easily find in the grocery store. It is tough to find ketchup that doesn’t have high fructose corn syrup. I think Hunt’s makes a version but it has to be the one with the label “ ALL NATUAL” not all of their ketchup is free of HFCS. I will eat stuff with high fructose corn syrup but try to limit it when I can. After getting tired of hunting down ketchup/ feeling too cheap to buy Whole Food’s version of organic ketchup I decided to make my own. It has a runnier consistency but its flavor is WAY better.
Homemade Ketchup Make about 1 quart 1 yellow onion 1 can (28 oz.) of whole peeled tomatoes in juice 2 tbsp. Canola oil 1 Cinnamon Stick 1 Bay Leaf 5 Cloves 5 Cardamom Pods smashed 15 Peppercorns ½ C. Apple Cider Vinegar 1/3 C. Brown Sugar Heat canola oil over medium high heat in a large pot, this stuff will splatter. In a Food Processor puree tomatoes and transfer all but ¼ c. of puree to a bowl. Add onion to Food Processor and puree. Put onion/tomato mixture in pot and cook for 10 minutes till onions start to turn a bit brown. Then add vinegar, sugar and tomato puree and lower heat. Simmer for 15 minutes. Take spices and place in a cheesecloth bundle/ tea ball/ empty tea bag and place in pot, continue to simmer for 10 minutes. Remove spice packet, let cool, add salt to taste. While working for an Australian family for a year I started to pick up on the quirks in language that they often used. Sweatshirts were referred to as sweaters, Baby Raf needed to be strapped in to the pram every time we went for a walk and closets were referred to as cupboards. Reading Amelia’s grocery lists always required a look over before leaving the house, caster sugar was not a term used in American baking but I soon learned it was just regular sugar just as I learned that pumpkin was really a butternut squash. I wonder what they carve up for Halloween? Pumpkin was incorporated into weekly dishes and one of the meals I would often make for Amelia and Greg with rave reviews was their recipe for Pumpkin and Goat Cheese Lasagna. I don’t really care for goat cheese or lasagna but I will gladly eat this dish. Another fun fact about Australia, there aren’t any squirrels there. Pumpkin and Goat Cheese Lasagna Preheat the oven to 400 1 lb. Butternut Squash, peeled and cut into chunks 4 Tbsp. EVOO 2 Tbsp. Butter 2 Leeks thinly sliced and washed I bag of spinach 2 Garlic Cloves crushed 400 mL good quality tomato passata or a jar of pasta sauce 3 Sheets of l fresh lasagna 150 g goat cheese crumbled, I used a small log from Trader Joes ½ C. Fresh grated Parmesan 1. Toss squash with 2 Tbsp. of EVOO, s+p and place on a roasting pan. Pop into oven for 30 minutes or until tender. Transfer to a bowl and mash. Set aside to cool. 2. Heat remaining butter and EVOO in a skillet. Over medium heat add leeks and cook, stirring for about 5-6 minutes or until softened. Add spinach and garlic and cook for 1-2 minutes or until spinach is wilted. Set aside and cool. 3. Grease a baking dish and add 4 Tbsp. of pasta sauce to bottom of dish and season with salt and pepper. Place a sheet of lasagna on top and spread mashed squash on top. Add another layer of lasagna, pressing down. Add 4 more Tbsp. of pasta sauce and then a layer of leek and spinach mixture. Finally add last layer of lasagna and spread it with the remaining pasta sauce. 4. Mix together goat cheese and Parmesan cheese. Sprinkle over top of lasagna. Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes, then remove the foil and return to oven for a further 15 minutes or until the top in golden. Remove from the oven and set aside for 5 minutes before cutting. *** You can use precooked dry lasagna sheets, you may need to increase the cooking time by another 15 minutes. On my 2 year anniversary to "Nate Dawg" (I don't really call him that) I remember the magic that brought us together. Let me paint you a picture.
Fall 2011 I had just moved to Philadelphia and adjusting to the city life from tiny Vermont. With all of my new city adventures I started to prowl for some man meat. I started the arduous task of blind dating via Okcupid. After a string of REALLY bad dates I was about to throw in the towel and give into my future life of a cat lady. I had one last date lined up to meet up at Dave and Busters. I didn't want to be rude but this didn't sound like fun. I hate spending money of games and I am significantly handicapped when it comes to any activities involving eye/hand coordination such as arcade games. Minutes before meeting any blind date potential I have the instinct to bail but am too chicken to do it. I intended to have a drink and bail so that I could enjoy an evening of grocery shopping and cooking. Little did I know that I would meet a guy who actually looked like his profile picture. Plus this guy could hold a conversation and was well mannered. It was almost too good to be true. One beer turned into a couple of hours of shuffleboard (which Nate taught me) some nachos and a Raven's game. 4 hours later Nate walked me to my car, we shared an awkward kiss and I went home happy. After that night more dates occurred and I knew I must have hit the jackpot, boyfriend gold. He made me flan in his toaster oven (that's not sexual innuendo, his apartment didn't have an oven), whenever we walked on the street he would insist on walking on the side closest to the street so I was further away from the cars, and the first night I crashed at his place I fell asleep in his bed fully clothed and woke up fully clothed as little spoon. I can't say that happened during all of our other sleepovers... wink wink. I was getting antsy for him to pop the question, the "will you be my girlfriend?" question. Sounds strange but I think that a guy needs to formally ask, you can't just assume that you're an item. You need to clarify between a relationship and a bed buddy. My brother-in-law thinks I'm nuts. And then the magic happened. Nate invited me to his apartment to meet his buddy who was in town for the weekend. I guess the excitement of the night before wore him out because Greg pretty much slept the whole night on the sofa. Nate wanted to go for a walk to a local park near his place. I'll paint a picture. It's a cold crisp night, there's a full moon and a bridge over a small pond. Nate pulls out his rico suave moves says (there is some debate over the next line) I hear Nate say " I want you to be my girlfriend" I take this as the question I've been waiting for. YES!!!!! Nate on the other hand says he was making a statement, there was no question to answer. I like my version better. To celebrate the 2 of us played beer pong in the backyard and have been having fun ever since. I was on a mission. I had gone to 3 different grocery stores in search of ONE RIPE AVOCADO. All I could find were rock hard ones. I needed one for TONIGHT. I was starting to get hangry and made one last attempt at my least favorite grocery store chain ACME. Wouldn’t you know they had a plethora of soft avocados. If I had stopped there first I know that they wouldn’t have any worth eating but since I was on a wild goose chase they were able to meet my needs in an attempt to lure me into being a frequent customer. I doubt that will ever happen. Before I made it to the back of the produce section with the avocados I was walking past the weekly sales and goodies that were featured that week and saw something amazing. The BIGGEST Cauliflower I had ever seen in my life. Seriously the size of volleyballs. AND THEY WERE ON SALE!!!. 2 of these massive heads for $5.00. Unreal! All I could think to myself was “I could make so much pickled cauliflower with these puppies”. After a week of crazy canning a few weeks ago I thought I was done for the season but when I stumbled upon these beauties I knew that canning pot was calling my name. I am going to need to start stashing all my pickles underneath beds, in the back of my closet, in the linen closet. There is probably a reason why these veggies were so huge. Most likely GMO or something unnatural but I am going to look past that temporarily, still tastes like a cauliflower to me. From these 2 massive heads of cauliflower I was able to make 9 jars of Spicy Pickled Cauliflower, Mom’s Cauliflower Salad and a Giardiniera. Mom started my addiction to pickled cauliflower last summer when she made a batch and shared a few jars with me. It’s yet another great recipe from Marisa McClellan from the blog Food in Jars. She does a great Youtube video in her kitchen and describes how easy it is to make these pickles. They are lemony/spicy/full of garlic and vinegary. I had 6 jars in my pantry and knew I needed more due to the fact I eat an entire jar in one sitting. Good thing Nate hates cauliflower and doesn’t really care for pickled things. YESSSS!!!! Spicy Pickled Cauliflower Makes 3-pint jars From Marissa McClellan 1 ½ C Vinegar 1 ½ C. Water 2 Tbsp. Salt ¼ tsp. Cayenne Bring this brine to a boil. In hot jars pop in a slice of lemon and stuff jar with raw cauliflower. Really push it down/cram it in. Add the following to each jar: ½ tsp. Peppercorns ½ tsp. Red Pepper Flakes ½ tsp. Mustard Seeds 1 Clove Garlic (I smash it a bit) Add hot brine to jars and top with a slice of lemon. Process jar in hot water bath for 5 minutes. After making 9 jars of pickles I decided to make another one of my favorite recipes from Mom. It’s a garlicky cauliflower salad. It’s salty with a lot of garlic and lemon juice with briny capers and green olives. MMmmmm! Mom’s Cauliflower Salad 1½ lbs. Cauliflower cut up into florets 1 C. Green Olves Capers to taste 1 Clove Garlic minced 2 Tbsp. Lemon Juice ½ C. EVOO ½ tsp. Salt & Pepper 1. Blanch cauliflower for 3 minutes in boiling water, drain. 2. Toss cauliflower with green olives and capers 3. Mash salt and garlic to make a paste 4. Mix paste with lemon juice. Strain (I don’t usually do this part) and toss with cauliflower. I still had a bit of cauliflower to use so I decided to make refrigerator giardiniera. I just found a recipe from America’s Test Kitchen that I was dying to try out. I will eat just about anything pickled. Giardiniera From America’s Test Kitchen Makes four 1-pint jars ½ Head of Cauliflower (about 1 lb.) Cut into florets 3 Carrots peeled and cut on bias into ½ inch pieces 3 Celery ribs cut into ½ inch pieces 1 Bell Pepper, Stemmed, Seeded, Cut into ½ inch strips 2 Serrano Chiles, sliced thin 4 Cloves Garlic sliced thin 1 C. Dill, stems and leaves chopped coarse 2 ¾ C. White Wine Vinegar 2 ¼ C Water ¼ C. Sugar ¼ C. Kosher Salt In a large bowl mix together cauliflower, carrots, celery, bell pepper, chilies and garlic. Pack into jars. Place dill into a cheesecloth bundle and tie up with twine. Combine Dill bundle, vinegar, water, salt and sugar in a pot. Bring to a boil over medium high heat. Cover, remove from heat and steep for 10 minutes. Remove dill bundle and bring brine back to a boil. Pour over veggies. Let cool before placing in fridge. Giardiniera needs to marinate for 1 week. Will keep for up to 1 month in fridge. ** I strayed from the recipe slightly. I used plain white vinegar because it’s all I had on hand. Giant was all out of Serrano chilies and so I used jalapenos for this batch. I also forgot to add the dill but threw in some dried dill into the brine. I’m sure my Giardiniera will taste a bit different but I think it will still satisfy my vinegar cravings. I busted out my cheese kit from Mom and Dad a few weeks ago and attempted homemade mozzarella. It was edible but needed perfecting. I decided to try my luck with ricotta cheese instead. Funny side story: In High School I was part of the super cool Theater Group. I was so into being a “techie” and participating backstage in all the plays. It was my life, until I got a boyfriend, then I only spent 50% of my life in the theater. Each year we participated in a yearly One Act Play competition. There was a Regional Festival, States Festival and New England Festival. For multiple years we were luck enough to participate in multiple festivals. I loved it! The only thing I hated about these festivals was the food. We were required to buy a meal ticket and without fail at EVERY SINGLE FESTIVAL they served LASAGNA. Oh man I really hate lasagna mostly because I despise ricotta cheese. Hate the stuff. I won’t eat stuffed shells, calzones or anything that contains the vile stuff. I am not a picky eater and will eat almost anything even if I don’t care for it with the exception of this. So I would starve when we went to festivals. I would always come home hungry and full of gas. I hadn’t reached the comfort level of tooting in front of my friends yet, another long story for later. Fast forward to 2012. I was a nanny for an Australian family who LOVED ricotta cheese. They smeared it on crackers, toast, and sandwiches or fed it by the spoonful to the baby. GROSS! They couldn’t believe I didn’t like it. I made gorgeous lasagnas for this family and for their friends but refused to eat it. They thought I was crazy. I was. One day I was FAMISHED and Amelia offered me cracker spread in ricotta with salt and pepper. Surprisingly it was good. I can hear Sarah saying, “ I told you so!” She happens to love ricotta too. I soon was eating ricotta regularly whenever I was working for this family. They had a more liberal cash flow compared to me and did all their grocery shopping at Whole Foods and would buy a tub of ricotta every week. It was from a Vermont farm and cost around $7.00 for a pint. While grocery shopping I decided to snag a container while at Trader Joes, it was less than $2.00 and I picked the low fat version to save on some calories. DISASTER! It was SO GROSS! It tasted nothing like the ricotta I had while working. I tried buying the full fat version the following week at Trader Joes, still GROSS! I realized they must be doing something right in Vermont to make this fluffy and wonderful cheese. Imagine my excitement when I gathered all my supplies to make my own ricotta cheese. Dreams of recreating the rich tasting ricotta from Vermont in my own tiny kitchen for a fraction of the price? Could I do it? Sadly the ricotta I made tasted nothing like the stuff from Vermont. I don’t know what they do but it looks like I will either need to attempt this again after doing more research or just bite the bullet and pay the stinking $7.00 for a tub of this magic cheese. DIY Ricotta Cheese 1/2 c. cool, chlorine-free water (I used filtered) 1 tsp. Citric Acid 1 Gallon of Milk 1 tsp. Cheese Salt Step 1: Pour water into a small bowl and stir in citric acid. Step 2: Pour milk into a large pot, add the citric acid solution and the cheese salt and stir well. Step 3: St the pot over medium heat and heat, gently checking the bottom of the pot with a slotted spoon for signs of scorching every 2 minutes or so. Avoid stirring as much as possible to allow curds to form. If the milk seems to be sticking, reduce heat to medium low. Heat milk to 180 degrees, do not allow milk mixture to boil over! Step 4: As soon as the curds and whey separate clearly (you will see white curds floating in yellowing whey when you move the curds) turn off heat and let stand undisturbed for 10 minutes. Step 5: Line a colander with cheesecloth and carefully pour curds and whey into colander. Drain until the cheese reaches the desired consistency, 15-30 minutes. Cheese will last up to one week in fridge. All of the supplies you will need for this culinary adventure. The magic is starting, the separation of curds and whey. Where's little Miss Muffet? What the heck is a tuffet (sp?) I should just Google that. Final Product. Inferior competitor to Vermont Ricotta. WHY ME?!?!?!
A couple of weeks ago I had a hankering for some of Mom’s Chili. It was something she would make in colder weather for a hearty Sunday meals, Super bowl or when we had the occasional guest come over to eat. I always enjoyed it because it was like baked potato bar at school. She would make a basic chili and let us dress it however we wished. Chopped onions, shredded cheese, black olives etc. Sometimes she would make a pork chili with green chilies as an alternative. No really one of my favorites, I liked to red kind best. I was telling Heather my sister how much I wanted some of Mom’s chili. Heather apparently doesn’t have much of a memory of this so called chili and couldn’t remember eating it as a kid. She probably blocked it out of her memory since onions were involved. Since I didn’t know how to make it I called her up and got the usual response. “Well, I don’t really have a recipe, I just kinda throw something together in a pot.” MOM! HOW CAN I REPLICATE YOUR COOKING IF YOU DON’T USE A RECIPE! Oh Man! She gave me a list of common ingredients she uses but it can change depending of what she has on hand. I made this chili Saturday night during the frenzy. It doesn’t taste like Mom’s chili but it’s close enough. Next time I go home I will have to stalk Mom in the kitchen and watch her make it while taking serious notes.
Mom’s Chili 1 Onion-chopped 2 lbs. Ground Beef Big Can of Red Enchilada Sauce (28 oz.) Can of Refried Beans Chopped Green Chilies ½ Beer Chili Seasoning Packet or a mixture of Chili Powder, Cumin, Onion Powder, Garlic Powder Sauté onion and ground beef over medium heat. You can drain the fat off or use Mom’s preferred method: Crank up the heat for a few minutes until the fat evaporates. Add the rest of the ingredients till the desired consistency is met, let simmer to let flavors meld. In the future I would maybe add some kidney beans, try ground turkey or add some pickled jalapeno slices. |
AuthorI am an aquarius who likes long walks on the beach and the flicker of candle light. If you haven't noticed yet, Just kidding! I'm a Vermonter who has left my beautiful home state in search of adventure. This blog contains all of my favorite things, mostly food so that my family back home can keep tabs on me. Mom & Dad I'm still alive!!!! Side note: I am terrible at spelling and grammar. There are bound to be typos all over this blog. It's like Where's Waldo. If you look hard enough you will find an error. Archives
April 2017
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