Our Wish for the Season

Peace on Earth

and

Good Will

to

All Creatures,

Great and Small

although

there is a good chance Min is actually wishing

she knew how to get rid of the dang jingle bell.

 

Post Thanksgiving

Stuffing waffles and the last day for the pumpkin plates.

The dressing that I made for after Thanksgiving was perfect.  I was disappointed in the made-without-a-turkey gravy but I will work on that.  It was fun to make the waffles but it turns out I don't really like an all over crispy dressing!  I guess that's because I was raised with stuffing actually cooked in the bird and that means not crisp but just a bit firmer than the mashed potatoes.  Since I wasn't crazy about the waffles, I'm glad I did not run to KFC for gravy after my gravy fail!

This was the recipe I used, with no changes, for the dressing:

Classic Sage and Sausage Stuffing (or Dressing) – Serious Eats 2014

• 2 1/2 pounds (about 2 loaves) high quality sandwich bread or soft Italian or French bread, cut into 3/4-inch dice, about 5 quarts (I used Great Harvest's Beehive White)
• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter
• 1 1/2 pounds sage sausage, removed from casing
• 1 large onion, finely chopped (about 2 cups)
• 4 large stalks celery, finely chopped (about 2 cups)
• 2 cloves garlic, minced or grated on microplane
• 1/4 cup minced fresh sage leaves (or 2 teaspoons dried sage leaves)
• 32 ounces (4 cups) low-sodium chicken or turkey broth, preferably homemade
• 3 whole eggs
• 1/4 cup minced parsley leaves
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Adjust oven racks to lower middle and upper middle position. Preheat oven to 275°F. Spread bread evenly over two rimmed baking sheets. Stagger trays on oven racks and bake until completely dried, about 50 minutes total, rotating trays and stirring bread cubes several times during baking. Remove from oven and allow to cool. Increase oven heat to 350°F

In large Dutch oven, melt butter over medium high heat until foaming subsides (don't allow butter to brown), about 2 minutes. Add sausage and mash with stiff whisk or potato masher to break up into fine pieces (largest pieces should be no greater than 1/4-inch).  Cook, stirring frequently until only a few bits of pink remain, about 8 minutes. Add onions, celery, garlic, and sage and cook, stirring frequently, until vegetables are softened, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat and add half of chicken stock.

Whisk remaining chicken stock, eggs, and 3 tablespoons parsley in medium bowl until homogeneous. Stirring constantly with wooden spoon, slowly pour egg mixture into sausage mixture. Add bread cubes and fold gently until evenly mixed.

Use part of stuffing to stuff bird if desired. To cook remaining stuffing, transfer to buttered 9 by 13 rectangular baking dish, cover tightly with foil, and bake until instant read thermometer reads 150°F when inserted into center of dish, about 45 minutes. Remove foil and continue baking until golden brown and crisp on top, about 10 minutes longer. Remove from oven, let cool for 5 minutes, sprinkle with remaining parsley and serve.

 http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/11/stuffing-waffle-stuff-puppies-stuffins-thanksgiving.html

Too Many To Count

photo credit Brigham Young University

Blessings, not turkeys.

My favorite part of Thanksgiving really is the cooking and eating.  Cooking for one leaves a lot to be desired and for the past many, many years I have participated in the Parker family gathering.  Sometimes there are large numbers of eaters sometimes not so many.  I always get to bring something and this year it will be roasted sweet potatoes, beets, and onions.  Plus cranberry sauce which is store bought and fps downright scandalous!  It was the Smith's sample lady that got me.

If you need to know more about cranberries, here is a great article.  Cranberries are very smart! When I read the article I was reminded of Michael Pollan's book The Botany of Desire.

For my personal Thanksgiving, I am making stuffing and gravy.  The bread has been toasted and the wings are roasting.  The oven will be on most of the morning and usually this time of year that would be a lovely thing because of the heat generated.  Yesterday it was 61 and today most likely warmer!

Manufactured Demand

One of the commercials I saw last night while watching Jeopardy (Tournament of Champions, go Julia!) was a Jeep Black Friday ad.  What struck me as odd is that it said "ending soon" and that made me wonder if perhaps there had been another Black Friday that I hadn't heard about or if perhaps Black Fridays are now monthly or perhaps even weekly.

This essay was in my mailbox this morning.  Even though I had a fairly short run in retail and my exposure is limited, this is insightful.

http://www.theminimalists.com/black-friday/

Seasons

When I got back from Denver, the weather just kept getting colder.  November after all and I had to get my gloves out.

One morning while we were out walking, I picked up this absolutely huge leaf.   A neighbor was out, (before 7am!) raking and could tell me it was from a hickory tree. (Correction: a horse chestnut tree.) The wax paper is almost 12 inches across so it really is a very big leaf.

The next day we had snow.

Min was not too excited about it but did the usual dog thing of eating the snow off the deck.  Truly, there was no joyous frolicking about by either of us.

End of an Era

My neighbors wheeling away the drill press.

Just a few small tools left in the garage.  I would be out there today working but there is a serious wind making 41 feel very cold.  Besides the stuff that's left isn't going anywhere and I always have room in the black can.

The Good News

70% of the 12,000 residents who voted Tuesday passed the school bond.  The bond is for repairing five schools in the Provo school district.  The 108 million dollar bond will mean approximately a $9 per month increase in taxes.  Based on the struggle to pass a Provo library building bond years ago as well as the school bond issues that did not pass in Salt Lake county last election, I had very little hope that this school bond would pass. 

Hooray for us for realizing the importance of this bond!!

HSH

Travel adventures are a wonderful thing and it might be a cliche but really, there's no place like being home and with dog.

Late Bloomer

I would say so since there are only about 36 hours until November!  Plus this Cosmos is a volunteer.  Way to go!

Goings On

Last week when the kids were here, we actually set up an accessory table in the kitchen.  It came from the storeroom and I honestly had forgotten about it until the recent purge.  It's a sewing table for the Featherweight (Singer).

Amy was cutting t-shirts into strips and I was cutting borders for a quilt.  We also used the table for gaming.  Rummikub and the new game we learned, Phase 10.

The inner strips had been cut for a class I was teaching years ago and when Amy plucked them out of a pile of fabric she wanted me to finish it for her.  She arranged the inner strips.  I fussed with the borders, piecing them so I had a good sized amount left for the back. It wasn't until I looked at this picture that I noticed the way the corners had turned out.  It's not that obvious in real life.  The colors are intense but not quite as intense as the morning light makes them appear.
 

Zucchini and Pepper Relish

This is a great book!  The subtitle is Preserving in Small Batches Year-round.  Perfect for a small household like mine.  This recipe calls for three pounds of zucchini but I had exactly half that amount so it worked out even better.  Three pints and two (one has already been shared) wee taster jars.

The relish is very tasty and no one would even guess that it's zucchini, if that's an issue for anyone.  Three pints will be more than a year's supply for me.

Her blog is here and has lots of great information.

Welcome!

And by the way there is a flushing problem.

.
Last year when the kids came to visit the toilet started running all the time.  We got that fixed before they left.  This time, at 11pm the night before they were to arrive, all of a sudden the tank wouldn't re-fill.  After fussing with it for 20 minutes I used a plastic container of antacids and a cap from a pill bottle to prop the innards in place to stop the water from running continuously.

All it involved was a quick Home Depot stop and a $4.50 flapper replacement.  I count myself very lucky.  My friends in the next block have a big hole in their front yard and a bill with many zeros.

And then there is this guy.  Not welcome and causing much consternation in the dry water dish next to the swing.  Still there after 24 hours.  I didn't feel comfortable putting something next to him for a size reference but I think his body is about 3/4" and over all front to back including his legs, twice that.  I/m pretty sure a Wolf spider but not dangerous.  I released him in the front yard moments ago.

The Extension Service

At about 6:30 tonight I looked out and thought perhaps I should mow.  It does get dark much earlier now.  I wondered why Min had been playing with the tennis ball as it was in the middle of the yard.  Well, no, it was not the tennis ball... I am pretty sure I plucked more than two pounds of mushrooms out of the backyard!  That big one in the lower right? not quite the size of a tennis ball but twice the size of a large egg.

So I will call the Extension Service tomorrow and see if these are edible or poisonous.  There have always been a few in the yard but certainly not pounds of them.  Perhaps I could start a little mushroom farm.  They must like the soil.

A Good Thing to Find

 

I intended to stop with the pictures of the Challenge but finding these early on, especially the wipes, made me laugh.  We had been to Costco in May and thinking I needed wipes, I stocked up with four more packages only to find two still on the shelf when we got home.

Cleaning the garage has required a lot of wipes. This container even had a bonus number of wipes, 65! and I have been grateful to have them and wonder exactly how many years they have been in the garage.  Unopened, they suffered not at all from below freezing temperatures.

The big bags got used for storing seasonal bedding. Perfect.

A Lime Green Crate

One of my favorite colors, although not for wearing.  This is the kind of crate that you can use for hanging folders and files.  Files of crafting, building, quilting, sewing, knitting, crocheting, and embroidery ideas. Papers.  Old, out of date papers.  Now it's all out there on the internet and it's the new current trends as well as the old.

And there is another inherent problem with these crates, at least at my house.  They sit on the floor. Dust and dog hair.  Not a good thing.  So today I used this fabulous, sturdy, lime green crate to carry the last of the Challenge stuff over to DI.  Yay!  They got the crate as a bonus and I am counting it in September even though it was filled with August stuff.

September's plan is much less obsessive.  One thing every day, at the least, removed. And this is the last of the pictures about it.

Salsa

A huge pot of tomatoes, peppers, and onions simmering on the stove sings of summer!  I made salsa on Saturday night after a run to Don and Jan's garden for additional produce.  It's been cool enough here that all that steam roiling around the kitchen was not the issue it sometimes is in August.

I really like Jan's salsa recipe so I followed it fairly closely.  I only processed 3 jars as my stove top is not designed for canning so I use a very small pot.  Also I wanted to see if there are any issues with taste or consistency with freezing most of the batch.  There will be visitors on Friday and we will give it a try then.

Straight From the Garden Salsa – Jan, August 2014

8 pounds of tomatoes

8 cups roughly chopped onion. I used 2 huge and 2 large

4 jalapeno peppers, seeded and roughly chopped

7 Anaheim peppers, seeded and roughly chopped

3 cloves of garlic

1 1/3 cup white vinegar

1  8-oz. can of tomato paste

1 tablespoon sugar

3 tablespoons salt

Wash, peel, and chop tomatoes, add to a very large pot.  I used a food processor and pulsed the onion, peppers and garlic to the size I felt would fit politely on a tortilla chip.  Add to the very large pot.  Stir in vinegar, tomato paste, sugar, and salt.  Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer.  Simmer, uncovered, for 1 to 1 ½ hours until salsa has reduced to almost half.   I set my timer every 15 minutes so I would remember to stir.

The heat of the peppers is the big unknown in this recipe.  I was not willing to leave in any seeds so this batch is mild.  I like it that way.  I think the next time I will adjust by adding hot sauce at the end if I feel it needs more kick but really, I like my salsa fairly kick-less.

Makes 7-10 pints

465 more or less

Iconic

I'll bet this hasn't been used in twenty years.  It's in really good condition too.  No cracks in the interior and just a little chipping of the classic green exterior paint.  Under each of the side handles is a bottle opener.  That made me smile.

So August's Challenge ended yesterday for me.  I thought about continuing today but the gross stuff left in the garage requires plastic gloves which I did not have.  Thirty days is good enough and that's where the 465 comes from, adding each day of the month.  Some of the "things" were just weighed and a lot of what I just tossed into the black can was not counted at all.  Hunks of wood here and there and the last minute dashes to the curb before the big truck came to pick up.

There's still plenty of work to do in the garage.  There are some built-in shelves I would like to remove and lots of misc. wood pieces that can still get tossed but one must have room in the black can to do so.  Perhaps I can borrow my neighbor's black can this week and fill it.

It's been a rewarding and humbling experience and for pete's sake, why do we keep all that stuff!

(I cut the grass last night!)

Why I Love This Car

Yesterday, I flipped up the back seats and loaded in 8 pieces of fairly heavy MDF.  I also had two screen doors to donate and because of their length I had to slide them in on their side edges and between the front seats.  It did limit my vision out the passenger side window and what with all the new people in town, many unfamiliar with red lights and also which lane to turn from, I decided it would be wise to wait until Tuesday for the drop off. Tuesday, the new people should be sitting in classes.  So I put the doors back in the garage.

Woke very early this morning fretting about this and that and it came to me that if I flattened out the front passenger seat perhaps I could slide the doors in flat.

Yes, indeed!

It makes me want to go on a little camping trip with Min to test out the sleeping arrangements.  Maybe we could just try it in the driveway one night.

QOTD

Let what

you do today

be

enough.

Pat and I saw this on a 2x2 decorative piece of "fence" that you might hang on your wall.  We were wandering around separately in Archibald's/the furniture shop, waiting to be paged for lunch and both mentioned to the other that we had found the quote of the day.  Ha! The same one!

 Three chairs part of yesterday's 27 items but taken to DI today. Must have enough room to load in more treasures for Day 28.

Sigh

If I can get rid of the excess paper around here, I will call this month's challenge a success.  A screaming success.

I pulled these folders out of the filing cabinet.  The filing cabinet has only two drawers and my goal is to get everything into one drawer and use the extra drawer for shoes.  I'm kind of kidding about that but the filing cabinet is in my closet after all.

I couldn't bring myself to just put these in the recycle bin.  You can see the dates, 1979, 1982 and 1988, so they sat on the kitchen table for a couple of weeks.  Yesterday I opened them.

The entire magazines were not in the folders, just the pages relating to the crafting instructions of 100 items under $100.  Talk about a walk back in time!  One of the issues had something I had actually made.  The advertisements were funny and startling too, all those cigarette ads aimed at women.

I did slip out a couple of pages to consider at a later date but 99% was tossed.  The funniest thing about this is that the address labels belong to someone else here in Utah.  I wasn't in the state yet!

Day 22 of the August Challenge

1987 Honda Elite C80

Picked up today and donated to KUER, our local National Public Radio station.  The scooter weighs 225 pounds which happens to be evenly divisible by 9 and there are now nine days left in the challenge.

It works for me!

Happy Birthday Dad

A picture that I came across recently was of Dad on a horse.  It was while we were on a camping trip to Kentucky Lake and I wanted to go horseback riding so badly.  I am pretty sure I had saved up babysitting money for my ride but Dad decided he would come along.  I don't remember if it was his first time on a horse too but I expect it was.  It was a great thing for him to come along with me, especially since I doubt it was a big dream of his.

The other picture that I love of Dad and that always brings a laugh is from an early family picnic.  It was a relay race, "running" while holding a carrot between your knees.  And those plaid shorts he wore.  Good times!

Today would have been his 90th birthday.  Yikes.

Day 19

Have not decorated for Easter for years.  Years.  Time to share the entire collection, including the box.  Certainly the more giant sized plastic boxes a person has, the more stuff one can keep.  Trying to change that.

Day 19 details

8 bunnies

1 lamb

1 spool of ribbon

4 wooden carrots

2 large decorated eggs

1 large group of plastic fill-able eggs

1 group of three large cut and painted 3D wooden eggs

1 large plastic storage box to hold it all (plus a few bonus items)

To date, I have freed myself of 190 things.  Of course that's not an exact item count as some of it I weighed before I tossed it.

Feeling some progress here!!

Mom's Spice Cookies

You never know what you might find in a box in the garage.

Playing with Numbers

Day 13 of the challenge.  I had planned to sort though another box in the garage.  It's a small box and I am pretty sure most everything in it can be tossed but "pretty sure" means there might be decisions and those take more time than they probably should.

I had two things on the calendar so time spent purging was going to be short.  I fell back to plan B which is just walk into the storeroom and look from side to side.  No need to even turn my head, just move my eyes.

Sure enough, there it was, a big bag of worn out jeans and jeans pieces, collected with the idea of making a jeans quilt.  Having seen many finished jeans quilts while working at the fabric store, I know that most of them are heavy enough to crush the air right out of you. No longer interested.

The bag weighs 32 lbs.  Very heavy!  But how to tie that into Day 13.  32, of course, is not evenly divisible by 13.  32/13 = 2.47  Oh, there it is!  2 + 4 + 7 = 13.  I'm counting it!!! That bag is outta here.

I love math. (Not logarithms though,)

Raspberry Jam?

Nope.  Beet Tahini.  We might call it beet hummus but I really think hummus must have chickpeas in it.  I might add some chickpeas the next time I make it but it is very good as is. 

Beet Tahini - Adapted  from The Inventive Vegetarian

1 ½ lbs. beets

Juice of 2 lemons

2 cloves of garlic

½ cup tahini

Salt, to taste

Preheat oven to 400F

 Wash and trim, but don’t peel, the beets, then wrap each one in tin foil and toss it in the oven for 45-60 minutes, until a knife can easily pierce each beet.  Once the beets have cooled enough to handle, rub them with your thumbs and the skins should come off easily.

Roughly chop the beets and the garlic and put both in a food processor.  Give a quick pulse to start breaking them down.  Add the tahini and lemon juice and puree until smooth.  Taste and adjust salt as desired. 

Makes 2 cups.  Serve cold or room temperature with crackers or raw vegetables.

Not Always Green!

We've been getting a lot of beets from the farm so I looked up some recipes for a change from just boiled.  Not that those aren't very good but still a little diversity is a good thing.

I just knew someone out there would come up with a beet smoothie.  The original is from Virtually Vegan Mama and you can find it here.  This is how I made mine: 

The Beetalicious Smoothie  Adapted from Virtually Vegan Mama

Serves 2

5 oz unsweetened almond milk

1 tablespoon orange juice concentrate
1/2 cup water

1/2 cup peeled and shredded raw beets
1/2 cup frozen mango chunks

1/2 cup frozen raspberries

1/2 cup fresh pineapple chunks

1/2 cup fresh sliced strawberries

1/2  of a medium banana

1/2 an avocado

Combine all ingredients in a blender. Puree until smooth and serve.

Note: if you have orange juice you can use half a cup rather than the concentrate and the water

YUM!!

QOTD

"You're only as young as your neck."

From an advertisement of course.

Days 6, 7, and 9

And 4 frames counted towards Day 10.  I need another box for the rest of Day 10.  All of these frames are empty and some are still shrink wrapped.  These are just from the storeroom. I am sure there are more in the house. 

I do need a 20x20x1-inch frame.  That I don't have.

A Finish

A pastel baby quilt made from 2 1/2 inch pre-cut strips.  It is pretty fabric and the light at noon doesn't do it justice.  Not my style but a sweet cottage look that looks very delicate and girly.

This picture shows the quilting.  I just followed the edges of each strip and used the wiggle stitch on my machine.  it's basically a large zig-zag with an extra stitch across the point that makes it look rounded.

Another 18x18x16" Box

Yay!  Another box from the garage emptied!  The recycling can is full and it's only Monday.  No running to the curb on Wednesday morning to make sure it was full like I did two weeks ago.  Of course my neighbor and I share and he did put stuff in this time but most of the box from the garage was just paper.  Just as before, there is a small stack of shredding and an even smaller stack of usable items.  What I am extra happy about is finding these:

The Ginghers have been MIA forever and I was really hoping they were just in a box somewhere and that's the one I opened today!

And total amount of cash in this box?  Three cents.

A Farmers Market Surprise

flor de calabazas

Squash blossoms!  The ones in the picture have closed up but at the market they were open and so beautiful I had to buy them.  Well, I bought them after the farmer explained to me what to do with them. He said quesadillas with cheese, ham and the squash blossoms.  That did not sound appealing to me but I was intrigued.  Here is the recipe I worked from:

Squash Blossom Quesadillas – from Simply Recipes

Traditionally a small sprig of epazote (a Mexican herb) is placed in each quesadilla with the squash blossoms. You can also lay a strip or two of roasted poblano chile in the quesadilla.

    2 Tbsp olive oil

    1 cup chopped onion

    5 cloves of garlic, minced

    30 summer squash blossoms

    1 teaspoon butter

    12 white corn tortillas

    8 ounces Oaxaca cheese (a Mexican string cheese) or Monterey jack cheese, sliced

    Chopped fresh cilantro for garnish

1 Prepare the squash blossoms. Check the insides of the blossoms for bugs, rinse out if you find any or if the blossoms are dusty. Otherwise there should be no need to wash. Cut away the stems. Roughly chop the blossoms, stamens and all.

2 Heat the oil in a large sauté pan on medium high heat. Add the chopped onion and sauté  for 5 to 6 minutes. Add the garlic and sauté a minute more. Add the squash blossoms and toss to coat with the garlic and onions. Cook for a minute or two more, until the blossoms are just wilted. Remove from heat.

3 Heat a large cast iron pan or a large relatively stick-free skillet on medium heat. Rub a little butter in the pan (just enough to give the tortillas a little flavor). Place a corn tortilla in the pan and heat on both sides for half a minute or so, until bubbles begin to form in the tortilla. Place a slice or two of the cheese on one side of the tortilla. Top with a tablespoon or two of the squash blossom mixture. Use a spatula to fold the other side of the tortilla over the side with the cheese and squash blossoms. Press down with a spatula. Cook until the cheese has melted and the tortilla lightly browned.  While the quesadilla is cooking, if your pan is large enough, you can start heating another tortilla in the pan.

4 When the cheese has melted, remove the quesadilla from the pan and continue to make the remaining quesadillas in the same manner. To serve, cut each quesadilla into triangles and serve with salsa, chopped fresh cilantro, avocado, black beans, Mexican queso crema (or diluted sour cream)

Serves 4-6

. . . . . . .
I had Swiss cheese, Cheddar, and Feta on hand so I went with the Feta.  I also had no poblano which she suggests at the top but I did have a fabulous green pepper and I chopped up a piece of that and cooked it with the onion.

I was careful to watch the cooking times and ended up with a nice taco with a little crunch to it.  The Feta worked and so does adding just a touch of butter to the pan when you add the tortillas. I added a little pico de gallo to the tacos when they were done but there was no need for much.  Next time I make these I will plan to have queso fresco on hand.  A slice of jack cheese seems too heavy to me.

So delicious!!  I hope they have squash blossoms next week!!

EDIT 08/11/14:  They did have squash blossoms again this last Saturday and it turns out that I like the feta better than the queso fresco. I still think the jack would be too heavy and the farmer reminded me he said pepper jack.