About Me

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West Virginia
When I started my retirement travels in 2009, I wanted a way to share it with family and friends as it was happening. Hence, "My Travel Journal". However I realized I wouldn't always be on a trip and wondered what to do with the blog in between times. My daughter pointed out, wisely, that travels can also include trips to the kitchen to try a new recipe, trips to visit family, trips to my neighborhood Starbucks, or a fun day trip with a friend. You're welcome to join me on any of these journeys! I've set up individual pages for each of my major trips (see tabs above).

Also, I have an Etsy shop where my current needlework resides. The last pieces I posted here were in 2013! So if you'd like to see what I have accomplished recently, go to (and I apologize for having to copy and paste):

www.etsy.com/shop/thedollhouseneedle

I recently added an "Italian Word a Day" thingie which shows up at the bottom of every page. You see the word and can click to hear it pronounced. I've been enjoying it and I think my accent is improving as time goes by.

January 15, 2010

I've Been Cookin'! (Unfortunately, Not With Gas...)

Well, I've tried two recipes so far from my "Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant" book.  A couple of nights ago, I made Black Beans for One and tonight I made Salsa Rosa.  Both recipes can be found at http://marylynnestraveljournal.blogspot.com/2008/12/my-recipe-collection.html.  And since I never seem to want to or be able to precisely follow a recipe, I'll be adding notes about what I did differently and/or will do differently the next time.

Of the two, right now, the black beans one was probably the front runner.  I made that one because I love beans and rice in all sorts of ways and because since it was the recipe from the writer's college days, he used canned beans (which I tend to distrust) so I was interested to see how it would turn out.  And I was really surprised - there is hardly any seasoning in this recipe so what I was tasting was very much black beans and they were quite delicious.

The Salsa Rosa sounds Mexican (as the writer points out) but it is a recipe he picked up while in Italy.  I want to make it again with several changes because it was good, but I think it could be better, and I'm not sure, but I think it could come very close to being the tomato sauce that seemed to be served on every pasta dish my husband and I ordered at the cheap little trattorias where we ate during our 9-day stay in Rome forty-one years ago!  I have always remembered that sauce and wished I could figure out how it was made.  It was very creamy, but still tomato-y and just very, very good - totally different from American Italian spaghetti sauce.  Mind you, I love my spaghetti and meatballs recipe (I'll have to post that sometime too) and so does everyone else, but this Rome sauce was a whole new idea.

And before I post my pictures of these two dishes, I'm going to post the address for Chris's (my son) gallery on BetterPhoto and then everyone can wonder how in the world I have the nerve to post my pictures.  But we can't all be stellar photographers!  My dad was an "amateur" photographer with his own darkroom, etc., and my sister and I still have a lot of his really wonderful photographs, so I guess Chris comes by it naturally.  Anyway, here is the address for his gallery:   http://www.betterphoto.com/gallery/gallery.asp?mem=136794.

And, here are my pics of the two recipes:

Black Beans for One - The onions and garlic browning on the left, and the finished dish with a trial helping of grated cheddar.


Salsa Rosa for One - The ingredients (that I had) for the dish and the finished product on the right.


Bon appetit!

1 comment:

Christopher said...

Mmm, I wish we had the technology to smell these pictures, cuz that saute pan of onion and garlic makes my mouth water...

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