What's Cookin'?

Well, I am off and on.  I enjoyed the ravioli and bread making while Sophia was here and told myself that I needed to get back to cooking when I got back home from my visit with the kids.  I have so many recipes clipped and so many markers in my way too many cookbooks that I'll never get to all of them, but I'm going to try and make myself get to some of them.

I dug out the old French bread recipe I mentioned in my Bits & Pieces post and made that and was somewhat disappointed.  For one thing, it's totally not a true French bread recipe - has sugar, oil, whatever, and French bread is supposed to be basically flour, water, yeast and salt.  So before I do any more bread making I'm going to research making good crusty French bread.

Next, I worked on an old brownie recipe I used to make regularly that used "Choco-Bake", a Nestle product that was basically melted unsweetened chocolate in squeezable pouches which was very convenient.  However, like all good things it is no longer made.  I saw a recipe on the back of my All-Bran box that used cocoa and decided to try that.  I thought the taste was wonderful but the brownies were kind of disgusting because there were all these lumps of All-Bran!  So that went in the trash.  Since then, I have tried two more batches using various and sundry combinations of my old recipe, the All-Bran recipe, two other recipes I found on line for cakey brownies and none of them were very good - they were so dry.  Made me wonder if since I haven't made them for so long and since when I have a brownie, it's a Starbucks brownie which is more the "chewy" variety, maybe I now like chewy brownies.  So having thrown out 3 batches of brownies, I'm cooling my heels on that one for a bit and will look for chewy brownie recipes next.

And after all that not so good work, I finally made something yesterday that I'm excited about.  I made a "rustic" plum tart.  The "rustic" basically means that you make pie dough, roll it out into a circle, heap the fruit in the center, and fold up the outside rim of the dough.

The exciting part is that for the first time ever (at least that I recall), I made a crust with butter rather than shortening or lard (which is what I use for fruit pies).  I don't know why I was always somewhat intimidated by the butter dough cause it turned out to be basically the same as making regular pie dough.  But, what makes it especially exciting is that because I didn't take the butter out of the freezer in time for it to thaw, when I pulsed it in my mini-processor, there were still too large lumps of butter in the flour.  So, for the first time ever (and this one was the first time ever), I used my fingers to work the lumps of butter into the flour and it worked and I survived.  I would see them doing that on cooking shows and could not imagine how I would not end up with an incredible mess if I did it.  And I thought the heat of my hands would melt the butter, and so on.  It went very well - but I did learn that even if I'm doing a small amount I should do it in a bigger bowl than I used.

So I made a plum tart and here is a picture of the finished product:

This was half of a recipe and it was still way too big for one serving although I sure kept eating it once I started.  I'd think "well, just one more bite..."  

I will certainly make a tart again and am hoping that maybe fresh, local peaches are finally coming in because I think I'd prefer those to the plums which were very tart even with the sugar mixed into them.  But, oh my, it was tasty and a very good experience.  I'm going to wait until I make another one before I post a recipe because in the reviews of this recipe I saw a couple of things people had added that sounded interesting and I'm going to try making a slightly smaller dough recipe and rolling it out a little thinner I think.

Next, I'm finally going to make puttanesca sauce which I've been wanting to do ever since the brand with which I discovered puttanesca sauce, was - again like all good things - taken off the market.  I never had the heart to try some of the other ones I'd see in the grocery store.  That's another recipe that can probably be tinkered with quite a bit.

So that's a whole lot of talk with only one picture but, as Emperor Franz Josef always said in the movie Amadeus - "there it is!"  I loved that movie and was going to watch it a few weeks ago and discovered that I no longer remembered how to use the VCR!!!  Sometime I must get around to figuring that out.

Wow! It's been a long, long time...

My last post appears to be from the night before I left Huntington to go to the kids for Christmas.  And I ended up not getting back home until January 18 I think it was so was gone about a month.

It was a good trip - very, very busy as far as going from place to place.  I figured out after I got home that aside from my trip up to my sister's in Massachusetts from January 4 to January 15, I never stayed anywhere for more than 2 nights going from one kid to another sort of constantly.  And while at my sister's, her husband, then she, and then I all got sick.  So that was kind of a shame, but the parts of the visit where we weren't sick were, as always, pleasant - lots of good food and lots of conversation.

What prompted tonight's post is that I finally worked up my nerve to haul out the butane gas portable burner that Heather got me for Christmas (and I got her one too - more fun than just buying one for yourself) and the paella pan that Chris gave me and made paella!  And for a first attempt, it went quite well.  The taste was very good but I needed to have a little more meat in it and it didn't get crusty on the bottom like it's supposed to.  Tonight I warmed up some of the leftovers in a skillet and heated it enough to crust up the bottom.  So, I think if I'm cooking it for myself, I'll use about half as much rice as I did this time and twice as much meat and then maybe do it the way you're supposed to (high heat at the beginning to brown the meat and cook the onions, garlic and such, then simmer to cook the rice) and at the end, turn the heat back up and get it crusted on the bottom.  But the taste really was nice so I'm ready to try it again.

And I was real impressed with the little burner. Of course, I have to cook on an electric stove so any gas stove would be an improvement.  But I put the oil in the pan and had it on high heat, turned away to get my pieces of chicken to drop in the pan and when I turned back the oil was already starting to smoke!  Shoot on the electric stove, the burner wouldn't even have been all the way hot yet!

Here's a picture of the little hottie.  I tried to get rid of the glare but couldn't.  The rounded thing on the right is where a can of butane gas goes and it's rated at 12.000 BTU!  If you cook on electric and would like to every now and then actually get something truly hot without waiting 5 minutes, I can highly recommend this. :)

And here are a few pictures of the paella session - they're not great either but there it is...

First I assembled all my ingredients - rice (a special kind for paella), chicken and vegetable broth, grated (!) tomatoes, smoked Spanish paprika, a paste of saffron threads, garlic, and coarse salt ground up in the cute little mortar and pestle that Heather brought back from Spain (or maybe Morocco?) for me, green peppers, mushrooms, more garlic, chicken and mushrooms.

Put it all together and voila - paella! (oh, and seeing the picture I remembered I also laid some springs of thyme on top)

And moving from visiting through paella, we come to needlework.  I've actually started working again on a petitpoint dollhouse rug that I started, I'm ashamed to admit, however many years ago.  Didn't really have any use for it aside from thinking that maybe I could make a real pretty bedroom roombox with a bed that I'd make a quilt for, etc., etc.  But as I began to realize that I probably wasn't going to be building bigger projects like that anymore, I pretty much lost interest.  Then while I was in Spain last fall, I got an e-mail from a woman who had visited my Etsy shop and wanted to know if I would be willing to make a custom order rug for her.  She mentioned that she wanted lavender in it.  I told her I had been working one with that and other colors in it and when I got back I could send her a picture of what I had done and also the size and a price.  So I did and she said great - she'd like me to finish it.  So once I settled down after getting back from all the holiday hoop-la, I got started on it and am pleased with how much I've finished.  I think I will have it finished by the end of March (if not before) which is what I told her.  And if she decides she doesn't want it after all, that will be fine too - at least I will have finished it!

It won't be all stretched like that once it's out of the hoop and finished.  When I sent her the first picture, the left side border only went up as high as the right hand border and the ring of flowers around the center medallion still had about four clusters missing and the cream colored background was only a little higher than that right hand border.  So I've made progress!

That's it for now!

Moving right along...

Yesterday I got the wallpapering finished and started on the wainscoting.  I had to paint, sand, paint, and varnish an extra strip of the wainscot cap because for some reason I had only done one.  My brain must have been running low on that day!

On the left, all finished with the wallpaper which gave me more fits than I would have liked.  My idea of making a slicker surface for the paste to slide on didn't seem to help much.  But it's on and I am pleased with the seam at the ceiling.  I didn't really want to install crown mold and the meeting of ceiling and paper is good enough that I don't have to.  It's not that I'm lazy or afraid to - I just think with the smallness of the room, all the wainscoting, and everything I want to put in it, it doesn't really need more "trim".  I left the two blank spaces for the bookcases.  They won't be built in, but they won't be sticking out as much from the wall as they would have with the baseboard and wainscot cap running behind them.  I should probably have taken the paper all the way down to the floor though, but I didn't think of that til I had the wainscoting in.  Which it is in the photo on the right and I'm really liking it.


 

I know - all the pictures look alike but they're not.  The one on the left now has all three walls with the wainscot applied and the one up above only had 2 walls.  So that's progress, right?  And the one on the right shows the bookcases in place and the wainscot cap installed on the two side walls - still need to do the bit between the bookcases.  And in this picture the room looks deeper than it is wide and that's not the case.  The room measures about 15" wide by 10" deep and the ceiling is about 10" high.

Next will come the wiring and I've drilled a hole on each side wall and in the ceiling to start.  I'm going to use sconces on the back wall and want to try one of those on/off slide switches so that just the lamp(s?) and sconces could be on sometimes.

And totally off topic, here's what I had for dinner last night.  I haven't been doing much cooking and haven't been eating much in the way of meat and when I'm in a phase like that, I finally get to where I'm craving some beef.  So yesterday I bought myself a little filet and cooked it on my cast iron grill pan.  Already had the potatoes and I rubbed them with olive oil and sprinkled them with the seasoned salt my sister gave me back some time ago and roasted them in my toaster oven.  Had the zucchini and yellow squash also and browned it up in olive oil with some garlic and a little more of the seasoned salt.  And, oh boy, it was good!!

Tomorrow, I hope to get some actual wiring done although since I'm taking the lamp wires to the outside of the box, I may get done as much as I can to everything before I actually wire the lamps in so they won't be rattling around as I'm turning the box upside down, etc.  Guess I could always tape them to the floor...or maybe I should put an outlet on the outside of the box...no, that defeats the purpose of wiring outside - I want to solder everything so hopefully they won't just quit working one day.

Anyway, that's today's report!

Chris is Chastising Me Again!

So I'd better get something posted.  He does keep after me...

I've actually been fairly busy this month what with my temporary filling in for the office manager type person in our condo building which entailed being available by phone, delivering packages, trying to help people who were having trouble with whatever, getting workmen down to the basement, up to the roof, taking down all the Christmas stuff in the lobby, etc., etc.  I was so glad the gentleman who normally does all that finally got to have a nice vacation, but I was also very glad to see him come home!

And once I got to feeling better after my strange on again/off again cold, I seem to have gotten all inspired to get to work on various projects.  I've actually started on getting those shelves installed in my bedroom window.  Put one in yesterday and managed to get another one in today.  It turns out to be killer work for me cause I'm having to drill into some kind of metal stud and really have to apply pressure whilst all twisted around trying to make sure I hold the drill straight, etc.  It is so far from a perfect job that it's really kind of hilarious.  After I got finished with the first one, I figured out that I had drilled at least 15 holes before I finally got the supports where I wanted them and even then I wasn't real pleased with them.  But today's shelf went in with only the necessary 4 holes drilled.  To get the screws in, I have to change drill bits three times!!  However, as long as they don't fall down once I get stuff on them (and I don't I think they will...) I'll be happy with them.

And while I was putting my Christmas decorations away, I decided to leave my little Christmas shop out for a while cause I like it plus I liked having its light turned on in the corner where I had it sitting.  That little shop started out as a pottery shop - I built the shop in a class at a miniature show and had all my collection of pottery pieces in it (mostly made by a guy here in Huntington who did beautiful work and then quit).  But then when my Christmas collection started growing, I wanted to display it, so I switched out the shop.  Long story short - I decided this year that I would use it for both - pottery shop all year and Christmas shop at Christmas.  That entails some customizing - have to have different wallpaper for them so had to make a second back piece (which is removable), and for the pottery shop I will have to use shelves like I did originally, but the original shelves were set into grooves in the side walls and I want to change the location of them slightly.  So, that means new shelves because the originals are glass and shattered when my framer guy tried to shorten them.  That brought me to a bit of a standstill while I try to find some acrylic sheeting that will be sturdy enough not to sag.

And I finished my little cross stitch of the "big" cat head and it turned out real cute, I thought.  Here's a picture of it where I was wanting to see how it would look framed since I was having a hard time working up the nerve to try and make it a pillow.

But I finally told myself to bite the bullet and attempt the pillow.  Bravely stitched it to a backing fabric, with great effort managed to get it turned right side out, even got it fairly well stuffed, but by then the open edge of the cross stitch fabric was sort of totally disintegrating with one of the seams starting to separate.  I made an effort to get the raw opening turned in so I could stitch it, but it was not to be.  My happy little cat went into the trash.  So, no more pillows for me!  Should have just framed it. :(

I also decided I want to make another quilt, got out my fabric stash and selected 5 colors and am trying to decide which of two patterns to make.  I had found a delightful scrapbooking paper that is tiny, tiny purple flowers, along with even tinier bits of yellow and pink flowers, green stems and leaves, all on a white background and I don't know why I bought it but I did.

When I get the quilt made, I will probably put it in my Etsy shop and maybe say "here's some paper if you want it".  If I had a dollhouse that needed a bedroom, I know how I'd do it.  I'd make the bottom of the wall white tongue and groove wainscoting and then paper the top with the paper.

I think that's all my projects - oh, I'm going to get back to work on my big petitpoint rug also.  But that's all my projects. :)

The other thing I've been doing is cooking a lot.  I've posted two new recipes - one for a recipe called Bulgarian Leek, Cabbage and Potato Soup and another for one my own creations that I made up last week and then tweaked it a little this week that's Pasta with White Beans, Tuna Fish and Tomatoes and so on.  I liked my attempt last week but felt like it could use a little jazzing up, so I made it again tonight and that's what I put in my recipe collection cause I suppose I shouldn't say it, but I thought it was delicious.

At some point on one of my cooking evenings, I looked out through my pass-through in the kitchen and saw this outside my dining room windows:

It looks like I fooled with the color on these but I didn't.  The sun on the hills somehow made them this very red color.  Really stunning!  I am SO glad I didn't have my pass-through closed in like I originally planned!

So, I had my cabbage soup twice, my pasta and bean creation twice, thawed my leftover meatball mix and had a meatball sub one night last week and spaghetti and meatballs one night this week.  And I still have some frozen chili in the freezer.  So, mother, pin a rose on me! :)

So there, Chris!  I will post pictures of my shelves if and when I ever get them finished and stuff on them.  And I'll post a picture of the pottery shop when it's finished.

I'm Getting There...

Yesterday I got the filling for the cuccidatti cookies made and in the fridge and last night I made the dough and put that in the fridge, and this morning, before I had too much time to think about it, I bit the bullet and dug in.  With these cookies you divide the dough in half and just work with one half at a time, leaving the other in the fridge.  And believe it or not, by the time I got the first half out of the oven and the glaze put on, it was probably around 1:30 or so.  Figured I deserved a break and ran a couple of errands (which turned out to be pretty fruitless), had a Subway for a late lunch and got back home.

Decided I would try a new recipe I had saved for a raisin-cinnamon apple bread before I tackled the rest of the cookies and that had to be in the oven for about 70 minutes.  About halfway through I started on the cookies again.  I tell you, I suppose it's old age creeping up or something, but I really have to push myself to get going on them.  Once I get them made I'm really glad I did and this year especially they seem extra good, but oh my gosh, they're a lot of work.  And, of course you have to keep cleaning everything up cause there's the filling stuff, the dough stuff, the putting them together stuff, the frosting and glazing stuff and at least in my tiny kitchen, there's not enough room to just let all that stuff accumulate.

But I took a little package of them to my friend Peggy today (she's pretty much lost her voice and sounds pitiful but kind of hilarious) and have made up two more little bundles - one for a few of the women I used to work with and one for the barristas at Starbucks.  The rest I'll take with me over to the kids - they all like them too.

I also got started gathering things up that I'll be taking with me.  Wrapped presents, unwrapped presents, and such.  I told myself to take something down to the car each time I go out of the building and then there won't be so much to do come Monday morning when I'm hoping to leave.  Might be Tuesday, but I think I can be ready by Monday.

This was a stellar week in my Etsy shop - I sold four items! I think shoppers must have been having one last fling before settling down to getting ready for the big day. :)

Sorry there are no pictures - there are pictures of the cuccidatti cookies in the recipe collection including pictures of some of the steps in making them.  Wish I had looked at them myself this year cause the new method I tried for measuring and cutting the strips this year didn't work as well as the new method I tried last year and forgot all about. :)

Thanksgiving Dinner for One

Once again this year I had decided that just because I was going to be alone didn't mean I shouldn't have the pleasure of a day of cooking and an evening of eating, so after an hour or so perusing cookbooks a couple of days before, I finally decided on a pork roast.  I found all kinds of great recipes for roasted chicken and thought that's what I'd do, but the recipe I found for roast pork was one where first you do this, a little later you do that, and that's what I wanted - something to fool with periodically throughout the day.

What with also making a pumpkin pie, fiddling off and on with the roast recipe, peeling and boiling some shrimp for a shrimp cocktail, and getting my sweet potato and asparagus in the oven, I ended up pretty much in the kitchen most of the day!

The only thing that wasn't good was the roasted asparagus I made for a green veggie - and I should have known better - it's very much a spring vegetable.  But everything else was very good (if I'm allowed to say that myself) and I was thrilled with the pork roast.  It cooked like a pot roast - covered and with liquid and I had never cooked a boneless pork roast that way.  Always roasted them open and dry and then made good gravy with the drippings.

I ended up taking parts from two similar recipes and I've posted the resulting recipe HERE.  If you like cooked cabbage and you like roast pork, I think you'll love this recipe!

Here are a couple pics of the end result of my efforts.  On the left, my shrimp cocktail as appetizer (even pulled out one of my mother's pretty pieces of crystal)...and on the right, dinner!  The cabbage didn't stay that bright, pretty purple color but that's probably just as well - it would definitely have clashed with my table rug (tee hee...)

Am I Delinquent?

I guess so...my son informs me it has been a while and even one of his friends mentioned to him that it was a long time.  Doesn't seem all that long to me, but I'll see what I can think to record.  It was nice to hear that someone I don't even know is enjoying and following the blog and it would be even nicer to get comments, shared stories, reader's own recipe ideas, etc., from people other than my poor long-suffering family.  So if you read my posts and something reminds you of a funny or interesting story, feel free to share it.  If you experiment with one of my recipes and are pleased with the result, I'd love to hear about that.  And if you have a favorite recipe or two you'd like to share, that would be great too.

Right now, I'm at my older daughter's home (Heather) in Maryland.  She broke her arm last Saturday falling off a horse and her husband and my granddaughter Sophia were already booked on a flight to Ireland for a christening of his brand new nephew, so I said I would come over and stay with her while they're gone.  I had already been thinking about coming over cause I hardly ever get to have my daughter all to myself and I'm selfish enough to think that would be real nice.  So, here I am and even though it's not quite as planned, it is nice being with her and my grandson Johnny.  Heather broke her humerus bone and the normal treatment for that, apparently, is to put a stiff something under the lower arm and a stiff something under the upper arm, and then wrap the whole thing in an Ace bandage and put it in a sling.  It sort of horrifies me cause, of course, any time it gets nudged or jiggled or anything it gives her a lot of pain.  She will see the doctor again on Tuesday and we're hopeful he'll move her on to "step 2" which is an upper arm brace type thing that, at least in the pictures, looks like it would be much better than what she has right now.  So that's pretty much where I am now.  She and her family are also moving into a new house in three weeks, so I told her I would try and get her breakables packed for her and have been working on that.

I'll be here probably until Thursday and then will go to my daughter January's new "place of residence".  They found a little rental house that sounds so nice for them - nothing at all fancy but not an apartment!!! Over a very unpleasant lady!!!  :)

On the homefront (Huntington), we have yet another new business that just opened - The Bottle and Wedge which is a delightful beer, wine and cheese store, along with having all sorts of special bottled sauces, jams and jellies, dips, marinades, all kinds of goodies.  I don't know much about beer but these are not the standard "grocery store beers".  And the cheeses he has so far are very enticing.  The shop is located in Pullman Square (same place as "my" bakery) and Pullman Square is really beginning to come back to life.  The bakery has open mike every Saturday and that really draws in a lot of people.  And, of course, so does what the bakery sells! :)  I took a picture of the outside and inside of the new shop, but only the outside photo is worth posting.  The second photo is just two really pretty demi-baguettes I bought at the bakery shortly before I came over here and they just looked so nice I took a picture of them.  Tasted good too!

 

Also, before I came over here, I was in kind of a cooking mood and tried that vodka pasta sauce recipe again.  It was better this time and as I worked on it, I wrote down what I was doing, but, of course, I left my little notes at home so can't update the recipe yet.  But I will and it really is quite tasty.  In fact one of my neighbors was in Starbucks one evening and sat down for a visit (a young med student) and told me how much he enjoyed the smells coming from my apartment sometimes and mentioned the night before which just happened to be when I had made the vodka sauce.  Here's a picture of dinner that night:..

and making half a recipe instead of a quarter, I had enough to eat it twice and then freeze the remainder for probably another one or two servings.  Maybe I should take my neighbor a helping.  

And I also got into a needleworking mood although the trip over here has kind of deep-sixed that for now.  But the woman who commissioned the quilt block cross stitches from me has a real life sampler she sent me a picture of and asked if I could replicate it in miniature.  Worked a long time getting a pattern for that and started stitching it, but discovered I was stitching on 28 count rather than 32 count so have put that one aside to ponder for a bit.  Even on 32 count, I think it would be a little large, but then I always remind myself her dollhouse is really big.  But starting on that got me digging once again through all my old patterns and I found several things I want to start working on and pulled out a rug I started a looonnnnggg time ago (probably at least 6 or 7 years ago and after the first burst of activity never worked on again.  It's on 40 count silk gauze and I've started working on it again.  Here's what was finished when I pulled it out:

In some ways, it's a much simpler pattern than the rug I stitched for January's roombox and the Aubusson I've been working on off and on for a while (not nearly as many colors for one thing), but it's just so striking and Oriental that I really like it.  I brought it with me but haven't worked on it here - just too much going on.  But I'll get back to it.

Oh, and one other neat thing - after Jamie Oliver filmed his first American food revolution TV show here in Huntington, what? two years ago? Jamie's Kitchen became Huntington's Kitchen, still using his program to teach cooking and nutrition and such and has been doing quite well I think.  Anyway, they've reopened their fresh market on Fridays and I heard they had local eggs so went down a couple of Fridays ago and bought half a dozen of those plus a basil plant and an oregano plant, both of which are still alive and well.  I went back a week or so later and this time a woman was there with two little goats in a cage and had some goat cheese samples which were delicious.  I asked her about buying some and she said that they don't sell the cheese direct - they sell shares in the goats!!  You buy a share or half a share and then you get a certain amount of cheese each month delivered to Huntington's Kitchen for pickup.  I'm still pondering that - I loved the cheeses I tasted but don't know that I could use up even half a share a month.  Might think about seeing if a neighbor would like to go in on it with me...

And that pretty much brings me up to date - just finished a marathon session of Craz y Eights with Johnny and Heather.  The last round went on so long that we finally had to set a time limit and agree that if the hand wasn't over by then, we'd continue tomorrow night.  And, amazingly enough, it wasn't finished, so we made sure we'd remember where to pick up again and are all eager to get back to it. :)   

After spending this coming Thursday evening with January and Maggie, I'll go on to Chris's Friday afternoon, spend the weekend there and then go back home Monday unless something should happen with Heather's arm.  Sure am anxious to see what Tuesday's appointment with the doc brings...

By Special Request...

Back last week sometime, my friend Shelly called to see if I wanted to meet at Starbucks for a visit and I said sure but would she like to come have a bowl of chili first?  She did and we had a nice visit here and then went to Starbucks and visited some more.  She was kind enough to say she really liked the chili and was I ever going to post that recipe to my blog.  I said I definitely would and now here a week has gone by and so my apologies to Shelly!  But now, I've just put a pot of what may or may not turn out to be edible into the oven to cook for a couple of hours.  I found a nice half pound package of stew meat at the store a couple days ago and thought "I'll try that with the Moroccan spices and see what I think".  So that's what's cooking now - it sure does smell good but I'm not sure how it will turn out.  I never seem to be real successful with stew beef - it always seems to remain hard, unchewable lumps of meat.  But try, try again is my motto!

Anyway, here is the link to the chili recipe which starts out with how I cook my pot roast since I now use leftover pot roast meat to make the chili. And, of course, I've put it in my Recipe Collection index also.

Any questions - let me know...

I Guess When It's Cold Outside, I Cook!

Cause that sure seems to be about all I've been doing.  Nothing too exciting although I did try a new recipe tonight which involved my first lamb shank ever.  More about that later.

I finally got around to using up the leftover meatball mix that was in the freezer and had spaghetti and meatballs (of course) one night and then a meatball sub with roasted cauliflower another night.  And it dawned on me I've never posted the meatball and sauce recipe so now I have and here's a link to that:  Spaghetti and Meatballs.   Don't know why I took pictures of both those meals cause they mostly just look like a mound of tomato sauce but I wanted to have a picture to put with the recipe so here they are.

You can see it makes a pretty thick sauce.  At some point I started making pasta with tomatoes (canned or fresh) chopped up, adding a little tomato paste to get the sauce good and tomato-y, and usually some sauteed veggies - zucchini, yellow crookneck, maybe broccoli, maybe mushrooms, etc.  And I really like that type of sauce now.  But when I make my good ole Mama Mia's Spaghetti and Meatballs, I still love it too.  And since it's not my own recipe, I'm allowed to say the meatballs are the best I've ever had.

And this is the meatball sub with the roasted cauliflower.  I forget now what prompted me to make the cauliflower - oh, I saw one of those bags of already chopped up cauliflower florets and they were still so nice and white looking I decided to get them and then had to decide what to do with them so this was a result of that.  I think I had copied out a recipe for roasted cauliflower with garlic and parmesan cheese so I adjusted a couple of things and it was quite delicious.

Then one night I did that business of cooking a little can of baked beans that I gussied up and baked in my miniature iron skillet and served with two blackened hotdogs.  Only thing is, this time I cooked the beans a little too long or hotter or something and they were pretty dried out.  But I'll just be more careful next time cause even dried out, it was still a fun dinner (if you like hotdogs!)  So no picture of that.

Moving right along, my next meal came about because I was wandering through the grocery store and saw a new product.  Our stores have always had those real thin, oblong packages of various Italian meats - prosciutto, salami, capacolla (not sure of the spelling).  Well, now they've come out with a baked ham that's been roasted with rosemary and garlic and, of course, I had to get that.  I decided I'd make that egg strata thing I made once before so I did and I'll be updating that recipe with a few changes I made.  So here's the new ham:

And here's the second strata:

I liked my first attempt, but I liked this one better, so I've updated that recipe (Easy Egg Strata)  I also used this ham in a sandwich one lunch time and still have some left that I think I'll use to make a carbonara type spaghetti sauce.

And that brings me to the Moroccan lamb shank tonight.  The seasonings in it were a lot different than what I normally cook with - at least in this combination - so that was fun.  Here's what all the main recipe called for:  paprika, turmeric, cumin, cayenne, cinnamon and kosher salt.  Along with the onion and carrot.  I'll probably post this recipe too although lamb shanks aren't always available at our stores - I don't know about other places.  And when I DO post it, I'll be adjusting a few things.  So here are my pictures from tonight's episode of Mary Lynne in the Kitchen. :)

Here are the onions and carrots waiting to be added back in...

And here's the lamb shank browning in that almost syrupy mix from all the spices mingling with the oil...

And here's the finished product with the nummy sweet potatoes.  My only complaint about this recipe is trying to get the meat separated from all it's "stuff".  The shank, being the bottom of the leg, has a lot of sinews, connecting tissue, etc.  But the meat was very tender and tasty.  It would be interesting to try a different cut but I think the slow cooking really permeates the meat (and any veggies) much more than it would with a more tender, quicker cooking meat.

So that's it for now - I'll post the spaghetti and lamb recipes shortly.

Good Food Makes for Good Memories!

I've been reading a book by Judith Jones called "The Tenth Muse".  Don't know if she's still alive or not but she apparently has been in love with and very much involved with food for most of her life.  She ended up working at Knopf Publishers and her first big success was the editing of Julia Child's and Simone Beck's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking".

Anyway, the book is a memoir and has been a pleasant read.  And there are a bunch of recipes in the back that I've been peeking at now and then.  Actually, she's also the author of "The Pleasures of Cooking for One", a book I have and mentioned on a post quite a while back.

Today, I came across the sentence "...among my favorites is the ritual...of picking peas..., shelling them and rushing the peas into the waiting pot of boiling water; the the thrill of their taste, made all the more poignant because they are being shared with the people she loves..." and I was immediately transported to my grandparents farm where my sister and I spent all the summers of our childhood after my father died (I was 3, my sister 6).  I can't say I remember peas being rushed to a pot of boiling water, although I can certainly remember how they sounded when we helped Grammy shell them into a metal pan; but I totally remember her putting a big pot of water on to boil, then going out to her vegetable garden, picking a bunch of sweet corn, bringing it back to the chairs under the apple tree where we would help husk it and then into the water.  And I've never had corn as good and sweet as that since.  I've had it that was picked in the morning, sold off the back of a truck, and then I'd cook it in the evening and it was plenty good, but, oh my goodness, that corn of Grammy's was heavenly.

It's a funny thing about Grammy's cooking.  We certainly had a full dinner every evening, but try as I might, I've never really remembered any dinner dishes except a chicken casserole type thing she made that we all loved and none of us have ever been able to figure out how she made it.   I know she had to cook other foods but aside from that (and that corn!) all I remember is all the wonderful baking she did.  She made a devil's food cake with what she called boiled frosting that was out of this world.  When I was a newlywed, they came out with a frosting mix that did away with the hassle of making boiled frosting from scratch, and I would make a devil's food cake from a mix and the frosting from a mix and it was good enough, but nothing like hers.  And with the frosting mix, after the first day, the frosting would get kind of tough.

She made bread too and here I have to confess to what little snots my sister and I could be - we loved the buns she made - where she took the bread dough and made them into buns about the size of hamburger buns but totally beyond spongy hamburger buns.  They would come hot out of the oven and we would slather them with butter and peanut butter and wolf them down.  But she also made loaves of bread for sandwiches and we didn't want to eat that bread - we wanted bread from the store like we were used to, so on their weekly trip into town, she'd buy us our bread for sandwiches.  Children are so strange...

And she made cherry pies and apple pies with the fruit from her trees, and meringue pies too.  Lemon, of course, but she also made a lemon-cream pie that I remember that was a cream pie but with just that little bit of lemony taste to it.  I loved that one.  Back then I wasn't a big fan of apple pies but I loved the cherry pies too.  Ooh, and gingersnaps - just remembered those.  And I remember one summer when we were a little bit older, we were there and she made something new - again it was using bread dough (although it may have been sweetened a little) and she rolled it into little balls, rolled each ball in melted butter and cinnamon sugar, arranged them in a layer in an angelfood cake pan, sprinkled chopped nuts over that and then did another layer and another, until the dough was all gone.  Then it would raise for a bit and she'd bake it.  As they say nowadays, OMG!!! it was incredible.  When we'd go up to my aunt and uncle's cottage at the lake, she'd sometimes take one of those and everyone would just sit pulling those little balls of deliciousness off and popping them in their mouths.  And then years later when I was grown and married, here came a mix for what they called "monkey bread" that, again, was basically that same thing and, again, not nearly as good.

Mama was a good cook too, although when it came to big dinners (holidays and such) she was kind of a nervous cook.  Everything always turned out great but I think she was probably about a basket case by the time it was all on the table.  The things she cooked that I remember best and loved were her gravies, her stuffing and her potato salad.  I finally insisted that I watch and measure one time when she was making stuffing and that's what I make now, and I don't think I ever actually measured amounts when she made potato salad, but I watched often enough that I can pretty much duplicate that.  And every now and then, I come somewhat close to her gravy, but never have I made it as good as she did.  Her gravy was practically black it was such a dark brown.  And there was always plenty of it - I'm sometimes lucky to get half a gravy boat full.  It's begun to dawn on me that perhaps one of the problems is that with our great worry about fat, meat has been hybridized (or whatever would be the correct term) until you just don't get as much "drippings" as she used to get.  I did finally learn, back when I made standing rib roasts for our Christmas dinners, to ask for extra beef fat and I would just put it in a baking pan and bake it for several hours so I'd have plenty of drippings for the roasted potatoes, Yorkshire pudding and gravy.  But I still never seemed to get it as dark as Mama's.

And that's a lot of what this book is about - the memories we all have of the food we grew up with, our first experiments with cooking as "grown-ups", memorable meals we've had with family and friends (or in Italy!), etc.  And it sure has opened up my memory banks which has been very enjoyable.I think about my childhood and how very, very lucky I was to have such a wonderful one and those summers at Grammy's were a big part of it.  Probably helped too that most of my childhood was in the 50's which sure seems like "the golden age" looking back on it now.

All that reading and looking at the recipes in the back of the book is keeping me inspired to keep cooking.  It's funny - today at the grocery store I noticed they had lamb (Ms. Jones uses lamb a fair amount) in various guises including individually packaged lamb shanks and I thought "I'll have to try and find some recipes for lamb shanks".  Came home, got my mail and there was my new "Bon Appetit" magazine and in it is a recipe for lamb shanks!  And one of "The Tenth Muse" recipes is for a Cornish hen that has all kinds of good herbs and seasonings stuffed under its skin - want to try that too.  That's one thing winter is good for - cooking!

Christmas, 2010 - A Brief Report

If I was really being brief, I'd just say it's been wonderful!  But just so I can remember why it was wonderful after time has passed, I'll journal what I can still remember.

January and Maggie arrived early enough on Thursday evening that we got to have a nice visit before we all went to bed.  They had an uneventful trip over which was nice and they arrived to Huntington's strange "season of snow".  The whole time they were in Huntington, it snowed off and on and made everything feel very right.  Friday, Christmas Eve, we took a walk down to the river (me and my river), saw a bunch of geese which always makes me wonder how they stand this weather, but there they are; and I'm already forgetting most of Friday.  Of course we went to Starbucks - what would be surprising is if we didn't.  And I know that thanks to January, we went to the grocery store cause I had decided to wait til Friday to get my pork roast for Christmas dinner and then totally forgot about it til she mentioned it around 4:30 - with the store closing at 6:00!  Oh, and again, of course, we went to Hillbilly Hotdogs for lunch.  Now, in my own defense, I must say I was going to take us to the new-ish Thai restaurant that seems to be popular and always busy.  But they were closed.  We were forced to go to Hillbilly.  And, I've been lucking out lately.  Once again, Sonny, the owner was there and kept us well entertained.  And while we were there, there were four people at another table and they ordered a Homewrecker and a Big Bad Bubba Burger, both of which are way oversized items.  The Homewrecker starts with a 15"(!) hotdog and comes with ALL of their toppings.  The Big Bad Bubba Burger starts with 3 pounds of ground beef.  I wish I had had my camera with me to get a picture of the man who was facing towards me when they brought out the plates.  He was stunned...  I know I've posted their web addy before, but if you want to see the Homewrecker up close and personal, here it is again:  http://hillbillyhotdogs.com.

When we came back, Maggie mentioned that she had never had the grand tour of the fitness center and the "club" room so we went to inspect those.  While we were in the club room, Maggie tried the remote on the TV (which I had done once with no success) and the TV came on.  So we decided that we would find out when "A Christmas Story" was going to be on and go down to the club room with our light cheese, bread and wine evening repast and watch it there since I don't have cable.  But before that, we met one of my neighbor ladies as we were coming in and she had told me she was hoping to meet January so we stopped and chatted.  I said she should come down for a glass of wine later, she said "I thought you'd never ask!" and a little later she did come down and I opened a bottle of Prosecco (good grief there's another story there!  NOTE:  and I just posted it here) and pretty much finished that off while she was there.  Then when it was time we took all our goodies down to the club room for our evening entertainment and it was just real nice.  The movie was, as always, lots of fun - if you grew up in the 50's and haven't seen it, you really should sometime.  It's sort of like reliving your childhood.

Doesn't it just look cozy? Bless their hearts, January and Maggie brought all the cheese with them - an aged gouda, some fresh goat cheese and a wonderful brie.  They also brought the bread - an olive wheat bread that was wonderful.  And we brought down some of the rum cake and a little 4" cheese cake I had made after throwing the big one in the trash.

Since we're all grown-ups now, there was no getting up at the crack of dawn, but we didn't be laggards either.  Had a nice time opening our presents to and from each other and the presents my sister had mailed to us.  The girls got me three bottles of nicer wine than I ever buy for myself, including one by Bogle called "Phantom" which was just luscious.  They only produce it once a year at the end of the harvest I guess, and it was wonderful.  Also a Bogle Old Vine Zinfandel and the DaVinci Chianti.  Nice...  They also gave me a stick blender which I tried while we were still in West Va.  I made my vodka pasta sauce and used the blender to puree it and it worked like a charm.  I think I'm going to be very happy with that.  Some tea and an over-the-cup loose tea strainer also which I had been wanting.

For dinner, we had a boneless, rolled and tied, pork loin roast which was tasty, tasty.  One of the presents from my sister was a wonderful sea salt seasoned with rosemary and I forget what else, but I rubbed that all over the roast before I put it in the oven - quite nummy.  We also made the sweet potatoes with browned butter and sage that I posted the recipe for last Thanksgiving and oh, my goodness - I think they were even better this year.  The butter came this close to actually getting burnt and that must have made a difference or something.  After all, Tyler Florence's recipe says to cook the butter until it's "brown and nutty - crazy nutty" and we decided that's what crazy nutty must mean.  Then we had mashed potatoes and gravy and steamed broccoli.  Finished off the bottle of Phantom that we had opened Christmas Eve.  So a very, very nice meal.

I had made a little gift certificate for the girls giving them the choice of going to the pottery place and each choosing something to paint and finish or going to a movie of their choice, with refreshments.  They chose the movie because they wanted to see "Voyage of the Dawn Treader" so we went to the matinee performance of that Sunday afternoon after my usual Sunday morning at Starbucks.  They had their drinks there, read the funnies and weekend magazine, met and visited with one of my Starbucks friends, and then went to Empire Book Store while I finished the crossword.  We considered the popcorn our "lunch" and then I made the vodka sauce and served it on some farfalle for dinner.  I love the taste of that sauce and am going to continue to work at getting things just right.  I'm having trouble getting the type and quantity of pasta right, I think.  This time, I used farfalle pasta and whole wheat too (don't even know why I bought that) and it was way to much pasta-chewing for the amount of sauce.  Also, I'm going to look at some other vodka sauce recipes on line and see how they might differ from mine.  I wouldn't want it much different, but I think mine either needs to go into the oven with more liquid than the recipe says or needs to cook for a much shorter period of time.  I shall update when I've perfected it. :)

And I think that's pretty much everything.  I've always loved going over to Virginia and Maryland for Christmas there with my kids, but it was nice to have Christmas in "my house" again.   I hitched a ride over to Virginia on Monday when January and Maggie went back home and have been at Chris's since then.  I'll report on that and then on my visit with Heather starting Sunday.

I guess 5:35 p.m. can be officially called evening, so it is now New Year's Eve and I can send everyone my heartfelt wishes for a very healthy, very happy, and (wouldn't it be wonderful?) a very peaceful 2011!!

I Think I'm Going to Make It!

It's Tuesday evening, December 21 and counting...and I got my trip to the post office done today, finished with all of my wrapping except for the grandkiddies and I'll be delivering theirs in person after Christmas.  Although I'm going to try to get them wrapped tomorrow - I don't think there's anything too much worse than wrapping presents after Christmas.

And last night I managed to get the filling made for my cuccidati cookies which have been my favorite Christmas cookie ever since I made them probably 5 or 6 years ago.  This morning I got the pastry made for them and will either put some together later tonight (doubtful) or do them tomorrow.  The filling and the pastry have to chill for at least 8 hours.  I can remember in "the olden days" doing my Christmas baking til 2:00 in the morning!  Of course back then I would make a rum cake, a cheese cake, fudge, at least 3 or 4 kinds of cookies and a Christmas mix thing of various cereals, pretzel stix, peanuts and M&M's all coated with melted white chocolate.  I think of doing that all now and can't imagine it.  Here's a picture of the filling with a picture of the cookies behind it.

They are a glorified - and I mean truly glorified - fig newtons basically and funny thing is I never cared for fig newtons.  But with these, the pastry is a butter pastry with milk, egg and vanilla, and the filling is figs and raisins with 2 kinds of nuts, orange and lemon zest, spices, vanilla, and brandy.  And, oh my goodness, they are good!  I am going to try real hard to remember to take a couple pictures of the putting them together process and the finished product but I seem to get so involved that I tend to forget.  And some day, I may post the recipe, but it'll take about two days to type it!

Oh, and I almost forgot!  I'm not the only one stirring up goodies for Christmas - here's my sweet little Sophia mixing up a batch of cookies.  That mixer is almost bigger than she is!

Lastly, here's a picture of my chocolate castle all decked out for Christmas.  I made these little luminaria a few years back and tried putting them out in front of my fabric store one year which didn't work too well.  I really like them in front of the chocolate store...

Guess that's about it - I just felt so darned good getting finished with my presents I had to say so.  And I discovered this Italian TV series on DVD's at the library and picked up another three episodes today so I can settle in for a cozy evening.  They're detective stories and quite enjoyable (plus the subtitles are actually readable) and, of course, the scenery is wonderful.  They are filmed in Sicily and I suppose it won't surprise anyone to hear that I've already started a "next trip" folder with Sicily info! :)

Buon Notte!

Two New Recipes and a Weather Update

Boy, we are really having unusual weather for Huntington at this time of year.  I think that's because a week or two ago, there was an article in the paper about how we could expect a milder and wetter winter than normal.  I found that intriguing since, normally, Huntington is quite mild and pretty darned wet at least for November and December and I was reading the article on one of our many frigid days we've been having.  And this morning I woke up to our third snowfall so far, and the heaviest so far too - I'd guess around three inches or so and, although it's not snowing right this minute, the skies are still very leaden and there is more to come.  The weather report on line says either more snow or snow mixed with sleet.  So aren't I glad I'm retired?  Yes, I am!

And here are just a couple pictures of another white morning:

So, that's the weather.  Now on to cooking which I have been doing a lot of this week and which can probably best be summarized as "the good, the bad, and the okay".  The bad was my cheesecake and rum cake which I have made for probably the last 30 years or so every Christmas.  I managed to ruin both of them so they went in the garbage can (truly!)  I did make another rum cake and it is just as good as always. The good was a chocolate-walnut tart that I think is scrumptious and all of my guests seemed to think so too (at least a number of them want the recipe) and also a recipe I tried called herbed cherry tomatoes.  Again, guests said they liked them but one never knows how much is politeness!  However, I really liked them.  The "okay" was everything else.  I've added the tomatoes and the tart recipes to My Recipe Collection (link to that above) and I'll put the links to them here also so you don't have to dig through the whole list to find them.  The cherry tomatoes are here:  http://marylynnestraveljournal.blogspot.com/2008/12/herbed-cherry-tomatoes.html and the chocolate walnut tart is here:  http://marylynnestraveljournal.blogspot.com/2008/12/chocolate-walnut-shortbread-tart.html  As usual, I added a fair number of notes at the bottom of each.

The reason for all this mad cooking was I, who hardly ever have company, ended up with a little party on Monday evening and another little party on Wednesday evening!   It was lots of fun each night - I love getting together with friends!  But my poor kitchen by last night must have wondered what on earth was going on.  And I will definitely be "eating simple" for the next few days! :)

Now, I need to get busy and finish wrapping my presents because next Thursday January and Maggie will be here.  And I definitely made up my mind that I'm going to ride back with them in their car and then take the train back home.  And my dear son, Chris, used some of his many Amtrak points to get my ticket and he got me my own small room with its own small "facility"!!  So, ain't I somethin'?  And once I get over there, I'll have my Christmas with Heather, Alex, and the kiddies which is always quite riotous fun.  Once I'm back home in January, life is going to seem very dull for a while.  But at my age, dull is also good now and then. :)

Now, I'm going to venture out I think (with my boots on!) and see if I can find some Christmas-y paper plates to take some of the rum cake and chocolate tart to a few neighbors or I will end up eating it all myself...

Real Snow!

It started snowing this morning kind of half-heartedly and by lunch time it had decided to just go ahead and do it and it snowed heavily until at least dark.  As I look out my windows now (late!), I can still see snow drifting past the streetlights but not as heavy at all as it was earlier.  It was a wet snow so all the trees and bushes looked very Christmas-y and since I was driving out to the mall to do a couple of final Christmas things, I enjoyed it.  By the time I was driving back, it was dark and the roads were actually beginning to feel a little iffy.  I did get one picture while I was at a stoplight...

And then this one was from my living room window trying to show how thick it was snowing but it doesn't look real thick...

And I got my vodka pasta sauce made and took a picture of the very initial start of the cooking and didn't take anymore!  I ended up not eating it the night I made it (even though it smelled very good!) and thought I'd take a picture of the finished product when I ate it, but I came home from my mall trip and got it all heated up and the last-minute things added and ate it all up without even thinking about a picture.  But it was good and I've posted the recipe here.  It's called Penne Pasta with Vodka Sauce but I didn't use penne pasta - I used a linguine noodle.  It would be good with penne though because it's quite thick and is meant to be rather than the "mop-up with a piece of bread" type sauce.

And, as long as I'm here, I might as well post a few pictures I took during Huntington's annual Christmas parade.  The newspaper said it was a success...maybe it's because I was freezing to death but to me it seemed inordinately long.  And I think there was one band in the whole parade (and that was after I had given up waiting for Santa and come back inside).  There were some "floats" but it seemed to be a lot of vehicles followed by people walking followed by more vehicles, etc., and everyone throwing out handfuls of candy to the kids along the way.  So, probably for the kids, it was a success. :)  I tried, really I did, to wait for the end which is when Santa appears but I couldn't make it.  And I watched the rest from my windows and I think he did appear at the end but instead of being on a float of any type, I think he was in the horse-drawn carriage that takes people for rides in the summer.  I think he deserved something a little more eye-catching.  At one point, while watching from my windows, I saw a big flat-bed truck (I think that's what it was) and I mean big, and I thought "oh, okay - Santa will be on the end of it" but he wasn't.  But, it was a parade, and lots of people lined the streets watching so good for Huntington I say.  Just maybe try more bands and fewer random vehicles and people next time?  Here are several pictures - I took lots but of course all the floats were moving as I shot, so most of them were not very good.

I'm not real sure what this was supposed to be - I mean, I know it's a red castle, but why?  But it's very easy to see whose float it is!

And this one was a bit of a mystery - it's a delightful little church - someone did a very nice job on that.  But why are there life-sized cartoon characters sitting outside of it?

And of all the random vehicles, this was the best one cause it's so classic and had a really ear-splitting siren.

And, what else - Saturday evening I was coming in from a nice cup of tea at Starbucks and ran into neighbors of mine.  Asked them what they were up to and they said going to dinner, did I want to come along?  I politely demurred, but they said, no, really and they were going to Huntington Prime so I said shoot, yes!  I do like that restaurant but don't go very often cause to me it's sort of a "splurge" place.  But having just finished off two cookies (Healthy Choice brand, mind you) I wasn't real hungry and so just ordered a delicious glass of house red and their appetizer of seared scallops in a red onion sauce?  jelly?  can't remember what term they used, but it was delicious!  So that was very nice and unexpected.

Then, today it was, of course tea and crossword puzzle at Starbucks in the morning and had a nice visit with a friend who I used to see quite often there but who has not been a frequent visitor lately.  Then in the afternoon I joined the group of ladies I did that steamboat ride with this past summer and we did the Huntington Candlelight House Tour - 7 homes with beautiful Christmas decorations (and beautiful homes even if they hadn't had Christmas decorations), then back to one of their homes for a little wine and sustenance.  So it's been a real nice few days and I'm feeling very content and fortunate to have such nice friends, such lovely snowy weather while decorating for Christmas, good food to eat, and a blog to blab on.

And, now back to the DVD I've been watching last night and tonight "People Like Us" which is a typically bizarre British TV series - very tee-hee-ish, so tee hee.

I've Added Some Recipes to My Collection

And sometime   I'm going to figure out a way to organize them into categories or something.  But for now,  I'm just going to put them in with all the others.

Here are the ones I'll be posting today so if you want to take a look at any of them, click on the "My Recipe Collection" link above.

Baked Potato Soup (a good one right now - it's been snowing off and on all day!)
Split Pea Soup
Osso Buco
Short Rib Ragu
Curried Chicken Salad Sandwich
Chicken Ragu Over Polenta
Vegetable Gratine for One
Roasted Carrots W/Orange Brown Butter and Sage
Smoked Salmon Fettucine for One
My Sister's Mushroom Sauce for Pasta

I've made all of these myself and they're ones I saved as keepers.  In fact I'm glad I decided to post them cause it's made me think I need to make them again.  I have some smoked salmon in the fridge, actually.  And tonight I'm baking a potato but I'm going to slow cook cabbage to serve over it so won't be turning it into soup.  That cabbage over potatoes was a dish I came up with when I was doing Weight Watchers and counting points.  I chop up the cabbage, put it in a skillet with some water (not a lot), add 1 tsp butter and 1 tsp bacon grease and cook until really soft and brothy.  Dump it on top of the opened, salted and peppered potato and it is good!  And 5 points!  I sometimes add onions too...oh, and sometimes I do the same thing but with fresh green beans.  And the cooking until quite soft is the West Virginia way and I love it.

So, buon appetito and if you try any of these, I hope you enjoy them and/or will let me know how you liked them.

Help!! I'm Cooking and I Can't Stop!

Yep, I'm still at it and I'm piling up so many leftovers (even after halving and quartering recipes) that I had to go buy a few more containers to put them in.

Referring back to my roasted red pepper sauce, I heated it up a second time (after having added the stuff I added), served it on some broken up linguine noodles and it was pretty delicious.  I think adding the honey (could have been sugar) really helped as did the sprinkle of cayenne.  It doesn't take much of it to be enough for a serving of pasta - I tend to keep thinking of it as a tomato-type sauce which I usually serve in fairly generous portions so I can mop it up with bread, but this has such an intense flavor that I think it's probably meant to be used more like a pesto-type sauce.  So I'll be adding this to my recipe collection after I'm all done with my cooking experiments and update the collection.

I still haven't made the vodka sauce or butternut squash sauce I mentioned a few days ago, but I did get busy and make the mini pumpkin pie and the Tuscan beans so here are my notes on that.

I had decided I would make half a recipe of pumpkin pie filling (using the Libby's canned pumpkin recipe which I've used all my life), make one mini pie and, as an experiment, freeze the rest of the filling to see if it would be useable at a future date.  I decided I would try to make a graham-cracker type crust but use some Anna's Ginger Snaps that I had in the cupboard because that seemed like a good idea.  And when finished, it was a very tasty idea - I really liked it with the filling, but it didn't bake like a graham cracker crust - it got kind of sticky and messy.  I had added sugar and butter to the crumbs just like I do my graham cracker crusts and I think probably the cookies have more sugar and oil/butter to begin with.  So it was fine to eat, but messy to serve which since it was just me, that was all right.  And I'm not really sure how I would fix it because you have to add some butter to make it "pressable".  I could leave out the extra sugar though and see if that helped.  I haven't used the frozen filling yet so can't report on that - I'm planning to make myself another little pie for Thanksgiving.

 This was before I baked it and I forgot to take a picture of it afterward.

The next project was the Tuscan beans.  I cooked the whole pound of cannellini beans I had purchased in Perugia from that wonderful store with the bags of all kinds of bulk beans sitting on the floor.  I shouldn't have cooked that many because that is a lot of beans.  But I tried two somewhat different recipes - one that was supposed to be pretty much like the white beans they serve on brushcetta as an antipasti course and the other that the recipe suggested serving with a roast pork loin among other things - it had a wee bit more seasoning in it and not as much olive oil.  Not too much exciting to report there although I was forced to decide that my great "find" of an enamelled cast iron Dutch oven wasn't such a great find after all.  It's what I made my disappointing pot roast in and then I cooked one of the batches of beans in it and that didn't work well either.  So, no more cast iron enamelled pots for me!  Both batches of beans came out fine and the ones that were for antipasti were very close to what I've had in Italy so I was happy about that.  I had them as a soup the first night and then tried them with toasted good bread the next and both were fine.  Then I froze the remainder of that batch and started on the second batch out of which I used some to make the ribollita soup.  This went pretty well also - the taste was very good and again, similar to what I remember having in Florence.  But I chopped everything up the way the recipe I followed described and next time I will chop everything much smaller.  In the bowls I've had in Florence, you can't really tell what any of it is - it's just good.  But mine had chunks of potatoes, slices of carrots, slices of celery, etc., all of which were very detectable.  Also, curiously enough, there was every now and then a bean that hadn't cooked as soft as the others and a piece of celery or carrot that was still slightly crunchy.  I don't know what causes this.  I remember one time cooking a batch of sauerkraut and Polish sausage and cooking potatoes and carrots in with it and the vegetables simply refused to ever get done.  I wonder if it's something to do with the acid that sauerkraut (and the tomatoes in the ribollita) would have?  But it was really tasty - I just would like it better with everything pretty much minced rather than chopped.  The recipe I followed said to take the leftovers and bake them in a casserole for an hour or so until the top got kind of crusty so I did that tonight and mmmm, that was good too. :)  Again, I forgot to take any pictures of the finished product.

This is after sauteing the onion and celery for awhile and then adding the potatoes, carrots, and tomatoes.

And after that's cooked a while, you're supposed to add a bunch of kale, a bunch of chard, and a Savoy cabbage but I only used a bunch of chard and didn't use all of that.  This is before it was wilted down.  Then after pureeing most of the beans, you add the puree and the beans you didn't puree and let it cook and cook.  When I make it again, I'll change that too - I won't puree most of the beans - it made the soup a fairly light color and in Italy, it's quite dark.  But overall, I was happy with it cause it was good!

And finally, I also used the other half of the canned pumpkin to make a recipe I found for pumpkin bread with sweetened dried cranberries and I'm certainly enjoying that!  The recipe called for vegetable oil and mine was so old, I was afraid to use it so I made it with butter instead and that worked fine.

I'm going to be by myself this Thanksgiving (that's my choice - I was invited to join family members and/or friends so I'm not neglected) and am just hoping this cooking jag lasts a little while longer.  Yesterday I bought a nice small roasting hen, a sweet potato, some celery (for the soup and next for a little bit of stuffing).  I'll defrost my pumpkin pie filling and see if it looks like I can make another pumpkin pie and, if not, I'll be freezing part of this bread and will be able to thaw that if need be.  And my plan is to also start a little of my Christmas decorating, a little on-line Christmas shopping and maybe even wrap a present or two so I think I will have a nice weekend. :)

If I don't write again before then, hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving and...buon appetito!