Rotisserie chicken - the solo cook's friend

I just finished making a batch of my curried chicken "pate" and am letting it sit to absorb the flavors. I made it with left-over rotisserie chicken and even though I've posted about it before I thought I'd post what I've done with this most recent chicken. First, by the time I got it home I was famished partly from smelling it all the way home from the store.  So my first meal from it was basically standing in the kitchen and cutting off a thigh and drumstick and eating it while it was still hot.  Not a pretty picture but juicy good!

Next I made a chicken pot pie (recipe here) and the crust wasn't too attractive but it still makes a very tasty, comfort food dinner.

Now today as I said, I've made a batch of the curried chicken pate (recipe here) which will be enough for two lunches.

And I still have a whole leg and some breast meat left. That will be more than enough to make a curried chicken tikka masala type dinner. No recipe here--I use a bottled sauce and always add a little milk or cream to it, some frozen peas and lots of times some chunks of tomato which I add right at the end just to heat them up. I serve that with the naan bread I buy at the grocery store which is very good.

So no pictures this time. Just a reminder that those rotisserie chickens are a wonderful boon for the solo cook. Bring one home, enjoy your first meal that evening while it's still hot, then after it cools take the meat off the carcass (I left the meat on the thigh and drumstick), put it in the fridge and come up with your own ideas for other meals - in a pasta sauce or a noodle casserole, a delicious salad (the kind with nuts and grapes), whatever floats your boat.

For my $4.99 bird I will have had 3 dinners and two lunches and that's hard to beat.

Having fun with little pizzas

and thinking maybe I should open a pizza-for-one parlor!  Not really, but since I made that first eggplant one, I've made three more that I remember - probably so far that's it.  But I've enjoyed each one and so far, no matter what I put on them, they are very tasty.  I took pictures of two of them:

First is a chili pizza!  I had made my chili and decided rather than just keep eating bowl after bowl, I'd (for some strange reason) try using it for a pizza.  Baked it on naan bread like the others and it was really good!  I also some onion and red & green peppers and sprinkled them around. (I might have some minced garlic in there too - can't remember).  Then I used grated cheddar for the topping, popped it in my toaster oven for 8 minutes and was really delighted with the result.  I think I was so tickled with it when I took it out of the oven I didn't remember to take another picture to show it finished.

I also think one reason I'm finding these so tasty is because of the bread.  It's just the right thickness and when it gets brown and crusty it has such a good toasty flavor - very different from a standard pizza crust but very tasty.


So, this next one didn't turn out too great because I used a regular sized tomato and cut the slices too thick.  I had meant for them to kind of shrivel up a little like they do when they're baked but the pizza doesn't bake long enough to give the thick slices time to do that.  However, I liked the flavor mix so I made another one later and used my Campari tomatoes - they're smaller than a regular tomato but bigger than a cherry tomato.  And I managed to get them sliced more thinly.

The picture on the left always makes me think I'm looking at fish for some reason.  I spread a couple teaspoons of crushed tomatoes on the bread, then added some of the sautéed onion/pepper mix and finished off with some Feta cheese.  It was tasty but ugly and very difficult to eat with those great slabs of tomato.  Wish I had taken a picture of the second one I made which was delicious!


So I think these little pizzas will be something I go to fairly regularly.  I was thinking since I'm using naan bread I should probably try a curry one sometime.  I'll ponder that for a bit.

Meanwhile, I tried another recipe a week or two before all this pizza baking.  It was from the Food & Wine cookbook and so was a recipe to serve four.  I cut it down either to a half or quarter.  It was Polenta with Eggplant, Onion and Tomato and was also very good although I think it would be just about as good and easier to just serve it on pasta.  I love polenta but it takes quite a while to get cooked and requires not necessarily constant stirring but frequent stirring.  

Here's the cooking part and below is the eating part. :)

And that's my cooking report.  I've also made a lentil recipe twice now - once with quite old lentils and when that wasn't wildly successful but was tasty I bought new lentils and made it again.  I'm going to be posting that one in My Recipes and will probably also add these pizza ideas to the pizza "recipe" I've already posted.  If anyone ever tries this idea (and you could always use those packaged individual pizza crusts although I prefer the naan) and comes up with other combinations, I would love to hear about them and post them.

Bon appetit!

A New "for one" Recipe and Bread Diary Part II

Well, I always seem to announce in my posts that I'm going to do this, that or the other and then often times never get around to it. This time I thought I remembered posting my latest "I'm going to" and went through my last two posts and nope, I didn't. And this time, I've been doing it!!! 

Ah, the vagaries of life...

Anyway, my vow was to go through most all my "cooking for one" cookbooks, select recipes that sounded good and easily doable,
make up shopping lists for each one and start trying them. And I've been doing that. So far, I've made SIX! And out of all those, the one I made last night is my favorite and I took a picture of it and have posted the recipe on my RECIPES page (tab above). It is Eggplant-Hummus Pizza for One and I hope you don't let the eggplant turn you off. I really enjoyed it plus which I think it would be just as good with veggies other than eggplant.

On my lists there are two that I pencilled in a big NO! after trying them - one was way too much trouble for a mediocre dish and the other one I can't remember why it got a thumbs down.  It's interesting that they were both from the same book and also that it was the only book that wasn't geared towards solo cooking.  All of its recipes served four.  I cut the ingredients of the ones I tried in half but that shouldn't have made them turn out bad.

I haven't put the other recipes on here yet.  There was another really strange sounding one but if you like cooked cabbage and pasta I bet you'd like it cause that's what it is.  Real simple and real tasty.  So I'll probably get around to posting that one too.  There was also a chicken and bread soup recipe I tried and it got a "not bad" and I will probably try it again and do a little tinkering.

My bread diary may turn out to be a long, long project.  I haven't made any for a while now.  After that first Julia Child, incredibly-salty-but-acting-like-French-bread session , I've made three more attempts.  Turns out that another of my solo cookbooks is called "Small Batch Baking" and there were two recipes I tried.  The first one was a total fiasco and went straight from the mixing bowl to the trash.  It would never have risen.

Here's a picture of the second one...it was all right I guess but not very hole-y.  In fact maybe this is a picture of my old French bread recipe I tried back in July before I tried the Julia Child one.

 And this is the last try I did - it was from the "Small Batch Baking" book and was a new-fangled method where you don't actually knead the dough - you mash it around for a while in the mixing bowl and then leave it to rise.  It actually worked and rose beautifully but it was a much softer and less sturdy dough than Julia's and so it came out pretty darned flat.

So I think I will go back to Julia's recipe, cut down on the salt and also make the entire recipe.  That will be way more dough that I could make use of in one baking so my experiment this time will be to divide the dough into thirds, make a loaf from one third and freeze the other two separately.  I have no idea if that will work or not but I think it might.  I imagine I can find some tips on freezing and thawing unrisen dough.  Maybe I'll get a good loaf of bread yet. :)

Deleting one recipe, adding another

I'm going to delete the Lamb Shank Moroccan Style recipe because I said it it, I will probably never make it again because it was so much trouble.  And I'm replacing it with Moroccan Beef Stew - loosely based on various tagine recipes I've seen and the lamb shank recipe.

A month or more ago, I bought my "last pot roast til fall" chuck roast and when I went to cook it I realized it was way bigger than normal so I cut off a hunk and froze it.  We've been having such chilly weather that yesterday I thought I would defrost it before the weather turns hot.  I remembered that lamb shank and thought I would adapt that to the beef and not just make another pot roast so I did.

It was (she said modestly) very tasty and tonight I'm going to take some of the leftovers and make a "sort of" shepherd's pie I think.  So, actually I won't post this until I've done that and will let you know how that worked out.

I only took a couple of pictures - was having such fun with it I kept forgetting to shoot as I cooked.  But here's the beginning:

And, here's the end.  I was sitting there just chowing down and then thought "oops - better take a picture before it's all gone!"  The meat was nice and tender and the flavor was very, very tasty and an interesting change from my beloved pot roast. :)  This would definitely serve two but I like having leftovers so it's nice for one too.

Update:  The shepherd's pie was quite edible but when I make this stew again, I will make a few changes as outlined in the recipe.

A new recipe for butternut squash soup

Well, it's new to the blog. I've been making it the last winter or two and really like it and I can't believe I never put it on my blog - looked it up on the blog and it wasn't there. Never had butternut squash soup, actually. I had tasted some of my son's one time at a restaurant and thought "hmmm..that's pretty good" but recipes I saw seemed, like so many recipes, to use a ton of ingredients, some of which I wouldn't be able to find, etc. So, when I got one of the periodic bunch of coupons and recipes that my store sends out and there was a recipe that was very simple and good sounding I tried it and have stayed with it. If you'd like to try it, just use the "recipes" tab at the top of the page and it will be the first recipe under "soups and sandwiches". If you do try it and like it, or make what you think is a good change or addition, I'd love to hear about it.

My first week home was so nice because for one thing I made my pot roast and it was a really good one - some are better than others (although they're all good) and this was one of the better ones.  Then I had my pot roast hash and a couple of nights ago, I made my big batch of chili.

And I got to see and visit with pretty much everyone.  Had lunch with Jamie, went to Charleston with Peggy, had take-out from Huntington's new food truck "Chickpeas" and then went to see a professional dance event at the Keith Albee, with Sandy, had a visit with my "Starbucks" friend, Shelley, and a couple of nice phone calls, so really felt I was welcomed back home.

Condo woes unfortunately started up on Friday night when water started pouring into the 12th floor hallway and I learned that the same thing had happened while I was gone.  And then yesterday morning, the entire building lost its water because of a very bad leak in the ancient basement.  It has not been a real good couple of days for sure, but hopefully, it will be fixed sometime tonight (they've been working on it today) and life can return to normal for a bit.  Well, maybe not normal - normal seems to be problems popping up all the time!

Anyway, I'm going to make my soup tonight I think.  Or maybe tomorrow night - we're supposed to get quite a cold snap starting tomorrow.

Bon appetit all!

Way too long since last post...

especially when I had every intention of reporting on what was probably one of the nicest Christmases I've had since my kids grew up and I started spending Christmases with them instead of them with me.  I enjoy all our Christmases, but this one was really special.  Part of it may be that I think the older I get (and I'm sure getting older!), the more I'm relaxing and just enjoying whatever is happening - no worry about this or that detail.  Anyway, it was great.

But today, I'm posting partly to say isn't weather a strange thing?  At least this year.  We have had, overall, one of the coldest winters I can remember - I mean FRIGID!!  And even though we never seemed to accumulate much, it snowed off and on all winter.  But spring finally comes, the trees start budding, one day all the whatever kind of trees are suddenly blooming, it gets too warm a few times, and then on April 15, it snows!  And I have tried over and over to get pictures of the snow and they're never good and neither is this one, but I'm posting it anyway cause, I mean, April 15!!!

This first one is the snow picture and if you think hard you can see little white dots.  It really did snow heavily periodically but never did accumulate since the day before it was in the 70's and then rained all night!  The second one is just to prove that stuff really was blooming. :) 

So that was Monday.  Today, I went to The Wild Ramp, a "local food" market, to get some eggs.  Bought my standard half dozen that always has 5 brown eggs and a real pretty soft green egg.  Then I noticed that they had quail eggs!  They were so cute I could hardly stand it but I wasn't real sure what I would do with them.  I know they're kind of the rage now at upscale restaurants, but my home isn't an upscale restaurant.  However, I decided to get them and check in with Google.  Did that and there were all kinds of ideas, especially Asian-type goodies, one of which was serving a poached quail egg on Soba noodles.  That made me think "Eureka!! - I'll make some spaghetti carbonara!"  I love it and have made it occasionally but using just two ounces of spaghetti and a large egg, it ends up with the egg not cooking and coating as well as it should.  So I'm thinking maybe two, or even three of these little bitties would be just about right.  And... yesterday I had just bought some Oscar Mayer "carving board" smoked ham which is thicker cut than their sandwich ham, thinking I would use it in my egg strata.  Now I will also use it in the spaghetti carbonara.  I realize you're supposed to use pancetta or bacon, but I've used ham before and it's good too.  And when I make the strata, I plan to use one regular egg and one little quail egg because all the comments about them say that they have a higher ratio of yolk to white than a chicken egg and therefore taste a little richer which should make the strata even tastier.

Aren't they just cute?  That's a quarter in the picture (and it just dawned on me, I should have used a chicken egg for comparison).  I realize all of this is probably pretty uninteresting to a lot of people but if you love cooking and are single, maybe you'll find it exciting too.  I will report on how it all goes...

And, if you've made it this far, I just came across this in my drafts which means I never published it, so I will now. 

Woo-hoo for Huntington!!  Follow this link and check out #7 to find out why.  After you've checked that out, you're allowed to look at the other nine and see if any of them would make a nice weekend trip for you. :)

Two posts in one day!!

This one is really only important if you're a "cooking for one" person cause if you are I made a major breakthrough today and am pretty chuffed about it.

I was cleaning out the fridge a little and there was my left-over chicken and I thought "well, I guess I could have creamed chicken on a biscuit" but what really sounded good was a chicken pot pie, I suppose because of such a cold, snowy day (see my report on that below.  Hadn't made one of those since I had a family to cook for.  So...after some math calculations, I came up with a recipe that I thought seemed about right for the crust and once I had that written out, I started on the filling.  Used some of my left-over broth (by Kitchen Basics - not me), some milk, some water, etc., and made the gravy part, then chopped up a little bit of carrot, let that cook for a bit, then added some frozen peas, and finally tossed in the chicken.  Set it aside and then made the pie dough which I put in the fridge to rest for a while.  Rolled it out and it seemed to be the perfect amount for my little red casserole so I heated up the chicken mix, added a little more milk, scooped it out into the casserole, put the crust on top and into the oven it went.

Had no idea how it would turn out and I had to keep adding more minutes to the cooking time since I had no idea how long it should cook, but eventually I took it out of the oven:

and I'm sorry, but I have to tell you this was so truly absolutely delicious that I ate all of it.  I should have made one in one of my little 4" tart pans but that seemed like it would have so little "pot" in the pie that I opted for my small casserole.  But the very most important part of this is that I came up with what is apparently a perfect ratio of ingredients for the crust because that crust was flaky, tender, tasty, perfection.  There, I've said it.  I'm going to post the recipe for it in my recipe collection (HERE) so if you cook for one and would like to make yourself a little homemade pie some day, now you can make the crust from scratch.

Bon appetit!

A quick cooking post...

I don't know if I posted before about cooking a thick pork chop (instead of my standard piece of pork tenderloin) with apples and serving it with sweet potato but I did that a couple of weeks ago.  It turned out well enough that I bought a couple more and decided I'd better cook one of them tonight.  I didn't have a sweet potato and was too lazy to go get one but I did have a russet and decided I would try something new.  I peeled it and then cut it into wedges and cut the wedges in half.  Put a little olive oil in a skillet and heated it up, and laid in the wedges, turning them to coat them with the oil.  I let them brown for a while on the first side, giving them a little seasoning while waiting (and pouring myself a little glass of wine).  Here they are after their first turning.

 Not real dark, but doing nicely.  I was wondering what about the curved sides, but whatever...

 And after both sides had browned and they're laying on their curved sides.  I used seasoned salt - had a little sage, rosemary, garlic and pepper in it - a blend my sister gave me and I seem to use constantly.

I moved all the potatoes out around the edge of the pan and then put the pork chop in and didn't think to take a picture, but trust me, it was a pork chop.  Probably about 3/4" thick maybe?  After I had browned it really well (turned the heat up some) and seasoned it (with the potatoes continuing to brown also), I poured in about a tablespoon of water, slapped a piece of tinfoil on top, put the lid on and put it in the oven for 30 minutes.  And here it is along with a single serving can of green beans which I doctor up with a bit of bacon fat, a bit of butter, some paprika and garlic powder and boil gently for that same half hour.  Sort of a quick version of West Virginia style green beans.

I couldn't believe it when I took the lid off and saw those potatoes - they were beautiful.  I knew they wouldn't be crusty like roasted potatoes, but that was all right cause they were delicious!!!  And the meat was good also although I must say, just like I think they've fed chickens something that gives them huge breasts that are not as good as they used to be, I think they've done something with pork because the texture is kind of strange.  They were very tasty and not dry at all, just a different texture.  But, I'll do it again, that's for sure.  If you love roasted potatoes, go ahead and try these - you don't have to pay any attention to them and they are really good.

 

Finished eating and as I was taking the dishes to the kitchen heard music, went to look out my window and there was a parade!  Not in honor of my potatoes I imagine.  I think this is probably Marshall's homecoming weekend  cause the parade was basically their band and some boy scouts and such - no big crowds or anything either.  But Marshall's band always sounds really good and so, of course, I took a video.  The sound isn't very good quality though and since I zoomed in, the picture isn't either, but HERE it is anyway.

And that's it for this evening - have to see if there's anything good on TV and if not, get myself to Starbucks for a nice cup of tea...

Oh boy! Fall is in the air...

What a glorious day -  blue sky and sunshine when I woke up and  52 degrees outside!  I had slept with my windows open and it was chilly inside too.  I took my Saturday walk (which I should expand to a Tuesday and Thursday walk sometime), stopping off at the bakery first  to make sure I got a chocolate croissant and a loaf of their incredible French bread before they were all sold out, had those set aside and then did my walk.  Did a total of probably around 17 blocks which isn’t  too shabby.  

I got back home and did just a little bit of condo work while I enjoyed my croissant and cup of tea.  I tell myself on Friday nights after a usually somewhat stressful and busy week of condo stuff that I’m not going to do any thing to do with the condo on Saturday and Sunday and today it worked and I had a really enjoyable morning.I spent.  I some quality time with my “The Simpsons Tapped Out” game and yes, I’m obsessed  with and addicted to it so there.

And since this isn't a travel post I'm not going to have many pictures so I'll share this one with you.  I found it on the Jigidi.com puzzle site that I love and I think it is absolutely one of the cutest photos I've ever seen.  I don't know why but I think she's a French baby - maybe her little outfit?  And her quite lovely Papa?  Here she is with her very insouciant air of moi, moi, je ne m'inquiete pas (which means "me, me, I don't care" - I googled that and it's from one of my favorite childhood stories).

So, around two o'clock I  was all set  to make make my standard turkey and ham sandwich on my delicious fresh bread when I remembered I needed to use my left-over rotisserie chicken in some curried chicken salad.  And about half an hour later, I was finally eating lunch – the chicken salad on toasted French bread.  Mmm-mm!

They’re having the annual chili-fest downtown today and I didn’t go this time but it’s getting me all inspired – I think it will soon be time for my first pot roast and then chili of the season and I’m ready!  

But since I wasn’t making it today, I had a brainstorm about something else to try.  My chocolate croissant this morning had a lot of that luscious, flaky pastry around the edges with no chocolate in it so, even though it’s idiotic to be calorie conscious when eating a chocolate croissant, I decided I would cut off the excess pastry.  And there it was still sitting on the cutting board this afternoon and when I was making the salad I thought  “wow, maybe I could make bread pudding with that”.  I had seen a cooking show this week where they used stale croissants instead of bread to make a bread pudding and I thought that sure seemed like a good idea.  So I started looking through my “for one” cookbooks and there were several bread pudding recipes  but not a "just right" one.    So, I looked in my good old  red and white checked cookbook, there was a recipe for a plain one, it was easily divisible into four parts and I used the cooking time from the “for one” book  and it has just come out of the oven.  Will be interested to see if it’s edible – it smells and looks pretty nice, I must say.  Wish I had some vanilla ice cream – maybe I should just mix up a little powdered sugar and milk and make a thin sauce…It dawned on me while making it  that it’s basically an egg strata but sweet instead of savory.  And I may start clucking soon – I just realized I made egg strata for dinner last night, then my chicken salad for lunch, and now another egg in the pudding.

The starting ingredients for the pudding.  I've started getting things measured and ready like they do on the cooking shows cause now that I don't cook every single day/night, I've found it helps keep me from getting frazzled.

Now another break for you if you're still with me - Chris (my son) sent me a link a week or so ago which I'll share with you and I really hope you'll watch it - it's a video of one of those "flash mob" events that took place at a mall in Amsterdam to celebrate the re-opening of their Rijksmuseum where Rembrandt's painting "Night Watch" is housed.   It is probably the most exciting and wonderful one of these type of videos that I've seen.  Click here to go to YouTube and have a look.   And click here if you like to read a NY Times article about the restoration - it was meant to take 3 years and took almost 10 years!  The museum was re-opened by Queen Beatrix on April 13, 2013 as one of her official last acts before abdicating the throne to her oldest son.  Chris told me he would love to see it and I said it was too bad he didn't have X-ray vision.  I was pregnant with him when his dad and I visited Holland and the Rijksmuseum while he was stationed in Germany so he's already been there! :)

Now I've tasted my bread pudding and am quite happy with it.  It actually makes two servings and I think I'll probably tweak it a little next time I make it, but it was successful enough to add the recipe to my recipes here.  If you're in the mood for a little bread pudding, take a look here.

And here's the pudding, piping hot.  This looks very dry but it was quite moist.  But I wouldn't have minded some type of sauce on it.  I remember when we had a Lazarus store here (it's still here but is Macy's now) and they had a tea room and served a bread pudding for dessert that was wonderful.  It had a rum or whiskey or something sauce and was really scrumptious.  I could probably find the recipe for that somewhere...they used to sell a cookbook of recipes for the things they served there.

And now it's Sunday and today wasn't the perfect day weather-wise that yesterday was but it was still pleasant and just a nice, quiet day - my Sunday trip to Starbucks for breakfast, the Sunday paper, and the puzzles, yet another curried chicken salad sandwich for lunch, a trip to the library which is good cause I sure had a pile of books to return, and now getting this post finished up.  Then I'll have to prod myself into a trip to the grocery store.

Am getting quite excited about my upcoming trip to California now...

Wanted to post sooner than this...

but I also wanted to finish the little cross stitch piece I was working on so I'd be able to show I had accomplished something! 

But the reason I wanted to post earlier was because things would happen and I'd think "oh, I should remember to post about that" and, of course, now that I'm finally getting around to it, who knows what wonderful, exciting, momentous things I'll be forgetting (that's a little joke, folks). :)

But before I forget I will post a few pictures of the evening sky about 3 nights ago I guess.  We've had mostly wonderful, wonderful weather but there have been a few days here and there of heavy rain.  This particular evening, it had rained most of the day and finally stopped, the clouds broke up, the sun came out and when I happened to look out my window, this is what I saw.  My windows face east so I don't see the sunset but I doubt if it was as gorgeous as these clouds!

First, the one black cloud in the sky (but even it was impressive).

And then these stunning "catching the sun" clouds:

Aren't they wonderful?  I sure thought so!

Also, I have a new recipe I've been wanting to post.  I've already made it 3 times cause it's pretty perfect for "cooking for one" when you don't want to fuss a bunch.  It's an egg strata and I can't for the life of me remember where I found the original recipe which called for 8 eggs(!)  But each time I've made it, I've done it slightly differently and it seems to be invincible - it's always good!  It's in my Recipe Collection but to save you looking for it, just click here to go take a look.  Of course, I didn't remember to take a picture of it which is a shame cause it's an attractive dish, especially in my bright red casserole.

And as I said at the beginning, I finished a miniature cross stitch and have put it in my Etsy shop.  My Etsy shop had to all intents and purposes died - never did sell a lot but had the fun of getting visitors every day and people "favoriting" things.  Even that had dwindled down to very little. Finally, one day I went to see how many visits I had had and it was 44!!  That's a large number for me but out of those 44 visits, not one thing had been "favorited".  I belong to an Etsy team of miniaturists and whined around about it in a post one day and everyone was politely sympathetic.  And pretty much ever since then, I've been having all kinds of activity - today there were even more "favorites" than there were visits.  In fact, I made a new treasury list and for the first time ever it's had 100 hits!!  Nothing compared to the 1,000's that a lot of them get but then I don't do anything to publicize mine - no Facebook or anything. Oh, and somewhere in that long saga, I did actually sell something - that white wire bed that I covered with the pastel squares quilt I made.  But since I'm not in it to make money, I don't care that much about not selling - I just like to see activity so this past week or so has been quite fun.

I did have a disaster this week - I had offered to cook dinner for a family in our building who are having severe health problems and decided I would make a batch of my spaghetti and meatballs, making a double recipe of the sauce cause it's not enough for how many meatballs there are.  That day I'd been feeling kind of glumpy cause it was raining and I had to go to the grocery store and I hate going to the grocery store in the rain now that I no longer have an attached garage to come home to.  But I got home, started cooking, things started smelling good, I started feeling domestic and was reaching the purring stage.  I had made so much sauce that I knew I'd have to switch from the skillet I had cooked the meatballs in to a larger pot.  So I put the meatballs in the pot first so they wouldn't plop into the sauce and splash.  As I was doing that I had a little omen of things to come - one meatball rolled out of the bowl and onto the floor.  But even that didn't spoil the mood, I just hummed the "On Top of Spaghetti" song to myself.  So, I'm pouring the sauce from the mixing bowl I mixed it up in into the skillet and somehow managed to drop the bowl right into the skillet of now pretty much sauce....  Sauce went everywhere!!!  Not the entire kitchen, true.  But all over the stove, down in the burners (and, of course, burning up on the two burners that were hot), all across the wall that runs behind the stove, over onto my canisters, etc., etc.  Golly, whizzers, darn!!!  Not exactly what I said at the time, but it will do for here.  However, I finished cooking it, kept myself three meatballs and a scoop of sauce, took the rest down to the family and came back and ate my share and in spite of everything, it was pretty good, as usual.  But good grief...

And now it's just about time for a friend to pick me up and we're going to have dinner at The Black Sheep where I've only been one time but enjoyed it that time.  So that will be nice.  And now I'm back from dinner which was nice and fun - lots of talk and laughter and a large $4 glass of good wine. :)

I'm about done I guess.  Here's a picture of the cross stitch I finished today:

And, what else?  Oh - I've had three nice shopping trips - the first one, I bought a new wine rack which I love, the second one I went over to Ashland to Belk's and bought 3 pairs of slacks, all of which I tried on in the store and thought "finally, some pants that fit and are the right length", got them home and now have them bagged up to take back.  So then my third trip was to our mall here in Barboursville where I bought two pairs of pants, 2 shirts, a pullover and a lightweight sweater!  And I'm only taking one of the shirts back.  I'm known for my returning habit so I'm pleased that I'm keeping everything else.  Then I went and bought the most expensive pair of shoes I've ever bought and they are very, very comfortable.  I think when I get ready for my next Europe trip, I'll probably buy another pair of their more actual walking shoe...

And if there's anything else, I've forgotten it!  So, g'night all and hope the weather is being as kind to you wherever you are as it is to us here in wild and wonderful West Virginia!

And, presto! Pesto!!

Just a quick note - last night, almost 2 years after my cooking class in Riomaggiore, Italy, I made some pesto.  A man who lives in my building had planted two of the building's window boxes with herbs, mainly basil and now it is going to seed and looking kind of bedraggled so the other night I went down and cut off a batch of the best looking pieces. (He had told people to help themselves...)

And yesterday I made pesto with it!  I looked at a couple of recipes on line and they both said if you don't have pine nuts, walnuts are okay and I had walnuts.

It was an interesting experiment and it sure made me wonder how people made it using a mortar and pestle.  You're supposed to have a food processor, of course, which I don't, but I figured I could make it in my mini-mincer.  And that did a good job on chopping up the basil, walnuts, and garlic, but then there was no way to add the oil.  I ended up dirtying the mini-mincer, my blending stick thingie and the cup that goes with it, and two small mixing bowls getting the job done.

But I also ended up with pesto and last night tried it out on half of a little demi baguette from our bakery.  The first piece I put the pesto on first and then a quite thin slice of fresh tomato and toasted it.  It came out kind of dry, so for the other piece, I put the tomato on first and spread the pesto around on top of that which worked better.

I'm going to try it on pasta next - think that should be quite tasty.  And even though I will probably never do it again, I'm glad I at least tried it once.  I've posted the ingredients I used (about a third of what the on-line recipe called for) HERE and if you have a food processor and love Italian food, I really encourage you to try it.  Aside from struggling due to lack of proper equipment, it is as easy as 1,2,3!

Bon appetit!

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.

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...)

Just a Quick Note (I think...)

My quick notes get long quickly. :)

I just posted a new recipe on my Recipe Collection page for a smoked salmon pasta with lemon and dill that I made a couple of nights ago and really enjoyed.  If you try it and like it, let me know!  And I actually learned how to set up a table within a post which is nice cause I can put in the full ingredients for a recipe and then in a second column put in how much I need to use for just me.  I find myself using my recipe collection here as my recipe file.

It is a beautiful evening tonight - in fact it's been pleasant all day.  Brilliant sun but low humidity and probably a high of around 85.  Sure beats what we've been having.  And now tonight is just perfect.  I was up on the roof having my little wine and cheese "dinner" and once they quit playing their insanely loud music down at the free "concert" at Pullman Square (which they have every Thursday night in the summer), it was perfect.

They're also having the annual rib fest this weekend and that started this evening.  I've gone a few times, but I find it's a lot of money to put out for a little bit of food.  You pay to get in and then, of course, pay for the food too so for just some barbecue and a soda, it's fairly expensive.   It sure smelled good though - with all the smokers going you can smell it all over town.

Went to see the movie "Midnight in Paris" last night mainly cause I wanted some popcorn and ended up really enjoying it.  It was just a romantic comedy, I suppose, but a really interesting story line, the music was great and at the very beginning, instead of just starting with the credits, there's like a video tour of the city of Paris, no words - no credits, just gorgeous views and what I thought was a really wonderful musical score.  So, if you haven't seen it - give it a look, maybe.

If you've made it down this far, here's a pretty picture as a reward.  Just my beautiful Ohio River, but I never get tired of it.  I'm disappointed though because when I took it, I could see the next bridge on down the river and there's not even a whisper of it in the picture which kind of surprises me.  And now, I just clicked to make this bigger and the second bridge is visible so Wilbur, I am content.

I feel pretty certain that there was something that for the past couple of days I've thought - remember to post that when you post the recipe.  I've spent a fair amount of time working on a couple of trip ideas I have but it's not that.  So, if there was something, it's now gone, so I will sign off on this lovely Thursday evening and wish everyone a happy weekend.