Still here

July has been a whirlwind. V and I had guests for the first two weekends and then I've been home two of the last ten days. It's wonderful to have guests and see friends and family but four weekends in a row gets a little stressful. Especially since work has been really busy this month. So, sometimes when I'm stressed I like to look at my wedding pictures on my computer. Not for a long time but just skimming through them helps me zone out and get better situated. So, that's why I put a wedding pick up there.

The biggest problem with being so busy on the weekends is that it's much harder to cook. I end up using the beginning of the week to catch up on things I should have done the last weekend and then end of the week to do things I should do on the coming weekend. So, unfortunately, cooking and grocery store runs tend to be the easiest thing to put aside. V has been really great about going to the store when I'm gone on grocery day (Sunday) but it's hard to make a good grocery list when I don't know what I'm going to make for the least.

I feel listless when I can't cook or bake for several days at a time. Every now and then it's a nice break not to cook, and I definitely do not cook every day. However, whenever I am unable to cook when I feel like cooking, it's almost unbearable. I feel bored and it makes me snack a lot more because I think I won't have a good meal if I don't make something. (though V cooks most weekends and does a very good job - that's usually what I consider my break from cooking... but I still bake on the weekends.) I'm hoping one weekend soon I will be able to have a big baking spree. Maybe I'll make iced sugar cookies or something similar. Not so much to eat them (though they will be eaten) but because it helps me destress from the week. For now, however, it's back to organizing the bills in the office from the last month.

Holiday! Celebrate!

I haven't been blogging lately. It's been a busy few weeks and it's not going to slow down for a few more. Luckily, most of the business will be very fun as well as being busy. This weekend Hannah and Gary came down from Chicago to play in the pool. We ate lots of yummy food too! The first night we had marinated squash, marinated kebabs, and grilled peaches and apricots with sweet cream ice cream. The grilled apricots were actually really really good. They kept their firmness but were warmed through. After taking them off the grill I sprinkled brown sugar over them and let them sit for a few minutes so the sugar got a little caramelized and a little syrupy so it was good to mix with the ice cream.

On Friday we had Jack Stack BBQ for lunch. Then for dinner we had burgers with sauteed onions and garlic in them. We also added one egg and a few dried breadcrumbs, worchestershire sauce, salt, pepper, and cayenne. I had hot dogs instead but V said they were really really good. I made tzatziki sauce for snack on throughout the weekend and it was a big hit. It's nice to have around because I used light yogurt and sour cream so it's a healthier alternative to premade dips but its still really satisfying.

Saturday we had steaks, I had an Italian sausage, grilled asparagus, and heirloom tomatoes and basil from the farmer's market. Ooh, so much yummy food!

Sunday I forgot to plan a meal and most of the restaurants were closed. Holiday on a Sunday is a bad combo for eating out. So, we got some D'Bronx pizza which was tasty as always. V got me a chocolate cake and mint chocolate chip ice cream for my birthday so it was pretty much a perfect day! It was great having Hannah and Gary over and now it's time to relax before our next guests. The pool is definitely a party pool.

Relaxation

Today, I refused to stain the deck. We decided to take the day off since we've been staining for the last 5 days straight. Thankfully we are so close to being finished! We have everything covered in at least one coat of stain. We just have to do a final coat on a little bit. And second coats are much easier than the first coat. So, I would guess about 3 more hours of work and we will be done! At least until it's time to strip it off and do the whole thing all over again. Next time though, we will only be doing a little bit each summer. This is just too much for one summer.

Tonight I made a vodka sauce I found on Epicurious. It's one of my go-to sauces because it's so easy. I accidentally added whole milk instead of cream though. It was definitely missing the velvety consistency it usually has.

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
10 cloves garlic, peeled
Crushed hot red pepper
1/4 cup vodka
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons unsalted butter or olive oil for finishing the sauce, if you like
2 to 3 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley

Pour the tomatoes and their liquid into the work bowl of a food processor. Using quick on/off pulses, process the tomatoes just until they are finely chopped. (Longer processing will aerate the tomatoes, turning them pink.)

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Whack the garlic cloves with the side of a knife and add them to the hot oil. Cook, shaking the skillet, until the garlic is lightly browned, about 3 minutes. Lower the work bowl with the tomatoes close to the skillet and carefully — they will splatter — slide the tomatoes into the pan. Bring to a boil, season lightly with salt and generously with crushed red pepper, and boil 2 minutes. Pour in the vodka, lower the heat so the sauce is at a lively simmer, and simmer until the pasta is ready.

Just before the pasta is done, fish the garlic cloves out of the sauce and pour in the cream. Serve over cooked pasta (I use penne for this sauce)

I also made the base for chocolate ice cream. I've got to let it cool so I'll be making it sometime later this week. It smells so good though!

Chocolate Ice Cream

from The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz

2 1/4 cups heavy cream

6 tablespoons unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder

1 cup sugar

pinch of salt

6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped (I used Ghirardelli bittersweet because it's what I had in the cabinet)

1 cup whole milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a large saucepan, whisk the cream, cocoa powder, sugar and salt together. Whisking frequently, heat until the mixture comes to a full, rolling boil. Remove the pan from the heat and add the chopped chocolate. Whisk until the chocolate melts completely, then add the milk and vanilla. (If the chocolate doesn't melt completely, you can pour the mixture into a blender and blend for 30 seconds, until smooth. I skipped this step because my chocolate melted without a problem.)

Chill the mixture thoroughly and then churn in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.

Nothing New

We haven't done much lately but more staining. I stained Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and V stained Saturday. Unfortunately, on Saturday it rained in the middle of the day before the stain had plenty of time to dry. This wasn't just a little spring storm, it was a torrential downpour! So, quite a bit of the area V stained was stripped so we have to go back over it tomorrow. But I think we might actually finish tomorrow! Or at least close enough that we could do the final bit one night after work.

Our neighbors just had a new baby. We don't really know them well but they seem friendly enough and I wanted to do something to let them know that even if we don't really talk to them it doesn't mean we are creepy people. I got a little basket at Target and little hippo rattle. At the time I didn't know whether they had a boy or a girl so I wanted to get them something gender neutral. It is surprisingly and annoyingly hard to find baby toys that aren't very clearly for either a boy or a girl. I was kind of shocked. I always hear people talk about how hard it is to try and give kids gender neutral toys when they are little but this was crazy. Everything is either pink or blue or says something about boy or girl. And once you get past that, everything is a brand! Either Disney or Dora or Handy Manny or whatever is popular now.

Anyway, in the basket I put brownies and snickerdoodle muffins. I found the recipe on Culinary Concoctions by Peabody's blog. She has lots of classics. These were really tasty. I'm not a big snickerdoodle person but V ate one and said it was tasty. The sugar on the outside got nice and crispy and yummy. I made them in mini-muffin tins instead of full-sized like Peabody did.

Snickerdoodle Muffins

2 sticks unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
¾ tsp baking soda
¾ tsp baking powder
¾ tsp cream of tarter
¾ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1 and ¼ cup sour cream
2 and ¼ cups all purpose flour

1 cup sugar and 2 TBSP cinnamon mixed together for rolling

1. Preheat oven to 350. Cream the butter and sugar. Add in the vanilla. Add in the eggs one at a time

2.In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, ground nutmeg cream of tarter.
3.Add the flour mixture and the sour cream alternately to the wet mixture in the additions. Start with the flour and end with the flour.
4. Scoop out muffin batter one at a time and drop into bowl filled with the cinnamon sugar mixture. Roll the muffin around in the mixture until it is covered completely in cinnamon sugar. Place muffin into a greased muffin tin. If using mini-muffin tins bake for about 13-14 minutes. Let cool completely. Use a paring knife to loosen from the tin before removing.

Feeling Hot Hot Hot

I think we need to find an outdoor air conditioner to go in the kitties' igloo. It's been pretty hot and humid around lately, we essentially didn't have a spring. Over the last few weeks since it has been so steamy the cats haven't really wanted to hang out in the igloo. We put their food in there in case it rains but other than to eat they don't go in there as much as before. Yesterday Inky was keeping me company while I was staining the deck and then poor thing was panting. I didn't even know cats did that! So I have decided we need to figure out a way to make a mini-air conditioner. Like, a dehumidifier combined with a humidifier so it could suck water in and then blow it out in a cool mist. Something along those lines.

It thunderstormed today so we didn't get any staining done. Yesterday we worked on the area by the hot tub again and now thankfully we only have to do the floor over there and then we will be finished with that part! Only two million more planks to stain. Anyway, since it was raining today was more of a lots of little projects sort of day. I we sanded and repainted a door that was messed up, planted our border bushes by the hot tub, and hung up the sail clover cover above the hot tub area. So that part is starting to look really cute. Too bad the hot tub is still broken so we can't appreciate it. But it's still nice to look at from the pool. And it's nice to have another area of the backyard finished.

Now we are watching Dr. Who and enjoying chocolate chip banana bread. Basically, take any banana bread recipe and add a cup of mini-chocolate chips. It's tasty stuff.

Lonely Hearts

Little Caiti still won't let us pet her. I know all of the websites on feral cats said the older the cat is when you try to tame it the longer it will take (or the more impossible it will be). But, we really thought that LC would see how nice we are and would warm up to us. Poor LC did have things worse than Inky (we was the first one caught in the trap, she was caughte multiple times, and then she had to live in our garage for 2 months while waiting for her foot to heal) so it's understandable that she would be a little more hesitant... but we are nice people! We haven't caught her since her paw healed, and we give her food everyday, and we don't kick her or anything like that. But you would think we do hurt her! Anytime I'm outside she runs past me at full speed. She watches me all the time and has only let me touch her once. She lets V touch her every now and then in the morning when she is too sleepy to realize what is going on but that's it. It's so sad though because I really think she wants some loving! Whenever I'm playing with Inky she lays down about a foot away and rolls around while staring at me. Hopefully she warms up soon because I feel so bad for her.

Inky has been super lovey lately. She has learned that if she meows it will get me to come outside and pet her for a long time. She didn't make any noise for the longest time so I'm happy she has become comfortable saying hi but it makes me feel so guilty when I leave her to go back inside. She's also started letting me pet her tummy which is adorable. She rolls over about every 45 seconds to make sure I pet every part of her tummy equally. She's a silly one.

Tonight for dinner we are having spaghetti with homemade sauce and meatballs. I don't really use a recipe for my sauce. I make sure I have two cans of each (this makes enough sauce to freeze at least 2 meals worth): tomato sauce, petite diced tomatoes, crushed tomatoes. One can tomato paste. 2-3 onions (diced), 4-6 cloves garlic (diced), 1 bay leaf, dried or fresh parsley, dried or fresh basil, pinch of sugar, tiny bit of dried oregano. Saute the onions and garlic in olive oil. Add tomato paste. Add one can each of tomatoes. Let reduce. Add another can of the crushed and diced. Only add the second can of sauce if you need to thin it out. Maybe add another can of died. Let saute for a few hours with a lid. Then let cool and divide into containers.

I can't remember what recipe I used for the meatballs. I made a ton of those (about 40 small) so I've still got some leftover. Once I do make them again I'll post what recipe I use. I will say, it's easy enough to make homemade meatballs and if you made a bunch in advance it's very easy and then you have quite a few pre-made dinners for weeks!

I would buy you a kebab

Inky was very naughty today. V left very early (before I was awake) to get to court. It was a torrential downpour when I woke up this morning so I ran out and put their food in the igloo then left them alone. After awhile it became just a heavy sprinkle so I braved the wet to put some wet food in their igloo. After gorging herself, Inky planted herself in front of the glass doors, watching me putter around getting ready. After awhile I took pity on her and went out to say this morning and pet her. Inky eventually got bored and started walking away. This is where she gets very badly behaved... I think she had a trap set for me.

I opened the door partway and stuck my foot in. Then Inky turned around and sprinted back and leapt over my foot into the house! Images flashed through my head of spending the entire day trying to find her and get her back outside. I tried to gently pull her back outside but she wasn't having any of it. Luckily, she just looked around for a few minutes then got bored and walked back out. It was still nerve wracking. So she's in trouble now.

I've been loving the grill so far this year. I usually don't like the flavor of grilled food because the smokey taste is overwhelming. But I think V was gotten much better about putting my portion of the food to the side so it doesn't get as charred. It's nice because we can swim for a bit after work then throw something on the grill and still eat by 7.

Last night V made a yummy dinner for us. A friend from work sent it to me and she got it from Martha's (THE Martha) website. She made a slight addition however... garlic powder. It's a simple thing but it adds a nice flavor.

Pork Kebabs with Pineapple Rice

1 cup long-grain white rice (I used 2 cups 5-minute rice)

1/3 cup honey

8 ounce can pineapple chunks, juices reserved (I think I had a bigger can... maybe 14 ounces)

1 pound pork (I used cutlets, she used tenderloin... I used closer to 1/2 pound) cut in chunks

2 red bell peppers, cut in pieces the same size as the pork

2 scallions (I didn't have these and the rice was still good)

1 tsp fresh grated ginger

1 lime cut into wedges (I used this, V used soy sauce)

Heat grill to medium

Cook the rice. After cooked add chopped pineapple chunks, scallions, ginger, salt, and pepper. Set aside.

Whisk honey, 2 tablespoons pineapple juice, salt and pepper

Alternately skewer pork and pepper pieces on skewers. Cook until pork is cooked (10-15 minutes). Occasionally brush with the honey sauce. This is where V sprinkled over some garlic powder too. Serve over rice. Squirt with lime juice or soy sauce as desired.