The School of Essential Ingredients

Just finished up a really good book this morning.  In fact, I got up early, took the dog out and climbed back into bed to finish it.

By Erica Bauermeister , this charming, quick read tells the story of eight different people who gather to take a cooking class from a rather unusual cook.

Lillian, the cook, has developed through her lifetime an unusual approach to food.  Not food just for foods sake.  Reading this book makes you want to jump up and run for the kitchen, not only to cook, but to smell.  Smells equal memories and emotions to Lillian and she has an uncanny way of creating the right dish for the right person.

One of my favorite parts is about a young mother and her feelings about being “touched” all the time.  Unless you are a mother who has gone through the constant contact with touching by children you might not understand her feelings.  But it made me go “that’s me!” when I read it.

What is really good about this book….you don’t want it to end!

Two Years and 1260 Miles

Yep, two years ago, on November 3, 2007, I logged into mapmywalk and signed up.  I started tracking my walks with the dog, to the store, to and from work.  I watched the miles slowly add up.  And funny, the pounds started coming off.

I invested in some better shoes (which currently need replacing again).  A better backpack…which can make all the difference when you are lugging a ton of stuff to/from work.  And started eating a little better.

Early this year I took over a bike.  After riding for a few weeks with my backpack of 10 tons on my back, feeling like I was going to fall over, I added tandem baskets to the back for my ‘stuff’.  Headlights and taillights went on also (they were before the baskets).

I have gone from not being able to make it up some hills (remember, no gears on this bike) to making it up a lot of them.  I watched my legs go from flabby to toned.  I have calves of steel now…or maybe they’re just not tinfoil anymore.

But in those 2 years I have logged 1260 miles.  This isn’t every ride and walk, but I would say at least 85% of them.  And I want to do more.

So next year my goal is 1000 miles in 1 year!  And a new bike (sorry Blue Bomber!).

Looking Up Their Skirts – Park Walk IV

The underside of a mushroom is pretty too.

Mushroom View of the World – Park Walk III

(October 11, 2009)

If you live under a mushroom, this must be what your view of the world would be like.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Drunken Shrimp and Less than $10 for Dinner

And it will be dinner again for two and at least 2 lunches, so dinner last night will be very economical despite the addition of shrimp.

One of the recipes Texter had marked in the Sandra Lee’s Semi-Homemade Weeknight Recipes (mentioned in earlier post) was Fettuccini Alfredo with Shrimp.  So I got the missing ingredients and off we went.  My most expensive purchase for it was the shrimp.  I bought salad shrimp, frozen, for $4.99 on sale and used that rather than larger shrimp. 

I started putting it together and in came Texter who took over after I chopped the onion and garlic.  The rest of a bottle of white wine went into the recipe so I didn’t have to buy wine.  A bottle of wine in my house lllasssstttssss for months.  I open it, have one or two glasses and then forget I have it.

No pictures were taken of the final results.  We were too busy eating it.  Really easy, especially if you buy your carrots already shredded like I did.  Fairly inexpensive, less than $10 for every (without counting the wine) and it will last through at least 6 servings if not 8.  So I am looking at something really tasty, easy and quick for about $1 a serving.

Texter did get tickled.  She pulled the cork out of the bottle for me.  See, I can have something over than screw top wine!  And dumped it in the mixture with the shrimp.  She kept calling them the “drunken shrimp”.  So we are renaming the dish “Drunken Shrimp Fettuccini Alfredo”.

Did I mention I finished off the dinner with one of the napoleons?

Texter is Cooking!

Slowly, but surely, Texter is doing a little more cooking.  She does fix an awesome breakfast.  Hash browns are her favorite to fix.   Right down to peeling and shredding the potatoes herself.

So when I gave her a new cookbook of easy dishes to go through and mark what she might be interested in eating (I am soooo tired of the same old dishes and am looking for new ones.), she came across  Black Forest Napoleons out of Sandra Lee’s Weeknight Wonders.  (I know the library hates me right now because I have asked for all their latest cookbooks.)

Anyway, here are the results….

Aren’t they beautiful!  And the proud cook….

Only problems…….(1) they are GOOD! and (2) they are so high you can’t bite it easily.  But I will suffer so as to not hurt her feelings…lol.

She has developed an interest in cooking later than her sister.  Of course, Savvy did have Home Ec in middle school which prompted her along.

Oh, Savvy, too bad we can’t save one for you.  But they do have those nasty RED cherries on top!  And we have a whole, BIG jar of them to go through in the refrigerator!  (Texter and I can stand in the door of the refrigerator and eat them straight from the bottle.  It’s a thing I’ve done my whole life, so I have to just not buy them.)

Last weekend, Texter fixed No-Knead Chocolate and Coconut Rolls – minus the coconut.  We didn’t take pictures, but here is the picture from Better Homes and Garden…

She will admit hers were not quite as perfect as these with regards to roundness and “rollness”, but they were good.  She really doesn’t like cinnamon, so when I found this recipe I thought it was a good replacement for when we wanted cinnamon rolls.

Creamy Shrimp Fettuccine is going to be her next attempt later in the week.

I have found if I cut the recipes in half, then there is enough for the two of us and then a little left over for my lunch the next day.  This way I don’t have to eat on it for days and days.

  

Looking Down – Walk in the Park Part II

(October 11, 2009)

Started out on my walk with the intention of taking pictures of leaves and such.  Instead, I found myself looking down as there were hundreds of mushrooms everywhere.

Some that were round and puffy and looked like a moonscape.

Some looked like a dark moon.

 

Some were red and white.

 

 

 

 

 

There were blue mushrooms….

Groups of ‘shrooms…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tiny ones…….

 

 

Big ones…..

 

 

Ones on logs…

 

Brown ones….

 

Purple ones….

 

While I wish I knew more about mushrooms, because I could have filled a wagon quickly, I did not touch a one. 

Where’s a mushroomer when you need one?