Three for 50 - Possibility Everywhere

 

Recipes Two and Three

Two new-to-me recipes this week - Cast Iron Pan Pizza and Cheddar Scone Biscuits.  I should explain for those new to my blog that we eat a lot of pizza at my house, mostly home-made (or ho-made as we like to say) and since March 2020 we have been having pizza every Sunday night.  This week we broke from our usual crust (which you can find the recipe for multiple times on the blog but here is one link for it which also tells why we call it Ho-made) and tried a new one.  Adapted from this blog, we halved the recipe and topped it with marinara, turkey sausage crumbles, shredded mozzarella, and green and red peppers. I will tell you how I made the pizza. We liked it and will substitute for our regular pizza crust occasionally (maybe once a month).  Note that the dough needs to rest for at least 30-60 minutes so plan ahead.  

Cast Iron Pan Pizza - recipe as below makes one 10" pizza, which serves 2-3 people

3/4 C warm water (approx 105-110 deg F)

1/4 t dry active yeast (I buy jars of yeast vs. pkg because it is more versatile)

1 T olive oil

1/2 t kosher salt

2 C all purpose flour

1 T cornmeal

2T grated parmesan cheese

1/2 C marinara (we used part of a jar already open in fridge.  You could also use an 8 oz can of tomato sauce with 1 t Italian seasoning and 2 minced garlic cloves or any other sauce you like)

1 C shredded mozzarella

your choice of toppings - we used about 1 C Jimmy Dean turkey sausage crumbles and about 1/2 pepper worth of diced red and green bell peppers

In a large bowl, add warm water and yeast.  Allow to sit for about 5 minutes to activate yeast.  Add olive oil, salt and flour - stir to combine.  Turn out on a floured surface and knead, adding a little flour if too sticky to handle.  It should be a little tacky but not sticky.  Knead until smooth and elastic (I kneaded about 20 times).  Put in zip top bag in fridge (next time would probablynot waste the plastic and would use a covered bowl) for at least 30-60 minutes or up to 8 hours.

Preheat oven to 525 F.  Sprinkle a 10" cast iron pan with a tablespoon of cornmeal.  Press dough into the pan, pressing it out towards the edges and up the sides as best as possible. Set stovetop to medium high and wait a few moments for pan to heat.  As pan and dough warm up, continue to press dough more evenly on bottom and up the sides to form the crust.  Cook a few more minutes until it starts to puff up and bubble slightly.  Remove from heat and use your fingers to create some slight divots in the dough.  Top with marinara, your toppings and mozzarella.  Sprinkle shredded parmesan along top edges of crust. Bake (in the pan) in oven for about 10 minutes or until cheese is melted and rust is golden brown. Allow to cool 5-10 minutes before slicing.

We also like soup at hour house and I have other posts on that here and there and everywhere.  Biscuits go great with many soups and this week we had good old Chicken Noodle Soup with this new recipe.  This recipe also lead to a google search to figure out what the difference is between scones and biscuits - egg is the main difference apparently.  Not sure how this one is both a scone and a biscuit.  It came from a Penzey's catalog back when they still used to send paper catalogs chock-full of recipes and interesting articles about cooks.  These puffed up tall and were very tasty.

Cheddar Scone Biscuits - makes 24 small biscuits

2 C cake flour (all-purpose flour works fine as well and that is what I used)

4 t baking powder

1 t salt

1/8-1/4 t Cayenne pepper or smoked paprika, to taste (optional - I used 1/4 t Hungarian smoked paprika)

1 egg

1/2-3/4 C milk, divided

5 T butter

1 C grated cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 475.  In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, salt and cayenne or paprika (I "sifted" with a wire whisk because Hallie does not sift). In a small bowl, beat the egg with 1/2 C of the milk.  Cut the butter into dry ingredients and blend until the mixture is pea-sized crumbles.(Recipe says easiest to use your fingers but I used my pastry blender because that is what I do for all biscuits.) Add the cheese and almost all of the egg/milk mixture, reserving about 1 T to brush on top of the biscuits.  Mix gently together until just combined but do not overmix or they will be tough.  Add the remaining milk if the dough is too dry (I added about a tablespoon).  

Roll or pat the dough to about 1 inch thick.  Cut into circles with a very small biscuit cutter (I used the smallest one I have which is about 2" diameter).  Brush scones with the reserved egg mix.  Bake at 475 on an ungreased heavy (or parchment-lined) baking sheet for about 10 minutes or until puffed up and lightly browned.  Watch carefully, as the size of the scone will determine how quickly they bake and at that temperature the bottoms can burn pretty quickly (mine took about 8 minutes).

Books One, Two and Three

I finished 3 books this week - off to the reading races!  Tuesday I finished a book club selection (the one I selected so I will need to review it later this month before attempting to lead discussion on 2/6) - Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston.  This one had come up on multiple lists of classics you should read at sometime in your life and I am so glad I finally read it.  It is not without its challenges for readers, including all of the dialogue written in dialect, but once I got into the flow of that (yes, I may have been reading out loud at times), I found the story very engaging and it pulled me through quicker than I thought it woud.  It takes place in the late 1920s/early '30s in Florida and is the story of Janie, a fierce independent Black woman, her life and her three marriages.  The writing is lyrical and flowing, starting off with "Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board." The story is told in a circle - we know right away Janie is coming back from burying someone, that she had last been seen in town with someone named Tea Cake and that the whole town's tongues were wagging with stories of her.  She then tells her whole life story to her friend Pheoby and entrusts her friend to tell her story to others as she wishes - "You can tell 'em what Ah say if you wants to. Dat's just de same as me 'cause mah tongue is in mah friend's mouf."  I would highly recommend this book - there is a reason it is on so many reading lists.  There are important racial, feminist and class themes but also a love story and poetic prose.

Book 2 - started and finished within the week (a couple days of not being able to sleep after feeding the cats at 5am helped) was The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky.  Very different than Their Eyes and probably more widely read (or maybe you saw the movie), Wallflower is teen fiction told completely in letters from Charlie, a 15-16 year old, to an unnamed person he simply addresses as "Dear friend".  Comical, troubling and at times relatable, Charlie is a wallflower, encouraged by his friends and teachers to "participate" in life.  It takes place in the early 90s and Charlie is a little younger than I was then.  There are a lot of issues brought up in this book (rape, homosexuality, drug and alcohol use, various types of abuse, mental illness) though not gone into in depth.  I think this one gets tossed out there as the high school experience of an outsider but I could not always relate to many of the things going on.  I didn't attend parties in high school and did not observe many of the things Charlie saw or did.  I know when happened (and still do) but many parts were not at all my experience.  That said, it was a good story, kept my attention and I always love stories told in letters!

Book 3 - And now for something completely different!  No Children, No Pets by Marion Holland was a childhood favorite that I read this week while I ate lunch.  My copy was a first edition, published in 1956 and I have no idea where or when I got the book.  My guess would be from a garage sale and 2nd or 3rd grade.  The main storyline is 3 children (Jane, the oldest, is 12) and their widowed mother from Philadelphia who inherits an old apartment building in Florida when her great uncle dies.  The family and their cat Victoria show up at the apartment house to try to settle the estate, and find a sign posted "No Children, No Pets", a rather run-down building, needy and angry tenants, and a missing caretaker.  

I now remember why I read it many times when I was young.  Florida, the ocean, hurricanes, coconuts and seashells were all new to me as a child in the Midwest.  Visiting another place through reading is a great escape and great way to learn too.  It is a simple gentle story with elements of mystery and characters who we learn aren't always who they seem to be at first.  

I was planning to do a little more Hindsight 2020 but with 2 recipes and 3 book reviews, I will leave that for a future post.  I plan to highlight some of the books I read last year.

Fifty for 50 Tally

Books completed – 3 (4 more started)

Recipes tried – 3

Blog posts published– 3

Miles walked in January –25.9

                Miles walked year-to-date –25.9

Scrap book pages completed –0

Hats donated – 0 (4 ready)

Hours volunteered – 0

Until we read and eat again,

Hallie

Ideas to warm you on a cold winter day

Reading: Since the last reading update, I have finished 2 books and started a third.  Should be reading another one but since I haven't picked it up from the library yet, that has been difficult!

The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan - I didn't get a chance to discuss it with book club because E was quite ill so I stayed home to tend to him and make sure he didn't keel over.  He's fully recovered now, thanks for asking.  Anyway, I liked the first part of the book pretty well, thought the second part wasn't very good at all, and then enjoyed the third and fourth parts.  Overall I liked it, but if I had stopped reading after the second part, I would not have said that.  As you may remember from my previous post, the author's intention was to tell the history of 4 plants (the apple, the tulip, marijuana, and the potato) that satisfy four fundamental human desires (sweetness, beauty, intoxication and control), and to discuss how the plants have evolved to satisfy us and how the plants have benefited from us.  In the apple section, he got to the point of this discussion on the evolution but spent a whole lot of time on the personal life of Johnny Appleseed.  It seemed like he was more interested in telling that story than in presenting his stated objective.  The tulip (second) section could have been written much better (keeping the focus, sticking to the stated intentions) - I felt like I missed a big part of the story there and that he never really got to the point.  The author's passion for marijuana was fairly evident in the third section - this is a story that he really was interested in.  He did a great job of telling the evolutionary and historical parts of the story as well as sticking to the intentions of the book.  I also enjoyed learning about the science behind intoxication.  The last section, potato, was also very good, and got into the genetically modified plants.  It made me never want to eat another store-bought potato again as long as I live.  I would recommend this book, but caution you not to give up after the first or second sections.

Lake of Sorrows by Erin Hart - I liked it better than I remembered liking it when I read it before.  That being said, I still am not a mystery fan.  As I told E about 3/4 of the way through the book, the thing I don't like about murder mysteries is that there is always so much murder.  I mean, really, how many people have to die in one book?  Stay away from people who know people who have been murdered - you are likely to end up dead yourself, apparently.  I liked the Ireland landscape and culture parts of the book, and I kept reading because I couldn't remember how it all tied up in the end.  One further complaint about this book - there were waaaayyy too many characters and I had to constantly try to remember how they were all related to each other and to the story.  We are reading the 3rd book by Erin Hart for Friday night book club - False Mermaid.  Stay tuned to see what I think of that.

The other book I am reading this month is Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne.  What better way to spend a cold (and I mean COLD) week, than snuggling up with a childhood classic?  This is the volume of the Pooh collection where we are introduced to the silly old bear himself, as well as Piglet, Rabbit (Pooh gets stuck in Rabbit's door after a honey eating binge in the second story in the book), Owl, Eeyore (who has a birthday and gets 2 presents), Kanga and Roo.  I will probably need to read House at Pooh Corners next.

Eating: I received a new recipe in my e-mail at work (from the Delicious Recipes of Hartford list that I am on) on Wednesday and tried it that same day.  A tasty, hearty new soup recipe (only needed one bowl of this to fill me up), it was also pretty easy.  I microwaved the potatoes to save time and had some cooked, crumbled bacon in the freezer from the last time I had a pound and only used part of it.  I am presenting it not as it was written but as it "should" be made, per my Mother Sauces cooking class, seasoning last.  Note that in my abbreviations, T means "Tablespoon" and t means "teaspoon".

Baked Potato Soup
4 large baking potatoes
3 T butter
2 T olive oil
1/2 C chopped onion (I did not add)
1/2 C chopped celery
1/2 C flour
6 C milk
1 C Velveeta, cubed
1/2 C sour cream
1/4 C cooked bacon crumbles
1/2 t garlic powder
1/2 t salt
1/2 t pepper

Bake the potatoes (I "baked" mine in the microwave.  You can also bake them in the oven at 350 for about an hour or until softened.). Let cool slightly.
In a large sauce pan, melt butter and add olive oil.  Saute onion and celery until onion is transparent.  Add flour - stir over medium heat until lightly browned.  Add milk and stir constantly until just boiling (may need to reduce heat to prevent scorching). Remove from heat.  Peel potatoes and mash slightly; add to milk mixture.  Add Velveeta, sour cream and bacon.  Stir until cheese is melted.  Season with garlic powder, salt and pepper, to taste.

Creating: I am picking up speed on the bass.  I started learning a blues progression - that is going to take some serious practice.  I play a little each day after work, and have been watching my "How to play electric bass" DVD.  I am thinking I will be playing in a band sometime really soon. Ha-ha!

I have been knitting a bit on my socks, some while on vacation.  And thinking about starting those Christmas presents...

Not much creating happening lately, I guess.

In other news, I am now on Pintrest and have been pinning away.  I started a board called "Things I don't like but other people seem to love" which kind of makes me laugh.  This board could get really full.  Right now there are a couple books and music, as well as yoga, but could expand greatly if I start adding things like TV shows.  My other boards are more productive and represent things I enjoy, similar to this blog.  There are books I have read (starting with this year, may expand back in time eventually), books I have really enjoyed (may or may not be some crossover between the lists), books I think I would like to read, places to travel to someday, recipes and some home decor and creative project ideas.  It is kind of fun to add things and see what is out there.  The web is wide!

Eat soup, stay warm and enjoy a good book.
Until we eat again,
Hallie

Cooking class, Paul Wellstone, and Scarves

Eating:  Our cooking class was a lot of fun.  It was a class on the "mother sauces" - the five sauces that are the basis for all sauces.  We were at a table/cooking station with 2 other couples who we had not met before we got there.  Cooking by committee with 4 people you do not know is, well, interesting.  Anyway... We started with bechemel, a kind of basic cream sauce, the base for creamy soups, cheese fondue, anything creamy and saucy.  Secret tip I learned?  A dash of nutmeg.  Who knew?  We tried this sauce on a croque monsieur (fancy French ham and cheese sandwich). 
Next was a veloute, a stock based sauce, which we made into a pasta and prawns dish with coconut chili lime sauce - super tasty and flavorful. 
The "entree" portion of the meal used an espagnole sauce, which is a dark brown sauce (think brown gravy) using beef stock.  In the sauce, we cooked some little gnocchi, then once the sauce was nice and thick (and full of flavor from the "holy trinity" (aka mire poix, aka carrots, celery and onion), stock and a bit of wine), it was serve over beef for beef bourguinone.  This was our favorite dish of the evening.
We then made, with a bit of difficulty, a hollandaise type sauce.  I say a bit of difficulty because the cooking by committee was in full force here, and the chef/instructor had stated that we now knew all the science we needed to make this sauce on our own.  Not that I am blaming either the committee or the instructor but this is a difficult sauce on a good day and ours needed to be started over.  Once we finished, though, it was scallops with a bacon garlic aioli, and it was good. 
For dessert, we made a vinagrette.  Vinagrette is not actually one of mother sauces (per the internet, anyway) and I was a bit curious how a vinagrette becomes dessert but it was an excellent balance to the sweetness of the other parts of the sauce and to the vanilla custard.  We started with chopped apples and some sugar, caramelized a bit in the pan, then added balsamic vinegar and some macerated berries.  Yum, yum, yum.
It was fun and I would definitely take a class there again, especially with a groupon, and especially with my hubby by my side.  It would be fun to do with friends, too.

Reading:  I finished Paul Wellstone: The Life of a Passionate Progressive about a week ago.  I really really liked it, and realized that I am still sad about his death.  He was a voice for the people who rarely have a voice - children, the poor, the mentally ill.  He learned how to work well across party lines and was well-known for making sure his opinions and views were heard.  The book was well-written by a guy who had been part of Wellstone's campaign and a friend. He had access to Paul's unpublished autobiography and clearly a lot of insight into the life of the late senator. 
A couple of my favorite quotes from Wellstone: "The many should not have to suffer so that a few can prosper.  Some people are very generous with other people's suffering."  "A society that abandons its children with inadequate health care, child-care, education and nutrition is a society that has failed its mission." 

After I finished that book (and added another about Wellstone to my list to read someday), I picked up a new copy of an old favorite, The Borrowers by Mary Norton.  We read this together as a family when I was a kid.  If you have not read this, or have not read it in a long time, or have not read it to your children, I highly recommend checking it out.  The fascinating story of little people who live beneath the floor and "borrow" things from the "human beans" is clever and entertaining.  I found myself amazed by how the Borrowers used our everyday objects (this also explains where things like safety pins and postage stamps are always disappearing to), and caught up in the adventures of them, as they risk being "seen" when "borrowing".  Awesome book.  Now, I will need to read the continued adventures in The Borrowers Afield, The Borrowers Afloat, and more. 

Creating: Here is the picture of the scarf I made for my favorite 5 year old for her birthday.  When we arrived yesterday with a pink gift bag in hand, she asked me who it was for.  I asked her who she thought it was for.  She said, "Me!" to which I replied, "Why would it be for you?"  "Because you forgot to give me a birthday present!"  She's got me there.  It wasn't so much I forgot, more like I wasn't done with it yet.  The sooner she accepts that handmade gifts for me are going to be late, the less disappointed she will be in the future...
And as a bonus, a couple pictures of the scarf I made for her 5" tall stuffed penguin.

naked penguin

penguin with scarf

Penny joins the nuns' choir

Weeding: First frost was Friday morning.  I discovered this Friday afternoon.  On Thursday I had the thought "I should take a picture of the compost tomato plants" because they were so huge and so heavy with fruits.  I also figured I needed to harvest a few more cherry tomatoes, if not more Lemon Boys. So Friday I went out with my camera and harvest basket (really a shallow vinyl bag), only to discover the plants were kaput and the tomatoes not looking so good (oozing a bit).  That afternoon, I battled the gnats (which apparently did NOT die with the frost) and wrestled the huge plants out and into the tarp bag to haul to the yard waste site.  Fifteen plants in there.  FIFTEEN!  And I tried to clean up as many fallen fruits as I could, but they are small and got squished.  So I fully expect more volunteers next year, not that I am complaining.  Those were truly the best tomatoes we grew this year.  They did not suffer blossom end rot or whatever it is called.  They were beautiful fruits.  And so tasty.
Now that corner of the yard just looks empty.  No more 4'x4' tomato shrub.  The end of the season is so sad.  I do still have the mums and asters lighting up the sides of the house with Viking spirit, though.  Gotta love late season blooms!

Eating:  We went to Nectar last night, just for happy hour.  If you don't know us, you may not know about Nectar though I am 99% positive everyone who reads this blog knows me and knows of our obsession for this fantastic wine bar/bistro with the chef-driven menu that changes every 2 weeks.  Anyway, it is the shrimp cakes I wanted to write about.  We have had the crab cakes in the past and they were very good.  But the shrimp cakes are even better.  I don't know how Chef Kevin makes them (will need to ask when we are there for dinner next week), but they are so full of meat and have very little filler (crumbs, etc.).  They taste absolutely divine, better than I imagined shrimp cakes could taste.  And the chili-lime cream sauce they were served with (a small amount drizzled on the plate, not an overpowering puddle of it) SO good.  A little heat, very finely chopped onions and peppers (so small and unobtrusive that E actually ate them), added just the right zip and flavor. If you ever find yourself in or near Osseo, MN, for any reason, stop by Nectar.  Tell Justin, the bartender, that you know E and order any one of the starters or entrees.  You will not be disappointed.  We never have been.

We signed up to take a cooking class.  E found a Groupon and we are going to learn 5 sauces, including Hollandaise, bechamel, and vinagrette (can't think of the other 2 right off the top of my head), and make dishes to go with them.  We are really looking forward to this class.  Sadly, it is not until December.  E swears he is not a foodie.  But he really is.  I at least admit it.

The roast chicken of last week later became chicken noodle soup.  I simmered the carcass in water (with chicken base, herbs, carrots, celery and onion) for a while until the meat literally fell off the bones.  Then chopped the chicken into bite-size pieces, added corn (which had been frozen shortly after roasting the fresh corn from the CSA), green and wax beans (also from CSA by way of the freezer) and some thick "home-style" frozen noodles (cooked according to package directions). I could have made by own noodles with my grandma's recipe but since I was cooking while also working, I opted for the easier method.  The pot of soup made several meals (we had soup 2 nights, 2 bowls each person, each night, then I had soup for lunches 3 times).  It seemed to get better each time we ate it.  Is there anything better than homemade soup when the temperature outside starts to drop?

Yesterday I mixed up some applesauce muffin batter and we had fresh-from-the-oven muffins each morning this weekend.  Here is my recipe, tweaked from a couple recipes I found on-line in various places (not giving credit for the recipes because, really, a muffin recipe is a muffin recipe and I took parts of different recipes to make this one).  A couple weeks ago I had made a small batch of applesauce with the assistance of a 4-almost-5-year-old.  I used this for the muffins.  We added streusel because we like streusel.

Applesauce Streusel Muffins
Combine: 1 1/2 C flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt

Mix together: 2 eggs
2/3 C brown sugar

Add eggs/sugar mixture to the dry ingredients.

Stir in: 6 Tbls butter, melted
1 1/2 C applesauce

Mix just until combined.

Divide batter into 12 muffin cups (or as we did, 6 muffin cups and then store the rest of the batter in the fridge until the next day).

To make streusel topping combine these ingredients and cut butter into dry ingredients until resembles crumbs:  1/4 C brown sugar
3 Tbls flour
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2 Tbls butter

Top muffins with streusel and bake for 20 minutes. 

Reading:  Treasure Island is the most recent classic.  I love it.  I am all caught up in the adventure and can't wait to keep reading to find out what happens.  It is the quintessential pirate adventure book.  And who doesn't love pirates?!?

The Saturday morning bookclub (which is now going to meet Friday evenings for dinner - can we still call it "Breakfast club" just for fun?) has chosen Haunted Ground by Erin Hart for our next read.  I read this one a few years ago for the other bookclub.  It is a mystery but I actually liked it more than I thought I would.  Maybe because it takes place in Ireland and starts with finding a perfectly preserved head in a peat bog.  And who doesn't like Ireland or heads in bogs?!?

Creating: E won tickets to an upcoming Vikings game.  So naturally he will need purple hat with braids.  We went to the store last night to pick out the right yarn colors for said hat and knitting will begin shortly.  I will try to take pictures of it as it goes.  I have no pattern but he found pictures of similar hats that he likes so we will tweak and pattern as we go.  First to measure his big head...

Sorry for the long post. I had a lot of words, apparently.

Until we read/eat again,
Hallie

Eating:  Tonight we are making a recipe that we first tried a couple weeks ago, Tagliatelle with Fresh Corn Pesto  http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2010/08/tagliatelle_with_fresh_corn_pesto  We use fetuccini because our grocery store doesn't carry tagliatelle but whatever.  It has a great corn flavor, making terrific use of the fresh sweet corn we just can't seem to get enough of this time of year.  It has a rich creamy flavor which tastes almost like carbonara (the bacon in there helps with that taste too!), and is really pretty easy to make.  Yum... my mouth is watering just thinking about it. 
This recipe came from an issue of Bon Appetit from last summer.  They had 3 whole menus, from appetizer/first course, to entree, side dish and dessert, each featuring a different abundant summer produce item: Corn, Zucchini, and Tomatoes.  And yes, there was a corn dessert and a tomato dessert.  Both sounded quite tasty but have not yet been tried by me.
A subscription, even if just for 1 year, to a cooking magazine is a great way to introduce yourself to new recipes.  And unlike most magazines which you read and then toss, you can keep them around forever and keep trying new things, or going back to old favorites.  And they usually have pictures for all the recipes, a big plus in my book.

Reading: I am finishing up Rhoda.  She is now in her late 50s/early 60s, as spunky as ever.  The story I finished last night took place in Paris.  Now I want to go back to Paris...
I selected my book for Sunday bookclub.  If you recall, I was trying to decide between a classic that I loved and wanted to re-read, or a classic that I had not read but think I should.  I ended up picking Pride and Prejudice, the one I should have read but have not.  The reason I went with this one is that it has been on my shelf to read for about 5 years and on my list of "books to pick for bookclub" for about 3 years.  What better time than "The Year of Classics" to pick it?  I don't anticipate loving it but at least when I am done, I can check it off my list.  And isn't that really what it is all about?  Checking things off our lists?  I love lists.

Weeding: The new veggie bed is done (need to get pics on this blog) and waiting to be filled with soil/compost.  It is big enough to bury a body in.  Not that I need to bury a body...
Did I ever tell you about our "volunteer" tomato plants that started growing in one of the compost bins?  It is one of the inactive bins, one where we are not currently adding to it or doing anything with it.  We noticed there were some things growing in there and realized they were tomato plants.  We let them go, just to see what they would do.  We now have at least 3 giant plants, one with cherry tomatoes on it, another with larger tomatoes (type yet to be determined) and probably another cherry (it is hard to see what is going on in there, really).  I harvested the first 6 "compost tomatoes" last night!  Don't know that we will get a whole lot out of them before it freezes but does it really matter?  They were free!  I love volunteer plants.  Last year I added some compost when transplanting some plants including day lilies.  A while later I noticed something growing next to a daylily.  I let it grow to see what it might turn out to be (didn't appear to be a noxious weed, so why not?).  A few months later, I harvested an acorn squash out of the daylilies.  And boy, was it good!

Off to cook dinner.
Hallie

Eating:  I hope I like ratatouille.  I am at this moment baking a big casserole full of it.  We got a large eggplant in our CSA last week and the only thing I could think of to do with it was ratatouille.  I have not been a fan of the eggplant dishes I have eaten in the past.  Ratatouille seems like a good way to use up a bunch of veggies at once, if nothing else, and I have read that I can freeze it.  Freezing a few smaller portions sounds appealing to me, since E will not eat it and I might have rata-overload if I eat the entire 3 qts. myself. 
When I mention to Chef Kevin at our favorite restaurant that I was thinking of trying to make this, his helpful suggestion was to rent the movie "Ratatouille" and do exactly what the mouse told me to do.  He may have been a little tipsy when offering this advice...

Reading: Sunday bookclub is reading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle this month.  We are almost done with our year of classics.  So far I have enjoyed all we have read.  We started with The Good Earth by Pearl Buck, which I had never read.  I would read it again - it reminded me in some ways to Giants in the Earth by Ole Rolvaag.  When the next person picked To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, she said it seemed like we were on a roll with classics.  Informally we decided that would be kind of fun.  We unanimously loved Mockingbird - how can you not love Scout? Next up was Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, which I enjoyed more now than I had when I read it when younger.  The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett was lovely read for spring and made me want to get out in the garden.  When it was time for Beth to pick, she had been deciding between horse books (The Red Pony or Black Beauty) but settled instead on the unsettling Lord of the Flies by William Golding - so many levels to read that one on and discuss. We then read another unsettling choice: Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes, which provided another opportunity for great discussion.  The next book was one I had never read but had been on my "list": My Antonia by Willa Cather - I really liked this one a lot.  I look forward to reading O Pioneers someday as well.  (I am missing one of the selections in there between Mockingbird and Huckleberry - can't remember - will probably come to me at 3AM.)  I am up to pick next and am having a bit of angst about it.  I can't decide between something I have never read but probably should at some time (Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen) or something I have read and remember loving, to see if I still like it (A Separate Peace by John Knowles).  Part of the fun of the year of classics has been reading things I have never read and part of it has been rediscovering things I had to read before and seeing if they struck me differently as an adult than than had when I was in high school.  What classics have you read and re-read as a child/teen and then again as a grown-up?

Weeding:  The garden is transitioning to the late summer blooms, some of the fall blooms coming early.  I am wandering the garden, deciding what needs to be divided and what is going up for the plant swap I am coordinating next month.  Looks like I have plenty of rudbekia, monarda and balloon flowers, as well as a hosta or two to divide.  Or give away completely.  I have decided I am not a fan of hosta.  They are boring to me.

That's all for today.  Need to take my ratatouille out of the oven.  It is smelling pretty tasty.

"When we lack proper time for the simple pleasures of life, for the enjoyment of eating, drinking, playing, creating, visiting friends, and watching children at play, then we have missed the purpose of life. Not on bread alone do we live but on all these human and heart-hungry luxuries."

I found this quote on someone else's Blog and either forgot to copy who said it or it was not there. I apologize for not giving proper credit, though I suspect I am not the only person to do so on-line. Anyway, I love this quote and think it applies to everyone of us, but especially those of us who get caught up in all the stuff we think we have to do and forget to take the time to do that which we would like to do. Take time right now (yes, I am talking to you!) for the simple pleasures. Don't put it off until you have finished cleaning the kitchen. I seriously doubt there is a person alive who, when reflecting on her life at age 99, says, "I really wish I had kept my house cleaner. I would like to have mopped more often."

And now, a quote from the all-too-quotable Mark Twain: "A classic is something that everyone wants to have read and nobody wants to read." Wuthering Heights, anyone?

Reading: I am reading Harry Potter at work. Is that illegal or something? Does it matter that there is nothing to do?

Harry is so cool. Everyone thinks that I may be Hermione but I don't think I was ever that bad, was I?. Ron Weasley is quite possibly my favorite. Apparently I go for dorky and a little clueless. No, E, this does not apply to real life--I do not think you are dorky or clueless. Anymore.

Eating: We had Pasta Salad last night. I am addicted to those flavored sliced almonds you can get (check the produce department, near the bagged salads). I could munch the whole bag... But then the Husband makes me share. Phfffffffftt!

Gardening: I watered everything very thoroughly yesterday evening, only to have it pour holy buckets of rain.

Reading: Our next book for bookclub is "Life of Pi" which looks interesting. I thought it might have something to do with the number/symbol pi (as in "pi times r squared") but it does not. Maybe I should write a book about that...

I have a few books I found that I have started and never finished so I may read some of those in between bookclub books. I may never ever finish reading Wuthering Heights, though. I have started that one about 7 times and never made if much past 20 pages. What is classic about that book? I may never know. Maybe I should start in the middle or something.

Eating: As promised, the recipe for Beefy Hashbrown Bake. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a 8x8 pan, combine 4 cups frozen shredded hashbrowns, 3 T. oil and some black pepper (don't measure pepper, as I have said before). Bake for 15-20 minutes. Meanwhile (back at the ranch...), brown 1 lb. ground beef. Drain and stir in a little garlic powder, 1 C. water and 1 pkg. brown gravy mix. Bring to a boil and cook and stir for 2 minutes. Add in 2 C. frozen mixed vegetables (or corn, in our case) and cook and stir for ~5 minutes more. Stir in 1/2 C. shredded cheddar and half of a 2 oz can of French fried onion thingies. Spread over top of hashbrowns (which will probably not be brown) and bake for 10 minutes. Sprinkle 1/2 C. shredded cheddar and the rest of the onion thingies over top and bake another 5 until the cheese is melted. Voila!