Holy Macaroni!

I check nbcnews.com every morning for my news fix, and noticed last week that they were doing viewer submitted photos for voting, the next week would be 'sunrise' photos.  Well, I figured I had the perfect photo from last year when I dragged poor Owen out for a sunrise shot of a shuttle fly-over.  So I submitted it.  Today I checked the website and holy carp, my photo was not only listed as one of the ones to vote for, but it was THE photo depicting the entire article! *faint*

So go vote already!  I think you have the whole week, but I'm not really sure.  I feel like I've won already, just by being selected, but still, shoot for the stars, dude!

http://www.today.com/travel/its-snap-stunning-sunrises-1B9232834

A few more photos from that day...I may have posted some here before but I can't remember and I'm too lazy to check right this moment...zzzz.....

ETA:  Those were from the Discover flyover and I DID post them already.  So enjoy the repeat! :)

Red Russian Kale

That sounds like it should be code for something.  I had never heard of it before until I got my box of fresh organic produce yesterday, from Space Girl Organics.  I had skimmed over the list already and made a few swaps, but I really didn't know what I was pulling out of there when I saw what looked like scraggly kale, so I ran back to the box to read the label.  Red Russian Kale.  Ok, then.  It's quite likely I've eaten it before and just didn't know what variety I had.  My Mamaw used to open a can of chopped kale and heat it up as part of Sunday dinner, served with a splash of vinegar.  Bitter, but I grew to sort of appreciate it.

What the heck is Red Russian Kale?

I knew I was going to cook some salmon filets that I'd had in the freezer and decided that I should go ahead and cook up this kale with it.  I happened to have some pancetta in the fridge (*cue deep male Spanish accented voice* I don't always have pancetta in the fridge, but when I do, I do a happy dance) for a recipe I never got around to cooking (sorry, Mom!).  I originally planned on browning it and then sprinkling the crumbled bits over some skillet sweet potatoes, but I decided I would try it in the kale instead, and it came out muy delicioso!

So here you go:

Brown a couple ounces of pancetta (or bacon, or ham with some olive oil) in a skillet over medium heat, being careful not to burn it--but let it get crispy for crumbling.  You will use the browned bits stuck on the bottom and we're not going for a charred flavor.  Remove the meat and allow to drain off any excess grease on a paper towel.  Roughly chop a bunch of kale, removing the tough stems, and place into the skillet with the rendered grease still inside.  It will cook fairly quickly, a huge bunch of kale will wilt into a rather small but tasty amount.  Once it is bright green and looking tender, just a few minutes, deglaze the skillet with about a Tbsp or two of vinegar...I used Balsamic this time since I was planning on using it on the salmon anyway.  Taste and add salt and pepper as needed.

Pancetta...yum.  Can't go wrong with something that looks and tastes so much like bacon!

 I used this kale as a bed for my salmon, tossing some halved grape tomatoes in at the very end (also from Lucinda! Woot!) and I sprinkled the pancetta bits over the salmon and finished it with a balsamic glaze.  It was very VERY tasty, although it was my first time reducing balsamic vinegar and I almost ended up with balsamic toffee.  Live and learn.

                               A food photographer I am not.  But it did taste good, I swear!

Oh yeah, I still did the skillet sweet potatoes, but they were a little sad to give up their pancetta friend :(  Next time, sweets, next time.

Grandparents

I was pretty lucky in the grandparents' department.  As fate would have it, my parents got married at a very young age and as such I was able to know several of my great grandparents and I spent an amazing amount of quality time with my other grandparents.  Especially Granny and Boom-pa.  I've posted about them before, but they were just such magical people, so very very full of love, you couldn't help but feel it spilling over and splashing on you when you were around them.

We were quite close when I was young, we lived nearby and spent many a night at their house, snuggled up in their bed with them, or napping in 'the girls' room' where my mom and aunt spent their youth.  I can still hear that box fan rattling away on a hot summer afternoon, and the occasional car drive by on the street down below the open window.  I can still hear her calling through the house, "Kids!!  Wash your hands!  Time for supper!"

One of the things I remember most about Granny is how soft she was.  She was a voluptuous woman, and her cushiony arms and legs and breasts were all the soft comfort a little one could need.  As a small child I loved nothing more than to curl up in her lap, or rest my head on her thigh while she played with my hair, the rest of me sprawled out on the couch.  I didn't care what she was doing or who she was talking to or anything about ANYthing if I could just relax there with her.

Boom-pa was our playmate.  Down over the hill by the river, or up at the house, or walking down to the little community park, he was just thrilled to be part of it all, and looking back I can SEE how he spent more time watching than actually playing, enjoying our joy.  One vivid memory I have is of us playing 'Red Light, Green Light' on the back porch.  We would get all ready to go crazy running and jumping and spinning the moment he said 'Green Light!', trying to be the first to reach the end, to reach him.  But he spoiled it... "Caution!" he called out.  What?  "BOOM-PA! You're supposed to say RED LIGHT!!"

"Oh no, there's always a yellow light first.  That yellow light means 'caution', it means the red light is coming."

"But Boom-pa, that's not how you play!  You're not supposed to use the yellow light!"

And he would just chuckle in his knowing way, and keep playing the game in his fashion, and we adjusted because it was still fun to play with Boom-pa, even if we DID have to slow down for the yellow light.

Magical memories...

I know everyone has their own beliefs of life and death and angels and guardians.  I'm not going to try and debate that, but I do want to share a thought that gives me warm fuzzies.

I was biking with Kevin back in late September, when I got hit by a car.  I was going down the sidewalk and in a rush to get home, we were so close, after 15 miles I just wanted OFF that bike.  It was a pretty new bike that I had named 'Besty' in a joking way, it was what Granny would write on almost all the birthday cards she ever gave me, somehow she just couldn't spell 'Betsy' properly.  So Besty and I were trucking along, with Kevin right behind and we were getting close to an intersection.  I could see a car pulling up, so I looked at the lights...hers was red, and I watched her slow down.  She was in a right hand turning lane and I was headed straight for her should she pull out, so I began to slow down also, and looked at her for confirmation that she was, indeed, stopping.  I saw her continue to slow and she looked left, when I made the assumption that she WAS stopping, so I sped up to get across the crosswalk quickly.  However, she didn't stop.  After she looked left, she stepped on the gas and sped up to make that turn, hitting me directly.

I felt the bumper of her car as it hit my leg, and the hood of the car as I flew up and landed on it, I saw the windshield as I rolled over the hood and almost smashed my face into the glass.  The car continued moving across both lanes of traffic, over the median and into the lanes of oncoming traffic.

When she finally rolled to a stop, I was able to get up off her car and walk across all three lanes and sit down in the grass on the other side, next to my mangled Besty.  She had gotten completely run over and suffered major structural damage.  There were no cars in the far lanes, cars that would have hit us head on...they were held up at a light just a block north.  I got large bruises on both my shoulders, my leg, my hip...but I felt no pain, I was barely sore even in the days after, my biggest problem was the adrenaline shock.

I like to feel that Boom-pa was up there playing 'Red Light, Green Light' with the southbound cars, while Granny softened my fall and cushioned my blows.  Besty took all the damage, their Betsy walked away pretty much unscathed, in spite of the large dent I (we?) left in the hood of that lady's car.
               

My boys now live close by to a wonderful pair of grandparents, Kevin's parents, and they are so blessed to have them, as I am blessed to have the free time they offer me ;)  They spend many nights sleeping over, getting spoiled, going on fun excursions to the zoo, or fishing, or the beach...you name it.  They have it made.  My mom, on the other hand, lives rather far away and doesn't get to see us very often.  So her recent visit was a special treat for all of us, and she did what Grannies and Grammies and Grandmas do best...lots of play, lots of love, lots of silliness with some gentle guidance along the way.

I am grateful that my boys have such loving grandparents and I hope they have magical memories to keep with them forever, just like I do.

Because of Lucinda...

More like Because of Alton Brown, to be truthful.

(This is a more detailed version of this post, so if it seems redundant, then that's why!)

I don't know when exactly my addiction to cooking shows started, but I do know when it started to click in my brain and make sense, especially the reason why my pancakes were always so bland and tough.  Alton Brown.  Sigh.  Hearts.  Music.  If you have never seen an episode of 'Good Eats', then you are truly missing out.  Alton is a cooking scientist and if you are a visual thinker like me, it is pure joy to SEE him explain the how and why of recipes and techniques.  And he is so entertaining, coming up with the corniest of visual aids and using people as molecules and a blue crab that keeps escaping the tank, haunting everyone on set...ahhh.  Zach would curl up next to me on the couch and we'd watch, enthralled, then jump up and cook something.  Let me tell you, I know how to make pancakes now.  No matter what recipe I use or what the directions say, I follow his technique and BAM! (sorry, Emeril) they are wonderful.

So Zach developed an interest in cooking, needless to say, forced into food tv watching with mama, and he's pretty good at it.  Recently, he and a classmate decided to join the kids' cooking competition at the county fair.  The concept was sort of like 'Chopped' where contestants get a box of surprise ingredients and must then use those ingredients (along with free rein of fridge and pantry) to create a tasty meal.  We were told the kids would get a box with a beef and a vegetable ingredient and we could bring spices from home.  And we had about 1 1/2 weeks to prepare, or at least try to wrap our heads around it.

Zach's classmate hadn't done a whole lot of cooking so I invited her over a few times to get her into the groove, so to speak, working on chopping vegetables (and garlic! Lots of garlic!) and coming up with a potential flavor palate that could be incorporated into a variety of beef cuts and veggie choices.  They decided Mexican/Southwest would be doable, and they practiced making chimichurri (hey, spices from home, parsley and cilantro are spices, no?) figuring ANY beef would be good with chimichurri on it.  Garlic and olive oil over sauteed veggies would be easy enough.

But I was worried.  Because, you see, I subscribe to this pretty awesome organic produce delivery, Space Girl Organics, run by the awesome and amazing Lucinda, and going by the contents of the box I could tell that eggplant was in season.  Eggplant.  What on earth would the kids do if they had EGGPLANT in their box to cook with?  Aside from ratatouille and eggplant parmesan, I don't even really know what to do with it myself.  I googled 'Mexican ratatouille' and came up with some interesting recipes, but none of them even had eggplant in them.  So I told the kids they should try and make their OWN Mexican ratatouille, using some of the same flavors in the chimichurri, the garlic, etc, and see what happened.

What happened was that there was no eggplant in the box of mandatory ingredients.  However, the kids loved that crazy Mexi-touille they had cooked so much, they decided to go for the OPTIONAL eggplant and add it to the mandatory zucchini and bell peppers that were in the box.  They wowed the judges with the recipe we invented so much that they won first prize.  So Because of Lucinda and Because of Alton Brown, my baby boy and his friend got a blue ribbon and a cash prize at the county fair.  Booyah!

Here's the rough recipe, you really should try it.  It made eggplant eaters out of two 12 year olds who had said "Ok, I'll cook it but I won't eat it!" ;)

Zach and Sage's Mexi-touille
Ingredients are estimates, all amounts can be changed to suit your tastes :)

• Canola oil
• Olive oil
• 1 medium sized eggplant, cut into approx 1/2 to 1" cubes
• 2 small/medium zucchini, or one zucchini and one yellow summer squash, cut into 1/2" pieces
• 1-2 bell peppers, diced into 1/2" pieces (red and/or yellow is great for adding color, you can see by the photo below that I would have been well served by listening to my own advice)
• One small/medium onion, diced however small you'd like
• 3 or so cloves of garlic, minced fine
• 1 14oz can diced tomatoes, or about 3 plum tomatoes, diced into 1/2" pieces
• 1 small can fire roasted green chiles, or you can try fresh chiles, diced small.  Jalapeno might be good!
• Fresh cilantro, roughly chopped, about 1/4 cup
• Kosher salt, one small handful, and more to taste
• Fresh cracked pepper to taste
• Crushed red pepper flakes, about 1/4 tsp
• Toasted cumin seed, 1/2 to 1 tsp
• Splash of lime juice
• Queso Freso, crumbled, about 1/2 cup

Trim the ends off the eggplant, then slice into 1/2 to 1" rounds, and then cube it.  Throw the cubes into a colander and toss with the small handful of kosher salt.  Toss to coat all the pieces with salt and let it pull out some of the bitter juices.  I'm not sure if it's necessary for this recipe, but I tried grilling eggplant once and I did NOT do a salt rest first, and it was NASTY. So rather than take any chances, we did it this way.  Let the eggplant rest in the colander for about 20 min or however long it takes to chop up all the other ingredients.  Then rinse it thoroughly with cold water and let the excess water drain.

Heat a skillet on medium high heat and drizzle a Tbsp or two of canola oil (better for higher heat than olive oil).  Toss the eggplant in to the heated oil and stir quickly to coat.  Eggplant will suck up that oil like a sponge so be quick.  Let the eggplant just start to brown and soften slightly, stirring frequently, then remove it to a plate.  Don't worry about the brown bits on the skillet.  Reduce the heat to medium and drizzle in about a Tbsp of olive oil and add your onions, bell peppers and fresh chiles if using them.  Sprinkle a pinch of kosher salt into the mix and let them sweat for a few minutes.  Add the garlic and continue to gently sautee for a minute or two, then add the tomatoes, canned chiles, red pepper flakes and cumin seed.  If using fresh tomatoes, add about 1/4 to 1/2 cup of water for liquid.  Reduce heat to a simmer and cover, simmer for about 10-15 minutes.  Remove cover and add zucchini, give it about 5 minutes for the zucchini to start to soften, taste and adjust seasonings with salt and pepper, then add the eggplant back in, along with the fresh cilantro and a splash of lime juice.  Once the eggplant is heated through, remove from heat and sprinkle with queso fresco.

Voila!

They also had ground sirloin in the basket, from which they made small slider sized burgers with queso fresco, cilantro, onion powder, garlic powder and salt and pepper, then drizzled with their fresh chimichurri after cooking.  Yummilicious.

My little Munchkin

I'm very tired, so I'm just going to post a few cute pics I took of Owen the other day.  BE WARNED!!!  A FLASH was used.  He's not very patient and doesn't allow his slow moving mama to make camera adjustments.  By the time I've moved ONE dial, he's off building half a Lego mall or something.


But srsly, isn't he just too cute?
In fact, he's so cute I almost forgot this cute thing he said the other day.  He says a million kazillion cute things, I admit I let them blur in my head from time to time.  But from now on, in our home, this song says 'Come alooooonnnng with meeee, I will eeeeeat your braaaaiiin...."

go ahead, find it :)


And then check out the cutie who heard the REAL lyrics.

Ok, I give. Uncle.  Whatever.  The link is below, my attempts at making cute arrows pointing to it have been proven futile.  Or skip it and just look at my sweet munchkin.

Come Along  

They did it!

Zach and his classmate not only competed, but they snagged first place at the cooking competition!  Woohoo!

I didn't get great photos b/c I was busy supervising and making sure injuries were kept to a minimum.  The box of 'surprise' ingredients held ground sirloin, bell peppers, new red potatoes and zucchini.

They made a southwest style mini burger mixing the meat with crumbled queso fresco, fresh cilantro, salt, pepper and a few other spices (shhhh, it's a secret!) and they made fresh chimichurri sauce to drizzle on top. For the veggie portion, they decided to replicate a recipe we came up with during a practice session and dove into the fridge for EGGPLANT to mix with the zucchini and bell peppers for a Mexican inspired ratatouille.  Weird, yes.  But sooo tasty.  The taters were chopped up small, tossed with oil and diced onion and fried up skillet style.

Yeah, the judges loved it.

Here are the few pitiful photos I took.  But big ol' WOOT!!  They did AWESOME!!!!!

It's been one week...

...since you looked at me... Yes, I know it's been more than one week but now you hopefully have a fun little #earworm.

I have been legitimately busy!  I swear!  I was emailed by Zach's teacher about a potential opportunity for him/other students.  The county fair is apparently having a youth cooking competition and maybe some of them would be interested?  It wouldn't be a school event, just an extra and I would be in charge of deciding whether or not to go forward.  Of COURSE Zach wanted to do it, anything to cram more stuff into MY life. One of the girls from last year's solar cooking competition (OMG that was crazy) was also mentioned as being interested and she agreed that she'd love to do it.  The catch?  I had about 1 1/2 weeks to prepare because the fair event is on Sunday the 24th.  Eeek.

So I'm still scrambling.  Zach hasn't done a lot of cooking lately and he tends to be a bit scattered, and S, his friend, hasn't done much cooking other than noodles (her words).  I've had 2 cooking days in the past week where I walk them through a meat and veg. with lots of garlic mincing along the way and it's been a big exhausting mess.  The catch to the competition, as I've been told, is that the kids in groups of 2 will have a box of a surprise beef and veg ingredients. They will then have to prepare an entree but will be able to bring 'spices' from home.  It's all up in the air, however, because I can't get the lady to call me back and I don't know if the two are actually registered or not, or if I need a waiver/liability form for S's parents to sign, what 'spices' actually means, etc.  So maybe we'll be cooking and maybe we won't.  Or they, not we.  Whatever.  At least I got dinner cooked for me last night and we made my first ever homemade chimichurri sauce.  Yummy!  No pics, though.  Too many dishes to wash for me to have the energy for the camera.

I did take pics of Zach over the weekend, though.  A few glasses of wine seems to help numb the burning in my hands and arms (woohoo!) so on Sat I indulged and set up my flash remotely so go off at an angle in the garage, hung some black muslin and made Zach grab his newest cloak.  I like what we ended up with.  The problem I had was that in backing up out of the garage to get a wider shot, I'd end up in the sun which was somehow affecting my ability to focus or skewed my light sensing or something, I'm not sure what.  So most of the shots had me too close to really get it all, but hey, it was an experiment and it was fun and that's what counts, right?

And how can I leave without posting one of my smaller spawn? ♥  He can't NOT make a face when I try to take a photo of him.  So rotten.  So lovable.

Freaky Family

So my cousin and her two boys came to visit this weekend, and during all the fun and chaos we were talking late into the night about some of our familial oddities.  Apparently she and I share an insanely sensitive sense of smell.  So naturally, last night as I couldn't sleep, my mind drifted to our conversation and I began to ponder on other strange aspects of my being, wondering if they are normal (as I've always presumed) or abnormal, as I'm learning often that those strange glances people give me aren't a good sign.

Here's one:  Most nights my nose gets congested.  No biggie, it just clogs up a bit and I'm able to breathe well enough from the clear side.  No, it's not adenoids, those were removed waaayy back in the dark ages.  BUT the apparently odd part (according to my dear husband's reaction when I told him) is the fact that the clogged side is always the side that's down, ie, the left nostril if I'm lying on my left side.  If it gets to the point that I feel pressure from the congestion, I can flip over to the right side and the swelling or whatever will shift over, and often I get a satisfying POP sensation when it clears completely, thus clogging the other side, complete with almost eye watering sensation.  Sometimes I try to trick it by waiting until a.l.m.o.s.t. popping and then flip to my back, as if to say AHA!  Caught you!  Now where are you going to go?  But it inevitably picks a side and I have to resume my flip flop routine until I fall asleep.  I guess it's a gravity dependent sinus edema.  It's not dripping, no postnasal drip, just blocking my life's breath.  As I said, no biggie.  Now if I'm truly sick or having an allergy attack with lots of drippy snot and whatnot, all bets are off.  No flip flop in the world will fix it then.  So, can you flip and clear your nose?

P.S....I would prefer to prove Kevin wrong, I'm NOT a freak in this situation.  So click 'yes', mmmkay?

See Spot Run.

School sure has changed a lot since I was a wee one.

Yesterday I was asked by Owen's teacher to help her with a project...the kids have 40 sight words that they need to have memorized by the end of the year and thanks to Pinterest, she found something that she thinks will be helpful in making it more fun, which for a kid (well, for anyone really) equals 'more likely to be accomplished'.  Each child held up a large printed word which I took photos of, then she will turn the digital files into a PowerPoint presentation. Seeing their classmates faces with the words is certainly more entertaining than the typical flash card system, no?

Here is my hooligan with two of the words.  He's such a little stinker.  But his teacher is pretty awesome.  I really should have found a less distracting background space, but I was focused on making sure I had a good bounce/light source and with me, one thought tends to take over, sneering back over its shoulder at all the other valid ideas pounding and screaming on the soundproof glass of my mind. And since my hands are all effed up, I wanted to get it done as quickly as possible. /end excuses. C'est la vie.

What a lovely day.

I heard someone refer to another person or conversation or SOMEthing as 'lovely' and it dawned on me, I don't hear or use that word often at all.  In fact, my writing and speaking vocabulary is pretty limited.  Maybe I should start a word-a-day.  I bet that would go over about as well as my photo-a-day.

But yesterday WAS lovely.  I got in some biking with Kevin, then biked again to Publix for the second time this week, and after school the boys and I made the small trek (via car!) to the farmer's market.  I like to buy eggs from the Funky Chicken Farm and browse and drool at all the other yummy things there.  I'd spend a fortune on the goat milk soaps and serrano/prosciutto and garlic sauce and fresh squeezed orange juice and on and on.  I did loosen up a little and get myself the boys some kettle corn, freshly made and smelling oooohh sooo delicious, as well as some fresh brussels sprouts to roast in a day or so, and some radishes.  We don't often eat radishes, but they were just so PRETTY.

I took my camera along and was sort of hemming and hawing mentally about using it, I'm just not that assertive person who likes to get in your space with a lens.  I need to work on that.  But the gentleman at the Fratello Sole stand spoke up and volunteered to be a model for me :)

I will vouch for the drooliciousness of his products, that serrano ham/prosciutto is uber tasty and Zach had several sandwiches in his lunch made with the asiago cheese we bought there a few weeks back.  Lucky boy.

We stowed our eggs and veggies in the car and then ran off to the small field on the other side, where I told the boys to run around and let me get some fun pics of them.  I've been feeling so achy and cranky lately, I figured we all needed some sunshine filled merriment.  And then I decided I REALLY need to get photos of myself with them, I have so few because I'm always taking the pictures and of course I'm never ready/look good enough/yada yada...thus I handed over my camera to each Zach and Owen, letting them take turns with it and I love what we ended up with.  My favoritest pictures ever ♥