At least twice recently (HERE and HERE) I’ve mentioned that Shannon is living at home. It’s only supposed to be temporary, while she tries to find a permanent job. But if she keeps doing the things she’s been doing, we might never let her leave.
Why?
Because she feeds us really well.
Before I go further, I have to explain the dinner rotation. For some time now, Hubby and I have had this rotation thing going on where he cooks one week then I cook the following week. Then it starts over. In other words, we take turns. Whoever isn’t cooking is responsible for cleanup.
When Shannon got home back in August (you do know she just went ’round the world, right?), she was really good about helping to clean up and stuff. And she’s always willing to help chop, slice, dice, etc. So we figured, it’s only fair that she get added to the rotation, too.
Of course she was willing. She loves to cook and bake. She’s good at it, too.
Even better? She takes orders.
One night last week, I requested pretzel dogs.
That’s basically a soft pretzel wrapped around a hot dog. Not just any soft pretzels. Made-from-scratch, DELICIOUS soft pretzels.
Pretzel Dogs
Typically I like ketchup, mustard and raw onions on my hot dogs. But pretzel dogs are best served with mustard only.
Here’s what the pretzel dog looks like on the inside.
Pretzel Dog Innards (note the mustard topping)
See what I mean about not letting her leave?
Besides, Hubby and I are kind of enjoying having her around. She was gone for ten whole months after all.
AND she’s promised to make buttermilk biscuits the next time she’s up, too.
The pretzel recipe actually is from Household Diva 6. She got it from someone else, but since Ann Marie is the one who told me about it, I had to give her a mention.
I was going to do a quick post yesterday to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving, but the morning flew by. And once we started cooking around 10:30 we didn’t stop doing, doing, doing until pretty late. And I was pooped.
So now it’s the day after…
I hope each and every one of you had a fabulous day. If it was even half as awesome as mine, I know it was good. Because our day was amazing.
It’s odd, though, because we only had a few people here. My Mom hasn’t been feeling well so she and my Dad did Thanksgiving alone at their house. My son-in-law, TJ, is still deployed. The grand kids were at their other grandparents’ house. Amy, who is still recuperating from foot surgery, stayed close to her own home and spent the holiday with friends. Eric’s girlfriend was with her family in Pennsylvania. My brother, sister-in-law and nephew are in Virginia (that’s where they live). So…
Our gathering consisted of Hubby, of course, my mother-in-law, Shannon, Eric and me. And the dogs. We can’t forget them. 🙂
We decided to be different this year and forgo some of the more-traditional fare (like a turkey). All of us prefer chicken. None of us are really crazy about pumpkin pie either. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Shannon, who also likes to cook, agreed that it would be fun to experiment. I’ve always wanted to try sausage stuffing. And I get REALLY tired of the same old side dishes all the time. We decided to start with the must-haves (chicken, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy) and then add some new stuff. Shannon took the initiative to find some interesting recipes. She succeeded, too.
I really am not exaggerating when I said we started at 10:30 and didn’t stop.
Actually, Shannon started on Wednesday by baking totally-from-scratch cinnamon rolls just like Hubby makes. They were designated as our Thanksgiving breakfast. She loves to bake, and it shows. The cinnamon rolls were delicious.
Homemade Cinnamon Rolls with Cream Cheese Icing for Breakfast
One of the must-have-again-SOON recipes Shannon found was Bella’s Brussels Sprouts with Bacon. Hubby, MIL and I really like Brussels Sprouts anyway. Shannon likes them, too. Eric doesn’t particularly care for them. But we all agreed that Bella’s Brussels Sprouts with Bacon ROCKED.
Then there were the Roasted Beets and Sweets…
The Most-interesting Vegetable
As much as I like red beets, I’ve never actually prepared them. Shannon hadn’t either. So we were both quite intrigued by the way the beets looked when freshly-peeled. The recipe was simple to follow and absolutely divine. If you’re a fan of red beets and sweet potatoes/yams, you have to try this Roasted Beets and Sweets recipe. Sorry I don’t have a picture of the finished product to show you.
I did mention that Shannon loves to bake, right? She’s my Kitchen Aide Pretzel Maker, remember? For dinner, she elected to make some dinner rolls. The recipe (actually called a formula) came from her bread maker’s Bible. Check these out…
Shaping the Rolls (I missed capturing the mixing and kneading action)Oven-readyFresh-from-the-Oven Goodness
Those were THE BEST rolls I have ever eaten. For serious. I’m not a huge bread fan. I mean, I like good-quality bread, but I’ve never been one to say, “Ooh, I would love to have some homemade rolls.” Now? We may never let Shannon move out. Having your own personal baker is AWESOME. Especially when they’re really good at it like Shannon.
While she and I cooked and baked, the dogs anxiously watched for our guests to arrive.
"Are they here yet? When are they coming?"
I baked an Apple Crumb Pie, too. Like the ones Brianna and I made back in October.
Please pass the garlic!
We used myriad spices as we cooked and baked. At one point, I had a few extra minutes and decided to reorganize the spice cabinet a bit. If you don’t do that periodically, things get completely out of hand. Shannon didn’t believe me when I told her we had FIVE different containers of garlic powder. So I got them out to show her.
When Eric still lived with us, we went through garlic powder like crazy. I prefer fresh garlic personally, but that boy loves him some garlic powder. Since it’s completely his fault that we had so much garlic in the cupboard, I made him take three of the five containers home.
Staying out of our way.
The dogs were pretty good about staying out from under foot. Every now and then one of them would sneak back into the kitchen. But for the most part, they did pretty good.
Back to our experimentation…
The last experimental side-dish was Garlic Carrots. Oh. My. GAWD. They were very simple, and really, really, really good. They were quite possibly the best cooked carrots I have EVER eaten. Again, I am not exaggerating. They were THAT good.
Experimental Chicken
We had two chickens because we made two kinds of stuffing. And the stuffing that’s cooked inside of the bird is ALWAYS better that the other stuff, so we had to have two chickens for the apples-to-apples comparison. The recipe Shannon chose was Awesome Sausage, Apple and Cranberry Stuffing. It was very good, but the traditional stuffing is still my favorite. That’s like one of my favorite things in the whole world to eat, so I’m not surprised that I liked it better. But the experimental stuffing was good, too.
Traditional Chicken
I’m sort of bummed that I didn’t take pictures of all the side dishes, but we were busy! I did try and get a shot of the meal on the table. None of these pictures are particularly good (there’s at least one person I captured with a weird look on their face or something out of focus in each), but I am posting them anyway because they were all the pictures I got.
Getting ready to eat.
That picture is actually not bad, but Eric is missing.
Hurry up, we're hungry!
This would’ve been a good one if Hubby hadn’t been goofing off and sporting a Gaige-face (Gaige loves to make goofy faces in pictures).
The meal.
And in that last one, I caught my MIL with her eyes closed. Sorry, Mom!
We were all half-starved by this point. Shannon and I somehow messed up our timing. The chickens weren’t finished until at least two hours after they were supposed to have been done. So I couldn’t make everyone wait too long to eat.
And eat we did. It doesn’t look like there’s that much food on the table, but there was. And it was all fabulous. I made succotash, too. That’s a staple. And I didn’t mention the gravy. I make yummy gravy, if I do say so myself.
Is it FINALLY our turn?
Once we were finished, the dogs got to eat their Thanksgiving meal. I use the chicken innards and necks to flavor the gravy base. Once that’s cooked for several hours, I always remove the innards, chop them all up and save it for the dogs. So they got that, some chicken, and a big dollop of gravy added to their bowls. They were all thrilled.
Even though we all wished the rest of the family could’ve come, we all agreed this was quite possibly our best Thanksgiving meal ever. Shannon and I really had a good time cooking together. And everyone enjoyed our experiments immensely. All-in-all, it was a very satisfying and very happy day.
Now, I think I’d better go and eat one of those leftover rolls of Shannon’s. And maybe some mashed potatoes and gravy, too. Plus some leftover stuffing…
Naan is an Indian flatbread we first discovered when it was served to us at the local kabob restaurant.
It is pronounced two different ways. The way we have always said it rhymes with Ann. One day last week, Shannon heard Mike say it that way and snickered, saying it really is pronounced like “non.” Since she did recently spend like a month in India AND she’s a foodie, we believed her.
But Hubby and I did enjoy a nice chuckle on Friday when he told Shannon we were having Naan Pizza (pronounced NON Pizza) for dinner and she said, “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”
You can’t blame her really. Hubby can sometimes be a smart ass and who knew what he might’ve meant by non-pizza.
As soon as he said it our way (naan rhyming with Ann) she knew what we meant.
Naan Pizza
The plan was that we would each assemble our own pizza. That meant we could have whatever we liked on it. I ended up assembling Hubby’s for him, though, because he was busy working to finish the basement. They all started with pizza sauce. Hubby’s had pepperoni, mozzarella cheese, and tomato chunks. Oh yeah, and a little bit of canned Parmesan cheese since foodie Shannon said that’s what makes the pizza top brown up a bit.
In addition to both cheeses, mine (shown on upper left in the above picture) had mushrooms, onions, black olives and pepperoni. It was DELICIOUS.
More Naan Pizza
We only have one pizza stone so we had to use a baking sheet to cook my second pizza and the two Shannon assembled. They got crispier than the ones cooked on the pizza stone, but were still very tasty. Shannon’s pizza had the cheeses plus pepperoni, tomato chunks, mushrooms and salad greens. (I’m probably forgetting something.) She and I had salads with ours, too.
Speaking of salads, I wish I’d been taking pictures of all the different salads I have made recently. I like assembling salads. It’s fun throwing a bunch of different stuff together to see what works best. Lately, I’ve been making some awesome salads, if I do say so myself.
My favorite is the one using spring mix (baby red and green romaine and oak leaf lettuces, red and green chard, arugula, friseé, and radicchio, among others) topped with pears, sliced strawberries, blueberries, tomatoes, pecans, feta cheese and a raspberry-walnut vinaigrette dressing.
Although last night’s more traditional salad of spring mix topped with mushrooms, cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, freshly-grated parmesan cheese, mesquite-marinated and grilled NY Strip steak and peppercorn ranch dressing was fabulous, too.
Hungry yet?
Sorry.
I won’t be talking about food or much of anything else over the next few days. I have to travel to King of Prussia, Pennsylvania (where my employer is headquartered) for a work thing. I’m looking forward to seeing my co-workers. Unfortunately, it’s only the US crew. But we hope to see our international comrades early next year.
I may or may not be blogging from KoP. If you don’t see any activity here over the next few days, that’s why.
One of my favorite bloggers — HouseholdDiva6 — has thissoft pretzel recipe on her blog that looks really yummy. I’ve always wanted to try it, but even more so since our trip to Europe. That’s where we discovered that, just like Ann Marie said, most little German bakeries sell them. At least that was the case in Austria and Italy. We found some pretzels at a bakery in Luxembourg City, too. The Swiss love their soft pretzels so much, that we saw quite a few Brezelkönig (Pretzel King) stands in the train stations. They sell them in grocery stores, too.
So, I’ve been wanting to try this recipe, but I’m not a baker. I mean, I could make the darn things if I wanted, but I just hadn’t been sufficiently motivated. But then the Kitchen Aide arrived.
AND, while at the grocery store on Sunday, I noticed they had blue crab meat on sale. (The meat is not blue, that’s what the crabs are called. CLICK HERE for a picture of some live blue crabs.) My first thought was to make crab cakes, and then I remembered Ann Marie’s pretzels . I knew that would be the perfect thing to use the Kitchen Aide for.
My Kitchen Aide pretzel maker.
Shannon loves cooking AND baking. Heck, the girl has made her own bagels before. Can you imagine doing that? (She takes after her Dad who also likes to bake.) She also likes crab pretzels. So I knew she’d probably be thrilled to make soft pretzels for me. Of course I had to photograph the process.
“Rawhide” has nothing to do with these pretzels by the way, except for the “rolling” thing. That tune just popped into my head.
Her pretzels even look like pretzels. Sprinkling on some salt.The finished product. Don't they look delicious? They smelled divine.
I didn’t photograph the entire process, just the highlights. I was working after all. The pretzels REALLY smelled yummy as they were baking.
Fresh from the oven.One of the crab pretzels.
Since it is summer and Papa John’s corn-on-the-cob — the best in the WORLD — is in season, it was only fitting that we serve that with our crab pretzel dinner, too.
Our crab pretzel and corn-on-the-cob dinner.
Now, doesn’t THAT look delicious? It was. Shannon’s homemade pretzels absolutely made the crab pretzel. The crab mixture on top was good, but the homemade pretzels are what really added the special touch.
I’m glad it all turned out in the end. I was a bit worried. Why? Because as I started to pick through the “fresh” crab meat to remove the shells, I realized it wasn’t so fresh after all. It smelled a bit off. Not horrible, but not great either. So I had to stop what I was doing and take it back to the store where I bought it then go to Costco for some of that pasteurized crab meat. Blue crab meat would’ve been better, but that’s not easy to find at reasonable ($12.99/pound) prices. It’s usually closer to $20 or even $25/pound.
It was still good though. I didn’t follow a recipe. I just mixed the crab with about 4 ounces of softened cream cheese, a few tablespoons of mayonnaise, a splash or two of Worcestershire sauce and a teaspoon or so of Old Bay seasoning. It could’ve used a teeny bit more of that, but I didn’t want the crab to be overly salty (like the shrimp salad I’d made a couple days prior). We cut little troughs in the tops of the pretzels, filled them with the crab mixture, sprinkled on a little four-cheese mixture plus an extra dusting of Old Bay and baked them at 400 degrees for about 5 minutes. Then I switched the oven to broil for a minute or two so the tops would get that nice, brown color.
I knew yesterday’s trip back to Maryland would be a hot one, so I set out early. Not super early, but early enough that I didn’t eat breakfast.
The Bon Matin Bakery in Berryville, Virginia
Driving the same old routes all of the time gets boring. So I decided to detour through Berryville, Virginia. We often drive past Berryville on our way to or from the WV place, but we never drive through the downtown business district. I knew we’d been there at least once during a day trip, but I couldn’t remember what it was like.
I was hoping to find a little cafe or bakery where I could get breakfast. But imagine my delight when I discovered not just any bakery, but a FRENCH bakery. Woo hoo! I was thrilled. I parked immediately and practically ran inside.
First, I ordered a blueberry and cream cheese-filled croissant. I also got a plain croissant to eat later. And then I saw these unlabeled mystery pastries.
Hmmm... what the heck are those?
“Um, what are those things?” I asked the guy behind the counter.
“They’re pretzels,” he replied. Seeing the look of confusion on my face, he said, “They’re not in the traditional pretzel shape because we use them to make sandwiches.”
When we were in Europe recently, one of the things we ate a lot (as often as possible) were pretzels. Soft pretzels made in bakeries are sort of similar to those you can get here in the US, but way better. Anyway, I had to have a couple of pretzels, too.
Here are a few shots of the cute little downtown area in Berryville…
Downtown Berryville looking west, showing the bench where I'd perched to eat my breakfast.Looking east from the bench.The Berryville Gallery, a couple blocks east of the bakery.
My croissant was quite tasty. I’ll definitely have to go back to that place. They offered a nice variety of sandwiches, too.
I didn’t dally too long. Remember, I was trying to beat the heat. (It didn’t work, by the way.)
During the rest of trip, with those fresh-baked pretzels snug in my saddlebag, I pondered what delectable sandwich I could make. AND what I could make to go with them.
The myriad produce stands I passed along the way inspired me.
Here’s what we had for dinner…
Caprese Salad
Shannon introduced me to this tasty treat over a year ago. It’s simply sliced fresh tomatoes, topped with fresh, soft mozzarella cheese, drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar then topped with salt, pepper and basil. YUM.
Corn on the Cob
What summer meal is complete without fresh corn on the cob?
And for the entree, I decided on Crab Melts.
Crab Melts
Essentially, this is the same stuff they use to make the traditional pretzel-shaped crab pretzels. Since these don’t LOOK like pretzels, I’m calling them Crab Melts. It’s just a mix of cream cheese, mayo, Old Bay seasoning and crab meat, all mixed together and spread on a pretzel, bread or, in this case, a roll-shaped pretzel. It’s all topped with shredded cheese. You bake it until the cheese melts and, voila… Crab Melts. (These are also good on English Muffins.)
Double YUM.
Dinner was definitely a success.
Now, if only this darn heat wave would break…
Oh yeah, I should also report how BORED the girls were without me. Don’t they look sad?
A week ago, I was happy to see temperatures in the 80s. It made for great motorcycling weather. Actual sunshine and warm temps were nice for a couple of days.
But it’s April, people. April. And that means it is way, Way, WAY too early in the year to get hot! So enough already.
Although heat does have its perks…
"Searchin' for my lost shaker of salt..."
Like margaritas. What a great way to beat the heat (if I do say so myself)!
But I can’t be beating the heat midday while I am working. I just can’t. It’s against the rules, of course, and would render me pretty ineffective, which can be very bad when working under a tight deadline trying to balance 400 lines of Excel calculations.
Anyway… by Monday, I was tired of the heat. It actually got downright hot. I don’t remember the exact high temperature for the day, but it was close to 90. By Tuesday, it was in the 90s for sure.
Now, the thought of turning on the A/C in April is appalling. Sort of. Mainly because A/C = higher energy bills. But as I lay sweltering in bed on Tuesday night (sort of) struggling to get to sleep, I kept thinking of the little thermometer in my office. The one that said the high temperature on Tuesday IN MY OFFICE was 92. And that’s with the ceiling fan on high and the window wide open.
There’s a frugal gene in Hubby’s bloodline. He really hates turning turning the A/C on too early in the year. I do, too, but I also hate to be hot. Wednesday morning I was all ready to go check into a hotel if Hubby wouldn’t let me turn the A/C on. But when I told him it hit 92 in my office the previous day, he said something to the effect of “quit whining and turn the air conditioner on.” It took me all of about three milliseconds to close all the windows and slide the thermostat switch from OFF to COOL.
Ah… sweet relief. It was so much easier to work that day. And the next day. This morning, however (Friday), I turned the A/C off. It was 49 degrees when I let the dogs out. And today’s high is only supposed to be 60.
Spring is back. Thank. GOD.
Seriously, I hate to be hot. Although it was a great excuse to whip up a blender full of my famous blue margaritas. (Not that I need an excuse, really.)
I imbibed happily on Wednesday afternoon while grilling some chicken for dinner. Is this a great summer image or what?
Grilled Chicken with Baja Citrus Marinade
Yum. My favorite way to eat grilled chicken is very thinly sliced, marinated, cooled, cut into small strips and sprinkled on a fresh garden salad. Double yum.
One of the best improvements Hubby has done here at the MD abode was to run a natural gas line out to the patio for the grill. So we can use it anytime, year-round, without ever having to worry about running out of propane. Whenever we get a hankering for something grilled (or “barbecued” as my Belgian friend would say), we can have it. I’ve cooked out there in all kinds of weather, too. Rain, sleet, snow, ice. Really.
The girls like to hang out with me while I am cooking outside. (They like to hang out with me inside, too, but I always kick them out of my indoor kitchen because then tend to get under foot.)
Meg with the Grill in the Background
Meg is my most faithful “guardian” (i.e., most diligent dog when it comes to waiting for droppage).
Belle Hoping for Droppage, Too
You can’t see K in the above image, but she wasn’t far away. She was waiting on the top step.
K... She's Actually Smiling for Once (she smiles a lot, just not often in pictures)
It doesn’t take long at all to grill chicken that is very thinly sliced. But then I had to let it sit for a while so it could cool thoroughly. There’s nothing worse, to me, than hot meat on a cold salad. Ew.
ToadMama's Famous Blue Margarita (aka Kick-ass Blue Margarita)
The REAL reason I took pictures of the margarita the other day is the strawberry. I’d never thought to garnish my margarita with a strawberry. But that’s probably just because I never had fresh strawberries on hand before while drinking margaritas. It’s pretty, isn’t it?
I just may have started a new trend…
While I am totally not ready for Summer yet, I must say that I’m glad the grill no longer looks like this.
The Grill As It Looked on February 13
Here’s something earworm-inducing to get your Friday started.
Why?
