Blizzard and Son On A Cooking Spree

We are under a Blizzard Weather Report. Son has been on a cooking spree all day. He has made his great grandmother’s crustless custard pie and her Buttermilk Cake and for supper ….chicken-cheese tortillas. YUM.

 

Happy Easter and Happy Passover

No matter what faith you are or how you celebrate this weekend, I pray your day is one of many blessings and filled with love and acceptance. Life is too short to have one filled with hatred, bitterness, judgmental feelings, anger, or any other negative emotions. I pray you fill your day with love and laughter and loved ones. The three L’s.

Happy Easter

image from teleflora.com

Happy Passover

image from mangolanguages.com

I find that in spite of pain or other things, the world is still a wonderful place and my world here with son close to my mountains is a wonderful place to be. If you don’t like your view, change your focus….change your view.

video by miodragmilosevicbl

I hope everyone is having a grand day. We have had a wonderful time just son and I.  Son gave me an Easter basket filled with goodies and I have enjoyed malted milk eggs and jelly beans. Son fixed us a nice breakfast of eggs, bacon and hash browns and juice and coffee. Later today we will eat our Easter meal.

And yes, to answer the emails some of you sent…I did color Easter eggs today. And it was fun. Here is my basket full. Son helped me while I make marks on the eggs with a candle so that it showed up white. Son had to do the dipping as my fine motor skills are not good enough and we would have had dye all over the counter if I had done it.

And son cooked the most fabulous ham. We ate some last nite. But today, we are having the ham, red potatoes and green beans and deviled eggs. I got to make the eggs with son’s help. He did the cutting and scooping and I mixed the egg  yolk part and he spooned in.  Here is the ham he cooked.

And so, I wish you peace, love, joy, happiness, excitement, acceptance, contentment, laughter…..:)

video by waljaard

Thank you Julia

We spend another afternoon making one of Julia’s recipes from Mastering the Art of French Cooking. I will tell more about that in a minute. Before I tell you about our cooking fun, I want to say thank you to Julia. Oh I wish I could have met her and now it is on my bucket list to see the museum where all her stuff is. She was a remarkable, vibrant, strong woman and I admire her greatly.

Learning about Julia, really reading the cookbooks and recipes and following them like Julia intended has taught me something about food. If you want a mediocre dinner that you can rush through and all the flavors are mushed all together, just cook anything. It will be fine and everyone will say it is great. BUT, if you want food that each ingredient is tasted and savored in every bite you take, then use Julia’s recipes.

I have learned so much from reading about her and our attempts to understand what she wanted to convey with her book. It is truly the greatest textbook on French cooking ever. She was a woman of great strength and determination. She persevered in spite of loss, rejection, lack of money..whatever. She has taught me to keep on trying no matter what if I really believe in it and dream of it. She has taught me that life is a sensory experience and should be savored as such. I am a sensory person but Julia only brought that home even more.

So, now I have Mastering the Art of French Cooking and My Life in France.

Cover of My Life in France

The next two books on my dream list are the one  with the letters that Julia and Avis wrote back and forth called AS Always Julia: The letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto and A Covert Affair: Julia Child and Paul Child in the OSS. I am hoping another friend has one of these books stuck on a bookshelf somewhere and sends it to me to read.

    

The more I read about her and her life and her love for Paul, the more intrigued I am. Such joy and determination she had in life in spite of the things she suffered with. She just reinforces my belief in looking for the good and staying focused on the positive and when things are tough…sparkle baby..sparkle.

And now for the cooking. We made basically…a chicken breast recipe with sautéed vegetables and cream wine sauce. Oh my was it beyond the wildest imaginations. We served it over rice.

Son and I have a routine. I am not allowed to chop anything cause my fine motor skills are not the best and son says he is afraid I will chop more than the veggies.  So he chops and cuts, I hand stuff and stir the things in the skillet. I did try tossing the mushrooms…you know that flip that makes them jump forward in the pan, only I am not strong enough to do it. So, anyway…I digress. The most amazing thing to me is what happens when you saute the vegetables. It is like they seal in the flavor so that it does not get all mushed into the dish when you combine every thing. As is normal for us, the cooking was such great time spent together and I know his brother and wife and niece are going to wonder who this French chef is when they come to visit in April.

After the above..basically…we poured beef stock, wine and heavy cream into the vegetables and chicken that was sauteed in the butter and it simmered for about thirty or forty minutes and then put it on rice. Son was eating and he looked up at me and said “OMG, this has to be the best tasting chicken dish I have EVER eaten in my life”.  I laughed and said “yes and YOU cooked it son”

Yes, Julia is teaching us how to cook and even more so, she is teaching us how to feast on life in huge bites. What an amazing woman and to do all the things she did in her lifetime. When I was reading My Life in France, I found myself teary when it came to the part about Paul and when he died. And Julia….in her Julia way was very matter of fact about it. She knows she holds in her heart and head the memories of all those years together and the pain of losing him does not make her wish she had never met him. It seems to solidify why she loved him so. Thank  you Julia….for being you…big, loud and full of life.

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Julia Child, Beef Bourguignon, Cookbooks and GPS Units

Oh, what a day it has been….ranging from the Sunshine Award, to son and I cooking Julia Child’s beef bourguignon to getting a box in the mail with a GPS unit in it. OHHH  what a day.

Son and I decided to try to cook Julia Child’s beef bourguignon. I can tell you now that if that Julie person cooked Julia’s beef bourguignon, she didn’t come in at 8 after work and do it. It took us hours to cook that. It takes 2 1/2 hours to cook after you fix all the other ingredients. Each ingredient, like the mushrooms, you fix before putting them in the pot to go in the oven. We cut up and sautéed the mushrooms prior to going in the pot. We peeled and fixed the pearl onions and browned or glazed them before going in the pot. The meat is browned before going in the pot and the bacon is boiled and then dried and fried in the skilled before going in the pot. It is a lot of deal. But, oh goodness the flavor. Below is son flipping the mushrooms as they are cooking. I always had lots of butter and juice when cooking mushrooms, never realizing there should be none.

We had two skillets going and working in tandem. Son is a good cook. I was really just the hander.

Those little pearl onions are so yum. I sat and pulled the dry skins off them and fixed them for the skilled. Then they were cooked until they started turning brown.

Son worked hard taking care of all the different ingredients. He glazed the vegetables and then used wine to get all that good stuff that sticks in the skillet. When it was all said and done, out came the pot. Our meat was cut smaller than Julia says but it still did good. And oh goodness, the flavor of that grave with the meat and vegetables. It is just to die for.

So, we toasted ourselves. LOL

But the amazing thing was….you all would never guess this in a million years. My book that was given to me …Mastering the Art of French Cooking…came right when we got done cooking. Son and I both were so excited and this is the 1966 edition. He is looking forward to trying more new recipes.

I think if anyone buys this book and expects a plain ole cookbook with pages of recipes, they will be slightly shocked. This is not just a cookbook, it is an encyclopaedia on cooking, a wonderful resource took and has everything you need in one book. It is a phenomenal book.

Oh and lest I forget. We also got another package. I think Sassy got tired of me always calling her asking her to look up the directions to somewhere because we were lost. She sent us a GPS unit. I was so tickled I cried years of joy.

So, to Sassy, I say thank you from my heart. And if I get lost now…who do I blame????  giggling. Oh and Sassy, son has one question. He says how do you make this thing talk with a southern accent so we can understand her?  LOL

Poor Jack was so wore out that he went and got in his bed while son and I were cooking in the kitchen.

And Mr. Wonder Dog, who does not want to wear any coat but his blue one, got mad at me because I took his blue one cape off to wash and put on his old one. See this look he is giving me. This is his “where the hell is my blue coat?”  look. ha

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Julia Child and “My Life In France”

I am so enjoying  My Life In France by Julia Child. I have always enjoyed her enthusiasm in her shows and her positive attitude. But, there is more to Julia than cooking I have learned. I loved watching her on her cook shows and the more I learn…the more I know I would loved to have met her and her husband Paul in person. He was so supportive of all her endeavors and she was of his.

from My Life In France

 image from popmatters.com

I love her open honesty and frankness, even in describing herself as clumsy and loud. I loved how she adored Paul and how he adored her. While many are still sitting there waiting for the perfect, handsome prince charming, Julia found hers and what he lacked in being the perfect, handsome prince charming…he made up for in smarts, love, style and devotion to Julia.

I can remember watching the French Chef with Julia when it was a black and white show. She is such a good cook but even more so, she is so funny.

The French Chef

video by FotoKadr

She was one that quickly recognized her weak areas and strived to improve them. She was a fighter and persevered in spite of obstacles that came up in her life. She never lost sight of her dream, which was to learn how to cook French cooking the best way possible and to publish that book.

She was not pretentious and I loved how she loved doing what many with money call mundane things. She loved walking in the market place, talking to the local people with their food stands. She and Paul loved finding the off the beaten path , homey places to eat rather than the ones that all the tourists ran to. They both walked Paris to learn about it, lived in a modest apartment that was freezing in winter and hot in summer. And yet, they had the time of their lives living in Paris.

After they moved back to the states and Julia’s dream came true and her book Mastering The Art of French Cooking was published, Julia began being on television and used her own kitchen to record in. This kitchen is now on display at the Smithsonian.

Image via Wikipedia

I loved reading about all the places they walked to and visited. Her descriptions just flow on the pages. They lived  Paris instead of visiting Paris. And because of that, they saw places the normal tourists did not. They lived in Paris in the late forties and early fifties. I love their spontaneous way of life and how they adapted to things there. I would love to have visited with both of them and sat in the apartment and tasted some of her cooking. The book is great if anyone wants to read a really good book, to see France in a new way and learn about Julia and Paul Child.

video by SASORI707

Image via Wikipedia

Dreary Rainy Snowy Day

Oh is it dreary outside. It is that wet kind of snow that makes for nasty slush. Fortunately it is not laying a lot of snow on the ground. Just enough to be nasty. So, what to do to make my day brighter.

Well, I am a sensory person, so time to light the little electric pot that I put cinnamon, cloves, oranges and other spices in to make the house smell good. Plus son put on a fab slow cooker of roasted chicken soup with veggies and tomatoes in it. He grilled the chicken first and got that roasted flavor to it.

Ohhhh the house is smelling good. Got on lots of lights to make it bright in here in my corner of the world and wonderful music playing. And son is going to make some of those homemade crescent pecan rolls. Yummy. Now, the inside is smelling and looking cheerful.

I put on my long john comfort shirt and fuzzy socks so the damp feeling is not so strong. And I am laying here looking around at my beautiful glass chimes, butterflies and hot air balloon chimes hanging on my stain glass light. It is all so beautiful.

I could not get the mobiles with the light on…so this is a picture with the light off and below is just the light with it on. I love my stain glass light. It was my one splurge when we were getting stuff to fix up the house and was on sale half price but was still 80 dollars. But, when my pain is high…I use it to focus on to get past the pain.

But see how pretty my light is when it is on.

I am determined to not let such a dreary day outside not make my inside dreary. It is up to me to change the focus of what I am looking at. So, as I lick my lips in anticipation of those luscious pecan crescent rolls and smell the wonderful smells coming from the kitchen, and listen to my music…I am very contented and happy today.

I had a new bird to the feeder today. It has red in it. I noticed it right off when they were all on the ground. Something totally ate all my bird seed last nite, I mean totally emptied the feeders. I wondered if it was one of the deer. Anyway. two pics of my new arrival. Also, my big birds I showed earlier…today I had 6 of them. One was so funny. It would fly close and land on the wire next to one and that one would scoot down. The first bird would fly and land close again and the other bird would slide down. I wondered if this was a mating ritual.

And here it is almost 4PM and my dreary day has been great. I have smelled and tasted good things, listened to great music, watched the birds, son helped me outside to take some cloud pictures, helped son inventory the pantry to make a grocery list, laid here and enjoyed my beautiful stained glass and played with Jack. Can’t complain a bit.

And now some fun pics of Jack. First one, is where he lays when he knows I do not feel good. He is laying up under my hospital bed. LOL

And the next two are his favorite thing to do….looking out the sliding glass door.

and last one is Jack being silly. He walks around with his blanket hanging off his hiney. He cracks me up. Here he is shaking and ears are flying.

Colorado Horses, Homesteads and Homemade Biscuits

Just a few pictures of the horses and the little burro I saw on my ride. They are so pretty. I whistled at these horses below to get their attention as we were on the highway and they came straight to me at the fence line.

I had to laugh later on yesterday, for son cooked homemade biscuits. He has become quite the biscuit maker and I was complimenting him on how good they were. I said… oh you finally found a recipe that works in high altitude. He said…oh it is your recipe Mom. I just used all the right ingredients this time. LOL

He made homemade mashed potatoes, gravy,  peas and Italian sausage. I ate biscuit and mashed potato as the ride got the vertigo going and it sure was good.

On our ride, we came across an old homestead that was way past use but I wondered who had lived there and what happened that their home was not carried on and taken care of. I would loved to have plundered through and looked  around and maybe even brought in a metal detector. I am such a curious person. I would love to know the story behind this remnant of a home.

And we ended the day as we rode the last couple of miles sharing an A&W root beer float. Boy has it been a long time. I remember when I was in school..yeah yeah..back in the dark ages and everyone went to the A&W and sat and talked and just hung out. If you were lucky you got your slot before it filled up and the rest of the cars would circle waiting on someone to pull out. And then home we came. I still wonder if the people who lived in this small homestead were some of the first settlers here in this area. An adventure for another day.

Mini Cinni’s

Son just cooked these. They look so good. This is another dream come true. …to have a house where the kitchen is centrally located and lots of yummy cooking going on. Our next dream is to remodel the kitchen and take out a long closet and make kitchen bigger as it is the center of our house.

MINI CINNI’S

2  eight ounce cans of refrigerated crescent rolls

6 Tablespoons softened butter

1/3 cup brown sugar firmly packed

1/4 cup of pecans…ground or very finely chopped

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

================

GLAZE

2/3 cup powdered sugar

1 tablespoon milk or half and half

1/4 tsp vanilla

1/8 tsp salt

Mix together and drizzle over warm mini cinns

================

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Open the crescent rolls and separate the portions into rectangles. (would be two crescents per rectangle)

Mix all the ingredients into a paste.

Spread on all rectangles

Roll rectangles up into a log like a jelly roll

Put in freezer for ten minutes so it is easier to slice into bite size pieces.

Each log should be cut into six pieces.

Place pieces on greased cookie sheet.

bake 15 to 18 minutes and toast brown

pull out and put on plate and apply glaze if you want.

Makes about 50 mini cinns.

Recipe came from http://www.coloradocountrylife.coop/

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