Feb 18, 2014 | Food |
So I’m a little late in posting this but it was Valentine’s Day! And I may have had a glass or two of wine…….
Regardless – here it is now! The second installment of SOUP-er Fridays! This week we made Creamy Tomato Soup. It was good, I ate it with grilled cheese (duh!) The soup was a little thicker than I like of my tomato soups – almost like eating pasta sauce! For the leftovers, The Other recommended I add more cream and that helped out a bit to make it more soupy and palatable.
And special thanks to Jackie for my Christmas gift of a PlatyPreserve!!! It can hold a full bottle of wine (although this time it only had to hold half). No messing with corks and its doing an awesome job of keeping the slight carbonation in my delicious Moscato.
Feb 8, 2014 | Food |
I found this magazine last time I went to Mariano’s. I really love soup so I picked it up and went home to mark which ones I would like to try. Upon handing the magazine to “The Other” so he could begin preparing me my food he asked if it wouldn’t have been easier just to mark the soups I DIDN’T want to try. Perhaps – but that isn’t my style!
After further discussion in which I told him that every Friday we would cook a soup from the magazine and he rolled his eyes I picked the first soup – Beef Barley Soup. Probably my all time favorite soup.
I had a lot of fun shopping for the ingredients for this soup and couldn’t wait to try it. It was going to be a long soup – especially since we opted to make the stock from scratch rather than buy it in a box/can
The first step was to soften the onions and brown the bones and beef for the stock. It was a long process – especially the bones.
After that you added some more ingredients (red wine, bay leaf, etc) and let the stock simmer for 2 hours!
Once the stock was done, you strained out the onions, beef and bones, keeping the beef aside to add to the soup later. Ideally we would have let the stock cool (at least overnight if not longer) so we could de-fat it. However this was dinner and I was way to excite to care about a little extra fat or a slightly foggy broth.
The other ingredients for the soup were barley (obviously), mushrooms, carrots, onions, diced tomatoes, thyme, and the beef!
The beef was delicious after being slow cooked for 2 hours. Even with little to no seasoning it was fantastic! I can tell you I ate more than a little while prepping the other ingredients. Brutus like it as well.
Once the ingredients went it, it was another hour of simmering until the soup was ready. Luckily I filled up on all that beef during prep 🙂
The final product was delicious. My only complaint was that the beef to vegetable ratio was off (we had added all the beef since we didn’t have another use for it, but you were only supposed to add 2 cups). I know its a silly complaint – too much beef? how can that be? But here we are. I think in the future I am going to serve it over some egg noodles or mashed potatoes. Carbs will help – carbs always help!
Brutus on the other hand had no complaints except that he didn’t get enough beef. Here is him in a sleepy stupor
Feb 2, 2014 | kittens |
Winzig was diagnosed with pancreatitis a few months back and due to his vomiting and general not feeling well he wasn’t eating as much as he should. Winzig has always been a picky eater, only eating a few pieces of kibble at a time and eating no treats but the original Party Mix. To make up the deficit in his calories, we started tube feeding him.
At first he struggled a bit but being the good kitty he is, eventually he gave up and let us tube him 1 can of A/D a day. This was made much easier thanks to a “how-to” video sent by my Aunt (thanks again Aunt Pam!)
Now he comes and finds us when he is hungry and meows until we tube him. I was a bit concerned about this so I called the vet and told her that I didn’t think he was eating on his own anymore. She said as long as he is alerting us he is hungry and we are tubing him its ok. So 3 times a day, we push 60 cc of food down his throat.
On top of that Pothole is not eating as much as she should – we think still some side effects from her vestibular disease – so the vet has approved tubing her as well. She is much more fighty and is definitely eating on her own so the most we do her is 2 times a day. And its messy.
With all the cats being tube fed, Brutus – who loves to eat – thought that maybe if he sat nice on the feeding towel he could get a tube or two as well.
Nov 9, 2012 | Current Events |
Last night I attended Fashion Forward at Northbrook Court. It consisted of a silent auction, live auction and fashion show – plus lots of edible goodies and drinks. All the proceeds went to various charities.
It was a lot of fun. The fashion show wasn’t crazy like Fashion Week but showed actual outfits you could wear from stores in the mall. For the live auction volunteers from the charities would walk the runway wearing outfits from a specific store in the mall and you would bid on a gift certificate to that store. The gift certificates were all in the $350 – $400 range. I bid on Tommy Bahama and White House/Black Market but lost both to higher bidders.
I also bid on a silent auction from Burberry which was a scarf and a $200 gift certificate. I lost that as well but my cousin bid on a Sephora silent auction with a bunch of products from their store and won!
There was also small bites from Whole Foods. I tried some of the Hors d’vours and they were ok but for dessert they had an assortment of mini-tarlets which were totally delicious. I liked the Key Lime Pie one the best. Whole Foods does such a good job with their tartlets I recommend you try them if you haven’t already. There was also coffee and tea from Corner Bakery as well as an open bar.
By far the best thing at the bar was the signature drink called “Glittering in Gold” It was a mix of Goldschlager and Apple Cider mixed together than topped off with Champagne. It tasted like cinnamon apple sauce and was absolutely amazing! I intend on serving these during Thanksgiving – they were that good.
All in all it was a fun night and if they have a similar event next year I will definitely go back.
Nov 4, 2012 | Hobbies |
Yesterday I decided to have a little retail therapy and ended up with these bad boys
That’s right, I own shoes with kitty faces on them! They may be ridiculous but they make me smile every time I see them so I think they do their job.
I also want to give a big shout out to Lime Mayo – I discovered this in a mexican supermarket a while back and bought it as a joke. Surprisingly its one of the most awesome condiments ever! If you haven’t tried it yet I highly recommend it.
You have to get this brand though. I recently tried the Kraft version (“touch of lime”) and it wasn’t nearly as tasty as this one. Trust me, you’ll love it!
Oct 28, 2012 | Current Events, Holidays |
It’s that time of year again….
Sep 5, 2011 | Hobbies, Travels |
Summer Event Season was eventful this year (pun intended). We attended the Lake County Fair (not as good as last year), Gurnee Greek Fest (great!), Niles Greek Fest (just ok), Wisconsin State Fair (excellent!!), Cuban Fest (great experience, probably wouldn’t go back), Holland Farmer’s Market, Buffalo Grove Farmer’s Market, Gurnee Farmer’s Market, and of course the Grayslake Farmer’s Market. Overall the season was a good one, there are some events I won’t be repeating and some I can’t wait for!!
As the weather gets cooler and the days get shorter it’s time for the summer fests to end and the fall fests to start. I am looking forward to a variety of corn mazes and apple cidar. I think maybe this year I would like to go pumpkin picking and maybe make something from it (pumpkin pie? soup? I’ll leave those decisions up to the chef…). I am also thinking of attending Trail of History this year; I haven’t been in 3-4 years but I am sure its pretty much like I remember it 🙂
But anyway, I am jumping ahead of myself – there is still a solid month of various summer festivals and farmer’s markets left for 2011 so while I count down the days until the next Grayslake Farmer’s Market, have a look at these photos from my time at the Wisconsin State Fair. (Click on the link if you would like to see the whole album)
Dep Fried Butter - just as gross as you imagine
Deep Fried Peanut Butter and Jelly on a Stick - I could have done without the stick but the sandwich was delicious!!
A picture of Harry Potter created out of Jelly Bellys - there was a whole gallery of tdifferent art pieces created out of Jelly Bellys at the fair (they where displayed at the Jelly Belly booth.
Drinking delicious Sprecher Rootbeer from their booth at the fair (official root beer of the fair!) K turns to me and says "If I had an army, those are the flags they would carry into battle". Almost made me spit my rootbeer across the table!!
Sheep Judging - didn't realize this was so complex!
Draft Horse Competition (at least I think that's what this is called)
Chicks - aren't they just adorable?!
Sep 3, 2011 | General Chit-Chat, Travels |
I have been very busy with work lately so I haven’t really wanted to come home and spend more time on the computer. Thus my blog has been slacking. However this weekend I plan on relaxing and catching up on things I have been missing – including this site! Hopefully I will get several posts up this weekend, but if not, just know I havn’t forgotten about you!!
In the mean time, enjoy these photos from Cuban Fest in Chicago. A delicious time was had by all!
The main stage
Authentic corn in a cup - with mayo and sprinkle cheese!!!
Apr 3, 2011 | General Chit-Chat, Holidays, Philsophy |
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Chicks, Ducks, and Bunnies
One look makes my mouth pucker
My face is sweating
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Some like the blue ones
Others like purple the best
No one likes the pink
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Don’t inhale, just chew
The dust will get in your lungs
WHAT DID I JUST SAY?!?
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Until I get sores
I will keep eating Chicks
Ducks and Bunnies too
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Sugar high today
Eating candy makes me laugh
The ducks talk to me
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Oct 31, 2010 | Bright Ideas, Current Events, General Chit-Chat |
When we first got our apartment I had big dreams of being the friendly apartment who handed out candy to all the kids. Sadly, no one trick-or-treated in our apartment complex so we had to eat the candy ourselves. (We actually ended up returning a lot of it too)
So when we bought our house I was super excited to actually have trick-or-treaters!! I always loved going out as a kid, then sorting and counting my haul later. (I never really ate the candy as a kid, just sorted and counted…)
K also had fond memories of trick-or-treating when he was a kid. He was in a more rural area so he especially remembered the houses that would give out full size candy bars. So we decided that’s what we wanted to do.
The first year we gave out full sized bars it was a huge hit. Kids were all very excited, some to the point of changing costumes and coming back a second time. (Yes these were the teenagers). The next year we did it again and we were already developing our reputation. We’d hand out the bars and the kids would tell their friends “see I told you!”. Excellent!! The third year K actually had to run out halfway to buy more since we were such a popular house!
So the fourth year we decided to up the ante to KING SIZED bars. I’ve never heard such squeals of delight from both boys and girls. We even got a few parents who came up to the house to get in on the action. So here we are, year #5 and the king sized bars are back! There is no greater joy then watching a kid walk away from your house screaming “Look Dad its KING-SIZED!”
Now a lot of planning goes into pulling something like this off. We want to avoid having to go out halfway to buy more candy, we want to make sure we get stuff the kids actually like, and we need to keep track of what we are pilfering from the fund. So last year we started keeping a log of what we bought, the weather, times of trick-or-treating, what we took, etc.
2009 –
Weather: Clear but coldish. Forcast from www.weather.com
Trick-or-Treat was from 1pm-4pm, kids came to about 5pm
12:05 PM Cloudy 43°F
From W 12mph
1:05 PM Cloudy 42°F
From W 9mph
2:05 PM Cloudy 43°F
From W 9mph
3:05 PM Cloudy 44°F
From W 10mph
4:05 PM Cloudy 45°F
From WNW 6mph
5:05 PM Cloudy 44°F
From W 12mph
We had 4 boxes of king-sized bars (kit kat, snickers, twix, reeses peanut butter cups) and used them all.
Each box was 24 ct
2 peanut butter cups went into the “j-fund”, 1 kit kat bar went into the “k-fund”
We also had 1 box of regular sized caramello bars (36 count) and used 29.
Twix and Reeses Cups were most popular, followed by Kit-Kat.
Twix was probably the more popular of the two, but they were very close.
Snickers were the least popular of the king-sized bars with many kids asking to trade them in for other types. Only 1 kid asked for snickers by name
Kids weren’t given a choice on the caramellos (they were saved until we ran out of other candy) but upon eating the leftovers decided they weren’t very good. (low quality chocolate)
For 2010 trick-or treating is from 2pm-6pm (+1 hour from last year), its on a sunday and the weather is forecast to be high of 50, low of 45 – a bit warmer then last year. So I’m expecting more kids. We ditched the snickers and caramellos this year and went with Butterfingers (what can I say I love them) and peanut butter m&ms. We also doubled up on Reeses and Twix. We purchased an additional 2 boxes of king sized bars. This gives us 6 king sized boxes and 1 regular sized box. I’ll let you know how it goes. 🙂
« Reply #1 on: October 31, 2010, 01:54:13 PM »
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So far its going well – Reeses have an early lead as the favorite, but Kit kat and Twix are also doing well.
Some of the kids are asking to trade their candy for others which is fine. I let them do that.
Several have already run away from the house screaming about the king-sized bars – so yay!
right now the temp is 48 degrees but it feels like 52 according to accuweather.com
Kids have been relatively steady since 2pm.
Will try to update again later!
« Reply #2 on: October 31, 2010, 03:01:37 PM »
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OK its 3:56, and accuweather says its still 49 degrees, but the sun is shining into my house so it feels more like 80.
By 3pm we were onto the second box of Twix and Reese’s. By 3:30 we were out of Butterfingers (esentially…there is 1 left but I am not giving it up until I have to!) by 3:45 we were out of Kit Kat.
I’m getting a little nervous now, however the flood of kids seems to have died down a little so that is good.
One kids tried to get double treats…gotta watch out for those sneaky ones – greedy little bastard! Another one told me a story about her sister who needed some treats. I asked how I could know she had a sister and her friends backed her up so I gave her one. I had to make some pre-teen boys explain their costumes cause they were everyday clothes….apparently they were characters from video games. Weak but I let it slide.
Interestingly several kids have asked for Hershey’s by name…will have to consider that for next year.
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