Week Six

(reading the bee book with Auntie Kendra)

I confess, I have been trying to type my blog this week and it just hasn't worked because I have felt so awful. The thought of typing about food just makes my stomach turn. Additionally, the food we have been eating is not very interesting because, well, as I mentioned, I haven't been feeling well. But, this week I have some ideas for some meals I think I can eat that will also be interesting to the palate. Tune in next Sunday for some recipes to try!

         

(We are coming up with creative ways to hold Charlotte in the pool to maximize her mobility)

Week Five

Monday-Left over spaghetti and meatballs. I generally enjoy them left over even more than I did when we had them the first time. Again I was not disappointed. Charlotte also enjoyed them, as did Sam who did clean up on the carpet. Yum for everyone.

Tuesday-Lucas and I had an extraordinarily delicious dinner. We had marinated round steak, baked potatoes, yummy artisan cheesy garlic bread, and my favorite...asparagus. I love when we can find asparagus at a reasonable price-it is such a fabulous vegetable. We are planning to attempt growing asparagus this year in one of our garden boxes. I am very hopeful that it will be fruitful.

Wednesday-mmmm tortilini soup. My mom makes this very nice soup with a simple chicken broth and vegetables. Then it has these perfectly plump cheese filled tortilinis. We like to spice the broth up a little by adding red pepper and red pepper flakes. We had some left over bread from Monday night that went perfectly with the soup and it was delish. We are having some cold, wet weather on our mountain so that soup was just the ticket.

Thursday-Scavengers we are. Lots of left overs to work on...we made good progress!

Friday-We went to Pastinis before the gymnastics meet. I had chicken marsala and what I loved about it was the artichoke hearts. They have such a nice, salty flavor to them. It is a reminder to me to add them to my cooking more often.

Saturday-In our preparations for meat fare (see Sunday's post) we grilled some steaks (twice this week!). Kendra's parents generously left some meat with us when they were here a couple weeks ago, so we have been working on that. They were very good, BUT the absolute highlight was the grilled asparagus with garlic and parsley. It was so tasty. The garlic pieces crisped up with the oil and seasonings to make these perfect little chips to eat with the asparagus spear. Plus, they only cooked for about 7 minutes in the oven before they were done. I absolutely recommend them. An additional meal highlight for the day was our breakfast. We shared waffles, bacon, and plum sauce with Mom and Les, who spent the night after the OSU meet. We all enjoyed the waffles, which is 100% due to the recipe we use: waffles.  If you are going to eat waffles, eat these ones!

Sunday-WARNING NON-MEAT-EATERS, this post is very meaty! Today is meat fare, which means today was the last day for meat before lent (as the childbearing, breast feeding one in the house, this doesn't apply to me). So for dinner we ate...meat. It turned out to be a hysterical combination of dishes. I made brocoli (we had to have something green) and cole slaw (something crunchy) and I also made cheesy rice with jalapenos (very spicy)...all of this accompanied the grilled steak, hot links, and pork loin (wow) and...get this...a pepperoni pizza (Sally's request). It was great, and delicious. A little of everything please. And then, we ended with root beer floats. I am very full!

Week Four

Sunday-For Sunday dinner we had some of our favorite guests this week, Patti Jo and John Meshnik (Kendra's parents). We had a wonderful time and ate well too. We started with marinated flank steak, later cooked over coals, cheesy potatoes, and broccoli. I also made an apple pie; using some of the apples we still have from the fall-I can't believe they have lasted so long. However, my favorite was the potatoes. I made a three cheese sauce of smoked gouda, gorgonzola, and sharp shedder and poured it generously over thinly sliced potatoes and baked it. Also in the sauce i added cayenne, nutmeg, and garlic powder...yum!

Monday-Dinner out. I met Jenna and Tonya in Corvallis for dinner. They picked McGraths so I met them there. I admit it is not my favorite pick in Corvallis but it is always nice to see them. I had a "Maui Chicken" with the basic potato and salad side. The highlight for me was the grilled pineapple on the chicken, I liked that.

Tuesday-Stir-fry vegetables, delicious marinaded chicken, and peanut sauce. Amazing peanut sauce. We love this recipe from one of our favorite cookbooks; Rebar. If you want a cookbook in your house I HIGHLY recommend this one. Each recipe is delicious in it's own interesting way. A note on marinating meat, I recently read in my Cooks Illustrated magazine that marinades can only really be absorbed into the outermost layers of the meat-no matter how long you soak it. Which meant meats that sat for an hour were equally as flavorful as those over night.

Wednesday-On this fast free week we indulged in pulled pork for Wednesday evening. As a complete NON-fan of packaged food I have to strongly advocate for Costco's pulled pork that you quickly cook up for sandwiches and what not. I prefer the pork alone with sauce and coleslaw, but some (who shall remain nameless) like to slop it all on a toasted kaizer bun. The pork is very juicy and full of flavor. Charlotte also enjoyed the pork and coleslaw, no surprise.

Thursday-The plan for tonight's dinner was a thought up concoction to use up some cooked white beans, chicken with broth, and spinach and create a soup. But, sadly things did not go according to plan. So, we fell back on a new favorite-medi wraps. I quickly marinated some pork in lemon and spices, made rice pilaf (from scratch-yey!) and threw together our broad collection of hummus, feta, lettuce, tomato, seeds, sour cream, balsamic...and what do you have? yum! Plus, i am pretty sure it is charlotte's new favorite too. There was rice and hummus EVERYWHERE...including in her ears, which I noticed at bath time. Impressive.

Friday-Burritos for 9...we had a sleepover in Charlottesville...5 ten year olds running around giggling. We believed it best to burrito them up, so that's what we did. A classic beans, corn and all the fixin's kind of burritos that seemed to be a hit for all (although not nearly as much as the rice pancakes Saturday morning that were awesome...those were a HUGE hit!)

Saturday-It is my new philosophy that vintners must need good, hearty food. We worked all afternoon planting 110 grapevines and we needed some serious food. I made spaghetti and meatballs. I use my mom's recipe, which is perfect, and we chowed down. It was exactly what we needed after digging, shoveling, packing, crawling, and hauling up and down our grape slope.

Sunday-Ranch meeting. Once a month we meet as a ranch to discuss farm business. Joan skypes in from PA and we do our best to eat, take care of charlotte, cover enormous business and stay on task while also passing the computer around so Joan can enjoy all of the angles. Tonight, sally cooked some various beef forms in the crock pot and baked some yummy, cheesy potatoes. We also enjoyed a fancy brie that I made that is always a well liked treat. I take a brie and cover it in brown sugar, craisens, and pecans and cook it in the oven. It is a lovely dish that seems so fancy! We had a good meeting, with the biggest highlights being planning our garden starts for the summer and the decision to get some more chickens! Excellent!

Week Three

To those of you actually check the blog I am very sorry for the absence for last week. It was a crazy week and didn't allow for such writing. However, I must share my favorite meal of the week, what will certainly be a new staple on our menu.


Friday-Mediterranian wraps. Making good use of yummy food in the fridge we put together what we are coining Mediterranean wraps. Spinach, feta, hummus, sour cream (we only had vanilla yogurt), tomatoes, chicken, and sunflower seeds (okay not very greek, i admit.) It was soooo good!!!

Look for this weeks deliciousness on Sunday!