The odd couple

I told a few people about this recipe before I actually made it and I got some mixed reviews.  When I told my brother I was making cheesy zucchini enchiladas, he told me zucchini goes in pasta or bread, but not in enchiladas....boy was he wrong!  I'll have to admit, I was also slightly skeptical but when you have cheese and enchilada sauce can you really go wrong?   I tweaked the sauce just a little bit, it has chipotles in adobo sauce in it and I thought the smokey flavor was a bit too much.  I just upped the tomato sauce and broth and it was perfect.  The whole recipe was pretty simple and if I could have you try one recipe it would be this!  It had a great texture and taste.  Typically Matt isn't a "non-meat" dinner person, but tonight was quite the different story.  This will for sure be a make again dinner!

 I am still anxiously awaiting some red tomatoes from our front porch garden.  Everything is so big and has tons of flowers but barely any green maters.  Lots of blossoms on the eggplant and we have tons of peppers ready for harvesting.  I also have more basil than I would ever know what to do with, anyone have any suggestions??

 Matt is outside working tonight and might I say it is HUMID outside.  But he is doing some good work and there is some good progress happening.  The piles of wood and brick came out from under the porch....ridiculous.  I am thinking in the next couple of weeks we will be able to get some dirt and have this landscaping almost finished up!

Mmmmm....

I am a big fan of Mexican food, and for some reason some of my favorite things is Chicken tortilla soup.  I don't really like the creamy ones, more of the broth type.  Well when I end up pretty much replicating my favorite soup....you know it was a good night.  Again I found this healthy recipe on www.skinnytaste.com, chicken and avocado soup.  It was insanely flavorful and was still great leftover.  I am a huge fan of avocado to begin with but the avocado in this soup had such a creamy good texture.  

In other news....I GOT MY FIRST RED TOMATOES OUT OF THE GARDEN TONIGHT!!!  I know, I know, you can pretty much get fresh tomatoes anywhere now.  But these came from our garden so that makes them even better.  Matt started making some pickles with the over abundance of cucumbers that we have.  Other than that we haven't been able to harvest anything else from the garden.

We have some house project progression!!  Matt has been working on cleaning out under the porch so he can start laying the cinder blocks to finish our landscaping project.  Tonight, he laid the first seven blocks!!  This might seem little and stupid...but it is a huge step in finally finishing this dang project, it makes me happy!!  Pictures to come soon!!!

New Obsession

Two things to start off with, first I need to talk about something else before my new obsession, and second, please note that this is two days in a row I am blogging...YAY!!  Ok so before the obsession, last week I made homemade pesto and I just had to share.  It was super easy and so delicious.  It was awesome to use some of the overgrown basil in my front yard!!  I just took a large handful of basil threw it in the food processor with some toasted pine nuts, parmesan cheese, garlic and olive oil.  Simply delicious!

Now for the good stuff.  I had a little free time during training at my new job and I found the website "stumble upon."  I might be way behind the times here but I instantly fell in love with the website and I have to admit I stumbled upon probably about a couple hundred sites (I really had alot of free time)  Well I found one hell of a gem and I am happy to indroduce you all to my new food crush, Skinny Taste!!  This website is amazing!  She has a ton of recipes and she also includes all the health information on every recipe.  If you find something you like, you can save it in your recipe box AND you can then create your very own shopping list from there.  I am sure I am losing readers now because you will all go to that one....but I will be cooking her recipes and telling you all about them, so keep reading!!


Last night I made my first recipe, Asian glazed chicken.  Well it is technically called asian glazed drumsticks....but we only had chicken quarters, so that is what we used.  This recipe took not many ingredients, was remotely quick to make (defrosting the chicken took the longest), was healthy and AMAZING.  Holy buckets, if this recipe is any indication of what this website has in store for me then you can count me in!  I served with with some steamed veggies to keep with the healthy theme.....mouth watering....

SUSHI!!

The best surprise EVER, coming home on a Friday night and to find out Matt had gone to the asain market and got a bunch of stuff for SUSHI!  I LOVE LOVE sushi so this was a perfect way to spend a Friday night.  I think I have tagged myself as a professional.  I must say it was a great "couples" activity.  It was just alot of fun.  We started off with making the sushi rice.  Not going to lie, waiting for it to cool was causing me a bit of anxiety because I just wanted to eat it.  Matt bought crab sticks, fresh salmon and tuna, we had avocado and cucumbers on hand so we had a good variety going.  The actual rolling of the sushi took a bit of practice but was fun.  I am not sure if I have said it yet or not...but we have a very small crowded kitchen....you will be able to tell from the pictures.

 We also made some sashami, but the rolls were my favorite.  I liked mixing and mashing the different ingredients.  Man sushi sounds good right now......

 We even had wasabi and the pickled ginger....measuring cups made great dippers for the soy sauce.  Hey when you don't have the space or the utensil, you gotta improvise!!  The best roll of the night was the "all in" roll.  I put every ingredient in it and I ate it all myself...Matt was full, whatever.  I am a bottomless pit for sushi!!

 Stay tuned for some killer recipes from my new food blog crush... www.skinnytaste.com
 

So Much to Say!!

I have never had this much to blog about before.  I am going to have to break this up into multiple posts...this is crazy!!  I will try and stay on top of this from now on.  Alright, well Matt worked over the weekend, so he was off work on Thursday and Friday.  He had dinner planned both nights which was wonderful.  Soooo lets start with Thursday night, salmon burgers.  Yum, this was a great surprise.  They were simple to make and we had almost all of the ingredients on hand.  Since the salmon gets broken up, we just used frozen salmon, which saved us a bunch of money.  Topping for the burger was arugula and tartar sauce, we aren't the biggest fans of tartar sauce but it was delicious.  If you are sick of grilling the the normal hamburgers and brats, I highly recommend this.

On to dessert.  I am going to do a huge teaser here...I am going to tell you all about dessert and show you pictures and tell you how yummy they were, and then not give you a recipe.  Here is the back story of the dessert.  We love The Nadas, and pretty much any time they are around here, we are in attendance.  We have developed a little "Nadas Family" as we like to call it.  Well one of the members, Emma to be precise, has a birthday coming up....and she also LOVES Guinness beer.  Well as I was browsing other food blogs I came across a picture of Guinness brownies with irish cream frosting and I knew they must be made for her.  So that we did, and by we I mean Matt did on his day off.  We make a killer regular brownie, seriously make them, so Matt took that recipe and subtracted this and that and added a bottle of guinness.  The frosting was pretty easy a little butter, cream cheese, irish cream and some powdered sugar.  We just added things until it tasted good.  And I must say they tasted GOOD.  We brought them to the bar to surprise her and she loved them....even the waitress enjoyed them.  

And last but not least, I finally remembered to take pictures of the garden during or "weeding" day.  I am still anxiously awaiting the ripening of all the baby tomatoes.  I mean i literally can't wait.....man I love tomatoes.  So we have a ton of cucumbers and even tonight I made a new huge batch of cucumber salad.  I can't wait to start making some greek salad with my fresh maters!

 Look for more posts this week, I have plenty more yummy food to tell you about!!!

Going Green

Well I don't mean to toot my own horn...but TOOT!!  Holy cow I don't even know how to explain my past two dinners.  Seriously I am in a food coma and I don't regret a single bite!  Last night was a repeat of Garlic Shrimp Casserole, and somehow it was even better than before.  Well actually I made a few tweaks to the recipe.  I made the chicken broth mixture thicker, which helped alot.  I think the thing that helped the most was my accidental purchase of lemon pepper panko instead of regular, best mistake ever!


On to the deliciousness of tonight.  We had quite the little mexican fiesta at the Mangela household.  We had tacos, those are pretty self explanatory, tortilla, cheese, sour cream, salsa and some browned up venison (hey it was free!)  Those were good but not even comparable to the side dishes.  The first was cilantro lime rice, my mouth is literally watering just typing this.  Now I can't take credit for this recipe and neither can food network, this is all from my bff Kate Stone.  Please everyone make this soon, maybe tomorrow.


Cilantro Lime Rice
2 cloves garlic minced
1 cup basmati rice
1 1/2 c chicken broth
2 T lime juice
salt
1/2 c cilantro
zest of one lime


Saute garlic with rice for a few min.  Add chicken broth, lime juice, and salt.  Bring to boil, then cook on low for 15-20 min (per cooking instructions)  When done, stir in cilantro and zest.  ENJOY!!


Ok, so the rice was great, but I have better!  Tomatillo Avocado Salsa, sounds amazing right??  Well think about the best thing you can eat, and then just know that this is even better!  As for a recipe, we make this so often that we just make it so I can only give you estimates of the ingredients.  Ok, so you will need 4 tomatillos, three avocados, a small onion, a bunch of cilantro, lime juice and salt and pepper.  Just chop everything and mix together.  It is better the longer it sits, but lets be honest....I ate it immediately.  

Now I think those of you who are reading this, read it and then dismiss all my hard work on finding these excellent recipes.  So now I would like to challenge you, make at least one recipe so then reading this is worth your while.  My friend Kate made the chocolate pork chops tonight and she told me it "was a win"  I promise to not lead you to a gross recipe....just give it a shot next time you are at a loss for something to make.  


Ok, so other updates, working on landscaping sucks when it is 100+ degrees so that is on a standstill.  The garden is over run by cucumbers, which is actually awesome because now we have cucumber salad constantly.  The tomatoes or starting to sprout up, as well as the weeds!!  That is tomorrow's goal, pick more cucumbers and weed the crud out of the garden.

Summer Treats

So summer has definitely taken over my life.  I have been keeping myself busy with random things as well as not making myself meals.  I am what everyone should call a "slacker," but while slacking I have for sure been enjoying myself with fishing trips, trips to the lake, and hanging out with great friends.  Well with all that out of the way I am  back to blogging.  I am making a new goal to get back into this and do at least two blogs a week!!  Seems like a big goal but I can do it.  So on that note lets get down to business...summer love.  

The garden is INSANE and I of course don't have an updated picture, but it is crazy.  The cucumbers have taken over, which is fine because I love them.  Today Matt and his parents picked seven, count them SEVEN cucumbers.  I am trying to perfect my cucumber salad.  

Tonight I started with my usual, two cucumbers thinly sliced along with an onion thinly sliced.  You then need to put these in a bowl or colander with a tablespoon of salt and let them sit for a bit.  Tonight I was antsy to eat so they didn't sit as long as they should but oh well.  Add a little white wine vinegar and sour cream and you have a great summer treat.  Oh I forgot the best part.....fresh dill.  I honestly think the dill makes the dish, so delicious.  I also just eat these cukes plan with some ranch.  I will have to learn to like them many new ways since I think we will have them until next year.

For dinner I felt the need to use some more garden goods.  Fresh basil is probably one of my favorite things to use.  I have the perfect recipe to use it in as well.  I am not sure exactly where the recipe came from but I am pretty sure it came from my Aunt Theresa.  

 Four ingredients and some pasta and you can make a great pasta and marinara sauce.  It is so simple.  I just took a 1/4 cup on olive oil and sauteed the garlic in it until it became fragrant.  Then I put two cans of diced tomatoes in and let it simmer for about 20 minutes.  Before serving throw in 8-10 chopped basil leaves, add some salt and pepper and throw over pasta.  This is so yummy and I love how quick it is to make.  Quick and simple delicious dinner with fresh ingredients from the garden!!  I think that is the part that makes me the most happy, that I grew some of my own parts of the meal!

Ok on to the amazing house I live in.....ugh.  So lets see in the past three week our newish tv crapped out, my cell phone crapped out, our a/c stopped working (this was by far the most horrible and expensive to replace), the kitchen drain was draining on the floor, the coffee maker stopped working, the sewer was backing up in our basement.....and Matt lost the only set of the truck keys.  I mean honestly, the ac breaking was enough.  I can finally use the phrase and mean it "when it rains it pours!"  One day at the house it was 90 and it felt better outside than it did inside.  Needless to say we spent a few nights at the in-law's (thanks for the hospitality Pat and Janene!)  The next big task was getting the crap out of the basement (literally)  thank goodness for this handy boyfriend I got.  Forty bucks will get you a roto rooter for four hours....and voila, poop be gone!!

Festive Feasts

For the first time in a long time, we had no plans this weekend and it was WONDERFUL.  It also gave me plenty of time to sleep in, drink some summer drinks and make some delicious food!!  Lets start off with the perfect summer drink...

 I am enjoying one of these as i speak, perfect blend of beer and lemonade.  So back to the task at hand, happy 4th of July everyone!!  In celebration of America's birthday (and a day off work) we decided to make some red, white and blue themed meals.  To start off bright and early we made homemade pancakes with blueberries, strawberries and whipped cream.

 We typically keep the dry mix in our cupboard at all times.  Regular pancakes are a weekend staple for us, but the fruit and whipped cream was a special holiday bonus.  I must say this might actually become a staple, I cut the blueberries and strawberries up and put them in the batter and then used more as topping.  They were freaking delicious.  The whipped cream just topped it all off, literally.  You must try these....not just on the holiday, more like tomorrow!!  Well since we slept in we ate late so lunch never happened today.  But dinner, ohhhhh dinner, it was so worth the wait.
So tonight we went with an oldie as the main course, steak with pepper cream sauce.  We actually used just one steak to feed both of us, that way we had more room for sides.  I have heard of the red, white and blue potato salad so that was my goal for tonight.  After sifting though numerous recipes, I found the winner, thanks Bobby Flay!  Grilled Red Potato Salad with bacon blue cheese vinigarette....sounds delicious right??  Well I can tell you positively that it doesn't just sound delicious....it is DELICIOUS!!

 Wow my mouth is still watering talking about the potatoes, but then we have to get to the cucumber salad.  This happened on a whim, we were at the grocery store and I saw cucumbers and I needed to have them.  I knew what kind of salad I wanted but I just had to find the right recipe.....here it is!!  Cucumber salad will be a need for some fresh summer meals.  I am very proud of my festive meals and new recipes.  I will be making all of these again and I urge you all to try them as well!  Happy Birthday America!!!

The joys of the Farmers Market

Ahhh summer, there really couldn't be a better way to start the day then hitting up the Des Moines farmers market.  We might have headed out a little late but we still made our first appearance today.  Our main goal for the morning was to try the pupusas.  Honestly I didn't know what they were before and I can't honestly say what exactly they are now, even after eating one.  It was good, I wouldn't have tried it if it wasn't for my friend that owns the Gooner stand at the market, I have mentioned this before, but seriously go get some gooners from him, you won't regret it.  Anyway, point of the post is that you never know what you are going to find and buy at the market, today it was elk ribeye.  Matt really wanted to find a meat stand and today the elk won out.  So after a quick trip to Fareway we started up on dinner.  Marinated grilled elk with asparagus that was topped with a vinaigrette.  

.I found the marinade for the elk by googling elk ribeye marinades.  And then i found the vinaigrette for the asparagus by checking out foodnetwork.com.  I have never had elk before and I must say I will for sure be having it again sometime.  The combination of the two were delicious, def a great summer meal.  

So on the note of meat, we feel that we are set for the rest of the summer!!  Matt is great at finding the sales on meat.  Although the price has gone up, he still found some great deals.  Today we bought two whole pork loins, I believe it was about 17 pounds total.  And it was about a week ago that Matt bought a 12 pound strip loin.  He likes to cut everything himself and then we vacuum pack everything.  Our freezer is officially full.  

Matt took the cruddy parts of the pork loin and used our handy dandy meat grinder to make some ground pork.  I mean look at the picture of the freezer, it looks amazing to me!!

As far as pictures of house projects or the garden....I got nothin.  I am hoping tomorrow we get a move on some more house projects, and today we visited the garden and most of it is looking fantastic.  The cucumbers and the beans have little flowers on it, which is super exciting.  Look for more updates soon!!

Dinner Party Idea

Ok, I realized I have been an absolute horrible blogger but I am going to try to change that.  My super busy time is now over so I am here to do a couple nights of food in one post.  Side note, my little brother got married this weekend and the wedding was AMAZING!!

Alright, so a few nights before this big day Matt and I whipped up a new DELICIOUS dinner.  It is a recipe that Alton made to use leftover garlic shrimp, but he also gave a recipe for his own garlic shrimp.  His Garlic Shrimp Casserole is pretty simple to make, and remotely quick with not a lot of ingredients.

Please take my advice and make this and LOVE it.  We will be making it again in the very near future.  So now this takes me to tonight's recipe.  I am thinking I need to have a Asian inspired dinner party.  Although this recipe is more of an intermediate recipe, I can promise you that it is well worth the extra effort.  So my dinner party idea is to have these Perfect Potstickers for an appetizer and then make the shrimp casserole for dinner and then i need to come up with some kind of asian desert, but I haven't gotten that far yet.  I will take this idea and make it happen at some point in my life.  Until then I will make both of these yummy recipes over and over again.

I learned how to fold them from the wonderful Gooners that I have mentioned earlier in this blog.  I just made some rice to go with the potstickers, since there isn't a whole lot else to go with this meal.  I scorched the first batch of these puppies but I got the hang of it the second time around.  My mouth is watering just thinking about these!!  Maybe if you are lucky, you can score an invite to my dinner party, although I need a kitchen table first!


Our landscaping project is still coming along nicely, just sort of a long process.  We went and checked on the garden today and it is mostly looking great.  Unfortunately we have a few causalities to mention, no more watermelon, eggplant (super sad about this) and no more onions.  We did add some peppers today, those took a bit longer to grow up from the seeds.  Matt also tried to harvest a radish today.....but no radish was found at the bottom.  Lets hope this isn't a trend.  

A Post for Thanks and Gratitude

Please be prepared for a slightly cheesy posting, and I don't mean cheddar, fontina or any other kind.  This posting is going to be dedicated to the boyfriend.  We have a foreclosed house, as already mentioned, and nothing would get done on this house without him.  Well in the past week we have had alot of progress, although it might not really look like it. 
Let's start with the stump.  When we first moved in to this house we had a big tree in the corner of the yard.   After the move in we had a slew of issues, starting with a leak in a pipe that was between the house and sidewalk, causing us to dig a five foot trench in the front lawn to fix the leak.

This was not an easy task with tree roots everywhere, in fact I would go as far as saying that it sucked.  After that fiasco we found out that the tree roots were growing in our sewer system causing it to back up into the basement. 

This was the result, and the concrete you see is a section of our driveway.  This was the last straw, we had to end the relationship with the tree.

This lead to a stump in the middle of our front yard....and it has been there for about a year and a half.  Which leads me to the present.  Last week Matt had some time off work, and he rented a stump grinder and turned our weedy stump filled portion of a white trash front yard, into the beginning of an actual complete front yard!

 Like I said earlier, it might not seem like alot but it is a huge step for us.  So again Matt, THANKS!
Ok moving on to the next big project.  As you can see in the previous picture, we started landscaping with the blocks last year, again another unfinished project.  In order to finish we need to get some cement blocks set in the back so the dirt won't all fall out.  Well today I can say blocks, cement, mortar, rocks and tools all purchased.  He even started on the project!  I can see progress and a beautiful planter in the near future!!

So today I just want to say THANKS to a wonderful boyfriend for working so hard to make our house a home.  I wouldn't be able to do this without you, literally I can hardly work power tools let alone shovel gravel.  I might not say thanks enough but I am extremely grateful for everything you do!!  I know laundry and dishes don't add up to all the things you accomplish, but it is all I am good at.  Hopefully I can learn so I can help out more.  LOVE YOU!!  (I warned you about the cheesyness)
Unfortunately I have no recipes or garden updates (but the garden is doing AMAZING) but I promise to change that this week!!  

Pasta a la yummy

After a long weekend, I am back!!  Tonight we finally made a new recipe, to be honest I am excited to eat the leftovers tomorrow for lunch.  We made penne with vodka sauce, it was super easy to make and delicious.  Not many ingredients are needed for this at all, I can honestly say that I will be making this recipe again.  

  As far as house projects, they are coming along at a snails pace.  It is really ok because we got a lot done in the garden, that is considered a house project right??  Over the weekend we got our garden spot tilled up, Matt added random things to help the soil (peat moss and gypsum) it is pretty clay like right now.  That was all on Friday night, on Monday we got to planting.  We quickly realized that our large spot would not house all of our plants.  I probably had about 60 tomato plants and I was only allowed to plant 12, such a bummer.  I better get a large yield out of those plants!!  I will probably end up planting some at home....just in case!  We are still tending to some little plants, pretty much all the peppers.  So when they get a bit bigger we will have to figure out where we can plant them.  As long as the coons, squirrels and deer stay out of the garden, we will be saving a bunch of money on produce.  We put up some fence and bought some animal stopper spray, keep your fingers crossed that it works!!

An oldie but a bestie

Tonight we went with an old standby, and probably one of the best things EVER!!  We discovered this recipe quite awhile back and have yet to be sick of it.  It all started with a huge hunk of strip steak Matt got on sale, so we needed something to go along with it.  Steak with pepper cream sauce is the perfect thing!  This sauce is beyond anything you have ever tasted before.  I typically skip the last bite of steak and just slurp up the sauce.  I also add it to whatever side dish we might be having, tonight it was a topping to my baked potato.  Seriously AMAZING!!  It is also pretty dang simple to make, so if you have steak and not sure what to do with it.....make this recipe for sure!  We also got to use a new fun tool in this dish as well, a mortar and pestle.  It is a fun tool and it is a nice and cool decoration for a countertop.

Unfortunately no new housing projects to report, kind of at a stand still.  The garden however is growing away.  The plants are currently still in the flats we planted them in.  They are just about too big for them, and they are started to get eaten by the local squirrels.  We still have to till the area we want to plant the garden....that should probably be a weekend project.  I can't wait for fresh produce!

 

Unda da Sea

Man I love the movie, The Little Mermaid.  I mean really Flounder is pretty hilarious, and Sebastian....how can you not like that guy.  I also like to eat all of these guys.  Yeah I know it sounds vulgar, but I am sure you are all agreeing with me right now.  I can't actually recall any mussels as main character in the movie, or in the movie at all, but that is what we ate tonight. 

Matt got them fresh from Waterfront after work.  We have had them only once before about a year and a half ago, I believe it was a creamy pasta type meal.  I recall it was delicious.  Tonight it was definitely good, more of a shell broth type meal.  We pretty much just cracked open the shell and used it like a little spoon and slurped it down.  This may not be the meal for everyone, and i totally understand that.  But if it sounds like something that might interest you, try it out,  The recipe is called Mojo Moulies,  don't worry they are not super fishy tasting.  They also pair very well with a nice glass of white wine!

On another note, Matt worked his butt off today while I was at work and I am soooo grateful for it!  He finished framing out the chimney that he tore down a few days ago.  Literally when he was tearing it apart he found pieces that said "Warning Combustible"  This was INSIDE our chimney.  The people that lived here before were idiots.  The picture I can provide won't look that great to you, it is covered by a tarp since it is supposed to rain and there is just a giant hole in the roof, but to me it is beautiful!!

And my last update of the night is the garden.

It is beautiful isn't it!!  This weekend we will try to start working on where the actual garden will be located.  It will be alot of work, but I believe all the soon to be veggies are worth it!!

 

An ode to fromage

Ohhhh cheese, how I love you.  Tonight we had Cheese Soup and it was soooo delicious.  So this recipe is a bit time consuming for a weeknight dinner, but it was worth it.  It is also a tad spendy, not the whole thing just the cheese.  It calls for Fontina cheese and believe me when I say it is worth it to be spendy on the cheese.  This isn't the first time we have made this recipe, but this was the first time we used Fontina.  Before when we made it we used something we probably had around the house or was on sale, I remember my teeth felt filmy when I was done and it left a layer on the spoon and bowl.  The Fontina makes it super creamy and non filmy.  It is pretty neat to see what this soup starts as...

Sometimes new recipes call for new hardware.  In this case we decided that an immersion blender was necessary, we tried pouring the soup into the blender once and it was tough and HOT.  So the immersion blender takes care of those problems.

And the then the soup turns into this...

I know it doesn't look like much, but you will have to trust me.  It is amazing!!

As far as the house project....Matt has been busy with non house things.  He has the next two days off, so I am hoping to see some major progress!!  I probably won't get my hopes too high....I tend to get let down...lets hope he doesn't read this :)

On another note, almost all of the little seedlings have sprouted.  That means we will probably need to get the actual garden started sometime soon!!  Can't wait to keep the updates coming!

El Cheapo

Typically I feel like when you are trying to pinch pennies you end up with a mish mosh of ingredients to make up a so so dinner.  Tonight was a complete different story.  Matt loves to buy a large amount of meat when it is on a good sale and freeze it in the food saver bags, so we had some thawed out pork chops in the fridge.  He found a food network recipe for the pork chops and it seemed like we had all the ingredients....holy cow I am glad he found it.  I feel a bit like I am cheating on Alton because it was a Paula Deen recipe, but dang that woman can do a mean pork chop!  So this sounds weird and honestly a little nasty but the recipe is called Chocolate Spiced Pork Chops and I urge each and every one of you to try it out.  Basically it is just a bunch of spices, that you probably have in your spice cabinet, on a pork chop, but the combination of the sweet and savory is perfect!  We combined it with yet another baked potato.  So in all honesty, out of all the recipes on this blog, this is probably my favorite and the easiest.  Mix spices, rub on meat, sear on both sides and throw in oven....POOF, amazing meal!!

Productivity!!

Ah how I love Sundays, especially productive Sundays!  Today meals were cooked and the house was worked on, overall super exciting for me.  After a breakfast of bacon and eggs we got to work.  Me on "housewife" duties and Matt on the chimney.  After some surveying from the roof, he realized that the current chimney was worthless so he knocked it down.  He will now be rebuilding a much more sturdy one, of course something else to add to the checklist.  At least when we are working on these project we do them right and not half assed.  I feel safe knowing that right now the opening in the roof where the former chimney resided, is now covered with a trash bag duct tape and staples....lets pray for no rain!!  I was standing where the fireplace will someday be looking up at Matt working....interesting shot I must say!

 The meal tonight, I must say, was pretty dang good and for sure a make again meal.  We have been addicted to making baked potatoes, of course using an Alton recipe.  Salty crispy skinned potatoe with some sour cream and cheese....I mean come on, you can't beat that.  The main dish of dinner tonight was chicken kiev.  In all honesty, I probably would have never heard of chicken kiev if it wasn't for my bff, she loves them.  They were a little time consuming to make, they have to sit in the fridge for two hours to overnight, so it is more of a weekend dinner.  But I really think the end result is worth it, delicious.  Basically it is pounded out chicken rolled around an herbed butter, then breaded and fried.  When you cut into it the buttery mixture just oozes out.  It is for sure a meal to try, something new and different that you have probably never had before.  I think I forgot to mention that the baked potatoes were MASSIVE tonight!!

Now for the garden update....WE HAVE SEEDLINGS!!!  I am so insanely excited about this.  Gardens and fresh veggies make me really excited.  We currently have radish and kohlrabi seedlings.  We weren't sure we were even going to get anything to grow since these seeds were from last year.  Pretty soon we are going to have plants ready to plant, and no where to put them.  We should probably get the actual garden ready at some point!

Gettin Down and Dirty

After a weekend away and a Monday night meal at Legends, we are back in business.  I would say that overall, tonight was spent overachieving at life!  Most of it can be contributed to a boyfriend who was home sick today and got a TON accomplished.  When I got home tonight Matt already had a pineapple upside down cake in the oven and dinner was about half done.  Dinner first started off with our Gooners as appetizers.  If you haven't been to the downtown farmers market and at Gooners....well you are missing out.  My coworker makes them and they are AMAZING.  Tonight we had some of his leftover sausage Gooners.  I must take credit for this recipe because I gave it to him!  Basically you have sausage, cream cheese and rotel in a wonton wrapper...makes my mouth water.  This is just one of many flavors....seriously try them!!

 Next course was finally an Alton recipe as promised.  We had turkey piccata and it was delicious.  I am a big fan of turkey, white wine and lemon juice so there isn't much make me dislike this recipe.  The only thing I added to my dish was capers....but honestly I could eat them with anything.  I just thought it would give it an added flavor, I was right!

For dessert we tried the pineapple upside down cake.  I was pretty pumped to dive into this treat, but wasn't so stoked about it after the first bite.  Not going to lie, it wasn't really what I expected.  It was more like pineapple cornbread.  I am sure we will tough through and eat most of it....but totally not something we will be making again.

We even sorta kinda accomplished a house project.  We both have always talked about wanting to have a big garden but we don't have the yard to have one.  Last year we attempted to plant a ton of seeds and they ended up dying after a major family issue....so this year we are trying again.  This garden has 300 seeds planted as of tonight.  If we can keep them alive this year we will save some major dollars!!  Here is our beginning stages!!

I will for sure be keeping updates on the garden, it makes me super excited!!