I am splitting my time today between work and spot watering the trees and shrubs (and, ok, a little blogging, too). As I was watering the herb garden, I noticed the big furry sage leaves.
I decided to snap a few pictures, and decided to see if B&W would make the texture pop, and it did.
We’ll have to stuff a chicken with some of these leaves soon.
The other night I had a hankering for chicken satay, so I looked up a recipe for the marinade and several hours later we had a tasty dinner. We ate them so fast that I forgot to take a photo.
So, I made them again tonight (making sure got get a photo this time) and they were even better. The peanut sauce is a *must have* to dip them in. You can make your own peanut sauce, or buy some… we had some on hand, so we didn’t have to make it this time. We have a little hibachi charcoal grill out back which is just perfect for cooking these.
Here’s the recipe, in case you want to try it as well:
Chicken Satay
Serves 2. Marinate 4-24 hours. Grill 5-6 minutes. Medium heat on grill.
1 lb. chicken breast tenderloins, or breasts that are boned, skinned & sliced into long strips
Peanut oil
Place chicken pieces in dish. Combine marinade ingredients and rub into meat. Cover and refrigerate 4 to 24 hours. If your skewers are combustible, don’t forget to soak them in water ahead of time! Thread meat onto skewers. Brush meat with peanut oil just before cooking. Grill 2-3 minutes on each side. Serve immediately with peanut sauce.
We stopped by our local pub, BB Rovers, to grab dinner and a beer or two this evening. This is a shot of their ceiling ducks above our table.
I’ve been very busy at work, working round the clock for the last 5 days or so on determining root cause of a critical outage at a client location that happened last week. I haven’t been able to come out to play, and was missing in action at the lake again this weekend.
Yesterday afternoon the doorbell rang and the nice man at the door was delivering warm cookies with cold milk! While I certainly didn’t need the calories, the thoughfulness certainly lifted my spirits. Thanks to Sue for providing the lift. 🙂
Hope to wrap this up soon.
P.S. a shout out to Tiff’s Treat’s … yummy!
Our garden is taking a beating in this heat and drought. Monte has already pulled up the tomato plants. They stop putting out flowers. But we did harvest some pretty red tomatoes off of them this year. The basil is getting tired, too. It dries up during the day, and in the evening it gets watered and pops back to life.
Our sprinkler system is shot, so we have been doing the manual watering thing this spring and summer – lots of hose schlepping. We know we will be out of town for a few days this summer. So instead of just letting the plants die, Monte is trying to use up as much as we can. We’ll plant more when we will be here to water them well.
So, tonight Monte cut some of the nicer sprigs, put them in bottles of water and walked them around the neighborhood to give to several of our neighbors. Hopefully they will use and enjoy it. For the rest, a marathon pesto session is in order. You can freeze it, if you hold off putting the cheese in. Maybe put some in an ice cube tray or two for future use in small amounts.
Tonight was a good night. We celebrated Laura’s birthday by going out for a girlfriends dinner @ Uchiko. The food was fantastic. Edamame, sushi, sashimi, boquerones, vino … everything was delicious.
I’ll leave you with this: “A True Friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words.”
Peace out 🙂
I had a doctor’s appointment this afternoon which took me downtown. Since I was in the neighborhood, I just had to stop by the Sno-Beach snocone stand. If you’ve never had one, you must. It will change your life. If you don’t live in Austin, fly or drive down here as soon as you can and get one. They make the absolutely, hands-down, indubitably BEST snocones on the planet. If any of you are skeptical, I’d even put money on it. And I NEVER make a bet unless I’m sure I’m right (even when i’m wrong) 😀
Even though there were about 30 people in front of me when I got there, and when I left I was in the middle of rush hour traffic on Mopac, it was worth it.
I’d like to work on ways to transform my blog into something more interesting for other people to follow. Up til now I’ve mostly been doing this for my own enjoyment. The Daily Post is hosting a Post-a-Day-2011 and Post-a-Week-2011 challenge, an online community really, for bloggers to share their posts and inspire eachother. It started at the beginning of the year, but I’m joining mid-way (or in work-speak, at the end of 2Q 🙂 ). I recently completed my own 365-project (a year of posting one photo taken of a moment from each day) but I have been and will continue to post here. So, in search of inspiration, today I signed up for the once a week version, check it out:
Oh, wait, one more thing! Here is a link to a video that my friend Teri took of us on Cupholder last weekend as we were all headed up to Cypress Creek Cove for the raftup. (we’re the little boat in the distance that Teri and Jim are catching up with quickly). It was WINDY… and we had 2 reefs in, so only a tiny bit of sail up, but we were MOVIN’! It’s good to be back…
The sun comes through the kitchen window as it rises and shines a bright beam of light across the room.
I looked down at my coffee cup before taking the first sip and saw this crescent moon.
The swirls of milk immediately make me think of the “..clouds in my coffee…” lyric from Carly Simon’s You’re So Vain (give it a listen here).
and, oh, yeah… TGIF!!!
My oh my, it’s June already!!
A couple weeks ago, my friend, Teresa, told me that she was making homemade vanilla extract. I was intrigued! And I want to make some, too. It’s going to take about 2 months – so, this is not an instant gratification project.
Here’s the recipe I’m using:
Homemade Vanilla Extract
Cut each bean lengthwise, splitting them in half, leaving an inch at the end connected.
Put vanilla beans in a glass jar or bottle with a tight fitting lid. Make sure the beans are completely covered by the vodka.
Give the bottle a good shake every once in a while. Store in a dark, cool place for 2 months or longer.
The resulting extract should lasts for years. Shake before using.
Update (18 months later!): This batch turned out great. I kept it in the pantry, which is out of direct sunlight, and after about 3-4 months it turned pretty dark. I have been using it ever since. I keep the bottle topped off with vodka after every couple of uses. I just added a new vanilla bean or two as well. That way it’s become a bottomless source of vanilla extract!
Happy Memorial Day!
I’ve been told that me and my siblings bear a strong family resemblance. But one thing I don’t share with them is a love for jelly beans.
I’m not a fan of jelly beans. Never have been. Every Easter (year after year), when all of us kids would make our way to the easter baskets, they were loaded with jelly beans. But, I always left them in the basket along with that plastic grass.
This week, a friend of my mom’s brought this box of gourmet Jelly Belly jelly beans up to her hospital room. And with the steady stream of visitors, they have been slowly disappearing. Some flavors quicker than the others. Good thing there’s a legend on the box top.
I have to admit that I did break down and try a buttered popcorn flavored jelly bean (2nd row from the bottom, 4th from the right), and it tasted EXACTLY like movie popcorn. Amazing. That ought to do me for a while.
Happy Easter
Monte planted 4 tomato plants earlier this spring and they are doing great. Lots of tomatoes on the vine!
My favorite not-homemade-pizza is the Tuscan from Brick Oven. It has a mushroom pesto sauce, some small pieces of prosciutto, a little bit of mozzarella and asiago cheese sprinkled on it. After it comes out of the oven, it is topped with a pile of arugula leaves and drizzled with truffle oil (my mouth is watering just typing that).
I want to make this pizza. So… we planted some arugula in the garden a few weeks back. It’s taking hold and has sprouted a bunch of these little tiny arugula blossoms. They are edible as well.
When the time comes to make our own version of the Tuscan pizza, i will definitely post a pic 🙂
Sheila365 