Garden Tuesday: Future Grapes

Yes, folks, there's great hope in my little corner of the world that we'll have a bumper crop of grapes.

I just hope the birds don't eat them before they're ripe enough for us.
Happy Garden Tuesday, everyone!

Risotto With Corn

I'll bet you thought I'd forgotten how to cook, right? Nope. Just not much different food going on around here these days, with the circus that is my life this summer. Nothing dramatic, just busy.

So, I found a recipe for risotto made with corn in my paper last week. And I thought I could do that. Of course, you know full right and well that it's been made a little easier by me, your favorite lazy cook. So, risotto made with corn is different, but it did meet with approval from the hungry hordes.

RISOTTO WITH CORN

olive oil
1/2 cup chopped chives or green onions
2 cups white rice*
4 to 5 cups chicken broth
2 cups corn, pureed in the food processor
ground black pepper
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese

Heat the olive oil to a simmer in a large pan, add the chives or green onions, and saute 2 to 3 minutes, until soft. Add the rice, cook and stir another 3 to 4 minutes. Add the 1 cup of the chicken broth, and stir well. Cook until most of the broth is gone, and stir in another cup of the broth. Repeat with the third cup of broth. With the fourth cup of broth, add the pureed corn and pepper, stir well, and continue simmering, stirring occasionally. Add the fifth cup of broth, if necessary, and stir in the parmesan just before all of the liquid is absorbed.

*Note: the recipe called for Arboria rice, but I didn't have it. I also have the impression it costs an exorbitant amount per pound, and I'm too cheap to lay out a lot for starch. Just sayin'. It didn't tell me explicitly to stir the rice constantly, as most risotto recipes do, so I didn't, and it was fine.

Ryan spent the meal playfully whining about my habit of putting weird things in his rice, but Dan deemed it pretty good. So, as Ryan was rinsing his plate, he offered one last complaint about yellow and green things in his rice, so Dan got his low velocity air soft pistol and shot Ryan in the butt. Yes, I let the boys play with airsoft pistols, and even shoot each other while doing so. Before I did, I shot myself in the leg. It stung pretty well, but the boys don't wear skirts, and don't shoot each other from 2 feet apart, so there's no harm. And most of the time they do this out in the yard, wandering around in the fresh air and sunshine, so I have no gripe there. And when Dan bellows, "I'm defending my mother's honor and cooking!" who can argue?

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Book Review!

I told you that I read old books, so you won't be hearing about the summer's bestsellers here. But you might just find something to check out of the library, under the approving smile of the librarian who's tired of hearing requests for the perpetually out-of-stock stuff.

Taylor Caldwell is one of my favorite authors. Her books are never action packed mystery thrillers or whatever else sells. Instead, they all seem to be set between 1870 and 1920, in Massachusetts, New York or Pennsylvania, and are all about a slice of life there. I had actually never read this one before I found it at a book sale for 50 cents in April - how could I have gone wrong with it?

TO LOOK AND PASS
By Taylor Caldwell
c. 1973

According to the first chapter, this is the story of the life of Dan Hendricks. It's set in a small town in Northwestern Pennsylvania between approximately 1890 and 1920. It's also the story of our narrator, the son of the town doctor, who becomes the town doctor himself, Olivia and Beverly. The story follows our four main characters through life from about age 12 through Dan's death at about 40, with varying degrees of detail. It's a long, gentle story which rambles, but draws the reader in. The reader loves most of the characters and sees one as despicable from the outset of the book. As I said, it's not exciting, but it is engrossing.

Happy reading!

On another happy note, Dan went out last night. This morning, I found a new electric kettle on my kitchen counter. What a wonderful son I have!

Out With the Old, and In With.....

...the Ancient.

My electric kettle has decided that 100 to 120degrees fahrenheit is the perfect temperature for tea water. Sadly, my tea disagrees. So, I've ordered a new one. In the meantime, I'm using....

....purchased in 1977, this was a hot ticket for college bound kids. You could heat up water for tea, cocoa or instant coffee, cook less than 8 ounces of pasta, and cook soup or other canned foods. You couldn't beat it with a stick.

Sad to say, it's only 400 watts, so it takes like 10 minutes to heat the water for a cup of tea. Amazon, you'd better have UPS moving soon!

It's Thorsday!

I wonder if they're going to share whatever they have with me? Hmmm?

Maybe I'll just lie down to wait.

Happy Thorsday, everyone!

In Which I Pretend I'm Bilingual.

Before the story begins, you need to understand that the Hispanic population of this area is maybe 2%. Then there's a group of migrant farm workers from Mexico who move from the strawberry farm to the pumpkin patch to the turkey farm, and probably a few places in between. And then there's my lawn service, owned by a guy innocently named Melvin. Melvin has an all Mexican lawn crew. And they work very hard.

Most of my lawn looks great. But, this year, our lawn service has been mowing the 20 foot square area just outside the kitchen with a weed wacker. It's not going all that well. Ryan has been taking Spanish in school, so I asked him if he could look up a couple of words and speak to the lawn service on my behalf. Nothing doing, responded Ryan, unless I wanted him to ask them if they sing well or where the library is. Glad to see that high school language courses are as useful as ever. (I took 6 years of French. I could introduce my dog to you, even now, and tell you that he is a good dog. Also a highly useful skill, don't you think?)

So, it was up to me and my dictionary to figure out how to speak to the nice Mexican man.

Hola! (I have this one down pat.)
No habla Espanol! (I know this one, too. Not for nothing I spent the summer of 1975 in California.)

Then it got tricky.
Tiene una cortadora de cesped pequena? (This should mean "Do you have a small lawn mower?") Evidently the sentence was understandable, because he nodded vigorouisly and said something enthusiastic.
Por favor, usa a la cortadora de cesped en esta area? (Pointing at the 20x20 area, and hoping that this did approximately translate to "Please use the small mower here."). He responded, "Si, Senora," trotted off, and came back with a hand mower, beaming. "Bueno!" I cheered, giving him the thumbs up sign.

Then he pointed at Thor and said something fast and long and Spanish. "Esta Thor!" I chirped. "Esta Bueno!"

"Good Bye, and Gracias!" I added. So my weedy little piece of lawn got mowed properly, and I pretended I could bumble through a tiny Spanish conversation.

The Garden on the Fourth

So, we set out last night to light the traditional fireworks. The sky had just a touch of color left. Can you see it in this picture? Here's a lightened view, just in case. I love the profiles of the trees at night.

And the little guy started us off with Roman Candles, with some help from Dan. Thor stayed inside where it was safe from the booming noises.
Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Miscellany for the Holiday Weekend

Our neighbors to the north are celebrating Canada Day today. I wish them all a happy holiday weekend!

Monday is our Independence Day holiday. We're just kicking back and taking it easy. Our oldest daughter is home until Tuesday, because her bar review course doesn't resume in Philly until Wednesday. Of course, Thor's encouraging us all to follow his fine example and do plenty of napping.
(It isn't that easy to draw stars with colored sugar. So you'll have to put up with a spotty blue field on my cake flag to start the holiday weekend.)

I've spent the last several weekends brutally cleaning out my closets and dresser drawers, reorganizing everything, giving each of my girls a huge armload of almost new clothes from when I weighed 15 to 20 pounds less (and was much younger, of course). Lawyer daughter was particularly thrilled to score 3 suits and 2 blazers. As for me, I was particularly thrilled to be able to rearrange everything and now find it. Sewing may recommence this weekend. And a trip to Joann's for the great 99 cent McCalls pattern sale may well be in order.

Other than that, I might venture into the sunshine for about 4 minutes (gotta avoid the sunburn!). Maybe I'll get around to a book review tomorrow or Sunday. And I might just take Thor's suggestion for a nice nap.

Happy Independence Day weekend to my American friends. Happy weekending to all the rest of you!

Happy Thorsday!

When I had my screaming headache, one of my sons brought a wingback chair from the family room into the breakfast room for me, and parked it next to the air conditioning vent, right under the ceiling fan. My friend spent 3 days right next to me.
He was recuperating, too. Notice that his left arm is shaved a bit. A cyst on his back broke open and got infected, so we took him to have it cleaned out. They used a mild sedative on him. After a week of antibiotics and steroids, he's in fine shape. They shaved a very large area on his back, and in deference to Thor's image, I won't be taking pictures of it. Suffice to say that he's been romping outside with the boys, who are anxiously keeping him out of the sun so he won't suffer sunburn!

Happy Thorsday, everyone! Thor's hoping you're all as healthy as he is!

Banana Cream Pie

Every year, Louise hosts a Picnic Game. Sadly, it's not a real picnic, since her participants hail from all over the world, but everyone who plays posts a recipe for something they enjoy on a picnic, in alphabetic order. This year, I drew the letter B.

So....

I'm going on a picnic, and I'm bringing...

A - Apricot Cobbler from Mae

B - Banana Cream Pie!

I just adore cream pies, and banana cream pie is my favorite. Of course, that's doubtless because I really love bananas. When I order them (by the case, of course), I'll eat almost nothing but bananas for the 4 or 5 days they last. Yep, about 8 bananas a day. And I lose weight doing so. (That, my friends, is a big bonus in my book.) So, here's my recipe (and a simple way out at the end).

BANANA CREAM PIE!

1 9" Pie crust, baked (I used my Best Ever Crust)
2/3 cup sugar
3 tbsp cornstarch
1/2 tsp salt
3 cups milk
3 egg yolks, lightly beaten
1 tbsp butter
1-1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3 bananas, sliced
whipped cream

In a medium saucepan, whisk together the sugar, cornstarch and salt. Whisk the milk in and turn the heat to medium (to speed the process, microwave the milk for 2 minutes before adding it to the pan). Cook until the mixture thickens. Pour a little of the hot mixture in with the egg yolks, then add the egg yolks to the pan and cook for one minute longer. Remove from the heat, stir in the butter and vanilla extract. Slice the bananas into the pie crust, and pour the custard mixture over them. Chill for at least 3 hours. Top with whipped cream (1 cup cream, 1/2 cup sugar, 2 tsp vanilla extract beaten until thick and luscious) and serve to your hungry hordes.

Of course, if it just happens to be nearly July and very hot, you can shortcut it this way: Use a graham cracker crust from the store. Slice the bananas into it. Whip up a box of vanilla instant pudding and pour it over the bananas. Top with whipped cream. Go ahead and take 2 minutes to make the real stuff...you'll enjoy it ever so much more than store-bought. Let it set for about 30 minutes, and enjoy. Don't confess that you took the easy way out, and no one will know.

Hop over to Louise's blog to see all of the Picnic Game entries, including one for our special 4-legged companions - that's right, Diva Doggy Treats!

See you on Thorsday!

Garden Visitor!

Have you ever had a headache that stretched on for 3 long days? That was my weekend and Monday, the kind of headache that's made worse by moving and thus elevating blood pressure. So I subsisted on orange juice, advil and tylenol. This guy's visit all day Saturday made me happy.

His momma showed up periodically with worms and whatnot. He spent the whole day in the rhododendron right outside my kitchen window, not more than a foot from the glass.

He was too fast at gobbling up his worms for me to get a picture of him being fed. So I just took pictures of him turning around.
He flew off with his momma on Saturday at dusk. I hope he's doing well!

Terry Bison Ranch

After reading Sue's post yesterday about the buffalo who have taken up residence near her house, I realized I'd never posted any pictures from the Terry Bison Ranch at the south side of Cheyenne, Wyoming. It's a great place. It's been in existence since the 1890s, when it extended west almost to Laramie (about 40 miles), east almost to Nebraska (about 100 miles), north and south about 100 miles each. Today the western boundary is I-25 North/South, east about 30 miles, north about 5 miles, and south about 10 miles from where the pictures were taken. The up close and personal buffalo here are what they call the "Show Herd" of animals that are more docile than most. Truly, you should avoid buffalo; they are very irritable animals, and extraordinarily powerful. The ranch herds them with Suburbans instead of horses to minimize danger to the people and horses. The buffalo have been know to charge the 4WD vehicles and knock them over - one on one. They can only be kept penned by use of high tensile strength barbed wire; they will walk through any other kind of fence.

Since they were shedding their winter coats, they really looked quite disreputable.

Most of the show herd gathered around the train that took us into their field, looking for the pellets our driver threw out the door. This one was particularly friendly.

I'm hungry; feed me!
This one liked her head rubbed. My daughters were enchanted.
Here's how you tell the adult boys from the girls, apart from the obvious. The girls' horns curl back over their heads, like these two lovely ladies.
The guys' horns go straight up. There are fewer dudes in the Show Herd, because they're fiercer.
This is one of three trains that roll through the buffalo pastures for their tour. The owner of the bison ranch built the trains and their track himself. He purposely looped his track about 3oo feet into Colorado, so he could boast that he owns the largest privately held interstate train line in this country. That made me laugh.
They had other assorted animals near the train depot, but the funniest was this goat. I love his hairdo.
And this is the mansion on the Terry Bison Ranch. Originally built by Senator F. E. Warren of Wyoming, very close to the Colorado state line (like 1/10th of a mile), President Teddy Roosevelt was a guest. So they can truly brag that "Teddy Roosevelt slept here!"
Of course, they had a restaurant with great food; we had buffalo burgers, bison chili and Beast sandwiches (pulled buffalo). No pictures of food; we were too busy celebrating Shannon's graduation.

And thus ends my little tour of Wyoming. I hope you all enjoyed it. And now you know what gender your buffalo are, should you ever encounter them!