Key Lime Cookies

I have too many limes.  It was cheaper to buy a bag of limes for $4.00 than to pay for an individual one at 2 for $1.00 when I needed four of them.  It just made more sense.  I used the first few limes to make a cilantro lime dressing for a salad (see earlier post on the Ty Thai salad).   Now I am making cookies!

I searched the internet and did not like a whole lot that I found.  Most of the cookies using lime involved corn meal....really? Corn meal? I would have NEVER thought of that!  It sounds gross to me. 

This is what I did:

(1) stick of margarine (I wanted to use butter but my supply is running low and I needed to get rid of the last of the margarine - not buying it anymore! Going to stick with butter from now on)

(1) cup of granulated sugar
(1) egg
(1) egg yolk
(1 1/2) teaspoons of lime zest
(1/4) cup of lime juice (freshly squeezed)
(1 1/2) cups of all purpose flour
(1) teaspoon of baking powder
(1/2) teaspoon of salt
powdered sugar

Combine the softened margarine, sugar, egg and egg yolk until combined.  Add the lime zest and lime juice.  Mix until blended well.  Add the flour, baking powder and salt and mix until well blended.  Drop one teaspoonful into a bowl with the powdered sugar and coat completely.  Put on a greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes.

Here is the finished product.  It is light and fluffy and citris-sy.  I am loving it! It is very yummy!!  I think they might go very well with some coffee.

Pasta, Salad and stuff

Today was a long day.  We had an Evangelism Tea at our church.  It was a lot of fun. My big sissy came all the way down from Richmond and sat with me.  It was a good time.  Unfortunately, I was rather melancholy when I got home.  I think it was because the speaker's message really struck a chord with me topped off by the fact that I guess I am worried about my husband's test results and my current job status.  WHEW....that is a lot!

This morning while lounging in bed before hitting the shower, I watched the new episode of Trisha Yearwood's cooking show on Food Network.  I love her cooking show but I was especially interested in it today because she was having her husband, Garth in the kitchen.  I really like him and I love Trisha because she is so REAL.  Her recipes on the show today were very diverse.  I have to admit I will never try her black bean & tofu lasagna.  My family would probably run me out of Dodge if I served tofu!  The Ty's Thai Salad sounded lovely.  The peanut butter balls looked delicious and deadly!

After the tea today, I headed to the grocery store alone with my melancholy self to buy milk and eggs.  After hugging my favorite cashier  Oshaine ( and trying to remember to only call him Shaine) I meandered through the produce department.  I suddenly found myself craving the salad I saw Trisha make.  I started throwing things in my cart and trying very hard to keep a count on the amount of money I was spending.

Here is the link to the original Trisha Yearwood recipe:

Trisha Yearwood's Ty's Thai Salad

So I started out by chopping up my cilantro.

There is something earthy and luscious about the smell of cilantro.  It speaks to my heart somehow and I truly love it.  Lately I have been trying to find different ways to use it.  Next I smashed three cloves of garlic. I confess, the Italian in me had me adding more garlic.  Her recipe only calls for two but I added one more.  I love it when I get the smell of garlic on my hands.  I know I am weird.

The dressing for the salad is the strangest I have ever tried.  Two cups of olive oil and one whole cup of sugar!  It was actually very tasty, not to mention a vibrant green!

Here it is in all of its green glory!  It was very, very sweet.  The ingredients were few and basic, olive oil, sugar, cilantro and garlic.  Quite the dressing!

After making the dressing I began to chop up my red cabbage, Napa cabbage and cucumber.  Now I have to make a confession:  as I chopped away (at the same time making my main dish of chicken and pasta) I completely forgot about the edamame. I also had neglected to buy a green onion while at the store, although I am proud of myself as I bought all the ingredients from memory with the green onion the only thing I forgot.  But alas, I forgot to include the edamame in my salad.

I threw some fresh, ripe avocado on top of my salad and three tablespoons of the cilantro lime dressing.  It was a yummy salad.  This was my very first experience with Napa cabbage.  I did not like it very much.  It was kind of curly and weird.  I am not sure what I should substitute it with? Any ideas?  I did like the red cabbage and the addition of the avocado.

I guess I am off to clean up my disaster I left in the kitchen from trying a new recipe.  Sometimes I turn into a tornado of disaster when trying a new recipe!  Don't forget to set your alarm to get up in time for church tomorrow!

Old Fashioned Chicken & Dumplings

Talk about an epic fail! I had planned to make my sweet husband some Healing Chicken Soup tonight and did not realize I was out of most of the ingredients! I guess I need to make a trip to the Farmer's Market!

Instead of the soup, I am making old fashioned chicken and  dumplings.  My husband generally prefers the flat dumpling but I do not have any.  And, as I am OUT of all the ingredients for the soup, I am making the old fashioned biscuit type dumplings.

Of course, I generally use Bisquick to make the dumplings but I have not bought any Bisquick in a while.  I opened up my old Pillsbury cookbook and used the baking powder biscuit recipe.  I did look at their dumpling recipe but did not like it.  It is all bubbling away on the stove right now.  Hopefully it will turn out nice and fluffy and yummy.

My sweetheart had outpatient surgery today to remove two areas that were determined to be possible skin cancer.  The one on the front of his chest is most likely a squamus cell cancer and the one on the back (and the bigger of the two) is not determined yet. 

This pot of chicken and dumplings will hopefully be just the comfort food he needs.  I am thankful for church family members and friends who were kind enough to pick up my kids for church and understand that I did not want to leave my baby alone. 

I hope you are all doing well.  Never forget to tell those you love that you do love them.  Our time on this earth is short, live it well, with love and in Jesus' name.

A new dish and finding ways to use it!

I admit it.  I am a glass junkie.  I love collecting carnival glass, milk glass or any other kind of glass that happens to catch my fancy!  I blame it on my grandmother! She started collecting the most amazing blue-purple Indiana Carnival glass and I inherited it from my mother.  It has a place of honor in my china cabinet and I have even bought a few more pieces to go with it.  I have also been buying the exact same pattern in green and gold and milk glass.  I LOVE Indiana Carnival glass!

A couple of months ago I found a delightful, large, heavy serving tray in the green carnival glass.  Alas, it is not the same pattern but I bought it anyway! It intrigued me.  I had never seen one in this design.  It has, to one side of it, a place to hold six deviled eggs.  Then the rest of the tray is segmented off to hold other things.  But what other things? I was not sure what the actual design intent was.  BUT, I had a party to go to with my Sunday school class ladies and NOW was the perfect time to use it.

As you can see, I made the deviled eggs (who only brings six deviled eggs to a party???).  I was not sure what to fill this dish up with.  I added the fresh strawberries (they were on sale!) and some green and red apple slices and then some slices of a baguette.  I needed the baguette to go with the Caprese salad that I also made (and did NOT have a fabulous dish to put it in! The horror!).

It was a fun evening with my girl friends.  I was regretful of a few things:  my caprese salad really needed some garlic but I did not add it, I should have made more deviled eggs as they were scrumptious, and I wish that I had found my sandals but wore tennis shoes instead! Never question the ramblings of a menopausal woman.  FUNNY! I guess my ramblings sound strange tonight because my heart is sad.  I will try to perk it up!  I must go in the kitchen and make these chocolate chip cookies that Billieanne made for her friend's birthday today!  I think inside Billieanne there lurks a secret baker because her cookies were sheer perfection! I will try and get pics if I do!

I know I have a few readers in Russia, I would love to become "pen pals" so feel free to drop me a comment and I will be happy to email! I would love to know what YOU take to a party to share!

Yellow Cake with Chocolate Buttercream and Sprinkles!

Yep....I discovered tonight that it takes roughly the same amount of time to make a yellow cake from scratch that it does to make one from a box.  It tastes better too.  I don't think I will ever be buying box cake mix again.

I used a recipe from the traditional Good Housekeeping cookbook.  It was simple and fast.  I did add the remaining leftover Christmas sprinkles on top! I was trying to empty the bottle so I could throw it away and not feel guilty!

On top is some homemade buttercream!  I NEVER buy store bought frosting as this recipe is super easy! No measuring just lots of tasting until it is just right.  All that is in it is melted butter (REAL butter), vanilla, milk, powdered sugar and cocoa.  Easy and delicious.

Okay, I know this entry will sound weird.  I am tired but I am very, very happy I got to go to Wednesday night service tonight.  Our pastor is pretty amazing.  His lesson tonight was great and I will post about it tomorrow when my eyes are not trying to force themselves closed on me!

GOODNIGHT!!

PS....lots of prayers to my sister in law Susan as she recovers from an illness! I love you Curly Sue!

Unused grape tomatoes equals relish?

It has been a very busy week for me! I started a part time job working from home on top of my full time job outside the home, plus taking care of my family and my other obligations! WHEW!

I was unable to make dinner last night but was determined it was going to happen tonight.  I did NOT want to go to the grocery store so I did what I always do and stood in the kitchen looking at what I had to determine what I could come up with.  Fortunately with some forethought during my grocery store shopping last week, I had some Polska Kielbasa in the fridge already! I decided to mix up a batch of Red Beans and Rice again!

I started with the usual ingredients of chopped onion, chopped and smashed garlic cloves and some olive oil.  That went into my frying pan while my rice was boiling happily away.  I sliced my kielbasa and threw it in the skillet along with a can (don't faint people....I have discovered I LIKE canned beans and they are SO much easier than having to make them from dried....my mother would shoot me!) of red kidney beans that I rinsed first.  In went the rice, some Kitchen Bouquet, chipotle chili powder, Soul Seasoning, fresh ground pepper and sea salt.

As that was perking along on the stove I noticed I had a container of grape tomatoes that were going to go bad very soon if I did not use them.  I almost threw them in with the red beans and rice but my middle daughter convinced me that would be a bad idea.  I decided I had to use them so why not a little relish on the side?  I chopped them in half and tossed them in a bowl with some more smashed garlic (I swear I smell so Italian right now!), some olive oil, balsamic vinegar, dried basil, dried oregano and some more chipotle chili powder.  I served it along side my rice and beans.  Well....at least that was the intent.  I ended up mixing  a rather large spoonful into my rice and beans! It was good but I have to admit my daughter was right, it would have been weird if I had thrown them into the mix.

Now I am off to finish up my part-time work so that I can go to bed! I have been staying up past midnight the last two nights in a row and still getting up at 5:30 in the morning.  I am not as young as I used to be so I better knock that off right now.

NIGHT!!!

Potatoes, Parrots and other GREEN things

Tonight's dinner was cube steak, baked potatoes and corn.  I wanted REAL steak but feeding a family of five + one requires some frugalness!  I needed steak as I have been dying to make a chimichurri sauce ever since I had it at a restaurant. And I must say, it turned out beautifully!

This is what I did:

(1) large bunch of cilantro, stems chopped off
(1) large bunch of Italian parsley, stems chopped off
(3) cloves of garlic, chopped and smashed
Extra virgin olive oil
Balsamic vinegar
water

I do not own a food processor.  If I did, I definitely would have used it!  I put the most of it in my Kitchen Aid blender.  I added the garlic and then (1) tablespoon of the oil, vinegar and water.  I pulsed it for a minute then continued to add the liquid ingredients a tablespoon at a time until I got a smooth-like consistency.

I then transferred the ingredients to a bowl and let sit and "marry" while my son (God bless him) went outside in the 29 degree cold weather on the back porch to grill my steaks! He put the fire pit on to keep his backside warm while the front side of him was kept warm by the grill! It was not too bad for him out there!

I guess by now you are wondering where the potatoes and parrots come in, right?  We had one baked potato left over after dinner.  Our parrot LOVES potatoes!  I cut open the potato and put it in his cage where he happily proceeded to eat it.  He is such a goof ball.

Dinner was successful overall.  There was no steak or chimichurri left over. And the last potato went to the parrot!  This is a picture of me and Louie! My lovable, crazy Yellow Naped Amazon Parrot!