Madness

I'm back! Miss me? Sorry to leave you with pictures of bacon turtles for so long, but I've been THIS CLOSE to insane! The new job at the preschool has taken up all my brain cells and more. I am drained, empty, no fun at all. I was afraid for a while that I would never even enjoy the kids again, but that has been coming back.

I got the nicest note from the nicest person telling me she missed the blog, and could I write some more? That was just what I needed to get me going. I have been noticing blog-worthy things lately, so maybe it'll be ok. Here is a Christmas item I thought was a little crazy:

Fancy Chair Leg Covers! Dress up your dining room furniture for the Holidays! You will surely be known as the eccentric relative if you buy these for your chairs. (Isn't the one on the left what the wicked witch was wearing when Dorothy dropped the house on her? Very festive.)









Did you see the Martha Stewart ad for Black Friday? The woman has totally lost it and isn't even trying to hide it! It's not so much showing up in people's bedrooms at 3 a.m. as it is the crazy look in her eyes as she rubs the chicken on their bedspread. See the video here. If that link won't work, I'm sorry, it's been a while since I've done this.

Jessica Simpson and Martha Stewart Wake Up Black Friday Shoppers for Macy's

I herewith declare myself the winner of the "Ugliest Thing" contest for the year, as nobody else entered. I purchased the following Halloween decoration for a nickle at a garage sale this last summer. I hung it in the kitchen just until I could take a picture of it to show you. IT'S STILL THERE! The family has begged me to take it down, so now I can. Somebody went to a lot of trouble to crochet 2 ghosts, a pumpkin-headed ghost and 3 bats. They even covered the hanging hardware with yarn! As hideous as this is, it was almost overtaken this last weekend by a purse made from a whole (deceased) armadillo! If I had a photo of that you would be amazed. I saw it in an antique shop in Duluth, but did not have my camera.



















Have I given you my recipe for cornflake chicken? I'm pretty sure Martha wouldn't be caught dead making it, but my family loves it!

Cornflake Chicken

Boneless, skinless chicken (I use thighs)
Salad dressing (the guys like ranch, I like french, use whatever you have, or want to use up)
Crushed corn flakes.

Cover a baking sheet with foil, or this will be a pain to scrub off. Coat the chicken in the salad dressing, then in the crushed corn flakes. Crush more corn flakes if you need to. Bake at 350 degrees until the chicken is done, maybe half an hour. Nice and crunchy, not as good as leftovers, because it gets soggy.

Celebrate with Bacon!

Did you have a good 4th of July? That was a while ago, I know, but I've been busy having a nervous breakdown! I'm worried about being in charge at preschool, so I am having nightmares and mini panic attacks. Going up north was a nice change. Paul was in China the week before the 4th, so we were happy to have him back. I was looking forward to trying "Bacon Turtles" that I saw on a website. It's basically a bacon cheeseburger with hot dog appendages.






You try to weave the bacon so it looks like a turtle shell. Frankly, it looked better when they did it, take a look here. I think they used more bacon than I did. Next time I will put the cheese inside the burger (like a juicy Lucy) because much of it melted and slid off. So sad. A waste of cheese!








The directions said to bake them, so the bacon wouldn't overcook before the meat was done. It was too hot in the (un-airconditioned) cabin to use the stove so we cooked them in a foil pan on the grill. It worked just fine. I made homemade buns and they were delicious! The hot dogs are an odd texture addition, but not bad.

I saw on another site a recipe for bacon vodka. Hmmm.... I may have to try it!




On the 4th, we went into Duluth for the day. They had a little carnival by Canal Park. The boys rode on some rides, and I pet a lemur. Yes! A real lemur! I paid three dollars and got a bit of chopped banana to feed them. I laughed when I got into the enclosure, because all the lemurs were asleep in a pile in the back of their cage. They were also stuffed to the gills on other people's bananas, so they weren't interested in mine. Luckily, the baby lemur was still awake, and I was able to pet him. I would show you a picture, but they wanted another $5 for a photo, whether you used your camera or theirs. I'm too cheap. In case you wonder, petting a lemur is very much like petting a wiggly cat.
Paul's brother Tim came with us. We listened to music in the park while we waited for Nate and Nick to be done with the rides.











We went to Paul and Tim's cousin's house for dinner. Dave and Teri have bought the old weather station in Duluth and are doing extensive renovations. This is the view from the roof, where there will be a garden someday. They were having a pig roast, with many guests. This is the kind of party I like, with flocks of kids and dogs swooping in and out, the ability to have a nice long chats with nice people, and good food!





Here I am with Nate and Nick on the roof. Yes, they are taller than last week! They just keep growing! Nick has an entirely new voice going on now. I did actually curl my hair before I went, but it was humid, so my hair went completely limp. Grrr!








We all watched the fireworks from Dave and Teri's yard. Fabulous! We couldn't hear the explosions, which was weird, but nice, I thought.

The food at the party was terrific. Dave cooked a pig, they had hot German potato salad and everybody brought a dish to share. Hot German potato salad is so good, it has bacon in it, too, so it was a very bacony weekend. Here is my favorite recipe for Hot German Potato Salad. (I got it from a hot German!)



Hot German Potato Salad

5 lbs red potatoes
1 lb bacon
2 onions, chopped
2 cups water
1 cup flour
1 2/3 cups white vinegar
1 2/3 cups sugar
Salt and pepper to taste

Cook, peel and slice potatoes. Cook bacon until crisp, cool, crumble and set aside. Cook onions in bacon fat until transparent. Scoop them out and let them rest with the bacon. Mix 2 cups water and one cup flour until smooth and cook it in the hot bacon fat until it gets thick. (It's German Roux!) While it's cooking, mix vinegar and sugar and bring to a boil. Once the roux is thick, add the vinegar mixture a bit at a time, stirring to keep it smooth. Add the bacon and onions and simmer until thickened. Mix with cooked potatoes and add salt and pepper.

Bejeweled, Vajazzled and Bewildered

I'm a gamer. Not really. A gamer is a big fan of video games. I like to play "Bejeweled", and Mahjong on my computer. My kids tell me these don't count as video games. I also buy $5 computer games at Half Price Books. I usually get $5 worth of fun out of them. Sometimes these involve searching for objects hidden in the pictures. I know that doesn't sound like huge amounts of fun, but when I play this sort of game, the kids come and sit by me on the couch and help look. It's teenager bait! I'll take what I can get.

I bought a game called "Keepsake" for $5. It took 3 disks to install and large amounts of memory, but it was months of fun for me. (If I had more than an hour a week to play it I probably would have finished it sooner.) It had terrific graphics and an interesting story about a young woman trying to solve a mystery in an abandoned school of magic. Apparently you can play it more than once, but I don't know why you'd want to.

Have you heard of "Vajazzling"? This has become a topic of interest since Jenny Love-Hewitt (star of "Ghost Whisperer") brought it up on a talk show. She has a new book out in which she tells of cheering herself up after a bad breakup by decorating her "lady parts" with stick-on rhinestones. It seems her body really is a wonderland!

I own stick-on rhinestones, but it has never occurred to me to stick them on anything but paper. My little preschool girls sometimes wear these for earrings, though. Quilters are adding glue-on rhinestones to quilts these days, too.









This is how I use the jewels. I use them to decorate scrapbook pages. (That is a picture from Yellowstone). If you want to see some masterful use of stick-on jewels, click on Gretchen's blog "Happiness is..." over there on the list of blogs I follow. Gretchen makes absolutely gorgeous cards that have ribbons and stamps and jewels on them. Making cards is very difficult (at least for me) but she makes it look easy. She has links to buy whatever you need for cardmaking. I get my jewels in the dollar bin at Michaels.



Back to "Vajazzling". The word is a combination of "Bedazzling" (a craft in which rhinestones are attached to fabric) and vagina, which is misleading, since the rhinestones are not actually anywhere near that particular lady part. I had to look this up since I could not believe that it would be possible to install these in or on a vah-jayjay. (That's a reference from "Grey's Anatomy", aren't I the pop culture queen?)

Indeed, the jewels are installed in the groin area. If you would like to see this, click here for a link to see a reporter having it done. My big problem with this would be the preparation of the site to be decorated. One must have a "Brazilian" bikini wax for vajazzling to work. Brazilian means completely bare. Waxing means ripping out. Um, no thank you.

The only thing "Brazilian" I'm interested in would be the Caipirinha, the national cocktail of Brazil. This is made by mixing lemon or lime juice, sugar, ice and cachaca, the Brazilian national liquor. Rum or vodka may be substituted (with vodka it is a "caiproska") although I'm told it is not the same. We are basically talking a vodka-lemonade here. I'm in! I also like brazil nuts, come to think of it.

You may be hearing more about vajazzling in the next few days, as Kathy Griffin has had it done. The new season of her show is starting and as a way of generating hype she is having a pap smear done poolside. I think the vajazzling is to make it interesting for the gynecologist.

Today's recipe is for bejeweled pork. Pomegranate seeds really are jewel-like, but are only available here in the northland for 1 month a year. The rest of the time try grapes or fresh currents.

Bejeweled Pork Medallions

1 pork tenderloin (1 1/4 lbs) boneless pork chops are also good
butter and olive oil to prevent sticking
salt and pepper to taste
3/4 cup pomegranate juice
1/2 cup chicken stock
2 tbs ketchup
1/4 cup dried cherries or cranberries
1 cup small grapes or 1/2 cup pomegranate seeds
chopped chives for garnish

Slice the tenderloin into 1 inch slices and saute on high (in the butter/oil) until almost done (still pink inside, they will finish cooking while resting) don't over cook the nice pork. Keep meat warm while making sauce.
Put juice and stock in the pan you used to cook the pork with the pork juices. Reduce liquid for 4-5 minutes. Add ketchup and dried fruit. Put pork on plates, drizzle sauce over meat, sprinkle grapes/pomegranate seeds over sauce and garnish with chopped chives. Serves 4

Vinnie's Party/Grand old day

We went to Fargo for my nephew Vinnie's high school graduation party on Saturday.
Here is the graduate in the plaid shirt. His brother Jessi is wearing the white shirt and black hat. The taller girl is Vinnie's girlfriend. She had nice shoes.

See the smile on Vinnie? He was smiling like that all day! He was so happy and so full of promise that it almost hurt to look at him. Do you have younger relatives that you love like that?

The whole day was full of love and no drama. Since my Nate will graduate next year, I was taking careful notes of all the nice touches at this party, like photos of Vinnie on the water bottles, School color M&M's, the computer slide show. I asked Nate what ideas he thought we could use. "Plastic silverware would be good", he said! Party planning is not his thing.

This is Vinnie holding the quilt I made for him. I like to give graduates a quilt. It's my best thing, and I want to honor their effort with an effort of my own.
















My mom and I with my three brothers, Erik, Gene and Chris. My sister couldn't make it, so the Spartan helmet represents her.











I went to Grand Old Day on Sunday with my BFF Reenie. We used to go to this when we were kids and wander down the street and buy junky trinkets. It's a little different now. There were not so many merchandise booths, just food booths, although I did buy a "GO-Girl". This is a funnel for girls so we can pee standing up. (There goes my resolution to keep down the "earthy" blog content!) The go-girl's inventor suggests that one practice in the shower BEFORE taking to the woods. We are going fishing this summer and I think this will come in handy in the boat. (The children are mortified). I will let you know how it works!
This is a picture of one of the street bands, they had a ghost thing going on. The people watching was amazing. Am I the only person in America without a tattoo? I seem to be the only woman who didn't think high heels were needed to walk for miles down Grand Avenue!


There was good food (but so expensive) at Grand Old Day. Gyros are always tasty. I made these last week and the kids loved them, although they wouldn't use the tzatziki sauce.

Chicken Gyros
Ingredients:
For the tzatziki sauce:
16 oz. plain yogurt (not nonfat, if possible)
1/2 hothouse cucumber or 1 regular cucumber, peeled and seeded
2-3 cloves garlic, pressed through a garlic press (or finely minced)
Salt and pepper

For the chicken:
4 cloves garlic, smashed
Juice of 1 lemon
2 tsp. red wine vinegar
2 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
2 heaping tbsp. plain yogurt
1 tbsp. dried oregano
Salt and pepper
1 1/4 lbs. chicken pieces (I used boneless, skinless chicken breasts)

To assemble:
Pita bread
Fresh tomatoes, seeded and diced
Red onion, sliced thin

Directions:
To make the tzatziki sauce, strain the yogurt using cheesecloth over a bowl. Let strain for several hours or overnight, if possible, to remove as much moisture as possible. You can skip this step, especially if you use greek-style yogurt, or if you don't mind the sauce a little runny.

Shred the cucumber. Wrap in a towel a squeeze to remove as much water as possible. Mix together the strained yogurt, shredded cucumber, garlic, salt and pepper to taste. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before serving to allow the flavors to meld.

To prepare the chicken, combine the garlic, lemon juice, red wine vinegar, olive oil, yogurt, oregano, and salt and pepper to taste in a medium bowl. Whisk together until mixed well. Add the chicken pieces to the bowl and mix well to coat. Cover and refrigerate for about 1 hour.

Cook the chicken as desired, either in the skillet or with the broiler. (I butterflied the chicken breasts and then cooked them under the broiler.) Once the chicken is completely cooked through, transfer to a plate and let rest for 5 minutes. Cut into strips.

Heat pitas. Top with chicken, tzatziki sauce, diced tomatoes and sliced onions. Serve immediately.

Fishing Opener

We went to Lake Vermillion for fishing opener. It is a nice lake and we stayed with nice people.
This is Nate, bundled up, it was a little chilly in the early morning.

Here is Nick, also chillin'. We all caught fish, but because of the slot limit we could only keep one. The rest were too big! Hah!
This is my fish. We could have kept him, he was a good eating size Northern Pike, but it was early in the day and we thought we could catch more. Sadly, we did not! We did eat the one walleye we could keep, and he was delicious. If you ever catch a good amount of northerns, you can pickle them. Then they keep in the refrigerator for a while and are nice with crackers. I like this recipe because the fish gets very firm. I eat pickled herring once a year (at Christmas) and the texture is always a little too floppy for me.

Al's Mom's pickled Northern

1 1/4 cup salt
3/4 gallon water

Cut fish in pieces (an inch or two square) (recipe does not specify amount of fish, but I'd say one or two big ones) and soak in salt water in refrigerator for 48 hours.

Drain and rinse fish.

Put in non-metal container and cover with white vinegar. Let sit in this in refrigerator for another48 hours.

2 cups sugar
2 cups white vinegar
2 cups White Satin wine (I don't know this wine, but with that much sugar and vinegar I think any white wine will do.)
2-3 large onions, sliced
1 green pepper, sliced (optional)
1 box pickling spice
extra bay leaves, if you have them

Dissolve sugar in vinegar, add other ingredients and drained fish. Wait 4 days to eat this. Keep refrigerated. Keeps 6-8 weeks.

Color me RED!

What you think when you see this video?




A. Oh, look, that nice lady is trying to show us that she is wearing the same T-shirt! Must be a fan of musical theater...

B. Oh my God, a crazy woman is chasing me across a parking lot, trying to show me her breasts! Run for your life!

Yes, well, I was going for "A", but the answer is apparently "B". I was at the grocery store and saw a woman with her husband in the parking lot. She was wearing her "Wicked" t-shirt and so was I. I made the above motion so as to (wordlessly) point out our shared taste in clothing and entertainment. The problem is, she didn't see me, only her husband did, and he had NO IDEA what I was doing. From the appalled and terrified look on his face, he thought I was coming on to him and (insanely) pointing out my rack.

When I realized this, I tried harder to get him to understand my innocent intentions, but he, um, started running. I didn't want to leave him with the wrong impression, so I yelled, "We are wearing the same t-shirt!", except he and I were not clad alike, so it didn't help. I slunk into the store, blushing from head to toe.

Sadly, this is not even my MOST embarrassing moment. I'll tell you that another time.

Blushing Breasts (Tandoori)

1 cup plain yogurt, divided
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp salt
1/2 tablespoon cinnamon
1 small jalapeno
6 cloves garlic
a little red food coloring
1 inch chunk of fresh ginger
1 small onion, roughly chopped

Puree 1/2 the yogurt and the rest in a blender, add the rest of the yogurt. Use this as a marinade for 2 lbs of chicken breasts. Marinate overnight. Grill until chicken is done.

Brilliant!

Have you been watching "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution"? I love that Jamie. He's cute and he says "Brilliant!" alot. He is also called the "Naked Chef", but again, sadly, he is never naked. The food is naked, as in good ingredients, simply prepared. Check out one of his books from the library, the pictures of the food are gorgeous. The new show is about re-thinking our food choices, our children's food especially. At least so far. Jamie would never approve of today's breakfast.......
The donut-as-big-as-your-head! They sell this "Texas Donut" at Hans' Bakery in Anoka.
My children eat them once, maybe twice a year. The rest of the time they eat the low-sugar, whole grain cereal I usually buy. I'm not too worried about it. Nick thanked me twice!

You are probably wondering how Genetics is going. I'm holding my own, but now we are getting to a hard part. The more it sounds like chemistry, the less I get it. The labs are getting more fun, though. We are at the fly breeding part! I am unusually excited about this. Last week we put a tube of mutants (far right) to sleep (with something called "Fly Nap") and looked at them under a microscope. We were to sort them out according to mutant features. Some had orange eyes (red eyes are most common in fruit flies) some had white eyes, some had yellow bodies or cupped wings. One group looked non-mutant to me, until the prof had me look at the edges of their wings. They were so pretty, I gasped! They were scalloped! Brilliant! Then we became matchmakers and arranged (group) marriages for some other flies. They are going to be so surprised when they wake up, I thought!

This week we killed the flies we mated last week. Hmmm. I did feel kinda bad about this. I wanted to just let them go, but this is really frowned upon. We also looked at some flies with glow-in-the-dark bits. By next week our orphaned larva should be adults and we will see what kind of mutants we made.

Happy Easter!

Here is a Jamie recipe. Good and easy! This is nice on salad or on other vegetables, such as asparagus.

Jamie's Vinaigrette

1 Tbls mustard (maybe not the bright yellow kind, try dijon)
4 Tbls vinegar (not plain white or cider, use balsamic or wine vinegar, maybe an herbal kind)
1-2 cloves finely chopped garlic
8 Tbls Extra virgin olive oil (EVOO to you Rachel fans)
Salt and pepper

I put this in a jar and shake it up just before serving. Brilliant!