Small Blogging World and Whirled Peas!

We made our first trip to Costco in a long time.  We had been eating down our food supplies while our garage/pantry area was getting remodeled.  And now, fresh with a second spacious fridge and lots of cabinet space, we boldly ventured into the world of bulk!

One of the things I picked up was a bag of sugar snap peas.  These always seem smaller at the store (perhaps because they don't look so big standing next to a 3 lb vat of hummus).  But once I got them home, I worried that we didn't have a good plan for using them all up in a reasonable time.  Then I remembered an amazing sugar snap pea soup that I had had at the restaurant that catered our wedding -- Le Papillon.

I did a quick Google search for sugar snap pea soups and settled on one with a gorgeous picture and on-hand ingredients.   It wasn't until I sat down to write this post and looked up the link to give credit where it's due that I realized --- hey, this blog looks familiar!  It belongs to an old friend from Jr. High who writes a great blog called Year in Food!  I should have known this was Kim's work!  I have had the pleasure of cooking a few recipes from her upcoming book and I can't wait to see all her great work in glossy print.

I stuck fairly close to the recipe but I added sautéed ham and green onions (one of the last in the yard) as a garnish.

Garden Update - October 25, 2013

Carrots.  Looking forward to learning how to effectively thin the crop.

I'm wondering if I planted enough garlic.  Last season I enjoyed using the garlic in its various stages, including green garlic.  I am concerned this is not going to be enough to get me through the year.

Adding some cages because crows have gobbled up some of the cauliflower.

Crust Bust

Note:  This will be an honest blog.  Sure, half of blogging is bragging about something and that's fun and all.  But I strive to share my good times and bad.  And on that note...

Insert whining sound:

I can't for the life of me make a pie crust.   I've tried repeatedly and I think I officially give up.

I used the recipe from Pioneer Woman.  I think it's a fine recipe -- I'm the problem.  I can't seem to roll the dough out to the proper thickness without having it crack and fall apart on me.  So, I ended up using way too thick pie crust dough that then doesn't cook all the way though.

Here's a picture of a rustic peach pie that I made.  The black stuff is the filling that oozed out through cracks and then burned.    I used the other half of this recipe which makes 2 crusts in a quiche tonight.

 While the filling tasted great, the crust was inedible except for the parts that poked up the top so they actually cooked through.

Once I tried to short cut the pie crust making by buying the trader joes crusts.  They come in a roll.  I have no clue what I did wrong there, but that raw dough basically came apart like confetti when I unrolled it from the plastic wrap.

There is no hope.  This shall be a pie-less home for all of time.

Fig, Blackberry and Rosemary Jam

We have a beautiful Rosemary bush.  I am always excited when I come across a recipe that gives me reason to use it!

I have been on a mission to clean out the freezer (more on that later) to migrate it into our new garage.  When I came across this recipe for fig rosemary jam, everything was falling into place.  I remember that I had a bag of figs from my parents' tree that I had frozen -- like two years ago!  I used that in this recipe, and added some blackberries I had on hand.  It turned out wonderful.  I served it tonight with a cheese plate and it paired beautifully.

Can do!

One blog that has always inspired me is Food in Jars.  Her cooking/preserving/photography skills put me to shame.   I've always aspired to have that moment where you open up a pantry or cabinet and see stacks and stacks of jars full of homemade goodness.

Jars, jars, my glorious jars!

I feel one step closer to that today.   We have re-done the garage (drywall, paint, cabinets, floors) and today we've been putting our stuff on the cabinet shelves.  I didn't realize how many jars we had tucked away in various corners, but now that they are all on one shelf, it looks promising!  I can almost see these filling up with jams, relishes, pickles, dried herbs, and what have you!  Hopefully as my journey progresses I can share some of those exciting photos.  (And yes, I realize that few others will find that "exciting" but cut me some slack here.)

And just for fun, we made pumpkin pancakes this morning from some
of our pumpkin meat.  The kids ate several servings!

Garden Progress - Oct. 18, 2013

This is where things start getting exciting!  Mostly the plants are progressing nicely -- with lettuce being a question mark.  Maybe next week all the peas will start to sprout!  I love that initial discovery of a little green popping through the dirt.  So much promise in such a little package.

I still go around every day and pick little weeds here and there.  I think I picked up an arugula sprout that I thought was a weed.  I ate it and it was yummy whatever it was.

Celery -- which I forgot to mention last week.  

Cauliflower -- which looked a little sad right after planting has perked up.

Cabbage.  

Radish sprouting!

Healthy looking romain lettuce

Kale coming along nicely

Gem lettuce looking questionable -- not that green and not showing growth

Garlic sprouting!

Bullet Sage Pesto

One of my new kitchen toys this year is the Magic Bullet.  I bought it because I accidentally dropped my blender and broke it.  I realize that I rarely used the blender because it was huge, heavy, and kind of leaked.  The only think I really ever used it for was smoothies.

So, trying to downsize, I picked up a Bullet.   I've used it for smoothies, but have also been trying to find other applications.  One of my favorites is making break crumbs.  It comes out much finder than using the food processor.

The latest project was making pesto with my sage pruning and preparing it on bread, garlic-bread-style. 

I used cashews, lemon, parmesan, garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper, and of course -- sage.