It's a Dog's Life

Oh I just wanted to post this picture of my Daisy that I found the other day. She's such a great companion, an all around "good dog". I must confess though, I did complain to Tom today as I ironed black pants and shirts that I am a bit tired of white dog hair on everything and slobbers, on a white shirt I had to get a wet cloth and rub the dried Daisy slobber off it....she likes to walk under the clothes as they hang on my indoor dryer thingamabob. Here in Dubai we do not have clothes dryers, or at least not here in this Villa.
Reminds me we got the new magazine today called Inside Out and it shows pictures of homes on the Palm Jumeriah...oh my goodness, talk about fancy schmancy. I'm not sure I could live that fancy...then again...I could think about it.
We saw the movie this weekend about Mark Zuckerman who founded Facebook, it was called Social Network. It was an interesting movie and how weird to be worth 25 billion dollars and be only 24 years old. We can't even conceive of that kind of money. As it is we feel rich and we're no where near that kind of money. I'd like to think if I had it, that I could do some good in the world, I don't know what exactly but something good. I know a really nicely done homeless shelter in my home town would be nice, also a nice women's shelter, though I think both places need to require that recipients of their services pay back with their own services to the shelter, either by cooking, cleaning or gardening to help keep the place up. Wouldn't it be nice, even in one town in America to see NO homeless folks on the streets and to have a really nice women's/children's shelter for those abused in their own homes and wouldn't it be really nice to see abuse disappear? I wonder if some sort of rehabilitation services for both shelters would work.
I know my Dad was raised from age 13 to 18 in the Odd Fellow's and Rebecca's Orphanage in Oklahoma, and he had to work on their farm, I don't think that hurt him any...but what did hurt him was the loss of his father to a ruptured appendix and then the poverty of his mother which forced her to place her six children in the orphanage. He had very mixed feelings about that part of it and thus mixed feelings about her. This was back in the 30's and I can't conceive even what that must've been like then for her or for him or his siblings. Only one of the six children is alive today, my Uncle Davey, I think he's 86 now and what a treasure. I should ask him a few questions.

Plum Cake

This recipe is from Martha Stewart Living and is delightful for a quickie dessert or to take to my stitch group.
Plum Cake

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for skillet
1 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for skillet
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
Coarse salt
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar
1 large egg
1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk
2 ripe medium plums, thinly sliced

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter an 8-inch ovenproof skillet (preferably cast-iron); dust with flour, tapping out excess or a square baking pan or a large pie pan. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and 1/2 teaspoon salt.
Beat butter and 3/4 cup sugar with a mixer on medium speed until pale and fluffy. Beat in egg. Add flour mixture alternating with buttermilk.
Pour batter into prepared skillet, and smooth top. Fan plums on top, and sprinkle with remaining 2 tablespoons sugar. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 35 to 40 minutes. Let cool slightly.

I like to use demerara sugar for the top and I just butter a large glass pie plate for the cake. It's nice served warm with vanilla ice cream or just with tea at stitch group.
I hope everyone visits Martha's website for all the wonderful ideas she so generously shares there.

Chicken Noodle Soup and Life Lessons #6 & 7 & 8

Have you ever been invited to go somewhere and think "oh I'm not sure I want to do that" but then you go anyway as you don't want to hurt anyone's feelings because you're an old stick in the mud? Well next time I have that I'm not sure feeling, I'm staying in. My stitch group, eight of us I think, decided we'd go as a group to Dragon Mart way out in the middle of the desert and we'd shop then have lunch. So my expectation was we'd be back by 1 or 1:30...well at 3 we were finally underway and they wanted to stop at yet another place, the Outlet Mall and I felt like an idiot begging them to do it another day or drop me at a taxi ...and I was the one who sat on a bench and did a lot of waiting, still with my old arthritis rearing it's ugly little head all the time I got really worn out between 9:30 and 3. Life Lesson # 6 Never go shopping with 7 other women! Thus by that night I started getting a sore throat and next day even worse and next day the full blown cold! I know I just wore myself out. You see Dragon Mart is gigantic, like maybe a mile long? not sure...but I know we covered a lot of area. As soon as we got back I went to bed, straight down for a nap, crashed, boom, out like a light! Then woke up sick. So now I have that nastiest of nasties a cold. So what do I do for a cold, well when I can gather my wits about me which I think I just did, I make a pot of Chicken Noodle Soup. Homemade of course.

Todays Version of Chicken Noodle Soup
I had leftover already boned chicken pieces in the freezer. I began by cutting up one sweet onion and two big pieces of celery and three garlic toes, those I sauteed until clear in lemon olive oil (find that at Carlucci's either in person or on line at http://www.carluccios.com/shop) oh it made the veggies smell delicious as they simmered. Then I cut up a big fat carrot, diced it well and put it in a small saucepan with more lemon olive oil and just covered with water to cook through, you see I forgot to add it to the other veggies. I added in six spinach balls, here in Dubai our frozen spinach is formed in the size of tater tots...then I added in Poultry Seasoning, salt and pepper, and garlic powder. You see you need all that garlic to get better...haha....then I decided I would add the juice of half a lemon and six cans of chicken broth and then four little round bunches of tagliatelle, and I crunched those up as I added them. Well then I decided I might like to add some cannellini beans, well the ones you get here in the can still seem to be a bit crunchy so I've got them boiling away while my soup is cooking, I'll add them in a little bit. I think that's all....I did a simple taste test...wow, pretty good with that lemon, now I can't wait until everything is all cooked together. I think I've decided to serve that for dinner. I'll also make an egg salad, bacon and basil sandwich, on toasted seeded bread. Yum, sounds good to me. Now, let's see, what did I do with that extra half a lemon, oh yes....I made myself a lemon tea....bring your water kettle to the boil, squeeze the lemon into a cup, add a spoon of honey then the hot water, stir and drink...soothing drink and supposedly Lemon cleans out your system, well let's hope so. Ahhhhh......maybe this will make me feel better fast.

Now if I can get myself really moving I want to try my hand at Malva Pudding. You can easily find it on the internet, my recipe came from Food.com. My stitch group went out for lunch last week too, but it was just lunch, no shopping but we went to Festival City Mall which is also huge and it was quite a trek to get to the restaurant, oh what was the name of it? oh yes Spurs, it's South African I believe......it was someone's birthday so we celebrated with Malva Pudding. It must be the best thing I've ever eaten in the desert category.
Oh I am not such a genius, while I sat right here by the stove and typed, my beans ran out of water before I noticed, well that takes me to Life Lesson #7. Buy really good pans. Mine are Jamie Oliver and I adore them, unfortunately they are quite difficult to find in the states, but never mind that I have purchased them here. Well here's what I did, I salvaged the top layer of beans, well yes, they do taste just a tiny bit smokey but they're fine, I did a taste test, then I put my little Jamie Oliver sauce pan to soak in hot water, I will give it twenty minutes to do that then all I have to do is scrape those beans out that got stuck in the brown/black goo and use my trusty little stainless steel scrubber and that wonderful pan will be good as new in less than five minutes, no kidding, I've burnt stuff before on these wonderful pans and they have always come clean as a whistle. I can remember way back when...I've been known to toss a heavily scorched pan.


......if you're out there Jamie, I do love your pans! Now my soup has that sort of smokey what on earth did you burn smell, but the taste is still good...now to cover it all up and get out my Lysol Linen scented spray and hopefully Tom will be none the wiser to my spoilt beans! I wonder sometimes if Martha Stewart or Julia Child ever burnt something onto their pans?


You see after about 10 minutes soaking in the hot water, I scrape this to one side so you can see how easily Jamie's pans come clean...and now I've had my bowl of soup, I'm still sneezing and sniffling of course but have had good nourishing stuff and I've made a pot full so that will be dinner as well my lunch tomorrow and after that whatever is leftover I think I will freeze for another lunch.

Now Life Lesson # 8 is extremely important, taught to me by my dear most of the time sweet husband...he says "Expect nothing, then you're not disappointed". I did make a huge booboo today by burning my beans and as I dumped the "good" ones into my soup pot I did wonder if I was ruining the whole pot, though I couldn't stop myself from dumping them in, I didn't expect anything and thus my soup is delicious!

Twenty Five Years

For twenty five years I have shared my life and love with this man. What an incredible experience and how blessed I am to have had these years. I can still feel the coolness of that fall day and the warmth of this man as we stood on our front porch amongst our immediate family and a small handful of friends and exchanged our vows. Our wedding was made even more special as Tom took my daughters to love and cherish as his own and he meant it and has stood by his vows.
I wish our wedding pictures were with us today to reflect on, but they're home in the states and we will see them soon. For now some really special memories are with me, at the end of the short ceremony Tom's father turned to my mother and said "it's about time". I always did think that simple loving man was full of wisdom and on this note he was so wise.
My wish to all who read the few words I write is that you too have a love this strong, this secure, this wonderful a marriage, to call your own.

Limes, Limes and More Limes

My little Lime Tree sure needed a hair cut, it had grown out at least 40 feet around and perhaps 20 to 25 feet tall....it was sagging with the weight of itself so I did ask the Gardener to go ahead and cut it back some...herewith the result and all the limes that were on the cut off branches and the thing is still FULL!
I've learned several other preservatives...one is to dry the entire lime, there are recipes from the Middle East and Asia that require whole dried limes, I believe you crush them in a mortar and pestle. Also I learned that you can slice them and freeze them...thus I sliced a bunch, laid them out on a cookie sheet to freeze then I will collect them into a zip loc bag...my friends tell me that you then just take one out as needed to add to a drink such as limeade or lemonade or even hot tea or some club soda.

Life Lesson #5/a bit graphic if you're "delicate", but it's funny

Well...I certainly won't do any photos for this one but must share this Life Lesson #5...if you did not go see "The Bucket List" either go see it or rent the movie or better yet, buy the DVD or video. Jack Nicholson gives us a few Life Lessons in that movie and they are these three, never pass up a bathroom, never trust a fart and never waste a hard on...I know they're all a bit graphic but bear with me as I share the Life Lesson from them...Tom wasn't listening apparently when the LIfe Lessons were given. The other day he called me frantically from work telling me he had had a horrible accident...he had let what he thought was a small fart slip out in his office at work...fortunately for him he was paying attention and made it to the bathroom just in time so to speak, though not totally...I had to pack up clean clothes including shirt, underwear, pants, and shoes along with a wash cloth, towel and plenty of soap too. Well...as he called me of course, I laughed so hard I nearly died, but began gathering up things to rush to help him...fortunately he had no meetings scheduled and everyone in his area seemed to be gone for the day already....so as we talked my stomach began to chortle terribly...I thought it was simply from laughing, perhaps sympathy pains...so I dashed out for the 30 minute drive to help him get cleaned up....I had remembered my cell phone for a change so was able to call to let him know how close I was and what floor is your office on anyway? and he said oh I'm waiting outside...hope you brought a towel...yes I had...well my stomach kept cramping, hurting something awful. However, I did pay attention to Jack Nicholson's Life Lessons so I didn't even entertain the idea of a fart. Well I got to the University, indeed he was waiting outside, just too anxious to get on home and get this mess fixed up....when he got in the car he told me that in his haste he forgot to lock the bathroom door....of course in walks one of the "Tea Boys" they call them, these are young men who actually serve tea in the executive offices, they do not speak any English at all...understand very little etc...well one of them walked in as Tom stood in front of the stink, drawers on the floor trying his best to clean with paper towels etc....we nearly died laughing as I drove away..again the cramping in my stomach...I told him this is not going to be a fun ride home...another at least 1/2 hour depending on traffic...well the traffic Gods were with us and we dashed home in record time...and of course I had a rather rough time in the bathroom too...we must've both eaten something the night before that urgently wanted out....but we sure did laugh....we really haven't a clue what the culprit was but we did both learn that we must pay attention when someone gives us a LIfe Lesson.

Limecello

grated zest of about 50 limes, dries well overnight, store in a glass jar.

Limecello in the making, at this point it is simply vodka and the lime zest.

My set up, limes, vodka, zester, juicer. I freeze lime juice in 1/2 cup amounts in zip loc bags, lay them flat, works out very well, then you can easily stack them up in the freezer. You do not use the juice in the limecello, just the zest which is later filtered out. After a few weeks I will need to make a simple syrup to add to the vodka/zest mixture. Then it will set again for several weeks.
This is the recipe I am following from my friend John....I'm hoping to get a good result and also hoping if it is good that I can make it again next year. I would've made more this year but only had the one bottle of vodka.

Limecello recipe from John:
take some of your limes ( depending on the size, 45-50 if they are small ones and peel the zest off, taking care not to get any of the white pulp.. Then in a glass or metal bowl, soak the zest's in 1 liter of Everclear (grain alcohol) if you can't get that, use a plain, unflavored vodka.
Let them marinate for 3-5 weeks, until the zests are the consistency of a chip. In a separate pan, make a simple syrup. 1 ltr of water mixed with the equivielent amount in white sugar. Bring to almost a boil and then simmer and stir until the sugar is completely dissolved.

Set the syrup aside to cool. Take the zest's and drain the vodka off using cheese cloth. Mix the vodka with the syrup an ...Voila! you have a nice batch of lime-a -cello. Sip, savor, repeat.

So my limecello has been quietly brewing in the fridge now for 3 weeks. I will let it sit another two weeks before making the syrup. I notice though that my zest has turned a bit dark as has the vodka. hmmmm....we'll see.