Blogging, Reading

I occasionally check the stats on my blogs to see how many people have been to visit me. Once in a while I got deeper and see where and why people are ending up on my blog. I was a bit ‘took aback’ yesterday to discover one person had arrived at a blog I had written in 2009. I guess if you are googling for something in particular that is likely to happen, one just doesn’t think of it though. 2009 is quite a way back, I posted my first blogs in October 2008, it feels like I have been blogging longer. For the longest time I was disappointed that I didn’t get many comments, but since joining the A to Z challenge, I get a lot more and looking at some of the other blogs in the challenge, I don’t think I want as many as they have. Some get hundreds of comments; complimentary though.

I haven’t talked about reading much lately, primarily because I have been downloading a lot of free books onto my Kindle, some of which have been great, some quite mediocre. So what, they were free. There is a trilogy I have enjoyed which, this may surprise those of you who know me, is about dragons LOL. When did I ever back away from dragon books? This one was the Dragon Stones Saga and I am awaiting book 3. I talked about these in April. Right now I am reading The Blood Gate by David Ross Erickson which I am enjoying but it is fairly slow going. I still have a lot of Kindle books to read plus I also got a book from the library the other day called Ricochet by Sandra Brown – a friend was reading it and I thought it looked good. A lot of my reading time has been taken up with reading other people’s blogs and I can assure you it takes up quite a lot of time. Since I started writing this I have begun reading ricochet, seems like a very good story.

This is a holiday weekend in Canada and a lot of people have gone ‘up north’ to their cottages and trailers. As a lot of our friends are retired, I don’t see why they leave it to the weekends to go away, they have all the time in the world. I miss our little trailer which we used to haul around all over the place even when we didn’t have lots of time. A lot of people seem to use their trailers as separate homes and leave them on one site all of the time. Where’s the fun in that? We did do that with one trailer we owned, but planned to move it around but for one reason or another, never did so, sold it before we moved it. Prior to that we had a small trailer which went everywhere with us at one time, it was with us when we first found North Carolina and we really had some fun with it. No, the picture wasn’t of ours, but it could well have been. I know we have some pictures but not sure where at the moment.

The picture of this recipe appealed to me, as did the recipe itself of course, so here it is, being shared with you.

Zucchini, Tomato, and Swiss Cheese Pie

ByDana Treat
WebMD Recipe from Foodily.com

Some people are afraid of yeast so they don’t make bread. Some people are afraid of crusts so they don’t make tarts or pies. (I myself am afraid of frosting layer cakes but I don’t let it stop me.) So, If I say “tart”, are you one of those people who gets scared? Truth be told, I find crusts can be tricky even thought I have made a lot of them. Every time I make a pie, I say a little prayer to the crust gods to make things go smoothly. My only advice is that it helps to have a good recipe and lots of practice.

If you do suffer from a crust phobia, please make this pie. I would say it’s like a crust-less quiche, but it does in fact have a crust. It is nothing more than some breadcrumbs sprinkled into a buttered pie plate, but somehow just that little bit of attention makes it more elegant, interesting, and also helps hold the slices together. The lack of a butter and/or shortening crust also makes a slice much lighter and healthier – so you can be a little more heavy-handed with the cheese.

This is one of many Jeanne Lemlin tarts that I have made – all easy, all delicious. It is totally adaptable and great for lunch, brunch, or dinner. Although she says it is important to use Swiss cheese in this one to help keep it all together, I bet you could substitute another firm cheese and have it turn out fabulously well.

Ingredients

1 tbsp. unsalted butter, room temperature
¼ cup bread crumbs
Olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced
3 medium zucchini, quartered lengthwise and thinly sliced
1 tsp. fennel seed
¼ tsp. salt
Freshly ground black pepper to taste
3 large eggs
1/3 cup milk
¼ pound grated Swiss cheese
3 tbsp. grated fresh Parmesan cheese

Instructions

Preheat oven to 375º F. Butter a 9 inch pie plate, then sprinkle the bread crumbs all over the sides and bottom. Allow whatever loose crumbs are there to just sit on the bottom.

Heat a large skillet over medium heat. Add enough olive oil to just coat the bottom, then add the onion. Sauté until translucent, then add the garlic and sauté for another 3 minutes.

Stir in the diced tomatoes and sauté another 5 minutes. Raise the heat to high. Mix in the zucchini, fennel seed, salt and pepper. Cook until the zucchini is barely tender, about 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and cool 5 minutes. (The recipe may be prepared in advance to this point and chill up to 24 hours. Bring to room temperature before proceeding.)

Beat the eggs in a large bowl. Stir in the milk, then mix in the zucchini mixture. Pour half into the prepared pie plate, top with the Swiss cheese, then pour on the remaining vegetable mixture. Sprinkle the Parmesan cheese all over the top.

Bake 30 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean and the top is golden brown. Let sit 10 minutes before cutting.

Adapted from Quick Vegetarian Pleasures

Total Servings: 4

Have a great weekend