Splatter Cloth, Book, Fireworks, Movie

For my birthday last year I was given the gift of a microwave splatter cloth which, I might say, is a very handy little item. However, it has a secondary use which was not intended by the makers, it is great for covering an opened wine bottle to ensure those pesky little fruit flies don’t get into it. It is a mesh cloth with little weights round the edges (the red dots). Researching it I discover Amazon.com sell them.

I have now finished Ricochet by Sandra Brown and thoroughly enjoyed it. Its not a new book, not sure where my friend got his copy but I got mine from the library. If you like detective/crime stories this fits the bill. I did guess some of it but not all. There was a pretty good twist at the end. Only trouble its left me with no desire to start anything else at the moment so I am at a loose end. Maybe I’ll go watch a movie.

You know I never thought of this before, but in Canada this last weekend it was Victoria Day when we celebrate our Royal connections by letting off lots of bangers and rockets, etc. Many of us have pets, or had them, who were absolutely terrified of all the bangs and hisses. But apparently nobody thinks of the poor wild animals who may be equally terrified of what is happening. How very inconsiderate we humans are. I even condemn myself for never having thought of it before and I am unaware of anyone else who has. Unfortunately there are a large percentage of people who, even if it was brought to their attention, probably wouldn’t give a damn anyway. Especially those who are lighting fireworks well into the small hours.

Tomorrow night a friend and I are going to see The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel which I have been looking forward to seeing for a while. Dame Judi Dench and Maggie Smith are in the movie and from the clips I have seen it should be a good film, unless, as has happened before, all the best bits were shown in the clips and the rest isn’t much cop. I do hope this isn’t the case. Its about a bunch of people who decide to take the inadequate pensions to a newly refurbished and considerably cheaper hotel in India. I honestly don’t see how a movie with those two ladies in it can possibly fail, I have always loved any performances they have previously given, so here’s hoping. I will obviously tell you all about it. My main post tomorrow will be as a guest post on Blogging A to Z. I hope you will check it out.

I am thinking I will make some potted shrimp this week, haven’t done so in a while, I really like them. I gave the recipe in my P is for Potted on the 18th of April. Matt and I both enjoy it. Unfortunately we can no longer get the little brown shrimp which were plentiful in England and the coasts of the Channel, they added a much better flavour. But regular shrimp work pretty well. I also need to make some more asparagus soup, we are supposed to have frozen it for later, but we have been eating it. Well its good. I need to go buy some more asparagus although I understand that is suffering from lack of rain.

Here is another asparagus recipe, simple to do, delightful to eat. The anchovies just give it a pleasant salty taste which is better than just using salt. Try it, you’ll like it. Just don’t try anchovies on their own, they are not very pleasant to eat like that.

Asparagus with Anchovies and Garlic

4 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
2 Tbs minced garlic
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper
2 bunches asparagus, tough ends trimmed, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 Tbs water
2 tsp anchovy paste or 1 anchovy fillet, minced

1. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add garlic and crushed red pepper and cook, stirring constantly, until the garlic is fragrant, 30 seconds to 1 minute. Add asparagus, water and anchovy; cook, stirring often, until the asparagus is tender-crisp, 5 to 6 minutes

Servings: 4
Source: Eating Well

Have a great day

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