Wildlife, Shopping, Dust, IP Experiment

I have seen  documentaries about how wildlife is adapting to towns and seen many pictures of foxes living in towns. Then I have recently been wondering about the park outside our windows and wondering what, if anything, other than squirrels of course, lived around it. Then today, we were coming home passing another park area close by here and be damned if a fox didn't cross the road in front of us. I was quite excited to see it bearing in mind that the best we have seen before was a mother Canada Goose with her string of goslings feeding on the grass verges. We have a lot of black squirrels here, I thought they were a separate breed, but somehow they have apparently mutated from grey squirrels. Used to love watching squirrels in NC, we put corn out for them and they would sit on the wooden platform and eat from the cobs. Think I have a picture somewhere. We used to have lots of birds feeding or nesting in our yard too. I miss that.

We went for a haircut this afternoon and then went to collect groceries. Between us we got the

shopping cart which seems to be on loan from a local store (although we have two again somehow) and filled it up. They are very heavy and I can hardly push them empty let alone manoeuver them through the doors. We don't have electronic buttons, we need them mind you. Matt pushed the trolley and I opened the doors - 5 not counting the elevator. Got the shopping to the kitchen and then took the trolley back (the store does know we have  them apparently although they usually only leave us one) and I parked the car in the underground parking lot. I said to Matt, is this worth $15. We decided it wasn't, but I'm, not so sure. Pushing the carts round the store might be OK, but not round this building.

Talking of the parking lot, the car is dusty as anything from being down  there. Didn't have this problem before they cleaned the garage!! I cleaned the car quite recently and really don't want to have to shell out again because of the dust, but I guess I am going to have to, I could hardly see out of the rear windshield. Whilst waiting for our groceries I cleaned it with a Kleenex, not very successful, but...

Oops, I have just realised they tried to deliver something to us from Costco and we weren't here. Gotta go. OK, panic over, they left a ticket and I can pick up "round the corner" after 1. Phew.

I have never been a devotee of stews as such or maybe I really mean stewed beef, not sure. Anyway, I found this Nigella Lawson recipe some years ago and have made it several times, it is ideal for freezing and keeps really well. However, in comes my Instant Pot. I have endeavoured to adapt it, the present quantity is way too big for my little pot, but I must be careful how I cut things down. Leave the spices alone Josephine. We will see what happens and I will be sure to let you know. So, below is the original recipe - for a start I have cut the beef back to 1 lb. and will go from there. From what I have been reading, it is a good idea to leave out the flour when cooking and add cornstarch when it is all done. So, here goes, wish me luck..

Spiced Beef in Red Wine

There is nothing to stop you from serving spiced beef in red wine at a dinner party, but proper

cooking should not be undertaken only for company. I make a batch of the beef and, when it is cool, bag it up in single portions and put it in the freezer. It makes a great warming supper for nights when you are lazing on a sofa watching television. Just because it's Wednesday, you need not have to resort to a bagel or grilled cheese for dinner.

2 slices bacon, roughly chopped
2 large onions, roughly chopped
2 large leeks, white and light-green parts only, roughly chopped
3 medium carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
½ cup fresh parsley
1/3 cup flour
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 ½ lbs chuck steak in 2-inch cubes
2 Tbs vegetable oil, or more as needed
pinch ground cloves
1 ½ cups red wine
2 cups beef stock or canned beef broth
2 Tbs Worcestershire sauce
3 star anise
1 Tbs light brown sugar

1. Working in batches in a food processor, process bacon, onions, leeks, carrots and parsley until finely chopped. Transfer mixture to a large bowl, and set aside. Place flour in a freezer bag or other plastic bag. Season with salt and pepper. Add steak cubes, seal bag, and shake until cubes are well coated.

2. Place a flameproof casserole dish over medium heat, and add 2 tablespoons oil. When hot, add beef in batches, turning until well seared on all sides. As beef is browned, transfer to a plate, and set aside.

3. If casserole dish is dry, add 1 tablespoon oil. Place over medium heat, and add bacon and vegetable mixture and ground cloves. Sauté until softened, about 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, combine wine, beef stock, Worcestershire sauce, star anise and brown sugar. Place over medium-high heat, and bring to a boil. When vegetables have softened, pour liquid over vegetables.

4. Return beef to pan, and stir well. Bring to a boil, partly cover, and reduce heat to low. Simmer gently until beef is tender, about 2 hours. Serve hot. If desired, stew may be cooked and then covered and refrigerated for up to 2 days or frozen for a month.

Servings: 6

Author Nigella Lawson.

Have a great day
 

Hurricane Matthew, Cooking, Thanksgiving and Oktoberfest, Wifi

Seems like Matthew is wreaking havoc in the Caribbean - heading for Cuba at the moment. The trouble with the islands, they don't really have anywhere to run to which makes them even more frightening. At least on the mainland you can head inland and hopefully avoid it altogether - OK your home might get damaged, but so long as everyone is alive, homes can be rebuilt. We were so lucky when we lived in North Carolina, a lot of hurricanes came our way and even though we weren't there, when we returned we still had a home to return to. A friend who had a house right on the Sound got flooded several times over the year not to mention the ruin of her carefully tended garden. She told me to come clean up my mess one time after Hurricane Josephine, now doubt she would want my husband to do the same LOL The picture shows the storm as of the morning, Tuesday.

Tuesday morning I decided to make the recipe I posted on Monday for Spiced Beef in Red Wine only problem was, it turned out to be a warm afternoon and really rather too hot for a beef stew. However, we ate it anyway and it was delicious. I also have 3 more meals in the freezer for when it is a bit cooler. It really is sweatsville this afternoon/evening. Talking to our new neighbours and they asked what the delicious smell was. Asked a friend if she would like to come over for Thanksgiving this weekend but her son should be returning from his Greek trip so she declined. Being Thanksgiving round here, also means Oktoberfest which will start on Friday with the tapping of the keg. We have never been involved in this although it is supposed to be one of the biggest outside Germany. OK for younger people, guess we are a tad past it these days. I'll stay home and drink my bubbly LOL.

I am expecting a call from our ISP technician this morning. I am having terrific trouble with my wifi. The PC works fine on cable, but the laptop is wifi and the connection drops and comes back all day long. It drives me bonkers. It may require swapping out my modem I gather.

This looks like a delicious soup and should appeal to my vegan friends too.

Cream of Cashew Pea Soup

Cashews lend body, creaminess, and richness to this pea soup and also make it vegan; sub almonds if

you prefer.

¼ cup olive oil
2 large onions, finely chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
4 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
Kosher salt, freshly ground pepper
2 cups raw cashews
2 Tbs raw or light brown sugar
1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
2 lbs frozen sugar snap or green peas, thawed
1 Tbs malt vinegar
Thinly sliced scallions and crushed potato chips (for serving

1. Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-low. Add onions, celery, and garlic and cook, stirring often and adding a splash or so of water if the bottom of pan gets too brown, until golden brown, 30–40 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Add cashews, sugar, red pepper flakes, and 3 cups water and bring mixture to a simmer. Cook until vegetables are very soft and losing their structure, 10–15 minutes.

2. Blend one-third of sugar snap peas with one-third of vegetable mixture in a blender, adding some cooking liquid from vegetable mixture as needed to thin, until very smooth, about 2 minutes. Press purée through a fine-mesh sieve into a medium saucepan; discard solids. Working in 2 batches, repeat with remaining peas and vegetable mixture, adding water as needed if you run out of cooking liquid. If soup is still very thick, thin with water until you get a velvety, pourable consistency. (You should have about 7 cups soup.)

3. Stir vinegar into soup; season with more salt and pepper and warm over medium-low until heated through.

4. Serve soup topped with scallions and potato chips.

5. Do Ahead: Soup can be made 2 days ahead. Let cool; cover and chill. Reheat over medium-low, thinning with water as needed until pourable.

Servings: 6

Author: Brooks Headley
Source: Bon Appétit


Have a great day
 

Stromatolites. 90th Birthday, Kir Royale,

I first heard about stromatolites from Glenda Larke who is an author and friend now back living in her native country, Australia. I have always had trouble remembering the name and figured if I blogged about them I might remember. They are something like 3 billion years old and are the origin of oxygen, without which we humans would never have developed. They are still forming in places like Shark Bay in Western Australia. Their formation is quite complicated to explain so if you want to know about it, click on the link. There are other places in the world where stromatolites have formed and still exist today, but nowadays they are few and far between. It is incredible to think that if these stromatolites hadn't been pushing CO2 into the air for all that time, we wouldn't be around. What brought them to my current attention was watching Coast Australia which is a British programme shown regularly on TVO (Canadian TV). Tonight they were visiting Western Australia the home of Shark Bay and it's stromatolites. I have remembered what they are for years, but their name would not stick in my head, maybe this time it will.

Today we celebrate the 90th birthday of one of our bowling friends. She is an incredible woman and extremely active. She is always off somewhere for a visit and she bowls twice a week during the winter season. She has kids in Michigan so often goes there visiting plus going on all kinds of bus trips and to theatrical performances. We have ordered a cake and hope it can be slipped into the alley without her noticing it's arrival. Turns out we had a bit of a screw up on the time of bowling. Partly my fault, never thought to tell the caterer what time our bowling was and she didn't think to ask me. It is being made by the same woman who catered Matt's 80th a couple of years ago. I sent her the only photo I had of our friend but it wasn't good enough, sadly.

As many of you know, I usually drink a couple of glasses of bubbly on Sunday morning before lunch. However, yesterday I suddenly thought of Kir Royale and decided to make a champagne cocktail. All you do is add Cassis liqueur to the sparkling wine. Cassis is made from blackcurrents. It is one of those liqueurs made by monks in France (or it was). The label says it is produced by L'Abbé Françoise but whether that is still a true abbey any more, I don't know. Just googled. It would appear that that is just a label. The original Cassis was/is produced in Burgundy, France and these days is marketed as Crème de Cassis de Bourgogne. Nobody else is allowed to use that derivation. Same as champagne. It is not allowed to be marketed as champagne unless it is produced in Champagne, France. Well, wherever it is produced, and my label says it is definitely produced in France, it makes a damned good cocktail.

This should be an absolutely delicious dish by the look of the ingredients in particular. Nigella Lawson, a British chef, really knows her stuff. This is very similar to a recipe I have made for years. I will certainly be trying this version.

Spiced Beef in Red Wine

There is nothing to stop you from serving spiced beef in red wine at a dinner party, but proper cooking should not be undertaken only for company. I make a batch of the beef and, when it is cool, bag it up in single portions and put it in the freezer. It makes a great warming supper for nights when

you are lazing on a sofa watching television. Just because it's Wednesday, you need not have to resort to a bagel or grilled cheese for dinner.

2 slices bacon, roughly chopped
2 large onions, roughly chopped
2 large leeks, white and light-green parts only, roughly chopped
3 medium carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
½ cup fresh parsley
1/3 cup flour
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 ½ lbs chuck steak in 2-inch cubes
2 Tbs vegetable oil, or more as needed
pinch ground cloves
1 ½ cups red wine
2 cups beef stock or canned beef broth
2 Tbs Worcestershire sauce
3 star anise
1 Tbs light brown sugar

1. Working in batches in a food processor, process bacon, onions, leeks, carrots and parsley until finely chopped. Transfer mixture to a large bowl, and set aside. Place flour in a freezer bag or other plastic bag. Season with salt and pepper. Add steak cubes, seal bag, and shake until cubes are well coated.

2. Place a flameproof casserole dish over medium heat, and add 2 tablespoons oil. When hot, add beef in batches, turning until well seared on all sides. As beef is browned, transfer to a plate, and set aside.

3. If casserole dish is dry, add 1 tablespoon oil. Place over medium heat, and add bacon and vegetable mixture and ground cloves. Sauté until softened, about 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, combine wine, beef stock, Worcestershire sauce, star anise and brown sugar. Place over medium-high heat, and bring to a boil. When vegetables have softened, pour liquid over vegetables.

4. Return beef to pan, and stir well. Bring to a boil, partly cover, and reduce heat to low. Simmer gently until beef is tender, about 2 hours. Serve hot. If desired, stew may be cooked and then covered and refrigerated for up to 2 days or frozen for a month.

Servings: 6

Author: Nigella Lawson
Source: The New York Times





Have a great day