St. Paddy’s, Medical, Bowling.

St. Patrick’s is the anniversary of my first wedding 52 years ago. Had I stayed with my first husband I would be a widow now anyway. I don’t suppose I would have ended up in Canada either. The church in the background was the one which is featured in Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations where Pip meets the convict. It’s pretty old. It goes back to the time of Edward the Confessor and is mentioned in the Domesday Book; the actual current building goes back to the 12th century. It is also the birthday of Matt’s younger daughter and her husband Mike, the wildlife artist too. Unusually, they are both the same age. There is a link to Mike’s wildlife art on this page. If you have never checked it out, do so, I am sure you will enjoy his art.

We saw the specialist on Monday and Matt is due for his procedure on Thursday at 1:30, of course he has to be at the hospital at noon. I have asked a friend to drive us there and back as I am still having dizzy spells which I think are to do with the Cipro I was taking. Hoping to catch up with our doc on Saturday as I am still getting lots of episodes of hypoglycemia too, (low sugars) as I mentioned before.

The weather people were talking about flurries of snow last night. I do hope not. Bowling wasn’t great, it wasn’t bad either. No 300 games though. Won’t be bowling again till next Monday as we will be at the hospital on Thursday. Just as well, I hadn’t registered it was March Break, doesn’t mean a lot to us but of course it does mean that the bowling alley will be full of screaming kids. Well many of them will scream.

I am a Scotch whisky (without the e) drinker and a champagne drinker so seeing this recipe which uses Irish whiskey for St. Paddy’s Day as well as champagne, I figured I would share it.

Cork County Bubbles

Contributed by John Coltharp

• SERVINGS: Makes 1 Drink

Mixologist John Coltharp likes making this Champagne cocktail with herbal, woody Jameson 12-year Irish whiskey (made in Ireland's County Cork).

1. Ice
2. 1 ounce Irish whiskey
3. 1/4 ounce yellow Chartreuse
4. 1/2 ounce fresh lemon juice
5. 1 teaspoon honey mixed with 1/2 teaspoon warm water
6. 1 ounce chilled Champagne
7. 1 lemon twist, preferably spiral-cut, for garnish

1. Fill a cocktail shaker with ice. Add all of the remaining ingredients except the Champagne and garnish and shake well. Strain into a chilled flute, stir in the Champagne and garnish with the twist.

Have a great day

This and That and a No Fly Zone. TV Thursday.

I went on about not eating specific foods on St. Patrick’s Day, but funnily enough, I seriously contemplated having corned beef and cabbage for dinner. Its not a bad meal, if I had had any corned beef handy I might have cooked it. I didn’t however. For those in the UK, we are not talking about the stuff in a tin, but salted beef brisket.

I always thought I had a pretty good knowledge of the English language but came across a word in Matt’s crossword yesterday “oppugn” – to oppose, contradict or call into question. Anyone else ever heard of it before?

The other day I printed up my blog book from July – Dec 2010. Matt has been reading it and he takes great delight in pointing out my typos. Once upon a time he used to read what I wrote before it was published, but for one reason or another, that no longer happens. Guess I should make sure he does read them first and then you wouldn’t have to put up with any mistakes, hopefully. One thing that does puzzle me, most of the pictures come out a regular size, not too big, but my signature when printed from the blog books, becomes comparatively huge, I have no idea why.

I don’t know about where you live, but gas prices are jumping up and down at the pumps here. Barrel prices have been doing much the same, obviously, and will continue to do so until the crisis in the Middle East is settled. The UN have decreed a ‘no fly’ zone over Libya which will certainly help the rebels and hopefully prevent civilian casualties, however, the UN have granted permission for a lot more interference from the rest of the world so there is no telling what is going to happen. There was a report at home saying that all prices have jumped 4% which is the highest increase for many years, this spirals because people, particularly pensioners, will need more money to live and I don’t see us (pensioners) getting it.

Last night we watched a couple of interesting programmes, one about the Ring of Fire (as it is known) in the Pacific which obviously includes Japan. I had seen this particular programme before but they showed it again because of what has just happened. I had forgotten that Japan is sitting at the conjunction of four tectonic plates and this is why it is so very prone to earthquakes. They virtually predicted this current disaster although they missed out on the nuclear problems.

The second programme (on the Doc Zone)) was about the Irish Potato Famine which I learnt about in history and more or less forgot. I hadn’t a clue about what had happened and how a potato blight had caused millions of Irish people to starve and they were given no help at all, in fact some of the landlords, if not all, were only too happy to get rid of a lot of the peasantry. At least a million died at the time. The story continued to cover the exodus of these starving people in an attempt to start a new life in Canada. Life on board ship was appalling and one particular ship ran aground on ice off the Newfoundland coast. The Captain skipped with his crew in the lifeboat having nailed down the hatches which, luckily, one or two of the other crew men ripped off again. Although many were lost, particularly children, quite a number were eventually rescued by another ship. Unfortunately the captain was never caught and punished for his crimes. A lot of this was the fault of the British so we should hang our heads in shame.

I had never eaten raw spinach until I came to Canada, I don’t know if people eat it in the UK today, probably, it is 35 odd years ago. Anyway, I learnt to like it very quickly and when I saw this recipe from Eating Well, I thought good, a new salad for me. I never know what you are supposed to do with the yolks in many of these recipes. I think I would just add 4 complete hard boiled eggs, although I suppose the salad may be healthier with only one yolk apiece. Seems a waste to throw out 6 yolks, don’t you think?

Loaded Spinach Salad

From EatingWell: March/April 2007, The EatingWell Diet (2007)

Like many spinach salads, this one features lots of chopped-up hard-boiled egg. But since most of the calories in an egg are in the yolk, we use just two whole eggs, plus the whites from six additional eggs. The result is a rich, eggy, satisfying spinach salad that keeps the calories in check.

2 servings, about 4 cups each

Ingredients

• 8 large eggs
• 6 cups baby spinach
• 4 tablespoons Creamy Blue Cheese Dressing, divided (recipe follows)
• 1 8-ounce can beets, rinsed and sliced
• 1 cup carrots, shredded
• 2 tablespoons chopped pecans, toasted (see Tip)

Preparation

1. Place eggs in a single layer in a saucepan; cover with water. Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to low, cover and cook at the lowest simmer for 10 minutes. Pour off the hot water and run cold water over the eggs until they are completely cooled. Peel the eggs, discard 6 of the yolks, chop the remaining yolks and whites.
2. Toss spinach and 2 tablespoons dressing in a large bowl. Divide between 2 plates. Top with chopped eggs, beets, carrots and pecans. Drizzle with the remaining 2 tablespoons dressing.

Nutrition

Per serving : 300 Calories; 13 g Fat; 3 g Sat; 6 g Mono; 216 mg Cholesterol; 26 g Carbohydrates; 22 g Protein; 8 g Fiber; 823 mg Sodium; 592 mg Potassium

1 Carbohydrate Serving

Exchanges: 4 vegetable, 2 lean meat, 1 1/2 fat

Tips & Notes

• Tip: To toast chopped nuts & seeds: Cook in a small dry skillet over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until fragrant and lightly browned, 2 to 4 minutes.

Have a great day

Tomorrow, Japan, St. Patrick’s, Health.

One of the blogs I read is written by an English woman, August Mayfield, and yesterday she was commenting on disasters and the fact that you never know what will happen tomorrow – or even in the next hour. As with Japan, life is normal one minute the next you have lost home, mother, father, children, friends – we cannot imagine the effects of such a disaster on the people living through it. Over the years there have been stories about people saving things to wear or use at some nebulous point in the future, but we don’t know and are never sure what will be in that future. So use that good china you have been saving, wear those special garments or eat those special foods. To quote August “Tomorrow’s Never Promised”.

Some of the pictures coming from Japan lately are absolutely incredible, there is some footage of a whole village being swept away. One wonders who stood and took those pictures of such a disaster. I saw a report yesterday morning saying the sea had returned 1,000 bodies which it had carried away when it receded, makes me wonder how many more will never be returned.

St. Patrick’s Day is coming up on Thursday and as usual there are all kinds of recipes. I used to have an Irish friend who went nuts about all this, she said the Irish do not eat anything different for St. Patrick’s than on any other day and got so teed off with all these recipes for Corned Beef and Cabbage especially for that one day. It is a fact, that it appears to be the ex patriot Irish who eat these things presumably as a nod to their erstwhile homeland which, today, many of them have never been near having been born in the countries in which they now live.

I went for my first and only mammogram two years ago and I understood, at my age, I wouldn’t have to go for another one, WRONG, I have had a letter requesting me to go again, I am not yet out of the mammogram woods it appears. Actually, having heard all the horror stories of breast screening, I didn’t find it bad at all. Nothing like I had imagined. Therefore, I urge every woman to go regularly even though I didn’t. Silly risk on my part, and so unnecessary as it turned out. I assure you, you do not have to practice by slamming your breast in a fridge door, or lying down on a garage floor and getting someone to run over you, it ain’t like that at all, I promise you.

Why the picture? It keeps popping up on Facebook and it amuses me.

Irish Cream Cheesecake

Food Network - Courtesy of Anna Olson

Rich and creamy cheesecake that's so good you might have to make two!

Preparation time: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 80 minutes
Yield: 10

Ingredients

Crust

• 3/4 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 1/2 cup regular oats (not quick cook)
• 1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Filling

• 2 cups whipping cream
• 6 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1 pound cream cheese at room temperature
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch
• 1/2 cup Irish Cream liqueur
• 2 large eggs

Brickle Almond Garnish

• 1 tablespoon egg white
• 1/2 cup whole almonds, lightly toasted
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions

To Assemble

1. For crust, preheat oven to 350 °F and grease a 9-inch springform pan. Pulse graham crumbs, oats and brown sugar in a food processor until oats have been roughly cut. Add melted butter and vanilla extract and pulse until an even texture. Press into bottom of prepared pan and bake for 7 minutes. Allow to cool while preparing filling.
2. For filling, reduce oven temperature to 325 °F. Heat cream to just below a simmer. Pour hot cream over chopped chocolate and whisk gently until smooth and set aside. In a bowl using electric beaters or with a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat cream cheese until fluffy, scraping the sides of the bowl often. While beating, slowly pour in sugar, again scraping the bowl often. Beat in cornstarch. By this time the filling should be looking a little more fluid. Slowly pour in Irish Cream and beat in eggs, one at a time. Pour chocolate mixture into cheesecake filling and blend well. Scrape filling into pan and bake for 30 minutes. Without opening the oven door, turn off the oven and leave cheesecake in another 30 minutes. Remove, let cool to room temperature, then chill overnight.
3. For brickle Almond Garnish, preheat oven to 350 °F. Whisk egg white until frothy. Add remaining ingredients and toss until almonds are evenly coated. Spread onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and toast for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally until sugar has browned. Allow to cool. Break apart almonds and chop in a food processor. Remove springform ring and bottom and place cheesecake on a serving plate. Press the ground brickle onto the sides of the cake and chill until ready to serve.

Have a great day