A to Z

Arlee Bird wrote a blog this week about the A to Z Challenge basically saying people who say they don’t have time to do the A to Z really do have it because it only takes a few minutes to write a simple blog post. He demonstrated by doing A for Apple. I do tend to agree with him. I write a blog every day except Sunday and it really doesn’t take that long to do it. Unless you have a very complicated blog like that of Alex J. Cavenaugh, but for the A to Z Challenge you really don’t have to be that complicated. You don’t even have to have a theme, I didn’t my first year, but merely to write a relatively short post which reflects the letter of the day. Some people go to heaps of trouble with their Challenge posts, but you don’t have to. The whole point is to have fun and to make new friends by visiting those others on the list. If you wonder who they are, click on the A to Z badge on the right and it will take you to the sign up list. (As a matter of interest, it took me half an hour to write this because I had to look up links for other blogs).

It all starts tomorrow, but you can jump in any time, I did, my first year, in fact I’m not sure anyone knew I was taking part. I discovered the challenge on Sia McKye’s blog Sia McKye Over Coffee decided I liked the sound of it and started posting for the Challenge. I write a lot of food oriented blogs and usually post a recipe so, surprise, surprise, this year I am writing about a food and then posting a recipe using that food. This stemmed from a comment made by Alex J. Cavenaugh (The Ninja Captain) last year.

This is a recipe I will be making this weekend. I need stuffing mushrooms, i.e. large ones. I was in the store today and didn’t see any in passing. If they don’t have them later in the week, I will use portobello mushrooms instead.

Vegetable Stuffed Mushrooms


12 large mushrooms
1 Tbs unsalted butter
5 green onions, chopped fine
1 med size stalk celery, chopped
1 small ripe tomato, cored and chopped
1/2 tsp dried marjoram, crumbled
1/8 tsp black pepper
1/2 cup soft white breadcrumbs

1. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Wash the mushrooms and twist off the stems; set the caps aside and mince the stems.
2. In a heavy 10 inch skillet, melt the butter over moderate heat; add th green onions, celery and mushroom stems and cook, uncovered, stirring often, until the vegetables are soft - about 5 mins. Add the tomato, marjoram and pepper and cook covered, 5 mins longer. Stir in the breadcrumbs and remove the skillet from the heat.
3. Spoon the mixture into the caps, mounding it up slightly. Ina lightly greased 13"x9"x2" baking pan, arrange the mushrooms in one layer. Bake uncovered for 20 minutes or until lightly browned

Servings: 4

Have a great day, see you at the A to Z

Rain in NC, Dinner, ISIS.

Sunday evening a friend called me from North Carolina, I am very glad we didn’t go down there for a vacation this September, everywhere is drenched. She said it poured with rain every day and the ground was soggy. Not only that the mosquitoes are bad, they have plenty of places to breed in all that wet. She also told me about her brother who lives in Detroit – they had 14 ft. of water on the main street and her brother’s freezer was floating in the basement. Considering the terrible fires in Yosemite, it is such a pity you can’t ship the water from one place to another. It seems to me the States has really been badly socked by the weather this year. Of course Alberta has had snow already and here it’s pretty chilly. Fall not winter though.

My birthday dinner party went very well on Saturday. I served Vegetable Stuffed Mushrooms (see below) Iscas accompanied by Goat Cheese Potato Purée, pole beans and Mediterranean Snow Peas. For dessert I had chocolate cups filled with yoghurt cheese, honey, whipped cream and raspberries. Of course we had wine with all this. Being the bright person I am, I totally forgot to take any pictures. I know I have posted the Potato Purée at some point in the past, but it must be a long time ago because I can’t find it. Guess I will have to post it again one day. It is a Bobby Flay recipe (TV chef) which we are very fond of and which I shouldn’t eat but can’t resist a small spoonful of.

I have just come across an article which I think is frightening. It states that the ISIS war chest increases by an estimated $3 million a day. ISIS earns money from a variety of sources, including smuggling antiquities out of Iraq, selling women and children as sex slaves, extortion payments, ransom from kidnapped hostages, and stealing materials from the towns it has seized. In the article they are described as a financial juggernaut. This whole thing is terrifying and I feel more should be done to counteract them. The British PM has been quoted as saying, after the latest beheading,  “they are not Muslims but monsters”.

This is an old favourite of ours which we haven’t made in a long while, I don’t know why. It comes from a Reader’s Digest Cookbook called Great Recipes.


Vegetable Stuffed Mushrooms

12 large mushrooms
1 Tbs unsalted butter
5 green onions, chopped fine
1 med size stalk celery, chopped
1 small ripe tomato, cored and chopped
1/2 tsp dried marjoram, crumbled
1/8 tsp black pepper
1/2 cup soft white breadcrumbs

1. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Wash the mushrooms and twist off the stems; set the caps aside and mince the stems.
2. In a heavy 10 inch skillet, melt the butter over moderate heat; add the green onions, celery and mushroom stems and cook, uncovered, stirring often, until the vegetables are soft - about 5 mins. Add the tomato, marjoram and pepper and cook covered, 5 mins longer. Stir in the breadcrumbs and remove the skillet from the heat.
3. Spoon the mixture into the caps, mounding it up slightly. In a lightly greased 13"x9"x2" baking pan, arrange the mushrooms in one layer. Bake uncovered for 20 minutes or until lightly browned

Servings: 4

Have a great day

Google, Hurrle's, Nova Science Now

Some of you may be wondering about the ads on my blog page. They will no longer appear as Google AdSense has closed my account. I am apparently a risk to their advertisers although I have not been told why this should be. On investigation, I find through the forums that lots of accounts have been closed in the last week or so, not just mine, and not one of the people knows why. I am feeling somewhat upset about the whole business so I apologise if this blog seems a little lacklustre. Yesterday afternoon, we drove into the country and visited a place called Hurrle's (pronounced Hurleys) where they have their own farmers' market. They have all kinds of vegetables and baked goods for sale there but we just ended up with strawberries and a few tomatoes. I had been told their strawberries were particularly good and I found them delicious. I sliced up one of their tomatoes for supper and found that to be very good too although I presume they are not field tomatoes yet, too early. We didn't check out any of the baked goods or breads as we don't eat a lot of that kind of thing. They also sold some sausages - I heard one customer say she waited for them every summer. The only problem is, they are rather a long way out of town and Matt kept pointing out that some of the items were a lot cheaper where we normally shop. I kept saying they were not as fresh. When we ate the strawberries and tomato Matt couldn't see any difference so...... I watched Nova Science NOW again last night, they had a very interesting segment on the Northern Lights or Aurora Borealis. An absolutely fascinating segment on bird brains which apparently have linguistic sections similar to ours and another about a young Japanese woman who is working on a robotic arm and hand or prosthesis which will eventually work exactly like an original hand, stimulated by the brain, for those who might lose theirs in an accident of some kind. You can watch these video segments here. The following is a recipe we have made often either for a dinner party or just for ourselves. We got the recipe from Readers Digest Great Recipes. Vegetable-Stuffed Mushrooms Serves: 4 12 lge mushrooms (about 1 lb) 1 tbs butter 5 green onions chopped fine 1 med size stalk of celery, chopped finely 1 small ripe tomato, cored and chopped 1/2 tsp dried marjoram crumbled 1/8 tsp black pepper 1/2 C soft white breadcrumbs or less if you use dried Instructions: Preheat the oven to 400 F. Wipe the mushrooms with a damp cloth and twist off the stems: set the caps aside and mince the stems. In a heavy 10 in skillet melt the margarine over moderate heat; add the green onions, celery and mushroom stems and cook uncovered, stirring often unti the veggies are soft - about 5 mins. Add the tomato, marjoram, and pepper and cook, covered, 5 mins longer. Stir in the breadcrumbs and remove skillet from the heat. Spoon the mixture into the mushroom caps, mounding it up slightly. Lightly grease a baking pan and arrange the mushrooms in one layer. Bake uncovered for 20 mins or until lightly browned. This recipe does not call for salt, however you may wish to add some. Have a great day.