Dinner Party, Thunderstorm, Technology.

We have friends coming for dinner this evening so we will be cooking most of the day I guess. We are doing the chicken dish we cooked the other day with a tarragon sauce. Matt had actually chosen another chicken dish, but we decided it was unsuitable. Then with it we are serving two new dishes, one is a rice dish and the other a zucchini dish. If they turn out to be successful I will post them later in the week. As a starter we are doing Vegetable Stuffed Mushrooms which I did post quite some time ago and for dessert we will be doing my new Tipsy Oranges.

I mentioned the Right Whale jumping on the boat off Cape Town. Now some video has surfaced showing the whale actually hitting the boat. http://tinyurl.com/3xv8bo5 I thought you might like to see it.

I had fun yesterday!!! I have mentioned before, Matt is, I'm sorry to say, a technological idiot. So with our nice new cell phone, I couldn't put a lock on it because he couldn't unlock it. Every time we put it in its carrying case or when he tried to attach it to his belt, the camera button got pressed and we ended up with lots of pictures of the inside of the pouch, etc. plus of course, it wasn't in the normal working mode. After what seemed like dozens of phone calls to our provider, Rogers, I finally discovered that you could actually put a lock on the camera (that includes video and music too) so our problem was finally solved. I had one of those days which seemed like I was forever on the phone either about this, or half a dozen other things.

I didn’t mention that Thursday night we had one heck of a thunderstorm with masses of rain, it was still raining when we got up the following morning. Matt went down to the pharmacy later and couldn’t enter because they were flooded. Incredible. Not being there I am not sure how they would have got flooded when nowhere else in the mall seemed to. Later in the day it then turned very hot and sticky.

With all this hot weather floating around us at the moment, I thought this Ice Cream cake from Smuckers looked just the thing for a warm evening. My only change would be not to use salted peanuts, for preference.

Ice Cream Sandwich Cake

Smuckers

Ingredients:

24 prepared ice cream sandwiches 2 cups (500mL) whipped cream, unsweetened 1 jar (250mL) Smucker’s® Chocolate Flavoured Topping 1 cup (250mL) salted peanuts, chopped ½ cup (125mL) Smucker's® Sundae Syrup™ Caramel Flavoured Syrup

Directions:

1. Place 12 ice cream sandwiches in bottom of freezer proof 9” x 13” (23cm x 33cm) pan. Top with ½ of whipped cream, all of Smucker’s® Chocolate Flavoured Topping and ½ of peanuts. Repeat with remaining ice cream sandwiches, cream and peanuts. Garnish with Smucker’s® Sundae Syrup™ Caramel Flavoured Syrup. Freeze until solid, about 2 hours. Let stand about 5 minutes, then cut into squares.

Have a great weekend

Lousy Weather, Rice Crispie Fish

The weather in our part of Canada is particularly miserable at the moment, dull, wet, cold. Spring I guess. Last night we had a humungous thunderstorm with lots of lightening and thunder. Sort of thing that usually comes with hot weather, not this miserable stuff. We didn't really go anywhere as we were waiting for the chair delivery which we were told would come between 10:50 and 2:50, honestly, a 4 hour window which turned out to be longer because they got a flat tire. However, it arrived and Matt is now happy after having ruined the love seat he used to sit on. I'm happy because the love seat was looking such a mess these days.

I just picked up a recipe from the Rice Crispies site. I would never have thought of using Rice Crispies to coat fish, but actually I thought this recipe looked very interesting. Particularly as there has been a lot in the news telling us how good almonds are for us and how, in one study, they fed a test group 2 oz almonds a day and they didn't gain weight.

Lime Baked Fish

500 mL	2 cups	RICE KRISPIES* cereal crushed to 250 mL (1 cup)
50 mL	1/4 cup	finely chopped almonds
15 mL	1 tbsp	chopped fresh parsley
50 mL	1/4 cup	all-purpose flour
2	egg whites or 1 egg
45 mL	3 tbsp	lime juice
1 mL	1/4 tsp	each: salt and ground ginger
2 mL	2 tsp	seasoned pepper
500 g	1 lb	fish fillets (such as tilapia, sole or haddock)

PREPARATION

1. In large plate or shallow pan, mix together crushed cereal, almonds and parsley. Place flour on second plate.
2. In small bowl, mix together egg whites, 30 mL (2 tbsp) of the lime juice, salt and seasonings.
3. Dip fish in flour, shaking off excess. Dip in egg mixture, draining slightly, then coat with cereal mixture. Place in single layer on foil-lined baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray. Drizzle with remaining lime juice.
4. Bake at 200°C (400°F) about 15 minutes or until fish flakes in thickest part, when tested with fork.

Have a great day.