First Ripe Blackberries and Monarch Butterflies

The first ripe blackberries coincide this year with our seeing the first Monarch Butterflies on Milk Weed plants at North Chagrin Reservation

The Rain in Spain Stays Mainly on the ?

It has been raining cats and dogs yesterday, all night and today. Some areas are under water, some areas have flooded. I am waiting for the pond to form in my backyard. Maybe I will get some tadpoles, anything but snakes! We are lucky so far, trees still standing, but look at those branches almost touching the ground!

My garden is doing well, as much kale as we might want. Someone continues to dig in my pot of arugula on my front porch, but who?
                                                                             

No need to wash the deck furniture or the grill, nature is doing it for me, can't paint the deck when it is soaking wet every other day, so I get to take a rest?

I have multiple barriers for my hydrangeas as our starving deer love them, but per our difficult and very long winter, the coldest on record in years, my hydrangea just started blooming this week. Mine are younger, but the older plants at my Mom's house have not yet started to bloom and last year they were  truly gorgeous!

                                                                           

Wow, and the branches of my Thornless Honey Locus trees (that are not so thornless) are nearly
touching the ground this morning per their wet leaves! Will the branches break off? Stay tuned!

Grilled Veggies, Baby Arugula Salad, and Salmon

The very top photo is my baby arugula growing in a pot next to my house, thus when I need to make a quick salad, I do not have to run in the backyard to my garden. Someone has been digging in it. I cut what I need and it grows back. Later today I will plant more seed in the dug out area of the pot.

I lightly coated the salmon with a bit of oil, a very tiny coating before placing the pieces, skin side down on the grill. I love Costco's Copper River Wild salmon - I buy a big slice and cut it up. When I have lots of company, I buy a whole salmon at Costco and grill the entire fish, very impressive for my nephews!

 However, I grill my vegetables first until tender and then take them off the grill before cooking the salmon as I am always afraid of contaminating something, having been trained as a microbiologist over 40+ years ago!

Try to get an assortment of colored vegetables to grill. My theory is if we have a variety of colors, it is healthier than our entire dinner plate being of one single color, like all brown. My middle sister used
to give this advice to her family when eating out, order a "colorful plate," not all "brown food," for
example.

The vegetables include sweet potatoes, vidalia onions cut in half, zucchini, and yellow squash. I had cut the squash into strips as the eggplant was cut into circles. My husband dislikes eggplant, but will eat anything from the grill.

While the food was cooking, my sister and I enjoyed hummus and blue chips on the deck.

I make humus and baba ganoush (eggplant hummus) too, but these are subjects for another post.

In regard to grilling salmon, I put it on the hot grill skin side down, reduce the heat to about #2 on my grill, cover, and leave it alone for about 10 minutes, perfect every time! Of course, I cleaned any remaining scales off the skin before placing on the grill and I do wash my fish in cold water as do not like seeing scales. The skin holds the fish together and I do not mind if any of the skin sticks to the grill.

I have to use a timer as do not want to eat undercooked fish and hate overcooked salmon.

The most wonderful part of grilling out is "NO pots and pans."

Wonder what I will grill tonight?

Baby Sister Coming to Dinner

My youngest sister, who is my "baby" no matter her age, is coming to dinner tomorrow night. I had to bake her favorite pie, pumpkin and her favorite shortbread cookies. I rarely bake in the summer, and even more rarely in July. Both of my sisters' birthdays are in August, so baking in summer can sometimes not be avoided.

I love using natural brown waxed paper to roll out a pie crust and always use parchment paper for baking cookies as it is fast.

I have little time as it may get hot today, but it is cool at the moment. I use the oven for multiple tasks on days like today!

I made a whole wheat pie crust with white whole wheat flour, photos included.

Some of the cookies are a bit overbaked for shortbread cookies, but we like our cookies to at least have a bit of a brownish area on the outside. These cookies are very, very, delicate.

Here is how I made the pie crust, I roll it on the brown waxed paper and move the paper over the
pie pan and deposit it on the glass pie pan. Using a scissors, I cut any extra and paste it if needed.
I pricked one pie crust with a fork but not the other, and do not see much difference in the pre-baking process. Since we dislike 'soggy" crusts, I bake the crust for about 10 minutes before adding the pumpkin filling.

For the cookies, I mixed the dough and placed it in the refrigerator while the pies were baking.

Here are the photos, my Mom made the most beautiful cookies, I rarely make a decent one!

I rolled the dough in long tubes and rolled into the wonderful brown waxed paper and refrigerated longer as my pies are in the oven. I have a double oven, but only use the top and try to put several items in it to bake, if I am going to bake!

I unrolled two of the rolls and froze the third one without the wax paper, and placed in a freezer bag in my freezer for another cold morning when we have company, as these butter cookies are NOT in our diet. I baked the cookies in two rows in my oven.

Here are the baked pies and cookies, now the problem is I am not to eat this until my sister comes over tomorrow. Guess, I better get a cup of coffee, sit on my porch, and dream about them as the smell is incredible, or get back to one of my "volunteer" projects!

Oh, and the dishes, luckily I put them in my really deep sink, so I do not see them, but here they are as no munchkins live in this house to clean up my kitchen!

Kale Omelette

                                                                    

I used some of that beautiful Italian Heirloom Kale from my garden to make a beautiful omelette. I included tomatoes, as my husband loves them in omelettes, onions, a bit of left over yellow summer squash. a few spoons of left over mashed potatoes (Yukon Gold and water), and a huge mushroom. I chopped everything up and sauteed in a bit of hot water as my husband (who had a heart attack at age 49) continues on a very low fat diet, but for the fats naturally found in veggies.

Per eggs, I took the yolks of half of the eggs and saved them for another recipe, as we try not to eat too many egg yolks, the other eggs were left whole. I beat the eggs but did not add any water to them as my veggies are cooked but with so many there may be some lingering wetness.

My mother would have beaten the egg whites, but I only do that for "special" occasions!

This is a big omelett and it should feed 4, but since we are only 2, it can also be for lunch or dinner
with an arugula salad from my garden.

First, I cooked all the veggies until tender, then gently beat the egg white/egg yolk mixture and slowly, under low heat, cook the omelette. In fact, it is slowly cooking on the lowest heat as I
write this.

Omelettes are the most tender if cooked on low heat, but we have to be careful of salmonella, etc, so I cook it until the top is more than set. I do not turn this type of omelette over until I plate it as this omelette is heavy on vegetables.

                                                                     

Here is the omelette plated out, I turn it upside down on the plate to show off the veggies!

I hate to admit it, but we ate the entire omelette! Guess it will be vegetarian spaghetti  tonight! Luckily, we both love spaghetti -- I like the brands from Italy best, my middle sister Cecile
does too!

Italian Heirloom and Red Kale

The first photo above shows my Italian Heirloom kale which is doing great this summer in my garden and the photo below it shows the border of my garden with Red Kale. The Kale is doing great this summer as we have more rain than usual and I am not good about watering my garden and I rarely water my lawn.

I did not plant the beautiful flowering kale this year as I like to rotate my kale crops since I can not help but plant some in areas where I planted members of this family the year before.

We pick leaves from the bottom; the oldest leaves and new ones continue to grow and develop from the top. I put chopped kale into almost everything and we use a leaf of kale instead of a leaf of lettuce in sandwiches.

We cook it like spinach, chop it up into sauces, but our very favorite might be "kale-banana-almond milk-based smoothies."

Deer eating up your garden, flowers and plants?

It was a cold 6 months of winter and now spring is here and we are starting our gardens for the yummy vegetables or will we have some? Most probably many of us are "sharing" our flowers and vegetable plants with the local deer herds. Yes, I mean "herds" of deer.

One came to me while I was mowing my lawn, after he ate the neighbors geraniums -- yes, they were sprayed with deer repellant, but we have no sure solutions in my area and we are using much Irish Spring soap and physical barriers like herbs, and objects to try to alter the path of the deer. They love my day lilies and I had to hide my tomato plant among leeks, basil, stakes of soap.

Luckily, the deer do not eat my Italian Heirloom Kale and that is most of my garden this year as they cleaned out my tomato plants last year, right down to the ground!

Here are some photos of the soap inside cut up onion bags and pantyhose! Can you find the lonely tomato plant surrounded by leeks, basil, and small bags of Irish Spring soap?

 

The deer is headed for my day lily garden!

 

You can see my kale plants, luckily the deer leave the kale for us to eat and we love it on sandwiches instead of lettuce, in smoothies with banana and almond milk, and sauteed for a few minutes. 

Kale is also great added to any soup in the fall. Kale also freezes well. 

Watermelon Cake?

I saw a recipe where they cut the rind completely off a large piece of watermelon the size of a cake and frost it with homemade whipping cream and berries!

No bake is a wonderful idea -- the cake is an alternative to my frosted angel food cake as there is no cake in the watermelon cake, the inside is pure watermelon.

It looks wonderful, but I think I would prefer a nonfat frosting, like Betty Crocker's Fluffy Frosting, which is composed of primarily egg white and sugar. It is a light and fluffy frosting.

The white frosting is decorated with blueberries and raspberries for a red, white, and blue, July 4th design!

Details on how to cut at http://www.isavea2z.com/no-bake-watermelon-cake-recipe/

I wonder how this cake would be half watermelon on the bottom and half angel food, for a really high cake!

Pineapple, Lemon, Raspberry, Surprise Cake

I received a surprise from my beautiful niece Julie who lives in Texas. She sent me a thank you bouquet of flowers. Since it remains cold in Cleveland, Ohio, and we might have a few lingering snow flurries, the flowers are a most welcome sign of "life" after winter.

The flowers look gorgeous on the table. I doubt if Julie knew that we had our 46th wedding anniversary a week ago, but we did not have a cake. The colors of the flowers in this beautiful bouquet are the inspiration for this pineapple, lemon, raspberry, surprise angel food cake!

But the question is why did I add the word "surprise" in the name of this Pineapple, Lemon, Raspberry "Surprise" cake?

One can see the raspberries on the outside of the cake and if one cuts into the cake, there is a layer of fluffy frosting with a few raspberries as a "surprise." I had cut into, but not through the unfrosted, cooled cake and placed some frosting and a raspberry surprise in what I determined would be a generous piece of angel food cake. I did not cut completely through the cake, I went around the outside of the cake with a knife, without cutting the cake completely into two layers as this particular angel food cake is very delicate and crumbly.

The cake was made with a box of angel food cake mix, but crushed pineapple was added in lieu of the 1 1/4 cups water indicated in the directions for preparing the cake. In addition, because I love the aroma of lemon, I added 3 tablespoons of lemon juice to the cake and to the frosting.

The frosting is Betty Crocker Fluffy Frosting, which contains no fat. Since I had a large can of crushed pineapple, I had pineapple left from making the cake batter, which only required the 1 1/4 cups.

The Betty Crocker Fluffy Frosting mix is to be mixed with 1/2 cup boiling water. Instead of water I used 3 tablespoons of lemon juice plus some of the remaining crushed pineapple to bring the liquid portion to 1/2 cup and heated it to boiling in the microwave.

I beat the frosting for the required 30 seconds on low and 5-7 minutes on high, and stiff peaks formed at about 6 minutes. It was amazing that the frosting turned from a bit of yellow from the pineapple to almost a pure white.

I frosted the cake quickly as want this cake to look like a fresh, homemade cake, it need not be perfect and the frosting is delicious!

My husband suggested I turn this into a pina colada angel food cake by adding coconut to the frosted cake, but I may try this another time!

Wish I could share this wonderful and very easy-to-make, tasty angel food cake with my Texas family!
I wish I could drop it off at their door!

Please note: any crushed fruit plus liquid can be added to the batter of an angel food cake in lieu of the water indicated in the directions. When my nephew said his favorite cake was "strawberry," I substituted fresh strawberry puree in the cake. I had made the strawberry puree from fresh berries in my blender and the baked cake retained a light pink color.

If my niece has room in her new garden, I can imagine planting a real lemon tree in the backyard!

Love to Julie for inspiring me to bake a cake today for my upcoming cookbook! How I wish I could send a piece over to my great-niece, Emma Louise! I will be working on creating the healthiest cupcakes for Emma, a true cupcake lover.

You can bet that Emma's cupcakes will always have a "surprise" inside!

Spring, where are you?

Think spring! I had to post this picture of my Mom growing her incredible eggplant. No matter what she grew it was wonderful and the plants looked the healthiest one can imagine. She used to make her own compost for her wonderful garden!

I will not fight with the deer this year, but will plant what they don't like. Our yards are not only home to many deer, but a few were born in the yard -- triplets!

I will plant arugula, kale, herbs, etc., but unfortunately no tomatoes or squash unless I can figure out where to hide them. I have already purchased Irish Spring soap and have other deer repellants, but to make it to our dinner table it will have to be something the deer don't like to eat!

A picture of my Mom in 1938, when she was 21 years old is on the cover of my book, Walk Forward,
on Amazon.com at http://www.amazon.com/Walk-Forward-ebook/dp/B009H6Y7AC in paperback and in Kindle format. One need not own a Kindle as the Ebook can be read in the Amazon cloud), book's trailer is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zp7uQap6p2M

Perch and Fresh Asparagus, My Favorites!

My favorite fish is Ocean Perch, which is on sale this time of year, along with fresh asparagus!

I wash the perch, dip in flour, spray a pan with cooking spray and add a bit of oil to barely coat the pan and "fry" the perch, skin side up -- I hope I have this correct -- that the skin side is up when first cooking the perch,k as if the wrong side is down, the pieces curl and are nearly impossible to cook evenly! If I forget which end is to be up, I cook one piece in the pan to double check! I like to get a brown coating on one side before turning the delicate fish. Just before placing the fish in the pan, I rub dried dill between my palms and sprinkle it on the coated fish. I add dill to the flour coating too. The reason I use flour for perch rather than corn meal or some other coating, is that I want a very delicate covering of the lovely perch. I love to see the petals of the fish, but always watch out for those tiny bones which usually find themselves on my husband's pieces of perch!

Perch is probably my favorite fish as living near Lake Erie, we ate it much as children, however, my mother would fry it to perfection. Frying is no longer a cooking option for us, but spraying the pan and adding a bit of oil to coat, gives us the illusion of fried perch, my very favorite fish. Add a Yukon gold potato  plain, without anything on it, allows us to justify the bit of fat in the fish, and the yellow color of the potato makes it look like it is full of yummy butter (not in our normal meal plan, but allowed at weddings and special occasions). I try to cook the asparagus until just barely tender as my husband dislikes what he calls "al dente" vegetables -- he likes his vegetables as if they came out of a can or are cooked to the state of mushiness! I much prefer a bit of a bite and the beautiful color of a slightly "al dente" vegetable, but love to eat them raw too!

The first time I had raw asparagus in a mixed salad was at the home of a friend's mother. My friend's mother lives in Maineville, Ohio, and would grow her asparagus and serve it freshly picked in a salad, literally having the "just picked goodness" of a homegrown vegetable.

I am thinking much of my friend's Mom and hope she is feeling better after some courageous surgery! Were the weather better, we would be visiting my friend's mother and enjoying the visit with her in her most incredible garden!

I don't usually garnish our plates with strawberries, but aromatic ones are on sale this week and having spent the weekend in Chicago at a fabulous wedding has influenced my simple meals for our homecoming!The perch is sitting on a bed of fresh arugula which I can not wait to grow again in my garden. My Mom planted arugula every year and baby arugula reminds me of a lunch my youngest sister and I had with my graduate school adviser, a friend for over 45 years, who took us for a beautiful lunch at The Tavern on the Green in Central Park (sadly, The Tavern is now closed), where we had baby arugula salads!

More Comfort Food

My sister who lives in Austin, Texas, sent me a "care" package with stone ground grits. The best grits I ever had in my entire life was at the Monument Cafe in Georgetown, Texas. Not only is this a wonderful place to eat, they are so helpful as to how to prepare their foods. No secret recipes here and knowing how to make the foods oftentimes increases visits to the restaurant as one does not always want to cook. Believe me, I will not visit Georgetown, Texas, without stopping in at the Monument Cafe!

My sister purchased the grits at the market adjacent to the Monument Cafe and the Cafe's cook most kindly shared how they cook them. They boil them in water until tender. Since I do not want to watch over a pot of boiling grits, and with my luck I will burn the pot, I decided to cook them in my slow cooker:

See how creamy the grits are getting with water as their only solvent? I set the slow cooker on high, used 1 cup grits to 3 cups of water, and stir about every hour.

We will eat the grits tonight, not tomorrow morning for breakfast, thus, the high setting on the slow cooker.

The grits will accompany salmon burgers and stir fried vegetables, we love them when the onions get a bit caramelized, yummy! Wish I could send this dinner from Cleveland to my Texas family!