Joys of summer...

Today, when I woke up, I found that my sister had left me some fresh garden peas to eat. I love peas when they are just out of the garden. They taste so good. I remember being at my grandparents' farm when I was younger and being asked to shell the peas----I think I ate more peas than actually made it into the bowl to use for dinner. The peas we had today were rather small but they still tasted quite good.

One of the joys of summer....

This afternoon when I woke up there were fresh strawberries ready to be eaten. My sister went and picked them at a U-Pick after church this morning. There is just nothing like really fresh strawberries. She came home with a basketful. I believe, as of the time I started this post, there are not quite enough strawberries to cover the bottom of the basket. Luckily, it was both of us eating them and not just one of us. So today's favourite thing is fresh strawberries.

Another post about food I didn't have to make...

My sister bought rhubarb the other day and spend lots of time trying to find the recipe for rhubarb pie amongst the myriad of recipes in her shelf. She couldn't find it so she got mom to email it to her. She made the pie today, despite a typo in the recipe where it asked for three cups of flour (chopped up) rather than three cups of rhubarb. It was a bit runny but it was still quite good, but then I really like rhubarb pie so I would say that. So today's favourite things is rhubarb pie.

it's greek to me...

Tonight was my night to make supper. I made chicken with feta. Basically, you put chicken breasts on a pan -you may choose to season them or not. Then you mix together feta cheese, tomato, mushrooms, possibly other vegetables, garlic (which I forgot tonight) and some spices. You then put the feta et al on top of the chicken and cook at 350 degress for 45 minutes (or until chicken is cooked thoroughly. I love chicken and feta. I didn't think I was going to like it but I ordered it at a local restaurant in Regina 3 or 4 years ago and absolutely loved it. It was made a bit differently but it was still quite good. Then my sisters started making it at home and it continues to be quite enjoyable.

Cool treats

Today, my sister and I went to Dairy Queen. We were going to go on yesterday in celebration of her birthday (Happy Birthday, Colette!), but after supper we were just too full and we wanted to actually be able to enjoy the DQ We both tried the new Midnight Truffle Blizzard which was quite good. It has three of the things I like the most in the world: chocolate, more chocolate and ice cream. I usually get the Chocolate Extreme blizzard when I go to Dairy Queen, but decided to try the new one this time. Today's favourite things is Blizzards from Dairy Queen.

It tastes better because I did none of the work.

I am a fan of fruits and vegetables but I probably don't eat as much of them as I should. Actually, there is no probably about it. I am not a huge fan of cutting things up so that they are edible, which why I rarely buy brocolli, cauliflower, melons or any number of other fruits and/or vegetables. Last week, my sister bought a cantaloupe for me. It sat there unmoving (like melons are wont to do) for a week. Yesterday my sister broke down and cut it up. Tonight, when I was watching Chuck after work, I ate half of it. The only difference in the melon before and after was that now it was easily edible and I am extremely lazy.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Today, at work, I decided to get a chocolate milkshake during my break. I try not to get stuff from work too often because, well, it's a fast food place and not even a healthy fast food place, at that. But today I felt like getting a chocolate milkshake and man it was good. Probably that extra tasty addition to the normal goodness of the chocolate milkshake was the fact that, for some strange reason that I don't quite understand, it was comped out because apparently I met my goal or something. I have no idea what that means and I was willing to pay for it - even full price if necessary (employees normally get meals at half price) - but it was cool that I didn't have to. I guess there are benefits to working at fast food places after all. Who would've thought?

Only monkeys eat bananas!

I don't eat bananas that often, but for the past few days after getting home from work, I just really want some fruit, and they are what is handy. I especially like them for chocolate fondue. Bananas and chocolate go so well together. But we all know how much I like chocolate so that probably isn't much of a surprise.

"Extreme"ly satisfying!

Today for lunch, my sister and I went to Extreme Pita. It was quite enjoyable. Normally, when we are out grocery shopping et al. we go grab some shawarma but today we went to a different grocery store that was closer to the Extreme Pita than it was to any good shawarma place. I enjoy Extreme Pita because of a few reasons:

1. There is more than one size available.
2. You can get various vegetables grilled.
3. You can get freestyle pitas as well as chef creations.

Compared to Pita Pit, that is good because, well, Pita Pita doesn't have any of those things (Well, not since I was last there last summer). I also find, at least in Canada, that there seem to be more locations of Extreme Pita than there are of Pita Pit. I know there a quite a few locations in Regina, SK while Pita Pit only has two (which I have never been to, but I have been to Pita Pits in Montreal and Boston). I am not even sure where a Pita Pit is in Ottawa.

You always got time for....

Tim Hortons. Anyway, today was my last French class. Because it is March break, the community centre was closed and the teacher hadn't let them know that we would be there so we had to go somewhere else. So we went to Tim Hortons instead. It was good. I like Tim Hortons and Robin's Donuts mostly because they offer more than just doughnuts and coffee. They also sell sandwiches and soup so, apart from the whole fact that they are a DOUGHNUT store, eating there doesn't seem quite so fattening. When I was in Boston, the nearest equivalent was Dunkin' Donuts and it didn't quite have the same feel. It was strictly a doughnut and coffee place with little to no seating. So, all in all, I enjoy Tim Hortons and Robin's much more.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Being that I am half-Irish, we tended to have a bit of a Saint Patrick's Day tradition. For one thing, we got together with some members of the Irish half of my family (specifically the ones that lived closest to us) on or around the 17th. My mom also made Irish themed food such as Potato Soup. Anyway, today I made Potato Soup which actually turned out quite well aside from the rather large onion bits that maybe the soup could have done without. We also made green lemon pie (well, lemon meringue pie without the meringue) which was good as well. My family in Saskatchewan was pretty much having the exact same thing except that they were also having Irish Sodabread.

A Friday tradition

Ever since I was little, Fridays have been a meat free day, especially during lent. Being that we were a pretty big meat-eating family, we didn't actually have a lot of ideas for meal ideas that didn't involve meat, so we tended to have Grandma's Big Pancakes for supper. They are quite similar to crepes in that they are thin and take up the entire area of a regular frying pan but they are cooked on both sides. They are typically served (in my family, at least) with butter and some sort of jam (rhubarb mostly, but occasionally other varieties). If for some reason, you don't eat them all the first night, they taste quite good if you cut them up into smaller pieces, and refry them the next morning so that the pieces are nice and crispy.
To make them you need:

• 3 cups flour (I usually put in 2 cups white and 1 cup whole wheat)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup powdered milk
• a handful of rolled oats (we just recently started putting rolled oats in them, so I just improvise on the amount of them)
• 3 eggs
• water (My recipe says three cups but I have no idea how much I actually use)

Basically, you put all the dry ingredients and the eggs into a bowl. Then you put some water in the bowl and stir it in. You keep adding water until you get a nice thin pourable batter.

You melt some butter on the pan and take a ladle and scoop some of the batter onto the pan. Then you wiggle the pan around until the batter covers the entire bottom of the pan. Once it looks like the pancake is pretty much all a darker colour, you flip the pancake and cook it for a couple more minutes. Then you take it out and repeat as needed. The first pancake needs to be cooked for quite awhile because the pan is not quite hot enough yet. I also tend to flip the first pancake more than the others.

They may not be the healthiest meal, but are certainly quite good.

PS. Colette, this isn't the recipe you told me but it is the recipe that was in Mom's recipe book.

"Many's the long night I've dreamed of cheese - toasted, mostly.”

Today, I came to the rather late realization that I love cheese. I knew I like it for a while but I didn't realize the depths of my feeling for it until today. I like a number of different types of cheeses. I also love both toasted/melted cheese. I like cheese buns as well but I prefer the homemade ones more because they seem less salty or something.

E-e-excellent!!!!

This past weekend, I got the urge to have both Puffed Wheat squares and Rice Krispie squares. Unfortunately, my craving kicked in after my sister went grocery shopping for the week. So, no go. But today, my sister needed me to get some cookie crumbs so that she could make a Cheesecake during her lunch break, so I picked up some Rice Krispies and marshmallows while I was at the store. Unfortunately, I couldn't find Puffed Wheat. I got home and put everything on the counter and went downstairs. I had planned to make some Rice Krispie squares in the not too distant future; my procrastination skills at work once more. When I came upstairs the next time, my sister had made them. It was awesome!

Perogies!

I really enjoy perogies. Today we didn't really know what to have for supper, so my sister just decided to cook the perogies she made a few weeks ago. You can find the recipe here. Living in Saskatchewan, perogies were quite the common food to be found at many different potlucks or community events. I don't know how common they are in other places. I know I had a difficult time finding them when I was living in Boston. I enjoy a few different types of perogies but my favourite type are the homemade perogies filled with cheesy mashed potatoes. So good. Some bought brands are definitely better than others and I enjoy the "Cheemo" brand ones. You can usually find perogies in the frozen sections of your local supermarkets or European grocers. There are a number of different ways to prepare them but I tend to just boil them and/or fry them in butter with onions. People eat them with sour cream and bacon bits as well. I tend just eat mine quite plainly.

Why is homemade stuff so much better?

I never really was much of a hummus eater until last year really. I had tried it but I didn't really care about it one way or the other. Then I tried the hummus, my sister Kathleen makes and I loved it. It is pretty much my favourite but I don't know if it's because it's the only stuff we ever really have or if it's actually that good. Today after dinner, my sister Colette and I still were a bit peckish so we had some of the hummus she had made last week with some of the bought pitas we had in the freezer (It was quite the sacrifice after eating the homemade ones last week). The hummus was what made the pitas worth eating. It was very good. If you are interested, the recipe is conveniently on Colette's blog.

And I was worried about writing about TV too much.....

Today's favourite thing is once again related to food. I can see that my previous fears about this blog becoming biased toward TV have been calmed but new fears about this being a blog about nothing other food are steadily growing. Tomorrow, my goal is to not write about food. Anyway, today I made homemade Lasagna. It was quite good and better than I thought it would be considering it was the first time I had made it on my own. I only had to call my mom once and my sister twice. So, not bad. I definitely like my mom's recipe for lasagna better than some of the other lasagna's I've had. Maybe, it's because it is the one I am most familiar with but, at any rate, it's pretty good. And, as a bonus, I may never have to cook again because I made a heck of a lot of lasagna for two people. That's probably an exaggeration but it will last us a while. I may actually eat a proper lunch this week. Go figure.

Food again...

The hardest part of writing this blog some days is coming up with the titles. The rest of the blog I am fine with even if I am writing about something pretty routine. Anyway.....Today, my sister and I went to Kelsey's for supper. We don't often get appetizers when we eat out, but we do when we go to Kelsey's because we love the Kelsey's Spinach Dip. I haven't had many varieties of spinach dip in my life, so I don't know if it's the absolute best, but it's pretty darn good so that's good enough for me. We always tend to eat all of the pita things before the dip is all gone, but they are pretty good about bringing you extra, especially if you discuss how you would like more as your server passes by. I guess you could actually ask for more directly, but being offered it just seems like more of a win.

More food.

I feel like such a copier because my sister already wrote about this in her blog but that's what happens when we do stuff together. Today we went to Dinner by Design. Basically, each month they put out a list of recipes that they have available that month. You choose which ones you want to make and when. You then go to a Dinner by Design location and assemble them. My sister and I made 12 meals. It's nice because they prepare everything that you will need for the recipe ahead of time so all you have to do when you get there is measure it out and follow the instructions for the assembly. You then get a label to put on the package that actually tells you how to do the actual cooking. I actually had quite a good time preparing the different meals. We are making one of the meals for supper tomorrow. We'll see how it goes. My sister has done it before, I haven't.

Not my usual but nice.

Today was kinda a "Meh" day. Nothing really bad happened but nothing happened that was so over the top amazing that it automatically popped into my head as something I absolutely must write about or forever hold my peace. However, something that I did enjoy today was what I had for lunch. It was a sandwich but it is not the type of sandwich that I would typically make for myself. It was a feta cheese and tomato sandwich. I am not a huge fan of feta in and off itself. I like feta in stuff (Feta chicken is awesome) but not such a big part of it. I am also not a huge fan of tomatoes. I like them but not in large amounts. I especially don't like cherry or grape tomates (my reasoning there is odd so I'll skip it). But this sandwich was really good. It was in a baguette and the feta was toasted on the baguette before the tomato was added. I was sceptical the first time I had it but I really do enjoy the sandwich.