Snowy Day Lunch

DSCN0108DSCN0116Yesterday was a snowy day in northern Wisconsin.  I didn’t venture out of my house, just watched the snow come down.  It was beautiful.

A nice, big, and healthy salad was my choice for lunch.  I started with lots of greens and added chunks of chicken breast, red pepper, black olives, pickled jalapenos, green onions, and shredded cheddar cheese.  For dressing I used a little salsa and sour cream.  I’m watching carbs for a couple weeks to get a quick start on this year’s diet.  It was delicious and filling.

Love on a Chip

DSCN0078This is a recipe that I mentioned in Death Nell without the  instructions to make it.  It was my sister’s and my favorite dip when we were young.  When I eat it now, good memories come back and it tastes like love on a chip.  I’ll give you the original and how I’ve changed it to make it more to my liking now.

 

8 oz. softened cream cheese

2 T. Western dressing

2 T. finely chopped onion

1/2 tsp. garlic salt

Stir together and eat with potato chips or crackers.  Change the amounts of dressing, onion, and garlic to suit your taste.

Now I use one clove real chopped garlic and some chives in addition to the chopped onion.  In my fridge, I always have a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce that I’ve chopped into a thick sauce in my hand blender or food processor.  I use that as a spicy flavoring in many of my recipes.  For this dip, I start with a teaspoon and add from there.  Taste as you go.  You no longer need the Western dressing if you use the pepper sauce.  A simpler way would be to still use the dressing, but just put in a few shakes of chipotle ground red pepper.  I add more pepper than this, but I like spice.  Sometimes now I’ll add 1/2 cup of sour cream to the cream cheese.  To decorate it, you can add a slice of jalapeno pepper or a few slices of green olive.  Enjoy this fast, easy recipe.

School – Where the Writing Began

My love of writing began in grade school when we were assigned creative writing.  For me, it was great fun to create outlandish characters and stimulating plots (at least in my young mind.)  Volunteering to read became second nature to me and I shared with gusto.  I won’t say my stories were any better than those of my classmates, who were quite a group of characters themselves.  But the teachers who encouraged me kept my love of writing alive.

In high school I wrote in my free time, but never did anything with my stories.  During college and my working years I still had the dream, but the pressures of life stood in my way.  A couple years before retiring from my teaching job, I joined a local writing group.  Then I joined a larger group in Green Bay.  Being around other writers gave me the motivation I needed to begin and finish my first book.  I’m planning to write many more.

If you have ever had that dream – that need to put on paper what is in your heart – give it a try.  To me – it’s delicious!

I Am Not A Chef

chefI am not a chef.

No surprises there. I do not even have years and years of home cooking experience under my belt. I didn’t even like cooking until I hit fifty which was about eight years ago. My husband, Mike, liked to cook and I was very happy to let him have the kitchen. I knew how to cook, but wasn’t too willing to spend much time doing so.

Mike passed on almost twelve years ago and subsequently I started my journey of making meals for myself. I certainly had no problem finding vast quantities of food. There were plenty of fast food places around and items in the grocery store that could be grabbed and eaten with minimal labor. The first few years I grudgingly prepared food, but little by little I started thinking about food in a new way. Not just what could I make quickly and devour, but I began to savor the actual physical act of taking separate ingredients and putting them together in a way that was delightful.

I found Mike’s recipes and pulled out my mom’s recipe box. There were some really cool dishes just waiting for me to try them. I soon found success. I was now able to make for myself all those specialties I had been hungry for. And it wasn’t that hard. We had all kinds of cookbooks. My head was soon buried in them on a daily basis. I knew Mike had found recipes on the internet, so I soon hit the food websites. This was fun! Initially after Mike died, I dreaded going to the grocery store. Now I started to enjoy it as I scoured the aisles for different products for my latest recipe. Some of my sadness over losing Mike started to dissipate as I found success doing an activity that he had enjoyed. My journey continues as I read cookbooks, websites, and magazines full of recipes and food information. Please join me as I share some of what I learn with you.