Our Weekend

We had a pretty packed weekend this weekend. One of the fun things we did was help out my cousin's wife's dad in the Adolphus Children's Parade in downtown Dallas. He is in the parade balloon business and needed help guiding the ballons. I LOVE parades so I was glad to be able to help. It was pretty tiring, but it was SO much fun!

We were in charge of the jingle bell balloons.

The most entertaining part of the morning was that Darth Vader was in the parade along with all of his storm troopers, Princess Leia, r2d2 (i think), and the rest of the crew. The crowd went wild anytime Darth passed by.

After the parade was over, we helped deflate the balloons and pack them away. This is us trying to get all the air out of Thomas the Train.

I also spend a lot of time doing yard work this weekend. I worked on raking leaves all three days of the weekend. We ended up with seven and a half bags of leaves. The sad part is, only one of our trees even looks remotely empty so I see a lot of raking in our future. After all the leaves were up Travis mowed the yard for the first time! It was actually pretty fun for both of us.

An Adventure - Green Tomato Pie with Whole Wheat Crust

I have been loving the cold weather we have been having here in Dallas lately! Snow in December, who would have guessed. Unfortunately, the freezing cold weather took the life of my poor tomato plants. We had about 20 tomatoes left on the vine so I decided to pick them off and see what I could do with them.

For breakfast on Thanksgiving I made Alton Brown's fried green tomatoes from his book I'm Just Here for the Food. We used corn meal instead of ritz crackers, and they were delicious, but we couldn't exactly cook up 20 tomatoes worth of fried green tomatoes.

I searched the internet for what to do with my batch of green tomatoes and my options seemed to be fried green tomatoes, tomato relish and green tomato pie.

Just like you, I though green tomato pie, BLECH! But this was the only recipe for which I had all of the ingredients on hand, and all of the reviews of the pie were good reviews. I figured it was worth trying, and if nothing else we could make it, taste it, and toss it. No one ever had to know.

As we started, we realized we were out of white flour so we ended up having to use wheat. Again, I figured this was going to be a tosser anyway, so why not go ahead and experiment with whole wheat pie crust.

Well, wouldn't you know this pie pretty much rocks. It tastes like a very tangy apple pie, one of the best apple pies I've had, except for it is green tomatoes. I will admit, there is a little bit of a don't think about what you are eating factor. I didn't take a picture of the pie before we tested it, but I guess that is good because you get to see that the filling looks perfectly normal. I guess if you wanted you could call this a way to sneak in some vegetables.

In case you are curious, here is the recipe I used for the pie (because the reviews said the filling was too runny, I added 1/4c extra flour and this flour was whole wheat as well, and then more cinnamon to compensate):

Green Tomato Pie

and for the crust (I only had 1 3/4 sticks of butter and this was the only recipe I could find that didn't call for 2 sticks of butter. I ended up making 1 1/2 of this recipe so I could have enough for a lattice top. Like I said, I used whole wheat flour instead of white. Also, this recipe needed sugar, so I added sugar on top. You, however, can use whatever crust you like!):

Pie Crust

And while I was writing this blog I found this Paula Deen recipe to try

Green Tomato Cake with Brown Butter Frosting

Oh, and while I was searching for that cake recipe again, I found Paula Deen makes a green tomato pie. See, I'm not such a freak after all, in this instance any way.

Paula Deen's Green Tomato Pie

Procrastination

I'm a pro at it!



I don't really have anything interesting to say, but I am in the mood to write and I have a lot to do at work that I am working very successfully to put off. So here are a few things going on in my life right now



-we've been trying to get pregnant for 8 months now with no luck. it is going to sound stupid, but I really had no idea we would have a problem. in fact, i'm pretty sure i was told in the hospital we wouldn't have a problem. i started tracking my temperature so I could better figure out when we were supposed to be trying, and by that I mean having sex in case you aren't up to date with the baby making lingo, and all I have figured out is that I am all messed up. my cycle used to be 28 days to the t. I started on the 3rd Thursday like clockwork. now, not only is my cycle not 28 days, but it isn't anything. every month it is a little longer. since i have been tracking it has been 33, then 35, and this last month 45 days. looking back, i realize that the reason i thought i was pregnant every month that we have been trying (sex) is because each month i was late. that is a lot of wasted pregnancy tests right there. i need to buy some stock in ept.



-along with this same subject i am struggling a little bit to know what i am supposed to do. i don't think i want to go on any sort of hormone to regulate my body, but if i don't it might be impossible to get things back on track. i have always felt very strongly that i was suppose to adopt, but i always thought it would be after we have kids and most likely after our children our grown. now i keep looking into what we would need to do, and it seems like even if we wanted to adopt it would be impossible. it takes so much time and money. we have all the time in the world, but we are about to spend all of our savings on a house. it is going to take forever to build that up again to the point where we can afford to bring a child in our home.



-along that point, why is it so expensive to adopt? i read an article that it takes anywhere from 10-30 thousand dollars to adopt a child. aren't there tons of children who are dying to be in a forever home? according to my economics degree, that means they should be giving them away, but I guess that is not the way it works.



-speaking of the house, we close in a week! we are moving in 8 days. i can hardly believe it. the schedule we have to work with is so tight. we close on a tuesday, are having the house painted on a wednesday, moving on a thursday, have my grandma's 80th birthday on saturday (all day), and have to be out of the apartment on sunday. be prepared to not hear from me at all. if you do, expect a little crazy.



-back to the baby making, why do they make you wait for a year of trying (remember, that is having sex) to see a doctor about problems you are having. don't they know that is 12 months of waiting and wondering.



-related to nothing else here, travis and i have been wanting for a long to time make some couple friends. we have tons of friends individually, and we love hanging out with them, but we don't really have many friends who are in our same position as DINKS. not any that live close any way. well finally, i think they are coming out of the woodwork, that phrase is really gross by the way. i have i hopes for our new sets of friends and they better end up being cool or else i am going to be forced to tp their house.



-speaking of friends and tping houses, we went by to see our house two weekends ago and we saw some people our age-ish moving in down the street!! i have always hoped that we could live on a street that has cool people living on it so we would have someone to sit outside and talk to while we drink margaritas and gossip about the neighbors. these people also better be cool or they are going to experience the wrath. you know what i am talking about (not sex)



there are my random thoughts for the day. maybe i will have more tomorrow, you probably hope not

oh my gee, i just typed up this whole post and then it disappeared. PTL for auto save or else i might have had to tp the computer.

Baking For the Troops

As some of you may have, but probably haven't, noticed, I haven't
blogged in a while.

I started getting behind when I was travelling a ton this summer. I
wouldn't want to blog one thing without blogging about the thing that
happened before. All of a sudden it's October and I haven't told my
loyal blog readers about my trip to Virginia or my very fun family
vacation (the first one we've taken since 99) to Lake Livingston.

Well I've just decided to start over. If I ever get around to sharing
pics about what's been going on, they'll just have to be super late

Anyway, on to the reason for this post. I heard about this Baking for
the Troops group of ladies through an internet forum I frequent. I
thought this would be a great way for me to support our troops, as I
love to bake and I love our troops. I think next time I do it I will
send more goodies, and maybe get more people involved. This was just
so easy to do, I don't see any reason not to get more people baking.

In the boxes are snickerdoodles and chocolate cookies dipped in nuts,
powdered sugar, or cinnamon sugar.

The soldier we are sending to this month is Alex and I also made a box
for my brother who is also stationed in Iraq. I didn't think it would
be cool to send a box to a stranger without also sending one to Patrick.

Please keep both of these men and their families in your prayers.

Go to Stephan Pyles, Go there Today

Welcome to my evening as Stephan Pyles. As you can tell from the post title, you need to get there immediately. The service and food were impeccable. We have been to several fine dining establishments before but I do not hesitate to say this was the most consistently best tasting food and wonderful service we've experienced. We decided to opt for the ten course tasting menu, me with wine pairing Travis without. He got the tower of tequila and the mojito instead. I will say while the wine pairing was fantastic, it was not the best ever and it was not always timely. That is a very very very small complaint, considering how incredible the rest of the evening was.

We started with amuse bouche (to get your palate ready for the meal) but I didn't think to take a picture. Trust me, it was fun and tantalizing.

Sorry the pictures are crappy. I was snapping them with my iphone in a hurry in order to not make a scene. Who are we kidding, I was too excited to dive into the food to take a good picture, and you'll see that with some of the courses more than others.

Our first of ten courses. Quatro ceviches. From left to right, salmon with capers, green olives, and jalapenoes (intense, delicious). Scallops with Aji Mirasol and Orange. Kampachi with guanabana and agave nectar (sweet, unlike any other ceviche I've ever had). Striped bass with avocado and tomatillo (this most mild but had a great flavor none the less).

One of the breads we were served through out the night. Balsamic, caramelized onion scone. It was very dense, but very tasty. Such a great flavor.

Charred tomato and eggplant soup with crab crouquetta. Sorry, I took a bite before I took a picture. It was worth it though. Imagine this with a fried crap cake and a dollop of creme fresh. I love the flavor of roasted tomato so this was delicious to me!

Almond gazpacho with lobster, vanilla-roasted fennel and frozen champagne grapes. This was the biggest WOW of the night. It was SO interesting and tasty. It is very difficult how to describe how the flavors worked but man, was it good. The sweet tart of the little frozen champagne grapes with the creaminess of the broth and the buttery-ness of the lobster just worked so well together but was so different than anything I have ever experienced.

Sea scallop with pork belly and passion fruit-serrano chile coulis. This was probably the weakest dish of the night. Not to say it was bad, per se, but it definitely was not as big of a hit as the other meals.

The most surprising course, as suspected. Foie Gras Creme Brulee with Bing Cherry Gastrique and Jalapeno Jam on Date and Nut toast. Wow! This was incredible. From my first and only experience I didn't think that I liked Foie Gras but this dish made me a believer. The servers made a joke about how they ate this particular dish until they thought they were going to die, and I can totally see how that would happen.

Palate cleanser, watermelon three ways. From left to right, key lime, granita, and pickled. That is also the order from best to least best. They first two were very delicious, and the third was best described as interesting.

One of the breads we tasted, potato focaccia. It was melt in your mouth good!



Out first warm entree, beef tenderloin with wild mushrooms (the kind that grow on the side of corn in Mexico, very interesting and VERY yummy), and a Sope with Mole. It was topped with jimica, red pepper, and mozz. from Dallas Mozz. Co.

Our last entree course, mint spiced rubbed lab with potatoes and date-balsamic demi glace YUM!

Happy Birthday to Me! A powdered sugar "Coffee and Doughnuts" (doughnut hole with espresso creme brulee), Chocolate Fondant with Caramel and Kahlua Crema, Banana Caramel Cake with Red Finger Banana and Banana Ice Cream, and my favorite, Powdered Sugar Lemon Fried Pie with Blackberry Ice Cream and Mango Chutney

and after this, they brought us three house made chocolates! I wish they had come in a box so we could have actually taken them home and enjoyed them!

The two of us, so full we're not sure who is going to roll us home

look what my husband got me

A clean kitchen! *swoon*

what my friends need part 1

I am always finding funny stuff for sale on the internet and every once in a while something will pop up that would be the perfect present for a friend, but it is just too expensive as a joke.

I've decided I will start posting the stuff on here so my friends will at least know that I am thinking of them when I see something hilarious.

This one is for Heather.