RECIPES TO TRY

apparently I have blueberries on the brain.  found some more recipes i want to try.

Strawberry Hand Pies With Cream Cheese Pastry

Studded Blueberry Cheesecake Bars

Blueberry Pancakes

The Best Blueberry Muffins

I would make these with sausage and possible leave out the green chiles

Canned green chile peppers (Recipe: green chile, cheese and egg breakfast or lunch muffins)

STYLE-SPIRATION

POTATO CHIP CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES.....WHAT

Check out this recipe I found.  I just might have to try this.

Potato chip chocolate chip cookies

Get the recipe HERE

TOMATO SAUCE

I haven't made this yet, but once my neighbor gives me more tomatoes I'm totally on it. YUM!


TOMATO SAUCE
4 pounds sad, unloved tomatoes (some swear by romas, I’ve had success with all varieties)

1/4 cup olive oil
Small onion
2 to 3 small cloves of garlic
1/2 medium carrot
1/2 stalk of celery
1/2 teaspoon salt plus more to taste
Slivers of fresh basil, to finish

Peel your tomatoes: Bring a pot of water to boil. Cut a small X at the bottom of each tomato. Blanche the tomatoes in the boiling water for 10 to 30 seconds, then either rinse under cold water or shock in an ice water bath. Peeling the tomatoes should now be a cinch. If one gives you trouble, toss it back in the boiling water for another 10 seconds until the skin loosens up. Discard the skins (or get crafty with them).

Finish preparing your tomatoes: If using plum tomatoes, halve each lengthwise. If using beefsteak or another round variety, quarter them. Squeeze the seeds out over a strainer over a bowl and reserve the juices. (You can discard the seeds, or get crafty with them.) Either coarsely chop you tomatoes on a cutting board or use a potato masher to do so in your pot, as you cook them in a bit.

Prepare your vegetables: I finely chop my onion, and mince my carrot, celery and garlic, as does Bastianich. Batali grates his carrots. Burell pulses all four on the food processor to form a paste. All of these methods work.

Cook your sauce: Heat your olive oil in a large pot over meduim. Cook your onions, carrots, celery and garlic, if you’re using them, until they just start to take on a little color, about 10 minutes. I really like to concentrate their flavor as much as possible. Add your tomatoes and bring to a simmer, lowering the heat to medium-low to keep it at a gentle simmer. If you haven’t chopped them yet, use a potato masher to break them up as you cook them. Simmer your sauce, stirring occasionally. At 30 minutes, you’ll have a fine pot of tomato sauce, but at 45 minutes, you might just find tomato sauce nirvana: more caramelized flavors, more harmonized texture.

If your sauce seems to be getting thicker than you want it to be, add back the reserved tomato juice as need. If your sauce is too lumpy for your taste, use an immersion blender to break it down to your desired texture. (“Blasphemy!” some will say, but they’re not in the kitchen with you. So there.) Season with 1/2 teaspoon salt and more to taste. I like somewhere between 1/2 and 1 teaspoon for 4 pounds of tomatoes. Scatter fresh basil over the pot before serving. Taste once more. Swear you’ll never buy jarred sauce again.

Recipe source Smitten Kitchen & there are more tips and tricks and there are lovely pictures of the making of the tomato sauce.

HOME-SPIRATION

Love the purple painted bricks.

Love this chair.

Would like to do something like this on the ceiling of my bedroom.

See more pictures of this New York home of Gerald Decock HERE

STYLE-SPIRATION

HOME-SPIRATION

PICTURE A RANDOM

SPIRITUAL ENLIGHTENMENT

THE SELF IS THE SEEKER
	LIFE is the path,  LAW is the guide,  LOVE is the way,  LIGHT is the goal.  The GOAL of life is to unite  the personal self... body and mind... with the SOUL.  Purify the body by fasting, bathing, deep breathing,  sunshine, exercise and eating a natural diet.  Purify the mind by...  truthfulness, forgiveness, meditation and prayer. Unite with the SOUL by living a CHRIST like life;  and by fulfilling the natural, social and spiritual laws. Life is eternal  Here and Now  In this body  Or in another  We only choose  The SOUL creates  Our hearts desire  Forever.

ROMAN RECIPE

My first attempt at a true from scratch Roman Recipe. Last week I was watching Anthony Bourdain No Reservations and he was in Rome eating some delicious food and I was jealous.  So I jotted down some ingredients from a few of the recipes that they actually told you what was in them.  I did some online research trying to find true roman recipes not just "hey I'm going to call myself Italian because I have pasta in me" recipe. I couldn't find this recipe so I just had to kind of guess at the amount of ingredients.  I did find some other yummy Roman recipes that I will be trying soon. More of those to come. :)
So I don't even know what the name of this recipe is because I wasn't smart enough to write that down....only the ingredients.
So this is what I did.

NO NAME ROMAN RECIPE (if you know the name let me know)

5 pieces of bacon chopped
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
White Wine (maybe a few tablespoons or less-I think I used too much)
8 ounces Rigatoni
15 ounce can Tomato Sauce
Parmesan

Heat olive oil in a pan
Add chopped bacon, Cook
[Separate pan, boil water, add rigatoni, & cook for 10-12 minutes until you like it]
Add white wine, cook until looks like bacon is completely done & starting to get some crisp
Add tomato sauce
Drain Rigatoni and add to sauce mix
Serve
Top with Parmesan

Something they were debating on the show was whether or not to add onion.  I personally like onion but my boys don't so I left it out.  I guess the original recipe did not have onion, but over the years some restaurants have begun to add onion.  So up to you.  If you do add onion you add it while you are cooking the bacon.

This recipe had an interesting flavor, but like I said I think I put too much white wine in. It was good though.  My kiddos did not like it though, so just make it for the adults & whip up some mac & cheese for the kiddos.

PICTURE A RANDOM

I DON'T LIKE YOU BUT...

Guest Post- "I don't like you but..."08/07/2010

 

The following a a guest post by Jesse Cardin.  Jesse is a member of PZI and the practice leader of Living Room Zen, in Santa Barbara CA.  This was originally posted on the prodigious PZI talk mailing list which is available to PZI members.  I liked it so much I asked Jesse if we could post it here.  Enjoy, and if you are in Santa Barbara, stop by to sit with Jesse's group. 

----

It turns out that I don't have to like someone to enjoy eating lunch
with them. I don't even have to like someone to be their friend. It


might be a very satisfying relationship, even if everything they say
or do seems wrong.

It reminds me of a pattern that I noticed a long time ago, that there
is a connection between how I treat myself and how I treat others.  As
long as I can remember (which is not far, maybe 10 years), I have not
been my own biggest fan -- certainly my biggest critic by a long shot.
One of the beautiful, functional aspects of meditation is that as I
sit with myself for extended periods of time, I am able to stand being
around myself for extended periods of time.  I consider this
compassion for myself. Isn't that nice? And as I grow to allow myself
to be itself without judging it, I can allow others to be themselves
without judging them.  And when I do not judge others...well, I find
it much easier to be kind. And the less I am judging, the less I am
suffering.

And it seems to work the other way as well.  Even if I am judging
myself and others rather harshly (and suffering!), if I can find a
little compassion for someone else it somehow translates into
compassion for myself as well. Maybe it's some crazy universal energy
thing, or maybe it's just noticing, "oh, well...if I can be nice to
someone even though I'm unhappy, maybe I'm not such a lout after all.
Maybe there's hope for me."

I'm not sure how this all ties in with my little thesis statement at
the top, but as for that...in 1914, during World War I, there was a
strange happening that no doubt you've heard of: The Christmas Truce.
On Christmas Day, 1914, German, French and British troops in the
trenches of the Western front stopped being German, French and British
troops for a day.  Instead of trying to kill each other, they played
soccer.  Instead of trading bullets, they traded cigars and liquor.
It's really neat when I forget that I dislike someone, when all those
tired old justifications that I hold so dear drop away.  It works like
that toward myself, too.

Isn't that nice?

SOURCE: San Francisco Zen Meditation

THE SITUATION

HOME-SPIRATION

YOU ARE WHAT YOU DO

You Are What You Do
(© Max Stein)

The beginning of a habit is like an invisable thread.
Every time you repeat the act you strengthen the strand.
Add to it another filament with each repetition,
until it becomes a great cable
and binds you irrevocably to each thought and act.

First you make your habits,
and then they make you.

Your thoughts lead you to your purpose.
Your purpose always manifests into action.
Your actions form your habits.
Your habits decide your character,
and your character fixes your destiny.

Your habits are either the best of servants or the worst of masters.

PICTURE A RANDOM

MAY YOU ALWAYS FEEL LOVED

May You Always Feel Loved
(Author Unknown)

May you find serenity and tranquility in a world you may not always understand.

May the pain you have known and the conflict you have experienced give you the strength to walk through life facing each new situation with optimism and courage.

Always know that there are those whose love and understanding will always be there even when you feel most alone.

May you discover enough goodness in others to believe in a world of peace.

May a kind word, a reassuring touch, a warm smile, be yours every day of your life, and may you give these gifts as well as receive them.

Remember the sunshine when the storm seems unending.

Teach love to those who know hate, and let that love embrace you as you go into the world.

May the teaching of those you admire become part of you, so that you may call upon them.

Remember, those lives you have touched and who have touched yours are always a part of you, even if the encounters were less than you would have wished.

May you not become too concerned with material matters, but instead place immeasurable value on the goodness in your heart. Find time in each day to see the beauty and love in the world around you.

Realize that each person has limitless abilities, but each of us is different in our own way. What you may feel you lack in one regard may be more than compensated for in another. What you feel you lack in the present may become one of your strengths in the future.

May you see your future as one filled with promise and possibility. Learn to view everything as a worthwhile experience.

May you find enough inner strength to determine your own worth by yourself, and not be dependent on another's judgments of your accomplishments.

May you always feel loved.

NATURE

Some nature pictures I took today while RePeat & I were out on our animal adventure & playground play.  I love natural light photos and love to see the detail in photos where it looks so real that you want to touch the photo to check.

FASHION-SPIRATION

ANIMAL ADVENTURE

RePeat & I set out on an adventure to take some apples from our apple tree and go feed them to the buffalo.  We drove around the buffalo reserve but all we found this beautiful guy.......

RePeat threw apples over the fence, and had a stare down. His antlers were enormous.

Poor thing was covered in flies under the shade tree.  He was skinny but beautiful.

Snout.

Love this shot.  Beautiful & Golden.  Looking off into the wilderness.