Memorial Weekend 2008

Yes, it's been a few days since I've written and I have been slightly busy.  First off the food reviews.  I made the Leek, Potato and Spinach soup from Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker cookbook on Thursday and it was very good.  And very easy as a slow cooker recipe should be, in my opinion. 

You don't really need a recipe for the soup.  You use 4 medium potatoes, 4 cups of sliced leeks, place in the slow cooker and barely cover with chicken broth or water, I used some of each to use up leftovers in the fridge.  You place the cooker on low for 5 to 7 hours and use the immersion blender to puree, add 2 tablespoons of butter, salt and pepper and you're done with the basic soup.  For the spinach variation you add 2 cups packed, fresh spinach an hour before the soup is done, puree, butter and the book says to add 1 cup of cream. I used a 6 ounce package of baby spinach.   I did not add cream and it was very good.  Not the prettiest green color ever seen, but very tasty. 

I had the soup for dinner Friday and my husband had the beef curry.  Both were excellent heated again. 

Saturday we had Southwestern Hash for breakfast from the Ellie Krieger cookbook. I'll post the recipe here since I found it on the Food Network site and don't have to type it!

Southwestern Hash

1 pound small red potatoes, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 small onion, diced (about 1 cup)
1 green pepper, diced (about 1 cup)
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon ancho chili powder or other chili powder
3 medium tomatoes diced (about 2 1/2 cups)
1 can no-salt-added black beans, drained and rinsed
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup chopped fresh cilantro leaves
4 eggs
Hot pepper sauce, for serving

 Place the potatoes in a large non-stick skillet. Cover with water, bring to a boil and cook until the potatoes are tender, about 8 minutes. Drain and set potatoes aside.

Dry the skillet with a paper towel. Add the oil and heat over a medium-high heat. Add the onions and peppers and cook until vegetables have softened, about 6 minutes. Stir in the potatoes, garlic, cumin, oregano, and chili powder. Add the tomatoes and beans and simmer for 5 minutes or until heated through. Season with salt and pepper. Stir in cilantro.

Transfer the hash onto serving plates. With the heat off, wipe out the pan again. Spray it with cooking spray, turn heat on to medium-low and cook the eggs, sunny-side up, or over-easy. Put an egg on top of each mound of hash. Serve with hot sauce.

This recipe serves 4, and we had leftover hash.  I'll probably have it for dinner on "whatever" Tuesday.  It was excellent. 

I went to Bloomingdale's in the afternoon to make some Shrimp Pesto Pizza using the food processor.  Very fast and easy and yummy.  We had a nice crowd for the demo and some happy pizza munchers.  One man bought a food processor "for his wife".  She was there and chose the color, but I believe he might be using it more than she will.

Sunday we had made plans to go to the Decatur Arts Festival so we got groceries at Publix before leaving to have fun.  And went out to breakfast at the ever popular Waffle House.  With prices of groceries getting higher, I've made a few changes with my shopping.  I am using what I have in the freezer and trying to add fresh veggies or salad to whatever is in the freezer.  If something is on sale, I do buy extra and put it in the freezer.  When I plan my menu, I'm basing it more on what I have, what is on sale and what is in season rather than choosong a cookbook and looking for recipes that sound good.

The Decatur Arts Festival was nice and I finally found an engagement gift for my niece.  I didn't want to get something anyone could get from anywhere.  Since we hadn't spent much time at the festival we had time to go to a quilt shop/sewing machine dealer and look at sewing machines.  The owner of the shop is very nice and is a very good salesperson and I have a new machine that scares me a little.  I'll be reading the manual and playing with it today.  More to follow with machine adventures.

I'm going to read the manual now, wait for a cake to cool so I can take a meal to someone from church and fold my load of laundry.  Lately I've had "help" with the laundry so of course it takes longer!  And there is attitude involved.