Skillet Turnips and Potatoes with Bacon

I have never had turnips so tasty as these (you know you can't go wrong with bacon)! This recipe uses a sweet vinegar mixture to help the veggies caramelize a bit and become oh so flavorful. I followed the recipe pretty closely, well, I thought I did. The only change that was significant is that I browned my turnips and potatoes in batches apart from the bacon mixture (in the vinegar mixture) because my skillet wasn't large enough. Also I had to use some dry parsley because I didn't have any fresh on hand and I used celery salt for a bit of an extra flavor boost.


Ingredients:

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

1 tablespoon sugar

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

8 ounces thick-cut bacon slices, cut crosswise into 1-inch pieces

1 medium onion, thinly sliced

4 large garlic cloves, peeled, crushed

1 1/2 pounds turnips, peeled, cut into 1-inch chunks

1 1/2 pounds white-skinned potatoes, peeled, cut into 1-inch chunks

1 teaspoon coarse sea salt

1 tablespoon chopped fresh Italian parsley

Mix 1/4 cup water, vinegar, and sugar in small bowl and set aside.

Combine oil and bacon in heavy large skillet; sauté over medium-high heat until fat is rendered, 3 to 4 minutes. Add onion and garlic; sauté until onion is golden, about 5 minutes.

Add turnips and potatoes; sprinkle with 1 teaspoon sea salt and toss 5 minutes. Reduce heat to medium/low, cover, and cook until vegetables are almost tender, stirring and turning vegetables occasionally, about 15 minutes.

Push vegetables to 1 side of skillet. Pour vinegar mixture into cleared space. Toss vegetables with vinegar mixture. Spread vegetables in even layer in skillet; cook until golden and slightly crisp on bottom, about 4 minutes. Turn vegetables over; spread in even layer and cook until browned and slightly crisp on bottom, about 4 minutes. Continue to turn, spread, and cook vegetables until tender, golden, and crisp around edges, 7 to 8 minutes longer. Season with more sea salt and black pepper. Transfer to bowl. Sprinkle with parsley.

You can also find the recipe here: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Skillet-Turnips-and-Potatoes-with-Bacon-361293#ixzz183czZJDM

Wreath How To

Here's a link to the actual tutorial, but I'll show you my progress and outcome through pictures. It is such a fun and inexpensive project!























I just love how it turned out! I took a lot of hot glue, but it is holding up great!

My Weekend in Photos

Hosted Thanksgiving Dinner

Delicious spread, all guests contributing, ham, turkey, fresh green bean casserole, mashed sweet potatoes, deviled eggs, cranberry salad, tossed salad, and home made crescent rolls - and not pictured, but amazing, pumpkin cheesecake with maple pecan glaze

Test knit a super cute baby hat

Completed some Christmas presents

Headed to the mountains to cut a Christmas tree with friends

Finished up the weekend with some decorating and dinner with old friends.

Thankfulness

When ranking holidays Thanksgiving rates right at the top for me. One of the reasons I like it is because, for me, it isn't about anything material or any one event. I don't associate it with football, turkey (I have a preference to ham), or the parade. And honestly, my pumpkin obsession starts in September and goes through December, not really centered on the holiday.

I like that we take time to celebrate our blessings. God has blessed my life in so many ways and I know I do not reflect on it enough.

For today, in this moment I am thankful for (in no particular order, of course)...

friendships that are growing and deepening.

a home where I can rest, create, and be hospitable.

a job where I am appreciated, provided for, and valued.

a God who is patient with me and wants me as I am.

a husband who hears me out, loves me, and even likes spending time with me.

There aren't may thanksgiving songs out there, but music is a huge emotional and spiritual connection for me so I tend to look for music when I am reflecting. So here are a few verses of a Thanksgiving Hymn to reflect on.

For The Beauty of The Earth, by Folliott S. Pierpoint, 1864

For the beauty of the earth,
For the glory of the skies;
For the love which from our birth,
Over and around us lies;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For the joy of human love,
Brother, sister, parent, child;
Friends on Earth and friends above,
For all gentle thoughts and mild;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For Thy church that evermore,
Lifteth holy hands above;
Off'ring up on ev'ry shore,
Her pure sacrifice of love;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For Thyself, best Gift Divine,
To the world so freely given,
For that great, great love of Thine,
Peace on earth and joy in heaven.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

Birch Pillow

It is finished and I love the result. yay! I'll let the photos speak for themselves, but here are the project notes.

Anniversary

I'm a little behind on my post this week, but at least I have some photos to share!

Well, last Saturday (October 2nd) was our 5 year wedding anniversary. Time flies, but it has been so amazing. I could go on and on about how much I love my husband and what kind, loving and generous guy he is but you all know that and I don't think he reads this blog anyhow. :)

We haven't celebrated any of our anniversaries, save maybe going out to dinner. We decided we'd actually get out and have bit of fun. So here are some photos and links to places we went.

Started our morning with a tour of Boulder Ice Cream, tasty. Then head back to Louisville for lunch at Lucky Pie Pizza - I HIGHLY recommend this place, so g o o d . Then we strolled about Denver for a bit and took the Banjo Billy Bus Tour, fun and very educational!

Then we checked into our hotel, The Curtis. We would recommend it, nice folks, cute place, and we even ended up with a great view from our room - oh and free hot cookies when you check in!

We then enjoyed a delicious dinner at the Vesta Dipping Grill - I got the lamb, David enjoyed the Salmon. I love sauces and dips so I thoroughly enjoyed their food and the flavors were amazing. And actually, this was a bit reminiscent of our wedding buffet, which was various kinds of dip.

After dinner we walked around LoDo and took some photos.

Then we enjoyed an improv show at The Impulse Theater. So funny, we had a great time! We definitely plan to go back.

Sunday was pretty low key, we slept late, enjoyed the luxury of room service (for the first time ever!) and then decided to head over to Denver Botanic Gardens (do I have any good reason for wanting to call them Botanical Gardens?)


And that was our anniversary outing - more pictures here. Super fun, not exhausting and we had a lot of laughs together which is oh so important. So, here's to the next five years, may they be just as fun, full of love, included fewer moves, and be abundant in blessing.

Birch Trees

Whenever I think of Birch Trees I think of the sandbox at the farm house where I grew up. It was the only birch tree on our property, it was taken down years later, but I always thought is was so cool. I would be playing in the sandbox (trying to avoid the cat poo surprises -ew) and would get distracted by the peeling bark of the birch and begin playing with bark or climbing around in the tree.

All that to say I have a fondness for birch trees and I am REALLY excited about this new knitting project - Birch Tree Pillow. The pattern is by Eva Katharina (ravelry link, sorry), if you're not on Ravelry you'll just have to wait and watch the pattern emerge as I knit this up.

I started spinning the yarn for this project in the early summer, I think. I have only spun half the wool I have, but I couldn't wait to cast on for this pillow - and honestly, I'm not even certain I'll need the other half of the wool so it may get designated to another project.

I find that whenever I do fair isle knitting I can't seem to put the project down! It is so fun to see the result emerge and I enjoy knitting with both hands - it make me feel more efficient or something.

I just finished this fair isle project - stirrup socks or yoga socks. I plan to wear them mostly with regular socks and ballet flats as an extra layer of warmth - since my gym doesn't offer classes (boo).

Anyhow, this pillow has me itching to keep knitting fair isle. This evening looks like it is shaping up to be an evening, at home, on the couch, with hubs and my knitting - lovely.

Book Review: 200 Fast and Easy Artisan Breads: No-Knead, One Bowl

I tend to be quite picky about my cookbooks. I enjoy chillin' on the couch looking through my cookbooks marking exciting new recipes, but I don't have the patience for a cookbook that just sit on my counter being uninspiring. Uninspiring cookbooks get booted.

Currently, I very much like all the cookbooks I have so I was hesitant to "invest" in a new one. But, I have had zero success making delicious bread. Every try has come out super dense - not chewy, not airy, and not flavorful as in my childhood memories.

So, discussed my failures with a dear friend who has all the bread making success in the world, and she chalked it up to this book "200 Fast and Easy Artisan Breads: No-Knead, One Bowl".


Finally I bought the book and gave it a try this past weekend. All I can say is A M A Z I N G.

On Saturday I made a loaf if sun-dried tomato bread and couldn't help but try another recipe, whole wheat boule, before the weekend was over. Not only were the loafs beautiful, but they had great flavor and texture. Beyond all, they were simple.

A few piece of equipment are required for various recipes in the book. You need to own an instant read thermometer, a baking stone, and a broiler pan. Also, this book uses instant or bread machine yeast rather than active dry yeast.

I already had stone(s), but I picked up the thermometer at Target for about $14 and the broiler was sadly $25, but you could probably thrift one if you keep your eye out.

I'm plan to try another recipe this weekend and I'll let you know how it turns out, but my current conclusion is this - if you want to make awesome, tasty, fancy looking breads that are easy and have very little hands on time then this book is for you.

Check it out from your library to give it a try!

For those of you who come by here for knitting more than cooking/baking here's peak at what I'm working on.

Poached Eggs in Spicy Indian Tomato Sauce

Sadly I do not have any photos of the delicious things I am about to share with you because I was too hungry, therefore I did not pause for a photo. Enjoy the photo above of some my canning adventures... now, on with the recipe.

A few weeks ago I was watching a cooking show and they poached some eggs in a tomato based sauce. I'm pretty sure I had to wipe the drool from my face.

So, last night when looking in the fridge I saw we had eggs, took out my favorite vegetarian cook book and looked through suggestions for eggs I was reminded of the cooking show and the drool.

I made a variation of the Spicy Indian Tomato Sauce and then poached some eggs in it. YUM. I even suggested to David that I could make some chicken in the left over sauce tomorrow, but he wanted more eggs instead. The man turned down meat - seriously, give this recipe a try.

Took me about 30 minutes from start to finish, and most of my adaptations were just because it is what I had one hand so you can be flexible with the ingredients.

Poached Eggs in Spicy Indian Tomato Sauce
adapted from Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian"

In a dutch oven or pot (that has a lid, you'll need it later) over med high heat melt

4 tbsps butter

add

1 med. onion chopped finely

cook until the onion is translucent, then add

2 cloves minced garlic
1 chopped green chili

saute for another minute then add your spices

2 tsp curry pwd
1/2 tsp ancho chili pwd
1/2 tsp dried cilantro
large pinch of sugar
fresh ground salt and pepper

cook until fragrant, about 2 minutes and then add

1 - 28 ounce can of fire roasted crushed tomatoes
1/2 cup whole milk or cream

bring to a gentle boil, sauce should be a normal marinara consistency, if not then cook off some more liquid before continuing.

add 1/2 cup water or stock to the sauce

return to a simmer, now it is time to add your eggs, I suggest 5 at the most for this amount of sauce

crack your egg into a small bowl or saucer and then slide it into the sauce
once all your eggs are in, cover and cook for 5-7 minutes.

Enjoy!

I'd love to hear how it turns our for you, happy cooking!

Fall Knits

Now that the summer heat is subsiding and mornings are crisp I find myself with a growing list of things I'm ready to knit.

Some are going to be Christmas gifts, others are things I have wanted to make for a long time, and others are sweaters - now is optimal sweater knitting because it is cool enough to be motivated and the cold will still be around long enough to enjoy the result.

First completed Christmas gift for this year, Harriet. Since babies don't read the internet I thought it would be okay to post a photo of the dear hippo in all her pinkness. Since baby knits are so addictive I'm sure Zoe will get more than just Harriet... maybe some leg warmies too.

Wildfire

Coming into work this morning I entered into the gray, fragrant haze. And as I sit at my desk there is a looming plume of smoke over Boulder.

If you have not heard about the wildfire in Left Hand Canyon here is a recent Denver Post article, but any Google search will give you all kinds of information at this point. Also, here are more photos of the situation from the Denver Post.

The photos above are David's, he went out to the hill in Louisville yesterday. I really don't have any words to add. This is just so sad and I pray they get the blaze under control soon!

September is here and so am I

Somewhere back in July I decided I'd give up on blogging again until September. I didn't let you all in on the plan, but now the time is here.

There is so much going on in the summer that there is tons to blog about, but no time to do it. So from time to time this fall and winter I might bring out a few pictures or projects from this summer and share those with you too.

To kick off this blogging season here are a few photos from my Golden Birthday party last Saturday. It was a murder mystery party the theme being set in a trailer park. (Golden birthday because I turned 28 on the 28th)

This is David, dressed as Big Hoss


Taylor trying to figure out who he suspects


Katy and Andrew just looking awesome

We all had a lot of laughs and after the mystery was solved we had some great times playing catch phrase.

Mmmm Pie

Summer being in full swing I have been out and about and have been making more plans to be out and about. But I haven't forgotten to take some photos to share with you so new posts are on their way!

There has been some home making-over, some baking, some knitting, and some traveling. And there will be some more traveling, house-guests, and so on.

Today I want to share with you a recipe for all those blueberries that are on sale. This past weekend I made a pie and I am super happy with the result - not too sweet, and so tasty! On the recommendation of David's aunt, who makes a killer blueberry pie, I used this filling and my favorite crust. Happy baking!