Category: (it's all about the) food

Date night (vacation week edition)

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, local fun, movies, restaurants
How do you know (promotional poster)

It’s been a while since we’ve been able to have a date night, what with the holidays coming, shopping for the holidays, wrapping for the holidays, hiding presents and then (forgetting where they were hidden) looking for the presents for the holidays….

It was nice to have Christmas behind us and get a little time together for a date (courtesy of our eldest child, who stayed with the youngest child). Going out one night during a week off from work feels totally different from going out on a “school night”. No worrying about getting home early, or having to get up at dawn to spoil things. It was nice to just think about what we wanted to do, where we wanted to go, without outside time constraints.

So, even though we decided to stay local and do the usual dinner and a movie, it felt…nicer. More relaxed. No rushing through the meal to get to the movie on time, since we didn’t have to leave after I’d gotten home from work.

First, we stopped at the Wells Public Library, because I love the library. That was pretty much the only reason. I dropped off some books, then chatted with my friends, the librarians (Cindy, Cindy, and Cindel), about blogging and the book that I’m writing (almost finished!!).

Next, we were headed to Ruby’s in York, when my husband (on a whim) made a U-turn and we went to East instead. What are you gonna do? It’s a man’s prerogative to change his mind at the last minute! The food was great, as was the service. The only annoying thing was the woman at the table next to us who wouldn’t shut up about how cold it was (it wasn’t) in there.

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Then we saw How do you know at the Wells Five Star Cinema. I loved it. He did not love it (as evidenced by him saying to the ticket seller after the movie, “You could’ve warned me!”). Okay, so I’m saying it: Bill, you’re the best husband ever for sitting through that movie and still having a smile on your face at the end!

One of the Best Christmases ever

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, family, Holidays, italian, quest for the best, tweens
Our tree!

I originally thought that this would be one of the worst Christmases ever.  It had three strikes against it before it even started:

  1. I had to work late and wouldn’t get home until 8:20PM Christmas Eve.
  2. My husband had to work early Christmas Day, leaving at 5:10 AM, and would be gone the entire day and night.
  3. My son had to work Christmas Day as well. He was home in the morning, which was nice, but then couldn’t come with us to have dinner with relatives.

We tried to make the best of it. The kids each opened a couple of gifts with Dad on Christmas Eve while I listened in from work over the phone. My husband and I had a little time to exchange our gifts Christmas Eve.

Christmas morning, after Bill went to work, I stayed up and baked some bread and then put our traditional Christmas morning breakfast (cinnamon buns) into the oven. We opened up the gifts, then got ready for our (mostly separate) day.

We stopped to see Grammy and Papa before heading to my brother’s house for Christmas dinner…which may well have been one of the Best Christmas Dinners of all time. We played Wii games between dinner and dessert, rationalizing that we’d have more room for tiramisu (was that wrong?).

Then we brought some dinner to my son and his girlfriend Lauren at work. Unfortunately, we didn’t get there until 6:30PM…oh well. The food was worth the wait! My sister-in-law Andrea is an excellent cook!

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The best yoga class ever!

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, baking, fitness, friends, quest for the best, yoga
Kathy, Alexis, Kristen (our teacher!), Janna, Me, Jeannie
Last night was a special yoga class at Windsong Yoga Studio in South Berwick. My friend Kristen (right in the center) is the instructor, and she teaches nice blend of many different styles of yoga. She has studied with some of the top teachers in the United States,  including Doug Keller, Desiree Rumbaugh, Sianna Sherman, and Judith Lasater, to name just a few. A bonus: she teaches women (no men allowed!). 🙂
She planned a special class to celebrate the winter solstice (the shortest day of the year).
After this excellent class, we were treated to an excellent meal, prepared for us by Kristen. A Tempeh Wreath was the main course, accompanied by a side salad of mixed greens, lightly dressed. Dessert was partially by way of Whole Foods  (and may I just say, OMG! Especially the chocolate covered figs? Unbelievable!). There were also some delicious Christmas cookies made for us by Janna, because, after all, what is Christmas without the cut outs? I ask  you.
Now, if you are someone who practices yoga, and midway through most classes you start thinking about pizza and/or assorted baked goods, this was like a class made in heaven. Thank you, Kristen! Put that Tempeh Wreath recipe in your cookbook!
What holiday celebrations are you participating in this year?

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To frost or not to frost?

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, baking, family, friends, tweens
Iz ready to bake!
My daughter and I were looking for something interesting to bake last weekend and came upon a recipe for blondies. Not just any blondies…pumpkin blondies.
Now it’s not often that we bake things that don’t list chocolate as one of the top ingredients, but these looked and sounded so great that we decided to take the leap.
We found the recipe in this month’s issue of Mixing Bowl Magazine.
My husband happened to call during the decision-making phase and I told him that we were baking, and the recipe we had picked. “What’s in them?” he asked. I told him that besides pumpkin, there were white chocolate chips and coconut, and he interrupted me. “White chocolate chips? Sounds gross,” he decided. “Don’t save me any.”
(Note: Never ask my husband his opinion about anything if you don’t really want it). 🙂
Well, we made them anyway, of course, and they were excellent. I thought a little maple frosting would kick these up a notch (I mean really; what isn’t better in life with a little frosting on top? I ask you), but my daughter didn’t agree.
We compromised by frosting half of them with some maple cream cheese whoopie pie filling that I’d made, and left half unadorned.
Well, they turned out great! We’ll definitely make these again. Our compromise on the frosting issue is this: next time, we’ll make a maple glaze and drizzle it over the bars.

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Dinner, revised

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, family, tweens

As I was rushing to get out the door the other morning, trying to make it to the gym before my workday, I heard my daughter say to my husband, “What’s for supper tonight?” He replied, “I don’t know yet. What do you want to have?”

I didn’t hear the response, having made it outside and to the bottom of the stairs by then, but I thought about it often throughout the day after I got to work.

Making supper every night had usually been my job, since after we had kids that were old enough to sit at the table and eat human food, I usually worked during the day, and my husband usually worked at night. About five years ago, however, we did a 180. I started a new job that required me to work evenings at first,  and so my husband changed his work schedule, and became the primary supper cook.

Now, it’s not like he had never cooked a meal before; he was a restaurant cook when we met, and he’d worked as a pizza maker for several years as well. It’s just something that he had rarely been called on to do at home, since a) I loved doing that job and b) he wasn’t home at suppertime. 🙂

His style of cooking is quite different from mine. I usually think about it for hours in advance, shop for all the things I need or may potentially someday need, and often will painstakingly follow a recipe, but he almost always just walks into the kitchen, looks around to see what we have, and then makes something out of what’s there. If there isn’t anything appealing in the house already, then he’ll go to the grocery store, and do basically the same thing: look around to see what they have that looks good, then go home and put the ingredients together into a meal…

…a meal that the kids (more often than not) actually like, and will eat. Really, what more could a parent ask?

So, here’s to all the Dad’s that are cooking dinner for the fam tonight; YOU ROCK!

Omelette Factory puts the “OM” in Omelet

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, local fun, restaurants
Blueberry muffin

Well, this picture may look familiar to some of you! My friend Susan and I went to the Omelette Factory on Rt 1 in Ogunquit recently. She had been there before but it was my first time.

The menu does include things other than omelettes, as you can see!
I ordered a spinach and mushroom (fresh veggies  were used) without cheese…and I actually got it that way (why do cooks always want to put cheese on my food, even after I ask them nicely not to??).
The omelette came with a piece of fresh-out-of-the-oven lemon poppy-seed bread and half an english muffin that they baked themselves. We also were offered excellent homemade raspberry jam to spread on it.
The coffee was great and my cup was never more than half empty before it was refilled without my asking.  Seating consists of a small, cozy dining room with extra seating in back of that on an enclosed, sunny porch, which is where we sat.
The Omelette Factory is a great place to go for a great local breakfast…in the summer months, at least. I’m wondering if they are open in the winter, and if so , am hoping that porch is heated…(I’m just sayin’).

Eggstra special breakfast

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, raising chickens, tweens
A double yoked egg!

I decided to cook a big breakfast last Sunday morning, so my daughter and I headed to the kitchen to strategize.

Me: Pumpkin Pancakes?
Izzy: No.
Me: Waffles?
Iz: No.
Me: Bacon and eggs?
Iz: Yes! And sausage!
Well, no surprise there; that’s almost always her breakfast of choice (we do raise chickens, after all!).
I headed to the cupboard for a pan; she headed to the fridge for the eggs.
She brought two eggs over to me for inspection, one of which was a very large egg with a network of funky ridges on it surface.
Now, I had been watching that egg for a few days…often when a young hen first starts laying, she will produce eggs of interesting sizes, shapes, and … textures.
I made Izzy her “tween omelet”:  egg scrambled with the mushrooms cooked separately and served on the side.
Then I bit the bullet and cracked the unusual egg into the bowl…and it had two yolks! Now, this wasn’t our first chicken egg that contained two yolks, but it was the first one that I’d ever personally cracked that did.
I was absurdly pleased by this.
One great thing about this egg was how bright and beautiful the yolks were. What was also great was that it was big enough to make an entire omelet from just the one egg!
Note: I put my mushrooms (and spinach!) in the actual omelet, as opposed to the “tween” version with them on the side. 🙂

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Fun with tweens on the weekend

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, books, family, friends, local fun, shopping, tweens

My tween daughter invited a friend to spend the day, and as the 7 hours loomed ominously unfilled ahead of us, I wondered:  What the heck should we do?  

First, I decided to do something for me: I had a 20% coupon to Kennebooks in Kennebunk so that was our first stop. A quick check of the local paper told me that they were having an Open House that started at 10:30am, so it was just me and my tween for this. When we arrived, there was a kids “author event” so we headed down for that, but it turned out to be for littler kids, so we did some browsing for an hour. I bought a book for a friend for Christmas.

Sigh. I love to be with the books. But I digress…

Next, we picked up the friend and headed for the library. They browsed the shelves, and checked out some books, and then harassed me until I gave up and said, “Okay, yes! I’m ready to leave too!”.  While we were there, we found a new cookbook called Betty Crocker’s Just the two of us, and they spied a recipe while flipping through it that they wanted to make. Since we had all of the ingredients already, I agreed.

Lunch was next, and I’m embarrassed to admit that I took the easy way out: McDonald’s was right nearby, and since it was almost 1pm and they were “starving”, we headed there next. In my defense, we haven’t eaten McD’s food in months, so here’s hoping that it didn’t do us too much damage. We drove through and brought it home to eat it (their choice).

Then we made the Double Chocolate Snack Cake.

Izzy and Ivy, the bakers

They did a great job! I helped a little but they were really in charge of the recipe (I was in charge of the oven) and it turned out really great. We ate most of it fairly quickly.

After that, they hula hooped and played on the swing in the yard, fed bread to the chickens, and played a few hands of cards: Uno, War.

Then, they actually read the books that they checked out of the library for a little while.
I had to run to Hannaford’s and they were thrilled to come with me. They got free cookies at the bakery, and free samples of cheese and turkey at the deli. They even watched the cart full of groceries after I realized that the most important thing that I went there to buy, I had forgotten, so I had to go back and get it and run through the cashier’s line again. (Hey, at least I remembered before I got back home; I figured that I was ahead of the game!)

When we got back, I made them spaghetti for supper, and after we finished eating they had another little bit of time to play.

They watched a little TV: one episode of iCarly, and one episode of Drake and Josh. Then they played some songs on the electric keyboard for a while.

When it was time for her friend to go home, they had even picked up after themselves!

It was a great day; I even was able to get my 2,000 words written in between everything else. Life is good!

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Dinner and a movie

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, local fun, movies, restaurants
Morning Glory promotional poster

In reviewing some of my past posts, I’ve noticed a date night trend toward Dinner and a Movie; this night is no different. The movie was “”What’s the Story?’ Morning Glory”, viewed at the Wells Five Star Cinema. It almost couldn’t be bad, with Diane Keaton and Harrison Ford, right? Rachel McAdams was the real draw for me though; she’s been great in all of the movies she’s been in (that I’ve seen) and was in this movie also. The first half of this movie was a little slow, but the lightning fast second half more than made up for it. Also, I was laughing so hard that I had tears in my eyes. It made me nostalgic for Broadcast News with Holly Hunter and William Hurt (the latter movie was a little better).

Dinner was at Mekong Thai in Wells. Our choice of restaurant is often based on being short of time and proximity to the theater, and tonight’s choice was no exception. That said, Mekong Thai has probably the best service of any restaurant I’ve ever been to.

When we were younger (in the late 90’s and early 00’s), when we had a little baby (and littler discretionary income) our dinner and a movie date night happened at home. We watched Dinner and a Movie on TBS with Annabelle Gurwitch and Paul Gilmartin. It didn’t even matter whether or not I liked the movie; I enjoyed watching Annabelle so much that was enough. I still have the apron with the Dinner and a Movie logo that my husband gave me one year for Christmas.

It is poignant to me now that the child that was sleeping in the crib in the next room is now babysitting our younger child so that we can have dinner and a movie out in the real world.

Dinner and a Movie  (with different hosts) is still on TBS; My Cousin Vinny is next up on December 17th, with Joe Pesci and Marisa Tomei (back when she still was keeping her clothes on for the camera). 🙂 Enjoy!

Garden update: November

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, fitness, gardening, raising chickens, tweens
Pumpkins gone wild!

Remember the (multiple) posts I’ve written about how much chickens love pumpkins? Well my husband did a wild and crazy thing: he bartered with the local Walmart and struck a world-class deal to help rid them of all of their end of season pumpkins. (After all, as soon as Halloween is over they have to make room for those Christmas decorations! 🙂 )

He came home with is 4-Runner stuffed to the gills with pumpkins of every size, shape, color, and some even with painted features (one had a frog!). The chickens are now in pumpkin heaven, and as a side benefit, our yard is very extravagantly decorated for fall. 🙂

Since we were having a warm day in November, I decided that would be relatively painless to check out what was left of the garden. I was thinking I’d harvest the dregs of the carrots and beets and check on the lettuce.

Well, the lettuce is not growing very much yet; maybe we got it into the ground a couple of weeks later than we should have (totally my fault). Hopefully there will be some that is harvestable and edible before the snow comes. The carrots were a big surprise though. Since I wasn’t having much luck pulling them up by the green above-ground fronds, I gave up and started to harvest them like potatoes: I dug into the ground under them and pushed them up through the soil. I couldn’t believe how many of them were lurking under there, just minding their own business. Had I not gone in after them, regardless of the presence of waving fronds, I would have missed at least half of them.

Up for next weekend: carrot soup.

P.S. Chickens also love carrot tops and beet greens.

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