Friday, July 22, 2011

Polish Cauliflower and Sausage Soup

Now that we have all that cauliflower, we need to do something with it! Fortunately Michael has several great recipes tucked away in his genius mind - here's one of our favorites.


Gorgeous giant cauliflower!


Ingredients

One head cauliflower
Two carrots
2 1/2 cups chicken stock (homemade is best)
1 onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 pound kielbasa, roughly chopped
3 Tbs butter
1/3 cup flour
Salt & pepper to taste
Cheese - as much as you see fit (Tillamook medium cheddar is our choice)

The recipe, as dictated by Michael:

Head of cauliflower, cut into florets
Two carrots, thinly sliced

In a saucepan, with 2 1/2 cups of chicken stock (preferably homemade); cover and simmer until tender.

Lightly blend and set aside.


So pretty in the blender

Bzzzt - blended



In same saucepan, brown one chopped onion, 3 cloves of minced garlic, and about a pound of kielbasa (roughly chopped)


Kielbasa, onions, and garlic


When browned, add 3 Tbs butter, 1/3 cup flour, salt & pepper to taste - mix well and cook for about a minute, remove from heat and slowly stir in 2 1/2 cups of milk

Heat until it thickens and is bubbly, on medium high - stirring continuously - simmer for two minutes

Add as much cheese as you see fit (we use Tillamook medium cheddar)

Over medium heat, add cauliflower carrot mixture and heat for ~5 minutes


Serve with buttered and salted baguette slices for mopping up the soup!


ENJOY!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Google+, giant veggies, and an amazing kid...

So. Google+ is live and it seems that everyone is stampeding over there to give it a try. That includes me. The jury hasn't rested yet, but I am leaning in a pretty positive direction. With a few more improvements, I can see moving most of my social network operations in that direction. If only they'd allow html in posts and comments! PLEASE!!!!!!! I'm begging you, great Google gurus!

A couple of things I've noticed already:

  • You can edit your posts! (hey now, there's a concept!)
  • There doesn't seem to be a limit on how long your post is (hey now, there's a concept!)

That's a couple, right? What's missing - the ability to use html in posts and comments. That's the biggest thing missing from most of the social sites. What if I want to embed a video or photo as part of my comment? Oh sorry, you can only post a link... the visual impact is lost because people have to visit another page to see it. There is definitely potential...


Giant veggie plants, with Nolan for scale


And on to giant veggies... and giant teen boys. I look at this picture, and Nolan looks even more grown up than ever - is that possible?!!! Look at that face - he's not a little kid anymore! When did this happen? He'll be 17 in a couple of weeks, and a senior next year in school. It's been a damn fine ride with this kid - I couldn't have asked for a better parenting experience with him. I'm so proud of the young man he's become, despite the constant motherly worry when he's out there in the wilds (like tonight... camping at Mount Baker and split boarding tomorrow). It's good that he has healthy interests!


Baby Nolan


What a cute little guy he was!

Oh yeah - back to the veggies. They're growing like mad this year! I took a few risks and put starts out when the weather seemed a bit dodgy - cold and rainy. It seems to have really worked out! We're getting tonnes of broccoli, and the first head of cauliflower was perfect. PERFECT.


A perfect head of cauliflower!

That's no keychain swiss army knife, nosiree! This first lovely head of cauliflower was turned into the most scrumptious cauli-cheese-sausage soup ever.

Time to go digest.

Sunday, July 3, 2011

All that is lost...

I AM LOST!


Can eventually be found - or so they say.

Today, I lost 68GB of my music collection when my external hard drive died during transfer to a new drive. Only 11GB was saved. I could be depressed, heartbroken, or despondent! But no. I'm am just annoyed. Annoyed that it happened in the summer, and not the winter when I have more time to futz around with it. Annoyed that I have to go through everything and figure out what made it and what didn't. Annoyed that it will take time away from other things that are more important!

But really, it's not that bad. I'll be able to clear out the crap I don't really want, and add plenty more new music. It's one of those freeing moments...


Happy Sad

It's a pain, but life will go on.

Any suggestions for music I should try?