Quick Pickled Zucchini

Just the other day I was wondering, "I wonder if I can pickle zucchinis?" and then Beth emailed me this recipe from 101 cookbooks.

Ingredients

• 3 medium (1 pound) zucchini, thinly sliced

• 1 medium white onion, thinly sliced

• 3 shallots, thinly sliced
• 1 1/2 tablespoons fine grain sea salt or pickling salt
  
• 1/4 cup (small handful) fresh dill sprigs
• 1 small fresh red chile pepper, very thinly sliced
• 1/2 tablespoon yellow mustard seeds
• 
3/4 cup cider vinegar

• 3/4 cup white wine vinegar

• 1/3 cup sugar

Directions
Toss the zucchini, onion, shallots, and salt together in a colander and place over a bowl to catch the liquids. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for at least a couple hours. Toss once or twice along the way. You're aiming to get as much liquid out of the zucchini as possible.

When you're finished draining the zucchini, shake off any water. At this point you want the zucchini as dry as possible. Place in a 1 liter / 1 quart jar along with the dill, chile pepper, and mustard seeds. Alternately, you can cram them into a 3/4 liter Weck jar like I do, but it's always a bit snug in the jar.

Combine the ciders and sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a simmer, stirring until the sugar dissolves, and continue to boil for a few minutes. Pour the liquid over the zucchini and seal the jar. Let cool, then refrigerate. The pickles are good for a week or so.



Makes one quart.

Results:
Unknown. I'm in Stevens Point right now for a conference and I put these together right before I left. At first whiff, they smelled like McDonald's pickles, but better.

Addendum:
These are pretty good! They go really well with, of all things, tuna fish. They don't keep tremendously long, only a couple weeks, so don't hold back when you're eating them.

Peanut Butter-Banana Oatmeal

From the Washington Post:

Summary:

The banana and peanut butter flavors in this creamy oatmeal are quite subtle. It tastes even better the next day, so you might want to make a double batch and keep it in the refrigerator; reheat with a little extra milk.

2 to 3 servings

Ingredients:

• 1 cup old-fashioned oatmeal (do not use quick-cooking or instant)
• 2 1/3 cups water
• Pinch salt
• 2 tablespoons creamy peanut butter
• 1 banana, cut into 1/4-inch slices
• 1/3 cup low-fat milk
• 1/2 teaspoon unsalted butter

Directions:

Combine the oatmeal, water and salt in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, stirring, over medium-high heat, then reduce the heat to medium and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes, until thickened and creamy. Add the peanut butter, banana, milk and butter; mix gently to combine. Cook for 1 minute. Divide among individual bowls and serve hot.

Results:
There's already a chill in the air here in the Great Northwoods. The mornings have been brisk, to say the least, and as I don't have to be anywhere today until 9:30, I thought I'd make myself a nice hot breakfast. Peanut butter and banana are in my top most favorite flavor combinations of all time, but I was a little disappointed. They're definitely "subtle," as the recipe claims, in this dish. I kicked it up by adding a little bit of homemade jam that my friend Sally gave me. And it is certainly creamy. I'm not sure how necessary the butter is, I bet you can leave that out.
Addendum:
Having gotten to the end of the bowl, I'm not sure I'd make this again. It was just TOO creamy, if that's possible, and not quite to my taste. But you might like it. :)

Harper does not like Frank Lloyd Wright

Chris and I said goodbye to summer with a trip down to Chicago for a wedding. The wedding was awesome, but also cool was the neighborhood we stayed in, Oak Park. Birthplace of Hemingway and proud show-er off-er of many Frank Lloyd Wright homes and his studio. It was amazing. We stayed at the Write Inn (which accepts dogs, by the way, and it fairly reasonably priced for it's location) which is right at the edge of the Wright houses (quick, how many homophones were in that sentence?). While Chris was helping get the wedding reception music set up, Harper and I went for a walk around this fabulous neighborhood. There were tons of tourists wandering around, and even the houses that weren't Wright homes were amazing. This house in the photo was his first independent contract after leaving his firm.

We also came across a bust of Wright, which had these hollow soulless eyes. Harper did NOT like this bust. She had an immediate distrust of it. It wasn't until I went up to the head and started poking it that she would approach it and sniff it, but she still didn't like it.