Creole Okra

Don't know what to do with okra?

INGREDIENTS:

2 tablespoons olive oil 1/2 large onion, chopped 2 cloves garlic, minced 1/2 green bell pepper, chopped 1 (16 ounce) can diced tomatoes in juice

3/8 teaspoon dried thyme 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper salt and pepper to taste 1 (16 ounce) package frozen cut okra

DIRECTIONS:

1.	Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Saute the onion and garlic until limp. Add the green pepper; cook and stir until tender. Drain the tomatoes, reserving juice, and pour them into the skillet. Season with thyme, parsley, cayenne, salt, and pepper. Simmer for 5 minutes over medium heat.
2.	Add the frozen okra, and pour in enough of the reserved juice from the tomatoes to cover the bottom of the pan. Cover, and cook for 15 minutes, or until okra is tender.

RESULTS: You can also use fresh okra! The slime sort of reminds me of the special effects in Alien, but otherwise this was pretty tasty, and if you serve it with rice it'll cut the heat a little. It was a little spicy, but nothing I couldn't handle (so, nothing almost anyone else couldn't handle). Beware leaving it on the heat too long in the last step, lest it burn to the bottom of the pan! I should have stirred it more.

I was walking with Harper the other day in the woods. The woods are right next to a golf course. We saw, playing right at the edge of the golf course (while we were under trees) a weird little fox-like animal. It seemed to be pretty young because it was chasing its tail (and didn't know we were there despite being only about 10 yards away and not terribly quiet), but not so young that there were other family members around. It looked like a very pale fox with very short fur, huge ears like a Sphnix cat, and a long, very skinny tail. Everyone's first suggestion when I tell them is that it was a possum, but it was definitely some sort of canine. Any ideas?

By the way, this comes mere hours after learning that there have been 52 bigfoot sightings in Indiana: www.bfro.net.

Twist on Pasta Arrabiata

One week you read that salmon's the best thing you can eat, and the next it's full of mercury, and then it's ok again. Very confusing. One of the few things that I've read nutritionists agree on, along with almonds and whole grains, is beans. Since we already don't really get enough protein (I think I've made maybe three things with meat in them), I've trying to work legumes into our diet more and more. They're also cheap and full of fiber. Good things!

Today I added a can of cannelloni beans (white kidney beans) into my usual Pasta Arrabiata. We both gave it a big thumbs up. The beans added a nice creamy texture. I just added them in with the tomatoes.

You may be wondering why I'm not posting more often as of late. The truth is, I'm not really cooking all that much with all the vegetables and fruit that taste pretty great just on their own. Yesterday I sat down with some watermelon I bought on Saturday and I think I must have eaten 3 cups before I made myself stop for fear of gastrointestinal distress. It's also just too stinking hot to cook up big productions. So, maybe in a few weeks I'll get the cooking bug again.

In other news, I made an appointment to have my eyes checked on Friday. Chris has been saying for years that I squint when I read, and yesterday I caught myself holding a letter at arm's length. This is very distressing. Needing reading glasses is, to me, a sign of age, whereas simply having bad eyesight since childhood is a genetic thing. I think I really did the eyes in with all the reading I had to do in graduate school and 8 hours on the computer every day since hasn't helped them any. As Indiana Jones says, it's not the years, it's the mileage. Sigh! Cross your fingers for me, I don't want glasses!

Beijing's pollution

I came across this website about China's pollution. I thought it was pretty balanced and informative. http://www.asiasociety.org/beijingair/#longing-for-blue-skies

Watermelon Salad

Work continues to be busy, so luckily this one was pretty easy.

1/2 c chopped red onion
3 Tbls fresh lime juice (anout 2 limes)
4 cups cubed seeded watermelon (about half a smallish watermelon)
1/4 cup pitted kalamata olives
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh parsley
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh mint
1/2 cup (2 ounces) feta cheese, crumbled

Combine onion and juice in a bowl and let stand for 10 minutes. Add remained ingredients, except for cheese. Cover and chill 1 hour, and sprinkle with cheese just before serving.

RESUTLS: now, I know it sounds weird, but it was really really good. I thought 1/2 cups of onions was a little too much, but I'm not really a fan of raw onions to begin with. It was sweet and savory and a little salty and really refreshing on a hot day.

By the way, I made the salad on Saturday, but this posting was stragetically delayed until Chris went away for the weekend. He HATED it, and asked if it would be ok to trash this recipe on the blog. I said ok...but I thought you all might like to bask in optimism for a few days before he had a chance to chime in. I think he didn't like the onions, either, but had a much more extreme reaction than I did.

Bethie made her own wordle with my blog a couple weeks ago. Here's her note:

You really like the word "dough", but not "doh!"

Orange Cookies

Remember those lime cookies I made a while ago? I brought them into work and Ross said that his mom makes orange cookies, which are his favorite cookies in the world. Six months later, she sent him the recipe to give to me. It seems to be from a church cookbook fundraiser, one in which everyone knows the contributers and would enjoy the little anecdotes about how Mrs. Wallace and her daughter have differing baking strategies. :) That was a nice touch. This made about twice as many cookies as a nestle toll house recipe.

2 C. sugar
1 c. Shortening
1 tsp. salt
3 eggs
2 oranges (grated rind and juice)
1 c. buttermilk
4.5 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder

Icing:
1 orange (grated rind and juice)
1 box powdered sugar
1 Tbles butter (optional)

Cream together sugar, shortening, and salt. Add egges, rind, and juice of the 2 oranges and buttermilk. Beat well. Add flour, soda, and baking powder. Blend well. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes.

While still warm, frost with icing made from orange rind and juice and sugar, combine until smooth before icing. (I used a knife to spread it on the cookies, working over the icing bowl).

Barbara Dorsey bakes her cookies at 350 for 10 minutes. She also adds 1 tbls butter to icing.

RESULTS: These turned out really light and fluffy. The cookies themselves don't have a lot of flavor, but the icing brings it all together. Because of the two weirdly different cooking times and temperatures, I split the difference and cooked them at 375 for 12 minutes. I think next time I'll try it on the higher temp and the longer time, to see what they would be like a little cruchier.