on the way home from a party...

The end of the weekend and I am sure she was saying something cute and funny- but all I could do was just stare at her.




-taVo

and what a nice weekend it was!

Here is my starter--see how nice and frothy! Okay, I have a question for you sourdough bakers. I normally bake my bread between 350 and 375 for about 30 minutes. EVERY sourdough recipe I found said to cook it at 400 for 45-60 minutes. I did for 45, and it was kind of burned on the bottom and the crust was VERY crisp. Is this right? Also, my loaf was kind of flat.

Apparently, the slightly burned crust and squat shape of the bread didn't deter my friends as we ate the entire loaf in one afternoon and I never even got a picture of it!

I made us some Sweet Potato and Tofu Curry for the week. I borrowed the recipe from the Atlanta Journal Constitution--but by the time I was finished, it was NOTHING like the original recipe. Also--I want to showcase one of my favorite kitchen devices: The Electric Fry Pan. I love it. It's the best!

Snazzy Lini Ingredients:

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 to 2 tablespoons red curry paste
1 package firm tofu--frozen, thawed, squeezed, cut
1 (14-ounce) can coconut milk
2 tablespoons fish sauce (or vegan substitute)
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into cubes
1-2 chiles, diced
1 1/2 cups frozen spinach
2 cups vegetable broth
Basil--fresh or dried
optional--1 T. cornstarch to thicken sauce

Instructions:

In a skillet over low heat, add the oil. Add the curry paste and stir for 1 to 2 minutes, or until it begins to change color. Add the tofu and sauté 5-6 minutes each side. Add the coconut milk and fish sauce, stirring well to combine. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the sweet potato, broth, and frozen spinach. Cover and simmer for 15 to 25 minutes, or until the sweet potato is tender. Add the chile and basil leaves and stir well to combine. Optional--stir in cornstarch to thicken.

We put this over rice, that I also cooked with a broth/water mixture. It is pretty fantastic!

Tavo had to work this weekend, so when he crawled off to bed early, I left him a little surprise for the morning.



Yeah!

Quiz: Martha Reeves and the Vandellas

This might not work--has anyone else noticed it's suddenly impossible to paste youtube videos?

Okay, this is a Motown Question:-- How did Martha Reeves and the Vandellas chose their name (just guess, don't wiki it!!) Buffalo--you might know this, but you live on the west side of the state, so you might not :)



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE2fnYpwrng

okay, now you can wiki. The audience--I wonder where this was shot?

And I'll give you a hint.
(supposedly, Eminem lived just off the same street...less famously, so did my parents)

at which time we ponder new, exciting projects

My parents have gone back home and our house is painted...and we are both slightly
unnerved with the lack of super huge projects that NEED to get done. Everything is...done. We can just...do whatever we want. Hmm...

First things first, we decided we needed a coffee table as our old one was turned into a painting. We found a great wooden and tin steamer trunk on craigslist and managed to finagle it for $40. This will be good to store our blankets and linens in as we only have 2 tiny closets in the whole house.



Also, I decided to get my sewing machine fixed. I inherited it from my grandfather in 2000. After an unfortunate decision to use a broken dresser as my sewing table (it collapsed within a week), the machine has not worked well since. A quick tune up, and its running!

I am a VERY novice seamstress. Zippers terrify me and patterns are curiously bewildering. While searching through www.craftster.org I did manage to find a project that was along the lines of my current abilities.
Super Spaceship Dress from user Roethke.



I left the bottom all crazy, but I think I want to alter this a bit more.

What new project is Tavo pondering?

Hooray for our wonderful parents

Mom and Dad came, we hung out with Tavo's family, we ate waaaaaay too much, and now we're back to normal.

I'm posting these pics--but for some reason, the color is truly odd.


I've got some exciting, non-house related projects planned for this weekend. I'll let you in on one--I'm trying homemade sourdough bread for the first time. My starter has been getting all kinds of sour this week!

...and still more home improvements

Can you guess what's going on? My parents are coming to visit for the first time since we replaced the siding...and...basically, Tavo and I have became crazy HGTV-esque banshees because we are introducing our parents this weekend (and we want to be showered with praise for all our hard work)

So, as its Wednesday night, we're getting down to the last projects. Here is our completed house (my apologies--its dark out!)

Tavo was super busy doing our shelves. We have an odd little alcove in our bedroom, and it just makes more sense to have shelves there than large dressers taking up space in the main part of the room.

Tavo also decided that the huge, homemade bookshelf my old roommate left with me should be moved into our main room. He moved the shelf AND our books!
....and we saw that my old roommate didn't bother to move the shelf when he decided to paint the room...(and we aren't going to paint over it--we both just like it)


And of course, we ate my ALL TIME FAVORITE MEAL EVER...pizza! Our friend, Pepé, came over to work on our ancient desktop--so I set up everything for "make your own pizza station" Which turned out to be a silly waste of time, because everyone wanted EVERY topping. Here's the goods:

Tavo catching me using the "secret ingredient" (kroger crushed tomatoes)

"No babe!! Get a pic of the vegetables!!" (caramelized onions, mushrooms sauteed in wine, green peppers, tomatoes, broccoli, and black olives) mozzarella and fresh grated parmesan waited in the fridge..

I chopped up some garlic for the top...everyone wanted that, too.

We did it!!!

Our big project, which took almost two years (actually, just 6-8 days of really hard work and about 600 to procrastinate) is done. We painted our half painted house....but actually finished this time!

...back in time....


We have a very old house...and we got it for a good price. That means that this wall of siding was pretty much rotten. We scraped and scraped and primered...but sometimes, its better just to call Dad and say, hey--can you come down from Detroit and teach me the fine art of residing a house?

Dad said, sure! Put a few Budweiser on ice for me. (I am lucky to have great parents!!)



Mom said, do you want me to start painting the unrotted parts? I had bought this khaki paint, but I didn't really like it. Especially when my neighbor painted their house about 2 tints from it. I'd joined the beige/khaki crowd, half-heartedly.

Mom is the fastest painter this side of the Mississippi...seriously. She did all this, with just a brush, in about 20 minutes.


...fast forward 1 1/2 years...our house is half painted weird khaki, with the other parts (those by overgrown bushes and other very mosquito-y areas still original green) I was at a breaking point. Our house had been half-painted for more than a year, and our tallest ladder couldn't reach the top. Three of our neighbors had a ridiculously similar shade of khaki/tan. We needed to make a change. So....we decided to buy some red paint.
oh, and we painted. We started Saturday, with 2 brushes and a 5 gallon.


and we had vittles. I'd actually bought some ground round to make burgers for Tavo. I generally do not buy meat--actually, I have not done it since I ate meat (more than 10 years) ...but Tavo had been so gung ho on this project that I wanted to surprise him with a hamburger on a homemade bun (btw--homemade buns are kind of hard, at least mine were. While tasty, I will probably use store bought buns next time, because these were just too dense)

Hamburger. (has garlic, onion, cumin and coriander mixed in beef, also fresh tomato and broccoli slaw)
...and my jerk tofu burger. Again with the overpowering, tough bun!! The slaw was OK, but I'm going to either get a cabbage or buy the cabbage slaw bag next time. Broccoli slaw is very...broccoli.

The jerk tofu was right on. Not too much of a recipe here, I just freeze it, squeeze it, and fry it.

before we ate, had to trim out at least 2 sides of the house...


Post eating, Tavo enjoyed being 20+ feet above the rest of us. (then we realized we needed a 30 ft. ladder to reach the peaks)


It's too dark to take any more pictures right now, but...we finished. Need to do some trim work, but the fact that house, and peaks, are painted is pretty awesome. Yes!



p.s. I would try and hide our address, but the fact that food delivery places and google maps can't find our place makes me feel okay.