A hot week followed by a cool, but anomalously humid weekend that finally recouped into an absolutely gorgeous Sunday evening with clear, cool air! The sky turned blue, the air dried and the light was picture perfect.
I stood in the sunroom and enjoyed.
Quiet. A cool breeze. Late afternoon light through the trees.
Bear…relaxed and comfortable.
Bob was out as well…
…seeing what there was to see.
A Sunday Evening.
Sherbet…I love sherbet…icy, fruity, sherbet.
I was talking to my mother about the frozen yogurt and she related that when I was born… August, 1955 – a VERY HOT!!! August…my grandmother made her pineapple sherbet. My mother remembered that the recipe included buttermilk. As we were talking, I was Google-ing and found a pineapple sherbet recipe…WITH buttermilk – and NO ice cream maker needed.
I had a fresh, uncut pineapple in my refrigerator. I had buttermilk. I had fresh basil.
Pineapple-basil sherbet – So VERY good! It was almost worth the 90-92F temperatures to enjoy this treat. I added the basil to the recipe and if you have not experimented with fruit-herb mix, I highly recommend. Basil and cherries is good as well. I will be experimenting further.
Today, Saturday, it was much cooler at 74F. At my house, the forecast rain did not happen and the overcast sky and heavy air was not as comfortable as 74F usually is in Northwest Montana…still – it was nice to have the A/C off and the windows open. We are to be at our normal low to mid-80’s this week.
Saturday evening: beating the heat.
Loch Ness has Nessie, Flathead Lake has the Flathead Lake Monster…
… and I have Bear, the Pillow Monster.
Happy Friday the 13th!
I love my Vita-Mix blender!
I have had it for almost 6 years. Although spendy, I had been burning up a regular blender about once a year AND no way could they liquefy whole fruits and vegetables like the Vita-Mix can. In response to the customer base’s: “We love the blender but it is so tall!” comments, V-Mix came out with a shorter, fatter jar and I recently succombed to purchasing one – perfect! It is a much better fit under my counter AND easier to get things like nut butter out of it.
Nut butter! I like to mix almonds, cashews and a few pecans for my nut mix. A pinch of sea salt and just enough sunflower oil to allow it to come together as a butter.
It is on the pale side, color-wise as I use blanched almond slices, i.e. no skins.
I always make nut butter in the morning…when I have some hot coffee left in the pot. My bonus from making the butter is an indulgent smoothie that uses the nut butter I can’t quite get out of the blender. Some hot coffee, milk, dark cocoa, a dollop of yogurt, protein powder, psyllium (fiber!) and even a bit of kale and spinach…you can’t taste the green stuff…
A nutty, mocha smoothie: breakfast :) !!
**** I just picked up a morning email from Swallow Crest Farm:
Todays’ produce will include:
Salad mix
Kale and swiss chard-both are good for steaming or stir-fry
Bagged baby carrots-thinned from the beds so the remaining carrots size up
Peas
Cauliflower
Basil
Cilantro
Ooooh boy – it will be a GREAT week of cooking from the garden!
It didn’t make it to 97 thankfully, but it did get to 92 before it started down and at 7:15 p.m. is 83 thanks to clouds, wind and an approaching “disturbance”. We have been mostly cooled off to a reasonable night time temperature by sunset thanks to the afternoon disturbances.
Still…hot and in addition to the fan, the behemoth A/C unit has been rolled out in the living room and is running full blast.
The A/C unit is pointed to the fan. The fan is pointed to my desk. Bear has been my cool companion.
Bob…he’s always one cool cat.
Lazy, hazy days of Summer??? – the days have turned hot and hazy and that makes me lazy as I just want to sit still and stay cool.
The garden did produce a small bag of veg this week: a bag of stir fry (small bits of greens, carrots, broccoli and carrots), a bag of mixed greens, a gorgeous and huge head of broccoli!! and a bag of fresh, fragrant basil.
The stir fry did not really appeal so I picked out the carrots and froze the rest to be used to make vegetable broth.
The basil became pesto…my first “traditional” pesto from the garden :)!
That broccoli – it was destined for a broccoli salad. The usual and delicious broccoli salad has raisins, onions, bacon and a light slightly creamy dressing. I made two modifications…
Instead of bacon, I used the “cajun” sausage that my folks bring back from Louisiana. Bill reportedly hunted high and low to find a butcher that made a sausage to his liking. This stuff is good: spicy, a little heat, full of flavor. And it stands up to being fried a bit crispy. I sliced it thin, quartered the slices and fried them crispy.
In place of raisins, dried and slightly sweetened cranberries. A light dressing of a little mayonaisse, Vidalia sweet onion, white wine vinegar, sugar and salt…AND a sprinkling of sunflower seeds.
A perfect salad for a side or a meal.
Continuing with summer salads…I typically make a huge bowl of macaroni salad or cabbage slaw and then kind of fizzle out as I get near the end of it. I decided that this year, I would make small bowls of each and have a variety through the week.
My folks had a picnic with friends and a shared macaroni salad with a new to them combination. I am not at liberty to divulge all, but the secret ingredient is pickle juice :)! – I use Tony Packo’s Sweet Hot Skinnies: pickles and peppers. Spring onions AND their tops – from the garden – are in this salad.
The cabbage is organic from California but the carrots in the slaw are from the garden and a poppy seed vinaigrette for dressing.
It is not rocket science…if I have some good things ready to go for a snack or a meal, I eat good things!
On to more good things.
It was 90 the last 2 days and is forecast to hit 97!!! today. That is about 20 degrees higher than what I consider hot enough. When I saw a recipe for homemade peach frozen yogurt without an ice cream maker, I decided that sounded like a thing to try. No ice cream maker needed! I am not a big ice cream fan, although I have toyed with getting a maker and making my own, but am not thrilled about the idea of a “one trick pony” kitchen gadget. I AM a fan of yogurt and this simple recipe of greek yogurt, some extract and fresh fruit sounded perfect. Instead of peaches, I thought, cherries – I have 4 cans of cherries in my cupboard….good Oregon cherries in only their own syrup with no added anything. My plan was cherries, almonds and almond extract with the yogurt.
On my errand run to Bigfork, Friday afternoon…whaddya’ know??? A local cherry stand was open. A local grower with a Washington orchard as well, had the first cherries from Washington. I bought a bag of Rainier’s. Rainier’s are sweet – not quite as sweet as the black cherry varieties, but they are a bit firmer.
So…greek yogurt, almond extract, a bit of protein powder and fresh cherries…frozen. No ice cream maker. Yes!
Pretty simple and what a treat… a sweet treat with no sugar other than what occurs naturally in the fruit and yogurt. And protein and other good for me stuff. The texture is something along the line of ice milk and the taste has the tang of the yogurt. For this not so great fan of ice cream, it is a perfect substitute.
This year, Bear is acclimated to Montana and so has felt the heat more than last year. He chooses to be in the cool house for the afternoon and early evening.
Bob sprawls on the front porch, often right against the house in the coolest spot, but mostly stays outside.
Occasionally, we have a bit of a stalemate…
Happy Monday!