thirty-six hours: extended

I love weekends. 
I love Summer. 
I especially love extended weekends due to public holidays. 

 

1. Baby Emmett passed out /// 2. Labor Day brunch with homemade waffles /// 3. Beautiful beach day. /// 4. Anchorman in the pool /// 5. Crazy Clouds /// 6. He works out. 

I'm ready for another long weekend, anyone else?

Dinner in the summer twilight

Simple Family Dinner 

I use to do this thing with my friends where we would plan a weekly family dinner. Often times we would go all out with an extravagant feast. While other times, like last night, we keep it simple and small. My friend Becca cooked chili. We should just call her Chef Becca, really. She comes up with the craziest recipes. I feel like she read my mind this night, the previous night I had a friend order chili and I was salivating because it looked scrumptious. I'm glad that my chili kick was cured within 24 hours.

Once we scooped up, we poured our drinks. I tried a Kalimotxo. A mix of red wine and coke. I remember a man in a wine section telling me about this in South Africa. And it's taking me a year and a half to try it. Then again, I don't normally drink coke or have it on hand. 

After, we went to the outside patio surrounded in twinkle lights and sat around the turquoise picnic table and chattered for a couple hours. It was a perfect summer night; it was one of those nights that I would have loved to capture in photos. But, I didn't think about it until this morning. For a photographer, I often times forget the camera aspect a lot.  Then we all went home at a reasonable hour and tucked ourselves sweetly in our beds.  (This is probably not 100% but it sounds so much sweeter.)

Source: Uploaded by user via Samantha on Pinterest

And they deep fried a turkey

Family Dinner is back and we're all growing up. 

I think I have mentioned this in the past but a while ago my roommate, Jessi, and I started this thing called family dinners. We pick a theme and text our friends and make magic happen. Everyone brings something depending on what type of night it is. Taco night has been a personal favorite

It is great time and is always a big hit. We eat, drink and be merry and play the occasional game like catch phrase. So then it becomes, we eat, drink, be merry and yell. A lot. 

But this week we stepped family dinner up to an impressive degree. 

First annual Pilgrims and Indians family dinner. 

Oh yes, we all cooked, baked and slaved away in the kitchen all day. Minus the ones who brought beverages and decided store buying was their safest bet. 

But we had everything and it was quite lovely. 

Jessi cooked one of the turkey's and then our dear friend, JR wanted  to test out deep frying. So, there was a deep fried turkey. 

There is a first time for everything and overall it was a success.  JR didn't burn himself or anyone surrounded the turkey. Cambria did a rain dance, and it so happened to rain. Said farewell to a good friend, Katrina Hagen, we will miss you.

Pumpkin pie requires some thought.

I mentioned that overall the night was a success.

Until, I may have taken the quote of the night. And not in a cocky sort of way. 

I find that I get over things fairly quickly if I spend more than a few hours on a project. 

Jess and I have had this can to make pumpkin pie in our cupboard through a couple of moves--maybe even dating back to Vanguard Centre.  But we had never made a pie and I get rather tired of looking at this can every time I open the cupboard. So impromptu decided I may as well make the pie.

But by the time I got to the pie, I was tired of being a perfectionist and measuring every detail. So I took a quick look at the directions and proceeded on my way. 

I guestimated the entire pie and put it in the oven. An hour after the normal cooking time it was finally baked. Personally, I had already vowed that I would not try this pie.

A few of my friends around the dining room table and a few of them are grabbing pie and there is my pumpkin pie chilling on the table. I see JR reach for the night and the only thing out of my mouth was, "Don't." 

All eyes were on me. There were some confused looks. And all I could do was give a quick smirk and ease the freak out.

I explained that all good chefs just know the right amount by feeling the ingredients. All good chefs don't measure.

My friend Jason's mother was in the room. She went on this Food Network kick. She chimed in, "yes, but when it comes to baking all the ingredients must be accurate. It's an issue of compounds and proportions."

Then every looked at me again and just laughed. 

And the rest of the night, a good deal of sentences started out with, "You know how good chef's just know the right amounts." 

Needless to say, I tossed the pie without a second thought. 

Thanks Becca for this one.

love this.

I have so much to be thankful for and I don't want to take it for granted.  I have far more than I need and am rich with friendship.

What are you thankful for this season? 

Cooking Fetish

I should probably stop now.

I have been on this cooking kick recently, it is kind of fun. The more exciting part about it is that I'm not the only one. My house, we've been getting pretty crafty lately. We try to do a family dinner at least once a week. It is quite fun. But it is a great way to just hang out, catch up and just be with each other for a bit.

A few weeks ago was beautiful. In all ways. It was the perfect beach day, Hannah, Beth's sister was in town. We went to the beach for many many hours, showered and made dinner. About six of us showed up. We made pasta, barbeque chicken pizza (not the store bought kind), salad and brownies for dessert. Later on, people came in and out and we just played goofy games for hours.

The next week, Jessi, Saylors, and I decided to make Apricot Glazed Pork Tenderloins (we did the mimic version from Outback Steakhouse) and broccoli. Fruity Sangria included. Yum.

This week, I just kicked back and watched. Sam Scott came to visit. Tiff joined too. But the menu was Sweet and Sour Chicken, vegetables and rice. Jessi managed this one. That's right, I said Jessi. My roommate's idea of cooking is pizza bagel bites and a dr. pepper. I'm proud of her, she has been cooking so much lately. She even makes me dinner, she baked chicken the other day.

Back from my tangent, we are getting more and more creative with our food. But also random impulses keep happening as well.

For instance, I had just gone to Grower's direct to buy my fruits and vegetables. I got lots of good stuff, blueberries, tomatoes, coconut, butternut squash, celery, avocados (staple food), and strawberries. This was the result:

PS. It is delicious. Toast is the greatest invention made right now.

Any suggestions for new foods to make?