Bella asked in the comments if I was going to stop at Bitchypoo-land while I am up there in the coming weeks. Been there, done that! I was just there in the past week or so, and Robyn was, as always, the consummate hostess. We took a walk about the grounds, I got some George & Gracie lovin, and we watched some chicken-sex. Awesome! ha! I'd gone up under the pretense of buying some eggs (aigs!). I really did need some eggs, but I needed a break from my crazy work schedule up there even more. Nothing like rocking on the Crooked Acres front porch, glass of iced tea in hand, listening to chicken sex.

Did I hand Robyn the camera to take a picture of me? No, I did not. Did I include Robyn in the picture I took? Why no, I did not. Could I have been making a dopier face when I took this photo? Yeah, probably.



I've been experimenting in the kitchen and this weekend's project was a winner I am definitely going to call Figgy Piggy. Let's see if I can put the actual recipe together:

FIGGY PIGGY

4 pork chops, 1.5", with a pocket cut into each

STUFFING
12 small fresh figs, chopped fine
1/2 c bread crumbs
1 T cherry habanero jam
1/4 c yellow onion chopped fine
2 T green onions chopped fine
1/4 c mushrooms chopped fine
1/2 c mild cheese, finely shredded
1/4 t each fresh ground salt & pepper
1/4 C walnuts, chopped fine
2 T butter, softened
1 T ea fresh thyme, basil, rosemary, your choice one, all or none
Mix above together until it just holds shape in your hand; adjust butter more or less to get it to form into a ball or patty

Divide the stuffing into 4 portions and stuff each chop with a portion. Season chops liberally on each side with salt & pepper. Heat 2T oil in a skillet and sear the chops, about 2 min on each side. Place chops into baking dish and bake at 350 30 minutes. Reserve fat in skillet for sauce.

FIG GLAZE
12 small fresh figs, halved
1/4 c yellow onion chopped fine
2 cloves garlic chopped
1 c red wine
2 T balsamic vinegar
1/2 c broth or water
1 T cherry habanero jam

Saute onions in skillet until they begin to soften, add garlic and saute another minute or two until garlic softens. Add figs, toss gently over medium heat until figs begin to stick. Add vinegar, then deglaze the pan with 1 c red wine, scraping all the bits from the bottom of the pan. Add water or broth and bring to a simmer. Lower heat and simmer very gently about 30 minutes to reduce by half. Add cherry habanero jam and work it in as it melts.

Remove chops from the oven, pour sauce over, return to oven for 10 minutes. Remove, let sit 10 minutes before serving.

Cook's notes: I forgot the walnuts, and would like to try it with pine nuts or pistachios. It's fine with no nuts. For bread crumbs, I toasted a handful of stale bread crusts and pulverized them. The taste ended up being a bit strong - next time I'd use a better bread, or Panko-style crumbs. Extra stuffing can be formed into a patty and baked along with the chops. I didn't have balsamic vinegar, so I substituted balsamic vinaigrette, worked fine (Paul Newman brand). For the cheese, I used Publix brand six cheese Italian blend. For the jam, of course, I had on hand Crooked Acres Chernobyl Cherry Habanero Jam (currently sold out, sorry!). Hot stuff, indeed! I imagine any hot/sweet jam or sauce would do here, even perhaps your basic pepper jelly.

I finally got my act together and brought a pile of goodies in here for the ICU staff tonight. The original plan was for my dad to be moved from ICU by tomorrow, and for this to be a sort of celebratory goodbye thankyou kind of thing. But that's not going to happen this week. When we found this out, though, the baking train had already left the station, so baked goods were baked, and packaged, and brought in. The reactions have been fun. My favorite: one of the techs came and stood in the doorway to my dad's room with her hand over her mouth, trying to start talking, but unable to because her mouth was so full. She kept waving her hand and looking like she was about to start talking, but all that came out was, "Mmmm! Mmmmm!" She totally cracked me up!( Read more... )

I hereby officially give up on the cheesecake baking method that begins with ten minutes at 475, then one hour at 200, then one hour in the shut-off oven. I have tried this twice, because it's reputed to totally avoid cracks in the top of the cheesecake. However, for me, it results in a distinctly scorched cheesecake. Every. Damned. Time. So that's ovah.( Read more... )

I am embarrassed how much time I've spent trying to get the Drive-By Christmas video uploaded. Turns out "rejected: excessive length" doesn't mean the file is too big, it means the video is too long. Doh! They said what they meant, but I misunderstood, and spent way too long resaving the movie in smaller and smaller sizes. Finally after uploading the third shrunken version, I realized it was the length. YouTube only allows videos of ten minutes or less. My video, despite the shrunken size, was still twelve minutes and change. ( Read more... )

I'm all turned around with the weeks all broken up by holidays. I had to stop and think - is today Friday? Or Saturday?

I've been a busy little bee. I didn't mean to miss another day updating, but I got all sucked into all kinds of little projects around here, and just didn't get back to the computer. Truth be told, I figure I've met my Holidailies quota by having posted 20 entries during December, which is the informal benchmark they give on the Holidailies site. Anyway! One of today's projects was to do another baked brie for a party this evening. I went the extra couple of steps and did those little leaves around the sides. I was quite impressed, but I think I was the only one. I'm not much of an artist, so the fact that I could make a piece of pastry look like a little leaf was quite the accomplishment for me. ( Read more... )

Looking at my little calendar in the sidebar, I see that I have not posted on a single Thursday during December. I didn't do it on purpose. In fact, this morning, I said to myself, I said, "Self, today is Thursday, so be sure to get an entry up there!" But I got crazy busy today and now it's 2:00 Friday morning and Thursday is gone and I have gone the whole month with no Thursday posts. Huh. Oh well. ( Read more... )

DreamDad's got a gun....
Of course, the gun is NOT loaded!

It's been another lovely day. We crashed last night after our whirlwind weekend, and while DreamGuy went off this morning to enjoy a busy day at his shop, I stayed home and...did a whole lot of nothing. I had gotten all confused about our gathering plans with DreamGuy's family, thinking we were having our big dinner this evening. DreamMom told me that we were just opening gifts and having a light meal tonight, with the big meal on Christmas Day.

As we talked this out on the phone, I found myself feeling incredibly cranky, and I started talking kind of stupid. You know, stupider than usual. It's hard to describe, but what actually happened was I got all obsessed during the conversation about what I thought the plan was, and the various differences between that, and what the plan actually was. I kept going back over it and over it. "OK well I thought we were having dinner tonight. OK so I don't need to do the potatoes and gravy until tomorrow? OK well I was just washing the potatoes because I thought it was tonight. So we don't need the potatoes tonight?" I know it had to have been incredibly irritating to poor DreamMom. I didn't quite understand it myself. Until I hung up the phone and stood up, and my knees went all wobbly. Blood sugar: 55. Yeah. ( Read more... )

Crack factory!

Alright, well that's done. Whew! I was so tired when I got home earlier this evening, I wanted to just crash. I did nod off for a few with the dogs on the sofa, but as DreamGuy was going to bed, I got up another head of steam, and got my holiday baking pretty much done. It's not like I had much choice. If I wanted to take baked stuff to people in Atlanta, it was now or never. So I did, gosh I am not sure, about eight batches of Christmas Crack (posted the recipe 2 days ago as "Home Made Heath Bar Candy"), and three batches of candied pecans. Tomorrow morning, I will finish packing it all up into gift tins and bags, and it'll be ready to go. Some is going to folks here, and some will come to Atlanta. The house smells delicious!( Read more... )

At work, I keep running into this little communication problem with my boss. We get lots of pressure from above to move things out at the end of the month. All the reporting is done on a monthly basis, and my boss's boss watches our statistics like a hawk. I have these huge things I'm working on, with thousands of pages of stuff being submitted in just the past couple of weeks. I can't even get it all indexed, much less examined, considered, researched, and worked into a revised final report, by the end of this month. So imagine my horror when today, after weeks of hearing, "Just keep plugging at it," I heard instead, "So, do you want to do a final report, or present it in a meeting?" Obviously he was talking about something that would happen soon. How soon? That would be tomorrow. Yeesh.( Read more... )

I can't seem to find the cable end connector to hook my printer to the USB cable on my new computer, or to the old computer for that matter. I need to print some recipes out for a friend who's over here helping me around the house today, so I'm posting them here in order to pull them up and print from DreamGuy's computer. They are my absolute go-to recipes for the holidays. I hope you can find a way to try them out. They're easy-peasy, use basic ingredients (OK except that pasta salad) and everybody loves them. I'll be back later with the recipe for Beth's Candied Pecans, but here are the first three of the four I wanted to share...( Read more... )

This is how the sky looked as I left the salon this afternoon. Of course!

I realize in preparing to write about hidradenitis suppurativa that I have actually written very, very little about it, here, or anywhere. I talked a little about why last time, and reading things like I read today online only reinforces my inclination to "come out" more about my experience with this disease. Gotta run. Back later with links.( Read more... )

Lots to say, no time to say it. First, check out that cat. He's HUGE! I presume he's a he, I guess because he's huge. And also because he has the stumpy tail. DreamGuy is pretty sure front porch kitties Stumpy and Big Fuzzy are females. I have a feeling they're the respective mothers of Shorty and Miss Fuzzy, and that Pimp Daddy Stumpy here is big daddy. Anyway, while DreamGuy had told me about this big guy last week, this is the first I've seen of him up close. ( Read more... )

Self portrait, at my desk.

A few folks have asked about how Rosey the Amazing Destructo-Puppy has been doing since she was chewed on by that dog on our walk a few weeks ago. She's doing great! She got over the limping the very next day, and her surgeon said her knees appeared to be fine, her recently-operated-on one in particular. She's got a weird diagonal bald strip on her side where the vet here shaved her to expose the puncture wounds. They've all healed up fine. Thanks for asking! ( Read more... )

A last thought on Thanksgiving: This was, by far, the most laid-back Thanksgiving I've had in years, in terms of what I had to do. I mean, take a look at what I did for Thanksgiving in 2002. Just reading that makes me tired!

OK...to the present, or near-past-present, the past 24 hours...

Football fans in Tuscaloosa all wondered which team would show up to play Auburn tonight in the Iron Bowl: the team that smashed Tennessee, or the team that lost horribly to minor schools like last week's Louisiana-Monroe. The title of this post gives it away. As we left Egan's tonight, they were playing, "Loser." Hee! ( Read more... )

How can it be that Thanksgiving is next week?????

Alrighty then. Next week it is. I made reservations for my sis & her family today and got a good rate & room. So that's done. And I braved the wilds of The Summit in Birmingham to visit the Williams-Sonoma store for some turkey brining supplies. In years past, I have chosen various methods by which to complicate the cooking of the turkey. This year, it's brining. And it's all The Pioneer Woman's fault. So there. ( Read more... )

Finally, the little Christmas tree.

Alrighty, then! Just in the nick of time, and I'm talking six minutes, my great big load of cases all settled. I had a dozen of them, one was a duplicate, so eleven cases all on basically the same issue, and it's just been like pulling teeth to get this settlement together. But as of this moment, the signed documents have been received at my office and faxed off to Atlanta for approval. Can I get a big HALLELUIA and A-MEN!

Whew.( Read more... )