FAIL

Well I made it six days into the month with daily blogging and I blew it yesterday!  I had a good excuse though - my broken heart after the Ducks lost to Stanford.  Our defense was sort of a "Where's Waldo" only we never did find it...poor Ducks.  But hats off to Stanford for a great game - we know how exciting that big win felt!  Being a "glass half full" kind of girl I prefer to focus on the fact that I had a great day out in the sunshine with my hubby, my brother (who flew into town for the game) and two of our good friends.  Even got to see a friend I haven't seen since high school.  He is a grandparent.  Ouch.  I am old!

So back in the saddle...both for blogging and for my Ducks.  quack.

Vegetarian Crockpot Chili

Tonight is movie night with our fellow empty nesters (two other couples in the neighborhood - we've formed our own little secret society- shhhhh).   Anyway, we're watching "Across the Universe" - one of my favorites.  I realize it's basically a two hour long music video but I love it anyway!  I made a pot of vegetarian chili and we are set to go.  I know I've posted this recipe before but it really is a good chili recipe - especially for serving to non-vegetarians - they always seem to like it!

Vegetarian Chili

1 large onion, chopped

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 garlic cloves, minced

¾ ounce ground cumin seed

1 ounce plain chili powder

2 tablespoons dijon style mustard

1 tablespoon salt

1 tablespoon dried basil

1 tablespoon dried oregano

2 tablespoons dried dill

2 tablespoons dried parsley

2 tablespoons red wine

2 tablespoons lemon juice

1 6 ounce can tomato paste

2 28 ounce cans chopped tomatoes (do not drain)

2 cans kidney beans, drained and rinsed

1 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed

1 cup TVP (texturized vegetable protein)

1 small can sliced black olives

water as needed

Combine everything except olives in crockpot and cook on high for about 4 hours then reduce to low for another 4 hours or so. Add olives about an hour before you’re ready to serve. The longer it cooks, the better it tastes.

Serves: 6-8

Adapted from Silver Palate Cookbook “Chili for a Crowd”

GO DUCKS!!!!

My favorite time of year

Fall is my favorite time of year - I love the weather, gearing up for the holidays, college football, even the getting-dark-early evenings.  There are many things I already miss about summer - mainly the fruit.  But today I had a perfect pear.  It was perfectly ripe - sweet and delicious.  And by the time I'm tired of pears it will be time for berries and melons once more.  I also got to watch a beautiful sunset -a very good day:

Fresh Figs with Goat Cheese and Almonds

We are nearing the end of a prolific fig season.  Our trees overflowed and the squirrels were overjoyed.  We had an invite for drinks and appetizers at a friend's house one night and I was scrambling at the last minute to find something to bring - I googled fresh fig appetizer and came upon this recipe at allrecipes.com:

Elegant Fig Appetizers with Goat Cheese and Almonds

Ingredients

• 12 fresh figs, halved
• 4 ounces herbed goat cheese (chevre)
• 24 almonds
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar

Directions

1. Preheat the oven broiler for high heat.
2. Place the fig halves, cut side up, on a baking sheet. Top each half with about 1/2 teaspoon goat cheese. Place one almond on each, press to push the cheese slightly into each fig.
3. Broil the figs in the preheated oven until the cheese is soft and the almonds are turning a rich shade of brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from the broiler and let cool for 5 minutes. Arrange the figs on a serving platter and drizzle with honey and balsamic vinegar. Serve warm.

I made it pretty much as written except I substituted slivered almonds for the whole almonds.  Wow.  We all loved this and I think I made it five or six times over the next couple of weeks.  I've made it with the herbed goat cheese and with plain.  Also made it with peppered goat cheese - all with great results.  I was a little loose with the amounts of honey and balsamic vinegar - just made sure each one got a little bit.  These go together so quickly and taste so good.  Some of the reviewers even said they made it with dried figs - I'll have to try it that way because I'm not sure I can wait until next fall to have these again!

Crispy Veggie Tacos

One of my very favorite places to eat in the bay area is Cactus Taqueria.  When I get my hair done in Berkeley it is a ritual - hair, then tacos.  The neighborhood where I get my hair done has so many good restaurants - Indian, Thai, even Zachary's Pizza (deep dish spinach and mushroom - yum!).  But every single time - I go and get my tacos.  They have crispy veggie tacos - grilled vegetables, cheese, guacamole, salsa and lettuce.  I would be too embarrassed to ever have more than one order (I mean, it's a plate with three tacos!) but I swear, I could do it.

I've never been into frying anything at home but sometimes the craving for those tacos is too strong to wait for the next haircut.  So one day I decided to make my own oven baked version.  I roasted some vegetables in the oven - some broccoli, zucchini and carrots - tossed with some olive oil and roasted in a 450 degree oven.  Once the veggies were nice and brown I warmed up some corn tortillas on the stovetop and then filled them with the veggies and some monterey jack cheese.  I folded them over and spray both sides with some olive oil spray  I put these in the oven for maybe 15 minutes or so, until the tortillas were brown and crispy.  Once out of the oven I pried them open and filled them with guacamole, salsa verde, chopped tomatoes and thinly slice romaine.  They were almost as good as the restaurant version - really, just as good for me - and there was no oil dripping out as we ate them.

Taco Tuesdays are still in effect in this empty nest and these definitely fit the bill!

Chaminade salad

In September we took our youngest down to the LA area for college. It was a busy, busy weekend and of course a tearful goodbye. The day we left also happened to be our 23rd wedding anniversary (which came a week after my birthday - I've now been married half my life!). So instead of driving straight home we went to Santa Cruz and spent the night at The Chaminade Resort & Spa. We went for a beautiful hike through the eucalyptus groves and ended up at the restaurant where we sat outside and sipped a couple icy cold Sierra Nevada Pale Ales. We watched the deer and the sunset and since we'd been there so long we decided we might as well just have dinner right then rather than going back to the room and cleaning up first. We got a little carried away with ordering and had a ridiculous amount of food. My favorite thing was a delicious salad: Bufala Mozzarella and Tomato, Mesclun Greens, Pinoli, Tomato Oil and
Foccacia Toast. Such a simple combination but better than any tomato and mozzarella salad I'd had before. Since then I've made my own version many times and now I simply call it the Chaminade salad. There's something about the addition of the pine nuts that adds so much flavor. We're now past the good, local heirloom tomatoes but I will be ready and waiting for their return.

That weekend also marked the beginning of a new era of cooking in our household - cooking for two. I find that I'm doing far less cookbook cooking and a lot more foraging for what we have on hand and turning it into something. It's actually a lot of fun and we've been eating pretty well. Hopefully I can get caught up on posting some of it...until tomorrow...

Mad Men Party!

I took the challenge from a friend and decided to sign up for NaBloPoMo. Let's see how this goes!

Fueling my obsession with my favorite show, Friday night we had a Mad Men themed Halloween party with several of

our friends and neighbors. We had close to 30 people and the most perfect weather we could have hoped for in late October.

I'd scoured the thrift stores over and over for serving dishes, table linens, glassware etc. We had deviled eggs, shrimp cocktail, chips and dip (of course) - one friend even brought pimento spread in the jar. Perfect.

How I wish I could have pulled off a Joan - I fear I ended up more like Betty's mother. Oh well - we had a blast!