Honey Butter

Whipped up a quick batch of honey butter tonight. Literally the easiest thing I've ever made.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter (cold)
1/2 cup honey

Beat till light and creamy.
Eat.

And we highly recommend it! It comes out of the refrigerator creamy and spreadable. Yum!
Just imagine it for pancakes, or crescents, or biscuits...or...wow...

Mediterranean Omelet

I am a recent inductee (within the last year) to the world of artichokes. I was first introduced to them by our friends, Patrick and Gioia. Skeptical as I was, I couldn't get over the delicious flavor and salty taste. They are very convincing little buggers.

Gioia prepared hers as full artichokes, stuffed with deliciousness. You would break off a section and scrape off the stuffing with your teeth. So yummy.

Since then, I've been more apt to try out various meals with artichokes, something I never would have done before. Last year, on a weekend away with my Hubs, we discovered artichoke omelets and just about died. Delicious.

The trend I've seen is that if the omelet includes artichokes, it is usually referred to as a Mediterranean Omelet and usually also contains spinach.

Friends, we bought artichoke hearts ourselves at the store this week. Call that a milestone in the marriage if you want to. :)

So tonight, I made my own Mediterranean Omelet.
I included spinach, cherry tomatoes, artichoke hearts, and mozzarella cheese.

How's that for domesticated? :) 

Caprese Salad Deliciousness

While up yonder in Nor Cal land over Labor Day, the G and I went to the little town's Farmer's Market to sample some delicious eats.

We got tri-tip skewers, tomales, blueberry pie, and caprese salad.
I'd never heard of caprese salad before, but I'll tell ya what. It rocked my world.

It's a simple little combination of tomato, salt, mozzarella cheese, basil, and olive oil or balsamic.
So simple.
So good.
So fresh.

So...easy to make myself! :)

Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever.....ever....will I claim to be a chef.

So when I can find something easy to make, by golly, I make it.

Ready for this recipe?

Get some tomatoes. I got red ones. But the yellow ones are so sweet and scrumptious. Next time.
Get some salt.
Get some mozzarella. Preferably the big block.
Get some basil. I prefer to chop it up. Makes it easier to eat.
Get some olive oil.

Slice the tomatoes. Put on plate. Sprinkle with some salt. Slice the mozzarella. Put on top of tomatoes. Chop the basil. Put on top of mozzarella. Drizzle with olive oil or balsamic.

Here's another fun option. Eat chilled, or eat heated! Yowza's!

Tonight I tossed mine into our little toaster oven for a couple of minutes, let the cheese melt a little, then pulled 'em out and sunk my fork into those puppies.

Scrumptious.

I dare ya to try it. :)

Cake Class #3

The 3rd week of cake class we made mini-cakes. My favorite. Known to the general population as cupcakes, these little treats are just the right amount of goodness. They are also more aesthetically pleasing to my eye as I tend to like looking at a collection of lots of things more than I do just one piece.

Case in point:

These are a collection of Lyndsey and my creations. So fun to make, and it felt a lot harder to mess these up. :) We loved using the stringy icing tip. Our instructor said it could also be used to make little monsters. I thought that'd be a cute idea for a kid's birthday or for Halloween. :) Just sayin'.

Cake Class #2

So it's been a little busy. I missed Cake Class #2 due to being sick. Coughing up a storm. I made a cake but didn't get to decorate it. I'm not sure that I've ever made a cake before, so I can go ahead and mark that off of my list of things to do before I do. I used a basic box cake. Chocolate of course. :) 

After the cake baked and cooled, I cut it in half. Then I put a ring of frosting around the outside of one layer, to create a barrier. I then filled the inside of the barrier with chocolate pudding. You can put any kind of filling that you want on the inside.

Here's Lyndsey adding her icing barrier to her cake. 

Once the filling is added, you can put on the other half of the cake. In order to have a smoother surface to ice, you can use the bottom of the cake. Meaning, if you cut the cake in half, use the top half as the bottom, and the bottom half, flipped over, the side that was next to the pan, as the top. It's usually a little less crumbly. 

The next thing you want to do is do a crumb layer of icing. This is the pre-icing, to try and catch all of the crumbs in a first icing layer. It looks something like this: 

Once the crumb layer is on, let it dry for about 20 minutes. This will make the final layer of icing easier to apply, and should catch most of your crumbs, so they don't show up in the top layer.

Finally, you're going add the final layer of icing. You want to make it as smooth as possible. It's a little difficult and takes a lot more patience than I'm usually able to muster. I have ended up saying not nice things to my cakes both times I've tried to ice them. I guess I need to practice a little more. :)

Cake Class #1

I haven't taken a class of any sort since 2004. The day I left college, I also left all that learning behind. But Tuesday night...changed all that. I'm back in the saddle, folks, and ready to expand my talents. I was invited by a sweet friend named Lyndsey to take a cake decorating class. There are four sessions, lots of accessories to buy, and many future cakes to be made! And I guess lots of icing to eat. :)

Grilled Pizza. Oh. My. Word.

So, the other night, our dear friend Janae came over for a little hang out time. Garrett and I were talking about what we should make. I've had grilled pizza before, but only once and it's been about 2 1/2 years. Garrett just did a grilled pizza night with his RA's recently but I wasn't able to join because of work. Anyways, I thought it'd be delicious, and super fun, to do grilled pizza. My recent, and probably all time favorite pizza is Chicken BBQ. I am a HUGE fan. I can't even imagine what I would do if Pizza Hut's Stuffed Crust was combined with a Chicken BBQ pizza. Hold the phone. MAYBE THEY DO HAVE IT!!

*Quick break to check Pizza Hut's website*

No dice. They don't have it. Well, shoot. I got super excited there for a minute. Stuffed Crust just makes my mouth water. Well, not really...'cause my mouth doesn't water for some reason. Garrett's does. : )

Anyways. We got a bunch of ingredients, got them all prepared and chopped up and ready to go. Janae decided to make a Pesto Chicken pizza. I did the Chicken BBQ. And Garrett did the Pepperoni. So Janae and I heated our pizza with the sauce, set that aside. I got some cilantro, red onions, and cheese. We rolled out the dough, and then headed for the grill. :)

Chicken BBQ Pizza ingredients ready to go. 

Lucille's BBQ Sauce, red onions, cilantro, chicken and cheese (not pictured). 

We then laid our dough on the grill and let one side cook.

 Suuuuuuper excited! 

Once you flip the dough over, you have to be ready to put on all your toppings. It goes fast from here. Add your sauce, and the toppings you'd like, then shut the lid so that it cooks quickly. 

There may be a little extra time to take a picture or two. :) 

Garrett saved the day by coming through with the loads of cheese! 

The finished product! Seriously, Adios California Pizza Kitchen. 

This BBQ Chicken pizza was just as good! 

This is a whole new way to do Barbecues with friends.
Change it up a little. And let me know what you think. :)

.i can make cookies, too.

I know. The title sounds like a bratty kid.

It's not meant to.

Honestly, I am seriously inspired...inspired...by the some of the women who have families, husbands and children, and are able to keep up with their blog, watch their kids, take cool pictures, cook creative dinners, sew up all kinds of creations, bake seriously ridiculously amazing desserts, decorate their homes, and do all sorts of things they are passionate about. The list really goes on and on. How do they do it!?!

It overwhelms me sometimes to read how much others are able to do, given the same amount of time that I am. Let's face it. We all have the same amount of time to work with. 24 hours every day. We just each choose to spend it differently. I think recently I've started realizing that I spend a lot of my time observing how others spend their time. I don't want to be an observer anymore!

Put me into the game, coach!

I think the that I wish for the most is to know what it is that really makes me excited.

To know what it is that I LOVE to do and then to do it well.

So thanks, ladies, for the inspiration.

Here's to the first project.

Cookies.

Not just any cookies.

Pretty cookies.

So with the help of my friend Janae, who makes Sugar Cookies that are TO DIE FOR...

...as well as the creative talents of two of my other sweet friends Kara and Jess...

...we had a Girls' Night.

We chatted.

Drank coffee.

Laughed.

And friends...we made cookies.

Now I know they're not perfect. But I gotta tell ya, I left this evening just thrilled.

And now, not only did I make cookies, I blogged about making cookies.

I feel like I'm actually getting somewhere! :)

Homemade Egg Rolls and Clogged Garbage Disposals

It has been a longstanding tradition in the Suhr household to make homemade egg rolls for Christmas.

When the boys were younger, Mr. and Mrs. Suhr welcomed several foreign exchange students into their home over the years. This was a great experience for both parties, and the Suhrs were taught some very valuable recipes that we now enjoy VERY much.

One of those recipes came from a couple of Vietnamese girls. Homemade Eggrolls.

d.e.l.i.c.i.o.u.s.

This was Garrett and I's first go at making the egg rolls. I'd tasted them at Jason and Rachel's house a couple of years back when I was engaged to be a Suhr. Last year we didn't try our hand at them, but this year, we thought we'd give it a whirl. We were a little late; they were more like New Year's Egg Rolls, but boy were they good (and secretly fun to make...as in...I actually enjoyed it!)

Here are some pictures!

The mixture you see is cabbage, carrots, tofu, sausage, bean threads, and a couple of spices.

(I think that's everything?)

Then you roll up the egg roll, adding a little water to the last flap to make it stick.

At the same time, you're heating the oil on the stovetop (or your husband is, in my case).

These are deep fried, of course. :)

The egg rolls start collecting on the side.

And then, when the oils at a good temperature (hot enough to cook 'em, but not too hot that it burns the outside without warming the inside), you drop 'em in...

 

Then it's a game of keep up. I was rollin' as fast as I could to keep up with Garrett who was fryin' as fast as he could...

That boy is a fryin' machine...

When all was said and done, we'd made 40 egg rolls.

35 with the regular stuffings.

 

4 dessert ones.

Stuffed with:

applesauce and cinnamon

peaches and brown sugar

apple butter

nutella, powdered sugar, and peanut butter morsels

and 1 that...didn't make it.

(Picture not shown)

All in all, it was a fun time, and a great dinner.

And leftovers were delicious, too!

And leftovers WILL be delicious again...

and again...

and again...

and...

The only thing that didn't work was...

our sink.

Apparently, I stuffed too many carrot nubs down the "in-sink-erator" and got it clogged.

Waaaaaaay clogged.

We plunged till we could plunge no more.

Nothin'.

We'll have to call facilities tomorrow.

After lunch.

A somewhat different Thanksgiving

What comes to mind when the idea of "Thanksgiving" is tossed into a conversation? The essentials; turkey, sweet potato casserole, rolls, green bean casserole, numerous pies and ice cream. Oh....and most of the time family! But this year was a little different for the southern California Suhr household of two. Instead of spending the holiday fighting traffic driving somewhere or loads of moolah flying home, we decided to spend it camping in a tent in a little place called Yosemite. Lodging? A cabin with a nice bed, fridge full of food and hot showers, right? Nope. Not even that. We went for the camping experience and it turned out to be a good one. We had 3 nights of freezing (literally) temperatures, but thanks to our numerous ground mattresses, blankets, and queen size sleeping bag we slept like babies! And our food....was goooood! Beth suggested "pigs in a blanket" for thanksgiving dinner and so that's what we did. Here's how. Roast a hot dog over the fire. Once it is done cooking, take a thin slice of cheese and place it around the hot dog and then wrap it in croissant dough (from the can), and finally in aluminum foil. After you roast it over the fire some more it starts sizzlin' and boy does it taste great! Oh...and speaking of fires, we had roaring fires at night. They kept us nice and toasty as we cooked and ate out meals and waited for the uneventful sighting of a bear. They were supposed to be in camp every night but we didn't hear or see any sign of them. Beth's beginning to think that animals don't exist where people say they do. On our honeymoon in New Hampshire we looked and looked for a moose for a week and a half and never saw one. We were up in the Boundary Waters canoeing for a week and didn't see one up there either. Now, no bears in Yosemite?! She might me on to something.

The interesting part of camping though at this time of year in a deep valley, is that the sun sets around 4pm and it's dark by 5. The game then becomes, "what can we do to stay awake for like 4 more hours till it's bed time?". The answer was NOTHING! Ahh.....going to bed at 8pm was actually a treat. We got about 12 hours of sleep each night.

During the days we hiked to gorgeous water falls via hiking trails that were near vertical. I looked at the hikers guide and it said that the hikes would be strenuous and then very strenuous, but I didn't believe it. But let me tell you, it's not 3 days after the hikes and we are both still so sore from it! The people on the trails were very friendly and everyone was wishing each other "happy Thanksgiving!" and we even got to hike with a man from San Francisco for a while. His wife and girls were staying down in the valley for the day and so we some good company for a while. One thing that seems to happen on our hikes is some sort of miscommunication. Beth says something, I don't hear it right for some reason and then the aftermath leaves us trying to sort out what happened. Neither of us like it, but it happens each time we go out! Every couple I talk to says that communication is the hardest part of a relationship....and I'll agree whole-heartedly on that one. A constant tension that we'll be learning about for years to come.

Back to the end of the trip...we came home and relaxed friday evening after thanksgiving and it was so nice to be warm, clean and sleeping with a down comforter! Saturday ended up being a huge day for us as well. We made our first, all by ourselves, thanksgiving dinner for us and 6 others! It was a hit and the people that came loved it. We really enjoyed the evening with our friends and just wish it could have lasted for longer. The day ended with a slice of pumpkin roll and some sparkling cider and laughter in the living room!
That was a different thanksgiving, but one I'll remember for the rest of my life. I'm going to put a few pics up just so you can see where we were for our fall holiday!