Angela Law

animal lover, gardener, knitter, and gourmet cook
 
food & drink, gardening & landscaping

what’s up

It seems all I have been doing is working in the yard/garden, cooking, cleaning wine bottles, and typing recipes. It’s quite apparent that I haven’t been spending all of my time blogging as of late.

All of the yard work/gardening isn’t a bad thing. I’ve actually been enjoying myself while working on it. This year I got a jump on things. There’s still a lot to do, but at the rate I’m going, I’ll get to it soon enough.

Today, I received an order from Gardener’s Supply. I ordered some new tomato cages, which I’m quite excited about and some willow fencing for my blueberry bushes. It seems the rabbits rather enjoy eating the blueberry bushes I put in last year. They nibbled them down to stubs over the winter (after eating every leaf off of them in the summer). I think they’ll survive if I can keep the rabbits away from them this year. Plus, I got two more blueberry bushes last week and I don’t want the rabbits near them. Hence, the fence (I would like to actually eat some blueberries at some point).

I transplanted all of my tomato plants over the weekend. I have a bunch of pepper plants that need to be transplanted, but I don’t have enough room under my grow lights for all of them so I’ve been procrastinating. I knew I should’ve gotten the bigger grow light system. Of course, had I done that, I probably just would’ve planted more stuff anyway and had the same issue.

As for cooking, sometimes I don’t know what gets into me when I’m making up my menus (Yes, I make up menus. I’m anal retentive, remember? Sometimes, I even have menus made up weeks in advance. How about that? Those of you who don’t make up menus obviously aren’t eating as well as we are. So there.) Anyway, the past two days, I got off work at 3, started cooking, and had supper ready at 6. So much for an afternoon nap…

I am so behind on my wine-making for the year. I have 3 kits sitting in my basement just waiting to be fermented. I need to get on that. Plus, I have 2 kits that are ready to be bottled, so I’ve been getting my bottles organized and started cleaning them yesterday. Hopefully, we’ll do some bottling this weekend.

I’ve been spending my evenings typing recipes (at least I get to sit while I do that). My mom got some new recipe software (her previous recipes were entered on a Mac and my parent’s haven’t had a Mac in probably 10 years, so it was time for an overhaul). I volunteered to type her recipes, so I’ve been spending time each night typing away.

It makes me wonder what I do with my free time all winter when there isn’t any gardening to do, wine to make, or recipes to type. Sure, I cook a lot in the winter (probably more so than the summer), but just what do I do with all of my time? Come to think of it, it’s been a while since I read a book…

food & drink, motorcycles

first ride

I took my first motorcycle ride of the new season today. Brian’s been after me to go for a ride with him for a month now, but the weather hasn’t been warm enough (in my opinion) so I passed until now. Today was pretty nice, but it was quite chilly on the bike. I’m glad I went because we’re planning an overnight trip sometime in the next month or two and I’m going to make sure it’s good and warm out before we decide on a date. I thought temps in the 60s were going to be warm enough, but I think 70s would be more suitable.

Jake stayed at my parent’s last night, so today was supposed to be a work day. We got some stuff done, but never as much as I’d like. The ride didn’t take too much time out of our day–we just ran to Conzatti’s to grab some lunch and Parmesan cheese (which is needed for tonight’s supper). I found out the hard way that if you’re going to buy Italian food, don’t bother going anywhere else–you’ll pay too much.

Shortly, we’re going to start cooking supper. We’re trying out a new manicotti recipe tonight. My current recipe just doesn’t thrill me like it used to so I guess it’s time to try something new. The recipe I linked to is the first of three that I’m going to try. I’ll be sure to post the results of the manicotti cookoff at some point in the future.

friends

boulevard grill

This evening was spent with Judy at the Boulevard Grill. We met at 6:30 for dinner and just got home not that long ago. That is a sign of a good evening. We’ve been trying to hook up for a few months now and finally managed to get our schedules to match up this evening. I had their flatiron steak, which was quite yummy. Brian and Judy both had the Kobe beef burger, which was also quite delicious from what I heard. That’s the first time Brian and I had eaten at the Boulevard in a long, long time. And, I have to say, it was also one of the most enjoyable evenings we’ve spent there.

friends

saturday night’s alright for cooking

Yesterday, our friend (and Brian’s former co-worker) Steve came over for dinner. So, we pretty much spent the day cooking and cleaning. That’s one downside to entertaining inside. I guess that’s why we do most of our entertaining on the patio. The upside is the house is nice and clean and we have some leftovers for our lunch tomorrow.

Dinner was quite delicious if I do say so myself. We had Chicken Cordon Bleu, Grilled Antipasto Vegetables, Sage Risotto with Fresh Mozzarella, and Romaine Salad with Parmesan Crisps. And for dessert, a Chocolate Raspberry Fallen Souffle Roll.

It’s always a pleasure to see Steve. He is an avid gardener and, like us, normally has some sort of home improvement project in the works, so there’s always plenty to talk about. We don’t get together nearly enough, but I guess that’s what happens when you live over an hour apart. We are way overdue for a sushi run, so I guess we’ll have to do that sometime this summer (Steve being the guy who introduced us to sushi).

movies

the upside of anger

I used to really like Kevin Costner. He had a remarkable string of good films (The Untouchables, No Way Out, Bull Durham, Field of Dreams, Dances with Wolves, etc.) Then, after cheating on his wife and his subsequent divorce, he had a remarkable string of forgettable films (I’d tell you about them, but I haven’t seen any of them). Some might call that karma.

But he made a list of all of the wrongs from his past and set out to make things right and then turned his life around. Oh. Wait. That was Earl who did that. I don’t actually know what Kevin did, but whatever it was, it looks like he’s back on track with this movie.

The movie was a simple story about a woman whose husband left her and their four daughters. After this happened, she would sit around all day and drink with her neighbor (Costner), who she later formed a relationship with. The movie had the requisite plot twist at the end.

I did learn some important signs that you might be drinking too much:
1. you switch from beer to vodka
2. drinking while wearing your pjs
3. wearing your pjs all day long
4. you buy 3 bottles of Grey Goose at your weekly trip to the grocery store

As for sign #4, if you’re buying 3 bottles of Grey Goose at a time, not only are you drinking too much, but you obviously have too much money. But, I digress.

Brian and I both enjoyed the movie, but I was even more pleasantly surprised with our snack choice of the evening: pretzel nuggets with honey-mustard sauce. I made the honey-mustard sauce myself. Ingredients: coarse-grained mustard and honey. Pretty easy, eh? It turned out pretty well. And, surprisingly, it went well with our Margaritas. I wasn’t so sure it would, but it did. And, it was way healthier (but, not tastier) than last week’s snack–a can of pringles and a gigantic vat of homemade chip dip. But, you can eat that kind of crap every week. Not at this age, anyway.