The beaver is a proud and noble animal
Notes from a bemused canuck
We cut the grass this weekend.
We had to.
It was becoming shameful.
I’ve seen hay fields that has shorter grasses. Katy has seen meadows that were less densely packed.
If you left the lawnmower in the middle of the grass, you could only see the top of the handlebar. It took about two hours to get everything done and even then, I stopped counting the number of times I had to restart the engine because it cut out.
And as such, it is the worst thing that can happen to me, oh woe is me. I stayed home yesterday and felt sorry for myself. I couldn’t justify it two days running and went to work today (having said that, I can actually swallow today – something I couldn’t really do without being in pain yesterday).
Seriously though, I hope I get rid of whatever bug I have before we leave for Canada. What’s even more important is that I hope Katy doesn’t get it while we’re in Canada. I want us to have a nice, event-free holiday for once.
Tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiired.
We went to Leics this weekend to see Katy’s parents. Donna and Will came up on Saturday to collect the fish from Mel’s pond (he wanted to get rid of it and they bagged all the fish, plants and rocks for their own pond). Katy had a nice chat with Rita and we all enjoyed Pam’s curries on Saturday night (though we suffered the following days – gotta love those chillies).
We came back to Cambs Sunday evening after depriving Mel of even more fish – the aquarium ones this time. We got half a dozen plants and about a dozen fish for ours, which finally make it seem nice and populated now. Best news is that none of them were floating upside-down this morning. See how the next few days go.
The weather is really starting to heat up hereabouts. They’re forecasting 24 today. I already miss winter.
Plans are going forward for our trip to Canada at the end of the month. We have the hotels booked for Montreal and Quebec. We only need to book the Hilton and arrange transportation across all the cities. This should get done this week.
We need to get the tires looked at on the car. It would seem that the alignment or the tracking is off because the wear pattern is off and they seem to be balding on one side more than the other. This is going to prove fun to do because of English law – if the tires are deemed unsafe, we can’t drive it off the lot but at the same time this is our only car and Katy needs it to drive to work. Fun.
Did I mention that we’re both tired?
We are.
I can only hope that the coming weeks don’t kill us for the vacation and that the time we spend in Canada is fun and uneventful.
Ingredients
225g/8oz self raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
50g/2oz butter
25g/1oz caster sugar
150ml/5fl oz milk combined with 1/2 beaten egg
Method
After much waiting, I now have my passport back. The home office has smeared a butt-ugly stamp in it that now means that I can travel again (though from now on, I need proof of employment with me when I re-enter the country, joy!)
Inhabitants of Oak Lawn, Ill. apparently have a hard time understanding the meaning of the large red octagons posted on street corners through the city.
So in an effort to get people to actually stop, the city installed smaller signs below their larger, legal counterparts to get motorists attention while providing them a half-hearted chuckle. The extra signs correlated with the “Stop” written above, with slogans including “and smell the roses,” “right there pilgrim” and “means you’re not moving.”
While residents and the town’s mayor found them funny, the Illinois Department of Transportation was less than enthused and claims that the signs violate the Fed’s Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices. That means that federal funding for projects in the city could be put on hold, so $1,700 worth of signs were pulled down. Booooooooooooo!
I made risotto for the first time today. It was dead simple but oh-so-tasty!
Ingredients
240g risotto rice
750 ml chicken stock
250g smoked lardons
300g cod
200g undyed smoked haddock
1 chopped onion
large handful of frozen peas, thawed
olive oil
parmesan
pepper
Method
1. Bring the stock to a boil and lower to a simmer. Poach the fish in the stock for 5 minutes. Remove the fish from the stock and set aside.
2. Brown the lardons in olive oil. When well coloured, add the onion and sautee until translucent.
3. Add the rice and mix well until all the grains are covered in bacon fat. Start adding the stock one ladle at a time until the stock is mostly absorbed. Stir often and simmer until all the stock has been used and the rice is cooked but the core still has a bit of bite (about 18 minutes).
4. Add the fish, peas and parmesan. Mix well, cover ant let sit for 3 minutes.
5. Serve with fresh black pepper and steamed asparagus.
I’ve mentioned before that I’m in the process of moving my blog to WordPress. This has caused some inconvenience to some of you because of a pop-up asking for a password when you loaded your friends page (as a side note, this has been fixed).
The reason there was a password request in the first place is that when I imported all of my 2000+ LJ posts, WordPress set them all to public by default. A few of those were private, and about 200 of the rest were friends-only. I’ve been going through all the locked posts to see which ones I need to reset as private. Surprisingly, a lot of them don’t need it any more. A lot of them dealt with old jobs, old dates and other things of that nature.
It’s been rather eye-opening to reread a lot of this stuff. Sometimes, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Also, I don’t believe how emo and whiny I was only 3 years ago :)
Ahh, bacon! That crispy, chewy, salty and sinful cut of pork we all love.
Bacon has disciples far and wide, some of whom devote entire blogs to it. The Bacon Show, for
example, posts a daily recipe featuring bacon; the site “101 Things Every Cook Should Cook” has an entire section devoted to bacon. Heather, of the site “Bacon Unwrapped”, chronicles her adventures with bacon,
and “Bacontarian” brings you bacon-y goodness from around the Internet, while “I Heart Bacon” conducts bacon reviews.
For those who’ve spent more time eating it than studying it, bacon is cut from the sides, belly, or back of a pig, near the ribs. It’s the fattiness of the meat that makes it so yummy. After the skin is cut away, the meat is cured, smoked, and sliced. It can be cooked in a pan on the stovetop, in the oven, or in the microwave, until it’s perfectly crisp.
You probably know bacon as the star of the BLT (bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich, in case you didn’t know), and the bacon cheeseburger. But there are so many other ways we can incorporate it into our diets and our lives! Here are 50 ways to use bacon:
1. Make a good old BLT sandwich, of course.
2. Bacon cheeseburgers will make anyone’s mouth water. Meat topped with more meat? Perfection!
3. Bacon-wrapped tater tots would go perfectly with that bacon cheeseburger!
4. Roast a bacon-wrapped turkey for Sunday dinner.
5. Make delicious bacon pastry slices.
6. Add a punch of flavor to your creamed spinach recipe.
7. Make your own hot bacon dressing to use on lettuce, cabbage, or even potato salad!
8. Entertaining? Whet your guests’ appetites with the bacon-cheese fundido appetizer.
9. Indulge in a bar of dark chocolate infused with the flavor of applewood smoked bacon as a special treat.
10. Maple bacon cupcakes will make your mouth water.
11. And if you liked those, try a bacon chocolate chip cookie with maple cinnamon glaze.
12. It’s not real, southern cornbread unless there’s bacon grease in it.
13. Visit The Plaid Mushroom’s e-shop to smother your lips with bacon lip balm made with real bacon oil, refined from bacon. (The link is to a listing that was reserved for a certain buyer, but contact theplaidmushroom to ask for your own listing.)
14. Join the bacon of the month club to have artisan bacon delivered to your door 12 times a year.
15. The beautiful city of Charleston, South Carolina gives us bacon-flavored cotton candy.
16. Enjoy a bacon martini with any meal.
17. Use bacon to dress up your leftovers for a second visit to the dinner table.
18. Whip up a tasty bacon asparagus quiche with Swiss cheese for dinner.
19. Cook bacon into the shape of cups and fill with lettuce and tomato for a breadless BLT.
20. Stay warm by wrapping a giant fleece bacon scarf around yourself.
21. Even if you’re a vegetarian and/or keep a kosher diet, you can still enjoy the taste of bacon salt, because, as the manufacturers say: “Everything should taste like bacon.”
22. If pork-covered pork appeals to you, you may also enjoy the bacon-wrapped deep-fried hot dog.
23. Trim your holiday tree with joyful ceramic bacon ornaments.
24. Use bacon instead of ground beef in stuffed peppers.
25. Get the morning off to a good start with beer cheese muffins with bacon cream cheese frosting.
26. Impress your guests with deceptively simple bacon-wrapped “crabette” appetizers.
27. A bacon-y take on an Asian favorite: bacon and bok choy potstickers.
28. Weave and bake bacon into edible placemats.
29. Then, use the woven bacon to augment your grilled cheese experience.
30. Or, use woven bacon to cook up an eggless bacon and cheese omelet.
31. Bacon and date appetizers will be the hit of your party.
32. Bacon egg salad croissants put a new spin on an old favourite.
33. Then, have a bowl of bacon ice cream for dessert.
34. Then use an actual bacon bandage to cover your own boo-boos.
35. Or wake up to cooking bacon with the bacon alarm clock, which is appropriately shaped like a pig’s face.
36. Add it to your bathroom in the form of bacon-printed toilet tissue.
37. Then, use it to wash up afterward.
38. Bacon popcorn is a deliciously salty, crunchy snack!
39. Try your hand at making your own bacon.
40. Enjoy barbecue-baked beans with bacon alongside your BLT.
41. Cook up a bacon buffet with bacon-topped potato skins, bacon-wrapped shrimp and scallops, bacon-wrapped asparagus, and eggs cooked in bacon grease.
42. Corn and bacon chowder sounds like the perfect soup to warm you up on the last chilly evenings before summer!
43. Strawberry bacon spinach salad will make you the star of any potluck.
44. Salty bacon will complement the sweet honey dressing in this imitation crab salad.
45. Try poached pears stuffed with blue cheese and baked with bacon.
46. Or try the same combo of flavors in a pear, blue cheese, bacon pizza.
47. Take a look at this bacon-filled quiche. It’ll really make your mouth water.
48. See who comes out on top with an action-figure wrestling match between Mr. Bacon
and Monsieur Tofu.
49. Smooth caramel topped with crunchy bacon: Does that sound delicious or disgusting? Try it and let us know.
50. Try many other bacon dishes suggested by foodnerd, including bacon fluffernutter sandwiches, bacon cups with macaroni and cheese, bacon-pepper-cheese scones, and more!
Original Source: http://startcooking.com/blog/395/50-Ways-to-Use-Bacon
This is another recipe we saw recently and just had to try out. It’s from the Beeb’s Something for the weekend. I prepared the mix the night before we wanted to cook it for dinner and it came out tasting loverly! The best thing though is that it makes excellent leftover meatloaf sandwiches :)
Ingredients
1 free-range egg, beaten
150ml oz milk
300g soft white bread, cut into cubes
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
pinch dried thyme
pinch freshly grated nutmeg
pinch dried basil
handful fresh parsley, finely chopped
1 onion, finely chopped
1 large stalk celery, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
225g bacon lardons, fried until golden-brown all over
salt and freshly ground black pepper
700g minced beef
200g minced pork
3 slices streaky bacon
ketchup, for basting
Method
1. For the meatloaf, place the egg and milk into a large bowl and mix together.
2. Add the cubes of bread and leave to stand for 15 minutes.
3. Mash the milk and egg-soaked bread with a fork.
4. Add the mustard, thyme, nutmeg, basil, onion, celery, carrot and bacon lardons, season with salt and freshly ground black pepper and mix well.
5. Add the beef and pork mince. Mix well to combine thoroughly.
6. Cover with cling film and place into the fridge to chill (overnight if possible, but for at least two hours).
7. Preheat the oven to 180C/360F/Gas 4.
8. Transfer the meatloaf mixture into a 30cm x 11cm/12in x 4in loaf tin.
9. Top with the streaky bacon slices to cover. Baste with ketchup.
10. Transfer to the oven and bake for 55 minutes, or until completely cooked through.
11. Remove from the oven and leave the meatloaf to stand for 5-6 minutes before slicing.
13. To serve, slice the meat loaf. Place a slice onto each plate with a dollop of mashed potato alongside. Pour over some gravy and enjoy.