Tomato harvest

I've been going out to check on the garden about once a day the last few weeks, and every day I've seen all kinds of green tomatoes, but almost no red ones. Today, they had finally turned.

The ones with the greenish tops are purple Cherokees, my absolute favorites. The smaller ones are like cherry tomatoes, and the long, skinny one is a San Marzano. Can't wait to see how those do in sauces.

The secret life of breadcrumbs

I don't even remember how this came up, but one day Mike and I were looking at labels of things in our cabinets and we noticed that the item with the most ingredients was ... breadcrumbs. Yeah.



I like how the label says "plain."



I had been buying them to use in my tofu nut loaf without ever having looked to see what was in them. I guess I just assumed bread - simple.

But no. There have to be more ingredients in this can than in a piece of mystery meat. I guess keeping them good at room temperature is a feat of science.

So we looked at other breadcrumbs in the store, just to see if there was anything better. This was the back of the panko bread crumb can.





Needless to say, we're switching. And if I can make them fresh, I'll do that, too. But sometimes when you're pressed for time you do reach for the can.

Just thought you might like to hear about our little discovery. It sure surprised me.

The doggie eye pillow

This photo came out a little dark, but I was trying to capture Reggie sleeping with her ear perfectly placed over her eyes, so as to block out the light. Clever!

Geek out: historical books

Me (and my book club) have been on a historical kick lately with our readings, so I thought I'd share them with you:

First, "In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex" by Nathaniel Philbrick. This was a book club selection, and I really liked it. The book covers the history of whaling, primarily in Nantucket, and the real-life story that inspired "Moby Dick." It was absolutely fascinating to imagine the lifestyle people led (women left alone for years at a time, while their husbands traveled thousands of miles around the world) and the reliance on whale oil that made people take absolutely insane risks. The story reminded me of that show, "I Shouldn't Be Alive." It's brutal, but worth a read.

Next, I grabbed "Salt: A World History" by Mark Kurlansky off my own book shelf. Mike had read it before, and I had always been curious about it. The book goes back thousands of years and traces the history of salt production and trade all over the world. I liked this book, but didn't love it. Mainly because it read more like a textbook. I found myself trailing off many times. The best parts described innovations that people had made to mine salt, or strange things that happened because of it (like a town that basically sunk because they took out too much salt underneath).

Staying on my history kick, I decided to read "1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus" by Charles Mann, which Mike had also read before. This book just blew my mind. It's about so much more than just the year 1491. It's about new findings related to when people came to the Americas thousands of years ago. It's about how native Americans had much more advanced civilizations than we used to believe. It's about how way more people were wiped out by disease than we ever realized. And it's about countering the idea that native Americans lived on the land but didn't mess with it. They did a lot to change their environment, but when their populations were decimated by disease, that stopped. Therefore what Europeans saw when they came here was much different. Anyway, though a few parts (mostly dealing with battles) bored me, the rest was so intriguing I couldn't put this book down. Highly recommend!

And finally, book club decided to go historical two times in a row and we chose "The Lost Cit of Z" by David Grann to read. It's about an explorer named Percy Fawcett, who disappeared in the Amazon in 1925 while looking for a lost city of riches. Apparently people have become obsessed with finding both what happened to him and the city itself, and many have died or been kidnapped in the process. The author goes on this journey himself, and finds some new details, and ultimately the same kind of conclusion that's written in "1491" (that advanced civilizations could have existed in the Amazon). Sadly, I was so into "1491" I couldn't quite appreciate this book as much. I would give it somewhere between a six and seven on our scale. Enjoyed, but would recommend this more as a library check out than a buy.

Checking in on the checklist

It's now less than two months until the wedding, and we've accomplished a lot of planning in the last week or so.

Remember the old checklist?

-pick out menswear
-make our food decisions
-pick out rings
-order flowers
-write our ceremony and vows
-buy plane tickets and make reservations for our honeymoon in Spain
-test cake recipes and proportions for the pans we have
-Make the decorations, table numbers, goodie bags, etc.
-Send the invitations and collect RSVPs
-Find a dog/house sitter
-Make a photo montage

I also got my second rosette pin made, got the cake toppers in the mail, figured out some travel logistics, and Mike assigned some people to bring speakers and run the music.

I had my dress fitting, which was lovely up until the point where they told me that the alterations were going to cost $291. WTF?! I could buy a whole other dress for that. I also have to come in for a second fitting, and then another time after they press it. Which would be a lot better if this place wasn't a 45-minute drive away.

I'll be honest - we had a little financial freakout after that and buying the plane tickets to Spain. But we are just trying to take it one step at a time. Many things still can't be done until about a month before the wedding. And we will get there.

Roasted beets with goat cheese

This has been my go-to side this week, now that we have fresh beets in the garden.



I've always found beets to be a little too strong tasting. I'll eat a few, but then I'll start to pick them out. But this recipe has given me a whole new appreciation for beets. I think the difference is that I finally cooked them long enough to caramelize, so they became more sweet than beet-y, if that makes any sense.

The addition of goat cheese and a drizzle of balsamic dressing just makes them even better.

The only sad part is that our beautiful chioggia beets lose most of their color when roasted. But I still get to enjoy the swirled patterns every time I cut one open.



So all you do for this recipe is wash the beets (as many as you want), trim the ends and cut off the greens.



Then you can peel the outer layer of skin if it's too rough.

Cut the beets into 1/4-inch slices, place them on a cookie sheet and drizzle on a little olive oil. Bake for 25-30 minutes at 400 degrees. You will be tempted to take them out too soon, but don't. You want them soft, with slightly curled edges.

When they're done, let them cool a few minutes, and cut the slices into 1-inch pieces. Sprinkle goat cheese on top (I like Northern Prairie Chevre's black pepper version) and drizzle with a little balsamic dressing.

The weekend in photos

Kind of ironic after my last post about freelancing, but last week was one of those where it was like everything happened at once work-wise. That's another thing I've noticed is work seems to happen all at once or not at all. And you have to use those down times for something productive because they suddenly disappear.

Anyway, I finally got a break over the weekend to do some yard work, and Mike and I had a fun time riding our bikes around the neighborhood. Ragbrai training plan: ride to Snookies, eat ice cream cone, ride back.

Anyway, I decided to go on a weed-killing cleanup mission in the backyard because it was starting to look like a jungle. I cleared out the space behind our garage, which had been so overgrown you couldn't walk back there, and our neighbor offered to weed whack the edges so that it was completely clear.



(Unfortunately it revealed just how badly our garage needs to be painted!)

This means I can finally tackle the "secret garden" spot in between our house and garage. I dug out all the weeds and baby trees and discovered all the rocks underneath that we had put in two years ago. I'm starting to scrape them back so we can put down a cover, then replace the rocks on top.



The rest of the yard is always going to get weedy unless we put down some more mulch, but I just don't know how much more money I want to invest in our yard, since we're renters.

One fun thing: After the first coneflower in our side garden died and we bought a second one, I noticed that a lone coneflower was growing out of the brush pile in our backyard.



So we'd had one all along. The little guy got a bit trampled by the dogs, but it still looks pretty good.



I weeded the garden some more and found that the yellow hot peppers are ready to pick, and that some of the beets are crowning.





I'm very excited to have these with dinner.

The other day I made stuffed shells, and I just had to take a picture because they looked so yummy. I just used a bit of ricotta mixed with parmesan cheese and black pepper for the filling.



Mike went up to Minneapolis over the weekend and found a suit for the wedding. We also sent out our invites and got several other items checked off our list, so we're feeling a lot better about things. I'm dying to go ring shopping now.

This is the hair pin I'm going to wear. Isn't it gorgeous?


And if you want one for yourself, go here.