Labor Day This & That

I hope everyone is having a happy and safe Labor Day! I had planned to smoke pork ribs but it started out as an overcast, drizzly morning so the pork ribs will get smoked tomorrow . . nope . . probably Wednesday. Other things going on tomorrow so the ribs will have to wait a day.

As a reminder, which I'm sure all of you know . . my blog is about this and that. Some used to complain that it wasn't always about quilting. It's really about what I do every day and I know there's no one out there who really cares but sometimes, there will be a good recipe or something that I share . . I hope! : )

Chad, Nicole and Addie came to Joplin this morning so they came by to bring something to Vince. They were going shopping, picking up fried chicken for all of us and coming here on their way home. I love it when they come to visit. 

When they left this morning, it was about 11:30. I had planned to have dinner about 2 but knowing them, they won't be back til around 4. Vince was already hungry so I grabbed a jar of canned pork carnitas, a jar of freeze dried refried beans, we had avocados so Vince made guacamole. I stirred up flour, salt, baking powder, olive oil and water and made flour tortillas and had lunch on the table in about 20 minutes. I love having canned food on the shelves.

We had bought a heavy round curtain rod and some of the drapes with the big holes and grommet things in them to hang over the new doors in the sewing room. Vince hung those up this morning and I "assisted".  There are four windows in there. When we bought the house, there was nothing over the existing French doors and the four windows had narrow (wimpy) spring form rods with very sheer curtains. Because two of the windows are on a basement wall, the windowsill is very deep and Boots loved sitting in the windowsill looking out. He didn't do it on purpose but he managed to pull those sheets down and bent the rods. The other two windows are almost floor to ceiling and Boots managed to get wrapped up in those sheets a couple of times and pulled them down so none of the windows had coverings on them. We ordered shades for all four windows. They should be here this week. 

It's now 3 p.m. and I haven't taken the first stitch yet. I thought I would start stitching about 7 a.m. and stitch all day . . I'll be doing good to start by 6 p.m.

Eggplant Salsa

For those of you who have been following me on Patchwork Times, you're probably cringing at the thought of another Eggplant Salsa post. Yes, I'll admit that I a so in love with this recipe. When I make the recipe, I triple it and I've made it 5 times this year so I have about 50 pints of it to get me through the year. 

I used two boneless, skinless chicken breasts, sliced them lengthwise into three pieces (I don't like huge, thick chicken breasts!), then sliced those into "slivers. Those were seasoned with salt, pepper, and Cajun RedHead (my favorite Cajun spice). They will mail order. They are in my hometown but they do not know me. Not affiliated in any way but they say they have almost 50% less sodium than other brands. If you've tried a Cajun spice before and thought it was too salty, Cajun RedHead is NOT too salty. I always add extra salt and we are not heavy salt users. OK . . so much for the promotion . . 

Once the chicken was sauteed til it was almost done, I added one 8 oz. package of mushrooms that I sliced, one jalapeno pepper that I seeded and sliced, sauteed those, then added about 1/2 cup of white wine (the kind in the box - nothing fancy around here). Near the end, I added a handful of sliced fresh basil.

We had this dish over cooked, hulled barley, which has less net carbs than does white or brown rice. We also had black beans that I had canned a while back.

Until recently, I would not eat Feta cheese. Didn't like it at all. Vince loves it and we bought some about a year ago at Sam's Club and that Feta is my very favorite cheese. I eat it on everything. 

Several times a year, I will go on a bean canning binge. I'll can five or six pints each of black beans, garbanzo beans/chickpeas, pinto beans, small red beans, great northern beans, cannellini beans and Lima beans. I don't like black eyed peas and Vince doesn't like kidney beans so I don't can those. I will usually can 12 jars of cannellini beans because those are both of our favorites. I usually try to can 5 or 6 dozen pint jars over several days. We eat beans almost every day but not EVERY day so the canned beans will last us three to four months. As soon as the garden canning is done, I'll get busy canning beans to restock those shelves.