Happy feast day! (That is, yesterday...)
St. Maria Faustina Kowalska (1905-1938)
Helena Kowalska was born in a small Polish village, the third of ten children. She entered the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy shortly before her 20th birthday, receiving the habit the following year and taking the name Maria Faustina of the Most Blessed Sacrament. Throughout the 1930s, St. Faustina received many messages and visions from Christ, Who desired her to spread the message of His Divine Mercy. She was canonized by Bl. John Paul II on April 30, 2000. The Chaplet and Novena of Divine Mercy are the most widely-known of the revelations she received; the full text of her diary can be found here.
Bl. Francis Xavier Seelos (1819-1867)
Francis Xavier Seelos was born in Bavaria, where he began seminary studies in 1847. He joined the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (Redemptorists) a few months later, and emigrated to New York to finish his studies in their seminary. He served German immigrants in Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Cumberland, and Anapolis, and was known as a remarkable confessor and spiritual director, marked by a "cheerful holiness." In 1960 he was proposed as a candidate for bishop of Pittsburgh, but asked to be excused from consideration; he spent the next six years as an itinerant preacher, reaching out to the poor and uneducated. He was assigned to a parish in New Orleans in 1866, but just a few months later contracted yellow fever as he tended to the ill among his flock, and died. He was canonized by Bl. John Paul II on April 9, 2000. Information about his cause for canonization can be found here.
October 5 is a very special day for our family: I have had a devotion to the Divine Mercy and St. Faustina for many years, so her feast day is close to my heart. Shortly after we were married, a priest friend gave us a first class relic of Bl. Seelos, asking us to learn more about him and ask his intercession for our marriage. We were so happy to learn that he shares a feast day with St. Faustina, because it gives us twice as much to celebrate! I invite you to learn more about this holy priest, and to pray for his cause for canonization.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
The last burger of summer
(This post has been waiting to go up since Labor Day weekend, but it took me this long to get the picture off of Matt's phone!)
Matt's employer very kindly gave him the day off for Labor Day, but my boss decided that we were staying open, and I wound up having a very hectic day. The last thing I wanted to do when I got home was spend another hour in the kitchen, so we were looking for a quick and easy supper that evening. What else would make more sense for a fast meal to make on Labor Day than burgers? It was perfect... we even had ground beef thawed and waiting in the fridge. The only thing missing was the bread.
We had a couple of frozen heels from old loaves of wheat bread, which would have worked fine, I suppose. It just wasn't quite what we had in mind. We discussed having burgers without buns, we wondered about baking fresh buns, we even contemplated pizza... then Matt pulled out the bag of corn tortillas.
While the Applebees chain is fairly common in cities across the United States (there's even one in Anchorage, AK), there isn't one anywhere near us. Which is sad, because we really like their food! But for those of you who have never experienced one of their quesadilla burgers, or who, like us, live in a city without an Applebees, we have a solution for you.
Matt's Quesadilla Burgers
1 lb ground beef
8 slices cheddar cheese
8 slices Monterrey jack cheese
8 corn tortillas
thick, chunky salsa*
Form ground beef into burgers; cook in skillet or on grill.
Meanwhile, lay out tortillas on large sheet pan. Brush very lightly with olive oil. Broil, checking often to make sure they don't burn. When tortillas are slightly crisp, remove from oven. Flip over and lay two slices of cheese on each tortilla.
When burgers are just about ready, put tortilla pan back under broiler just until cheese begins to melt. Remove from oven; put burger and salsa between two tortillas.
We enjoyed ours with home-made potato crisps, made by peeling and thinly slicing two potatoes, brushing lightly with oil, and broiling. If the pieces aren't uniform, the thinner ones will char while the thicker ones are still raw... it wasn't very fun, they didn't taste all that amazing and wonderful, and next time I would probably just take the same amount of time to whip up a quick potato salad. The rest of the meal was wonderful, though!
*If your salsa has too much moisture in it, this is going to be a very messy meal! We strained ours through paper towels, and just put the chunks of tomato and peppers on our burgers.
Matt's employer very kindly gave him the day off for Labor Day, but my boss decided that we were staying open, and I wound up having a very hectic day. The last thing I wanted to do when I got home was spend another hour in the kitchen, so we were looking for a quick and easy supper that evening. What else would make more sense for a fast meal to make on Labor Day than burgers? It was perfect... we even had ground beef thawed and waiting in the fridge. The only thing missing was the bread.
We had a couple of frozen heels from old loaves of wheat bread, which would have worked fine, I suppose. It just wasn't quite what we had in mind. We discussed having burgers without buns, we wondered about baking fresh buns, we even contemplated pizza... then Matt pulled out the bag of corn tortillas.
While the Applebees chain is fairly common in cities across the United States (there's even one in Anchorage, AK), there isn't one anywhere near us. Which is sad, because we really like their food! But for those of you who have never experienced one of their quesadilla burgers, or who, like us, live in a city without an Applebees, we have a solution for you.
Matt's Quesadilla Burgers
1 lb ground beef
8 slices cheddar cheese
8 slices Monterrey jack cheese
8 corn tortillas
thick, chunky salsa*
Form ground beef into burgers; cook in skillet or on grill.
Meanwhile, lay out tortillas on large sheet pan. Brush very lightly with olive oil. Broil, checking often to make sure they don't burn. When tortillas are slightly crisp, remove from oven. Flip over and lay two slices of cheese on each tortilla.
When burgers are just about ready, put tortilla pan back under broiler just until cheese begins to melt. Remove from oven; put burger and salsa between two tortillas.
We enjoyed ours with home-made potato crisps, made by peeling and thinly slicing two potatoes, brushing lightly with oil, and broiling. If the pieces aren't uniform, the thinner ones will char while the thicker ones are still raw... it wasn't very fun, they didn't taste all that amazing and wonderful, and next time I would probably just take the same amount of time to whip up a quick potato salad. The rest of the meal was wonderful, though!
*If your salsa has too much moisture in it, this is going to be a very messy meal! We strained ours through paper towels, and just put the chunks of tomato and peppers on our burgers.
A Tale of Two Pastas
Since our wedding two months ago, Matt and I have learned a lot about our backgrounds through our different instincts when it comes to food. Neither of us are picky eaters, so the main difference has been in the place different starches hold in our minds. For Matt, who is half Sicilian and grew up eating a lot of Italian food, pasta is a basic element of most meals: If we go too many days without eating pasta, he feels like he hasn't really eaten dinner.
For me, with my hodgepodge Scandinavian/German/Irish ancestry, that central place is shared by hearty breads and potatoes. I like pasta, but I don't feel that I've put a whole meal on the table if the pasta isn't accompanied by breadsticks, garlic bread, or the like.
Nevertheless, pasta is admittedly easier than fresh bread, and decidedly faster than potatoes, so we've eaten quite a bit of pasta in recent weeks as I've been working full days and haven't had the energy to bake for the next day when we get home at night. We try to vary the pasta dishes, though, and have come up with a couple of good, simple versions that I wanted to share.
This is our variation on a ham carbonara, which is probably far enough away from the original recipe that we should find something else to call it entirely. I basically omitted the sauce, which is what technically makes it carbonara, simply tossing the ham, vegetables and pasta with a touch of olive oil.
1 box pasta (we used farfalle, but any short pasta would work)
5-6 slices cooked ham, chopped into pieces about 1" wide
10-15 olives, sliced
1 red bell pepper, sliced
olive oil
parsley
red pepper flakes
Parmesan cheese, grated
Cook pasta according to directions on box, making sure to use enough water (Matt says this is very important). Drain and return to pot; add ham and vegetables, toss with olive oil. Season with parsley and red pepper flakes. Top with grated Parmesan cheese.
The ham carbonara is fast and easy to prepare, but looks impressive enough that I would feel comfortable making it if we were entertaining for dinner. If you don't have the time to chop all of the little pieces, though, here is a pasta dish that comes together even more quickly:
Literally 20 minutes from walking in the door to sitting down for dinner, and so simple I don't even have a name for it.
Spaghetti
1 link sausage per person
1/2 c frozen broccoli per person
Parmesan cheese, grated
Cook spaghetti according to directions on box. Add frozen broccoli to spaghetti pot a few minutes before pasta is done. Slice sausages into 1/4" pieces. Drain pasta and broccoli; add sausages. Heat until sausages are warmed (about 5 minutes). Top with grated Parmesan cheese.
As you can see, I did manage to serve this meal with bread: just a slice of Italian bread with a piece of mozzarella cheese on top, toasted under the broiler for a couple of minutes.
For me, with my hodgepodge Scandinavian/German/Irish ancestry, that central place is shared by hearty breads and potatoes. I like pasta, but I don't feel that I've put a whole meal on the table if the pasta isn't accompanied by breadsticks, garlic bread, or the like.
Nevertheless, pasta is admittedly easier than fresh bread, and decidedly faster than potatoes, so we've eaten quite a bit of pasta in recent weeks as I've been working full days and haven't had the energy to bake for the next day when we get home at night. We try to vary the pasta dishes, though, and have come up with a couple of good, simple versions that I wanted to share.
1 box pasta (we used farfalle, but any short pasta would work)
5-6 slices cooked ham, chopped into pieces about 1" wide
10-15 olives, sliced
1 red bell pepper, sliced
olive oil
parsley
red pepper flakes
Parmesan cheese, grated
Cook pasta according to directions on box, making sure to use enough water (Matt says this is very important). Drain and return to pot; add ham and vegetables, toss with olive oil. Season with parsley and red pepper flakes. Top with grated Parmesan cheese.
The ham carbonara is fast and easy to prepare, but looks impressive enough that I would feel comfortable making it if we were entertaining for dinner. If you don't have the time to chop all of the little pieces, though, here is a pasta dish that comes together even more quickly:
Spaghetti
1 link sausage per person
1/2 c frozen broccoli per person
Parmesan cheese, grated
Cook spaghetti according to directions on box. Add frozen broccoli to spaghetti pot a few minutes before pasta is done. Slice sausages into 1/4" pieces. Drain pasta and broccoli; add sausages. Heat until sausages are warmed (about 5 minutes). Top with grated Parmesan cheese.
As you can see, I did manage to serve this meal with bread: just a slice of Italian bread with a piece of mozzarella cheese on top, toasted under the broiler for a couple of minutes.
Friday Lasagna
Pasta is a frequent meal for us on days when we get home from work tired and hungry, and didn't manage to prepare anything for dinner before we left in the morning. This particular day, though, I had planned ahead to make a fancier pasta dish than the typical spaghetti-and-marinara: I had the box of lasagna set out next to the stove, the spinach thawed and squeezed dry, and a container of Matt's home-made tomato sauce thawing in the refrigerator. All I had to do when we got home was throw everything in a pan, put it in the oven for an hour or so, and we would have dinner.
Except, nothing is that easy. Our recipe called for one box of frozen chopped spinach, and I'd purchased the only size of box that our grocery store carries. Apparently the person who wrote the original recipe shops at a store where they sell monster boxes of frozen chopped spinach: my little pile of spinach was nowhere near enough greenery for a 13x9 pan of lasagna.
Fortunately, we had just visited my parents the evening before, and been sent home with a small crown of fresh broccoli from their garden. I chopped it up and threw it in a skillet with some garlic to soften up, adding the spinach for the last few minutes to let the flavors merge before adding the mixture to the rest of the lasagna.
It turned out pretty well, and we enjoyed leftovers for the next few lunches. The broccoli added interest and texture to the lasagna, which otherwise would have been very uniform: cheese, lasagna noodles and spinach are all smooth, thin and stretchy. I definitely plan on trying out vegetable lasagnas with other atypical veggies in the future!
Broccoli Spinach Lasagna
9 uncooked lasagna noodles
2 T olive oil
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 c spinach, chopped
1 c broccoli, chopped
3 - 3.5 c ricotta
2.5 c mozzarella
2 qt pasta sauce
2 T Parmesan, grated
Preheat oven to 350 F. Heat oil in medium skillet. Add garlic; saute 1 min. Add spinach and broccoli; cook, stirring, 3 min. Season with salt and pepper if desired. Combine 1/2 c mozzarella with ricotta; mix well. Lightly cover bottom of 13x9 pan with pasta sauce. Layer 3 noodles, sauce, 1/2 of the ricotta mixture, 1/2 of the spinach mixture, 1/2 c mozzarella. Repeat. Top with remaining 3 noodles, remaining sauce, and 1 c mozzarella, making sure noodles are submerged in sauce. Cover with foil and bake for 1 hour 15 minutes or until noodles are cooked. Remove foil and grate Parmesan onto top. May add more mozzarella if desired, or if all your original mozzarella stuck to the foil when you took it off. Bake 15-20 min uncovered until cheese is browned and excess moisture cooks off.
Except, nothing is that easy. Our recipe called for one box of frozen chopped spinach, and I'd purchased the only size of box that our grocery store carries. Apparently the person who wrote the original recipe shops at a store where they sell monster boxes of frozen chopped spinach: my little pile of spinach was nowhere near enough greenery for a 13x9 pan of lasagna.
Fortunately, we had just visited my parents the evening before, and been sent home with a small crown of fresh broccoli from their garden. I chopped it up and threw it in a skillet with some garlic to soften up, adding the spinach for the last few minutes to let the flavors merge before adding the mixture to the rest of the lasagna.
It turned out pretty well, and we enjoyed leftovers for the next few lunches. The broccoli added interest and texture to the lasagna, which otherwise would have been very uniform: cheese, lasagna noodles and spinach are all smooth, thin and stretchy. I definitely plan on trying out vegetable lasagnas with other atypical veggies in the future!
Broccoli Spinach Lasagna
9 uncooked lasagna noodles
2 T olive oil
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 c spinach, chopped
1 c broccoli, chopped
3 - 3.5 c ricotta
2.5 c mozzarella
2 qt pasta sauce
2 T Parmesan, grated
Preheat oven to 350 F. Heat oil in medium skillet. Add garlic; saute 1 min. Add spinach and broccoli; cook, stirring, 3 min. Season with salt and pepper if desired. Combine 1/2 c mozzarella with ricotta; mix well. Lightly cover bottom of 13x9 pan with pasta sauce. Layer 3 noodles, sauce, 1/2 of the ricotta mixture, 1/2 of the spinach mixture, 1/2 c mozzarella. Repeat. Top with remaining 3 noodles, remaining sauce, and 1 c mozzarella, making sure noodles are submerged in sauce. Cover with foil and bake for 1 hour 15 minutes or until noodles are cooked. Remove foil and grate Parmesan onto top. May add more mozzarella if desired, or if all your original mozzarella stuck to the foil when you took it off. Bake 15-20 min uncovered until cheese is browned and excess moisture cooks off.
Make-up day
I'm home by myself today with no cleaning to do (did it all yesterday), no dinner to make (we're visiting my parents tonight), no freelance writing to work on (finished my last assignment this morning), so it's finally time to catch up on all of the blog posts we've been meaning to put up over the past few weeks!* Bear with me; there are probably going to be several today.
*Except for the photos of our trip to Gakona. I'm sorry, Alice! They will be up soon, I promise! They're still on Matt's phone.
*Except for the photos of our trip to Gakona. I'm sorry, Alice! They will be up soon, I promise! They're still on Matt's phone.
Preparing for winter
I was talking with a friend in New Jersey the other day who remarked that fall was just beginning there; the first few leaves changing color, the weather still uncomfortably warm and humid. As she talked, I looked around and laughed: I was sitting at a frost-covered picnic table, yellow leaves around my feet and a barren tree behind me, with the last Canadian geese honking good-bye as they sped south to avoid the approaching snow. The temperatures hover around freezing well into the middle of the day now, and the weathermen have been calling for snow every other day the past two weeks; our autumn is nearly over.
Matt spent last weekend making sure that our car will be ready when the snow flies:
He took advantage of a sunny, if chilly, afternoon to re-attach the weather stripping across the top of the windshield. We also brought home some windshield washer fluid rated to -60 F. As far as we can tell, they don't even sell windshield fluid rated to such cold temperatures in most other states!
Matt spent last weekend making sure that our car will be ready when the snow flies:
He took advantage of a sunny, if chilly, afternoon to re-attach the weather stripping across the top of the windshield. We also brought home some windshield washer fluid rated to -60 F. As far as we can tell, they don't even sell windshield fluid rated to such cold temperatures in most other states!
Friday, September 30, 2011
And then life struck.
We honestly meant it when we said that we intended to update every week, really we did... Then I got sick, and the next weekend we took a road trip, and the next weekend neither of us remembers what happened, but the blog slowly slid off of our radar. Thanks to a number of serious changes to our regular schedule, though, we're hoping to be posting more regularly soon.
You probably know that I have been working at a local coffee shop for the past five months; you may also know that I am allergic to caffeine. In the past, I had only experienced a negative reaction when I actually drank a caffeinated beverage, but over the past few months I have gotten to the point where merely being around espresso makes me ill. For the sake of my health, I am leaving my job at the coffee shop, and just yesterday evening was hired as part-time secretary for the new pastor of the parish where we were married. The part-time hours will be nice: more time for cooking and cleaning, for my freelance work, and for the blog!
You probably know that I have been working at a local coffee shop for the past five months; you may also know that I am allergic to caffeine. In the past, I had only experienced a negative reaction when I actually drank a caffeinated beverage, but over the past few months I have gotten to the point where merely being around espresso makes me ill. For the sake of my health, I am leaving my job at the coffee shop, and just yesterday evening was hired as part-time secretary for the new pastor of the parish where we were married. The part-time hours will be nice: more time for cooking and cleaning, for my freelance work, and for the blog!
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