Why you mock me blank page?!

I walk around almost every day with a blog topic in my head. It gets written and edited in my head before it hits the page. The moment I sit down in front of a blank screen, it disappears. All I am left with is a vague idea of what it might have been about. Family? Shoes? A family of shoes? So I will give you "Things Currently Occupying my Noodle." And maybe, just maybe, I will get my brain back to blogging:

1. Garden, version 2 - Due to crappy soil in our garden area, I decided on raised beds this year. Our garden wasn't terrible, but it took a lot more work than I was willing (and able, especially after surgery) to put in. This year, we will also have smaller sections and more vertical structures (but more produce).

2. Crafts - I swear I am in the middle of a craft crapstorm. I have 5,476,392 things I would like to do...and I have started about half of them already. I thought about detailing them, but then I realized it would exhaust me just to write them out. I have learned that any project without a set finish date will likely not get completed.

3. Vacation - we haven't been on vacation since 2006 (excludes anything in the midwest). I have been wanting to go somewhere - anywhere - other than our neighboring states. Preferably some place warm. With or without the kid.
Finally, I got ShankRabbit on board with the idea. We will have a small getaway (without the child) sometime soon and another one toward the end of the year with the kid (at a place with a kingdom of magic...).

I am about as shocked as I can physically be. Yay for vacation!

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My brain has officially checked out, so here are some random pictures for you to enjoy (sorry to anyone on Twitter who has already seen these):


Gluten free thin mints. Yes, they can be done (om nom nom nom...)


Jacques, our new dishwasher. I love him so much.


A non-deviled egg. Part of an elaborate "welcome" gag played on a friend's boyfriend. He hates deviled eggs. So I made some out of meringue, yellow cupcake frosting, and red sugar. Heh heh...


My kid. My almost 3 year old.

My cup runneth over.

Pie!

I do not recall ever making a true* pie before. You know - cutting cold butter into flour, making pretty edges on the crust, prepping the filling, etc.
I love a good piece of homemade apple pie, but I would never attempt to make it myself. No culinary desire to do so. Until this past weekend...

I asked ShankRabbit what kind of dessert he would like for his birthday.

"Pecan pie. Man, I LOVE pecan pie," he said, practically drooling.
My look of confusion must have signaled further explanation.
"It's my dad's fault - it's his favorite as well. Wait...you didn't know my favorite pie is pecan?"

I've known this man for 9 years, been married to him for almost 3, and I would have never guessed pecan pie as his favorite. The only pie I've ever seen him consume was pumpkin (this man makes a kick-butt pumpkin pie, I must say).

My first thought was "maybe I could find a pre-made GF pecan pie?" Before you laugh at me, there is a place in Pewaukee known as Molly's Gluten-Free Bakery. They make excellent GF bakery items (I have a great story about this place, but I'll save it for a later post). Unfortunately, I was not within in their 2 day notice time frame and didn't see "pecan pie" on their list...so I was definitely stuck making my own.

If you have never attempted baking something gluten free, try it sometime. It will humble you. Bland and brittle are just two words that describe the majority of my GF baking attempts.

After a lengthy online search, I settled on combining this GF basic pie crust recipe (from Glutenfreeda.com) with this pecan filling recipe (from Pillsbury.com)

So, I was set to make the pie...except there was a catch. We were having dinner with friends (and their parents) that night, so I had to finish baking it there.

...

Did you catch that? Not only was I bringing them a GF pecan pie that I had never tried before, but I had to finish baking it in someone else's kitchen (a.k.a. an oven I was not familiar with).

[Cue minor freak out]

After I calmed down a bit, I figured, "hey, if this pie sucks, at least we'll have a funny story to tell" and I would have a great blog post.

Pie was eventually baked and consumed...with delight. I've never had pecan pie before so I can't give a true comparison, but I can tell you that it did not taste GF at all. It was darn tasty.

There were quite a few people at dinner that night, so the pie servings were pretty small. I decided to make another pecan pie a few days later...you know, to see if I could make it just as good.

My stomach says yes.

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* Our Thanksgiving Pumpkin pies don't count because we use a simple cereal pie crust. Very easy, very yummy.

Random #20

I've decided not to give my Random posts a name other than "Random #[insert current number here]"...because when the fancy strikes me, it's never on the day I schedule. I am assigning the arbitrary number of 20, because I don't want to go back and count what actual random day we are on. So, # 20 here we go:

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I think I should start with a confession. I've had two beers. An amount that typically has no effect on me, but tonight (as I am writing this on Tuesday night. Don't worry, I'm not a morning boozer) I feel like I've consumed a whole bottle of wine...and a few shots. Let the par-tay begin!

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This past winter, we had to move around our living room furniture to accommodate our Christmas tree. This meant the TV stand (with receiver, record player, CD player, and Wii) collected dust in a corner of our tiny bedroom...until now. Today I moved it back to the living room - but that meant I had to move the big couch, the little couch, and the ridiculously heavy coffee table (I think it was originally intended for a Wookie frat house). And since Peanut's birthday party is a mere 11 days away, I figured the crap collecting desk dining room table could go to the basement now. Though, I'm saving that big project for when ShankRabbit can help. Peanut doesn't know how to dial 911 just yet.

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I made a kick-butt pork roast today.
*looks to see what part of the pig a pork roast comes from...after 5 minutes of searching, realizes it said "shoulder" on the packaging. Saddened I cannot make intended butt / rump joke*
And because I like you, here is the recipe (I would love to give credit where credit is due, but I can't remember where it came from):

Plagiarism Pork Roast
1 pork roast (4-5 pounds)
1 garlic clove, halved lengthwise
salt
pepper
1/4 c. maple syrup
1/4 c. brown sugar
1 Tbsp corn starch
1 Tbsp Dijon mustard (I used what I had on hand: Jack Daniels horseradish mustard)
*optional* about a 1/4 tsp of Sriracha...because we put it on practically everything in our house.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Rub roast with garlic and discard the clove halves when done. Sprinkle salt and pepper over roast. Put on rack and bake for 2 hours (this is where I got creative with a metal wok rack and a Pyrex baking dish. Worked great!). Mix rest of ingredients together and cover the roast with it. Bake for an additional 30-45 minutes or until the internal temperature reads 155 degrees. Let rest 10 minutes before slicing. Supposedly serves 6 (bahahaha...more like 3-4).

For feeling like I'm buzzin' I did an AMAZING job at recalling all the details of this recipe with no visual assistance.
I better re-read this tomorrow and make sure I didn't just give you a recipe for a shepherd's pie truffle. Or feet.


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I use the oven a lot. You'd think with all the baking and cooking I do, I'd remember to preheat the darn thing - especially when the first direction is always "preheat the oven to..."
I forget every time.

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ShankRabbit is at his desk, playing a computer game. I stretch and without missing a beat he says, "SOOOO BIG!"
Can you tell we have a kid?

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Leave a comment on Code Monkey Daddy's blog to enter the "Song About You" contest. No purchase necessary.

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Dance Party Time!
(Have no idea what I'm referring to?...read the bottom of this post)

Artist/Band: New Radicals
Song Title: You Get What You Give
Kid-friendly?: Sorta...there is one swear at the end of the song

Meringue. It's what's for dinner.

I have issues working with meringue. I never realized how difficult it was until I attempted to make some meringue ghosts for Halloween (recommended by Milwaukee's Foodie Mom, Dawn). They turned out more like marshmallow blobs, not the pretty ghosts I saw in the picture.

After explaining my trials with this dessert, Dawn agreed to help me with my next meringue adventure.

Today was declared a "Baking Day." After 5 hours of baking, here's what we made (clockwise, starting with the pink one):





1) Candy cane meringue cookies
2) Peanut butter burgers
3) Toffee bars (with GF flour)
4) Fudge with toffee
5) Fudge with walnuts
6) Chocolate meringue stars

#1 and #6 were from the same recipe, but we crushed a couple candy canes into the first. The fudge was from the same recipe, but we made a batch with toffee bits in place of the walnuts (and sprinkled some toffee on top).


Oh. So. Yummy.


I think it's going to take a while to come off this sugar high.