Destruction & Construction, oh my!

First, some immediate news about the wonderful weather we are having here in the upper mid-west. If I had an Auntie Em, I would have been yelling her name over the past few days. :o) To make a very long few days of story very short, we had 6 tornado's within a 40 mile radius around B-town and one that hit the west side of our fair city, destroying a trailer park (surprise!) and it appears to have skipped along the tops of the trees in our neighborhood, not actually touching the ground but ripping up enormous trees and throwing them around like sticks. Of course we were in our basement for the excitement watching the American Idol finale (Lauren was robbed!). The power went out the second after they announced the winner (right after I heard that wind that sounds like a train. Auntie Em!!!). That is when we knew something outside wasn't very good. The paper the next day said we had winds between 80-115 mph. We have had power companies and tree removal guys from other cities and states here for the last 48 hours helping to put things back together for us. We just had our power restored about 2 hours ago after a 36 hour outage. Here are some of the amazing photos of what our neighborhood looks like:

This enormous maple tree fell on the street behind our house blocking the street. The children who live in the house where the tree belongs had stuck a sign to the tree to let the guys who will remove it know that there is a family of raccoons who live inside the tree and to please not hurt them. A very sweet human gesture during a very trying time.

This tree slammed into an apartment house, ripping one side of it away. No one was hurt. This was 4 blocks from our house.

This guy was in his car driving when this beauty came down on him. Luckily he was not hurt. I bet he had one stiff drink when he got home! Hell, I've had three just looking at the picture! This was 1/2 block away from our house.

Ouch! Another street blocked by a fallen tree. We had two rounds of storms, the first one on Monday night the 23rd and the second one on Wednesday the 25th. It was impossible to go anywhere in our neighborhood for quite some time from Tuesday morning right on through today, the 27th. And, they are still cutting up trees, removing debris and trying to restore power to many who are still in the dark.

This MONSTER tree fell on a road going through the IU campus. The campus had dozens of very old majestic trees fall in a wide area. Many fell against old limestone buildings and blocked roadways making it extremely difficult to get through campus.

This is one of our favorite houses in our neighborhood, just around the corner from us. No, that tree is not supposed to be laying on it.

OK, so this is the scariest one we came across. Look at the size of this tree!!!! When we saw it we knew what was on the other end of it just couldn't be good..........

Here it what that monster had fallen into! It sliced this apartment house clean in half!!! It was a miracle that no one was killed! This is about 4 blocks from our house.

This is the mess 3 blocks from us on 1st street. This street is a main thoroughfare, but not today.

Ouch again!

This poor guy is trying to figure out how he is going to get his gold SUV our from under this tree. Can you say 'chainsaw' Mr.?

This house had it's front porch knocked away.

We are so thankful no one was killed during all of this. Our neighborhood suffered most of the damage except for the trailer park on the west side that was completely destroyed.

All of this was quite exciting for my dad who has been here visiting for the last 2 weeks. He has definitely had his Wizard of Oz experience on this visit, as we all have.

AUNTIE EM!!!!! AUNTIE EM!!!!! ...........

Next post, the construction we have been doing while dad was here.

What's Cookin'

It hasn't taken long for me to get my cooking mojo back now that our kitchen is together enough to make cooking enjoyable. We also have taken possession of a nearly new Kitchen Aid convection cooking range. Our dear neighbors across the street just got a fancy new Wolf range and want us to have their 3 year old Kitchen Aid. WHAT A GIFT! With all of the money we are spending on the remodel, it was going to be a while before a new range was in our cards so we are very lucky indeed.

Here is what has been cooking.........

It is wild mushroom season here in the upper midwest, so that means our friend Sally can be found roaming around in an undisclosed location finding her secret stash of morel mushrooms. This is serious business in these parts an no one, NO ONE ever tells you where their secret place to find these treasures is. Folks will go to the grave with this secret. Just like every year in May, there is that knock at our door and an outstretched had greets us as we open the door. There we see a huge container of morels begging for an immediate trip to a frying pan. YUM!!! This year we chose to make chicken scallopini with the bundle of deliciousness.

After cleaning the bugs out of the morels (remember, they are the fungusamongus and always need some funky poopy moldy soil in order to prosper), we chopped them up with some fresh shiitake mushrooms from the local farmers market, then put them in a saute' pan with shallots, butter, olive oil, salt & pepper and sauted until tender. Remove the shrooms from the pan and set aside (the morels are the dark ones in the front row of the photo).

We then prepared some chicken thighs (you can use breasts too, but we like the dark meat :o)

Make sure to cut away as much fat from the boneless/skinless thighs as possible. Add a pad of butter to the pan and more olive oil, add the chicken and saute' until brown on both sides.

Remove the chicken from the pan and set aside. Add the shallots and brown. Add 1/3 cup chicken stock and 1/4 cup white wine to the pan and bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer. Scrape up any brown bits. Simmer until liquid is reduced by 1/2. Stir in 1/2 cup half-and-half.

Add mushrooms and chicken back to pan to reheat. Sprinkle with freshly chopped parsley.

We made a wonderful fresh greens salad from greens we purchased at our local farmers market. Lettuce, spinach and baby kale are the greens being used. Tomatoes and sliced almonds finish it off. Simple and delicious.

You will see that chicken is a theme in our house in spring. It's light and easy to cook and great with fresh spring greens and root veggies. For our Easter celebration we decided on Herb, Garlic & Lemon Roast Chicken. This will be our first real test of the new convection oven so that is why there are no guests here for this one. Serving a charred football for dinner is a horror I just cannot bare (that would be me naked :o). So here goes...........

Get a whole fresh chicken, and not one of those huge steroid & water filled monsters that look like a small turkey. Nothing bigger than a 4 pounder. I always use the free range organic chickens and they REALLY DO taste better. The first thing you have to do is prepare the herb butter. Take 1/2 stick butter (softened) and put in a small bowl. Add minced zest of a lemon, 2 T minced fresh thyme, 2 T minced fresh rosemary, 2 T minced fresh sage, 5 pressed garlic cloves. Mix herbs & garlic into softened butter with a fork.

Herb butter

Once herb butter is ready, wash and dry the chicken. Use your fingers to get between the skin and flesh around the breast meat and do the same around the legs, etc. then start smearing the herb butter under the skin and onto the meat. Do the same inside the cavity. Use the lemon you grated the zest from and cut it in half and squeeze over the outside of the chicken. Then, put the two lemon halves inside the chicken cavity. Now sprinkle a little dry white wine over the bird and rub the entire outside of the chicken with soy sauce and then sprinkle with salt & pepper. I also sprinkle a few mixed herbs over the top of the chicken too.

Throw this beauty into a 375 degree F oven, uncovered for about 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 and cook, basting about every 15 minutes. Cook about 1 hour or until juices run clear. Your family will beg you for more!

I serve this with simple roasted vegetables. Use whatever variety is in season. Here I used butternut squash, red potatoes, parsnips and carrots. Simply chop them up into a big bowl, add salt, pepper, herbs, onions if desired and toss to coat the vegies with a combination of olive oil and canola oil.

Pour veggies onto a large baking tray and roast for about 45 minutes in the oven along with the chicken at 350 F. Stir vegies about every 15 minutes. The magic of the convection oven is you are able to stack items in the oven and they all cook evenly. If you don't have a convection oven, you will have to do these dishes in shifts or make room for them side-by-side to cook.

The YUMMY roasted herb chicken as it comes out of the oven.

Our only green veg for this meal is baby kale. It grows like a weed here in early spring and has an amazing green hearty taste. I saute it very briefly in olive oil with kosher salt and pepper. You still want it to be a little crunchy. That's it!

Here is our finished Easter meal. Absolutely delicious served with a nice semi-dry french rose'.

Oh, and I must tell you we love, love, LOVE the new cooking range.

So, those of you who know us know that we can get pretty silly. Well, for the rest of you, here is proof. Oh dear........

You can tell that Lulu is really enjoying this moment. It's OK. I gave her some chicken scraps for being such a good sport.

And there is more..............can you say 'laaaaaaamb shaaaaanks'?

Rowan went away to a conference in Florida the first week of May, so........I always get to eat what I want when she is away :o) The first thing that came to my mind was the bits of lamb we have left from the one we had slaughtered last winter (I know, its cruel..... but delicious!). I dug through the freezer and found a couple of lamb shanks. I couldn't resist, so here they are in all of their garlicky, rosemary, lemon zest, olive oil encrusted wonderfulness just after they were browned and as they went into the oven.

Is it wrong for me to eat this way when I am home alone? I don't think so. It really isn't baaaaaaad! It's good! :o)

More home improvement developments in the next post. Stay tuned......

Cabinets and Carol Burnett

End of April.

I can't let more than a couple of posts go by without some new construction news. Our latest project is getting the ginormous new maple bookcases for the living room stained and finished. There are two bookcases, 8ft tall x 3ft wide that will pretty much cover the entire back wall of our living room. We will build them in and build a few more shelves on to one side to create a library environment. We ordered the shelves from a local unfinished furniture place and they were built by an Amish furniture maker in Pennsylvania.

Now back to more play...........we had the great opportunity to go see Carol Burnett live at our local auditorium about a week ago. What a treat to see one of my favorite entertainers of my life. She was one of my idols when I was growing up. I remember watching her show with my family every Friday night as a child. Hysterically funny! They just don't make them like her any more. This stage show was done in the question and answer style just like she used to do at the beginning of her TV show. The audience got to ask her questions and she showed some of her favorite clips from the funniest skits on her show. Tim Conway, Harvey Korman, Lyle Waggoner, Vicky Lawrence......all so hysterical. When she did the Tarzan yell live in the auditorium, it brought the house down. Such a joy to see that at 79 years old, she is still as sharp as a tack and extremely funny. I wish I could have taken photos during the show (we were only 18 rows back from the stage), but photography was not allowed. Here is a photo of the program:

Here are a couple of YouTube links to my favorite skits:

Gone with the wind- (just the stair scene)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6bOpJ5elW8&feature=related

The Dentist-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9T8i4FkNVo&feature=related

You can go to YouTube and find bunches of her old sketches. Good for a belly laugh :o)

If you remember watching her when you were younger, we highly recommend that you go see her if she comes to your town. What a real treat!

We are back to cooking in the next post!

Sister Act

Late news from mid April

We had lots of action happening here in early spring as my sister Patty arrived from Seattle for a weeks visit. It has been about 7 years since her last visit so we had lots of new developments to go over. Both of us have had house remodels since then as our lives keep moving forward. We had a GREAT time going to the opera, doing a little local sightseeing, walking the neighborhoods and breaking ground on the spring garden. Sis was a HUGE help getting the iris, herbs, and lettuce planted. Not to mention getting the nails, concrete, rocks, wood chips, etc. cleaned out of the very construction damaged soil in the garden beds. We removed quite a few inches of debris and sticky clay soil before the new top soil was added. We went out and purchased a new tiller to make our job easier. Amazingly, we were both able to get out of bed then next morning :o) The hot tub at the YMCA late that afternoon must have helped too!

We slipped my sis right into Rowans 'couch potato' fleece lounging suit soon after her arrival. Thanks to our dear friend Nina, who turned us on to this piece of lounging heaven, we can now pamper our guests with the slip on sleeping bag. And, it makes one look so perfectly ridiculous that it is always good for a laugh.

No, this is not me, it is my sister. It's WACKY how much we look alike when she is wearing my clothes. Here she is as we were trying to move some of the clay out so we could add some good top soil to plant the iris.

Here are a bunch of the iris we had dug up out of the yard before the construction. We packed them in straw over the winter and here they are now planted in front of the new porch. We are not expecting many to bloom this year, but hope we can give you a beautiful picture of them next spring.

My sis at it again in the side garden bed mixing in some of the new top soil.

Here I am setting the blocks that will be the foundation for our rain barrels.

My sis again, this time preparing and planting the herb pots. These and the lettuce, onions, kale, tomatoes, etc. will be the only things growing in our yard until we get the house painted. The rest of the yard comes LAST!

The beautiful bed of lettuce and kale.

We really had a great time visiting, eating (never a shortage of that!), exercising, sightseeing going to the FABULOUS new opera 'Vincent' at out opera house and just relaxing and catching up on life.