The weekend
Oh my god! It's such a gorgeous day outside and I should really get out and run, so I'll make this as short as possible.
We had a great weekend. Saturday, Chris smoked another pork shoulder (or rather the other half of the last one). While it wasn't quite as good as the last one, it was far better than most anything we could buy around here! I made a sauce that I'll attempt to quantify here, for my own reference, next time I want to recreate it.
1 medium can of tomato sauce (I think maybe 8 oz. or so, definitely not the 15 oz size)
1 cup brown sugar
a couple of shots or so (I just sort of poured) of whiskey - I used Johnny Walker Scotch Whiskey because that's what we happened to have
1 tablespoon or so hot sauce (something smoky would be preferred, I used the Peri-Peri sauce we had)
about a cup of white vinegar
Maybe 1/3rd to 1/2 cup of Worcestershire sauce
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of black pepper
1 tablespoon garlic powder
Simmer down on medium low heat until it starts to thicken, remembering that it will thicken considerably more as it cools.
It was quite tasty! Sweet, spicy, smoky and whiskey!
That night, I also made a cheesecake that's been long overdue. I got the ingredients to make it for my mother-in-law's birthday at the beginning of March. We never officially got together for her birthday, so another container of cream cheese and another box of graham crackers later, I made it for my brother-in-law's birthday which we celebrated yesterday. Chris' family all came over and we had a wonderful lunch of pulled pork sandwiches (the pork Chris smoked Saturday), baked beans (just out of a can, I know, total cop-out), and my mother-in-law's potato salad. She also brought up some really great cranberry salsa and spicy dill pickles as well as some deviled eggs which are kind of a guilty pleasure of mine. For dessert, my pride and joy:
I think the crust came out the best it ever has. It's of course the Alton Brown recipe, but the one from the cookbook, not the episode. There are some subtle differences in the construction that make a big difference in the final product, especially how the crust comes together.
Aside from that, I finally got to go on another walk with sailingwest, witchcat07 and arymetore on Saturday. We took the paved trail through Edwin Warner Park since it had been raining and was likely to be muddy. It's a good thing too, since I had lent our child carrying pack to a neighbor for the weekend. I must say though, I think Jonah is easier to carry in the pack than he is to push in the stroller. So, I made it to the park twice last week. David, our neighbor, came over Thursday trying to get his daughter Maya to take a nap and to see if I wanted to join them at the park to try to get her to unwind a bit.
In a bit of bittersweet news, our washer officially stopped spinning last week, so yes, I'm afraid the funny sounds I started hearing from it about a month ago were it's last gasps at life. The agitator still works and the motor still runs and sounds like it's spinning, but it's definitely not, the water just drains out. Clothes came out soaking wet and therefore, I'm sure I put the dryer through some undue stress to make up for it. I tried to wring everything out as best I could. But, looks like we're shopping for a new washer. On the one hand, I'm happy to get a new washer. It means we can get a front loader and finally install some counter tops in the laundry room. It does however mean the end of my days dyeing fabric in the washer (unless of course I don't care much about the outcome). But we did want to go ahead and get hardwood floors for downstairs and I'm not sure if this postpones that (yet again) or not. Here's hoping not. This will mean that we've purchased every major appliance at least once in our lives together thus far.
And finally, all plane tickets have been purchased for our trip in May. I'm quite excited!
We had a great weekend. Saturday, Chris smoked another pork shoulder (or rather the other half of the last one). While it wasn't quite as good as the last one, it was far better than most anything we could buy around here! I made a sauce that I'll attempt to quantify here, for my own reference, next time I want to recreate it.
1 medium can of tomato sauce (I think maybe 8 oz. or so, definitely not the 15 oz size)
1 cup brown sugar
a couple of shots or so (I just sort of poured) of whiskey - I used Johnny Walker Scotch Whiskey because that's what we happened to have
1 tablespoon or so hot sauce (something smoky would be preferred, I used the Peri-Peri sauce we had)
about a cup of white vinegar
Maybe 1/3rd to 1/2 cup of Worcestershire sauce
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of black pepper
1 tablespoon garlic powder
Simmer down on medium low heat until it starts to thicken, remembering that it will thicken considerably more as it cools.
It was quite tasty! Sweet, spicy, smoky and whiskey!
That night, I also made a cheesecake that's been long overdue. I got the ingredients to make it for my mother-in-law's birthday at the beginning of March. We never officially got together for her birthday, so another container of cream cheese and another box of graham crackers later, I made it for my brother-in-law's birthday which we celebrated yesterday. Chris' family all came over and we had a wonderful lunch of pulled pork sandwiches (the pork Chris smoked Saturday), baked beans (just out of a can, I know, total cop-out), and my mother-in-law's potato salad. She also brought up some really great cranberry salsa and spicy dill pickles as well as some deviled eggs which are kind of a guilty pleasure of mine. For dessert, my pride and joy:
I think the crust came out the best it ever has. It's of course the Alton Brown recipe, but the one from the cookbook, not the episode. There are some subtle differences in the construction that make a big difference in the final product, especially how the crust comes together.
Aside from that, I finally got to go on another walk with sailingwest, witchcat07 and arymetore on Saturday. We took the paved trail through Edwin Warner Park since it had been raining and was likely to be muddy. It's a good thing too, since I had lent our child carrying pack to a neighbor for the weekend. I must say though, I think Jonah is easier to carry in the pack than he is to push in the stroller. So, I made it to the park twice last week. David, our neighbor, came over Thursday trying to get his daughter Maya to take a nap and to see if I wanted to join them at the park to try to get her to unwind a bit.
In a bit of bittersweet news, our washer officially stopped spinning last week, so yes, I'm afraid the funny sounds I started hearing from it about a month ago were it's last gasps at life. The agitator still works and the motor still runs and sounds like it's spinning, but it's definitely not, the water just drains out. Clothes came out soaking wet and therefore, I'm sure I put the dryer through some undue stress to make up for it. I tried to wring everything out as best I could. But, looks like we're shopping for a new washer. On the one hand, I'm happy to get a new washer. It means we can get a front loader and finally install some counter tops in the laundry room. It does however mean the end of my days dyeing fabric in the washer (unless of course I don't care much about the outcome). But we did want to go ahead and get hardwood floors for downstairs and I'm not sure if this postpones that (yet again) or not. Here's hoping not. This will mean that we've purchased every major appliance at least once in our lives together thus far.
And finally, all plane tickets have been purchased for our trip in May. I'm quite excited!