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The VERY best sloppy joes you will ever eat

Sloppy Joes with an Asian flair. I have, ahem, fallen off the diet bandwagon a bit these past few weeks. Fallen off, landed in a ditch and gone down stream a mile or two.

I know I need to get back on track before any of those angry pounds come looking for me and try to jump back on. So this was a last meal, so to speak, before I start eating nothing but eggs again.

Last week I made a fabulous turkey burger, courtesy of Oprah and Donald Trump. If you google it you'll find it. Mar-a-Lago turkey burger. Anyway I decided I wanted semi-home made buns to go with it so I bought frozen bread dough (Bridgeford), let it rise, then cut it into bun size pieces, let rise a bit more then baked them. Very easy and very tasty.

So going with that same theme – I made home made buns again. Not the prettiest looking buns in the world but the way they smell and taste is worth a little mis-shapeness.

For the innards of the Sloppy Joes – I wanted something reminiscent of PF Chang's lettuce wrap chicken. This is the recipe I came up with:

1.25 lbs ground turkey

2 tbsp. olive oil

1/2 diced yellow onion

1 tsp./clove diced garlic

1/4 tsp. ground ginger

3 tbsp. soy sauce

1/3 cup hoisin sauce

2 tbsp. sesame oil

1 can water chestnuts diced

1/4 – 1/2 tsp. chili hot sauce (too taste)

Brown the turkey in the olive oil. Remove from pan. Add onion to the pan and when it begins to soften add the rest of the ingredients and cook for about five minutes. Add cooked turkey and heat through.

Serve on heated sliced buns.

If salt is an issue for you then you might want to skip this recipe. I use lower sodium soy sauce but between the soy sauce and the hoisin sauce it's pretty salty. I'm going to look like a Bassett hound when I get up tomorrow, I just know it.

Wine and chickens at the cottage

"Why don't you and Grandpa come up to the cottage for a glass of wine…"

I love getting those emails from Sara. We went up yesterday afternoon to visit the chickens and see the bees and partake in Ryan's latest white wine offering, a Riesling.

The last time I saw the chickens they weren't chickens yet – they were just little handfuls of fluffy feathers.

Not that they still aren't fluffy. And I'm certainly not one to point fingers but would you take a look at those fluffy butts up there.

They have nice digs, a pale yellow chicken coop with a cozy place to sleep and they have a grassy hill to wander on.

The bees aren't quite as lively right now. They are conserving their energy.

Ryan and Sara have provided them with food right at their hive so they don't have to go too far afield to find it. If you click on the picture to see it bigger you can see a few dark spots on the lower right hand corner of the hive – those are a few bees just checking out the sunshine.

Here the girls are all looking through the fence towards the beehive. That is Rosie up front, she has healed nicely from her accident.

They are really quite comical to watch. When one runs to go look at something they ALL have to see what the fuss is about.

After we oohed and ahhed over the girls we went inside and had a glass of Ryan's new Riesling. I'm a dyed in the wool Chardonnay drinker but the Riesling was exceptionally good. It had a sparkly quality to it. Very easy to sip. The name, Firefly and the painting for the label perfectly capture this wine.

Random shot, just because I thought it was so pretty hanging there in the arbor amongst the wisteria vines.

Linens and laundry

I have a few sets of these oddly sized embroidered pieces. I couldn't figure out why anyone would want three doilies or dresser scarves in various sizes. I mean it is obvious they are a set but how would they be displayed? The bigger one in the middle with the two smaller on either side? Or was the bigger one for a dresser and the smaller for bedside tables?

Then when I was over at Kelly's she handed me the set above and I mentioned my confusion and she just looked at me patiently for a second and said they were for the arms and the back of a chair.

Oh.

I have had a couple people tell me that when you have a piece that is stained Biz is the way to go. I am becoming a spokesperson for Biz now. I love the stuff. It brightens, gets rid of really stubborn stains and doesn't fade colors.

This one took a bit of work, but patience pays off. First I soaked it over night in the sink with a cup of Biz, then the next morning, when the stains still hadn't quite lifted, I made a paste of water and Biz and rubbed it all over the stained area and let it dry for about an hour. Then I plopped the whole thing back in the sink with some hot water and let it soak for a couple more hours. That did the trick. The stain isn't 100% gone but it's is hard to see it.

After I rinsed the piece well I filled the sink with hot water again and about a 1/4 cup of white vinegar to remove any Biz residue. So soak, rinse with vinegar, rinse with plain water, air dry.

Gingersnaps

I spent the afternoon baking cookies so I could send some back with my nephew when he goes back to school on Monday. Working on one's Masters is hungry work. You need all the sustenance you can get.

He is a tea drinker and I wanted cookies that would travel well and would go nicely with a cuppa. He's also an adventurous eater so I wanted to punch them up a bit (I think he was the only one that truly appreciated my spicy Mexican chocolate cookies).

I found a recipe for ginger snaps on allrecipes.com. I made some very minor adjustments and one major addition.

My minor adjustments were to use dark molasses, rather than light. Per some of the other reviewers I doubled the spices. I also baked them for 11 minutes rather than 9. I prefer a crispier cookie and I think they hold up better it you want to dunk them in a cup of tea.

The major addition was that I made crystallized ginger and added it the recipe. Crystallized ginger is a bit time consuming but very easy to make. And if you see how expensive it is in the store then the time seems well spent.

I took a nice sized piece of fresh ginger root, peeled it and diced it into small pieces (a bit smaller than 1/4"). You place the diced ginger in a small, heavy saucepan and cover with water. I brought it to a gentle simmer and cooked it, stirring occasionally for 30 minutes.

I drained it, weighed it and then added it back to the saucepan with an equal amount of sugar and 3 tablespoons of water. I boiled it, stirring frequently, until it was almost dry. It starts looking syrupy and bit foamy and then all of the sudden it kind of crystallizes up. Then I just tossed it into a bowl of sugar and coated it well. I was sure it was just going to clump up into a big wad but once I started stirring it around each piece was coated nicely.

It gives the cookies a nice extra jolt of ginger.

When I was pregnant, eight million years ago, I used to keep a box of gingersnaps by the bed to help with morning sickness. Only every time I reached for the box, it was empty. Someone else must have been feeling queasy too.

It's also reputed to be good for arthritis and in Indonesia they believe it helps reduce "winds" in the blood. Have no idea what that condition is.

I'm just hoping it is a nice respite from studying.

TGIF

I have been feeling this urge to just clear the decks – pile up all my decorative objets, take inventory and then redecorate. With what I have.

For anyone that lives in Northern California (and who knows, maybe other parts of the world as well) is going to totally understand what I'm about to describe. January is a really sneaky month around here. It never fails we have a week of just fabulous weather. You walk outside and the air is starting to feel warm, it's sunny and everything is so green. So you think Spring is making her first furtive gestures. You break out your sandals, start stalking the local nurseries for impatiens.

Then February and March show up, all dour and cranky and rain on your parade. Well right now we are in that wonder week of January. It's so hard to even fathom the bitter cold my North-Eastern friends are feeling. I'm really sorry! Come visit me and we can BBQ out on the back deck.

More Kelly generosity here – the turquoise tole tray, the pretty pink sugar bowl, sans lid – makes a perfect container for mismatched silver spoons, also courtesy of Kelly.

Rick has been working on a project that I can't wait to show you (sorry for the pressure, sweetie). He's making a bead board headboard for the the guest room bed. It is turning out quite nice. I'm hoping our sneaky January weather holds out so he can paint it this weekend.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend and that the weather is cooperating for you – if not – come see me!

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