It has taken a week, but I will finally post a couple food pictures:
I will never be a food blogger because I don't have the patience to pose my food beautifully or remember to write down what is going into my dinner. Or even what I had for dinner some nights. But I do at least think about these things and OCCASIONALLY remember to take a photo.
For my wrap-fest, the only one that got near a camera was eggplant night. You will notice immediately that eggplant, while tasty, is not very photogenic.
(You'll also notice that my slices aren't very even. Another reason I'll never be a food blogger.)
They do look a little better once they have be sacrificed to the Char-King
(pay no attention to the piece that is under the grate. It was a rough flipping)
Sadly the goat cheese spread on a flour tortilla doesn't do much for the color. Thank goodness for a little lettuce mix.
It was probably slightly redundant to serve it with a salad, but hey, I needed to add something to call it dinner and I thought that chips would diminish that "healthy" aspect I was kind of going for. (It's only a little goat cheese, it just looks like a lot) 
Or maybe this is the shrimp one. Since I didn't slice for the photo, who knows!
So for the really good pictures of food, visit someone who seems to have more patience to photograph every thing, beautifully as well as posting the recipes. Thank goodness for people like Cathy, who cooks, photographs everything, raises hooligans and is soon planting a winery. How do you manage to do it??? (and remember me when you need tasters :) )
Also not to be missed is another amazing chef/photographer who answers the Eternal Question What's for Lunch Honey?
There are tons more out there, but those are my current faves!
I will also take a minute to talk about my grilled pizzas, once again. (I swear that I will photograph these babies at some point when I am not scrambling to get them on the table to feed people) (how do you do that, make the photo all pretty and still have a hot dinner???)
Anyway, I did a variation on my grilled pizza and am very excited because I learned that it will be possible for me to make these year-round.
Some of the talented young men I know at the GoggleWorks recently had a gallery show. As with all good things, it had to come to an end and it did last Friday night. But the guys decided to go out with a bang and a party so I agreed to make some dip. Which then turned into some dip and a little food. On the menu: Redneck Fondue (a yummy beer-cheese dip), Sweet & Saucy Meatballs (turkey meatballs in a ginger-peach sauce spiked with bourbon) and grilled pizzas. I was a little bummed (but not at all surprised) I couldn't bring my tabletop propane grill, but I was able to bring this:
My ever trusty Farberware grill. My parents got one as a wedding gift, my mom picked up a spare for parts at a garage sale because she was frightened it would one day fail. I got mine when the local Service Merchandise was closing. It is rather large & a pain to store, but it is an awesome piece of kitchen equipment. (It's most common use in my home is the rotisserie feature for a Christmas duck. There is NO other way to cook it!) So I saw it sitting there and decided that was the answer to hot food.
I made my pizza dough as normal, but when it came time to shape it, I used an empty tin to create small (about the size of an English Muffin) individual pizza crusts. I hammered them out and put them in the freezer until it was time to go. I wanted to keep it as simple as possible (or at least as simple as I could at this point) so I prepped for 2 kinds of pizza. The first had a cheese spread made with Goat Cheese (I can get an 11 oz. log for $5.25 at the local farmer's market; it is a
staple in my house) mixed with cream cheese and fresh snipped herbs. I think I used oregano, marjoram, rosemary and thyme with a little salt and pepper. I also had caramelized onions (another favorite in my home) and roasted red-pepper. My other variety was fresh mozzarella marinated in Balsamic vinegar, sliced tomato in olive oil and fresh basil.
I prepped all the toppings and put them in their plastic containers and trudged off to the Gallery.
The creation of these mini-miracles was actually pretty easy.
I preheated the grill and then plopped the pre-cut dough circles (ok, by that time, maybe not circles, but close enough) onto the grill. I then either (a) smeared it with the cheese spread, and topped it with onions and red peppers or (b) placed the mozzarella, tomato and basil on top. I brought my
Pampered Chef bar pan and used that as a lid to trap the heat inside which almost worked. (a couple of the pizzas rose a lot so the toppings stuck and I had a bit of a mess)
Amazingly enough, this worked out really well. The pizzas cooked up brilliantly and disappeared as fast as I could make them. I also figure that I can make a bunch of small crusts (maybe muffin sized, maybe dessert plate sized) and freeze them ahead of time so that the mess of the crusts is out of the way, and I can eat these on a whim instead of on several hours notice. (The dough is very simple, but it does take time to rise, and I usually make a big mess--which is another reason I don't take photos).
As you may have realized, these are very unconventional pizzas, but I haven't figured out a better name for them. My husband was vying for "Grillza" but I am not so sure. Any ideas??
I am also constantly looking for ideas of what to top these with. I did get a great inspiration tonight. How perfect would an upside down version of
these be? Pizza Rockefeller anyone?
Any other suggestions for these? Please, I think I'm in a (tasty) goat cheese rut!
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The kitchen started a terra cotta color with these blue cabinets. When I bought the house I thought the kitchen was cozy and warm. After 7 years of cooking and living in it, I decided it was dingy and tortuous.
We started with the ceiling, then did prep & cut in around the miles of moulding in the kitchen. Can ya see the garden through the window?
We had a lot of prep, and had a hard time figuring out what to with the stuff we use every day. We worked around it for a little while.
We were still cutting in on HP's birthday, so I made him a card.
We put the new sink & countertop in after we painted the "racing stripes"
We had a dearth of doors for a while! I think this was supposed to show the "after" color on the yellow. The "before" picture is one that was eaten by my camera's random memory card issues. The yellow was very bright and sunny, but we didn't want to want to wear sunglasses for our morning coffee, so I toned it down with a glaze effect made with brown glaze and beer. (no, that doesn't count the beer I was drinking at the time, really I mixed the two and applied it to the wall)
