Paleo Meals and Future Sewing

Food first!  Can't live without it!

Liver

We like liver with onions and gizzards.  Of course, we start with bacon, cook it slowly for a long time in a large skillet, then add onions:

Then we cut the gizzards into bite-sized pieces, rinse very well, and add to the bacon and onions.  These have to simmer for 25-30 minutes:

Meanwhile, the chicken livers must be cut into bite-sized pieces, then rinsed, and rinsed, and rinsed, and rinsed  ...  and rinsed - well, you get the idea.  The livers are added to the skillet, but turned over every three minutes or so until cooked.  This picture was taken just after they were added to the skillet:

Uh, I just realized that I don't have a picture of the finished dish, but this is how we like it best.

Steak

Here is a meal from a different day - steak, herbed zucchini, and onions sauteed with mushrooms:

Soup

We found a green soup recipe in the Reader's Digest magazine, and thought we'd try it.  It turns out to be an easy way to eat lots of greens.  It tastes pretty good, too!

Of course, one must start with two whole onions, chopped, and cook them until they are almost caramelized.  Meanwhile, cut up a large bunch of kale and steam or boil it in a large pot until it is soft.  The kale is drained and rinsed until cool, then pureed in the blender with chicken stock and the onions, with a little lemon juice, salt, and cayenne.  The soup is returned to the pot to heat until almost boiling.

Above is our variation on the recipe we found - click here.

Here is a picture of our green soup, served with chicken salad made by DH:

Picadillo

I also have a nice recipe for picadillo, which could loosely be translated as Cuban chili.

Start off a Picadillo Day by filling a coffee cup half-way with raisins.  Cover that with wine or rum, then let is soak for later.

Sautee 2 lbs of ground beef with a little water added.  Somehow the water makes it easier to chop the ground beef into uniform pieces.  Drain off the water when the meat is cooked:

Add two coarsely chopped onions to the ground beef and cook until the onions start to soften:

Place the meat in a large stew pot.  To the stew pot, add the remaining ingredients as shown left to right in the next picture:

• spices in a cup - lots of cinnamon, some allspice, ground cloves, ground nutmeg, cumin, oregano, cilantro, and chili powder
• raisins soaking in cup
• chopped tomatoes with no salt (we used 2)
• tomato paste
• stuff in bowl - drained sliced black olives (1/2 small jar), drained chopped stuffed green olives (medium can), drained capers (1/2 jar)

Cover the pot and turn the heat down, and let it simmer from five to 30 minutes.

Ladle into bowls and serve with a dollop of sour cream on top of each serving.

Here's what it looks like as a leftover - and a fine leftover it is:

Sewing

My next sewing project will be pillowcases and pillowcase liners.  Hah!  These pillowcase liners will just be more white pillowcases.  Here's the fabric for the pillowcases:

A simple sewing project should re-set my mojo, since I did not enjoy the hand-sewing part of the little purses.

What do you do to re-set your sewing mojo?

Distracted from Sewing

We went to JA's a couple weeks ago and bought some fabric on sale - for sheets!  It's 90-inch wide cotton quilt backing in navy blue, and we bought eight yards for about $40, which is a really good deal!  After bringing it home, I had to cut the length in half so I could zigzag the cut ends and launder it.  Somehow, eight yards of double-wide fabric does not fit in my washing machine all at one time.

I finally got both pieces of fabric laundered three times each.  So far, I have managed to iron around the edge of one piece of fabric and fold it up neatly.  After I iron and fold the other piece, I will inquire about cutting the fabric on the floor of my friend's neighborhood clubhouse, as we did for the red sheets (click here to see).

It has taken some time, but we have also managed to put in a garden.  In addition to two raised beds that DH built last year, we bought and installed a recycle lumber frame, which is shorter and wider than the first two beds.

While weeding the garden beds, I found some chickweed that DH guarantees to be chemical-free - because the whole garden area of the yard has never been sprayed for weeds.  I just finished drinking an apple pie smoothie that I made with chickweed instead of spinach (click here for the recipe).

Besides the normal plants - tomatoes and lettuce (actually a salad mix) - we also put in some squash and zucchini!  There will be filler plants, too, such as carrots and onions.  I plan to sow some marigold seeds to help deter bugs.  The stevia plant and the sweet potato vine were moved, since we had to allow for rotating certain crops.

We placed the home-made cover over the lettuce, and realized that it is worse for the wear.  Basically, we will have to make a new fabric cover for it.

Also, DH - who is very tall - ran right into a bird feeder in our yard.  He was so ticked off that he pulled that sucker! out and you will see it on the ground by the fence.

My fern "moved house" from the original cheap plastic container to a decorative pot I found while shopping one day.

Here are some pictures of our garden:

Monday's Supper

DH cooked a chicken and asked me to make the side dishes.  I started the rice in the small rice cooker, and selected one zucchini and one yellow squash.  The rest is here for you in pictures (the first picture includes coconut oil, butter, and cut scallions).