Grow Your Own for May

So I decided to participate in the "Grow Your Own" blog event this month after reading about it on the "Is My Blog Burning?" blog. GYO is an event held each month where bloggers post recipes, photos, etc. of things they make using ingredients they grow. This month I decided to use our dinner from tonight, which incorporated some freshly grown thyme. Actually I had planned the dinner before I decided to join the blogging, so it just worked out right. I had some sweet yellow onions that needed to be used up, so there you have it.

So, here's the recipe and a few pictures to get your appetites going :)

Christi's Caramelized Onion & Goat Cheese Pizza

Ingredients:
4 large sweet yellow onions
1 stick butter (1/2 cup)
2 tbsp olive oil
3 packets Splenda sweetener (if needed)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp (or to taste) fresh thyme leaves
8 oz crumbled goat cheese
1 premade pizza crust (we used a Boboli thin crust this time)

First, we caramelize the onions. Start with a large saute pan over medium high heat. To this add 1 stick of butter and 2 tbsp of olive oil. Now, to prep the onions. To do this, top and tail your onions, peeling off the outer dried layers. Then cut them pole to pole (from root to stem end). Now slice them into fairly thin (1/4 inch or so) slices. Separate the layers into half moon shaped pieces and add to the melted butter and oil in the pan. Allow the onions to cook, stirring occasionally, until they start to wilt down. Add the salt and, if your onions seem strong (ie. not sweet) add Splenda or a pinch of granulated sugar. Toss this through the onions and then allow them to cook, undisturbed, until you start to smell browning or see it in the pan. Don't worry that there is some fond developing on the bottom of the pan. Once you see this, stir the onions well, which will distribute the fond and clean the pan bottom. Do this three or four times, allowing the onions to cook undisturbed between stirrings. You want a caramelized color throughout the onions and for them to be very soft and almost sticky. They will form a sort of creamy sauce on themselves which is great for this pizza. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit and place your pizza crust onto a pizza pan (or preheat your pizza stone if using one). Add the fresh thyme to the caramelized onions at this point and stir to incorporate. You should smell a slightly thyme-like perfume, but it should not overwhelm the onions. Turn off the heat on the onions and spread about half the onions over your pizza crust. Sprinkle the goat cheese over top and slide into your preheated oven for 12-15 minutes or until the cheese gets golden brown and melted. Allow to cool for 6-8 minutes before cutting and serving. Freeze the remaining onions for your next batch!

So here is a picture of the onions after caramelizing but before use:



And here are a couple of shots of the completed pizza:





Enjoy!

Personality types?

Ok, so I was reading Isela's blog (Purling Sprite) and she had this personality type quiz up so I took it. Not sure how accurate I think it is, but here's the results... So what's your personality type?

You Are An INFJ

The Protector You live your life with integrity, originality, vision, and creativity. Independent and stubborn, you rarely stray from your vision - no matter what it is. You are an excellent listener, with almost infinite patience. You have complex, deep feelings, and you take great care to express them. In love, you truly see relationships as an opportunity to connect and grow. You enjoy relationships as long as they are improving and changing. You can't stand stagnation. At work, you stay motivated and happy... as long as you are working toward a dream you support. You would make a great photographer, alternative medicine guru, or teacher. How you see yourself: Hardworking, ethical, and helpful When other people don't get you, they see you as: Manipulative, weak, and unstable

What's Your Personality Type?

Cakes, Cakes and more Cakes

Ok, so I finally located the pictures Mike took of the cake I made for our church graduation Sunday. It's the Sunday in May when we celebrate all the seniors who are graduating and we have a little reception after church for them. So I made the cake... Four different torted cakes, two were butter cake with apricot filling, one was dark chocolate with chocolate buttercream filling and the last was dark chocolate with no filling, but covered in melted bittersweet chocolate. The flat portion of the grad cap is made from a matzo cracker, coated in bittersweet chocolate. Each of the book cakes started as a larger flat sheet which I split into two pieces for the layers. Two are wrapped with fondant (the red and yellow ones) and one is iced smooth with buttercream. It was a blast to make!

Since I'm sharing cake photos, I figured I'd share a couple other from this year. Next is my grandmother's birthday cake. It was a really warm April day making this one and we didn't have the window A/C units on, so the fondant was "melty" along with the buttercream... I think this would have been much prettier but it was what it was :)

Then there's the cake I made for the Women's Ministry cake auction at our spring Fiesta. I actually made two cakes, but this is the only one Mike remembered to take a photo of. It was a coconut cream cake with fresh shaved coconut on top which I made into a bonnet cake. I created the flower out of fondant using templates from my scrapbooking stash. It sold for $30! Pretty good if you ask me! :)

Next is the cake I made for the closing of our summer vacation bible school. Our theme this year was based on hot air balloons, so I created a hot air balloon cake. Anyway, I used the gel colors to fill it in and covered the board with some cloud scrapbooking paper :)

And last but not least is the birthday cakes I made for my niece Kayla's birthday in November. One is a Dora the Explorer cake made from the custom Dora pan and the other is my own version of "Backpack" (from Dora cartoons). I cut two 8x8 square cakes to make the backpack. Kayla seemed to enjoy them both so that made me happy :)

Hope you enjoy seeing these as much as I have enjoyed making them!

How fun!

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Gad Zukes!

Wordless Wednesday

What Kind of Yarn Are You? (Quiz)

This was fun... Found this quiz link on another Loom Knitter's blog She's got a lot of cool patterns, including one for a "Three Crosses" dishcloth that I'm hoping to knit a few of! So take the quiz and see "What Kind of Yarn Are You"?

Duct Tape Christmas Gift Bag

I also thought I'd share the fun project I did for Mike's Christmas party gift exchange in 2006. It was a white elephant type gift exchange and his group is all computer folks. And of course he didn't mention needing a gift for it until the night before Fortunately we had a book:

(Clicking on image will take you to Amazon.com)

that he was able to give as the gift, but we didn't really have any appropriate package for it. Of course he didn't find out until the next day that he was SUPPOSED to wrap it in newspaper so no one could tell one package from another, but oh well! So anyway, being that he loved his duct tape wallet that I made for him so very much, I came up with the idea to make a duct tape gift bag for his gift exchange present. J So I used a paper bag as a template and then scaled to match the book, allowing for overlap at the top to make the closure. I then created a sheet of "duct tape cloth" using the technique I learned in doing the wallets, which is basically like this...

1. Start by having a non-stick, cut-able surface available. I use one of the large quilter's self-healing mats for this and it works well.


2. Tear off a strip of duct tape the length of your finished piece plus 1". So, if you need a sheet of "cloth" that is 14" long, you'd make your first strip 15"


3. Tear off two more strips this same length.


4. Place your first strip sticky-side-up on your cutting surface.


5. Line up your second strip and place it, sticky-side-down, half-way onto this piece. So, if your duct tape is 2" wide, you'd place the edge of the second strip 1" onto the first strip, with 1" hanging off. So at this point you should have 1" of uncovered tape, sticky side up (the first strip) and 1" of uncovered tape, sticky side down (the second strip).


6. Line up your third strip, sticky-side-down, and cover the remaining sticky-side-up portion of strip 1. So now you should have two strips, sticky-side-down showing with none of strip #1 showing at all.


7. Flip your strips over so that strip #1 is now on top and the sticky sides of 2 & 3 are face up. Fold one of these sticky sides down onto strip #1 to form your edge strip.


8. Now repeat adding strips in alternate fashion (sticky-side-up, sticky-side-down, etc.) until you have a sheet that is the width you need. When measuring for your final width, don't forget to account for the extra "fold down" part of your sheet so you can have a nice clean finished edge. Once you have enough strips joined together, fold that last strip over like you did at the top of your sheet to finish it off.

Viola! You now have a sheet of "duct tape fabric" that you can do lots of things with!

So, I took the sheet of "fabric" and formed a "lunch sack" type bag with it, complete with folding sides and bottom. I just used extra strips of tape to create the seams. I put the book in to find where I could fold it down and then marked a spot to put holes to tie it closed. Using my eyelet hole punch (from scrapbooking) I punched holes in the top of the bag and in the body of one side of the bag for tying. Mike got some CAT-5 cable from his stash and stripped the insulation off so I was left with a bundle of twisted colored wire, which I used to make the bow tie closure. I then added a red poinsettia paper flower ornament with a glue dot because I told him the black bag just didn't look very "Christmasy" to me Anyway, he liked it and said it was a hit with those who got to see it before he had to take the book out and re-wrap it in newspaper And he gave the bag to the person who got the book (his friend Doug I think) in the end as well. It was a very sturdy bag and would probably make a really neat lunch bag for a fun-loving kid. Surface washable too! Anyway, here's a couple of pics of the finished product (click on them for larger views).

Still trying to decide where to put the poinsettia...

The finished product!

Christmas in Boerne photos

Ok, so I'm finally getting some of the photos uploaded to the web from our Christmas picture taking... I've put some of the pictures Mike took of our outside decorations as well as some of the ones he took of downtown Boerne on my photobucket site if you're curious.

Click on the thumbnails to see each picture.

Side View of our front yard decorations.



The 5'x8' canvas I painted two years ago. Miniature lights are strung through it as stars. I hope to add another canvas this year...



This is a look through our front gate.



Ella Blue. A boutique clothing store in downtown Boerne. I just love the snowflake lights! They won best storefront this year I think.



The gazebo in town square.




Our historic public library building. It is so beautiful this time of year!



Another shot of the library...



A different angle shot of the library. Can you tell Mike likes the library?



Last shot of the library. This one a little closer so you can see the building sign.



Looking down the lawn of town square. The light tree in the distance is probably 2 stories tall at center.



A little closer look a that light tree.



This is my favorite shot of this past year. Looking through the gazebo down the lawn at the light tree. Beautiful shot hun!

Bibliomania: Free Online Literature and Study Guides

Ok, so I'm cleaning my inbox... But where in the heck was this place when I was in school??? All those wasted $ on Cliff's Notes!!! I know, you're saying, well, you coulda just read the books... And I am... now... but there's something about being forced to read something that just goes against my grain! So I'll read the classics now when I can enjoy them!

-CC

BBC - Science

Ok, so if you can't sleep, count sheep...so they say... Well I couldn't sleep and came across this link in an email in my box and decided to give it a visit... My best time was a "Bobbing Bobcat". Not bad for 3 hours sleep! But I think it might be better to shoot me with the tranquilizer and leave the sheep alone :)

-CC

Have you ever read something that just stuck with you? That changed your thinking or challenged your viewpoints? I love reading books like that and purposely search out such reading. Last night I stayed up way to late to finish a book that did just that. It's called "A Skeleton in God's Closet" by Paul Maier. It is a fictional novel centering on biblical archaelogy professor Jonathan Weber, who becomes involved in a plot surrounding the discovery of the supposed bones of Jesus Christ. Now, like many mainstream Christians, I believe in the ressurection of Christ and His assention to heaven following a time here on earth in which He met with followers and instructed them in the ways to continue His ministry. Being a "moderate" Methodist by choice, I have rarely stopped to consider the implications of such a discovery on the church, our Christian belief structure and the world in general. I believe this book gives a wonderful account of the chaos that might result from such a discovery. It has caused great and deep thinking in my soul though about my own beliefs about the Resurrected Savior. Do I believe in a very physical resurrection, where no bones would be left behind, or do I believe more in a "spiritual" resurrection, whereby the physical body would have been left behind? Many people point to the fact that when Christ met with Doubting Thomas and offered to let him touch his wounds (although the Bible doesn't say that Thomas actually did so) and following this He was given a piece of fish which He ate in their presence. But with God all things are possible, so who is to say that His resurrection body was the same physical body that was buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimethea? Does believing or not believing in a physical resurrection make the resurrection any less powerful or less important? Does it make His message any less real in today's world? Ok, so I'm not sure what I believe in this respect, although I lean toward the literal interpretation of the Bible, meaning that I lean toward belief in a physical resurrection. Obviously more study and contemplation is needed, but that's what faith is all about isn't it? Believing what is unseen, only felt. More to ponder, more to consider, more to discover...

As always...

-CC