Uncle Ed and Aunt Cheryl

Uncle Ed passed away a couple of weeks ago and I still can't believe he is gone. I see his face when I flip through my phone contacts because I have his number.

I sure did love that guy. He is my favorite uncle. the only one I was really close to.

I will miss him.

Miss you Mom!

Yes.... I did.....

Carhartt is a store for work clothes. Stuff for construction workers, farmers, outdoors people.  But they have some  REALLY nice clothes for kids.

Adelyn has a little dress she was wearing when I tried to  make a mold of her hand and I think I kind of ruined the dress. I felt bad.

Anyhow... I got this as a "replacement". It's 9M size so should fit.

I love shopping for baby stuff.

I should know better......

 I know better. I know that I know better. So why did I sit in 103 degree temperature for over an hour with my car idling and the AC on full blast?

CUZ IT WAS HOT!

I had to drive to Farmington to pick up G from work and I was about 45 minutes early. There's no where to go and it was hot as you know where, so I sat in the car. With the AC on.

Then we drove to Taylorsville and had to stop at Lowes. I was hot and tired so I told G to go by himself and I would wait. In the car. With it running.

Dumb idea in many ways because funny as it seems I know my way around Lowes WAY better than he does. (I thought men had built in direction markers for hardware stores?)

Anyhow, he couldn't find what he was looking for (I could have found it in 5 minutes), and so I sat idling for another half hour. When we tried to leave Lowes... uh oh....

El coche no va!    (the car doesn't go!)

After letting it cool off it goes, but it doesn't act right. I would not dare to drive it to Farmington again... or very far from home at all.

So, sigh.............  I have an appt for service on Monday at 7:30am at the Hyundai place. Hope it doesn't cost us a fortune.

Thursday Musings

 I have a friend who is going through a really tough time and I wanted to send her some inspirational quotes. I liked them so much, I decided to put them on my blog for today.

 Tears may fall, Cry a river. It's cleansing.

Mistakes are part of life.

How can we ever learn if we don't make mistakes? And why are we so AFRAID to make mistakes? It's how we learn.

 Some of my best food concoctions were things I messed up.

A lot of wise people have reached that wisdom through making some mistakes. And learning from them.

Namaste.

Hot but Amazing! Shrimp in Guajillo chili adobo sauce

 This is what is known as a guajillo chili pepper. These are perfect for making home made enchilada sauce, or adobo sauce. I decided to make shrimp in adobo sauce.

You buy the chilies in a pkg like this. They come dried. Most grocery stores that have a good "Latino" aisle will have these. Saves you having to go to a specialty shop. My local groceries (Harmons and Fresh Market) have these. But we also have a large hispanic community.  Anyhow, you put on gloves to handle these. Take them out of the package and cut off the tops and empty out the seeds that are inside. Don't go crazy trying to get every seed, just the majority of what you can shake out is fine. You want about twelve to make this sauce.

 Put the chilies in a hot dry pan (no oil needed) over med low heat till they are soft and pliable and smell good. Keep turning them over about every thirty seconds. They only need to be in the hot pan for a few minutes. You don't want to burn them or they are ruined. Then soak in cold water for 30 minutes. Drain off the water. Put 3/4 cup fresh water in a blender, along with the chilies, 2 or 4 cloves of garlic, skinned, 1 1/2 tea. apple cider vinegar (I didn't have it so I used red wine vinegar), 1 tea ground cumin, 1/2 tea salt. Blend it up, adding more water if needed until it's thick.

 It should be nice and thick like what you see here.
Take a bunch of raw shrimp that has been cleaned, skinned, and deveined. (You can leave the tails on, but I don't). Stir the shrimp into the sauce and put it in a pan -- like a roasting pan. Let it sit for about 15 minutes. Then put it under the broiler -- about 8 inches away (second from the top rack) and broil for about 8 minutes, but keep an eye on it because it could be done at 5 minutes. Hard to tell though because the sauce covers the shrimp.

Take out of the broiler, and squirt with a bit of lime. Then eat! Mine didn't look quite like this because it had a thick coating of adobo on it. Next time I may make the sauce a little bit thinner. It had a bit of a hot kick to it, but it was REALLY good.

We ate the whole pan along with a T-bone steak, some fruit salad, and a spoonful of beans.  I will be be making again. I think David will really like it.

Gettin' My Mojo ready (or my Molcajete Seasoned)

 Before using a molcajete (a mortar and pestle made out of volcanic lava rock), you have to season it to avoid grit, rocks, dirt, and stones from mixing with your salsas and getting into your mouth. There are many ways to do this, as I found out when I googled  "How to Season a Molcajete".  This is the way I did it, which combined the instructions which came with it, AND some tidbits I gleaned from google.

 First off... you SOAK completely covered in warm clear water for several hours. Some say 24 hours, some say 12 hours, some say 2 hours.... I did mine for about 6 hours. Then you turn it upside down on a dish rack and let it air dry for several hours. It may look dry on the outside, but being lava, it has absorbed a lot of water, so it is probably still wet inside the rock. Let it sit overnight to dry. Unless it's humid where you are, then it may take longer. Whatever you do... do NOT EVER use soap or any cleaning product on your molcajete. ONLY hot water and brushing.

 After soaking, and drying, its time to grind some rice. Put about a 1/4 cup of rice in the bottom and about a 1/8 teaspoon water. Grind this until your rice no longer resembles rice... it looks like flour. It takes a good while... at the very least 20 minutes. More likely longer. Dump the rice in the garbage, and add more. Do it again. And again. And again. When your arm starts hurting... wait and do it all over again the next day. Be sure to brush the bowl out with a dry brush after each time. I used both long grain rice, and then switched to Jasmine rice (it smelled nicer). I did this about 8 times. Do it until the rice is not grayish after you turn it to flour.

 Then buy some rock salt (see box below). Also known as "ice cream salt". I found it with the other salt in the spice section. Crush this until it is the consistency of regular table salt. Very fine. Dump the salt and do it again. And again. And again... and --- well, you get the idea. Do it until there are no gray pieces in the salt. It actually took me about 8 times.

Be prepared when you dump it in the garbage that you will inhale some and get a very salty taste in your mouth. Blech. Don't add water to the salt, by the way.

 Once that is done, rinse it in very hot water and let dry completely. Then comes the fun part. (yeah, the other parts were not so fun... more like work..)  Take 3 cloves of garlic, a teaspoon of salt, (regular table salt) a teaspoon of cumin seeds, and a teaspoon of black pepper corns and grind them up into a paste. Let this sit for 24 hours. If you don't want your house and your things to smell like garlic, put tin foil over the molcajete. It worked great.

Notice the molcajete is sitting on a dish towel? Be sure you put towels or some kind of protection under it every time you use it. (starting with grinding the rice), because it will scratch your counter top, table, or whatever it sits on. Trust me on this.

After the garlic has set for 24 hours, rinse the molcajete and scrub with a brush then let dry.

You will have to wait until next time for my first attempt at making salsa in the molcajete!  Ok, actually it will be the THIRD time... I forgot to take pictures of the other two.  But can we say "Ay, muy bueno!"   Yes we can!!

Farewell Uncle Ed

 My most favorite uncle in the world passed away yesterday, July 4, 2012. When I was a little girl I couldn't say "Uncle Eddie" so I called him "Uncle Sheshy." And he drove a red mustang convertible -- FAST -- which I dubbed "the Sheshy mobile".

When I was about 15, I became part time nanny to their three kids, Little Ed, Missy and Jason. Every day after school, I got off the bus at their house and took care of the kids, and house, and cooked dinner, did laundry, cleaned, etc... until 9 o'clock at night. And then I'd often spend all day Saturday there too. Aunt Cheryl worked at the hospital. Jason was just a wee one... 9 months old, and he saw me more than his momma for a little while and started calling me "Mommy Mick".

I did that for about a year. Then Cheryl changed her hours so she was home more. But it was good memories for me. Uncle Ed bringing me home every night in his pick up truck.

He always ate the dinner I cooked, even though at age 15 about the best I could do was macaroni and cheese with hotdogs. He never complained.

Ed and Cheryl always had a beautiful home. (He was, after all, a house builder for many years before working at Putney Paper). One of the homes they had in Brattleboro was so incredibly awesome that I videotaped it so I could have decorating ideas!

Several years ago, Uncle Ed was diagnosed with lung cancer. Even though he had quit smoking years prior... the damage was done. And when I heard he had lung cancer I thought that was the end of my uncle Ed. But that man managed to live for several more years! The Aplins are hardy stock for sure.

The last time I saw my uncle Ed, was in Dunkin Donuts having coffee and a donut. I was home in Putney for a visit and Dad and I stopped in to the Dunkin Donuts and there was a voice that hollered "Well, hello! What are you doing here Michelle?" and I looked and saw Uncle Ed. He actually took my breath away for a minute because he looked so much like my grandpa (his father), who had passed away. I almost thought I was seeing a ghost.

We sat and had a great chat. Dad said that soon after that, Ed stopped going to Dunkin Donuts because his health declined too much and he couldn't get out that much.

So, Uncle Ed has joined his mom, dad, sisters Mary (my mom), Joyce, brother David. And Uncle Ed and Cheryl had a little baby boy, Donald, that passed away. He will be missed. He was greatly loved by many.