Chicken and Sausage Pesto Pasta

Here's a recipe from Tony.  We love to serve this if we have a large dinner party.  It's a whole meal in one dish.  If you like pesto, you'll love this!  If you don't know what pesto is, check it out here:

Fresh Basil Pesto 

Brown some Sweet Italian Sausages slowly in a heavy-bottomed pan with some oil.  Get good coloring on all sides.

Brown Chicken Tenderloins or Chicken Breast pieces in some oil.  Season with salt, pepper, and garlic powder.

Tony slices the sausage links with a diagonal cut, and cuts the chicken tenderloins in half.  Then he adds steamed broccoli florets and some roasted red peppers or tomatoes.  You could add olives, artichokes, steamed carrot slices, or another veggie.  Toss all this with some cooked pasta and pesto.  Voila!  Here's the finished product.  It's a great dish!

Nina's Rice Pudding

My mother-in-law, Nina, is an amazing cook.  I'm so glad that I've learned some good techniques and great recipes from her.  Here's a simple rice pudding that has an old-world feel. It's perfect for a crisp fall day!

Start with 5 cups of whole milk, 1/3 cup sugar and a half stick of butter in a heavy bottomed pot.

Heat it on medium high until the butter melts.  Then add 3/4 cup rice.  Don't use the good stuff, cheap rice is best!

Lower the heat to simmer, and cook this slow and long, stirring every 5 minutes or so.  Don't go too far away until you know that the milky rice is just bubbling softly.  Make sure the heat isn't too high.  If you've ever had milk boil over on the stove, you know what I'm talking about.

It should start to get "thickish" in about an hour, but it could take longer.  Remember that it will thicken up much more when it cools, so don't let it get too thick on the stove.

When it's done add 1-2 teaspoons of vanilla and pour into a glass dish to cool.  I put plastic wrap right over the top of the surface so that it doesn't form a rubbery "peel" as it cools.  Refrigerate for at least an hour.  Sprinkle with cinnamon before serving.

You could add some raisins during the cooking if you like! I've also tried this with coconut milk and it's really nice.

Let me know what you think!

Clean Your Grill!

Fall is a great time to get outside on a sunny day and do some clean up!  If your grill is anything like mine, it needs some TLC after a lot of summer grilling.  I get some old rags and some spray cleaner and wipe down the outside and the knobs well.  Then I take out the grates and the "tent-shaped" covers that direct the flames.  I scrub all those as best I could.  The grates go in the dishwasher to remove grease and really loosen all the grime.

Then I scrape out all the bits of charred ash from the bottom of the grill with a spatula.  After that I wipe out the storage area underneath and all the utensils that we keep there.

Now my grill is ready to go for another round of great cooking.  Tony's been making some killer rubs for racks of ribs lately...more to come...

Tile and Hardwood Floor Care

I have tile floors in my kitchen and wood floors almost everywhere else except in the bedrooms.  I don't like wall-t0-wall carpet because it's so difficult to keep clean and it's impossible to get ALL the dirt out of carpet.  Here are my tips!

I have 2 Swiffer mop heads, 1 upstairs and 1 downstairs.  I don't buy the expensive refill cloths, I just make my own!  If you have old t-shirts (and everyone does!!) you can cut rectangles larger than the surface of your Swiffer mop and use them instead.  I have piles of these cloths ready to go when I decide to clean my floors.  I use one per room and toss them in the wash easily.

When I see dirt on the kitchen tile, I dust with a dry/slightly damp cloth.



If more aggressive cleaning is needed, I dampen the cloth and spray a little cleaner on the floor before mopping.  I do this often in the kitchen around the sink and stove where most of the messes happen.  From start to finish this takes me less than 5 minutes - much easier than traditional mopping.

For my wood floors dry/damp mopping is what I do most. I have felt pads under the feet of all my big furniture so I can slide it when necessary and clean underneath.  The pads protect the floors from scratches.  If your floors get scratched, and they will, just darken the spot with stain or a dark marker.  My floors have many imperfections that give an aged "patina" look to them.  A new scratch only looks bad because it's usually light colored.  So darken it up and don't worry about scratches anymore!

If you have pets you will need to do dust mop a lot more often.  (Side note:  You should check and change your furnace filters often also!  Pet hair clogs those up quickly.)

When I think my wood needs more than dusting, I dampen the cloth with water and then sprinkle a little white vinegar as well.  The vinegar is safe on polyurethane surfaces and will remove grime.

The best secret to having clean floors is.......DON'T WEAR SHOES IN YOUR HOUSE.  I learned this trick the first time I visited friends in Canada.  I asked my friend a question about her "new" carpet.  She informed me that it was over 10 years old.  As I stood there guffawed wondering how beige carpet could look so good after 10 years, she told me that no one in Canada wears shoes inside the home.  Then I noticed the pile of shoes by the door and thought that I should try this back home.  Well, it works!  Lots of dirt and small stones get stuck onto your shoes.  If they never travel past the doorway you don't have to sweep as often.

less dirt = less cleaning = happy people = more free time

Acorn Squash Time!

Next to my garden I have a compost pile where we put all our kitchen vegetable and fruit scraps.  This summer I got a surprise - a huge squash vine started growing out of the pile.  I had no idea what it was because I don't grow any vines.  Then I saw the acorn squash growing and I was delighted!  To date I've harvested 8 beautiful squash.  Here's how I cook them:

Cut them in half, scoop out the seeds, nestle them in a glass baking pan.

In the centers put some brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, pecans or walnuts, and a pat of butter.  Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for about an hour.  I make a pan full and refrigerate them.

I love this as a dinner accompaniment or a snack!

What do you do with acorn squash?

Laundry Stain Treatment

Laundry stains are not difficult to treat.  I have a few products that are "must-haves" in my laundry room.  

Dawn Dish Liquid

1 part Liquid Laundry Detergent (any kind) & 1 part Ammonia

Lestoil

Here are my basic laundry stain rules:

1.  Men's dress shirts - put a line of Dawn across the collar and cuffs and rub in with a toothbrush just before washing.  It gets the "ring" out and keeps the shirts like new longer.

2.  Food stains that aren't greasy - rub the Ammonia mix in with a toothbrush just before washing.  Don't let this sit overnight on clothes, especially cotton or khaki, because it can remove some color.

3.  Grease stains - rub Lestoil on the spot and let it sit for a few minutes before washing.  If it doesn't come out the first time, DON'T machine dry the garment.  Try the Lestoil again and let it sit a little longer, then wash.  If the stain is still there, try it again and let the garment soak in some cold water with Lestoil for a few hours, then wash.  I've had great success with this process!!

4.  White clothes & underarm stains - sorry, I don't have a magic wand for this.  From what I've read the yellowing is an enzyme reaction and not a stain.  That's why stain removers and bleach don't work.  The best defense against yellowing is to get the sweat out of the garment as quickly as possible after wearing.  If you put the garment in a bucket of cold water to sit until you're ready to wash a load, that will work. If you're favorite white blouse is yellowed, I'm afraid you'll have to buy another one!

5.  Whites and light-colors  - I love to hang clothes outside. The sun is a tremendous stain-fighter.  It will bleach out red food stains and wine stains from your clothes while it brightens up white t-shirts and linens.

You may notice that bleach is not on this list.  I'm not a fan. Bleach deteriorates elastic from socks and underwear and erodes other fabric fibers.  I think it's more harmful than helpful so I don't use it often.

I hope something here is helpful.  What's your favorite laundry product?

Creating a Landscaping Bed

Most of my landscaping lessons I've learned the hard way, and this one is no exception.  I can't count how many hours I've spent digging up sod so that I could make room for plants.  When I took my Master Gardener class several years ago, one of the presenters showed us another way to create a planting bed that is SO much easier than what I used to do. Here's an example from my backyard that I just finished.

I needed to extend the curved edge of one planting bed by a couple of feet.  I laid down 10-layer-newspaper sections on top of the grass up against the edge of the existing bed.  

I carefully placed the edges right where I wanted the end of the new bed to be.  I wet the newspapers with a hose as I went along so that the wind wouldn't undo all my hard work.

I covered all the newspapers with a 2-3 inch layer of topsoil and compost, tamping it down with my hands along the edges.

Finally I put down a thick layer of mulch to inhibit weeds and keep the roots cool around my new dappled willow bush.



And that's it!  The newspapers will kill the grass over the winter, and I'll be able to dig through it and plant anything I want next spring.  This is MUCH easier than digging up sod. And leaving the grass in place gives the new bed some height without using so much topsoil.

Do you have any landscaping tips??  I'd love to hear them!