Pasta With Tomatoes & Fresh Basil

One of my favorite summer meals.

This is just a can of diced tomatoes, a small diced onion, a small spoonful of honey, salt, pepper, olive oil and fresh basil for sauce over spaghetti. You can really use any sort of pasta - I plan on making this same sauce with a different pasta tonight.

Updated Entryway

Before:

After:

Added Bonus:

Instead of painting the inside of the door white, I was too lazy. And my sander was at my mother-in-law's house to help her with her kitchen. So I organized instead. There's now room for my boots at the bottom AND there's extra space for more shoes. SCORE!

CSA Recipe - Pork Tenderloin With Grilled Veggies

Delish!

I purchased a pre-seasoned pork tenderloin at the grocery store and it was fantastic - so I decided to try another one, this time teriyaki, and grab some of the veggies from the CSA box to grill.

The tenderloin was easy - sear all sides of the tenderloin and move to indirect heat for 25 minutes.

Veggies:

Instead of veggie or olive oil, use sesame oil (YUM!!!), a dash of soy sauce, salt, pepper & I sprinkled with a little ground ginger. I tossed into the veggie basket and let grill away! I used snow peas (or snap peas, I don't know which, I'm not exactly the best pea-identifier), asparagus, broccoli and green beans.

Belated Wordless Wednesday

CSA Recipe - Grilled Cauliflower

Since I've obtained a grill basket, I've become much more daring with the grill. Bimmer Man grills hot dogs, I grill meals, just to clarify our relationships with the grill. I LOVE trying new ideas, recipes, veggies all the time and if it were my choice to purchase certain veggies at the grocery, I probably would not. When cauliflower and broccoli ended up in the last CSA box, I was pleasantly surprised!

And to the grill they went! And into the grill basket so they wouldn't fall through the grates...

All that's on the cauliflower - Moroccan seasoning, salt, pepper and veggie oil.

Quick tip: Veggie oil has higher smoking rate than olive oil, so I try and use veggie oil on the grill instead of olive oil if I can remember!

Funny Story About Shaving Cream

Yes, yes, that's right. Sometimes I tell stories about things that happen to me.

Like my dog is an asshole (really, he totally is. But if he were a person I think he would either be a laid back surfer dude or maybe just a d-bag. Some days it's hard to tell!).

In any case.

Remember having roommates in college and your bath stuff would disappear pretty quickly? I never really understood until after I moved in with Bimmer Man and shaving cream would last two months instead of two weeks. Or how I always seemed to need new razors, shampoo, conditioner and body wash weekly but then when I moved in with Bimmer Man he didn't really want to smell like girly bath products so I didn't need to buy them so often. Huh. Makes you wonder, right?

Well, I've been buying the Skintimate Shaving Cream for as long as I can remember. It's pretty floofy and foamy but still, it's shaving cream and it doesn't give me razor burn.

So today I used my new stuff (thank you, Costco for carrying Gillette Sensitive Skin and letting me try this stuff out).

I put the same amount of shaving cream in my hands that I normally use and BAM!!!

That stuff foamed up faster than you can say Minnesota.

I'm almost embarrassed about this. Almost. 

There was so much foam, that if I wanted to, I probably could have shaved my whole body. Seriously.

Ok, so maybe for a nanosecond I thought about shaving my head so I wouldn't waste shaving cream.

But I just wanted to share with you my new love of Gillette Sensitive Skin shaving cream. It's foamy. You don't need to use too much (because if you do, you'll end up having to clean the whole entire shower of shaving cream OR realize when you're done cleaning that shaving cream somehow managed to reach the ceiling when you were trying to shake it off your hands and the razor because it didn't exactly rinse off as easily as your old shaving cream), and it doesn't give you razor burn.

Is this post because Gillette paid me? NO. It's because I wanted to warn you before you use it and have to clean up a mess of shaving cream.

Happy weekend!

Minnesota Government Shutdown = No More Beer

Boo. Any liquor distributor that did not renew its license cannot deliver beer to Minnesota.

See here.

And here.

So, hopefully no booze will get people motivated to decide upon a budget and get state workers back to work, truckers able to pee at rest areas on the freeways, campers back into state parks and well, beer to be stocked on the shelves!

Grilled Peaches

Anything and everything seems to be grilled this week so be prepared.

For grilled peaches - prepare your grill before you light it (either spray Pam on COLD grill grates OR use veggie oil on tinfoil to coat HOT grill grates). Grill over medium-high heat for about 7 - 8 minutes. The peaches should have sear marks and should be soft, but not mushy. I served with Caramel Macchiato Ice Cream (but I think I would have served with Dulce de Leche ice cream instead).

Delish!

New On The iPod This Week

What's new on my iPod?



And I'm such a dork - Bimmer Man sent me the link (and I don't think he even knows this) but it's also on the Twilight: Eclipse soundtrack so...

And Ellie Goulding:



And of course, the Duchess Kate likes the Black Lips so I had to google them too.



So for something different I thought I would share a bit of my playlist for your entertainment at work. And um, if you really get bored, feel free to listen to The Flying Burrito Brothers.



Happy Tuesday!

10 Random Things About Me Today

1. I've got the urge to sew this afternoon.

2. I LOVE my orbital sander. Thank you, Bimmer Man.

3. I am wearing a Journey T-shirt today.

4. I've got leftover pasta with tomatoes & fresh basil for lunch

5. I've hopped on the skinny jean bandwagon a bit late but they make my short legs look longer.

6. I wish that we would've done the CSA weekly instead of bi-weekly. At least there's always next year.

7. Bruegger's. I love bagels.

8. The awful carpet needs to be ripped out of the basement.

9. And I'm going to paint the entry-way Persimmon. It's my goal to be achieved this weekend. Oops, I forgot to tell Bimmer Man. Well, it'll either be a surprise when he reads this or gets home from racing.

10. I need to stop procrastinating and get this darn tunic sewn. Saturday, people, I will do it on Saturday. Oh, wait - that's when I'm painting. Ok, Friday night maybe?