Journal

2018 - Week 41 Cooking Results

Lincolnshire Sausage over potatoes

Yes, you are supposed to mash the potatoes, but this allows you the beauty of new potato and the skin and the fat from the sausages. It’s a good thing. Also, it’s a bit easier to do. Roasted in the pan, in the oven.

Farfalle with Spicy Sausage and Butternut Squash

Delayed! The night I was going to make this, I got home exhausted and proceeded to take a 2 hour nap, I slept through my wife texting me what was for dinner. I slept through it all, and woke up a bit stunned. I ordered from Jimmy John’s and we ate later then normal.

On a side note, I don’t know if they are in the process of changing hosting providers or what not, but I liked the tracking that they had and have now taken away. Maybe they’ll restore them, maybe not, but I liked it. Also no order history? wtf.

Curry Roast Chicken over Sweet Potatoes

I cleaned the small sweet potatoes, tossed them in salt, pepper and olive oil. Did the same for the chicken, except added some curry powder too, and let them roast slowly in the oven at 350, I moved it up to 400 later. I kept attention with a thermometer, and got it roasted and it was pretty good. Some of the potatoes were perfect, some were a little under done (they were wider), but it was good for the most part.

Taco Salad

I feel as if I’m making this as an excuse to eat the Kalona Sour Cream. Never the same, but following the same pathway.

Jamaican Goat Curry

With the cold weather starting to set in it is once again time for letting things braise for a long time and use that wonderful. So I had to make some modification (didn’t want to order Jamaican Curry Powder for just this, cause it’s apparently a thing). Anyways I used mostly local ingrediants (97% or so from the farmer’s market), add a few. I napped a bit while they simmered, my watch going off every once in a while to remind me to stir it a bit. I enjoy this type of cooking. I knew that I had to control the heat of it, so I combined a habanero and a jalapeno, diced them up. It had a nice heat level enough to put a little heat on the lips, but not so much to burn. I was cautious with the pepper as I have accidentally transferred the heat to my eyes in the past. It was a risk as you never quite know how it will turn out after a braise.

I served it over rice and it was a warming wonderful way to spend a Saturday.

2018 - Week 40 Cooking Results

Ham Hock and White Bean Stew

Fall! Long cooking! Hooray! So I had a leftover ham bone, and picked up a smoked hock from Lucky George at the market Saturday morning. I followed the recipe for the most part (adjustments made around the vegetables) and gave myself a bit more time to make sure the beans got done. Turned out pretty good, I’m pretty happy with the first soup of the fall. Last night I did forget to add the sour cream mixture and chopped cornichons, but added them when I had it for lunch today. Pretty good.

Pork Cutlets

Seared, cut into smaller pieces and sandwiched.

Lincolnshire Sausage

Delayed!

Stovetop Mac & Cheese

I’ve made this a time or to before, and this really turned out well this time. Creamy, smooth, I think it is because I had nice cornstarch slurry first. I added Green Onion sausage as well.

Hamburgers

Good things.

Early Fall Trip 2018 - Coming home Through Burlington, IA

We had plans to go through Nauvoo, however it is a much smaller town then I remember (I’d be my who knows how many times, and Shannon’s first time) and apprently closes down almost entirely on Sunday afternoon (very unwelcoming). I guess I should’ve done more research, rather then just depending on my memory. So we needed a lunch and made a call that instead of looking in a tiny town where everything appeared to be closed, we’d head to Burlington, which was on our plan anyways.

Snake Alley

Mosquito Park

Early Fall Trip 2018 - Dana Thomas House

So the Dana Thomas House is another check in our long list of visiting public Frank Lloyd Wright places. As with many places, the photographs of the inside was forbidden, and I can understand it to some extent (sales of photos, time on tours, etc), but there was the lamp, and butterfly chandelier (OMG) that I really really wanted to spend time with. So it made me a bit sad, but it was a wonderful double visit (we arrived to one of the last tours of the day, so we came back the next day to take pictures in the garden).

Early Fall Trip 2018 - Abe Lincoln Binge and Springfield, IL

(alt title: Whole lotta Lincoln Going On)

We visited The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, Union Station, Lincoln Home, Old state Capital, Lincoln’s Tomb, The Lincoln - Herndon Law offices, Lincoln Depot, New Salem and the Lincoln Memorial Garden and Nature Center. We walked around quite a bit in the downtown area, so we took some shots from around there too. I really liked the red door of the First Presbyterian Church just down the street from the Lincoln Home. I may have scared a UPS person that was close by as I expressed how pretty I thought it was.

Early Fall Trip 2018 - Airbnb - Virginia, IL

This was our first Airbnb, we have been thinking about it for a while, there is always a bit of trepidation there, because it is a new thing. That being said, this was quite a delightful experience. It felt like staying at a friends house (without the feeling that you may be a burden on your friend). It was cozy and nice, and unlike some places, I didn’t have that much problem falling asleep (I did have a hard time finding the right position so my CPAP machine would work right). There was enough space to allow me to stay up a bit later (as is usually the case), unlike a hotel room. We were located right on the town square, with the courthouse across the street. While we were hoping that this place that was just a couple doors down would be open (it had permanently closed the week before we got there). There was a lot of noise related to harvest season (semis going back and forth), but for the most part it was pretty quiet.

Early Fall Trip 2018 - To Springfield, Illinois

I am easily bored while driving, so while we trip, we try to schedule breaks, and avoid roads we’ve driven many times before. I have lived in Iowa all of my life (Shannon most) and I’ve never been here. A bit out of the way, sure, but a nice stop off.

American Gothic House

Maharishi University

I’ll not lie, this is partially because of my interest of the obscure, plus the mention of a golden dome was interesting (yellow is more accurate)

Villa Kathrine

Just across the river in Quincy. This is an indicator of an odd fellow liking a concept and making it happen. A wonderful view, the house still looks out of place, even decades upon decades after being there.

2018 - Week 39 Cooking Results

Sloppy Sammys

I’ve been craving these for a bit. The issue here is that this feels like a colder weather meal and this week finally provided one. While the recipe never really stays the same, a lot of it is similar. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Brats (probably the last for a while)

Simple meal, good to go.

Roast Leeks, New Potatoes and Bangers

Roasted the leaks, put the potatoes on them, then put the bangers on those. I tossed the leeks and potatoes in olive oil and salt and pepper (separately). It came out to be a nice meal.

Notes From a quick vacation

We did quite a bit of research before we went to our weekend in Springfield, Illinois. This worked out pretty well. I found the Snail of Approval to be one of the things that was most likely to be with something that we wanted.

We were shocked, and I think everyone else was, as to how busy the Soap Co. Coffee House (Jacksonville) was when we visited. The coffee was ok, and had we gotten in and out pretty quick, it would’ve been fine, but with the wait…

It takes me about twice to get bored with a road. I drove back and forth on IL-125 to and from our Airbnb in Virginia, IL.

Driving back and forth on IL-125 it appeared as if the ground was being shaved, as the farm equipment slowly brought in the harvest.

There in the miles and miles we covered, there were a plethora of road kills, mostly racoon and opossum, but we saw a fox as well.

There was a large difference between the towns that appear to be attempting to recover, have recovered and may have given up. The smaller the town is, the harder this is to do, (notable exceptions are towns that something bringing people there).

There is a lot of anti-Chicago talk in the political ads (we’d get in for the night and watch a bit of TV).