Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Re: Why Onions Make Me Cry and Smile

Dear Snow Bunny!

First, your house looks gorgeous in snow! Second, no you did not tell me about the drama with your couch. Do share! I love good drama stories! And third, your soup looks totally delish. You'll remember from ordering for staff lunches that I always ask for my salads or sandwiches without onion, but I do actually like the flavor - just not the texture. Sometimes I make a black bean soup where I have let the onions sit and carmelize for hours before mixing in the beans and putting it through the blender. Soooo goooood...

I think this is also the perfect time to mention one of my goals for 2011 (a comprehensive list is coming soon...I promise!). The other day I listed out all my go-to recipes and I came up with 20. This is all for main courses (so, meat) and I even included the lamb chops I made for Jon's birthday, even though I have only made those once (because I would do it again for company or a special occasion). So then I went through and broke the list into four categories: Regular Rotation, Weekends (for meals that are a little more labor-intensive for a week night), Company and Rarely (lamb chops went into this category).

So, out of my 20 recipes (I think 18 are Ina's or some variation of hers), only 9 were labeled "Regular Rotation," which means we are eating the same things a lot. So, one of my goals will be to add a new recipe to "Regular Rotation" either once a week or every other week...I think it might end up being the latter, just because a new recipe every week might be a bit much. But there are a ton of recipes in my cookbooks that I have just dismissed because they were unfamiliar, and there are so many websites that I can use as a resource too.

What do you make for dinner? One of the hardest things for me is that since Jon doesn't eat vegetables, it's very limiting. Plus we don't eat red meat more than a few times a month, we really don't eat pork at all...so that pretty much leaves chicken, fish and shellfish. And since Jon doesn't eat vegetables, some of the vegetarian dishes I would like to make (like Wild Mushroom Risotto - yum!) he just looks at and asks, "Where's the meat?" Ahh!

Speaking of dining, I am also going to work on re-painting my dining room chairs. Here they are, in their current state:


I don't love the style, but they were free from my father-in-law (and chairs are expensive!). They were originally a blonde wood, but I painted them black and put this upholstery on. But I'm kind of tired of the fabric, so I'm going to start with painting them first and then finding new fabric. There are six chairs total; only two have arms. I am going to keep them black, but I got a high-gloss paint so they'll almost look laquered. We can decide on fabric options at a later date. It will all depend on if I decide to paint my kitchen or not...which is a convesation for another day! Maybe tomorrow?!


Stay warm!
Kara

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