Who you calling Shrimp?

Well that would be the tiny critters that were succulently sauteed for this evenings meal. The Mrs. decided to put a scald on some shrimp and garlic. Nice work. This was then mixed in with a big pot of cooked pasta and some other seasonings. In another pan an assortment of vegetables was stir fried with some ginger. Result. Kids no like spicy vegetables. Kids want many plates of pasta dish. Dad's fibre intake increases greatly.
This fibre factor also came into play when the wife took a run at this recipe here. Now she did make some wifely adjustments. Half of the butter was turned into apple sauce. The sugar amount was cut in half and the peanut butter amount was doubled. I think my wife's new nickname should be half sugar. I mean any recipe she finds she just decides to use half the sugar. I am not judging. It is a good thing I am not a big sweet tooth guy. However, the daughter was not impressed. As usual I am shovelling them back.
It has been quite a nice long weekend. Manged to make it to 29 celsius here today. That is 84 for those south of the border. A very summer like day. My gardening guru hit me with some hot pepper and eggplant seedlings. The lovely lady across the way has beefed up my supply of tomato seedlings. The small plants in the dark green pots are mine. Its a learning process. Here is the garlic that was planted in the fall or the fallgarlic for short. This is the transplanted lettuce volunteers with some seeds that were started two weeks ago. Gotta get into a regular watering pattern. Everything seems to be coming but unfortunately that includes my grand selection of weeds. In some ways they are like bad credit card debt. The problem is so monumental now that I only pick a few from a select section once in a while. For example I weeded the tiny bed out front and have done nothing with the greater garden. It is probably like a two or three day job and there is so much more weedy goodness waiting to bubble up that even if I weed the whole show it will be looking green again very soon. Not the right green however. I have so much shame I haven't even taken a picture. But seeing as I am sharing I will brb after rounding up the incriminating evidence.I am cringing in my seat right now. I didn't have the courage to photograph the dandelions. I mean I mowed two day ago and they are brazenly flaunting the fact that I won't mow again until next weekend. On a positive note they attract lots of bees to our apple and cherry trees and will be useful again once the raspberries start to blossom. In then end I think I will be able to overcome the garden lethargy and it will be a great summer.

Assorted

Well that is what we had this evening. We finished off a couple of leftovers and I finally made the shrimp dish. Huge gap between my expectations and how things finally turned out. I just remember making it the last time and being totally impressed with myself (it happens more than you would think and considering my audience you get some idea of the frequency I'm talking about). Perhaps it was the lack of zest from the rest of the meal. The shrimp was still pleasant and the kids polished it off (now I'm looking for tomorrow's lunch idea) so I can't be that down. I think it was the anticipating the making of it for the last three days which was the problem. Anyways we have a new menu for this week and the shopping is alldone so thatshould bode well. Tomorrow is another Monday so its time to get in gear.

Surf and Turf

Eating like kings we are. Not that we had a classic surf and turf. We had pork chops and a shrimp pasta combination but never the less, two choices of protein. I try not to think about how good we have it here. But we do. On top of this there was left over coleslaw salad and a green salad featuring some nice juicy chunks of tomato. Even had some ice cream for dessert. Yes we do live like kings.

I managed to leave work early and walk home with the daughter today. As the snow melts during the day it makes a fragile jagged formation all over the southern face of any snow bank. The kid was all about kicking, karate chopping of various other forms of destruction. She left a swath of carnage five feet wide in some places. Between that and pretending she was mountain climbing it took us quite a while to make it home, more than double our to school time. But that was okay. We weren't in a rush to do anything.

Just now she popped out of the bath to see if we could still go skating this evening. It had been part of the plan but before dinner she didn't want to do her home reading. She wanted to play balloons with her brother. Which was great and I can totally back that as being a fun thing to do. But now I have to go back to work and she still has her home reading and homework to finish. Grade one is tough. You should hear the tears coming from the bath right now. Well this hard hearted dad has to sign off. Manyana.

Friday June 6th

Double the trouble when two curries are in the house. This first curry was a shrimp, broccoli and red pepper affair. I was spiced from scratch using tumeric, coriander (home grown) cumin, garlic, paprica, basil, oregano salt and pepper. The garlic was sauted with onions till the were brown. The the spices were all added with some more olive oil. Once the good smells started coming out I threw in the shrimp and when they had that nice cooked look on both sides I took everything out. I then stirfried the veggies and when they started to steam I put the shrimp back in, added some yogurt, brought to a boil and then let sit. Meanwhile, kids and dad went to swimming. Upon arriving back home the little ones tucked right in and I got started on the second curry. The first curry was not hot at all, I mean it had great flavour but since it was meant for the little guys I didn't put any heat in. The second curry I made for the after hours crowd. I started with yam. Cubed and microwaved with a little bit of water in the bottom of the bowl. Then left to stand for about five minutes. Fresh ginger was the heart of the heat, lots of it sliced and then minced, but not too small. My curry base was a pre-packaged indonesian curry paste. This was fried in really hot olive oil until it started to sizzle and then the garlic and onions once again. Ginger rolled in just after the onions and garlic. Soon after that came the mushrooms. The green beans came in for a little fry just before adding a small can of coconut milk. I was feeling pretty satisfied, when suddenly I realised I had forgotten about the yams. The were steamed to perfection and I poured them, and the steaming water, into the pot. The over all effect was great. Nice thick consistency from the yams which also brought up the sweetness. The ginger and curry paste together added all the heat we could ask for. A very good evening.