.:: Fire The Housewife ::.

BUT REALLY I’M INSANE AND NEED LISTS LIKE THIS TO SURVIVE.

So, our garden. It’s on. AND EVEN THOUGH WE BOUGHT STARTER PLANTS AT A GREAT PLANT SALE THE OTHER DAY THAT THE BOYFRIEND HAS STILL NOT PUT IN THE GROUND I’M NOT FREAKING OUT AT ALL. NO. No, I’m doing a lot of other things, THINGS BESIDE FREAKING OUT. Things like adhering to this list:

I have this notebook you see, and in this notebook I have made lists for each month. Lists that tell me what plants should be started inside and what plants should be transferred outside, and which plants are just plain okay to pop in the ground outside. At the beginning of March I started by planting starters of broccoli, leeks, onion bulbs, and green onions inside. Outside I started carrots, lettuce, peas, potatoes, chives, and cilantro. I also started my other herbs, but we’ll have to wait and see what happens with those, we’ve had a few unexpectedly cold nights around here and I might have to have a do-over. We’re doing this in hopes we will have fresh herbs and veggies throughout the summer without having to purchase them from the grocery store. Whereas The Boyfriend does not eat a lot of veggies, I’d be happy living out my summers eating nothing but raw, fresh veggies.

This is a wonderful little outline that I compiled by searching the internet for sites on gardening and by using the Puget Sound Farm Guide. The farm guide is helpful in a lot of ways, it gives a “What’s Fresh” guide so I know what foods are more likely to be locally grown based on when they’re in season here. You’d be amazed at the free resources you can find when you really look.

So, back to my garden. The Boyfriend has mostly taken a liking to working on this greenhouse project in our backyard. Initially we started out with a giant PVC and plastic structure that took over the tiny plot of dirt in our backyard as well as the view from our back windows (not that it’s much of a view, we have a stone retaining wall back there…). But recently he decided to start over and built this…

I have to admit, It’s pretty nice. It actually works too. I’m pretty excited to start seeing some veggie results in there. We’ve already had some luck with sprouts…

And on the brightside, all that plastic and netting keeps those darn drunk slugs from trashing the place. SLUGS.

So, in closing, since it’s almost April, if you’re living in a climate similar to mine you might get prepped to plant:

Inside:

leeks

Outside:

carrots

lettuce

peas

potatoes

radishes

green onions

chives

cilantro

dill

parsley

and you can transplant these indoor starters outside:

brocolli

leeks

lettuce

onion bulbs

green onions

chives

cilantro

parsley

thyme

So, this is a special request from The Sister who is dying for me to post this already, I think she’s just really excited to see what AMAZING THING I DID FOR THE BOYFRIEND THIS YEAR.

I’m sorry, but this is going to be horribly disappointing. This year, unlike most years, I didn’t have a clear picture of what The Boyfriend’s cupcake should look like. I tossed around ideas of fail whales and cupcakes with cut out tops, but the only clear decision I had made is that these cupcakes would be Chocolate Chocolate Chip with Cream Cheese frosting.

Then ..it.. hit the fan anyway. The Boyfriend was demanding to know what time I would be coming into town with his cupcakes. It’s his party and he can cry if he wants to. I didn’t know! I had showered, I had gone to the store for supplies, but I didn’t have them finished! I still didn’t even know what I was going to put on top! I DIDN’T KNOW ANYTHING! Heart racing, I made the stupid decision to say “OH! I’ll leave the house by 2!” Let’s just say this resulted in some hurriedly decorated cupcakes.

THEN! Oh boy. There’s a then. So, anyone who has met me in real life knows my driving skills are, sub par, I ONCE ROLLED A CAR ON A DESERTED HIGHWAY BECAUSE A COYOTE WAS SITTING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD. Yes. I am really awful at driving. I understand. Let’s all move on from that. Now, when I do actually drive somewhere, I tend to have a very short, very direct route. There is no lollygagging in my world. But this day, OH THIS DAY. I drive downtown and where I would usually park is completely full. So is the block after that. So I have to turn. Okay, we’re still fine, I drive around the block, the only thing available? BACK IN ANGLE PARKING. I cannot back up in a straight line. Once I tried to back into The Republi-Dad’s driveway, which is huge and there is enough for 3 cars and only 1 car was there at the time I was trying to back in, and I couldn’t do it. So, then, I’m trying to tell The Boyfriend all this and he’s like “Are you at 4th? I think I can see you!” HE IS WATCHING ME FROM HIS BUILDING. For reals. Dude is watching me have a total melt down from 28 floors up. Then The Boyfriend comes down to help me park and he sits on the cupcakes. They were in Pyrex, so no real harm was done, but one of them wasn’t full and they got jostled, so by the time I even got these to his office they looked like crap. I guess it’s just karma paying him back for my birthday. Here is what they looked like pre-meltdown:

What was not horrible or hurried was this recipe. It’s a cupcake-brownie hybrid which is why the cut out tops wouldn’t work (too crispy on top!). I most definitely recommend this recipe. You will need to fill the cupcakes pretty full when you bake them because they are like a brownie and don’t rise THAT much.

you will need:

1 2/3 c. cake flour

3/4 Tbsp baking powder

1/8 tsp salt

7 Tbsp softened butter

3/4 c. sugar

1 c. milk

1 T. vanilla

3/4 c. cocoa

3 egg whites beaten to stiff peaks

1 cup mini chocolate chips (you can use regular chips)

So, in general I use 3 bowls for this recipe. First, I beat the egg whites to stiff peaks and set them aside. Then, I sift all the dry ingredients into another bowl and set aside. Finally, I mix the wet ingredients and set aside. Then you have nothing left! Woo! Okay, starting bringing them back. Mix the wet and dry ingredients together first, then gently fold in the egg whites. Bake at 350 degrees for about 20-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean (or mostly clean, there are chocolate chips in there!)

See what I mean about it being a cupcake-brownie hybrid?!

For the frosting I used a really really basic cream cheese frosting.

6 oz. cream cheese

1/2 cup butter

2 tsp. vanilla

4 cups powdered sugar

First cream together your cream cheese and butter. Add vanilla. Add powdered sugar. You can also use gel food coloring to color it, if you use liquid food coloring, be sure to add a little extra powdered sugar. This frosting is substantial enough to use in a pastry bag, but just barely, so you’re definitely going to want to make sure your coloring doesn’t make your frosting too runny.

For the past few years I’ve kept a garden. It all started with a little box of dirt my friend Mark hung from my first apartment’s balcony in which I grew carrots and only carrots, then I grew just the supplies for salsa making at The Republi-Dad’s and then last year I hit the big time. The Boyfriend and I had a fair sized balcony where we grew an assortment of herbs, tomatoes, cucumbers, green beans, green peppers, and onions. It was wonderful! I learned I do not love lemon cucumbers and green peppers are bitter if they’re not properly grown, but The Boyfriend had green onions fresh from our balcony garden for a good part of the summer and I was always in green beans and cucumbers. The tomatoes were another story, neither of us eat just plain tomatoes and my dreams of pasta sauce and salsa were dashed as I realized our balcony garden only provides us with about 3 romas at a time. NOT ENOUGH.

This year…oh this year. I have lived and I have learned. We have a little back yard this year which we are loving and we have spent countless weekends already cleaning it up and making it something we can be in. The first several weekends were all about the boyfriend standing outside screaming because of the giant spiders while I was curled in a ball upstairs far away from them. I HATE SPIDERS. What I hate more than spiders are slugs. Washington, in general, is full of these slimy little guys and our backyard seems to be their favorite place on earth. Yesterday I walked outside while The Boyfriend was working on our new greenhouse and noticed this…

My beautiful flowers I planted a couple weeks ago were being eaten alive but them! I immediately flipped out and made The Boyfriend pick them off of my precious flowers and then went on the warpath.

We are trying to grow an organic garden this year and I wasn’t about to ruin everything by dumping slug killer all over everything so I thought back on the book I mentioned in THIS post and remembered it suggested a tin of beer, the slugs will crawl in it, drink the beer, and drown. YOU CAN BET I WAS ABOUT TO TRY THIS. My first problem was that I didn’t want to use one of my pie tins. I settled on one of these plates The Boyfriend had from a pre-Girlfriend life

and to my surprise within just a few minutes…

As I watched this guy I noticed he wasn’t crawling in, he was just sitting on the edge, sipping my beer and enjoying himself. PARTY IN FTHW’S BACKYARD, YA’LL! No Thank YOU, SLUGGO. So, I switched to a bowl. Don’t worry, it was a plastic bowl that also belonged to The Boyfriend’s former no-girlfriend life. I noticed this morning I had caught only 1 slug, but boy was he bloated and disgusting in that bowl. I am sparing you the horror of that picture. Today I must make a trip to the dreaded Albertson’s for some grocery sales, but I think I’m going to stop by Value Village and get a pie tin that will exclusively be a slug trap.

In addition to the drunk slug trap the members of the FTHW household will be saving eggshells to crush and place around the perimeter of my flower garden (don’t worry, our veggies are safely tucked away in the greenhouse). I’ve also read that anything that is a little sharp will hurt the slug’s bellies too much for them to be able to slither over it

In closing I want you all to know that while writing this post I have freaked out multiple times because slugs gross me out big time. Thank you for your time.

I have a great love for Nutella. It all started 12 years ago when The Sister returned from a semester in Germany with a jar of this amazing stuff. Mostly we put it on toast. Or ate it from the jar with a spoon. Either way I was in love. I was in love with it until I made my own trip across the pond to France. I didn’t eat it as much there because I was stupid. I was so stupid. It was so accessible. I saw it every day! I didn’t eat nearly enough of it. Luckily, when I came back Nutella had started to appear in the grocery store. AMAZING! Since then I have not forgotten my love for Nutella, it has only grown stronger, now that we have a only slightly used jar in the cabinet I CAN MAKE SO MANY NUTELLA FLAVORED THINGS! or…I CAN EAT SO MANY SPOONFULS OF NUTELLA!

This recipe is so ridiculously easy you’re going to run right out and make it today. SERIOULY. It is THAT EASY. Trust me. From start to finish this will take you 25 minutes and you’re going to look AWESOME for making these.

In the original recipe it said to use fillo shells, but Safeway didn’t have any, so I used puff pastry shells, they worked out pretty well, but got a little bit too crunch after I had to chill them. If you can find fillo shells, try them out, tell me how it works! Also, I cut this recipe down from like 15 servings to 4 serving so don’t feel bad if you want to make this for 20 people and have to do some multiplication. It will still work out.

You will need:

4 baked pastry puff shells

about 1/4 cup chocolate chips

2 oz. cream cheese

2 oz Cool Whip

3 Tbsp + 1/2 tsp sugar

2 heaping tsp. Nutella

First off, bake your pastry puff shells, when they’re done, put a few chocolate chips in each shell, you want just enough that when they melt they will cover the bottom of the shell. Pop those back in the oven about 3-5 minutes until the chips have melted then use a toothpick to spread out the chocolate. If you have room in your freezer, put them in there until your mousse is ready, if you don’t, you may have to wait a little longer to put your mousse in, you want that chocolate to be set before you add your mousse.

On to the mousse!

Mix the cream cheese and sugar until it’s smooth. I hadn’t let my cream cheese come to room temperature so I used a wooden spoon and mushed it around pretty good, I’m sure your cream cheese will be at room temperature and this step will be a breeze, right? When that is mixed, add the Nutella and mix well. Then gently fold in the Cool Whip until mixed. Try not to over mix

I am going to give you permission to take one of the tops you cut off of the pastry shells and put the mousse on it and try it right now. I will admit that I did just that. Mmmmm. You can also just eat a big spoonful if you want. I’m not here to judge.

Now comes the easy part! Grab a couple spoons and spoon that mousse into the pastry shells and top with some whipped cream. Easy stuff! Then take a giant bite out of it.

To begin: Happy Birthday, Boyfriend, I will bake your cupcakes today, but I will not blog your cupcakes today. That will have to wait until I’m done with our Anniversary dinner.  Funny how you chose to start dating me after my birthday BUT BEFORE YOURS!  If you REALLY need to look at some birthday reminder, let’s talk about LAST YEAR.

Storytime! Once upon a 4 years ago I started dating The Boyfriend.  The Boyfriend ate primarily foods that could be frozen until time for consumption.  This mostly included hamburger pizzas. Totinos hamburger pizzas.  Seriously, of the ultimate in disgusting frozen pizzas, he picked the top dog.  One of the first “dates” we had, we drove to from where we lived to where we live.  We ate a lot of McDonalds on that trip.  A LOT.  While we were there, my aunt offered to take us out to eat.  I grew up eating any random assortment of things that found its way to our plate and didn’t complain because well, I could eat what we had or not eat at all.  There was no fixin’ something different in our house.  Not until we were old enough to fix our own peanut butter sandwich that is.  So going out to eat with my aunt was no  big deal, we’d probably go somewhere, I’d find something that sounded good, I’d order it, and I’d eat it.  Now, being the aunt she is, she took us out to eat at a nice seafood restaurant.  I was pretty okay with this, at the time I didn’t eat a large variety of seafood, but I ate salmon, crab, shrimp, you know, the usuals.  The Boyfriend, on the other hand, would have none of it.  No seafood! He hates seafood! Aunt embarassed, Boyfriend embarassed, steak is ordered.

The Boyfriend has evolved since then.  The boyfriend has had me cry before because he acted as though he didn’t like something I’ve cooked.  The Boyfriend now eats things because he doesn’t want to hurt my feelings.  This has led to a whole new world of things The Boyfriend actually enjoys, for instance, scallops.

This is not a well photographed recipe, it all just happens so fast! SO FAST!

Here’s what you’ll need:

enough spaghetti for 2

sea scallops (I used the small ones, the recipe called for the large ones,  use what you can find, adjust how much you need for how many you want.  This recipe is really just for 2 people)

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 Tbsp butter

1 clove garlic

1/2 red pepper, diced

1 cup wheat beer (the recipe actually calls for white wine, vegetable stock, OR beer, I had some wheat beer in the fridge and I think this turned out WONDERFULLY.  It gave the pasta a good color and left a mild wheat beer flavor.  The Boyfriend thought I had used whole wheat pasta)

1 sprig parsley, minced

a small amount of lemon juice

salt and pepper

You are going to want to have all your stuff prepared and in bowls ready to go before you start cooking.  Trust me.

So, I’m going to be honest with you, using the small scallops you’re going to look like Julia Child cooking these.  So, while your pasta is boiling away prep your scallops by drying them on a paper towel, I didn’t really follow the directions on this part, so, if you don’t either, I’m sure you’ll be fine.    Heat your frying pan over high heat, when it’s hot, swirl in the olive oil and toss in your scallops.  I used the small scallops so the cooking part will be different if you use the large ones.  With the large ones you’ll let them cook for 2 minutes, then turn them over.  I used some pretty small scallops so I put them in the hot pan, shook the pan to cover them in a little oil, waited 20 seconds, shook again.  I repeated this process until they were all brown.  At one point I did pull out a spatula and turn over a few that didn’t appear to be turning when I shook the pan.  Channel Tim Gunn and MAKE IT WORK.

When those scallops are good and browned, put them on a plate and put it somewhere to keep warm, I just put mine in the microwave, not turned on.  Turn your heat to low and throw in your butter and garlic.  Wait about 10 seconds and add the red pepper and onions.  I cooked this until the onions just started to look a little soft.  Then add your beer, parsley, and lemon juice.  Let that boil for a few minutes, add your salt and pepper, and continue to boil until it has reduced quite a bit.  I twill not be thick like pasta sauce, but it will be noticeably more brown.  Scrape the pan and get all the bits from frying those scallops mixed in with your sauce.

This is not even close to cooked enough, but seriously, tasty.

After your sauce is cooked it’s just a simple matter of stirring everything together.  My advice is to leave the scallops out and put them on top of the pasta after you’ve put it on the plate.  I stirred it all together and had to try to get scallops out of the bottom of the pan so one of us didn’t end up with all the scallops.

It doesn’t look all that pretty here, but, it seriously was.  I kind of forgot to take a picture until after I had eaten some of the pasta and scallops.  Plus, I didn’t put nearly as many red peppers in as I would have liked because of Picky Eater McGee.  Yours will be prettier, I promise.  One thing I felt like mine did need was more salt and pepper after I had cooked it, so maybe add some extra spices to yours.  I definitely will next time.