Soul Food

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

OUR FIRST THROWDOWN!!!

Well, our love of, or maybe obsession with BBQ has led to our first THROWDOWN, after Bobby Flay's Throwdown program on the food network. We challenged each other with our best burger recipes, voted, then ATE! Katie made a jalapeno burger with provolone and dresssing, Donna made a pesto parmesan burger and those tied for 1st place. Second was Vanessa and Salomon's turkey, soy chorizo, cilantro, and cheese on tortilla along with Greg's (our neighbor and friend), plain burger with a kickin' sauce (secret recipe). Carl came in 3rd with his steak seasoning burger. Jake contributed his famous jalapeno spinach artichoke dip - yummmmm!

Greg and his fiance, Carol have become very good friends of our family and we adore them. Ken has been working with Greg on a massive decking project at Greg's house. People are driving by just to see it!

You'll notice a blonde young lady on our deck that looks a lot like Carol - that's her twin - Clea.

We will be having more throwdown - next will be chicken, then Italian, then Mexican.

We already know Salomon will win the Mexican throwdown - we just want the food!

Thursday, August 21, 2008

WATCH MY GARDEN GROW!!! (a little bit of Cali in Utah)

I'm finally getting a feel for how to manage the intense sun, heat, wind and lack of humididty here.

With such a short growing season, and the risk of late frost, things somehow know to turn on the growth in high gear so no time is really lost. I've got three kinds of squash, tomatoes, at least four kinds of sunflowers, and some peppers and pumkins. The sunflowers end up feeding so many of the awesome birds around here. And the pond gives them a place to cool off and drink. Wasps like it too though, and love wood. Since we have a deck that nearly equals the square footage of our house we have lots of the critters around but they really don't bother.

We have the COOLEST bugs here! The katydids and crickets sound off every night now. We have the most colorful giant moths and beetles. We found a huge praying mantis by our pond!

Koral loves bugs and Ivy loves dirt, so outside is where you'll likely find us. Those pics soon to come:) (Pics courtesy of Jake who has taken up photography)