Don’t tell the nectarine and the peach tree that spring doesn’t officially begin until next week!

Before.

After.

Gary and I made bread in the wood fired oven again today. We are still working on timing the bread and oven and ended up baking bread until after dark. The good news is we didn’t burn any bread this time!

The white bread is pain al ancienne from Peter Reinhart’s Bread Baker’s Apprentice.  It’s our go to party bread. It’s easy and has a wonderful flavor. It’s a little under done today, but we’ll brown it when we reheat it.

The brown bread is multigrain struan,  from Reinhart’s Whole Grain Breads. We love it so much that  it’s our new daily bread. It’s 100% whole grain and  fairly high in protein. The bread is mostly whole wheat flour, but the multigrain part is up to the baker. My version includes quinoa, oats, cornmeal, chia seeds and flax seeds. Today is the first time I tried the sunflower seeds on the outside so I only did half the loaves. I was afraid of burning them, but they came out just fine.

I wish I could have gotten a better photo, but my photography skillz were a big FAIL last night.

Mellow has no idea what is coming

It didn’t take long for Mellow to head to the bedroom closet to ride out the Christmas storm.

The kids had an ornament exchange.

I never did get a photo of everyone at once.

Dave is not texting. He's doing one of those metal puzzles.

A lot of people were out on the porch where we had a fire in the fireplace. It was too cold for me, so there aren’t any photos.

Tequila! And pickle juice? Yep, that's what they were drinking.

After a few hours of visiting and gift opening, some of the guests went down to the basement bar for something a little stronger than tea, coffee or wine.

Yes, we have a breathalizer.

We made sure all the drivers were legal. These were not the drivers.

1 cup frozen strawberries

1 cup pineapple

1 ripe banana

juice of one orange

1/2 cup coconut milk (So Delicious original flavor)

2 cups red Russian kale

Then I added one green smoothie a day to my diet. Wow! The smoothies made a huge difference in my energy level and general physical well being. I’ve had one almost every day for 32 days now. I started making them with an Oster blender, which works okay, but it takes a while and doesn’t pulverize the greens as well as a high powered blender.

After a month on the smoothies, we bought a Vitamix. The basic recipe I started with is:

2 Tb flax seeds
some pomegranate juice or water
a cup or so of frozen berries, usually blueberries and strawberries
one date
2 cups of greens, (lactino kale, red russian kale, collard greens, spinach, chard, dandelion greens…)
some mint from the garden
some ice

Today’s smoothie was pomegranate juice, lactino kale, a carrot, strawberries, a banana and flax seeds. I think it was too sweet with the carrot and banana and I won’t make this one again. Blend and learn.

Even though the smoothies always have greens in them, they are not always green. The basic recipe is more purple. The smoothies taste far better then they sound. If you use mild greens like spinach and chard, you really can’t taste the greens at all. I don’t always use berries or flax. Sometimes it’s an apple or orange or whatever fruit we have on hand. Raw almonds work well in place of flax and they are filling too. If you google green smoothie, you’ll find more recipes than you can make.

So, if you need an energy boost or an immune boost, try a green smoothie. You might be surprised at how good it makes you feel. I was.

Ingredients

olive oil
almost a pound Mushrooms – sliced (criminis, a shiitake from the logs, and a packaged chefs blend from whole foods)
7 cloves Garlic – minced
1 onion – chopped
4 jalepenos – seeded and chopped
1 serano – diced
5 roma tomatoes – seeded and chopped
some red wine
1/2 cup cilantro – destemmed and chopped
1 Tb lemon juice
1 tp oregano
1/2 tp thyme
cayenne pepper
salt
pepper
pasta

Directions

Saute the mushrooms in olive oil with a little salt over medium heat.
Add the garlic when the mushrooms are starting to soften and have released their juices. Once the liquid cooks away, pour in a little red wine.
In another pan, saute the onion and peppers in olive oil with a little salt also over medium heat.
Once the onions are soft, add the tomatoes and herbs. Cook the tomatoes down a bit. Add the mushroom and garlic mixture. Add salt, pepper and cayenne to taste. Really, taste it! Turn the heat down to low medium and cover the pot.

Start cooking the pasta in salted water. (We used whole wheat spaghetti.)

Add a couple of tablespoons of pasta water to the sauce until it looks right. (This is why I’m not writing recipes for a living.)

Right before the pasta is done add the cilantro and lemon juice to sauce and turn off the heat.

Serve the sauce over pasta. Add a little Parmesan cheese if you want, but it’s really good without it.

I made the very spicy spice rub, which was what the black stuff is.

Gary and one of his birds

Babies!

This is  a lot a people for the size of this porch.

Everyone likes to hang out in the kitchen – although this was one of the less crowded moments.

For veggie broth, of course. I made this today with onion, carrot, celery, garlic, random herbs and shiitake stems. It’s oh so umami-ish. I think I see mushroom risotto in our near future.