Bless My Heart I Married A Yankee

I have to admit I have had dried hibiscus flowers for like over 2 years now and just never made it into tea.  Last week my husband can home and was telling me about some tea he had at a Mexican restaurant that day.  He explained to me that it was hibiscus tea.  I told him that I had dried hibiscus flowers in the cabinet and could make him some.   That very night I threw some dried flowers in some water and boiled them then allowed them to steep overnight.  The next day, I strained out the flowers and poured the tea into a pitcher.  If you know me, I hate to waste stuff so I then put the flowers back in my pot and added some more water.  Brought it to a boil and allowed it to steep all day.  About 8 hours later I added it to the other tea and put around 1/4 cup of agave syrup in the pitcher.   Hibiscus tea reminds me of cranberry juice.  It is nice and tart with a delicate flowery sweet flavor.   If you prefer to have a calorie-free drink do not add any sugar or

I have been making pumpkin butter for some time.  This butter is quite good and I am not a pumpkin fan.   Better yet it is so easy to make.  I used fresh pumpkin to make my own pumpkin puree.  You can buy pumpkin puree.  I also have some puree in the freezer and chunks of pumpkin canned.   Since I started with fresh pumpkin  I started by cooking it in the microwave and then chopping it up and placing the pumpkin in my crockpot. I had to cook my pumpkin for a while longer before it was soft enough to make the puree.  Once it was I used my immersion blender to puree it up.   Add the spices and sugar. Then allow it to cook down. If you are starting with already canned puree, place this in your crockpot and allow to warm.  Then add your spices and sugar.  You want the puree warm to help melt the sugar and blend the spices.  This is where my recipe gets a bit dicey.  Per safety rules you should not can pumpkin butter.  Everything I have read is it is du

I love making sourdough bread.  I try hard not to eat too much of it though.  But it is so much fun to make and give to friends. I have played around numerous times with my starter, making various bread.  From focaccia, sandwich, cinnamon rolls, sweet bread, pizza crust but it has been a while since I used some whole wheat flour.  I decided I wanted to play around and see what I could do.  First, I was going for getting the correct ratio of whole wheat flour to bread flour.  I did not want the bread to be too dense.  In the past, I have had that issue and I personally was not fond of it but others were.  Second, I was going for a crunchy crust.  Which meant I had to create some steam in the oven.  Last but not least, I was going for different shapes.  I think I nailed all 3.  As I mentioned this recipe is sourdough and the starter I used was a potato flake starter.  If you do not have a starter  click here  for the recipe.  Tomorrow is Thanksgiving so if you do not h

CHICKEN CACCIATORE  This is by far one of my favorite meals.  It is especially good on a cold fall or winter's night.  The warmth of this dish will spread heat through your body to keep you nice and toasty.  Who is kidding it is just so good that you can eat it on any day.   In Italian cacciatore means hunter, with onions, peppers, herbs, tomatoes, and wine.  Of course, you have to add plenty of garlic.  Normally this dish is made with braised chicken or rabbit.  Yes, rabbit.   In this recipe, I used bone-in chicken thighs with the skin left on.  However, I do plan on using rabbit the next time I make this dish.  Which will be sooner than later.  I honestly can not say just how delicious this meal is.   If you have the option use the best ingredients you can.  If you can use fresh do so.  The quality of this dish is stepped up by using the best ingredients.  I used home-canned San Marzano tomatoes and marinara sauce.  I also was able to use a few fresh tom

GARLIC HERB GOAT CHEESE AND BACON STUFFED MUSHROOMS Yesterday as I was pondering what I was going to make for dinner I decided to have a nice appetizer waiting on Scott for when he got home.  Since we both love mushrooms I decided at the last minute to get the fixings for this recipe.  I totally came up with this while in the store shopping.  I had planned on using cream cheese as most recipe call for this ingredient.  However, I wanted to step up my game and decided on using goat cheese instead.  I have been playing around with goat cheese with other recipes this summer.  I love the nice tangy bit of goat cheese.  I buy this cheese at Lidl.  I love it.  The cost is awesome and the flavor is amazing.  It also comes in honey and plain.   I must apologize I normally take step by step pictures but honestly had not planned on putting this on my blog but Scott loved it so much and I had several people comment on my picture.   During the summer the house tends to get ra

JA-MAKING ME CRAZY RICE AND PEAS Scott and I decided to have Jamaican night at our house with our good friend, Jeremy.  Jamaican night always means Jerk Chicken smoked on the BGE.  We started growing MOA (minster of agriculture) Scotch Bonnet peppers a few years back and I needed to figure out what to do with a gazillion fruity hot peppers? So me being me, I got out my handy dandy notebook and started tons of research hoping to find recipes that look really good.   Since Scott was going to smoke some Jerk Chicken I wanted to be as authentic as I could be and find another Jamaican recipe.   While doing a bit of research I came across this recipe.  AKA Jamaican Rice and Peas.  I looked at several recipes and pretty much combined them and made my own version of this wonderful dish.  Let me say the name is a bit misleading.  It is rice but it is NOT peas.  You actually use kidney beans in this recipe.   My version consisted of white or brown jasmine rice, a scotch bonnet pepper

 SUN-DRIED TOMATOES WITHOUT THE SUN