~*~ Adventures in the Kitchen ~*~

Well, after church today I came home and explored my fun new How to Know the Beetles book, courtesy of Josh and Ricci Humphrey. Super fun old-school beetle key, published in 1980!! Some of the family names and things have changed since this book was printed, but it's still amazing - another fun book to add to my ever-growing ento collection.

I then decided to take a little 30min snooze. Well, that 30min turned into 4hrs! I apparently needed sleep, but now it's 1am and I'm super awake...ah well, such is life.

When I finally woke up I decided to go run a few quick errands: Barnes & Noble then HEB.
I finished my sermon journal in church this morning and I had a B&N gift card so I decided to go pick up a new journal - got a cute "green" one that just so happens to be green...I like it.

Then I went to HEB, because, dear ones, I have been craving ceviche for about a year and I decided I was going to splurge a little and just go ahead and attempt making it myself. So, I picked up some red snapper (this was the splurge part...), a few limes & lemons, a red onion, Tabasco, and a pepper (it was supposed to be a serrano...but HEB was out and so I just grabbed a pretty green one that I thought might at least add some sort of flavor). I came home with my treasures in hand and a spirit of determination.


I don't have much experience working with fish...chicken, beef, pork I have pretty much down, fish is still a rather new realm to me - therein lie my adventure! I promptly got to work on the fish...this was interesting. I had 3 fillets to work with. The first one went horribly and the majority of the fish ended up shredded - not exactly the 1/2inch cubes that ceviche calls for. I was not giving up and I certainly was NOT throwing away that fish just because it didn't turn out all that pretty. Fillet #2 went a little better...the first half of it was about the same as #1, but then I got the brilliant idea to dice the fish into the cubes before I attempted to remove the fish from the skin!! That's the ticket, folks! I have no idea if that is the right way to work with snapper, but it worked for me and I got a ton more usable fish than I did from the 1st one. Fillet #3 was then a piece of cake. Ok, so my fish was taken care of, messy as it may have been. I then started slicing and dicing the veggies and such. All went smoothly from there on out. I added a bit of extra Tabasco since I was going to be missing the heat from the serrano - we'll see how that turns out. I threw everything together in the casserole pan and set it in the fridge to start marinating (it had to sit for an hour, then stir it up again, and throw it back in the fridge for several hours/overnight). I'll let you know how it turns out tomorrow!! Can't wait.


Next I worked on some chicken I had - I just needed to decide what to do with it. So, since there was already an air of experimentation I decided to do just that! I first attempted some marinated chicken strips, using butter and an onion soup mix, then cooked it all up in a frying pan. Ummm...friggin delicious!!!


After that little experiment I used the remaining 3 chicken breasts and made my fail-free chicken packets: 2 standard lemon pepper packets with fresh lemon and tomato slices and one experimental roasted red pepper Italian dressing packet with fresh tomato slices....I haven't tasted that one yet - it will be dinner tomorrow, so I'll let you know how it turns out then.

After I finished all the "real food" adventures, I attempted to make some banana and date macaroons...that was interesting. Super easy and quick recipe, but I think I'm going to have to keep working on the perfect banana ripeness factor. I think my banana this go 'round was a little too ripe...made the mashing easy, but it tastes a little too much like banana bread for a macaroon. Flavor is still good, but I think a little less ripe will be better, and a greener banana might help hold everything together a little more nicely, as well. We shall see.



All in all, today was fairly productive...I didn't get to any plant potting, but that leaves me something fun to do when I get off work tomorrow. Now that it is nearly 1:30am, I am going to attempt to get some sleeeeep. I am tired, but my brain is awake.

Hope everyone's Monday goes smoothly and speedily!

~MW

P.S. - my hands STILL smell like fish...I've washed them a good 30-40times over the course of tonight *not joke* and they still smell!!! Gross, but funny, and evidence of my adventure in the kitchen :)