Dish-o-the-Week: Chili Potatoes

What to do with the leftovers?  That's always the question.  Lately Speed Racer and I have been trying to get better about freezing dishes that we don't want to eat every day for a month, so that we might enjoy them later.  So say that you made some PW Chili, and say that you didn't freeze quite enough for two people...what should you do???  Add potatoes. This is a great recipe to get rid of some leftovers and enjoy on a cold day.  It's the prefect fall dinner, and very filling at that.

So start off with  your potatoes.  Speed Racer and I really could have shared one, we had MORE leftovers.  So you may want to do a half potato per person.  Prick your potato with a fork all over, then rub olive oil on the skin.  Next sprinkle some sea salt over the skin.  Preheat your oven to 450, and bake your potatoes for about an hour.  Note!!  This time can change depending on size of the potatoes, so you will definitely want to keep an eye on them to make sure they are not burning or getting underdone.

While the potatoes are taking forever to bake, especially since SOMEBODY didn't know to put them on a higher heat and had them at 350 instead...take a kitty break.

Maybe even sing the jeapordy song a little bit... doo doo doo doo...doo doo doo doo...DOO duh  doot doot doot doot.

Don't look at me that way.

Ding!  Potatoes are done.  Heat up your left over chili that you hopefully got out of the freezer to defrost already.

Put your chili on top of your lovely hot potatoes,and top with fixin's.

Finally be sure to unbutton your top pants button to make room for this warm, cozy, FILLING, fall dish.

10 Things...

about Fall.  Fall has taken hold of my heart and it won't give it back.  I know that it's a cruel mistress because really it's just the precursor to winter, but I'm going to enjoy it all the same.

So because I am enamored with fall right now...

And because someone greeted me with "Buenos Tardes" today...

I'm dedicating the next couple of posts to fall.  Hopefully there will be fall photos, fall dishes, fall deserts, fall colors, and anything else that pops into my twisted little noggin'.

10 Things I like about Fall.

1. The colors of the leaves.  I know this seems like a given but every year it amazes me.  It's like after August, the summer has burnt everything up and then finally, it all catches fire with a glory of colors.

2. Snuggling.  This is a trick I learned from my Grandfather, Chief Bald Eagle.  Colder weather means an excuse to get just that much closer to the one you love.

3. The food.  Do I even have to say it?  Pumpkin Pie.  Any kind of pie!  Sweet potato casserole.  THANKSGIVING.

4.  Fluff.  We keep our house pretty chilly and in the fall our cute little kitties become little fluff balls, and for whatever reason, it really cracks me up.

5. Clean.  Everything just feels cleaner.  Is that weird?  The air is crisp and fresh, after a rain everything just seems squeaky clean.

6. Planting bulbs.  This year I'm making an effort to really plan the garden for spring, so I'm excited about getting out there and getting my  hands dirty.

7. Hot Spiced Tea.  Nuff said.

8. Fires.  Obviously not the destructive kind, but bonfires,  and fires in the fire place.  :see snuggling:

9. Sky.  To me a fall sky is bluer, deeper, and could go on forever.

10.  Holidays.  This one is a little selfish, not because of presents actually, although they are nice.  I love that fall has several holidays close together (I'm going to lump Christmas in there too even though I know that's technically winter) because I love the opportunity to see my family.  I love that when it gets colder outside, and darker, we all huddle closer together, find reasons to celebrate, share in the bounty we have, and just try to make it through the winter.

On being Alone

Speed Racer often travels for work, and as soon as he's gone I hear "What do you DO while he's gone?" "Aren't you afraid to be by yourself?" "But you're ALONE!"  So I thought I would show just a few words of wisdom and insight on being alone. Being alone is always a hard thing.  I try to stay tough but I have to admit that when I'm in the house I lock every door...even ridiculous ones...like the closet...just in case.  But when I'm not being neurotic, I try to stay busy.  I can't even imagine how hard it would be to be a single Mom.  I don't have kids but it takes a lot more to keep the house running and the kitties fed when Speed Racer isn't around.

But when I'm not super busy, here's a list of things I do to have fun and keep entertained.  And to keep the "missing Speed Racer" thoughts away.

1. I take funny pictures...mostly of myself...and the kitties.

2. I watch lots of girlie movies.

3. I eat

4. I dance around the house, weirder than usual.

5. I talk to the kitties...alot...not just like "Hey pretty kitty.." but more like "Woah! Did you see that? I saw that..that was crazy...crazy."

6. I hang out with friends

7. I don't watch scary movies, I can't handle them on my own.

8. I sleep in the middle of the bed...I only crowd Speed Racer's side a tiny bit more than usual.

9. I try to do chores.

10. I miss Speed Racer...alot.

Cows, Cow tails, and Cow pies

We all know it's not nice to make faces behind people's back, especially cow's backs, I prefer to make faces...TO THEIR FACE.  Okay, random I know, but I thought the above picture warranted a comment.  Moving on. As I have mentioned before, I live in a weird no mans land of city and country.  We've got cows, as you can see, but Target is literally 3 minutes from my house.  It's a little strange.  But these cows in particular always keep me entertained.  They're located on my way home and I constantly get to see new baby cows which I usually identify by screaming "BABY COW!!" out the window while I almost drive us into the ditch and Speed Racer tries to pretend that I have kidnapped him and he doesn't really know me.

This little family is so cute.  Big Bull, pretty Momma Cow, and cute black and white patched baby cow.

This lady was a curious one...

And a grumpy one...

And a pretty one.

Poor little guy was trying to avoid me and got caught all alone.

Most people who work with cows will probably think I'm crazy, but I think they're interesting.  Their faces have such great expressions that make fantastic pictures.  It made for a fun afternoon taking photos of some cows, cow tails, and unfortunately cow pies.

I know Magic

Levitation pictures can be really fun, or creepy, or elegant, or whatever floats your boat.  And if you have photoshop or another editing system, they are surprisingly easy to recreate. First you want to start off with two pictures: *side note you will definitely want to use a tripod for this.

Picture number one should just be a picture of your background, whatever that may be.  Now here is the super important part.  Once you decide on a background, angle, etc that you like, do not move your tripod, or you're going to make life a lot harder on yourself.

Picture numero 2:  A picture of whatever you wish to be levitating in the foreground on a stool, of some kind.  You ideally want something that isn't too elaborate.  It's hard to tell in this picture because the bench I used was very similar in color to the background, but the subject is laying on a bench.

Next in photoshop you are going to open those two photos and pull the foreground photo on top of the background photo and line them up so they are exactly on top of each other.  If you're having some problem doing this you can lower the opacity of the top layer so you can see the one beneath.

Next, create a layer mask on the foreground layer (you can do this by clicking on the icon of the square with a circle in it at the bottom of your layers menu) and using your brush start to paint over the stool, or bench.  You can see here that I went a little too far so I'm losing some of the subject's leg, that's no biggie!  Just switch your brush color back to white so you are adding back to the layer mask.  Work with it until you no longer can see the support feature.

Do a little tweaking with colors, etc to make the picture as eerie as you would like, I mean we are getting close to Halloween after all.  I think they are a lot of fun, and I hope you will try these out as well!

Joy and Thanks

First my apologies for being away from the blog some this week.  It was quite the week, I started a different part time job, had a lot of meetings for photography, and it was my birthday...whew.  So it was quite busy.  But I warned you it was going to be that way for awhile, so hang in there, I promise I'm here and I'm not going anywhere.Now that apologies are out front and center, I want to say thank you to everyone for making my birthday such a wonderful day.  Thank you for all the facebook well wishes, for my husband for spoiling me like always, and all my friends and family that took the time to call.  It was a wonderful day and I thoroughly enjoyed it. So, speaking of spoiling, two of my presents that I got COMPLETELY spoiled with are shown in the above picture.  My parents got a 10 piece cooking set, which I was totally surprised by.  We never got one for our wedding and had been using a set from Speed Racer's bachelor days, and although that set was very nice too, it's nice to have a complete set.

The other really cool present I got was from my friend T-shirt.  She ordered these spices from Penzeys Spices, with a cute note that said "Hope this inspires a Dish-o-the-Week!"  I can't wait to try them out, and I'll have to think of a new dish and call it the T-shirt :)

So there you go, I've officially been spoiled.  There's no going back.  I love birthdays, not just because of gifts, but when I get down to the heart of the matter it's because I love any excuse to celebrate whether it's for me or someone else.  Thanks again to everyone for such a wonderful day, and keep your eye on the blog for some new cooking recipes now that I am armed and ready to go!

Camera Basics: Shutter Speed

We touched on Shutter Speed a little bit in Camera Basics 101, but today we're going to talk about shutter speed and motion. Specifically we are going to talk about Stop Motion versus Motion Blur.  Again, a lot of photography elements are based on your preferences.  I personally lean more in favor of stop motion.  I like the look of it, probably from my days working for the sports beat for the newspaper.  BUT, there are times where I really enjoy motion blur.  For example, low lit artsy pictures, anytime you're dealing with some fun light, or lights that are moving.  Here are a few examples of what I'm talking about and how to achieve these lovely pictures.

Stop Motion

The idea here is that you are "stopping" or freezing something right at the peak of it's motion.  It can cause some really fun pictures.  Since this is a self portrait and I'm using a wireless remote for my shutter, you can see it gets a little motion around the edges, and a tad out of focus.

Here's a little bit better example, and one I have used before.  By having a faster shutter speed (ie higher numbers) you will be able to stop the action.  Now remember to compensate for your lighting in each situation by adjusting your ISO and aperture as necessary depending on your situation.

Motion Blur

As I stated in the above paragraph, motion blur isn't usually my thing...to the point where I had trouble finding a good example to show you in my library of photographs.  SO, I cheated, this is one that Speed Racer took of me while we were camping.  It's a great example of motion blur because the real action that he's blurring is the sparks coming off the fire.  They make beautiful spirals that if you had stopped the action you wouldn't see.  If you're worried about your other subjects blurring, we're getting some blurring here, be sure to use a tripod.  Sometimes it's nice though.  I like it in this photograph because I think it helps add to the softness and feeling of a campfire.  Have I mentioned I love camping?  I do.

Again, in motion blur situations be sure to adjust your lighting to the situation.  Also, it's a good rule of thumb that if your shutter speed is lower than 60, you probably want to use a tripod instead of hand held.  There's so much you can do with motion blur.  You can set up a tripod and track the stars by leaving the shutter open for hours, you can crank down the shutter speed and let the lights of cars paint your photograph, you can pan with a runner or car and get streaks behind them, and you can even make water look like silk...fo real!  Lots and lots of options, so go out there and experiment with stop motion and motion blur!

The DESK

This is my DESK...for now.  Soon it will be Speed Racer's desk, and by soon I mean whenever we finish his office.  So that's pretty relative.  But until then I get to use it, and that is awesome.

It has really cool drawers and secret compartments.  This desk was a give away from one of my Mom's coworkers, and they couldn't fit it in their house.  I'm sure one of my brothers would love to have it but one lives in Illinois (long way away) and the other one has two flights of stairs to his office.  So booya suckers!  Ahem.  I mean, it's so awful that you didn't get this beautiful desk.

All kidding aside, we were very lucky to get it, even if it doesn't fit in our living room.  And even though it was VERY heavy to move.  But we're still super stoked.

And now I finally have somewhere to put all my papers, and hide that I have lots of papers.

Mr. Elephant who lives on my desk says, "Hooray!" I second that Mr. Elephant, I second that.

Moment of Zen: Le Kitten

I walked into our bedroom the other day to find this.  It was too adorable not to post about.  I wish I could be this relaxed when I sleep, Speed Racer would say that I am.  But this is just too much. So since today is cloudy and yucky here in Knoxville...

Since I am exhausted for some reason...

Since I am fighting a headache...

And since we all need more kittens in our lives...

I'm posting these photos for you.  Enjoy your moment of Kitten Zen.

Dish-o-the-Week: Homemade Granola

I love homemade granola.  It's such a great and healthier way to start the day.  Granola just makes me think of good things, and smells AMAZING when it's baking in the oven. I was raised on this recipe and can still remember my Mom baking it fresh on Saturday mornings.  It took me awhile to appreciate it, what small child wants granola when they can have Cinnamon Toast Crunch!  But now it's one of my favorite breakfasts: it's healthy, it's filling, it's delicious.

My Mom got this recipe from the "More with Less" Cookbook, sold HERE.  If you haven't ever seen this cookbook you are missing out.  It is a Mennonite community cookbook and it has great, natural recipes in bulk.  It's not the best on deserts because a lot of their recipes are low sugar, which I mean if I'm going to eat desert, I want the sugar.  But it has fabulous soups, main dishes, breads, and cereals.  Definitely check it out.

Granola is really pretty basic.  You're mixing your dry ingredients with your wet ingredients and baking it together.  You can add dried fruits, different nuts, or anything else to your hearts content.  Here I started with 10c. of rolled oats, 1c. wheat germ, 1c. cornmeal, 1c. peanuts, and 1 c. of coconut flakes.

For the wet ingredients I used, 1 1/2c. honey, 1c. peanut butter, 1 T. cinnamon, 2/3c. oil, 1/2c. water and 1T. salt.

MMmmm...so delicious.

You want to combine them on low heat until the peanut butter is completely melted.

Then combine the dry and wet ingredients until they are all mixed together.

Bake at 350 on a greased cookie sheet for 30 min.  You will want to turn them every few minutes or so to keep one side from browning too much.

And ta-da! Delicious snack and breakfast all at once.  And it's really pretty easy.  Again, check out "More with Less," for other great recipes and how to work on keeping your grocery costs down while providing healthy meals.