What's Cookin', Katie?

In case the CIA or FBI needs to know what I've been checking out of the library lately, I'll save them the trouble of a warrant or subpoena or whatever--oh, wait-- nevermind. Well, in any case, the current checkout includes 5 dog books; a close inspection reveals the title "Solutions," which may indicate that the honeymoon is over, our darling perfect Katie is ever-so-slightly rough around the edges, and the Time on Her Hands family is collectively clueless about doggie behavior.

Of the pile of books, one has proved to be more interesting and useful than the others:
It made me smile when I saw it. It just seems like a fun novelty: I can make dog treats? In my kitchen? And these recipes! They read so much like a gourmet snack menu that I briefly worried I might put Katie off her kibble with such delectables. But, have I mentioned that I have some time on my hands?

I picked a recipe that sounded intriguing, and Katie sort of cocked her head at me when I read out the title (I took it as a sign), and most importantly it didn't require that I grind dry dog food into a course flour (I know, I know--poor Katie with the lazy owner).

Why I don't mind not owning a rolling pin!

And voila! These are Crispy Cheese Circles, and Katie loves them. They couldn't have been simpler, and though I over did it on the cornmeal dusting on the rolling surface (my dough was very sticky--possibly had something to do with reading the recipe through the bottom of the rolling pin), they look pretty good too. They almost fooled Mr. Time on Her Hands, but that's a different story and he's paid me not to mention it. I Googled "dog treat recipes" and came up with about a zillion sites, enough to keep Katie and me experimenting long after the book is due (or in my house, overdue).

Crispy Cheese Circles

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup grated fresh Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup cornmeal
• 1 tablespoon low-sodium beef bouillon powder
• 1 large egg
• 3/4 to 1 cup warm water
• 1 cup cornmeal for rolling out treats

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Mix the first four ingredients together and then add the egg and 3/4 cup warm water. Mix to form a dough. If the mixture is too dry, add more of the remaining water.
3. Spread the cornmeal on a breadboard. Form half the dough into a ball. Drop it on the cornmeal, flatten slightly, and turn it over to get cornmeal on both sides. Roll the dough out to 1/4 inch thick.
4. Use a circular cookie cutter 2-1/2 inches in diameter to cut the dough into circles.
5. Place onto greases cookie sheets.
6. Bake 15 to 20 minutes or until the bottoms are golden brown.
7. Repeat steps 3-6 with the other half of the dough.
8. Remove from the oven, let cool thoroughly and store in an airtight container.

For crunchier/crisper treats: When all the cookies have baked, turn off the oven. Put all the cookies back on a cookie sheet and return them to the oven. Leave them cooling in the oven for several hours or overnight to harden. I did this, and let me tell you, they are rock hard. Katie doesn't seem to be bothered by this, although I fear our neighbors can hear her crunching on them.

Summertime Couscous Salad

Summertime is the time for couscous. I had my "one tomato" and some oregano from my garden all ready to go, and Simon applauded the decision to use garlic (as if I wouldn't). Anyway, I'm grateful he doesn't appear to be a vampire cat in addition to his other rascally PAB behaviors.

It would be worth it to invent Smell-o-vision for this, kids!

Ingredients:

• a couple garlic cloves, chopped
• one package Israeli couscous
• 1/4 cup olive oil, plus a drizzle to saute garlic
• the juice of two lemons
• zest of one lemon
• 3 cups chicken stock
• salt and pepper, to taste
• the season's first tomato
• oregano
• toasted almonds

In a large sauce pan, heated to medium, saute the garlic in a little olive oil until you can begin to smell it off the pan. Add the package of couscous and the juice of one lemon. Toast the couscous until it's coated with the olive oil and deepening in color (a few minutes). Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil, then simmer and cook until it's tender but not soggy (10 minutes or less). Drain & transfer to a bowl. Add the olive oil, juice of the second lemon, the lemon zest, and the salt and pepper. Let stand to room temperature-ish.

Chop the tomato and oregano and rough chop the almonds (who the heck slivers an almond?) and toss with the couscous.

I eat it right out of the bowl, and if there's any left, I just put it in the fridge (fork and all) so it's ready for me the next day (you do the fork-thing too, you know you do).

Current garden woes

The caterpillars are enjoying the heliotropes more than Elvis impersonators love Vegas.

Tripple whammy assault on the sunflowers--wilting in the heat, snails (I think/am hoping it's snails), and some sort of leaf rot. Horray, it's the trifecta! I'm doing what I can about the droop, but I don't want to overwater them, either. I've dumped a week's worth of egg shells in careful rings around the plants this evening, so we'll see if that conquors the snails (but what else can it be?) without bringing the raccoons or worse. But the leaf rot is beyond my repertoire of home remedies. I'm just snipping off everthing ugly, but that's not leaving me with much.

Honey, there's a couch on my patio! This sleeper got moved outside to make way for the new, improved sofa 2.0. Problem is, the sleeper doesn't seem to be going anywhere. We both hoped it would grow legs and walk away, but no. And I am NOT fooled--this is no substitute for a porch swing.

Veggies: one small, gradual, kicking and screaming step for a man

To be clear, Mr Time on Her Hands does not eat vegetables. Some of this is legit (onion allergies); some is just stubborn aversion. However, I love to eat vegetables. Over the years we have found a few varieties that overlap on our respective Venn diagrams, some of which are in this farmer's market bounty. Some of what's here is not yet in the still-small-but-gradually-increasing group of "safe" veggies, but I'm ever hopeful.

More freezing

I'm melting, the cats are pooped, my sunflowers are drooping, only Katie the Fresno dog still seems perky in this heat. So what am I doing? Freezing!

The joy of freeze storing on a blistering day! I'm freezing everything in sight. These red bells were legitimately on the list, but I've been eyeing other produce and even random foodstuffs. If I write about frozen peanut butter next, please, someone, send help!

Future omelets?

Berry-rific

Oh, this heat! What better thing to do than freeze fresh foods for later in the year? I have spent hours rinsing pounds and pounds of berries (cool water, of course!), and setting laden trays in the freezer. Checking the freezing process frequently is a perk-- I mean, necessary part of the procedure--, and tasting the icy fruit is required quality control.


Future pie?


Future triffle?

One tomato, two tomato, three tomato, more?

Look at my one tomato--all grown up!


And to my delight, there are more! Beautiful tomato plant, I am no longer insulted. You're just a late bloomer, and for that I dub you Leo.

Happy Birthday, Mr Time on Her Hands

Due to technical problems (well, okay, it was just lazy) this birthday brunch is being substituted for birthday lunch. It's not chocolate cake, but it'll do (in some circles). Three candles to represent his "thirties" (it would have been cruel to be more specific).
Here's what I ate--a delicious grilled eggplant wrapped around grilled asparagus and goat cheese, on a bed of baby greens with cherry tomatoes. I think my first "food porn" photos turned out pretty well.
This little guy graced us with a charming concert as we dined. Or he was tormenting Katie-dog. Either way, since I wasn't about to sing Happy Birthday, I'm glad someone did the job.

For those who know Mr Time well enough, don't worry. He didn't actually eat the cole slaw on his plate, so the world is not about to stop spinning and fall out of the sky!

Learning the iris lesson, again

My little patch of irises didn't really bloom this year--I had divided them last year, so it wasn't unexpected. I like how they are a lush, green section of my yard for a large portion of the year, so when I swear I could hear the snails and slugs living it up big in there, I worried a bit. Sure, they were floppy and tangled, but they weren't overgrown, undergrown, wilty, bolted, or any of the other annoying descriptions of some of my other plants. But they were definitely prime mollusk territory, and in my garden, that means ewww.No one will be hiring me for a haircut anytime soon, and now I can not only hear the slugs and snails, I can see them, too. And as a bonus, notice that the painstaking rows and triangles of iris rhizomes I labored over last summer are shot already.
I actually don't know why the insane desire to crew cut the irises comes over me each year. Yeah, I could blame it on the slimy paths criss-crossing the patch, but I suspect it's some other intuition-gone-wrong, as I am certain this isn't necessary, if not even wrong-headed (is that a record for hyphenated words and phrases in one sentence? I think so).

So my little blog project will have served a noble purpose if, in a year, my irises don't look like they're new recruits for the army.

The Case of the Assaulted Slipper

It was a quiet day at the Ada Street Detective Agency and Small Animal Petting Zoo--too quiet. 'Bout mid-afternoon, a dark-haired dame with a pudgy belly and an appetite for more (more what? more anything) arrived in my office, looking shocked and desperate. It took a while, but I finally gathered that she had witnessed something terrible, a scene of depraved destruction, and she knew more than she let on. But I'm a sucker for a sweet face, so I took the case.

She wasn't in any condition to take me to the scene of the crime, so I used my super-sleuth skills to look for clues. The first thing I noticed was the bedroom door ajar. I started off in that direction for a closer look, but before I could get too close, a shifty-looking bystander appeared out of nowhere, acting skittery and nervous, scared of his own shadow. It took a bit to win him over, but he finally calmed enough for me to approach slowly. He hedged at my inquiries but I pressed on, my intuition telling me he had a piece to this puzzle. I'm not above offering bribes when it will close a case, and luckily I had just the thing to feed this guy's addiction--catnip, and lots of it. Poor guy, I wonder if his family knows. He was practically swooning by the time I got any useful info out of him, but it was a gem and confirmed I was on the right track with the ajar bedroom door. I promised it would all be off the record--you understand.

At the bedroom, I hestated only a second before pushing open the door. I have a reputation for being a rock-solid detective/petting zoo handler. I pick up the stinky, gooey stuff my bi-pedal assistant won't touch, but I have to say, whatever lay behind that door gave me pause. Maybe it was the dark-haired dame's vague but insistant behavior, or the skittery witness's, well, skittery-ness. In the end, though, personal hesitations have to be put aside; the job has to be done. Gil Grissom's not my hero for nothing. And this is what I saw:

Yep, there you have it--the victim was DOA on arrival. We don't have many violent crimes around here. Oh sure, a few yarn mice, a couple house plant leaves, but this was something all together different. And I had a hunch that newcomer was involved. Mind you, there was no hard evidence--forensics was all over that scene like stink on a peanut but nothing pointed to the perp. Still, that niggling feeling in the back of my mind just told me I was right about this, and I didn't make a name for myself as a crack detective/small animal petting zookeeper by ignoring my spidey-sense. I long-legged it out of that crime scene and headed straight to the flophouse.

Sure enough! "It's no use trying to hide out now!" I said. "For a first offence, the judge will probably just give you a restraining order and strictly supervised slipper encounters from now on."

And that was that, or sort of. The dark-haired dame insisted on repaying me by allowing me to rub her belly and put kibble in her dish. I tried to tell her it wasn't necessary--when one has a calling, payment is not the priority. But she insisted, and even purred a bit as a tip. Nice.

Simon: The Grand Plan

Let's see if we can follow his train of thought here:

1. I have an idea.

2. Very interesting...could work...can't resist...

3. Voila!...hmm... a little awkward. And could that woman have picked a worse angle? Jeeze, lady, a little dignity, okay? Hey! Are you laughing at me? Whoa...this is great! I mean, it's exactly what I wanted to happen...

One tomato!?

This had better be the best tomato in the world.

How can there be one tomato on my plant? I don't have room for a whole bed of vegetables (and only I would eat them), so I just pot up one plant each of a few essentials, tomatoes most certainly falling in that category. Last year I had the most delicious Roma tomatoes. This year, I tried something different, "Early Red Chief." Mr. Time on Her Hands chose it, so at least I can say it wasn't my fault. But seriously, whoever heard of a tomato plant growing one tomato? That's not sauce, or even salsa. It's sort of insulting.

Crazed with the love of light

Ta-da! Here they are, five Sundance Kid sunflower plants all planted up in the new flower bed. And it only took three days, a pickaxe, a friendly stranger, and one torn finger nail to get it done.

"Bring me then the plant that points to those bright Lucidites, swirling up from the earth,

And life itself exhaling that central breath!

Bring me the sunflower, crazed with the love of light."

--Eugenio Montale

(p.s.--this is the 300th picture taken with my new camera)

Sunflower exercise plan

This beautiful view is from Wonderlich Park looking out toward the bay (which is hiding behind some haze). My friend and I hiked here today, and as I tried to disguise my gasping and weezing up the hill, she blithely trotted on up, chatting the whole time. I guess that great workout I thought I was getting from walking the dog and working in the garden everyday needs to be ramped up.

After the hike, I stopped by to check on the school garden, and was so inspired by this:



that I immediately went to the nursery and bought five "Sundance Kid" sunflowers to put in my garden. Then I spent the next several hours fighting the patch of dirt in my backyard that was to become my sunflower forest. However, no amount of garden fork torque or brute force with the shovel could turn my newly designated flower bed into anything more than three inches deep of dusty, clotty, rocky dirt. I could hear it laughing at me as I propped up my tools in defeat and headed inside for a glass of anything with ice in it. Bah, who likes flowers anyway?

So now I'm sitting here, nursing my sore back and bruised green-thumb, trying to figure out if it's worth it to rent a Roto-tiller to plant a bed of five sunflowers. I suppose if I can just keep at it with the shovel and fork, maybe I'll be able to keep up with my friend on our hikes.

(not actually in my) Garden Photo: 7/9/06

Cape Plumbago hedge on the creek trail in my neighborhood.

I actually just stumbled on this section of the trail the other day when I found an entrance I hadn't known about. It's near a busy street but you'd never guess, partly because of this huge hedge.

Shane with thyme on her hands

Finally decided to finish planting between the concrete chunks in the utility area. It was only half done, and getting weedy. Here's the before shot (a keen observer might notice Katie's legs in the lower right corner):
And here's the finished result. I added wooly and silver thyme (in the back) to the Reiters and other miscellaneous creeping thyme already growing. There better not be any clover managing to linger around!

Simon and Belle: Perch Pose

This is where you can find Simon and Belle almost every morning. It's a very companionable scene, lasting until one or the other gets set off about something; then it's indignant looks and occasional grumblings, and eventually a full on squabble. But it's all forgotten in time for their afternoon nap in the spare bedroom.

Garden Photo: 7/7/06

A blooming artichoke in my colleague's garden. The first time I ever saw one was in a garden I had in Arcata. The artichokes were tasty, but I let a few stay on the plant. A month later, I had an amazing purple thistle, just like this one.

Garden Photo: 7/6/06

Agapanthus--ugly name for a pretty flower.

Katie: Coffee Shop Dog

Why do we always have to interrupt our fun walk to stop at this boring place? It's only because Katie likes it so much, otherwise I wouldn't bother :)

Garden Photo: 7/5/06

The lemon tree needed a haircut:

Before...
...and After
I was sorry to see so many future lemons go, but we left the tree a little lopsided to preserve the crop. If only I would learn to do this in February! But all in all the proceedure went well with only a little blood spilled.

Katie: She's Here!

We've been waiting for Katie for a long time--we wondered when would be the right time, we agonized over what would be the right dog, we worried about being the right kind of dog owners. There are always reasons not to do something. So we just decided to make this the right time and figure out the rest.

And then this confident, cheerful, smart, gentle, sweet little dog enters the picture, and we officially become dog people.

I love this picture of Katie. It looks like she knows she's found the right place to be!

Garden Photo: 7/4/06

Violas against a red brick--how's that for a patriotic color scheme!

Garden Photo: 7/3/06

Black Eyed Susans, also not actually in my garden. I love the macro feature on my camera's zoom! And I'm not afraid to travel around town with a camera dangling around my neck, no matter how many "she's a weird one" stares I get!

Simon: He's kind of a rascal

But he's sooo sweet! With his multiple personalities, every moment is interesting, often frustrating, usually amusing, totally endearing. The second Brian saw him at the shelter, we knew this little tiger would rule our hearts, as well as our house! Was it those outrageous stripes, that melting gaze, or the saucy attitude?

Sure enough, this brazen boy ignores all house rules to walk on the counters, sit on the table, dance on the hutch, leap on the headboard, chew on the cables...whatever flights of fancy strike his mood.

In these pictures, he's keeping an eye on things in the hallway and den (in other words, he's supervising at a safe distance), all the while plotting his next adventure, I'm sure! That's our Simon--he's kind of a rascal.

Garden Photo: 7/2/06

This blossom is not really from my garden--it's from my anniversary flowers which were absolutely stunning.

Princess Bellerina: What's Better than TV?

Belle never gets on the counters like this, and I couldn't bring myself to add to her recent sense of injustice by squirting her or shooing her off. A lot has changed for poor Belle this week: Katie-dog joined the household and the classroom fish came home for the summer. Obviously, some of these changes went over better than others. Hey, after a stressful day, I like to lose myself in some Law & Order, so I get it.

Garden Photo: 7/1/06

Here's a hydrangea in my garden.