Lemon Bars

It was our week to make Sunday dinner at my parents' house today. I had seen a recipe for lemon bars in my Taste of Home, so we thought that would be a nice dessert to have with our Maui burgers. 

Bake-Sale Lemon Bars

3/4 cup butter, softened

2/3 cup confectioners' sugar

1 1/2 cups plus 3 T all-purpose flour, divided

3 eggs, lightly beaten

1 1/2 cups sugar

1/4 cup lemon juice

Additional confectioners' sugar

Preheat oven to 350. In a large bowl, beat butter and confectioners' sugar until blended. Gradually beat in 1 1/2 cups flour. Press onto bottom of a greased 13x9-in baking pan. Bake 18-20 minutes or until golden brown. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, whisk eggs, sugar, lemon juice, and remaining flour until frothy; pour over hot crust. Bake 20-25 minutes longer or until topping is set and lightly browned. Cool completely on a wire rack. Dust with additional confectioners' sugar. Cut into bars. Refrigerate leftovers.

I like my lemon bars nice and lemony, so I went ahead and put a teaspoon of lemon zest in too. I was glad I had because, even with the addition, the lemon bars were not as lemony as I like them. They were pretty good though, and had great texture. 

Falafel Round Two

Our second attempt at falafels turned out much better than the first. I'm on a Mediterranean kick right now; it's hard not to be when the food is so delicious and fresh and requires minimal cooking, if any at all. I'm grateful I have a husband who happily puts up with all my cooking ideas and trends.

We made Sean's Falafel and Cucumber Sauce and Sun-Dried Tomato Hummus for dinner last night, recipes  six and seven. This falafel recipe had egg and bread crumbs in it and was shaped into patties instead of balls, all of which probably contributed to them being easier to fry. We also had a better idea of how much flame to heat the oil over. These were much easier to work with and tasted great, although I probably liked the taste of the other falafels slightly more. The hummus was again made without tahini because I haven't bothered to look for it anywhere (it's like I'm working full time or something crazy like that); it's hard to be motivated when you can make delicious hummus without it. This hummus also turned out well, although the garlic in it was pretty strong.

Plum Chicken Wraps

On Tuesday this week we had Plum Chicken Wraps, a recipe I found in Taste of Home.

Plum Chicken Wraps

1 can (8 oz) unsweetened crushed pineapple, drained

1/3 cup plum sauce

1 T rice vinegar

1/2 t sesame oil

2 cups cubed cooked chicken breast

1/2 cup chopped green onions

1/4 cup salted cashews

2 medium fresh plums, sliced

12 Boston or Bibb lettuce leaves

In a large saucepan, combine the pineapple, plum sauce, vinegar, and oil. Cook and stir over medium heat for 5 minutes. Stir in chicken, green onions, and cashews; heat through. Remove from the heat; stir in plums. Place 1/3 cup chicken mixture on each lettuce leaf. Fold lettuce over filling.

These were pretty simple to make, the only problem was that I didn't have plum sauce or Boston or Bibb lettuce. For the plum sauce, I looked up a recipe online and just threw the ingredients I had in with the pineapple, vinegar, and oil. For lettuce, I used the end of our spinach and some swiss chard leaves. The wraps turned out pretty well and were something fun and different that was quick enough to make on a week night.

Problematic Falafels

 I have been postponing making hummus until I found tahini, but after only looking at one grocery store, I decided I didn't want to wait and would make hummus without it. I'm still hoping to find tahini and make hummus again. So, recipe three was Hummus, without tahini. It was delicious. We added a little extra garlic and thought it turned out well. To go with our hummus, we attempted to make Falafel , recipe number four. The recipe had a number of suggestions for what to do if the mixture doesn't stick together before you fry it, but it assured us that once you get it frying in the oil, it will all stick together. Well, we had no trouble forming the mixture beforehand, but the frying was pretty problematic. We started with eight falafels and ended up with two and a half. First, the oil was too cool, then too hot, then too cool again. One of the falafels was burned on the outside and not even warm on the inside and many of them just disintegrated in the oil. It was a mess and pretty disappointing. But the falafels we managed to cook tasted good. And with all that hummus and some pita bread and a freshly picked tomato, we ended up with a delicious meal, whew!

Father's Day Part Two

We made it back to Visalia in time to celebrate Father's Day with my family. We had a delicious feast for dinner, followed by lemon meringue pie made by Heather for dessert. Grandpa was able to be there too, so we got to celebrate with four dads.

Father's Day Part One

We got to celebrate Father's Day with Dave today because tomorrow is going to be a very busy day for him at church. His ideal Father's Day this year was to all cook and eat together, then play cards; that sounded great to me. We started out by making curtido, using a recipe that Dave and Joy got at a class they went to during the week. All the ingredients were cut up, sprinkled with salt, and pounded. Then it was divided into quart jars to ferment for a week.

After that project, we started into making dinner together. We ground beef, lamb, and pork together to make burgers and had green salad, fruit salad, and potato salad to go with them.

When I found out I got to make the pie for dessert, I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to try the cherry pie recipe I had seen on my friend, Katie's, blog. I had read the post quite awhile ago and bookmarked it because I'm looking for good pie crust recipes and the idea of using vodka in the crust was intriguing. Since cherry pie is one of Dave's favorites, I decided to make the whole pie instead of just the crust with a different filling. The crust threw me off; it was unlike any pie crust I have ever made. It seemed like way too much liquid and was a sticky dough that was difficult to work with, I kept worrying I was mixing it too much. For the filling, I used fresh cherries since they are in season right now and didn't use any bourbon because I didn't have any. The pie turned out great though; it looked good, set well, and tasted good. I liked the consistency of the filling, it was set without being rubbery and the cherry halves held up well in the baking to give it nice texture. The crust was flaky and browned perfectly without burning. Recipe number two was certainly a success; thanks Katie!

After eating lots of good food, we learned a new card game together and finished off an enjoyable day.

Crab Salad

Recipe number one for the second three months was Creamy Crab and Pasta Salad. I substituted plain yogurt for the sour cream and cut the mayonnaise in half, it was still plenty creamy. This was a good, but probably forgettable, dish. We both enjoyed it, but didn't think it was anything special. Although, I did think it was better the next day for lunch. Maybe because the flavors had a chance to mingle more or maybe just because I was really hungry.

First Three Months

I finished my first thirty recipes in three months. Most of the recipes were good, with only a couple that we didn't like as well as some that were great and have already been repeated. Here is a review:

Chocolate Beer Cupcakes

Orange Ginger Shrimp Stir-Fry

Honey Lime Chicken

Makeover Spinach Salad Dressing

Sweet and Sour Pork

No Knead Rolls

Vegetarian Sweet and Sour Meatballs

Brussel Sprouts with Spiced Pecans

Pad Thai

1970's French Strawberry Pie

Rosemary Pecans

Sweet and Tart Strawberry Salad

Banana-Peanut Butter Smoothie

Cranberry Pumpkin Muffins

Lavender Cookies

Mediterranean Chickpea Salad

Sensational Sirlion Kabobs

Creamy Dilled Cucumber Salad

Ultimate Chocolate Brownies

Berry Cheesecake Parfaits

Chicken Marsala

Fusion Hummus

Brown-Sugar Salmon with Strawberries

Baked Asparagus with Balsamic Butter Sauce

Peanut Butter Cookies IX

Lime Cilantro Rice

Rhubarb Muffins

Rhubarb Salsa

Greek Tzatziki

Mediterranean Chickpea Salad

I realized in making this list that I made two salads called Mediterranean Chickpea Salad, but they were quite different. It has been a lot of fun to try so many new recipes and discover lots of delicious dishes. We are looking forward to the next three months!

Mediterranean Meal

We tried two new recipes, recipes twenty-nine and thirty, for dinner last night, Greek Tzatziki and Mediterranean Chickpea Salad. Both were easy and delicious. One of the things I really appreciated about both of them was that I didn't have to do any cooking. I just cut things up and let them set in the fridge. So at dinner time, all I had to do was pull them out, add fresh tomato (the second from our plant!), and cut up the pita bread. It was a wonderful meal to have on such a hot day. And we really liked both of them. I did cut back by about half on the onion in the salad and the salt in the sauce.

Shields Family Reunion

We hit the road again Monday morning, heading to Las Vegas to meet up with my family. They were there with my mom's family for a family reunion. The weekend we were celebrating our anniversary, the family was in Las Vegas and on Monday the reunion moved to St. George. So Joshua and I met up with the family in Las Vegas and drove to St. George with them, where we toured Grandma's new house. Tuesday we all headed to Zion National Park and hiked the paved part of the Narrows trail. It was hot, but still beautiful.

We stopped and had a picnic lunch by the river.

At the end of the short hike, there was more time for wading and exploring before we headed back.

We got hot hiking back, so we stopped for ice cream at Zion Lodge.

The next morning, Nathan gave us a pancake making demo. The theme of the pancakes was dinosaurs, with movable jaws. 

All the kids were sitting on the couch together; apparently, this was quite photo worthy.

After Nathan finished making dinosaurs and some mustaches, other people got to try making some pancakes. Joshua made a palm tree.

The artists with their pancakes.

Pancake mustache picture.

After our leisurely pancake breakfast, we headed to a spot nearby where they have fossilized dinosaur footprints. 

Evan thought this T-Rex footprint was pretty impressive; I agreed.

There was a room full of activities where we had fun after looking at all the prints.

Back at the condos, Joshua and Nathan had a jam session after dinner.

A Shields family reunion wouldn't be complete without gingerbread!

Laura gave Michelle and I a belly dancing lesson Wednesday night.

Thursday Joshua and I headed up to Grandma's old house with Dad, Mom, Uncle Terry, and Aunt Alma. Grandma was getting rid a most of her old furniture and other household items, so we picked up a number of things. We also moved her office furniture down to her new house in St. George.

We got back to St. George late that night, but had time to eat dinner and say good bye to everyone.

We drove home Friday, making a stop to get doughnuts for national doughnut day.

It was a long day of driving and we were glad to arrive back at home, particularly when we discovered that our first tomato had ripened while we were gone! So we had tomato and cheese sandwiches for dinner.