CSA #2

This past week flew by! Last Sunday, we divided and conquered our errands. My task was heading to Cub Foods while Mikey ran the brush pile down to the city mulch pile. Let me just say... Cub was so overwhelming! I was totally overstimulated and bought the wrong mushrooms and the wrong chicken stock. Thankfully, Mikey rolled with it and still managed to make delicious Pork Lo Mein:
He used up the bok choy from last week's CSA delivery and picked up some Pastures A Plenty pork from the Coop.
While at Cub, I totally stocked up on veggies and fruit for this week. I had this monster of a salad (lettuce, red pepper, tomato, sprouts, avocado, onion, cucumber) and a juicy nectarine one night:
On Wednesday, our second CSA delivery arrived.
Here's this week's loot...
?? Napa Cabbage perhaps:

Kale:
Spinach:
Butter lettuce:
I also stopped at the UMD Farmers Market and picked up this:
Our favorite jam (though it appears I made another shopping snafu and got jelly instead of jam).
The coffee is a french roast/sumatra blend made by a lady from Cloquet. The verdict? Very tasty and robust! I've really enjoyed it the past 2 days.

The veggie love fest continued with delicious sandwiches packed for lunch:
and some cantaloupe:
I've been smearing the avocado on the bread (in lieu of mayo or mustard) for both flavor and holding power. It's really helping me not be hungry an hour later.

I had a really busy week at work with Grand Opening events for 2 new buildings on campus- the Bagley Outdoor Classroom on Tuesday and the Civil Engineering Legislative Luncheon today. After an exhausting week, I decided to treat myself to this:

Oh goodness... it's my new favorite! Coffee flavored ice cream is my favorite and this was beyond awesome. AND, Target had it on sale for $2.50!! Such a good end to the week:)

Grandma's Marathon

It was Race Day today! I was up at 6:40 and was out of the house by 6:50. I stopped at Great Harvest Bread on my walk down to the race and picked up breakfast. I met Nikki in front of Fitgers at 7:20 and we settled in for the race. It was a lovely morning with a temp of about 60 degrees and a 15mph wind. Mile markers 24 (for the full) and 11 (for the half) were in front of Fitgers and so there was a water station and a DJ playing some tunes:


The Half Marathon started at 6:30am. I knew a handful of people that would be running the Half. Henry was by far the speediest of the group finishing in 1:20:00!! That is incredible considering the winning time was 1:04:24! This was Henry's personal record... we nearly missed him as we weren't expecting him so soon:
The Rod (fitness coordinator at UMD):
Christyn May (assistant volleyball coach at UMD and recent winner of a body building contest):
Ed Fuhs (part of the Rec Sports family at UMD):
Stacy Loberg (our college buddy):
All smiles after the race:
The water station workers got all the H2O cups cleared out of the road just in time for the full marathon runners to arrive.
Here are the male leaders for the full marathon:
and the female leader:
The winning times for the male & female racers were 2:15:44 and 2:31:35 respectively.

I didn't stick around for all of the marathon runners as I wanted to get back home to awake the Sleeping Bear. On my walk back home I swung by the 14th Ave Farmers Market to get some more cooking herbs. Unfortunately, I think it's too late in the season to get starter plants. All was not lost however as I managed to find some chocolate and lavender hand soap.

I woke Mikey up and we had lunch together and then he was off to work and I took a nap! It was a great day! I even got the canine princess out for a walk this evening.

I neglected to show you Mikey's cooking project from last weekend:
He made a stock pot of homemade spaghetti sauce. We used up some tomatoes that we froze from last year's harvest as well as some chicken & beef bones that were in the freezer. There was lots of pureeing and straining and simmering... for 24 hours! It made for some awesome leftovers all week!

greens

It's the start of my weekend! I love working four 10-hour shifts during the summer.
Our weekly produce deliveries from Northern Harvest Farm started yesterday. We'll be getting deliveries every week from now until mid-October.
There is also a Farmers Market at UMD every Wednesday where I get some of my favorite things in the summer.
Wednesdays are like Christmas all summer long!
Tonight I put this dinner together with some of our Wednesday treats:

-Maple Cinnamon Almond Butter that I made last night
-Gooseberry jam from the Farmers Market
-Spinach, lettuce & broccoli from the Farm
-Greek dressing that Mikey made last night

It was the perfect light summer meal.

For our CSA, we split a produce box with Nikki and Henry and this is what we got this week:
Lots of spinach:
Bok Choy & Lettuce:
The little broccoli that could:
We live in Zone 3 for plant hardiness and so it takes a while for the plants to get going. It's pretty amazing that these farmers even have produce for us in June. They have quite a few greenhouses to expedite the process. We hope to attend some of the Farm festivities this summer (member potluck, farm tour, etc) to see what it takes to pull this off. I'll be sure to take some pics.

I also got a few things at the farmers market...
Shade loving Begonias for our garden:
Parsley:
Lots of basil:
Our attempt to start our own seeds this year did not go well and so we had to buy these starters. I'm hoping to get some more cooking herbs (rosemary, thyme, cilantro & tarragon) this weekend at our neighborhood farmers market (2 blocks from our house). I really appreciate living and working close to such great resources.

I'll be rising early on Saturday morning for Grandma's Marathon. I'm not running it but a number of our friends are so I'll be out cheering them on. I am however thinking of running the Midnight Sun 5k next week. I hope I can get Mikey to join me!

june dinner club

It's been a busy couple of weeks here. The highlight was hosting dinner club last Sunday. After following me around all afternoon (she loves to help me clean), Annie caught some zzz's prior to the party:
Around Noon, Bruce dropped off his ingredients for the appetizer and some Crispin ciders:
while Mikey got the slaw sweating:


and meticulously cut up a pineapple for me (20 minute process):
We have a Memorial Day-ish tradition of making sangria to kick off the summer. This year I used strawberries, lemons, oranges and pineapple:
They were a hit!
The party started off with fried wonton chips and dips from Nellie & Bruce:
The red dip was pickled cabbage with soy sauce. The orange dip was an Asian carrot dip. I can't recall what was in white and green dip but it was kind of like hummus. I'm over-simplifying the descriptions but they all had a distinct flavor and did a great job of awakening our palettes:

Next I pulled out a graduation gift (German Riesling) that I've been waiting to share with friends:
While we were all enjoying the appetizer, Mikey was hard at work making Soy-Ginger Scallop Ceviche. The scallops were "cooked" by the acid of some lime juice for a half hour. I was pleasantly surprised by the buttery texture of the scallop. The combination of the cucumbers with the soy ginger sauce tasted so fresh!
We all took our Ceviche outside to the porch so that we could hang with Mikey while he grilled the main course:
I tried getting the group to give me their best gangsta pose and it led to quite a few laughs:
This was their best effort:
Just as the sun was setting, we headed inside for the main course. Mikey made Asian themed chicken burgers and slaw:
There was some spice in the burgers but it was mellowed by the peanut butter coconut milk dressing. The peanut coconut theme was carried over to the sauce on the slaw. Everybody loved it and Kaija said it was the best slaw she had ever tasted!!

Nikki & Henry were in charge of dessert and started it off with a milk chocolate tasting. Nikki had 4 brands of chocolate that she placed in each person's mouth one at a time. We were required to close our eyes while she placed the chocolate in our mouth and then write our impression of each one. Dean came out of the chocolate closet and identified the BRANDS of 3 out of the 4 chocolates! Who knew? He and and Kaija are chocolate connoisseurs. The only chocolate he didn't identify was the sugar-free sample and that was only because they don't eat sugar-free chocolate. We were all very impressed and it was a lot of fun!
After the chocolate tasting, Nikki presented the actual dessert:

She let the frozen berries thaw for 15 minutes just to the point where they were sweating. Meanwhile, she made a sauce by heating up a Ghirardelli white chocolate bar and mixing in 1 1/2 cups heavy cream. The sauce was poured over the berries for a hot-cold effect. Nikki said the dessert was inspired by a Barefoot Contessa recipe. It was divine.
Nikki also brought this 2002 Pinot:

It was robust but very smooth. I LOVE Oregon Pinots!
Henry was traveling for work and so Nikki didn't have a partner for the photo shoot but she did a great job flying solo:
We missed you Henry!

Kaija & Dean provided a lot of humor:
Nellie and Bruce told some great stories:
and we had a blast being the hosts:

We LOVE entertaining guests! It'll be autumn the next time we host dinner club.

This past week I had book club on Tuesday (love those gals) and then we went to Mike's co-worker's 50th birthday party last night. Have I mentioned how much I love having my nights and weekends free again?? Last night at the birthday party there was a well known Duluth band called Two Many Banjos providing the entertainment. Mike's co-worker lives on Skyline Drive and so we got to watch ships come in to the harbor while listening to the band, sipping wine and eating really good food. It was a spectacular evening and so much fun to hang out together.
I'm back to being "widowed" for the weekend. Mikey works Fri-Sun and so I'm hoping to get motivated to do a few small house projects. We both cannot wait for vacation in 3 weeks. We're both a little burnt out with work and looking forward to a change in scenery.
Cheers to summer!!