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photo by Sheri Dixon

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Garden Fresh Goodness Squelches Mental Meltdown

Today was a special day- the first batch of sauce from our garden tomatoes.

I fully understand that by September (with any luck) I'll be thoroughly sick of saucing tomatoes, but this first batch is always magic.

It's actually ridiculously easy to make tomato sauce, so easy there's not even a written recipe for it, and the amounts of the ingredients can be adjusted to taste without any problem at all.

Fresh Tomato Sauce

tomatoes (I used a mix of cherry tomatoes, romas and yellow cherries)
fresh onion (I used yellow)
fresh garlic
fresh basil
brown sugar

Cut the tomatoes into pieces- 6 pieces for the romas, halved for the cherries- and place in large saucepan- start simmering
Chop the onion into medium chunks and mince the garlic- add to pan
Tear the basil leaves and add to the mix
Add a few pinches of brown sugar and stir

Simmer and cook down till the onion is transparent and tender
Pour it all into a blender and chop till it's more "saucelike" in appearance and less like a pan of veggies- very important step for a house with children

Serve over spaghetti noodles (tossed with olive oil) and fresh grated cheese and

Garlic Bread

medium loaves of french bread, sliced lengthwise, then in half (quartered)
melted butter/olive oil- half of each
minced fresh garlic, added to melty stuff
fresh basil
shredded cheese

Spoon the melty/garlic mix onto the cut sides of the bread
Sprinkle with fresh chopped basil and shredded cheese
Bake at 350 till just barely browned

If you anticipate a VERY difficult day, make a pre-emptive strike to finish off dinner with

Fresh Peach Frozen Custard

Make the custard-
1c sugar
1/6c flour
3c milk (if you have goats milk, that's best)

Stir together sugar and flour in a saucepan and add the milk- cook till thickened slightly and just barely boiling.

Add 3 beaten eggs (stir a small amount of the hot milk into the eggs first, then pour the eggs back into the milk and stir very quickly to avoid curdling). cook till thickened and of a custard consistency.

Chill for at least 3 hours- take this time to be sure you've got your ice cream freezer parts ready to go including ice/rock salt etc.

Spoon chilled custard into ice cream maker, add 1 1/2c heavy cream and 1 1/2c pureed fresh peaches (taste best when from a friend's tree) with 1/4c sugar added and freeze as directed.

Wait! Before you run off to a scrumptious dinner/dessert, don't you want to hear all about my horrible day?

I'll tell you anyway.

The cancer doctor's office called. The cancer doctor who made the July appointments for Ward's scans and bloodwork FOUR MONTHS AGO- appointments (let me repeat) that were made by the doctor's office, not at our request.

Appointments that we've built all our other post-surgical appointments to coincide with.

That doctor's office called (just a few weeks before these appointments) to say "I'm very sorry, but Dr. HXXXX is going to be out of town all of July and we need to reschedule for August".

Really. No shit.

That's FINE.

It's not like I've made hotel reservations, or made arrangements for work, or made sure we've got a farm-sitter for those days.

Oh. Wait.

Well, then, at least it's not like we might be having to pack up our entire house and MOVE in August.

Oh. Wait.

Close on the tail of that lovely information, I went shopping. For myself. For new...undergarments.

But it's OK- because undergarment shopping is a joy since all sizes in all brands universally coincide, and all those little darlings that look so divine on the rack look even BETTER on my real-life, gravity-challenged aging female body. Especially in the attractive lighting of the dressing rooms.

I need more ice cream...

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