Fresh Food

My favorite thing to do with lots and lots of garden tomatoes is make salsa!

This stuff is good enough to drink.

And we go through homemade salsa like gang busters.

(That's the phrase my mom always uses).

Chop tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, garlic, and your choice of hot peppers.

Drain or save excess tomato juice.

Add a bit of salt, pepper, garlic powder, cumin, chili powder, vinegar, lemon juice, and tomato paste to thicken it up.

I also added our favorite sauce "Jamaican Me Crazy" for extra spice!

Josie and I made bread together.

I'll let you guess which loaf was mine.

Broccoli Salad

This is my new favorite way to eat broccoli. I use a lot of broccoli (as in, I fill up the bowl --- not sure how much that is) and not as much dressing because I like that barely there taste. You can add whatever tasty embellishments you want.

• Broccoli
• 1/2 cup chopped red onion
• 4 pieces of crumbled bacon

Dressing

• 1/2 cup mayonnaise (or miracle whip - blechy)
• 2 TB sugar
• 2 TB white vinegar

Verde

Green eggs & ham and loads of watermelon

Rainbow Fruit Dessert

Waffles: So Much Better For Dinner Than Breakfast

After a cooking catastrophe earlier this week, India and I opted for waffles for dinner. And they were delicious.  And since we don't buy syrup and the Royer's didn't have any, I made homemade syrup (Brad offered to make some syrup since he didn't have any - it never dawned on me that you could make syrup. Stop making fun of me).  I can't tell you what it tasted like because I'm not a syrup person, but it made India happy and that's all I needed.

I don't think I'll ever like cooking.  What turns me off is the mess it creates.  And then when it doesn't taste good, I've wasted money and time.

In other news, I nearly left Maya on someone's doorstep this week. She's cutting four teeth and is as temperamental as carnivore on a banana-and-green-leafy-stuff diet.  If she had acted like this before her 1 year guarantee expired, she'd a been put up for adoption in Russia.  I'm not one of those unconditional lovin' mothers. Lucky for me and Maya we've got Ammon to save us from each other at the end of the day. I love my husband.

Aunt Elaine's Best Ever Waffles
2 cups flour                       2 eggs (seperated)
2 tsp baking powder         2 cups milk
pinch of salt                      1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp sugar                        6 TB oil

Seperate eggs. Add yolk to liquid ingredients. Beat in dry ingredietns. Beat eggs whites until soft peaks form. Fold into batter. Bake in preheated waffle iron.  ENJOY!  And thank you Grandma Parker for the deluxe waffle iron.  You have no idea how many times I use that thing.

Dessert Night

Maya enjoyed her first red vine with lots of friends and neighbors.

And here is the cake recipe that Ammon made - thanks Royers for introducing us to the best chocolate cake EVER!

1 pkg chocolate cake mix (without pudding in the mix)

4 eggs

3/4 cup vegetable oil

2 cups sour cream

1/2 cups liquid hazelnut coffee creamer

1 small pkg instant (regular flavored, not milk or white) chocolate pudding

6 oz semisweet chocolate chips

Mix all ingredients except chocolate chips until smooth. Add chocolate chips and pour into a sprayed bundt cake pan. Bake 1 hour until done at 350. Top with anything you like.