Tasty Tuesday

 It's officially fall and you know what that means.....yes....Soup Season!!!!!

 Don't get me wrong I love summer and everything it has to offer(swimming, great weather and tons of fresh fruit and vegetables)but it's nice to cool down a bit, so I can enjoy these warm and inexpensive meals.

 

Today I want to give a big Tasty Tuesday shout out to......Black Bean Soup!!!

 

First I want to apologize for not having my recipe together-this recipe is so easy, I sometimes forget to write down my measurements.  I'm a pinch here, pinch there, type of cook. I pretty much eyeball to make a lot of my soups.

What am I saying, this is pretty much how I cook all the time.

Let me stop with all the chatter and get to the recipe.

 

Well....let's get it....let's go!!

 

Ingredients

1 (16oz pkg) of dried black beans(cook accordingly) or 2 cans of black beans

1 can of diced tomatoes

5-6 cloves of garlic, minced

1 large onion diced

2 celery stalks, chopped

2-3 large carrots chopped

1 can (14.5 oz) of chicken broth or vegetable broth

 bacon, turkey or ham (optional)

2 tbsp. of olive oil if not using bacon

If using bacon, sautée garlic, onions celery and carrots in the bacon fat.

Season to taste

 

Directions

In a pot heat up the black beans and broth together.

Bring to a light boil, and cover.

Heat up the 2tbsp. of olive oil and cook the garlic, onions, celery and carrots (season to taste)

As the veggies cook down, this is the time to add any of the meat if your using it.

Use your own discretion to how much meat to add, you can also reserve some of the bacon as a topping for the soup if you want.

Now turn your beans back on and lightly drain the can of dice tomatoes and the sautéed veggies and meat to the pot.

Season to taste and bring everything to a boil.

Let soup cool down a bit.

Pour soup into blender and blend until smooth or consistency you like.

Pour mixture back into pot to heat up.

 

And there you have it....Black Bean Soup!!!

 

Now you can garnish your soup with cheddar cheese and a dollop of sour cream or whatever floats your boat.

 

Hope you enjoy!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Quote of the Week

A Rainy Saturday

It's a rainy day here in Atlanta and it's time to get my Sorry Slider on.
I love playing this game despite having no wins in the column. Who knows...today might be the day. Wish me luck!
-Shelly

Mushrooms in Front Yard

Wished I knew how to identify the many types of mushrooms. I found a few clusters growing in my front yard yesterday, and three weeks ago there were tons growing around the neighborhood. One of my neighbors had these huge dark mushrooms growing in her front yard, that I thought were absolutely beautiful looking.

The mushrooms in my yard aren't as fabulous looking as my neighbors dark shrooms, but I'm still fascinated with the cluster of fungi growing in my yard.

Honestly, if I knew they were safe, I wouldn't have any problem with collecting them for dinner. Since they can't be Identified by me, I'll have to be an admirer.

Can you identify these shrooms from the picture?

-Shelly

Womp...Womp...Womp

A few weeks back, I shared a post called "A Tale of Two Pumpkins." I  showed the difference between one pumpkin that was struggling with powdery mildew and another pumpkin that wasn't being crippled with any disease or fungus.

In that post you could see the tremendous difference between the two plants, the powdery mildew suffering plant was losing leaves and beginning to look a little shriveled up. I seriously thought about pulling the plant up and just discarding it, but I wanted to see if it could be saved. So, I made a mixture of baking soda, olive oil, and water to see if I could save the plant.

When I started using the mixture, it actually didn't seem like it was working, but eventually I finally got some new growth and the plant looks a lot healthier. Now the real issue is, it's so late in the gardening season that I probably won't be getting any pumpkins from this plant.

The "healthy" pumpkin plant 

 

It's pretty safe to say, that I probably won't get any pumpkins this year because my "healthy" plant that had flower buds on it and all--had a broken stem. I tried to save the plant, by trying to make a splint with a pencil and piece of stretchy orange cloth...but I don't think it worked. 

 

The last two pictures show what my "healthy" plant looks like now.

Yes looks like, I won't get pumpkins from this plant either, so this gardening project gets a big fat Fail.

 

That's okay, I'll have better luck next year and more growing time too.

-Shelly

The break/bend in the healthy plant

My attempt to make a splint

 

Happy Fall

Tasty Tuesday

Thought I would highlight a salad since it's the last official day of summer.

I don't know about you, but I love all the endless possibilities that come with making a salad.

This salad doesn't have the usual wow factor of some of the salads I usually make,but hey...its still delish!

The key players in this dish are:

Red Leaf Lettuce and Romaine Lettuce

Sauteed Green Beans

Grilled Onions

Baby Carrots

A few slices of Cucumber

1/2 of an Avocado

Your favorite salad dressing

Quote Of The Week

Tasty Tuesday: Hummus and Kale Wrap

Today's Tasty Tuesday Treat Is.....A Hummus and Kale Wrap. This is an absolutely delicious wrap.  I also like to call this my clean out the fridge wrap or the leftover wrap because a lot of the things pictured in the photo are leftovers.

My Ingredients

Burrito wrap

Leftover sautéed Kale cooked with garlic

Hummus

sour cream (not in photo, but I did add it after I took the picture)

grilled onions

sliced tomatoes 

 

You can use the ingredients that I used or you can just mix up your ingredients. Fill up your wrap as much as you want(just give yourself enough room to be able to roll your wrap up).

 

Oh, before I forget...I'm going to share a little secret with you about how I cooked the Kale. You don't have to cook it this way, but my husband couldn't get enough of this Kale when I could it this particular way. Are you ready?

Well....here goes....I sautéed the Kale and garlic with the leftover fat from hamburgers that we cooked two days earlier. I sometimes skim the leftover fat from the meat to help save on buying olive oil all the time( I bake a lot and use a lot of olive oil and butter) and also to bring some rich flavors to food from time to time.

That was my little secret about the sautéed kale in the photo, but I hope you enjoy today's recipe.

Have a delicious Tuesday and always remember to keep growing!

 

 

Quote of the Week

Trying to Get Motivated

Good Morning Blogosphere!!! Here I sit at the computer eating leftover spaghetti for breakfast( I couldn't wait until lunch time)trying to decide if I'm going outside to work in the garden and the front yard today.

While I have a rain free moment, I really should get out and at least map out what I want to do for the front yard at least, but my body just won't get up and go. My spirit is calling for some outside time and my mind is just swirling with a boat load of ideas for what to plant in the front yard. This will be the first time I've ever planted anything in the front yard, so yeah I'm really excited about planting in this area.

Still trying to figure out if I want to plant a few greens in the front yard or just plan to put tulips in the front yard. I'm not planning to use all of my front yard up for this task, just a small area close to the house.

The more I'm sitting here thinking about this stuff.....the more motivated I'm getting.

I think I'm ready to head outside, if not plant, harvest or clip things, more so to layout my plans.


-peace


Keep Growing!!!

Tasty Tuesday

This week's recipe is one my mother would make occasionally for dinner, Ground Beef and Rice w/gravy.

 

Instead of ground beef, I'll be using turkey instead. Don't get me wrong, I love the ground beef version, but turkey was on sale, so I'm going with turkey on this one.

 

 Ingredients

3 lbs. of ground turkey

1 onion diced

3 garlic cloves

4 cups of cold water

2  2/3 cups of flour

salt and pepper to taste

 

Directions

First start on your rice and cook 4 cups of brown rice accordingly to package.

After you've gotten your rice cooked or started on, you can start cooking the ground turkey.

Add your turkey to a medium heated skillet and cook for about 5 minutes and then add your onions, garlic and salt and pepper at this time.

Cook all ingredients together until turkey meat is no longer pink and onions and garlic are translucent.

Now turn off your stove top and strain your meat if it isn't very lean, but if it doesn't have a lot of fat excess then just leave it(let's say a tablespoon of fat), it will add lots of good flavor to the gravy.

Place strained turkey, garlic and onions back into skillet and let it sit to cool off.

While meat is cooling down, it's time to make the gravy. 

 

The Goods for the Gravy

4 cups of cold water

2  2/3 cups of  flour

mix until flour has no lumps in the mixture

 

You can adjust your mixture if need be, but .

If you want a thicker gravy add more flour, thinner gravy less flour.

 

 

Now, that the gravy is made, you can turn your focus back to the cooked ground turkey with the onions and garlic. Taste to see if the meat is seasoned well, if not add your seasonings to taste. After adjusting the seasonings turn the stove back on to a medium heat, and pour the flour and water mixture over the ground turkey, make sure the water mixture fully covers the meat. Stir mixture slowly allowing it to bubble a little, taste to see if seasonings are still on point and adjust accordingly if need be. If the taste is the good then it is ready to serve over a plate of rice. Remember to scoop up all that good gravy.

 

 

 

The other players on my plate were leftover cream corn and sautéed zucchini. #Iloveleftovers #nofoodthrownaway,#leftoversaregood

 

 

Quote of the Week

Green Beans Still Flowering