Life Guard on Duty

Now that it is spring and the weather is getting warmer, Nathan and I decided to have a pool put in. Yes, a swimming pool with water. So grab your sunscreen and noodles!




Here is a picture of Duncan enjoying the water.

Note the fancy waterfall feature.

And here is Nathan on duty.

Salsa update

I have been busy trying out salsa recipes - no ulcers yet. Here are a few that I really liked.

Salsa Mexicana
2 T. finely diced white onion
8 Roma tomatoes, diced
2 serrano chiles, finely diced, with seeds
2 T. finely chopped fresh cilantro
1 t. sugar
1 T. fresh lime juice

Place the onion in a strainer and rinse with hot water and drain. Combine all ingredients. Add more sugar if the tomatoes are to acidic. Refrigerate at least 30 mins. before serving.

Tomatillo-Avocado Salsa
1 lb. tomatillos (about 15) husked, rinsed and chopped
1 avocado roughly chopped
1 serrano chile, with seeds
3/4 c. fresh cilantro leaves
2 T. fresh lime juice
1 t. salt

Place all ingredients in a food processor and puree.

Fire-Roasted Tomato Chipotle Salsa
1/4 cup plus 1 T. virgin olive oil
1/2 onion chopped
2 lbs. Roma tomatoes, blackened
4 t. finely minced roasted garlic
1/2 c. minced fresh cilantro
4 chipotle chiles en adobo, chopped
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 T. salt
1 t. sugar

Heat a T. of olive oil in pan until lightly smoking. Add onion and saute until caramelized. Transfer the onion, half the blackened tomatoes, and garlic to a food processor and pulse until finely chopped. Add the cilantro and chipotle chiles and pulse again.
Peel, seed, and chop the remaining tomatoes and fold in together with the remaining 1/4 c. olive oil, vinegar, salt, sugar, and other tomatoe mixture.

Avocado-Serrano Salsa
2 large avocados chopped
1/4 c. fresh lime juice
1 Roma tomato diced
3 T. minced red onion
4 t. minced serrano chile, with seeds
2 t. minced cilantro
1 1/2 t. salt

Carefully fold all the ingredients together in a mixing bowl.

And finally...

Tomatillo Salsa Verde
1 lb. tomatillos husked, rinsed, and roughly chopped
3 serrano chiles, with seeds
3/4 c. fresh cilantro leaves
2 T. fresh lime juice
1 t. sugar
1 t. salt

Place all the ingredients in a food processor and puree.

Ole!

So I mentioned that we had a pinata - and not just any pinata. A really hideous one that looks, well like a poor Mexican horse. Ha! Why you ask? We had a ward birthday party and each month had it's own table and was suppose to be decorated. My friend and I were in charge of May and decided on a Cinco De Mayo theme. It turned out pretty cute with a fajita bar, sombreros, jalapenos, and of course the coup de grace a huge donkey pinata with a sombrero on! (which I got an awesome deal on! Did you know you can haggle with the checkers at WalMart?! I didn't either until my friend suggested it while I was checking out. But that is another story.) As I was carrying this eye sore around the church, the following conversation took place:

Me: I have no idea what I am going to do with this thing after all of this is over.

Friend: Ha, keep it and we can have a joint birthday party with it.

Bishopric wife: (very casually) Oh, well you can keep it and have naked pinata night with your husband.

Me: What? (not so much a what as in "Oh, what is that? That sounds nice." more of a "Say whaaat?")

Bishopric wife: You know, you, Nathan, no clothes, and the pinata. It could be lots of fun.

Ok, I was not offended by this comment, I thought it to be quite hilarious. However, our friends don't seem to be interested in having game night at our house...

I present to you El Burro, our current center piece in the kitchen.

Happiness does not come from a jar!

I Y salsa! Yes, I do. Not the nasty Pace stuff in a jar, but homemade with tomatoes, cilantro, onions, and all those good things. If I were to get a paper cut, I would bleed salsa. Nathan can attest to my addiction. (Addiction...such an ugly word. Let's go back to I Ysalsa! Yes, I like that much better.) Today while meandering through the library, I came across a little book called "The Great Salsa Book." Just reading the title had me salivating. I checked it out and have decided that it would be silly of me to try out multiple recipes with just the two of us eating oodles of salsa in one sitting. (Tempting but I think it would kill Nathan) Instead, I think I will have friends over for fajitas and a salsa bar. Perhaps, a joint Cinco de Mayo themed birthday party even though neither of our birthdays are the 5th? I even have a pinata! (I'll tell you all about that in another post.) I'll keep you posted on the details. Until then, happy salsa sampling to me :)

Swimming Lessons

Last weekend, we took Duncan to Cherry Creek State Park. For those of you not familiar with the area, this park is a HUGE off leash dog park along the Cherry Creek about 15 minutes from our house. We thought that we could exhaust the pooch and enjoy the nice spring weather walking around the park. Up until this day, Duncan had yet to go swimming -- baths don't really count. When we found an area that had other dogs playing in the creek, we told Duncan to go play. He was a little hesitant to run around in the water, but quickly decided that it was doggy heaven. Of course, it wouldn't be a true day at the park without a wet doggy shaking all over you! Eww! After a while of frolicking, we walked a little farther and found a marshy area with a pond. I thought to myself, "I wonder if he would swim if I threw a stick in the deep area where he would have to doggy paddle?" I picked up a stick, threw it in, and and told Duncan to go get it. He looked at me like, "Lady, if you wanted the stick, why did you throw it in to the middle of the pond?" He took a few steps into the water, doggy paddled for about 10 seconds, turned around, grabbed the closest stick to him and promptly got out of the water. He looked so pleased with himself that 1. he swam for the first time 2. he retrieved a stick 3. he thought he had out smarted us and we didn't notice that it wasn't the stick. We got a pretty good laugh out of it. Anyone out there give doggy paddling lessons? :)