Dining Al Fresco

Enjoying the gorgeous weather today by eating out on the front patio. We both took the day off to put final touches on the house; Kansas City Friends are arriving to help celebrate my 30th birthday.

Do you see the new patio rug?  Chris wanted a brighter one.  We compromised by getting new bright blue cushions for the chairs and I spray painted a terra cotta pot to add some color.

Got Batteries?

Sears is offering a $5 gift card for every automotive, lawn and garden, marine or power sport battery taken to a Sears Auto Center to be recycled.

Tebowie (Tim Tebow + David Bowie)

Tim Tebow got traded to the Jets.  Hopefully we will never blog about him again, but these Tebowie videos by Jimmy Fallon are pretty darn funny.  

Make Your Own Refried Beans

This summer we received a couple bags of dried Peruvian beans in our CSA share.  Yesterday I made refried beans with them.  It was super easy and I was able to use my new stick blender to mash them up.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 onion, peeled and halved
• 2 cups dry pinto beans, rinsed
• ½ fresh jalapeno or other hot pepper, seeded and chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• ¾ teaspoons salt
• ½ teaspoon black pepper
• One big pinch of cumin
• 6 cups water

DIRECTIONS

1. Combine all ingredients in slow cooker.
2. Cook on high for 8 hours or overnight while you are sleeping.
3. Remove the bigger onion chunks and drain the excess liquid. If desired, save excess liquid until the final product is desired consistency.
4. Mash remaining beans with a potato masher and voila! You have homemade refried beans.

http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/2011/08/29/recipe-easy-slow-cooker-refried-beans/ 

Spring Cleaning!

We did quite a bit around the house this weekend.  On Saturday, Chris cut and bundled all of the branches from the tree/bush next to the house that succumbed to the snow this winter.  They are at the curb for garbage pick up tomorrow.  Erica cleaned out all of the front flower beds and pruned the shrub roses.

Today we completed our Sunday morning ritual of coffee and Sunday ads.  Then off to Lowe's, Echter's (neighborhood lawn and garden center), and finally Target.  We got home, put away all of our purchases and got to work on the second downstairs bedroom.  

This is what it looks like after 5 hours of work.  I know you must think we are joking, but before we started, you couldn't even walk into the room.  So, we are pretty happy with the way things look right now.  We have started to accumulate a nice pile of garage sale items, and the most exciting part is we finally found our board games!  We were looking for them over Christmas without any luck.  The funny part is we own the game Farkel, which we played last weekend, and at the time didn't think we had ever heard of it.

Bookcliff Winery

Yesterday we both called it an early day at the office and headed to Boulder for a wine tasting and tour of Bookcliff Winery.  All of their wines are made from 100% Colorado grapes.  We left with a bottle of Friday's Folly and Ensemble, both red blends.

We also had food from the Heirloom Food Truck which was parked outside.  The staff at the winery helped us pair wine with our food.  We shared a Banh Mi Sandwich (on the right) and Frybread with Duck Confit.  

After the wine tasting, we headed next door to Upslope Brewing for a beer or two.  It was a nice little evening.

We Yurted this Weekend

We got up bright and early on Saturday morning and drove into Poudre Canyon outside of Fort Collins to spend a weekend in a yurt at Colorado State Forest State Park with 2 other couples.

The yurt was .3 miles from the parking area.

There were 3 bunks, a table and chairs, a wood stove and a small cooking area.  No electricity, no water.  An outhouse was around the back of the yurt.

Snowshoeing

We went out snowshoeing for about 4 hours on Saturday afternoon.  Great weather.

The Yurt at Night

The view from the Yurt at sunset:

We ate dinner by candlelight and then played games and drank wine until midnight.  There was a little propane stove top for cooking.  2 new games we had never played before, but really liked were Farkel (dice) and Mexican Train (dominoes).

Night at the Symphony

Tonight we saw Guster with The Colorado Symphony.  It was a good show.  People were out of their seats dancing, not something you usually see at the symphony.  You could tell that Guster was not used to having to wait for other players or to be counted into a song.  They played a lot of new songs that we were not familiar with.  We were hoping for more old stuff that we know and love.

Tulips are Up!

I planted about 60 white and red/white tulips last fall in our front flower beds and totally forgot about them until today.

Homemade Chicken Stock

I made my first whole chicken in the crock pot yesterday.  

I strained 8+ cups of chicken stock out of the crock pot this morning.  After cleaning all the meat off the chicken bones last night (and preserving the wishbone), all of the bones went back into the crock pot with the onions that had cooked with the chicken initially.  I also added a bunch of dried parsley from this summer, filled the crock almost to the top with water, turned it on low and went to bed.  

The house smelled really good this morning!  Once these containers cool a bit more, they are heading to the freezer until needed.

I got this "recipe" right here at 100 Days of Real Food.

The Whole Chicken

Threw this whole chicken recipe in the crock pot around 2 o'clock this afternoon.  We attempted a run around the lake today, but it was extremely windy.  Erica was all wheezy from the cold air and wind.  Chris has since caught a runny nose.  Super hot showers, reading on the couch snuggled up in blankets sipping tea, and watching movies from the library took up the rest of the afternoon.

The chicken just finished cooking and we had chicken and vegetables for dinner.  Chris liked the little bite from the cayenne.  Erica is now trying to talk Chris into leaving the house for Little Man ice cream.

The bones will be saved from the chicken to make chicken stock in the crock pot as well.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 teaspoons paprika
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon thyme
• ½ teaspoon garlic powder
• ¼ teaspoon cayenne (red) pepper
• ¼ teaspoon black pepper
• 1 onion
• 1 large chicken

DIRECTIONS

1. Combine the dried spices in a small bowl.
2. Loosely chop the onion and place it in the bottom of the slow cooker.
3. Remove any giblets from the chicken and then rub the spice mixture all over. You can even put some of the spices inside the cavity and under the skin covering the breasts.
4. Put prepared chicken on top of the onions in the slow cooker, cover it, and turn it on to high. There is no need to add any liquid.
5. Cook for 4 – 5 hours (for a 3 or 4 pound chicken) or until the chicken is falling off the bone. 

http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/2011/02/25/recipe-the-best-whole-chicken-in-a-crock-pot/