Something Green for St. Patrick's Day

It's tradition to eat, drink or wear something green to celebrate St. Patrick's Day.  I'd like to share a delicious salad recipe full of flavor and plenty of green for you to enjoy as you celebrate the holiday.  

                                              Warm Apple Pistachio Spinach Salad

    3 tablespoons butter

        2 cups chopped crisp apples, unpeeled (about 2 medium apples)

        1 teaspoon ginger

        1 cup shelled roasted pistachios

        2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

        1 package (5 ounces) fresh baby spinach

        1 cup goat cheese

        Optional-honey to drizzle over salad

     In a large skillet, melt butter over medium to medium-high heat. Add apples and ginger; cook and stir until apples soften and begin to caramelize, 3-5 minutes. Stir in pistachios and Dijon mustard. Reduce heat, cover, simmer 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

 Place spinach on a serving platter (or individual salad plates). Pour two-thirds of apple mixture over spinach. Sprinkle goat cheese on apple mixture; top with remaining apple mixture. 

 

 

I hope you enjoy a very special St. Patrick's Day.  I'd like to conclude by sharing part of a prayer from St. Patrick.  You can find the entire prayer if you click here.

Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,

Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,

Christ on my right, Christ on my left,

Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down,

Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,

Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks of me,

Christ in the eye that sees me,

Christ in the ear that hears me.

 

 

Do You Wanna Build a Snowman?

We are getting hit by the fourth snow event in two weeks and I just had to take advantage of the wet snow by building a snowman.    I don’t remember the last time I made a snowman because when it snows here my time is spent moving the snow out of the way.    My husband is especially sensitive to songs like “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas”  and “Let it snow” because snow means more work.  

  

While many folks enjoyed Super Bowl XLIX in
the warmth of their homes, we were moving snow
from early in the morning until late that night. We
called it Super Snow Sunday.  We finished in time to
 enjoy the last few minutes of the game with a bowl of chili.

When we get a snow event there are several jobs that have to be done.  First the roads must be cleared so that the feedtruck and vehicles can get around.   The next job is getting the bunks clean.  We have a very nice piece of equipment that makes this job much easier than when we had to scoop them all with a shovel.  The bunk blower works well unless you get really wet snow.  Really wet snow usually melts or it has to be scooped.  

After the cattle are fed and cared for we get to work removing the snow or piling the snow that is in their pens.   The snow eventually gets hauled out so that the pens can stay dry.  When we get wet snow we keep the cement areas cleaned off and put some type of bedding material down so they have a dry place to lie down.

Steve is box scraping snow from the cement pads.

I have always been amazed at how quickly cattle adjust to weather changes.  They seem to adjust the quickest to cold weather.  Cattle are often seen running around in the snow, kicking up their heels and playing like children.   My favorite sight to see is when they are laying down soaking up the warm sun on a cold day.

Cattle enjoying a dry place to lay and sunshine.  The metal
windbreak provides additional protection from cold winds.

One of our favorite meals to enjoy on a cold day is chili soup.  I have a recipe that has gone over very well with our family and when used at large gatherings.  Here is my recipe: 

Game Day Chili

2-pounds ground beef

1-46 ounce can tomato juice

1-27 ounce can Bush’s Chili Beans

2-tablespoons chili powder

2-tablespoons onion flakes

Brown the ground beef with onion flakes. Turn crock pot on high and pour in tomato juice and beans.  Drain hamburger and add to crock pot. Sprinkle chili powder on top and stir mixture.  Leave on high for 1 hour or low for several hours. Toppings that go well are shredded cheddar cheese with crackers or corn chips.  It is a tradition in our community to serve cinnamon rolls with chili soup. 

I am joined by my husband, Steve, granddaughter, Ella,
daughter, Ginger and son-in-law, Casey for a chili supper.

My husband enjoyed my snowman made of snow, insulators, caps from spray cans and whatever else I could find around our shop.  Our dog also enjoyed time to play in the snow!   Having a playful attitude helps to relieve some of the stress weather can bring! 

 

Our Bichon, Zoey, loves the snow and after playing it looks
like she has a snow moustache! 

Do you have snow?  Doyou wanna build a snowman?  How about a nice, hot bowl of Chili?

Soup's On!

I would love to share with you one of my favorite soups!  This soup is perfect because it is flexible.  You can substitute vegetables according to what you have on hand and it can be available to eat whenever the meal is needed.  Since I tend to make it on snow days I call it my Beef Blizzard Soup!

 

Ingredients:

2 pounds lean ground beef

¼ cup chopped onion

4 medium potatoes, peeled

2 cups cut up carrots

2 cups frozen peas

2 cups frozen corn

3 tsp beef base

Start with a pot of water with about 8 cups of water in it.  Put it on the stove on high heat and wait for it to boil.  While the water is heating put the hamburger and chopped onion in a skillet and brown on medium heat. 

The carrots and potatoes are in the boiling water.

While the water is heating put the hamburger and chopped onion in a skillet and brown on medium heat.

This is one of my favorite
kitchen tools from Pampered
Chef.  I used it to brown my
hamburger and mix the soup.

Once the water is boiling put the carrots in.  Wait five minutes and add the potatoes.  Allow to gently boil for about 10 minutes.  You will have to adjust the time according to how big your pieces are.  I like mine to be small so that hot potato bite doesn’t burn the tongue.  

I love to use the frozen sweet corn I have from my 2012 garden.
I didn't have as much luck growing peas so I buy those!

When the hamburger is browned spread the frozen corn over it and turn down to low heat allowing the corn to soften. 

I am only using two pans for this meal!

Add the frozen peas to the boiling water mix for around 5 minutes.  Next add three heaping teaspoons of beef base.  We use “Better than Bullion”.  Stir until dissolved.  I do not add salt to this soup because of the beef base.  You can add salt and pepper according to personal preference.

This does require refrigeration after opening.

Now you are ready to put your ingredients into your soup kettle. 

This mixture nearly fills a large crock pot.

  I use a crock pot so it can stay warm until someone needs to eat.  Add the hamburger mixture first.  Next pour the potato, carrot and pea mixture with the liquid carefully into the pot.  Stir and you are finished!   

A nice hot bowl of soup!

 

Cow Pie Recipe

Many blogs have recipes on them.  I would like to share with you the recipe for cow pie.

A cow pie is a combination of ingredients according to available feedstuffs and the needs of the recipient.  I will share with you two of our recipes. 

The first recipe is designed for growing bodies.  The ingredients are measured in pounds according to a percentage.  The recipe is called a ration when feeding livestock.  Our growing ration utilizes an ethanol by-product, wet distillers grain, called Synergy.  The ration also includes corn silage, a supplement and ground alfalfa hay.  The percentages of each ingredient can be seen in this picture.

The second recipe will be for the finishing steer.  This steer has had time to grow his frame so that now he can put on more muscle.  This phase often lasts around 180 days in a feedlot.  In this recipe we include the wet distillers grain.  The ground hay in this ration is usually made from crop residue like soybean straw and corn stalks instead of alfalfa.  Hay is a term that often refers to the roughage used.    Corn and a supplement to balance needed vitamins/minerals are the other two ingredients.  Here is the percentage picture of a finishing ration.

Once the ration has been formulated it is loaded into a feed truck with a mixer that blends it all together just like our kitchen mixers do with cookie dough. 

The ration is distributed to the pen using a scale on the feed truck  for precise and timely distribution.  The feed is digested throughout an amazing system God put into the beef animal allowing the making of a cow pie.

Here we have a cow pie!

Side view!

Now, what to do with the cow pie?  We use them for fertilizer on our crops.  I learned as a child the value of cow manure.  When I was growing up we had a neighbor that would get a few pickup loads of manure on his garden every fall.  His garden in the summer always looked like it should be on a magazine cover. 

The pioneers used cow pies for fuel. Trees were scarce so they used dry grass and manure to make heat for baking and keeping warm.    We are expecting a winter storm today so perhaps I should save a few of these just in case the lights go out and Steve still wants supper tonight!