July Recipes

July

I love, love, LOVE the month of July. Summer is here, the pools are open and the barbeque parties are in full swing. Whether you're throwing one yourself, or bringing a side dish to someone elses', here are some easy recipes for you to throw together, so's you have more time for visitin' a spell. As William Shakespeare wrote: "Summer's lease hath all too short a date"

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When I was younger we didn't have a pool to swim in. Nope, every summer was spent with the cousins up at my Grandparents place on Stone Lake in Middlebury, IN. Our days were spent playing...hard. Us kids, all thirteen of us, slept out on the screened in porch lined up sleeping bag to sleeping bag, like sardines going third class. Breakfast was a bowl of cereal outside on the picnic table.

Really, it could've been a bowl of dirt for all you tasted as it was eaten with haste because that grand and glorious lake was beckoning you. A quick change into your swimming suit and you were water bound until lunch. This consisted of a quick sandwich and a glass of milk in which I was forever looking for ways to pour mine out instead of drinking it. It's still a major "YUCK" in my book. This was followed by an agonizing hour of ritualistic waiting (pacing) so you didn't cramp up after eating. I actually have never heard of someone cramping up for not waiting a full hour to swim and I believe it was even tested on "Myth Busters" (Added fact: as a Mother of four, I've never made any of my kiddies wait even five minutes and I haven't had to scrape anyone off the bottom of the pool yet. Just sayin' ;) However, all the adults watched us like hawks anyway. Believe me, that hour was torture, pure torture. We were only allowed to sit on the pier and swing our feet. We would have opted to pass the time away with watching a little television but we only received three stations. One came in clear, one looked like a continual blizzard and the other was evangelistic "say babeeeee" preaching. Besides, if you were caught sitting inside viewing the TV, some adult always took notice. This raised eyebrows and 9/10's of the time there was a hand slapped to the front of your forehead and a resounding, "Do you think she feels warm?". Well hell yes, I'm warm. It's 90* outside, I'm a kid and I've been playing hard but inevitably this triggered a chain of events that got you "the glare' from your 24 cousins because that smack to the forehead was never gentle and now you're seeing "two" of everything (heh, double the cousins double the fun!) and just like that everyone was under surveillance.
We didn't have video games either, or handheld games or IPod's. We actually used our imaginations and created our own play. Unless, of course, you were still feeling "warm". Then this bought you time inside watching the blizzard.

This type of fun in the sun went on until supper when my Grandfather would fire up the grill. There was always meat for dinner, but when he put this chicken on, people all around the lake would simultaneously lift their heads in our direction and take a deep breathe. We knew. They knew. It was wicked good stuff. This barbeque sauce made the man famous.

Grampa Mast's Bar-B-Que Sauce for One Chicken

1 cup water
1 cup vinegar
1 stick butter
1/8 cup salt

Set it on the top rack or over low coals to keep warm while basting your chicken.
Set extra plates and be prepared for "unexpected' guest to "drop" by :)

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Oh my, you can't just have one helping of theses. It's my Grama Mast's recipe and why, they're almost like candy! The house smells just heavenly in the morning from my slow cooking all night. My Grama passed away two years ago but she was on the go right p until the end. At 93, she even shot a commercial (her first!) for my brother's Biker Outlet. She was all decked out in full leather gear and sitting on a Harley. The commercial is hysterical and she was a character!

Georgia's Baked Beans

1 lb navy beans
1/2 lb bacon ends
1 medium onion (quartered)
1/4 c brown sugar
1/3 c molasses
2 tsp dry mustard
2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
2 tbs vinegar
2 c hot water

Soak beans over night in 6 cups of water; add 1/4 teaspoon baking soda if water is hard. Parboil beans for 20 minutes. Drain beans after parboiling: rinse with cold water. Dice bacons ends to 1 square inch, placing half in bottom of a 2 quart bean pot or casserole along with the quartered onion. Add beans. Mix remaining ingredients with hot water. Pour over top of beans. Top with remaining bacon ends. Cover and bake in a slow (250-300 degree) oven for about 6 hours, adding hot water as needed to keep beans moist. Serves 8-10 (I'd double the recipe, it goes fast).

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A cool dish for hot summer days. I left the title the way my Mother has it written on the recipe card. It's special to me because it's her handwriting and has a loving reference. My parents were very active in the Young Republicans and someone brought this dish to a political party they were attending. Dad really enjoyed the dish and Mother sought out the recipe to make it for him. So I thought I'd just leave it, you can omit the personalization if you decided to add it to your recipe collection :)

Cucumbers in Sour Cream (your Dad's favorite)

2 medium cucumbers, peeled
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 c sour cream
2 tbs vinegar
1/4 tsp sugar
1/8 tsp paprika
1 tbs parsley flakes

Draw tines of fork lengthwise down cucumbers, then cut in thin slices. Add onion and sprinkle with 1 tsp salt. Let stand 10 minutes, then press out excess liquid. Mix sour cream, remaining salt and other ingredients. Add to cucumbers mixing lightly with fork. Chill thoroughly. Makes about 2 cups.

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This dish has been on more tables during get together and holidays than I care to remember. I don't care for the beets so I'd just pick out the eggs to eat, which still gets me into trouble with my Mother for not taking some of both. Everyone loves this dish but me. I wouldn't want to be selfish now and not share the wealth just because I don't like them. Besides my Mother reads this and I'd probably never ever hear the end of it!

Pickled Eggs and Red Beets

1 1/2 c vinegar
1/2 c water (I used the red beet juice instead of water)
1/2 c white sugar

Heat until boiling then pour over hard boiled eggs and red beets.

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Oh, this is a keeper. It doesn't matter if you have an in ground, above ground, wading pool or your just sitting in the kids sprinkler, this stuff is awesome! I made it one afternoon when my sister and i got together with our combined eight kids. The wasn't any left by the time the afternoon was over. It's very addictive and I'm asked for this recipe all the time. If you have children, my sister Stacy invented a grand wizard of an idea.... she drained and chopped up a can of mixed vegetables and added it. The kids chowed down with gusto and never knew the difference. That was a beautiful thing ;)


Heidi's Pool Dip

2 pkg 16 oz cream cheese softened
1 pkg 1 oz Ranch style salad dressing mix
2 cans 4 1/2 oz ripe olives, chopped and drained
1 4 oz jar sliced green olives
1 cup 11 oz kernel corn, drained
1 can 4 oz green chilies, chopped, drained
1 med red bell pepper, chopped about 1 cup
tortilla chips or crackers

Beat cream cheese and the dressing mix, in a large bowl, until smooth. Stir in the remaining ingredients (except chips...duh)
Cover and refrigerate 1-2 hours until well chilled.

For those of you who really know me, you know that I’ve had a long time love affair (ok, obsession) with human behavior, the brain, influences, patterns, etc. So this will come as no surprise that I HAD to share (and document) what just occurred yesterday.

I am extremely affected by color. I have trouble eating in red rooms, dark colors on walls make me feel lethargic, irritable and uneasy, I tend to like my bedroom walls plain white and with very little, if anything, on them. When I wake up in the morning I like to have the palette before me clean so that my thoughts and dream residual can color my world.

A few years ago, I bought a rather thick and heavy book on the psychology of color. I was curious if my thoughts had any validity. Interesting enough, the book gave a whole explanation of each color and all the ways it influenced our brains. Of course, I devoured the book and when I stumbled upon blue and read its effects, well, you just KNOW I had to conduct my own experiment. Just a brief synopsis of the explanation, blue is one of the most popular colors, and favored among men but it is one of the least appetizing. Blue rarely occurs naturally in food aside from blueberries, egg plant, grapes and some plums. Humans are geared to avoid foods that are poisonous and blue coloring in food is often a sign of spoilage or poison. Some weight loss plans even recommend eating your food off of a blue plate and even going so far as painting your kitchen blue. I’m pretty sure you know what my brain was thinking…

“Let’s do an experiment, I wanna see if this has any truth to it!”

This was in October and I had bunko coming up (a dice game for women who are usually do imbibed with vino and chatting it up to learn how to place Bridge or anything else that requires actually thought while playing) so I planned a “fall hoe-down” kind of theme. The main dish being mini BBQ sandwiches. I cut open Hawaiian rolls and stuffed them with pork bbq and then stacked it in a croque-en-bouche style on two separate plates. One being white and the other… yeap, blue.

I set them both side by side, front and center on the buffet table. Half way through the night, I checked on refilling the dishes and found that the entire content of sandwiches from the white plate were gone, while the blue plate had a few sandwiches skimmed off the top. I quickly took sandwiches from the blue plate and moved them to the white plate but also switch the positions so that the blue plate was “closer” to the front of the line. I checked back about 30 minutes later and again, the white plate had far more taken from it than the blue plate. Ok, I’m at bunko, all excited with my findings and can’t really blurt out what I’ve just proven because I'm not sure how well, "Hey, ya'll were a part of this here experiment,not that I secretly made you eat anything gross but, well, you all did EXACTLY what it said you'd do, Hot Damn!" would really go over.

Fast forward five years.

Rathe and I are at the market picking up a few odds and ends. We run across a dozen frosted Easter cookies, six in yellow frosting, six in blueish purple. We bring them home and a week later I notice all six yellow cookies are gone….and all six blueish purple ones are left. So I ask, “Rathe, what’s wrong with these blue cookies, did the yellow ones taste better?’ and his answer was, “No Mom, they just didn’t look… well, very appetizing”

I am beaming :)

Maybe America doesn’t new healthcare entirely, maybe we just need to paint our kitchens blue. Of course, I’ll probably get sued for putting Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig and the rest of them out of business but a gallon of blue paint is far less expensive :)

Every year Trusted Mentors www.trustedmentors.org holds a call for handbag designers entitled “Bags2Riches”. This unique handmade handbag competition is dedicated to stabilizing lives, preventing homelessness and near homelessness in the Indianapolis community. Trusted Mentors Inc is an adult mentoring program which helps adults rebuild their lives and break the cycle of poverty. It is sponsored by IndySwank and Aesthetic Design Style with the grand prize award of $500.

I decided to create a one of a kind handbag with really no intention of entering the contest to win but to help play a part in this valuable mentoring program by generating bids as a donation. I gave a great deal of thought to my creation but nothing would come to mind, at least nothing that pleased me. People were inquiring daily regarding what I was creating. I would just smile and tell them it was a surprise. No one had a clue how much of a surprise it would be, especially to me, as my imagination felt like a empty box filled with fog. I decided to be proactive and meditate on it. Nothing.

I listened to music and…. Nothing. Sigh. I browsed websites, looked through books, magazines (help!) and I was quickly coming to the conclusion that perhaps, just maybe, this one time it wasn’t going to be my calling. Late one evening I went for a barefoot run. I love the way the ground dances underneath my feet, the energy that vibrates upward making my steps light and my heart and imagination soar. With the wind brushing my face and the last of summer’s warm ribbons of light caressing my skin I all but drifted home. I took my bath without washing away the earth’s energy and fell into bed.

Only to be torn from my sleep at 4:00am with my handbag idea so vividly imprinted in my imagination that I leapt from my bed, darted down to my studio, flipped on the lights, powered up the sewing machine and began the mad madness of an artist possessed. I cut off a pair of my old jeans to represent recycling. On the bottom I added black pom-pom trim to represent dirt, added a layer of moss green lace to represent grass, lined the inside with a white bandana to act as the clouds, attached to an old skirt waistband with bold flowers to represent flora and fauna. But the pièce de résistance was in finding little nickel size glass beaded bees to represent renewed birth. I hand stitched five bees in random places on the flowered waistband.

I then added bamboo handles as a renewable resource. After three months of eluding me, in less than two hours I had created my entry handbag.
I know this was inspired by my earlier run. I decided to entitle it “From the Ground Up”.

I hauled it off to Trusted Mentors, paid my $10 submission fee and came home to wait. After three weeks I was informed out of several hundred, my handbag made the top ten finalist list. The judging would begin a few weeks later.

I attended the event and watched my purse being carried around by volunteer models. Guests were invited to bid in a silent auction on the finalist handbag. My wonderful friend bid on my creation and in the end won! My handbag placed but did not win. I was not disheartened, as the satisfaction came in knowing that all of our efforts went towards helping others help themselves. Perhaps in some small way I inspired one of the (near) homeless to believe in their dreams and create, if not a handbag, something from their heart for others to appreciate.

Altered Couture