Steak Chili

This week I made a new recipe for steak chili.  I found a good recipe in the food network magazine, but as with most recipes I made some changes to make it my own.  It was delicious, with some good spice and heartiness. We ended up with A LOT of leftovers, so I probably should have cut this recipe in half when I made it, but I'm going to try to do something fun with what's left.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 lbs of sirloin steak cut into 2 inch cubes
1 12 oz can of black beans drained and rinsed
1 12 oz can of kidney beans drained and rinsed
1 onion chopped
1-1/2 12 oz cans of diced tomatoes
2 3.5 oz cans of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce chopped
3/4 cup of chili powder
1 tablespoon of cumin
5 cloves of garlic chopped
1 tablespoon of olive oil
salt & pepper to taste
1 green onion sliced
sour cream

Heat a saute pan and the olive oil and add the steak.  Brown on all sides.  Do this in batches so that the pan doesn't get over crowded and transfer the browned meat to a 5 - 6 quart slow cooker.  Once all the meat is browned add the chopped onion to the saute pan and let cook until it starts to get soft about 3 minutes.  (leave a little bite in the onion for some texture in the chili)  Add the garlic, chipolte peppers with any adobo sauce, chili powder, and cumin.  Let this cook together for another 2 - 3 minutes.  Then add 1 1/2 cups of water and the diced tomatoes.  Scrape up any bits off the bottom of the pan and mix all the spices into the liquid and let this cook for another 2- 3 minutes.  Add the mixture to the slow cooker with the meat, pour in the beans and stir to incorporate everything together.  Put the slow cooker on low and let it cook for 6 hours.

Once done ladle into bowls, sprinkle with the green onion and a tablespoon of sour cream, and it is ready for eating!

This was a nice recipe to do on Sunday.  I was able to get everything in the slow cooker in the morning and could run around working on different things all day knowing that dinner was already taken care of. 

Weekend Recap: Not a whole lot going on for us

Well, this weekend we had grand plans originally to get away to Lake Geneva with friends, but time got away from us to really get it booked and set.  So, we had a whole weekend with nothing going on. 

Both Teddy and I had brutal weeks at work, so Friday we treated ourselves to a nice dinner out at Cooper's Hawk, which is one of our favorites.  We're wine club members there.  Everything was delicious and we enjoyed getting some time together. 

Saturday was errand day.  We had big plans for work in the yard, but it rained pretty much all day, and then I threw my back out.  So, not much was really getting done other than some laundry, dry cleaning and taking Fozzie for his hair cut.

While we didn't have much happening this weekend, my cousin Chris and his wife Sara did.  Sara gave birth to a baby girl at 1:24pm on Saturday.  Her name is Ava Morgan and she was 7lbs and 20 1/2 inches long.  Here are a few pictures of the pretty girl and her parents.

What a cutie!  I can't wait to meet her and get her something pink.  Congratulations to Chris and Sara on your new daughter!

Sunday has been spent working in the yard.  We started the process of getting things ready for winter.  We pulled out our garden and some plants that weren't looking too hot in pots.  Then we decided to close the pool.  We haven't used it for a few weeks since the weather has been cool, and it's a lot easier to do it before it gets too cold out there.  So, Teddy and I got going on getting things ready.  His parents even came over to help with some of the final steps in the process.  We were SO glad to get that done.  We're looking forward to opening it again in about 7 months.  :)

Tonight we're going to enjoy some chili I've been cooking all day (recipe to come) and relax before a new week begins.

Weekend Recap: Art Fair, Baby Shower, and Bears

Last weekend was fairly uneventful.  On Saturday Teddy and I went and picked up our new iPhones.

We have been having fun downloading some app's and taking advantage of all its features.  It's quite an improvement over the Blackberry's we had previously. 

After picking up the phones we headed over to the Downer's Grove Art Fair.  We grabbed some lunch at Another Round and spent the rest of the day checking out the different booths at the art fair.

Here I am in front of a line of booths

Teddy and me

Hey, stop taking pictures and give me my phone back!

On Sunday I went to my cousin Chris and his wife Sara's baby shower.  Teddy headed to his sister Erica's place to watch the Bear's game.  Chris and Sara are expecting their bundle to come the first week of October, and they are going to be surprised whether it is a boy or a girl.  We can't wait to find out which one it is.  The shower was at my Aunt Diane's house, and was very nice.  It was great to visit with my aunts and cousins and all the kids.  We had fun passing around the twins like hot potatoes.  Chris and Sara got some great gifts, with Chris being jealous of all the cool outfits the baby was getting.  If you're looking for a birthday or Christmas gift for Chris, go for footie pajamas.  Apparently he really wants some! :)  Here are some pictures of the party.

Here's the happy couple

Here's me, mom, Sara and Aunt Diane waiting for gift time!

Me with that little peanut Cole

Sara with Cole

Brenna with Carter

Scott & Deborah

The hungry caterpillar blanket Chris and Sara got

More gift opening

Up at the Bear's game, Teddy was having some fun with video capturing some antics of our niece and nephew and the excitement of the Bear's game home opener. 

Emily Rockin Out

Kris and Carson mesmerized by TV - and the rest of the group getting pumped (?) for the Bears

It was a nice relaxing weekend, and we're looking forward to a few more of these before the holiday season hits.



Stuffed Banana Peppers

In my last blog I said I'd post a recipe for some stuffed banana peppers.  A while back I was at a restaurant with my family and we ordered these as an appetizer, and they were AMAZING!  So, I figured I'd try a quick version of these at home.  The farmers market had some nice looking banana peppers and I had some left over Italian sausage from making stuffed zucchini the week before, so I was ready to experiment.

Ingredients

4 banana peppers
1/2 lb of bulk mild Italian sausage
1 1/2 cups of marinara sauce
1/2 cup of mozzarella cheese

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.  Then cut the tops off the banana peppers and with a small spoon scoop out the seeds.  Then I took small amounts of the sausage and pushed it into the pepper trying to get it all the way down to the bottom.  After the peppers were stuffed I placed them in a small casserole dish and covered them with marinara sauce, covered the dish and put it in the oven for 45 minutes.  After 45 minutes I removed the cover, sprinkled on the cheese and put it back in the oven for 10 more minutes.  It will then be ready to enjoy.

These were so delicious.  The heat from the pepper becomes more mild as you cook it, and tastes great with the Italian sausage.  It tasted pretty close the the restaurant version that was basing it off of.  Next time I think I might mix it up a little bit with the filling by using hot Italian sausage and some breadcrumbs and seasoning, but I thought for never making it before it turned out pretty great.

Weekend Recap: 2 Weekends of Birthdays, Projects, and More.

Yet again I have fallen behind in my blogging and never posted about last weekend.  Last weekend was pretty hectic.  Although Saturday during the day we were able to find some time to relax.  I was able to read some of my latest book.

While Teddy was able to catch up on some sleep.

Saturday night we headed out to Wicker park for Stacy's birthday dinner.  She picked a new place to try called People's Lounge.  It had been months since we all had hung out together, so it was great to see everyone.  Here's a picture of the group enjoying dinner.

After dinner we headed out for a few more drinks at a neighborhood bar.  It was great to catch up with everyone, and we definitely agreed that we need to see each other more often!

Sunday we finally did some of the maintenance on the wood in the front of our house.  We have wood around the front door and the window casing in front that requires an annual sanding and polyurethane coating.  It's a pretty lengthy process starting with cleaning the wood, letting it dry, sanding it, cleaning and drying again.  And then putting on two coats of the poly with about 4 hours in between.  So, it took pretty much all day.  Sunday was also Jennifer's birthday!  Happy birthday to Jennifer.  So, after finishing the project we called her up to sing happy birthday and make plans to party with her to celebrate.

Which leads us to this weekend.  This weekend was Labor Day!  Who doesn't love a long weekend?  Friday night Teddy and I headed up to Round Lake to celebrate Jennifer's birthday with her.  We met her and her friend Doug at Austin's.

Why this was the only picture we took of that night, I'm not really sure.  But we all had some good food and good drinks and good laughs to celebrate the birthday festivities.  Later on we headed back to Jennifer's place to hang out and play a few games.  It was great to spend some time with her and we were happy to be able to party with her for her birthday.

Saturday was errand day for Teddy and I.  We headed to the farmer's market in the morning (my favorite weekend activity).  We got all the fixens for a crudite plate for a BBQ with my parents, sister and her husband on Sunday.  After the farmer's market we dropped off our purchases at home and headed out to the photographer for our wedding to turn in our final order.  I cannot wait to see our final wedding album.  Hopefully we'll have it back before Thanksgiving to share with the family.  The rest of Saturday was some more shopping stops (Sam's, Jewel, etc.) and then I made some stuffed banana peppers (recipe to come in a future blog) and eggplant parmesan for dinner.

Sunday we had my parents, Sara and Michael over for a "pool party".  Well, we had hoped it'd be a pool party, but it was a little too cold.  So, we ended up spending some time catching up on the back deck.  It had been far too long since we had seen them.  Sara brought a bunch of delicious appetizers for lunch and then I made BBQ ribs and corn served along side my mom's potato salad and baked beans for dinner.  It was all delicious.  We spent the rest of the night playing some games and finished it off with some dessert of rainbow cones that dad picked up earlier that day for all of us.  This is a classic from my childhood that is an absolute favorite. 

Monday Teddy and I enjoyed a terrific day together.  After our morning run we decided to head to the park to play some tennis.  I am NOT a tennis player.  I played badminton in high school and it is quite different to hit a super bouncy ball and an extremely light birdy.  Plus I'm just way out of practice in general.  So, I fully expected to make Teddy run all over that court, but to my surprise we actually got a few good volleys going. 

After that we grabbed some lunch at home and decided to go catch a movie.  We decided to see Going the Distance.

It was a girl (Drew Barrymore) meets boy (Justin Long) story where the girl has to leave NYC to move home to San Francisco in 6 weeks after they fall in love, and they try to make it work long distance.  Another predictable romantic comedy?  Maybe, but this was a rated R romantic comedy, and it got fairly raunchy.  It was ripe with funny one liners, hilarious scenes, and plenty of awkward humor.  All in all Teddy and I really liked it. 

After the movie we headed home to make some dinner and spend the rest of our long weekend relaxing together. 

All in all, two great weekends back to back. 

Stuffed Zucchini with a side of Roasted Tomatoes

This week I had a gigantic zucchini from my garden that I had to use, so I decided to make stuffed zucchini.  It's something that I haven't made in a really long time, but is a yummy way to use more veggies in our dinner.  I again didn't take any pictures while I was cooking, so sorry about that!  I made some roasted tomatoes with it as I have SO many tomatoes from my garden and am always looking for new ways to use them.  So, on to the recipe.

Stuffed Zucchini

Ingredients:

1 large zucchini
1 cup mushrooms sliced
1/2 lb of mild Italian sausage bulk
1 tablespoon of fresh basil minced
1 tablespoon of fresh oregano minced
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1/4 cup of Italian bread crumbs
1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Heat a saute pan and put the olive oil in.  Then add the sausage and saute until browned (break the sausage up with a wooden spoon as it's cooking)  While the sausage is browning slice the zucchini in half.  Using a melon-baller scoop out the center of the zucchini to make small boats to put the stuffing in.  Place these on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet.  Chop the scooped out zucchini into bite size pieces.  After the sausage is done remove it from the pan and set it aside in a bowl.  Then add the basil and oregano to the pan.  After about 30 seconds you should start to smell the herbs cooking, then add the chopped zucchini, season with salt and pepper, and saute for 2 minutes.  Then add the mushrooms.  Saute these together for another 2 minutes until they are almost fully cooked.  Then mix in the browned Italian sausage.  Turn off the heat and stir in half of the grated cheese.  The mixture is now ready to add to your zucchini boat.  Fill as much of the mixture in that you can, top with a sprinkling of breadcrumbs and the rest of the cheese.  Put in the oven for 20 minutes or until zucchini boats are tender. Enjoy!

Roasted Tomatoes

Ingredients:

2 large tomatoes quartered (any variety - I used big boys)
1 tablespoon of fresh rosemary minced
1 tablespoon of fresh thyme minced
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Place the tomatoes on a parchment lined cookie sheet.  Sprinkle the tomatoes with the oil, then add salt and pepper.  Sprinkle each tomato with the rosemary and thyme, and then add the balsamic vinegar.  Pop these in the oven for 10 minutes and enjoy!

Both recipes turned out great and was a great way to use some of our fresh veggies for dinner.

Weekend Recap: Michigan Dunes and Camping (Sort of)

This weekend Teddy and I went with friends and family to Mears, Michigan to camp, dune ride, and enjoy Silver Lake.  On Friday Teddy and I got a late start after work and hit the road around 5pm.  We knew we would be getting up there late, and since we have awesome friends and family they brought our tent up for us earlier to set up before dark hit.  We were all a little worried about the weather as showers were in the forecast for Friday, but we figured it would be fine.  We'd been camping in the rain before, right?! 

We were about 20 miles from our destination when we got a call from Erica, that we had missed all the fun.  A storm had blown through (which we were driving in), and they had to set up some other later arrival tents in a downpour.  In addition, tents already set up were being blown all over the camp ground.  We were happy to hear that they moved our tent from the swamp that had accumulated around it to higher ground. 

We finally arrived at the camp ground and everyone was tucked away in their tents trying for shelter from the rain.  We ran in, set up our air mattress and got ready for bed, when we suddenly realized that our rain fly was leaking.  Not terribly, just a fairly constant dripping throughout the tent.  And of course, most of the dripping was on my face while I am trying to sleep.  I crawled under the sleeping bag for protection from the drips and somehow even though it was a humid, sticky mess, I fell asleep. 

At 2:30 am I woke up to find Teddy just staring at the ceiling (he started to get dripped on too), the sleeping bag soaked, and the pillow soaked with the storm still screaming outside.  It was kind of like Chinese water torture.  We both then decided we were done with camping for the night and left to find a potential hotel for the night.  Teddy remembered seeing a hotel when we got off the highway just a few miles from our campground.  So, we went there, and of course, they were full.  Teddy explained the situation, and the hotel clerk said, "Well, we do have our overrun room."  She took Teddy to see it and he was sold.  I think I would have slept in a broom closet at that point. 

Their overrun room was a VERY large conference room with table, chairs, two couches, tv, and two double beds.  The one wall wasn't a real wall, but one of those dividers that can split a large room into two.  On the other side of that wall was the breakfast area.  We didn't care, we had a bathroom, a bed, and a roof that didn't drip on us.  We woke up the next morning to the beep of the waffle maker through the dividing wall.  :)

Here Teddy is modeling the dance floor that was part of the room.

The next morning we headed back to the camp site to meet up with everyone and get ready for the dunes.  The sky still looked a little ominous, but we were hopeful that the rain and bad weather was behind us, and we'd be able to enjoy the beach and dune riding.  So, we headed out and set up camp at the beach.

This is the entrance to the park.  Just over that hill are some huge dune hills and a beach

Heading towards the beach

Some campers got to the beach first and were already relaxing

Emily was having fun playing in the sand

After we got completely set up at the beach we had a quick sand volleyball match.  It was Teddy, Kris, Toby, Jill, and Heather vs. Erica, Mark, Casey, Joe, and Me.  It was a good game, my team unfortunately lost, but I think we won in spirit!  We all relaxed for a bit after that.

Kirstyn, Mark & Shelby relaxing before a dune run

Pretty soon, the group wanted to go out for their first run on the dunes.

Mark, Heather and Erica took their Jeeps out for the first run of the day

While they were gone, Teddy, Becky and I just relaxed beach side chatting and reading.  By the time the group got back it was lunch time and the sun was really coming out.  So, we grabbed some grub and then enjoyed the sun.  There was some swimming, frisbee throwing, football throwing, floating, and talking going on.  A group also buried Casey.  Doesn't he look cozy.

Emily had so much fun running and playing, that she was ready for a quick nap.

The group wanted to do one more run of the dunes before they called it a day and I decided to head out with them.  It was the first time I would be heading out on the big hills with these guys, and we were going to head here...

This is razor back.  It's called that because the top is as thin as a razor's edge with a straight drop down on the other side.  AHHHHH!  We drove all over those dunes (I of course forgot to bring my camera on the run with us), and had a ton of fun. 

This is when we returned from the run - I popped out the top of the Jeep waving at Teddy

It was a fun ride!

When we got back, we broke down camp to head back to the camp ground for some dinner and campfire time.  But of course before we did that, we needed to take a group photo of all the dune runners that day.

Kirstyn and Casey were taking photos, so their missing from the shot, but we have Jennifer, Heather, Teddy, Me, Kris, Mark, Joe, Becky, Jill and Toby.  It was a great group!

Back at the campground we got a fire going while people showered all the sand off.  Some people were still drying out things from the storms the night before.

We were ready to make some dinner.  Emily was excited to be hanging out by the fire.

Ok, maybe she was a little tired.

After everyone ate, we decided to head into town for some ice cream and go karts.  Kris was ready to get this thing going.

So we piled in cars and headed into town.

Kris was really excited to take Emily out on the go karts.  She wasn't so sure...but she had some fun.

Emily's getting strapped in

Kris is getting lined up to start the race

Look how fast they were going!

Here they are! 

I think Emily had a fun time, but I think we all enjoyed watching her fly around the track even more.  Here's a short video of her ride.

We all had a great time in town, but were ready to head back to the campsite fore some more campfire time. 

After hanging out with everyone for a while, Teddy and I decided to hit the road.  We were not going to be staying in our wet tent for the night, so we thought we'd drive an hour or so and find a hotel to crash for the night.  Our tent went right into the dumpster on our way out.  Leaky tents are no fun! 

We were about an hour into our drive when we hit Holland Michigan.  There was a pretty large area off the highway with 4 or 5 hotels, so we thought this would be a good place to stop.  Every hotel had a No Vacancy sign on its front door...Uh oh!  So, we headed down to Saugatauk hoping to get a room there.  And, no such luck.  It was the same situation - No Vacancy. 

At that point I was getting pretty sleepy.  Teddy insisted that he was fine and would stop again if he was getting too tired.  We had about 2 hours and 30 minutes left in our drive.  I must have fallen asleep because next thing I knew, I woke up and we were in Michigan City, Indiana about an hour away from home.  I couldn't believe we were going to make that full drive that late at night.  We pulled into home around 3:00am and just collapsed into bed. 

Wow, were we tired!  We woke up around 11am on Sunday, ran over to my parents to pick up Fozzie and then spent the rest of the day running errands (laundry, grocery shopping, mowing the lawn, etc...) 

It was a busy weekend, but jam packed with fun!  Thanks to Kris and Erica for planning everything on the camping trip.  You guys always make it a blast for everyone.