My Homemade Iowa Life

Iowa eats: Hickory Park in Ames

2012-02-14T15:00:00.000-06:00

I had a serious case of the winter blues, so I asked my sister to meet me for lunch at one of our favorite restaurants, Hickory Park in Ames. We've been going to this restaurant since we were little girls. Our parents used to take us to Iowa State University basketball games during winter break, and they would often treat us to lunch at Hickory Park or at Ruttle's. (Does anyone else remember Ruttle's? We loved their malts and burger bar.)

I checked ahead of time to make sure there wasn't a home basketball game, when the lines at Hickory Park are especially long. Luckily, we got seated right away. I was in the mood for fried food, maybe because it was 10 degrees outside, so we ordered an appetizer tray of onion rings, cheese balls and sweet potato fries. I especially loved the sweet potato fries! I'll be ordering these again next time.

My sister loves cherry cokes, and I decided to order one, too. Hickory Park makes them the old fashioned way, with cherry flavored syrup.

For lunch, I ordered the Saucy Southerner pulled pork, beef and chicken sandwich, with a side of cole slaw. Hickory Park has the best cole slaw. My sister ordered the cheeseburger. (She always orders a cheeseburger wherever we eat! But the Hickory Park burgers are terrific.)

Hickory Park offers an amazing ice cream menu, but instead, we ordered a side of pickles to end our meal. We gobbled these up quickly. We both love pickles!

After lunch, we bundled up in our winter coats and headed over to the new bowling alley on the west side of Ames. It was a great way to spend an afternoon. We both agreed we should bowl together more often. My sister won the first game, but I won the second! We were just happy to bowl a score of 100!

What does your family do to beat the winter "blahs"? I've been doing a lot of baking, but I try to get outside as much as I can, especially on the weekends.

Iowa eats: Tastee Inn & Out, Sioux City

2012-02-11T03:00:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago, I drove (in the snow) to Sioux City in northwest Iowa. I stopped at the Tastee Inn & Out, a retro drive-thru restaurant known for its "Tastee" sandwiches. The Tastee is a loose-meat sandwich, or a "tavern" as folks in northwest Iowa call them. (I grew up calling them "maid-rites." My husband, who grew up in far northwest Iowa, calls them taverns.)

Did I mention it was snowing? So I didn't want to leave my car to take the photos. Here's the view of the Tastee Inn & Out neon sign from my car window.

There's a tire store right next to the Tastee Inn & Out. Couldn't help but notice this guy.

I ordered a Tastee and fries for $2. Pretty much can't beat that deal.

Are loose-meat sandwiches a Midwest thing? What does your family call them: taverns, maid-rites or sloppy joes?

Iowa sweets: Dutch Oven Bakery, Boone

2012-02-08T15:00:00.000-06:00

When I was a kid, my mom would occasionally treat my sister and I with a trip to the bakery on Main Street on Saturday mornings. We each got to pick out two doughnuts (oh, I wish I still had that kind of metabolism!), plus a pint of chocolate milk to wash it down with. The bakery closed a few years later, but I still love a good doughnut. I try not to indulge too often anymore, especially now that doughnuts are sold at every gas station and grocery store.

But I still like to treat myself with a trip to the closest bakery, the Dutch Oven Bakery in Boone, a couple times a year. And since I'm treating myself, I choose the biggest pastry I can find, and don't feel guilty about it at all!

The Dutch Oven Bakery in downtown Boone.

My latest pick was a gorgeous rose-shaped pastry called a raspberry rosette. It was a glazed doughnut with a raspberry jam-like coating to give it a pink color. My photo isn't the best, but it was a large doughnut, and it was worth every calorie!

Do you have a favorite bakery, or a favorite pastry? Would love to learn about more bakeries here in Iowa or elsewhere.

Iowa eats: Cache Bake Shoppe, Clive

2012-02-05T15:00:00.000-06:00

I was running a few errands over my lunch hour the other day, and I noticed a new bakery across the street from Living History Farms in Clive (next to Starbucks). I couldn't help but check it out for myself. The new Cache Bake Shoppe specializes in cakes and cheesecakes. Their take-out menu featured cheesecake bites and cake balls. I bought a couple cake balls for an afternoon snack: a strawberry cake ball and a German chocolate cake ball.

This strawberry cake ball was so good! I'm planning to buy a dozen of these for Valentine's Day for my sweetie.

Skillet chocolate chip cookie

2012-02-03T15:00:00.000-06:00

I told you I was on a chocolate baking kick lately. When I saw this chocolate chip skillet cookie on Eat Live Run, I knew I just had to try it. And I have the perfect pan for the recipe -- the old cast-iron skillet my husband found for me at the annual Walnut, Iowa, antique festival. (If you've never gone before, you must. Such a great community event.)

I loved this recipe! It looked so gorgeous right out of the oven. But in the interest of full disclosure, I must admit that I ended up not eating more than a couple bites of this cookie. It tasted a little like onion, because my husband uses this pan to cook omelets and such. Oh well! At least it looked pretty for the photos! Next time, I'll try to bake this in a pie plate.

I flipped the cookie onto a plate for easier slicing. Doesn't it look gorgeous out of the pan?

Carmelitas

2012-01-31T15:00:00.000-06:00

I've been on a caramel-chocolate baking binge lately. And it started with these carmelita bars from Brown Eyed Baker. I had never heard of carmelitas before, but then after I baked these, I saw them for sale at the cafeteria where I work. Strange coincidence!

These bars are excellent and fun to make. And they gave me an excuse to buy a bag of caramel candies at the grocery store! My husband isn't a huge fan of chocolate, but he does like oatmeal desserts, so he ended up eating quite a few of these carmelitas. I'm planning to make these for our Super Bowl party at the office.

Homemade Larabars

2012-01-28T15:00:00.000-06:00

The local grocery store chain, Hy-Vee, publishes its own food magazine, and the latest issue includes several recipes for homemade energy bars. I've been looking for a good granola bar recipe, so I gave these chewy almond energy bars from Hy-Vee Seasons magazine a try. This recipe was almost no-bake, except for a quick trip in the oven to toast the almonds. And I always like to find another reason to break out my food processor.

However, these bars were just OK. My husband and I ended up eating the whole batch, mostly because we're trying to eat a little healthier. But we didn't love these bars. I did substitute one ingredient -- the almond butter -- for peanut butter because I didn't want to buy a whole jar of almond butter when only a small amount was needed for the recipe. Maybe they would have tasted better with the almond butter?

These bars were fun to make, though. The Hy-Vee Seasons magazine has several other energy bar recipes as well, so maybe I just need to experiment a little more to find the combination we like. You could find the recipes on the Hy-Vee Seasons website right now. The recipes will likely be under the "Past Issues" tabs later this month.

Wordless Wednesday: Sac County barn quilt

2012-01-25T15:00:00.000-06:00

Fried eggplant

2012-01-22T07:27:00.000-06:00

My husband's favorite way to eat eggplant is rather odd. He likes to peel and slice up an eggplant, then dip it in eggwash, bread crumbs and flour before frying it up in his cast-iron skillet. But what's really odd is that he likes to serve it with maple syrup -- like a pancake. That's the way his dad used to make eggplant. And surprisingly, it's very good!

My husband took these pictures himself! His plate of fried eggplant, topped with maple syrup & served with sausage.

My husband is excellent at breading & frying. He's gotten a lot of practice from frying up the catfish he brings home in the summer. I'm not exactly sure how he does it, but he's told me a few secrets: Let the eggplant (or fish) sit a few minutes after dunking it in the eggwash & flour/bread crumbs and make sure the pan is hot enough (sometimes he uses a frying/candy thermometer). He also likes to use Panko bread crumbs when possible for extra crunch. Let me tell you, this eggplant dish was quite a treat!

Cocoa nib cookies

2012-01-19T15:00:00.000-06:00

Remember a couple weeks ago when I visited the Allspice store in East Village, Des Moines? I bought a small bag of cocoa nibs while I was there, but I didn't really know how I would use them.

A couple weeks later, I found this recipe for Oatmeal Walnut Cocoa Nib Cookies from Joy the Baker. Finally, a great recipe to try out the cocoa nibs. And this was a great recipe. I love a good oatmeal cookie, and the cocoa nibs added a nice coffee-like kick to these treats. If you don't have cocoa nibs at home, then you could probably just add dark chocolate chips, or just stick with the semi-sweet chips. Either way, these are a good go-to cookie for snacking.

I hear you can also use cocoa nibs as a topper for yogurt or oatmeal, but I thought the flavor was too bitter. But they were perfect in cookie form!

Iowa eats: Ames Cupcake Emporium

2012-01-16T15:00:00.000-06:00

During the holiday break, I finally took the time to visit a bakery I've been wanting to check out for the longest time -- the Ames Cupcake Emporium in downtown Ames. I wish I would have taken a few photos of the bakery itself, because it was so retro-adorable, but I was in a hurry. (I realized on my walk to the store that I forgot to feed the parking meter. The city of Ames loves to give out parking tickets, even on the weekends. I've discovered this the hard way.)

But back to the cupcakes, I ordered a red velvet and a white chocolate raspberry. The cupcakes weren't as big as I thought they would be, but the frosting more than made up for it. Wow, was the frosting good! I actually think there was more frosting than cupcake, but that was fine by me. My favorite cupcake was the white chocolate raspberry. The red velvet cupcake was just so-so for me, but I'm not really a red velvet cake fan; I chose it for my husband, since it's one of his favorites. Next time I stop, I'm going to try a chocolate cupcake, and maybe a vanilla one, too!

If you're ever in Ames for a ball game or event, be sure to stop downtown and check out the shops. Downtown Ames is way nicer now than back when I went to college there. It's actually become one of my favorite weekend shopping destinations in central Iowa. But don't forget to pay the parking meter!

Iowa recipes: Three bean salad

2012-01-13T15:00:00.000-06:00

I realize this salad is a bit of a departure from my usual Cookie Friday recipes. But it's definitely worth sharing.

My husband and I are trying to eat more vegetables (or "green things" as he likes to say). I saw this recipe for Three Bean Salad in a local ag newspaper and decided to give it a try just to see if my husband would like it. According to the newspaper article, this salad is one of the most popular items offered at a family-owned diner in central Iowa.

Overall, I think this salad was excellent. My husband's only complaint was that he still isn't that fond of kidney beans. But I think the kidney beans add a lot to the texture and color. So next time, I'll probably only put half a can of kidney beans in the salad. This would be an excellent salad to take to a potluck or picnic because it doesn't include any mayo. You can find the recipe below, if you want to give it a try. Recipes don't get much easier than this!

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Three Bean Salad

1 (14.5-oz.) can cut green beans, drained and rinsed
1 (14.5-oz.) can wax beans, drained and rinsed
1 (14.5-oz.) can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 medium onion, chopped
1 green pepper, diced
Dash of salt and pepper
1 C. sugar
1/2 C. vinegar
1/4 C. vegetable oil
1/4 C. water

Combine all beans, onion, green pepper, salt and pepper in a bowl. Combine sugar, vinegar, oil and water, and mix with beans.

Pre-cooked lobster

2012-01-10T15:00:00.000-06:00

I thought it would be fun to cook a seafood dinner to ring in the new year last week. Yet when I got to the grocery store, I almost changed my mind. The lobster tails on sale at Hy-Vee were frozen and small, but still cost $24 for two tails. The king crab legs, also frozen, were packaged together in shrink wrap, with a price tag of more than $40! I wasn't feeling too flush with cash after the Christmas holiday, so I passed on both of these "sale" items. I went up to the butchers' counter and saw cooked, whole lobsters on sale for $10 each. I would have loved to have bought a live lobster, but Hy-Vee didn't sell them. So I bought one of the cooked lobsters, since it was a little more in my price range.

We weren't exactly sure how to warm up a pre-cooked lobster in the shell. My husband searched on the Internet for instructions. The best advice he found was to place the lobster in boiling water for just a couple minutes to warm it up. So that's what he did.

The lobster turned out pretty good, although not the best we've ever had. My husband said he'd like to try the pre-cooked lobster again so he could try to make a lobster roll or salad recipe. Lobster is always a treat, especially when we live in land-locked Iowa!

Carrot quick bread using Ultragrain flour

2012-01-07T15:00:00.000-06:00

A couple weeks ago, I won a free bag of Ultragrain flour from the company's Facebook giveaway. I discovered Ultragrain flour at the Iowa State Fair this summer, where the company reps were handing out free, warm chocolate chip cookies made with Ultragrain. Even though Ultragrain is a whole-wheat flour, you can bake with Ultragrain like white flour. It has more fiber than all-purpose flour, without the whole-wheat texture.

My husband and I are trying to eat healthier, but my hubby isn't a big fan of whole-grain breads and pastas. That's why I buy the soft white whole-grain breads at the grocery store. The Ultragrain flour is used in a lot of those breads, according to the company's website.

I've been using Ultragrain flour for the past few months in my cookie and quick bread recipes. For the most part, I haven't noticed a difference in the taste of the baked goods, although sometimes the texture seems a little heavier, but it might just be imagining a difference. My husband hasn't noticed a difference at all. He'll gobble up anything I make for him!

I have found Ultragrain flour at the East Lincoln Way Hy-Vee in Ames and at the Fareway store in north Ames. I believe the packaging has been redesigned and is no longer called "Eagle Mills" flour, according to the company's Facebook page. Instead, look for the "Ultragrain" name. The flour is available in both all-purpose flour and white whole wheat flour varieties. I've been baking with the all-purpose flour.

One of my husband's favorite recipes is a carrot quick bread I found in Cooking Light magazine years ago. It's a fun breakfast bread to make, mostly because it uses not one -- but three -- different types of flour, including soy flour for added protein. I thought it would also be a great recipe to showcase the Ultragrain flour.

Look for soy flour in the baking aisle, with the other flours.

As you could probably guess, the real reason why my husband likes the carrot quick bread is because of the cream cheese frosting! It's like eating carrot cake, but a lot healthier. You can find the recipe on the Cooking Light website.

Garden update: January 2012

2012-01-04T15:00:00.000-06:00

Yep. That's right. I'm sharing a garden update -- in January! We've been snowless here in central Iowa, and it's been wonderful! I actually went for a bike ride on Christmas day. No snow or ice, plus mild temperatures, have made for a memorable holiday season.

As you can see from the photo above, the spinach I planted in late August is a little frost-bitten, but still green. I'm betting that even after we get a blanket of snow (yes, the snow will eventually arrive) that the spinach will start growing again when the temperatures warm up in the spring. Spinach is very cold tolerant, and it's the first thing to pop up from my garden in April.

Here's a wider view of my backyard. Can you believe the grass looks green in January?

A closer look at my perennial garden. Looks a little messy because I thought it would be covered with snow!

Iowa Caucus Recipe: Grassley Family Meatloaf

2012-01-01T15:00:00.000-06:00

With the 2012 Iowa Caucus just a few days away, I thought it would be fun to share a politically inspired recipe on my blog.

To be honest, I've been glued to my TV the last week, watching the pre-Iowa caucus coverage. Of course, I want to hear what the presidential candidates have to say (I'm still an undecided voter). But I'm also getting a kick out of seeing the places where the presidential candidates are visiting in Iowa. It's been fun to see all the stump speeches in restaurants, towns and stores I'm familiar with. I have yet to see a presidential candidate up close and in person, mostly because all of their events are held when I'm at work. But I'm thinking of driving to Des Moines this weekend to see all the national media in town for the caucuses.

In honor of all the caucus excitement, I prepared a special dinner at home. I inherited a stack of cookbooks from my grandmother, and in her recipe clippings, I found a pamphlet of recipes from Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley's family, dated 2004. If I remember correctly, it was the year when Grassley ran virtually unopposed for the Iowa Senate seat. He's a very well-respected politician in our state.

I decided to try the Grassley's "Tasty Meatloaf" recipe, since my husband and I were a little tired of eating Christmas ham leftovers. It's pretty much a standard meatloaf recipe, with the spicy addition of chili powder. I also "frosted" the meatloaf with ketchup, just like my husband likes it. Definitely a comfort food favorite -- and a winner on caucus night or any night of the year. The recipe is below, if you want to give it a try. Enjoy!

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Tasty Meat Loaf

From Grassley Family Favorites

1-1/2 pound ground beef
1 C. oatmeal (uncooked)
2 eggs
1/4 C. (or more) chopped onion
1 Tbl. worcestershire sauce
1 tsp. chili powder
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 Tbl. ketchup
2 tsp. salt
1 C. milk

Mix all ingredients thoroughly -- hands work best. Shape into two meat loaves. Put crosswise in 9 x 13 cake pan. Pour water around the loaves. (I skipped this step, and it turned out fine.) Bake in a 350 degree oven until loaves are brown -- 45 minutes to 1 hour. (Note: I like to spread ketchup on top after 45 minutes of bake time, then pop it in the oven for the remaining 15 minutes.)

2011 year in review

2011-12-29T15:00:00.000-06:00

Thought it would be fun to look back on all my milestones from the past year. The great thing about blogging is that I can look back and remember all the fun times I've enjoyed. It's amazing how much I forget, even in such a short time.

Here are a few of my favorite accomplishments in 2011:

1) I got to milk a dairy goat & drive a team of draft horses.

2) I ended up growing a huge batch of banana peppers, which I canned as pickled banana pepper rings.

3) I ran 10 road races this year and rode a half-day of RAGBRAI on my old Huffy bike.

4) I checked out several new bike trails, including the High Trestle Trail in central Iowa.

High Trestle Trail

T-Bone Trail

Raccoon River Valley Trail

Grant Wood Trail

Wabash Trace Trail

5) I took two non-work-related trips -- one to Arizona and the other to Colorado.

Apache Junction, Ariz.

Golden, Colo.

6) I baked a lot of bread & cookies!

7) I made a lot of good memories with my family.

8) I saw the craziness that was the Ames straw poll.

9) I tried new foods at the World Food Festival, Greek Food Festival and Iowa State Fair.

10) We brought home our first real Christmas tree!

I'm excited to see what adventures await in 2012! I just want to thank all of you for following my blog over the past year. I definitely appreciate all your comments and encouragement. And I enjoy learning from all of you, too. Have a great 2012!

Making lefse: A flour-covered kitchen

2011-12-26T15:00:00.000-06:00

I spent an entire day making a batch of Norwegian lefse for our family's Christmas dinner. Lefse dough is very sticky to work with, so I had to use a ton of flour to keep it workable. The goal is to roll out the lefse as thin as possible, but not so thin that the dough tears when you lift it from the cloth-covered board.

Before the day was done, there was dough and flour everywhere. And I mean everywhere!

But all the mess was worth it in the end. I ended up with a nice batch of lefse to send home with my family at Christmas!

If you're interested in my grandma's lefse recipe, check out my earlier lefse post.

Cookie Friday: Peanut butter blossom cookies

2011-12-23T15:00:00.000-06:00

When Christmas rolls around, I get a little obsessed with cookie baking. I pour through all my cookbooks, trying to find a new recipe that will wow my family. But I always crave my old favorite, Peanut Butter Blossoms, with the Brach's chocolate stars, just like my mom made when I was a kid.

I've tried a couple different recipes for this cookie, but my favorite so far is the peanut butter blossoms recipe from Land O'Lakes. Be sure to eat one of these cookies fresh from the oven, when the chocolate star is melting on top. Yum!

We'll be leaving out a plate of peanut butter cookie blossoms for Santa this year!

Have a Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah, all my blog friends! Wishing you all the best and brightest of the season.

Pella Dutch letters

2011-12-20T15:00:00.000-06:00

Last week, a work colleague sent a package of Dutch letters to our office as a thank-you. I had never tried a Dutch letter until a couple years ago. But now I'm hooked! The best Dutch letters I can find come from Pella, Iowa. As you can see, the Pella Dutch letters are shaped like an "S," but I read last year in the Des Moines Register that the home bakers in Pella actually make Dutch letters in any shape.

The gift box of Dutch letters came from Vander Ploeg's bakery in Pella.

I only got a chance to eat one of these delectable Dutch letters, because my husband polished off the rest in one day! We're both big fans of Dutch letters. And what's not too love? Flaky, buttery pastry. A sweet almond paste filling. Crunchy sugar sprinkled on top. Yum!

I've got to stop in Pella sometime so I can see these Dutch letter bakeries in person!

Apple streusel muffins

2011-12-17T15:00:00.000-06:00

One of my favorite food magazines is Seasons from Hy-Vee, an Iowa-based grocery store chain. I used to pick up a copy of Seasons whenever I saw a new edition at Hy-Vee. But then I figured out I could sign up to have the magazine delivered to my house -- for free! No yearly subscription!

Like the name suggests, Seasons features recipes that are perfect for the season. This month's issue offers Christmas baking and seafood recipes (which I can't wait to try for New Year's this year.)

As for the baking recipes, I had a few overripe apples in my refrigerator, so I decided to bake up a batch of the Baked Apple Crumble Muffins featured in the fall issue. The recipe was a little more complicated to make than the typical muffin recipe. But I loved all the different spices, particularly the "heavy" (1/2 tsp.) dose of cloves.

My husband wasn't too excited when he saw these muffins cooling on the counter. But he ended up loving them. "I don't usually like muffins, but these were good," he said. So I'm sharing the recipe with all of you. Hope you enjoy it!

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Baked Apple Crumble Muffins (or Apple Streusel Muffins)

From Hy-Vee's Seasons magazine

Topping:

1/2 C. unsalted butter
1/4 C. sugar
1/4 C. plus 2 Tbls. packed light brown sugar
2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
Pinch of salt
1-1/3 C. flour
1/2 C. chopped walnuts

Muffins:

1-1/2 C. packed light brown sugar
1/3 C. vegetable oil
1/3 C. unsweetened applesauce
1 large egg
1-1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
2-1/2 C. flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1-1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp. ginger
1 C. buttermilk
1-1/4 C. chopped walnuts
2-1/2 C. chopped apple

For topping: In a small saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Remove pan from the heat and add the granulated sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Stir with a rubber scraper, pressing when necessary, until smooth. Add flour and mix until well-blended and pasty. Fold in chopped walnuts; set aside.

For muffins: Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. In a large bowl, whisk together brown sugar, oil, applesauce, egg and vanilla until smooth. In a separate bowl, sift together flour, soda, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves and ginger. Stir oil mixture into flour mixture alternately with buttermilk. Stir in walnuts. Fold in apples, mixing until just combined. Spoon into greased standard-size muffin cups, filling almost full. Break up the topping mixture with your fingers into medium-size pieces. Evenly sprinkle the topping pieces over the muffin batter. Bake 25 to 30 minutes until golden brown and tops spring back when lightly touched. Yield: 18 muffins.

Allspice in East Village, Des Moines

2011-12-14T16:00:00.000-06:00

This weekend, I was in the mood for a little adventure. And for me, a little adventure means exploring close to home. I've been hearing a lot about a new shop, Allspice, in downtown Des Moines' East Village. I love shopping in the East Village. So many fun stores and restaurants, all within walking distance. If you're looking for a unique Christmas gift, check out the East Village.

I found Allspice on Locust Street, and the store was packed! I parked myself at the tasting bar, where I tried several different olive oils and balsamic vinegars. I really liked the "fruity" flavors, such as the red apple balsamic. I ended up buying a couple small bottles of pomegranate balsamic and blood orange olive oil. I plan to use these in stirfries and salad dressings.

I also bought a few baking supplies: cocoa nibs, which I've always wanted to try, crystallized ginger (one of my favorites) and maple sugar powder, which I plan to add to my morning bowl of oatmeal. Allspice was a foodie paradise, and I'm sure I'll be making many more visits in the future. Plus, I'm always looking for an excuse to visit the East Village!

Iowa recipes: Caramel corn

2011-12-11T15:00:00.000-06:00

I wasn't going to post this recipe. But my husband said I should go ahead and share it, even if it didn't turn out perfect. He said it'll make my blog "more real."

To be fair, I don't think it was the recipe's fault. It's a pretty standard caramel corn recipe, which I found in an old 4-H cookbook. This caramel corn was very good, and my husband and I ended up eating the entire batch. But the texture wasn't right. I think it has more to do with my inexperience with a candy thermometer than with the recipe. The "caramel" on the popcorn crystallized when it cooled. The flavor was excellent, but the texture wasn't as smooth as it should be. (Does that make sense?)

Think I'm going to give this recipe another try this weekend. I'll let you know if it turns out, and tell you what I did differently. Do you have any advice for making caramel corn? The recipe looks so simple; I just need to get over my fear of the candy thermometer!

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Caramel Corn

1 C. butter
2 C. sugar
1/2 C. dark corn syrup
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
6 quarts unsalted popped popcorn.

Combine the butter, sugar, corn syrup and salt in a saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Cook for 5 minutes or to 240 to 248 degrees on a candy thermometer, firm-ball stage, stirring frequently. Remove from heat.

Add the baking soda, beating well. Pour over the popped popcorn in a bowl, stirring to coat.

Spread on a large baking sheet. Bake at 250 degrees for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

Yield: 20 servings.

Our first real Christmas tree

2011-12-08T16:00:00.000-06:00

I've met quite a few Christmas tree growers through my job, but I've never set up a real Christmas tree in our house. This year, I decided to convince my husband to help me pick out our first real Christmas tree. It turned out, he didn't need much convincing. His family never had a real Christmas tree when he was growing up, so he was all for the idea. He suggested that we drive to a nearby grocery store and pick out a tree. But I insisted that we visit a local Christmas tree farm.

There aren't many Christmas tree farms left in Iowa. It's a tough business to get into. First, you need the land. With today's high corn prices, you're likely to make more money planting corn than planting Christmas trees. Plus, operating a Christmas tree farm is a lot harder than it looks. You need to tend to the trees throughout the year, trimming and weeding and spraying for insects when necessary. You also have to keep the deer from eating all your trees. And did I mention that it takes seven years before a Christmas tree is large enough to sell? You better have a lot of patience if you're a Christmas tree grower.

My husband and I traveled to the Kidman tree farm near Polk City to buy our tree. We chose a White pine, because I love the "Teddy bear" soft needles.

I'm leaving the tag on the tree as an "ornament."

We bought the tree stand at the farm, as well, for only $25. It's a very sturdy tree stand, and very simple to use. (Sorry, I forgot to take a picture before we put the tree up. But I'll post one sometime.) The best part of buying straight from the farm? They had the tree all wrapped and placed in the back of our pick-up by the time we left the gift shop. We were in and out in 15 minutes, which made my impatient hubby very happy.

So far, the tree has been very easy to care for. It's like an indoor gardening project. I water the tree twice a day, since it sucks up quite a bit of water. We've had only a few needles to clean up from the carpet. I put down a layer of garbage bags to protect the carpet from water, but so far, there hasn't been any water spilled, another benefit of a good tree stand.

I wrapped the tree in the homemade tree skirt my mother-in-law made for us. It's such a beautiful addition to our holiday decorations.

You may have noticed that I don't have any ornaments on the tree. Too be honest, I'm not really a fan of ornaments. I hate packing and unpacking them each year. I might make time to put a few ornaments up, but I'm happy with just the lights. My philosophy with Christmas lights: the more colorful, the better!

So does your family prefer a real tree to an artificial tree? Do you prefer white lights over colored lights? Or do you skip the tree all together? I'm usually not big on decorating the house for the holidays, but I was excited about getting a real tree for the first time.

Best-ever caramel rolls

2011-12-05T16:00:00.000-06:00

Consider this an early Christmas present.

I'm sharing my favorite recipe for caramel pecan rolls. And this time, I'm not taking any shortcuts. I made these rolls on Thanksgiving weekend, using leftover mashed potatoes. Usually, I'll use my go-to bread dough recipe to make these rolls. Or (gasp!) I'll use potato buds. But these rolls really do turn out best with real mashed potatoes.

Oh yeah. That's real caramel on the top, too. Not butterscotch pudding mix.

My photos (taken at night without natural light) really don't do these rolls justice. The dough was soft and white, like a marshmallow. My husband gobbled about half the pan up in one sitting.

These rolls would be perfect for a holiday brunch, or alongside a bowl of chili. (Did anyone else enjoy chili and cinnamon rolls at their elementary school cafeteria?) Enjoy, my blog friends!

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Caramel Pecan Rolls

3/4 C. sugar
3/4 C. hot mashed potatoes
1-1/2 C. warm water (105 to 115 degrees)
2 packages instant dry yeat
1 C. butter, softened
2 eggs
2 tsp. salt
5-1/2 to 6-1/2 C. all-purpose flour
Caramel syrup (recipe below)
Cinnamon-sugar filling (recipe below)

In large bowl, combine sugar and potatoes. Add water and yeast; mix well. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1 hour. Stir down dough. Mix in 1/2 of the butter, eggs and salt. Gradually stir in flour to make a soft dough. Turn out onto lightly floured surface. Knead until dough is smooth and elastic, about 8 to 10 minutes. Place dough in a greased bowl, turning once to grease the top. Let rise until doubled. While dough rises, prepare caramel syrup. (Recipe below.) Pour syrup into two 9-inch square greased pans. Sprinkle 1 C. pecans over syrup in each pan.

When dough has doubled, divide in half and roll out each half to a 14x8-inch rectangle. Spread each rectangle of dough with 1/4 C. of the butter, then sprinkle with filling. (Recipe below.) Roll up dough from the long sides, jellyroll style. Cut each roll into 9 pieces. Place rolls, cut-side down, into prepared pans. Cover and let rise until double. Bake in 350 degree oven to 30 to 35 minutes, until browned. Cool 5 minutes in pans before turning out. Makes 18 rolls.

For caramel syrup:

1/2 C. butter
1 C. packed brown sugar
1/4 C. light corn syrup
2-3/4 T. heavy cream
2 C. coarsely chopped pecans

Mix butter, brown sugar, corn syrup and cream in a small saucepan. Cook over medium heat, stirring until all melted.

For filling:

2/3 C. sugar
1 T. cinnamon

Combine sugar and cinnamon. Set aside.

Cozy crochet

2011-12-02T16:00:00.000-06:00

It took me almost a year, but I finally took the time to finish up a large crochet project I've been working on since last winter. I made this crochet blanket, my largest crochet project to date, from a pattern I found in Crochet Today magazine. Not sure if I completely like how this striped blanket turned out, but the soft, fluffy yarn is very cozy. It's a great blanket for snuggling up on the couch.

After such a large project, I wanted to do something quick and easy. I used some leftover yarn to make these crochet snowflakes, also from Crochet Today magazine. I think they'll make cute ornaments.

I'm already looking for my next crochet project for the winter. Hopefully, it won't take nearly a year to finish!

Shop local: Iowa gift ideas

2011-11-29T16:00:00.000-06:00

So are you getting back into a routine after the first round of holidays? This is the time of year when things get crazy where I work, so I don't have as much time to spend on my hobbies. For a change of pace, I thought I'd share a few of my favorite Iowa discoveries over the past year. These would make great gifts and stocking stuffers for those hard-to-shop-for friends, co-workers and family members.

Farmers Best Gourmet Popcorn, grown in Rockwell City, Iowa: I was fortunate to meet the family that grows Farmers Best Gourmet Popcorn, and they generously gave me a free sample so I can discover what makes their popcorn a "premium" product. Farmers Best popcorn is tender, white popcorn that doesn't have the tough hulls that the brand-name popcorns have. You can find Farmers Best popcorn in 1-pound bags, or in microwaveable bags, at several Hy-Vee and Fareway stores across Iowa. Or order online at www.farmersbestpopcorn.com.

Spring Valley Honey Farms lip balm, from Perry Iowa: I love these little honey-flavored lip balms so much! I carry one in my purse and one in my make-up drawer so I'm never far from them. They're a must for the dry winters, and I prefer these honey lip balms to the Burt's Bees products. In the summer, you can buy these at the Iowa Honey Producers booth at the Iowa State Fair. Or order online at www.springvalleyhoneyfarms.com. (Don't forget to buy some Iowa honey on the site, too.)

Beaverdale Confections gourmet marshmallows, from Des Moines, Iowa: I discovered these marshmallows at the World Food Festival in Des Moines this fall, and it was love at first bite! These soft marshmallows come in a variety of yummy flavors (the marshmallows pictured above are coconut and caramel flavored). I'm planning to buy these for holiday gifts this year, and a few extra for myself! They would be perfect with hot chocolate. Visit the candy store in Beaverdale, or order online at http://www.beaverdaleconfections.com/.

Do you plan to shop local for the holidays? Do you have a favorite local product that would be perfect for gift-giving? I would love to hear about it.

Thanksgiving successes & messes

2011-11-26T16:00:00.000-06:00

Hello everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, with plenty of pie!

Once again this year, my hubby and I enjoyed Thanksgiving together at home. It's quite a marathon to put together an entire Thanksgiving meal, even when it's just for two. This year, I made all the classics: cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, green bean casserole, marshmallow-topped sweet potatoes. My husband is an expert at making gravy, so I let him take over that task.

Can't believe I ate this whole plate of food! On the plate: stuffing, cranberry-apple sauce, sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, dinner rolls and, of course, turkey.

Thought I'd share a few of my successes and messes from Thanksgiving meal prep. I'm hoping I'll look back at a few of these later on for a good laugh:

Success: We decided to roast the turkey the night before to save time the next day.
Mess: I dropped the turkey on the floor! No kidding! I pulled the turkey out of the oven and set it on top of the stove to check the temp. When I turned around to grab the food thermometer, I heard a loud clatter and saw the turkey and roast pan drop to the floor! Thankfully, I cooked the turkey in a Reynolds bag. So my husband just picked the turkey bag up, plopped it back in the roasting pan and put it back in the oven to finish cooking. Some of the liquid spilled onto the floor. But otherwise, the bag protected the turkey! We're still laughing about this one today!

Success: I finished preparing the entire Thanksgiving meal before noon!
Mess: I ended up leaving the pumpkin pie in the oven a little too long, and the crust got way too brown -- almost black on the edges.

Success: I woke up early to burn a few extra calories at a 7 a.m. Spin class.
Mess: I didn't have time to take a shower until 1 p.m.!

So how was your Thanksgiving this year? Did you cook the turkey yourself, or do you get together for a big family gathering? Hopefully, your turkey stayed off the floor!

I'm thankful for all you blog readers out there. You really inspire me to try new things and not be afraid to fail every once and a while.

Whole-wheat rolls (using Iowa-grown wheat)

2011-11-23T16:00:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago, I visited Carlson Christmas tree farm near Hampton in northern Iowa. I met Cathy Carlson, who started the tree farm with her husband 25 years ago. In addition to selling Christmas trees, Cathy also runs her own home-based bakery. You can find Cathy's baked goods at Dudley's Corner, the gas station along Interstate 35 off the Hampton (Highway 3) exit. She gave me these blondie bars to take home to my husband, which he quickly devoured, of course.

Cathy also gave me a sample of her home-grown whole wheat flour. That's right -- in addition to her baking business, Cathy also grows 6-1/2 acres of wheat. She sells the wheat either as milled flour or unmilled, if you prefer to mill the wheat yourself. (I would love to get a grain mill someday.)

The whole wheat looked gorgeous coming out of the bag, very soft and caramel-colored.

As soon as I got home, I baked up Cathy's recipe for 60 minute whole wheat rolls. Actually, these rolls took me a couple hours to make. I live in a drafty house, so I find it difficult to get bread to rise quickly. Also, the recipe called for quick-rise yeast, which I didn't have on hand. I just used the Red Star active dry yeast I keep in my freezer at all times.

These rolls turns out great! They were very soft and tender for a whole wheat roll. I drizzled them with honey, which was an excellent decision. My husband also gave these rolls a try, but he didn't like them as well as the white rolls I typically bake. He's just not a big fan of whole wheat anything, but I'm trying to convert him since whole wheat is a more nutritious choice.

Here's Cathy's recipe for 60-minute whole wheat rolls. Enjoy!

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Cathy's 60 Minute Rolls

2 C. whole wheat flour
2-1/2 C. of unsifted white flour (Cathy's note: I mix the flours together before I start to make the recipe)
1 tsp. salt
3 Tbls. sugar
2 packages Fleishmann's Active Dry Yeast (Cathy's note: I recommend rapid rise yeast)
1 C. milk
1/2 C. water
1/4 C. margarine

Combine milk, water and margarine in a saucepan. Heat over low heat until liquid is very warm (120 degrees). Margarine doesn't need to be melted.

In a large bowl, measure 1-1/2 C. of flour, then sugar, salt and yeast. Mix thoroughly and gradually add the heated ingredients. Beat 2 minutes at a medium speed of electric mixer, scraping bowl occasionally. Add 1/2 C. of flour. Beat at high speed. Stir in enough flour to make a soft dough.

Turn onto a lightly floured board; knead until smooth and elastic, about 5 minutes. Place in a greased bowl cover and let rise for 15 to 20 minutes. Make your favorite rolls.

Cover and let rise in a warm place free from draft, 15 to 20 minutes. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes or until golden brown.

Iowa recipes: Blue-ribbon pie crust

2011-11-20T16:00:00.000-06:00

I'm convinced that some people have inherited a gene that makes them a natural in the kitchen. My husband can throw together a bunch of ingredients from the cupboard and come up with a 4-star meal. Yet almost everything I cook turns out bland and boring. That's why I like baking. Just follow the recipe, and it will likely turn out great.

But I've always struggled with pie crust. I've tried all kinds of recipes -- using lard, butter, shortening or a combination of these, and I've even taken cooking classes to learn how to make pie crust. Yet when I get home, I can never get the crust to turn out. It's either too crumbly, or too wet. I've tried to keep my ingredients in the freezer to keep them as cold as possible (as recommended by Martha Stewart). I've tried pastry blenders, the food processor and the two-knife method to cut the butter or shortening into the flour.

And then there's the waiting. Most recipes call for refrigerating the dough for a couple hours or overnight. I don't have that kind of time to wait. When I want pie, I want it now!

A few years ago, I visited a farm for a luncheon, and the wife served us the best apple pie. She said it was easy to make the crust -- she just "eyeballed it" by mixing vegetable oil with flour. Vegetable oil? I had to find that recipe.

Then I found my new favorite pie crust recipe. It was printed in several Iowa State Fair Cookbooks. It was a recipe from Louise Piper, an Iowan who is famous for her blue-ribbon pies. It's a four-ingredient pie crust recipe that doesn't require refrigeration. Just mix it up, roll it out between two sheets of wax paper (no sticking to the rolling pin!) and fit it on the pie pan. This pie crust is easier to mix up than a batch of cookies!

I've got nothing against store-bought pie crusts, by the way. But it's fun to impress your family and friends with a pie made from scratch. Plus, a home-baked pie always tastes better because of the work you put into it.

Give this pie crust recipe a try for Thanksgiving or year round. Enjoy!

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Blue-Ribbon Pie Crust

From Iowa State Fair Cookbook, submitted by Louise Piper of Rolfe

2 C. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
1/4 C. cold milk
1/2 C. vegetable oil

Stir together flour and salt. Pour milk into oil; do not stir. Add liquid to flour mixture; stir well. Shape mixture into two balls. If mixture is too dry and crumbly, add 1 to 2 Tablespoons more oil. Roll each ball out ball out between two sheets of waxed paper.

Iowa recipes: Pumpkin bars

2011-11-17T16:00:00.000-06:00

Pumpkin recipes are very trendy in the food blog world right now. Over the past few weeks, I've seen recipes for pumpkin cookies, pumpkin cakes, pumpkin rolls, pumpkin ice cream, pumpkin granola, pumpkin lattes, pumpkin pastas -- and the list goes on and on.

I've actually tried a few of these recipes. But nothing really compares to good, old-fashioned pumpkin bars with cream cheese frosting. These pumpkin bars are always a hit whenever I bring them to potlucks or family gatherings. My husband has also requested pumpkin bars many times for his October birthdays.


Mmm ... Cream cheese frosting

Make these pumpkin bars, and be prepared for the compliments! Enjoy!

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Pumpkin bars

From 2004 Iowa State Fair Cookbook

2 C. all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 C. sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
4 eggs, slightly beaten
2 C. pumpkin
1 C. vegetable oil
3/4 C. finely chopped walnuts

Sift dry ingredients into mixing bowl. Mix eggs, pumpkin and oil. Add to dry ingredients. Mix and stir in nuts. Pour into greased and floured pan. Bake at 375 degree for 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted near center comes out clean. Cool; frost bars.

Frosting:

3 oz. cream cheese, softened
6 Tbls. butter or margarine
1 Tbl. milk
1 tsp. vanilla
1-3/4 C. powdered sugar

Combine all ingredients; beat until smooth. Spread over bars.

Bike Iowa: Wabash Trace Trail

2011-11-14T16:00:00.000-06:00

I was fortunate that my work took me to a part of the state I've never been to before, the town of Malvern in southwest Iowa. I was excited to finally get a chance to check out the Wabash Trace Trail, a 62-mile bike trail that stretches from the Council Bluffs/Omaha area down close to the Missouri border.

Malvern seems proud of its place along the Wabash Trace. Bike art decorated the main street. Wonder if the town has ever hosted RAGBRAI?

I had a little trouble finding the trail head, but eventually found it a couple blocks west of downtown. It was a chilly day, and it was later in the afternoon, so I didn't venture very far down the trail.

It is a beautiful trail. Definitely one of my new favorite discoveries in Iowa. I'm so glad I got to see it in the fall and enjoy all the autumn colors.

About a mile north of town, the trail turned from concrete to limestone. I was a little worried about riding my little bike down an unpaved path, but the limestone was actually very smooth. The only bumps were when I ran over a few black walnuts that had fallen from the trees.

Up ahead, I saw what looked like a tunnel in the distance. It turned out that the tunnel was actually just a thick canopy of trees. It was quite something!

The falling leaves completely covered the trail at a few points. It was fun to sink my bike tires into a pile of leaves. So glad I brought my bike along so I could check out the Wabash Trace Trail.

Iowa eats: Starboard Market, Clear Lake

2011-11-11T16:00:00.000-06:00

A few weekends ago, I drove up to northern Iowa to visit my mom and stepdad before they leave for Arizona for the winter. It was a beautiful fall day, and I was driving through Clear Lake over the noon hour. So I decided to stop at one of my favorite delis in Iowa, Starboard Market in downtown Clear Lake.

I discovered Starboard Market when someone treated me to lunch there at work. For you Des Moines folks, Starboard Market is a lot like Palmer's Deli, but on a smaller scale. The restaurant has soups, sandwiches, wraps and salads on the menu, plus amazing desserts like lemon bars, chocolate chip cookies and cheesecakes. A lot of people were ordering the cheesecakes when I stopped in.

The deli doesn't have a lot of seating, so I headed outside for a little picnic lunch at the nearby Clear Lake. There were several open picnic tables right by the water. I loved soaking in all this beautiful fall scenery.

I enjoy trying a little bit of everything whenever I eat at Starboard Market. This time, I ordered the salad sampler platter.

I always like to order a pasta salad, and so I picked the Greek salad with feta cheese and olives. Just for fun, I also ordered the cornbread salad. It was very good, although not at all what I expected. The cornbread salad was savory, not sweet, dressed with mayonnaise and studded with red peppers, herbs and green olives. Unusual combination, but it worked.

But my favorite was the caramel apple salad. It was so good! I'm not exactly sure what the ingredients were, other than the apples. The dressing was caramel-flavored (maybe vanilla pudding, Cool Whip & caramel topping?), and the salad was topped with a crunchy sprinkle of cinnamon and brown sugar. I would love to find the recipe to make this salad at home.

Starboard Market is famous for its cornbread, so I ordered it on the side. The cornbread lived up to its reptutation. It was light, delicate and perfect. (Sorry for the terrible picture. I was trying to be "stealthy" as a family of tourists walked by.)

If you're ever driving north on Interstate 35, maybe on a trip to the Twin Cities, take a few extra minutes to visit Starboard Market in Clear Lake. Or stop at one of the many other restaurants in downtown Clear Lake. It's a much better alternative to the fast-food choices along the Interstate, and it's just a couple miles out of the way.

Garden update: Planting tulips

2011-11-08T16:00:00.000-06:00

Last weekend, I spent an afternoon cleaning up my garden after the first hard frost. I dug up as many gladiolus and dahlia bulbs that I could find. Even though I enjoy growing a backyard vegetable garden, I really love to grow flowers. My favorite vase was full of dahlias, zinnias, asters and glads from late summer to mid-fall. Always made me happy to look at those cheerful flowers on my kitchen counter while I was washing dishes.

I don't have a lot of garden space in my backyard, but I still like to reserve a spot each fall for planting tulips and daffodils. It's so much fun to watch the tulips pop up in the spring before the other perennials start growing.

This year, I once again bought my tulip bulbs at Earl May, an Iowa-based garden center. The store has an excellent selection of tulips shipped in direct from Holland. I like that Earl May lets me mix-and-match different types of tulips, instead of having to buy one large bag of one type of tulip. Since I have a lot of purple spring perennials in my garden, I decided to buy purple tulips and yellow daffodils this year.

By coincidence, right after I bought the tulips, I happened to watch an episode of the Martha Stewart show about planting tulips in the fall. Martha invited a couple of tulip experts from Holland to her farm, and they showed her how to "scatter" tulip bulbs in the garden for a natural look. So instead of planting the tulips in straight rows, they took the different types of tulips, mixed them up in a paper bag, threw them on the ground, then planted the bulbs where they landed.

I decided to give the "scatter" method a try in my own backyard. I just mixed up the different tulips and daffodils and threw them on the ground. Then covered them up with soil and pine needles. (I have pine needles everywhere thanks to our giant evergreen trees.)

It was a little difficult to plant tulips this year because the ground was so dry. We went almost an entire month without rain this October! But Iowa State University Extension recommends that Iowans plant tulips in October. Unfortunately, I noticed last weekend that a few squirrels have already dug up a couple of the bulbs. I could probably remedy that with a little bit of chicken wire fencing, but I'm not sure I like the look of it, so I'll probably just take my chances with the squirrels. But I'll have to figure something out in the spring before the rabbits get to tulips. They ate all my tulips last year!

I also planted a few garlic cloves just for fun. Last year, I planted a large patch of garlic. But for some reason, the garlic died back way too early, around July 4, and never grew large enough to harvest. My husband told me just to leave the remaining garlic in the ground and see if it will grow bigger next spring. Sure enough, the garlic started to green up again this fall. Gardening is always an experiment, isn't it?

Did you plant tulips or garlic this fall? Do you have any planting tips you can share? Or any advice on how to keep the squirrels and rabbits away? I'm always looking for new ideas.

Iowa recipes: Caramel Apple Bars

2011-11-05T16:00:00.000-05:00

Nope, I'm not done with apple recipes yet. I made these caramel apple bars for my husband the other day, and he loved them! This recipe is a keeper.

I found the recipe for caramel apple bars in an Iowa ag newspaper. Just goes to show, farm women know how to bake!

These bars actually turned out more like a coffee cake. My favorite part was pouring the caramel sauce on top, of course.

My husband loved the coconut on top of these bars. Who knew that apple and coconut were a perfect pairing?

Here's the recipe if you want to give them a try. Enjoy!

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Caramel apple bars

1 C. pecans, chopped
2/3 C. brown sugar
1 C. coconut
2-1/2 C. flour
1-1/2 C. sugar
1-1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
2 eggs
1/2 C. evaporated milk
1/3 C. water
2 C. apples, peeled and finely shredded or chopped

Topping:

2/3 C. brown sugar
1/2 C. evaporated milk
4 Tbls. butter, softened

Combine pecans, brown sugar and coconut in bowl and set aside. In mixing bowl, combine the next six ingredients. In a small bowls, combine egg, milk, water and apples. Add to flour mixture. Mix well. Pour into a greased 10x15-inch pan and sprinkle with nut mixture. Bake 40 to 45 minutes at 325 degrees Fahrenheit. In a heavy saucepan, combine topping ingredients. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until sugar dissolves and mixture thickens slightly, about 8 minutes. Poke holes with fork in top of hot bars. Immediately spoon topping over bars. Cool.

Wordless Wednesday: Dog tired @ The Iowa Pet Expo

2011-11-02T16:00:00.000-05:00

World Food Festival

2011-10-30T16:00:00.000-05:00

Des Moines hosted the annual World Food Prize ceremony in early October. The kick-off event for the celebration was the World Food Festival, which featured food vendors serving up specialty dishes from all around the world. I'd heard good things about the World Food Festival, so I didn't want to miss it again this year.

I was greeted by dancers and rows of food vendors lining the streets of the East Village.

Each vendor offered $1 samples. I tried as many of those samples as I could. Some of the foods I didn't like, but most were wonderful. One of my favorite booths was Indian Delights. I ordered the $1 sample, which was a curry-spiced potato, and the Mango lassi, which looked so pretty in the dish.

I stood in line forever to try a bacon-wrapped grilled banana. To be honest, it wasn't that great -- not terrible, but not all that good either. But at least I can say I tried one!

My favorite discovery of the day was the cabbage-stuffed pierogi. It was a revelation! Soft and doughy like a fresh donut, but with a touch of peppery cabbage filling. It was worth driving to Des Moines just for this pierogi!

Of course, I also couldn't help but get a $1 sample of the bacon ice cream. Again, it was just OK, nothing outstanding. Actually, I could barely taste the bacon, it was chopped so fine.

Pretty soon, I was getting full, and I didn't feel like standing in any more lines. On a whim, I decided to try the homemade toasted marshmallows. They were wonderful. One marshmallow was coconut flavored, the other caramel. They were nice a gooey on the inside. I could have eaten several more of these lovelies.

Before I left, I ordered the chili-spiced cantaloupe with lime juice, just for fun. Oh, goodness. I loved this! The hot chili powder really complimented the sweet cantaloupe. I've got to try this at home.

I already can't wait to attend the World Food Festival again next year, just so I can get my hands on another periogi!

Colorado vacation: Boulder

2011-10-27T16:00:00.000-05:00

On our second day in Colorado, my sister and I took our friends' advice and traveled up to Boulder, Colo. The traffic was heavy on the highway between Golden & Boulder, and we quickly found out why. There was a University of Colorado football home game that Saturday! We saw tailgaters everywhere!

Our friends told us that we had to go check out the pedestrian mall in Boulder. And it was amazing! Lots of neat, trendy shops, especially for outdoor enthusiasts. And the food. Oh, there was food everywhere.

Once again, luck was on our side. We showed up just in time to check out the Boulder farmers market! We have some great farmers markets in central Iowa, but I've never seen such a wide selection of produce. I couldn't stop taking pictures of it all!

We walked up and down the pedestrian mall, checking out shops that peaked our interest. We couldn't help but stop in this toy shop. The kites were so colorful!

And I'm such a geek, but I had to take a picture of this dual-flushing toilet at a restroom we found. Boulder is a very eco-friendly community!

We were also excited to find an amazing restaurant, Snooze, which serves up all-day breakfast grub. I had heard of Snooze before, but I thought it was only in downtown Denver. Turns out, we showed up at Snooze's new Boulder restaurant on its opening weekend! Once again, we couldn't believe our luck.

My sister ordered the sticky roll French toast. It was unbelievable! It was just like eating the best part of a sticky roll -- the gooey caramel topping.

I couldn't decide between two pancakes I wanted to try. So I ordered both! The first was a blueberry lemon bar pancake. The second was my favorite, a pineapple upside pancake, with crushed pineapple inside the pancake and a brown sugar butter topping. So good!

We also ordered a side of hash browns. Loved the presentation.

I absolutely loved everything about Boulder -- the bike trails, the shopping, the restaurants, the coffee shops on every corner. And we saw the most colorful people -- literally. Check out this green-screen man trying to get signatures for a petition. Can you read what the sign is promoting?

On our way back to the hotel, we drove through Denver. I really wanted to check out the REI flagship store. It was inside a restored warehouse, with a rock climbing wall in the center. It was neat to see, but the clothes were way out of my price range. (We found winter gloves for $200!)

We still had so much we wanted to see, including Elitch Gardens amusement park next door. But rain clouds were moving in, so we decided to call it a day. Wish we had more time to spend in Colorado. I'm already fantasizing about returning for another short trip next year. The weather was beautiful in the fall, and there was so much to do and see.

But I was very glad to come home to Iowa. Even the mountains of Colorado can't really compare to Iowa in the autumn, in my opinion.

Colorado vacation: Golden

2011-10-24T16:00:00.000-05:00

For years, my sister and I have talked about going on a vacation together. But school and work (and our finances) got in the way. Now that my sister has finished school and has a great job as a dental hygienist, I asked her to join me on a trip to Colorado this fall. What can I say? I love Iowa, but every once and a while a girl wants to see the mountains.

It was a quick weekend trip. We flew out of Des Moines on Thursday and came back on Sunday. We decided to fly rather than drive to maximize our short time there. But we left wishing that we stayed an extra day. There was so much to see!

We started our trip in Golden, Colo., with a visit to the Coors Brewery. It was a terrific tour -- and it was all free, including the beer samples!

Glad we hopped on the tour bus early, because there was quite a line when we were finished.

Here I am, standing in front of the "crystal clear waters" of Coors.

My sister, taking pictures of the copper kettles that start the brewing process.

Tried our first pumpkin beer at the Coors brewery tour. They offered us each three free samples!

What I loved about Colorado -- other than the mountains, of course -- were all the bikes on the street There was even a bike lane on the highway to and from the Denver airport! Maybe someday Iowa will be this bike friendly. My sister noticed that it seemed like everyone in Colorado was in good shape (i.e., they weren't packing any extra pounds.) We saw lots of people enjoying the outdoors -- jogging, biking and kayaking.

I'm so used to seeing "road" bikes in Iowa, it was cool to see all the mountain bikes in Colorado.

As recommended by our Coors tour guide, we stopped at a local bar (I think it was called Buffalo Rose) for lunch. Honestly, it was kind of a dive bar, with a lot of greasy food on the menu. But I did get a kick out of the Iowa Pork Fritter on the menu!

I had a craving for a Reuben sandwich, so I order it with a side of onion rings. (Why not? I'm on vacation.) The onion rings turned out to be gigantic! They were each the size of half an onion! So good.

We then attempted to walk off the fried food and beer with a stroll along the trail. We couldn't get over how clear the water was. Absolutely beautiful.

Also I loved the public art in Golden. They embrace their western roots.

Before we left for the day, we drove up to nearby Red Rocks Amphitheater, an outdoor concert venue built into the rocky landscape. We couldn't stay long, however, because they were setting up for a Grateful Dead concert that night. There were already several "Deadheads" camped out, waiting for the concert to begin. They were quite a colorful group of folks, to say the least.

Smoggy view of the Denver skyline.

My sister and I wrapped up our day with a trip to the coolest outlet mall we've ever seen. We wished we had more room in our suitcases for all the cute clothes we wanted to buy! And it seems like Colorado was more fashion-forward than Iowa. (I've heard that Iowa is about two years behind all the trends on the East Coast.) Someday, I'm coming back to Denver just for the shopping!

Cookie Friday: Apple brownies

2011-10-21T16:00:00.000-05:00

I don't know about you, but I can't resist a good apple recipe, especially when Iowa-grown apples are in season in the fall. I found this apple brownie recipe in a recent issue of King Arthur Flour's Baking Sheet. I'm not sure why they are called "brownies," instead of "blondies." There isn't any chocolate in this recipe. Yet these apple "brownies" are still excellent. I've baked up these brownies twice now because my husband liked them so much. The recipe is below, if you want to give them a try.

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Apple Brownies

From King Arthur Flour

1-1/4 C. King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 C. unsalted butter
1 C. sugar
1 large egg
2-1/2 C. (3 medium) apples, peeled and chopped
1/2 C. cinnamon chips (I left these out)
1/2 C. chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350 degree Fahrenheit. Grease and flour a 9-inch square pan.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Set aside. melt the butter, either in a saucepan or the microwave. Remove from the heat and stir in the sugar. Cool the mixture to lukewarm, then stir in the egg. Once incorporated, add the flour mixture, mixing to combine. Fold in the apples, chips and nuts. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 40 minutes. Yield: 16 brownies.

Watermelon Rind Pickles

2011-10-18T16:00:00.000-05:00

My husband practically begs me to make watermelon rind pickles for him every summer. It's a favorite that his grandma used to make. She would typically serve watermelon pickles for Christmas. She would use food coloring to tint the pickles in pink and green holiday colors.

I had never heard of or tried watermelon rind pickles before I met my husband. I wasn't convinced that I would like them. After all, why would you eat the rind? But I gave it a try for my husband. And what do you know, I actually like watermelon rind pickles quite a bit -- although not as much as my husband, who will eat half a jar in one night!

I went to the North Grand Farmers Market in Ames to find the watermelons. Most of the watermelons at the the grocery store are the seedless variety nowadays, and we find that seedless watermelons don't have very thick rinds. And when you're making watermelon rind pickles, you want a lot of rind to work with.

To my surprise, the vendor at the farmers market gave me two overripe watermelon for free (!) when I told him I was making watermelon rind pickles. I brought them home and asked my hubby to cut up the rinds for me, since his knife skills are better than mine.

He came up with a ingenious way to get the most rind from the watermelon. He used our Oxo potato peeler to strip away the green part of the rind. He even took a picture for my blog to demonstrate.

Many watermelon rind pickle recipes use white sugar and food coloring to tint the pickles. My favorite recipe uses brown sugar and no food coloring. The pickles aren't as pretty, but they taste like caramel candy, with a nice sourness from the vinegar. Yes, they taste way better than they look!

Below is my favorite watermelon rind pickle recipe, from the "Joy of Pickling." The pickles are are a little time consuming to make, but will definitely impress your friends and family when served on a holiday relish tray. Enjoy!

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Watermelon Rind Pickles

Adapted from "The Joy of Pickling"

7 C. prepared watermelon rind (cut away the pink flesh and green skin, then cut into 1/2 to 3/4-inch pieces)
6 C. cold water
1 quart cider vinegar or distilled white vinegar (I use white)
5 C. firmly packed dark brown sugar
Two 3-inch cinnamon sticks,, browken
1 Tbl. whole cloves

Put the watermelon rind into a pot and cover with cold water. Bring the water to a boil, and boil the rind until it is just translucent; don't let it get soft.

In another pot, bring to a boil the vinegar and sugar, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Tie the spices in a spice bag or scrap of cheesecloth, and add them to the syrup. Drain the rind and add it to the syrup, too. Bring the contents to a simmer. Simmer them for 1-1/2 hours, until the syrup is dark and thick.

Remove the spice bag. Ladle the rind and syrup into pint or half-pint mason jars, leaving 1/2 headspace, and close the jars with 2-piece caps. Process the jars for 10 minutes in a boiling-water bath.

Store the jars in a cool, dry, dark place.

Fall garden update

2011-10-15T16:00:00.000-05:00

I'm happy to report that my garden is still going strong, despite a couple of frost scares earlier this fall. In early October, we've been enjoying 80 degree temperatures. Last year at this time, we got our first snow! My husband and I are taking advantage of these unseasonably warm days by spending a lot of time on the bike trail and lake. Needless to say, my garden and house aren't as spruced up as they should be, but we figure we've got all winter to work on household chores.

However, I did manage to remember to plant a few lettuce, radish and spinach seeds back in late August for a third-season garden crop. The warm weather really helped these little seedlings along. Unfortunately, the weather has also been dry. We've gone almost two weeks now without rain! But these little plants are still hanging in there. The radishes are small, but I think they are ready to pick this weekend.

Please ignore the weeds. I've been too busy biking to spend time in the garden.

I'm really excited to share a little "experiment" I've been trying out in my garden. At a recent community garden open house in Osceola, I learned about "bag" gardening. I decided to give it a try. I had a reuseable shopping bag that had ripped at the handles (the grocery bagger guy told me this happens all the time). I wanted to find another use for the bag, so I thought why not use it in the garden. I filled the bag with potting soil, sprinkled lettuce seeds on top, placed it under a shade tree (since lettuce doesn't like the summer heat) and then kept it watered regularly.

Sure enough, I ended up with "bagged" lettuce!

The annual flowers in my garden are also looking pretty good, despite the cool temperatures at night. I love these marigolds. They are from a free seed packet I received in a goodie bag for a 5K race.

Even more surprising, the ever-bearing strawberry plant is doing even better in fall than it did in the spring and summer. I've got lots of berries forming. Unfortunately, the bugs have discovered the fruit, so I haven't been able to eat them. Still trying to decide if I want to try to overwinter my stack-a-pot strawberries, especially now that I'm worried about bringing bugs into the house.

Strawberry Stack-a-Pot

I'm so proud of my little backyard garden. It produced the best tomato and pepper crop that I've had in years. And it still looks pretty and is productive in the fall. I love three-season gardening! I think I'm also going to start a herb garden in my kitchen this winter.

How are all your gardens growing? Have you done a lot of canning and freezing with your garden produce?

Wordless Wednesday: Ledges State Park

2011-10-12T16:00:00.000-05:00

Canning peaches

2011-10-09T16:00:00.000-05:00

In my earlier post, I told you how much I loved the Iowa-grown peaches I discovered at Center Grove Orchard in Cambridge. Well, I liked them so much that I went back to the orchard the next weekend and bought another bag. As much as I enjoyed the peach pie I made with them, I knew that these peaches would be perfect for canning. And I had a great recipe that I wanted to try.

Earlier this summer, I picked up a copy of the Better Homes and Gardens Canning special interest magazine. It's definitely a collectors' issue. I want to try every recipe in the magazine! It features canning recipes for every season -- root crops in the fall, squash in the summer, berries in the spring. There's even an entire section of peach, nectarine and apricot canning recipes.

I had a difficult time deciding, but eventually I picked the spiced peaches recipe. I loved the idea of canned peaches with a touch of cinnamon-spice flavor, just like a pie. This recipe was very easy to follow. The hardest part was prepping all the tiny peaches! The Iowa-grown peaches were about half the size of the grocery-store variety, which means you have to pit about twice as many!

The only problem I had was that when I pulled the jars out of the canner, I noticed that some of the syrup had leaked out of a few jars. I was worried that it meant the jars didn't seal properly, but I looked it up on an Extension canning website and discovered that the jars were sealed as long as the lids were "popped" down and would be safe to eat. However, I decided not to take any chances, and I placed those leaking jars in the refrigerator and ate the peaches within a few days.

I loved these canned peaches! Such a great way to enjoy Iowa-grown peaches year round, especially since the season is so short. My only compliant is that I didn't really taste the spices, so next time I'm going to either add more or let the spices "steep" in the syrup for longer.

It's a rather long recipe to type out, so I hope you don't mind, but I'm sharing a link from another blog for the Better Homes and Gardens spiced peaches. Or if you would me to email you a copy, just leave a comment.

Iowa Recipes: Classic Peach Pie

2011-10-06T16:00:00.000-05:00

I'm so fortunate to live within a short drive of a couple apple orchards. One of my favorites, Center Grove Orchard in Cambridge, sends out a weekly newsletter during its fall apple season. From the orchard's email newsletter, I learned that the farm was offering home-grown peaches for the first time this August. I couldn't resist stopping by the orchard to buy a few peaches.

Iowa-grown peaches are a bit of a rarity. From what I've heard, peach trees grow best in southern Iowa, right along the Missouri border. But there are a few peach varieties that can handle the cold winters better. The peaches available at Center Grove Orchard were smaller than the grocery-store variety. But they were very sweet and good for eating. I decided to bake the peaches into a pie.

Pretty peaches from Center Grove Orchard

The Iowa-grown peaches were tiny, even smaller than a medium-size apple.

I'm still trying to improve my pie-making skills. One of my biggest challenges is trying to avoid a "runny" fruit filling. King Arthur Flour's "Baking Sheet" newsletter, which I subscribe to, recently had a few tips on using different thickeners in pie fillings. I actually prefer to use tapioca as a thickener. I like the texture of the little beads of tapioca, although usually they aren't too noticeable. King Arthur Flour recommends using 1 tablespoon of tapioca for every 1 cup of fruit.

I also followed the advice from the Kitchn and let the peaches sit in sugar for 15 minutes, then drained off some of the juice.

Well, the pie turned out great! It definitely wasn't soggy, but I may have added too much tapioca because the pie filling was "solid." It had a Jello-like texture, although that made it easier to slice.

Not the prettiest pie, but at least it looks homemade.

The Iowa peaches were perfect for pie. Here's an easy recipe I found in an old Iowa State Fair cookbook. Give it a try next summer when peaches are in season. If you can find Iowa-grown peaches, even better!

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Classic Peach Pie

4 to 5 C. Iowa-grown, tree-ripened peaches, sliced
1-1/4 C. sugar
3 T. tapioca or cornstarch
Dash of salt
1 T. freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 T. butter or margarine
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
Pastry for double-crust 9-inch pie

Combine peaches, sugar, tapioca or cornstarch, salt and lemon juice. Set aside 15 minutes. Spoon into pastry-lined pie pan. Dot with butter or margarine and sprinkle cinnamon on top. Cover with top crust or lattice top. Cut slits in crust for steam to escape. Bake in 400 degree oven 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees and continue baking for an additional 40 minutes, or until golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cool 1 hour before serving.

Iowa recipes: Zucchini bread

2011-10-03T15:28:00.000-05:00

This year at the Iowa State Fair, I met a couple of local bakers who published their first cookbook, "Two Chicks from the Sticks: Back Home Baking." I've been trying not to buy any new cookbooks lately, since I still have so many recipes from my old cookbooks that I haven't tried yet. But I couldn't resist buying "Two Chicks from the Sticks." The recipes looked like they came straight from my grandma's kitchen. The book features many of my childhood favorites -- like apple pie bars and monster cookie bars -- and one of my new favorites, zucchini bread.

The Two Chicks' version of zucchini bread turned out perfect. The pretty loaves were speckled with shredded zucchini, which I bought at the Valley Junction Farmers Market in West Des Moines.

If you would like to try the Two Chicks zucchini bread recipe, you can find it on their blog, which is updated frequently with recipes from their baking book and from their own kitchen experiments. They recently posted a recipe for whole-grain pumpkin bars that I'm looking forward to trying.

Biking Iowa: Grant Wood Trail

2011-09-30T16:00:00.000-05:00

I was driving through Jones County the other day, when I came across a small rest area on the way to Anamosa. The rest area was a trail head for the Grant Wood Trail, west of the small town of Olin.

The Grant Wood Trail runs about 3.5 miles, a little short for a bike ride, but perfect for walking. It was a pretty stretch of nature, with wildflowers and corn fields bordering the trail.

A lot of folks are calling Iowa the "king of bike trails," and I'm starting to discover why. I carry my folding travel bike in the back of my car whenever I'm on the road for work, so I'm always ready for a quick ride whenever I see a new trail. It's a great way to stretch my legs and get a little exercise while I'm traveling for work. And it seems like there really is a bike trail in every county in Iowa, even in unexpected spots like little towns.

Iowa road trip: Lincoln Highway historical exhibit, Missouri Valley

2011-09-27T16:00:00.000-05:00

I've been fascinated by the history of the Lincoln Highway ever since I started seeing these new Iowa Byway signs popping up along Highway 30 in central Iowa.

I discovered a new Lincoln Highway exhibit at the Harrison County Welcome Center in Missouri Valley, a little town tucked into the Loess Hills of western Iowa. The welcome center has a terrific indoor and outdoor display with photos and interpretive signs telling the story of the Lincoln Highway in Iowa.

If you're not familiar with its history, the Lincoln Highway was the first highway to stretch across the United States from New York City to San Francisco. It was started in the early 1900s, around the time that automobiles were just hitting the road. Actually, "highway" is a loose description. The Lincoln Highway was a series of roads; at first, most of them were mud trails. Over time, the roads eventually were paved. Here in Iowa, the Lincoln Highway is the precursor to Highway 30 and Interstate 80 in central Iowa.

But back to the Welcome Center, I was delighted to see on display an original concrete marker, with a Lincoln medallion. The host at the Welcome Center told me the marker was placed by the Boy Scouts back in the 1930s. The Lincoln Highway used to run right through the Welcome Center, back when the land was an apple orchard. In the 1970s, the farmer sold the land to the county to create a conservation/welcome center. So the Lincoln Highway marker is pretty much in its original spot, even though its not on the highway anymore.

The outdoor exhibit was excellent. I'm glad I stopped to check it out. I found a large map of the Lincoln Highway's path through Iowa.

There was a model of an old filling station. (You can still see a lot of these old filling stations when you drive along the old Lincoln Highway in Iowa.)

And this was really neat: You could walk through a small-scale re-creation of the Lincoln Highway to get a feel for what it was like to drive on the roads in the 1920s.

Another highlight was a demonstration of the different types of roads that made up the Lincoln Highway -- dirt, gravel and paved. I learned that Iowa was notorious for being the "stuck in the mud" state. Cars would sink into the muddy roads whenever it rained.

I highly recommend a stop at the Harrison County Welcome Center if you're traveling to the Loess Hills. It's a great area of the state to visit.

Pickled banana pepper rings

2011-09-24T16:00:00.000-05:00

This year was my first attempt at growing banana peppers, and boy oh boy, did I end up with a bumper crop of peppers! I planted three banana pepper seedlings earlier in the summer, and the weather was perfect for peppers this year. I'm still trying to figure out what to do with all the peppers. Every time I pick one, two more seem to grow in its place!

I actually decided to plant banana peppers this year because I wanted to make pickled banana pepper rings, like the kind you find at Subway or Quizno's. However, I should have looked for a recipe BEFORE planting the peppers, because I've had a tough time trying to find banana pepper recipes to use up my bumper crop.

After quite a bit of searching on the Web, I finally found a pickled yellow pepper ring recipe from the National Center for Home Preserving. This was a very easy canning recipe to follow. The most time-consuming part was cutting up all the peppers.

The peppers settled to the bottom a few minutes after a pulled them from the canner.

I waited a month before opening up a finished jar to let the flavors develop. Overall, these pickled banana pepper rings are pretty good, and definitely hot. If I were to make this recipe again, I would probably substitute another type of vinegar, maybe just plain vinegar, because I'm not too fond of the taste of cider vinegar, for some reason.

Do you have a recipe for banana peppers that your family enjoys? I'm still on a hunt for ways to use up all my banana peppers. We missed last week's frost, so the peppers are still growing out in my garden.

Wordless Wednesday: Foggy morning on the High Trestle Trail

2011-09-21T16:00:00.000-05:00

Summer at the Iowa Arboretum

2011-09-18T16:00:00.000-05:00

Every time the Iowa Arboretum has a plant sale, I can't seem to drive by without stopping. This time, I ended up buying a few daylily bulbs for my garden. I was looking for red and yellow daylilies to add a little more color to the garden, since all I have now are orange daylilies.

My hands were literally full of bulbs, but I tried to snap a couple pictures of the Arboretum's children's garden. It featured a mix of flowers and vegetables, planted in raised beds. I also discovered this garden tunnel for the kids to play in.

It was really sunny out when I took the photo below, so it's hard to see. But the garden displayed plants ranging from A to Z, as you could see from the stone markers. (If you look closely, you can see the "M" towards the front.) I loved this idea!

The Iowa Arboretum also has several miles of hiking trails, which I plan to check out this fall. The arboretum is located north of Madrid near the 4-H camp. From Highway 30 west of Ames, travel south on Highway 17, then turn west at the old brick school. Look for the signs pointing south to the Arboretum road.

Iowa Church Cookbook Recipes: Banana Bars

2011-09-15T16:00:00.000-05:00

I've officially declared this the summer of bananas. I've baked up three different varieties of banana bread, and then I followed it up with these banana bars. I remember eating these little bars with their rich cream-cheese frosting at our after-church gatherings when I was a kid. These bars are so easy to bake, I'm not sure why I don't make them more often.

Well, I've remedied that this year. My husband and I enjoyed these banana bars so much, I made another batch the following weekend, which we shared with the neighbors. Hope you enjoy this recipe as much I as we do.

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Can't Be Beat Banana Bars

Bars:

1-1/2 C. sugar
1/2 C. margarine (I used butter instead)
2 eggs
1 C. sour cream
3 ripe bananas, mahsed
2 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
2 C. flour

Frosting:

3 oz. cream cheese, softened
1 tsp. vanilla
6 T. butter
1 T. cream
2 C. powdered sugar

Bars: Cream sugar and margarine. Beat in eggs and sour cream. Mix in bananas and vanilla. Sift baking soda, salt and flour. Add to banana mixture. Bake in greased 10 x 13 inch pan at 350 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes. Frosting: Mix all frosting ingredients together well. Spread on cooled bars.

Frost advisory

2011-09-14T21:57:00.001-05:00

Tonight, I enjoyed a wonderful dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Felix & Oscars in West Des Moines, with my sister and mom, who was in town for a meeting. When I got home, I checked my Facebook page and saw that my friends were picking their tomatoes ahead of this evening's first frost of the season. Granted, many of my friends are from northern Iowa, where temps are supposed to dip well below freezing. But when I saw that a CSA farmer in nearby Boone was also picking her tomatoes and peppers, I realized I better save what I could, even if it was 9 o'clock at night.

So my husband and I grabbed flashlights and jackets, and we just finished picking the tomatoes and peppers worth saving (i.e., those that aren't too small or bug-ridden). I really wanted to save the late-planted heirloom tomatoes I bought at the Osceola Community Garden back in June. The plant had plenty of tomatoes on it, but none had ripened yet. I'm hoping they will ripen after picking on my kitchen counter.

Looks like my gardening season is coming to an early close. Did your gardens escape the frost?

Iowa Capitol 9/11 Tribute

2011-09-12T16:34:00.000-05:00

We will never forget.

Iowa church cookbook recipe: Morning Glory Muffins

2011-09-09T16:00:00.000-05:00

I planted carrots in the same garden plot as tomatoes. By mid-July, the tomatoes were getting so big that they were overshadowing the carrots. So even though the carrots were on the small side, I decided it was time to yank them out of the ground. We have really rich, black, heavy soil here in central Iowa, so I always have a difficult time trying to get the little carrots out of the ground without them breaking off. Does anyone have a trick for digging up carrots?

Even though the carrots were small, I ended up with quite a few of them.

Fresh from the garden.

All cleaned up!

Since they were so tiny, I thought it would be best to shred them in the food processor and bake with them. I wasn't in the mood for carrot cake, so I turned to my favorite church cookbook and found a recipe for Morning Glory Muffins. I had all the ingredients on hand, which is great because I didn't want to make another trip to the grocery store.

These muffins turned out a little "tough," but I think that's because I didn't add the shredded apple. (I was out of apples.) You're welcome to give them a try if you have a few extra carrots in your refrigerator that need to be used up.

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Morning Glory Muffins

1/2 C. raisins, soaked 1/2 hour in hot water (drain)
2 C. flour
1 C. sugar
2 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp nutmet
2 C. shredded carrots
1 large tart apple, shredded
1/2 C. sliced almonds (opt.)
1/2 C. coconut (opt.)
3 eggs
2/3 C. cooking oil
2 tsp. vanilla

Combine flour, sugar, baking soda and spices. Stir in drained raisins, carrots, apples, almonds and coconut. Beat eggs. Add oil and vanilla. Add to flour mixture and stir just to combine. Grease muffin cups or line with paper liners. Fill cups 2/3 full. You can sprinkle sugar and cinnamon on top, if desired. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 to35 minutes. Yield: 24 muffins.

Biking Iowa: Raccoon River Valley Trail

2011-09-06T14:00:00.000-05:00

I've been having so much fun hitting up different bike trails this summer. Now I know why Iowa is gaining a reputation as the bike trail capital of the world. There are many miles of trails within a short driving (or walking) distance from my home and work.

I recently took a day off to check out the Raccoon River Valley Trail, which runs through Adel in central Iowa. It was such a hot, humid day, my camera fogged up when I stopped to snap of picture of my little Dahon folding bike. But I kind of like the photo effect of the foggy lens.

The scenery was absolutely gorgeous. Iowa is so green and beautiful in the summertime.

The trail crosses the Raccoon River on the way east to Waukee. The steel bridges were radiating heat on the 90-plus degree day. Thankfully, most of the trail runs through wooded areas.

Discovered this steel engraving on the trail bridge over the Raccoon River.

The locals know that any trip on the Raccoon River Trail requires a stop at the Adel ice cream shop. My stomach was a little uneasy from the heat, so I opted for a fountain cherry coke instead. Gotta love the cherry syrup!

Have you visited any bike trails this summer? Do you have a favorite bike trail? I'm looking forward to hitting a few trails during the height of the fall color. Can't believe it's that time of year already!

Iowa Road Trip: Missouri - Mississippi Divide

2011-09-03T14:00:00.000-05:00

A few weeks back, I was driving in west-central Iowa along Highway 44, when I noticed a sign on the road that said "Missouri - Mississippi Divide." I had never heard of this before, so I looked it up when I got back home. Turns out, it's the dividing line where every river on the west side flows to the Missouri River, and every river on the east side flows to the Mississippi River.

I learned a little bit about the geography of my state just by reading a highway sign!

It was such a beautiful, hilly area, I stopped to take a few pictures before heading on my way.

Have you ever heard of the Missouri - Mississippi Divide?

Garden update: August 2011

2011-08-31T16:00:00.000-05:00

I took a few photos of my garden a couple weeks ago, but I've been so busy, I haven't had time to put them up on the blog until now. I'm finding that this blog is an excellent way to compare my garden from year to year. It gives me a better idea of what works, what doesn't and how my garden has evolved over time.

As you can see from the photo above, the little stack-a-pot strawberries I planted back in April are blooming again. These are an ever-bearing variety, so they are supposed to produce fruit throughout the summer. I was about to give up on these plants, after I only got one strawberry off them this spring. But now I'm finding that the plants will bloom and fruit immediately after I fertilize them with Miracle Gro every two weeks or so. The berries aren't very big or numerous, but they are very sweet. They are fun to snack on while I'm checking out the rest of my garden.

The banana peppers are growing very well in this summer's hot and dry weather. I definitely have more peppers than I know what to do with.

And I couldn't wait any longer. I finally pulled the rest of the carrots out of the garden. They were tiny, but numerous.

My biggest success this year has been the gladiolus flowers. I planted three different varieties, and they've been blooming at staggered intervals throughout the summer. It's been so nice to have a vase full of fresh flowers every day in my kitchen.

After a slow start, the tomatoes finally started turning red. The patio container tomato was the first to bear ripe fruit. The tomatoes were small, but allowed us to enjoy garden-fresh BLTs this month.

As you can see, my patio tomato is struggling with blight. The container-planted pepper is still going strong in August.

Here's another look at my potted herbs and strawberry stack-a-pot. They looked a little wilted when this photo was taken due to lack of rain. But they've perked up again since then.

The ever-bearing strawberries are flowering and setting fruit well into August.

My cucumbers were also growing fast in early August. Unfortunately, after this photo was taken, the vine started to yellow from the bottom up. It almost looks like the same blight that has struck the patio tomato, but I'm not sure if cucumbers get blight.

I've been trying to add more late-season color to my perennial garden. I planted another coneflower this year, and it's been blooming since June.

I also bought some half-priced coral bells after July 4. I'm trying to establish a shade garden under our evergreen trees. We're using lawn clippings as mulch for now.

Overall, I'm really happy with how my garden looks this year. I wish I had more time to keep it weeded and groomed, but I'm trying not to let perfection take over and just be happy with what I have accomplished. So how are your gardens growing?

Boland stand-still parade

2011-08-28T22:29:00.000-05:00

Whew! I'm exhausted from my busy, fun weekend. Yet I wanted to share a few highlights while they were still fresh in my mind. This weekend, I joined my mom and step-dad on a 13-mile bike ride during Boland's 125th anniversary celebration. Boland is just a few miles down the road from where I grew up. It's famously known as one of the smallest towns in Iowa, population 9. In 1989, talk-show host David Letterman invited the entire town of Boland to appear on his show.

Boland has always been proud of being small but mighty. Each year, the town hosts a stand-still parade, a twist on an old favorite. Since the town is only 3 blocks long, the parade floats are parked on main street, and visitors walk the length of the parade "route." Such a clever idea!

We arrived bright and early at 7:30 a.m. to register for the bike ride. A few craft and food vendors were already setting up.

Canned goods for sale at the Boland festival.

A lot of folks from this north Iowa area (including myself) have Scandinavian roots. We saw lefse for sale, a flat bread made from potatoes that my grandmother used to make every Christmas.

A wooden train is a popular playground for kids.

In addition to the bike ride, there was also a classic tractor ride. Many tractor brands were well represented.

If you're not familiar with tractor rides, it's a caravan of restored tractors. It gives people a chance to show off the work they put into restoring the tractors.

Once the tractors took to the roads, the bikes followed. Thankfully, the blacktop roads were very smooth, and the route was relatively flat. We pedaled 7 miles before hitting our first stop, Grafton, a rural town that's just a little bigger than Boland.

After resting our legs for a few minutes, we pedaled our bikes on the trip back to Boland. I couldn't get over how pretty the scenery was. We rode in the shadow of a wind farm, which seemed to stretch for miles.

When we got back to Boland, we stopped to watch a chainsaw-carving artist. I had to stop myself from taking this little guy home.

But we didn't stay and watch for long. We were on a mission. Our registration for the bike ride included free homemade pie and ice cream! It was tough to choose one slice of pie. There were so many yummy options!

I ended up picking the apple crumb pie. It was even better than I imagined. The crumb topping had a wonderful caramel-like flavor and crunch. And the homemade vanilla ice cream melted perfectly into the crumb topping. So good!

My mom chose the peach pie. My step-dad, the apple. We lined 'em up before we dug in.

Somehow, my step-dad managed to get two scoops of ice cream! I was so jealous.

After our eating every last crumb of pie, we toured the historic Boland schoolhouse, which is currently under renovation.

A brass band entertained the crowds. Such excellent musicians. Nothing beats the sound of a tuba!

Soon, the crowd was invited to watch a skydiving demonstration. One of the skydivers was a local woman who has served in the U.S. Army for 28 years and has won several skydiving competitions. She chose Boland for her last jump before retiring from military service.

At this point, we were getting pretty tired from waking up a 5:30 a.m. and spending 5 hours at the festival. So we left just as the stand-still parade was getting started. I must have been tired, because I only took a few half-hearted pictures. Wish I took more to give a better idea of what the parade looked like.

But before we left, I had to get one more picture to remember the day. We had a great time in Boland, and we're already planning to come back for the bike ride next year!

Banana blueberry bread

2011-08-25T16:00:00.000-05:00

Don't the blueberries look fluorescent in this picture? Don't know how that happened.

I like to buy fresh blueberries whenever they are sale in the summer. I usually bake up a batch of blueberry muffins, but I also had some over-ripe bananas that I needed to use up. So I found a recipe for blueberry banana bread from Taste of Home, my go-to source for baking recipes.

The recipe calls for shortening, which I typically don't like to bake with because I prefer real butter (for the flavor) or canola oil (a healthier alternative). But I didn't have time to tinker with the recipe, so I just made it as is. The bread baked up just fine, and I enjoyed it. My only compliant is that it was a little bland. For some reason, I couldn't really taste the blueberries, which was disappointing. In the future, I'll probably try to look for another recipe if I ever find myself with blueberries and bananas that need to be used up.

If you know of a good blueberry bread recipe, please share. I would love to try it sometime.

Iowa State Fair memories

2011-08-22T16:00:00.000-05:00

If you'll indulge me, I just wanted to share a few more highlights of my second weekend at the 2011 Iowa State Fair.

The "big bull" enjoying a big breakfast.

The best lunch ever - pork loin sandwich from the Iowa Pork Tent.

Artisan Bread in 5: Pita Bread

2011-08-19T19:21:00.000-05:00

My husband and I love gyros. Actually, I didn't love gyros until I met my husband and fell in love with him. When we lived in a little apartment in a bigger city, he used to buy sliced gyro meat, cucumber sauce and pitas from the deli in our favorite grocery store. But when we moved to a small town, the nearest grocery store didn't carry the gyro fixings. So we were left reminiscing about one of our favorite foods.

Then a few months ago, I discovered that a grocery store on my way home from work offers gyro meat, sauce and pitas, just like we used to buy. However, the pita bread isn't nearly as good. I've searched several area grocery stores for good pita bread, but the pitas I have found (if I find them at all) are stale or really tiny, I suppose for making little sandwiches.

I remembered that my Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day cookbook carried a pita bread recipe. And I'm always looking for a reason to use my pizza stone (which I still love, by the way. Our best kitchen investment since the Oxo salad spinner.) But I was a little hesitant to try making my own pitas. They look too time consuming, and I didn't want to spend my weekend cleaning up flour dust from my kitchen.

Well, I finally decided to take a chance, man up, and give the pita recipe a try. And guess what? It was so easy! The hardest part was waiting for the bread to rise in the fridge overnight. Rolling out the dough wasn't difficult at all. I thought the dough would be sticky, but it wasn't. In fact, I didn't have to use much flour at all, so there wasn't a lot of mess to clean up. And it was so cool to see the finished product -- a bread that puffed up in the oven, then flattened as cooled. The pitas were hollow inside, making them perfect for cutting in half and filling with gyro fixings. So glad that we can now enjoy gyros with fresh pita bread again!

You can find a copy of the pita bread recipe in the cookbook Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day. (I first discovered it at my local library.) Or you can google "Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes pita recipe" and find versions of the recipe online. Give it a try if you're feeling adventurous.

Trip to the Iowa State Fair

2011-08-16T18:27:00.001-05:00

It was a busy weekend for me -- first, a trip to the Ames straw poll, and then the next day, a visit to the Iowa State Fair with my sister. We were both feeling a little under the weather, trying to get over summer colds. So I didn't take many photos. But I have a few highlights to share with you.

This year's blue-ribbon winner for non-traditional sweet roll was a bacon sticky roll! Can you see the chunks of bacon?

One of my favorite exhibits was "Can-struction," sculptures made by stacking donated canned goods. There was a canned-good butter cow and market-weight hog.

We hopped over to the Iowa lamb food stand for a lamb burger (my husband's favorite).

Then we checked out the pampered show pigs, who were relaxing in the breeze of the fans blowing through the swine barn.

We saw blue-ribbon potatoes.

And waited in a huge line to see the famous butter cow.

The fair was celebrating the 100th anniversary of the butter cow by asking local organizations to paint mini-butter cows, which were placed all over the fair grounds. This was one of my favorites.

I came home with a few pieces of fresh saltwater taffy.

OK. Several pieces of taffy.

And I brought home the famous chocolate chip cookies in a cup. Admittedly, this cup was full when I bought it. I don't know where the cookies disappeared to...

Iowa straw poll

2011-08-13T18:27:00.001-05:00

I couldn't resist the urge to check out the Iowa Straw Poll in Ames. Don't worry. I'm not going political with this blog. However, I am proud of Iowa's first-in-the-nation role in electing our next U.S. president. I never used to pay attention to the caucus hype until a few years, when I heard a speaker explain that Iowans shouldn't take our role in the presidential election for granted. It's not very often that a small-population state gets so much attention from politicians.

The Iowa Straw Poll definitely has a county-fair atmosphere. There were games, food and freebies everywhere. Right away, I spotted my first politician of the day -- Mike Huckabee.

Then I stopped at the ginormous AARP booth, where I got to meet "Teddy Roosevelt."

When I saw that Abraham Lincoln was on the schedule, I decided to check it out.

Even better -- I got my picture taken with Honest Abe! Not sure why he wasn't looking into the camera...

The Ron Paul booth was by far the largest (i.e., the most expensive). There was an inflatable slide for the kiddies.

Not sure who thought this was a good idea for a sign.

Lots of folks showed their support for favorite candidates. This guy told me people were asking him all day for his picture!

Here's one of my favorite exhibitors -- the Mid-South Tea Party. They came dressed as a leather-clad motorcycle gang. The band was playing Lynard Skynard, of course.

Another fun exhibitor was presidential candidate Thad McConner. I never heard of him until a week ago, and he didn't have a big fancy booth like the other candidates. Instead, his campaign rented two ice cream trucks, offering free bomb pops.

Then Thad McCotter and his family rocked out on stage. And boy, can Thad shred a guitar! I was impressed by his musical talents. I almost got the feeling that he came to the Iowa Straw Poll just to have an excuse for a jam session. I hope he stays in the race a little longer so I can learn more about his politics, too. Quite an interesting guy.

I also hopped over to Herman Cain's booth to hear him speak. I was very impressed by his message. I also hope he stays in the race. He's got some great ideas for the country.

How cool is it that Herman Cain's staff gave out free Godfather's Pizza?

After awhile, the lines started to get really long, especially for the Michelle Bachman booth. So I decided to call it day. But not before I voted. Got my finger stamped blue to prove it!

On my way out, I saw this "petition" signed on the blade of a wind turbine.

Just had to take a picture of this -- looks like they got "Rick rolled." Can you see it?

I rode my bike back to my car to avoid the heavy traffic. A car honked at me while I was waiting at the stop light. I couldn't figure out why until I got back to my car and looked at the free bag I received at the straw poll. I had no idea that I was carrying a big yellow NRA bag! I must have looked like an NRA billboard! How funny!

What a strange but fun day! Isn't democracy great!

Wordless Wednesday: Audubon, Iowa - Home of Albert the Bull

2011-08-10T20:08:00.001-05:00

Missouri River flooding

2011-08-07T19:49:00.000-05:00

A few weeks back, I drove to western Iowa for work and stopped in Missouri Valley to fuel up my car. Next door to the gas station was my favorite restaurant, Pizza Ranch, surrounded by sandbags. The sign outside read: "Yes, we're open."

Missouri Valley is tucked in the scenic Loess Hills of western Iowa, just a few short miles from the Missouri River.

Iowa is anything but flat. It's home to one of only two Loess hill formations in the world.

Fortunately, Missouri Valley missed out on the predicted flooding from the nearby Missouri River. I stopped in this Missouri Valley McDonald's on the way home for an iced latte caffeine jolt. The drive-thru was closed because of the 3-foot-tall sandbag barricade.

Unfortunately, many western Iowa towns didn't escape the flooding, including parts of Sioux City, Omaha and the small community of Hamburg. The flooding started in June and continues today. That means farmers and local residents have been separated from their homes for more than two months, and the flooding is projected to continue through October. There hasn't been that much in the national news about this flooding, which is too bad it's not getting the attention it deserves. Many families have lost their homes and prime farmland on an unprecedented scale.

If you want to learn more about the Missouri River flooding and its impact on farmers, I recommend visiting Sara's House HD to see aerial photos of the flood zone. My prayers go out to all the families involved. You are not forgotten, and you'll always find friends willing to help provide what you need.

Dried peaches

2011-08-04T15:56:00.000-05:00

Aren't these beautiful? My husband sliced up a bunch of peaches and dried them in our food dehydrator. I bought our Nesco dehydrator a couple years back as a birthday gift for my husband. I wasn't sure what he would think of the gift (especially because it was a selfish gift on my part; I've always wanted a food dehydrator). But he was really excited to get it, and it's truly been a gift that keeps on giving.

My husband has become in expert in making dried apples. He slices them perfectly, then sprinkles them with a little powdered fruit preserve (you can find it with the canning supplies in the grocery store) and some cinnamon and sugar. Whenever there's a sale at the grocery store for 99-cents-a-pound apples, I stock up so my husband can make dried apples. We even gave them away last year as Christmas gifts, to rave reviews from our family.

He's also dried all kinds of fruits, including pears, peaches (again, these were 99 cents a pound a few weeks ago) and pineapple. Believe it or not, we also love dried carrots! My husband adds them to his homemade "hamburger helper" -- what he calls his quick-fix supper of hamburger, egg noodles, onions, dried shitake mushrooms (from the Asian food store), beef boullion and dried carrots. Sounds a little odd, but it's delicious.

We bought our Nesco dehydrator at Amazon.com and highly recommend it if you're interest in a smaller-scale dehydrator. Do you use a food dehydrator at home? What are your favorite foods to dry?

RAGBRAI: Part 2

2011-08-01T15:38:00.003-05:00

When I learned that RAGBRAI was rolling through the area, I knew I just had to join in. If you've never heard of it, RAGBRAI is an annual week-long bike ride across the entire of state of Iowa. It attracts 10,000 cyclists from all around the world. The event is pretty much a rolling party. The RAGBRAI route travels along country roads and through tiny Iowa towns. For the most part, Iowa communities love to host RAGBRAI, because the cyclists often spend quite a bit of money on food and refreshments wherever they stop.

I've never been on RAGBRAI, but it was another item on my "bucket list." But all I have is an old hand-me-down Huffy mountain bike, so I was nervous about joining in. Most cyclists ride on road bikes, which are way easier to pedal than my clunky ol' bike. But I also have heard that people ride some pretty ridiculous bikes on RAGBRAI, so I figured I wouldn't be the slowest rider on the route.

I rode a half-day of RAGBRAI. My husband dropped me off along the route on his way to work, then I rode about 13 miles to the nearest host town. Then I got off the route and rode our local bike trail back home. Altogether, it was a 24 mile bike ride. That was pretty far for me!

As I expected, I got passed by almost everyone on the route. And many people came really close to my bike as they passed me. There were plenty of farms to stop at along the route, with folks selling breakfast burritos, water and gatorade. Unfortunately, I was scared to stop and pull off to the side of the road. There were so many cyclists coming up behind me, and I was afraid I would cause a crash if I just stopped in front of them.

I rode 7 miles in the heat before I finally got the courage to stop and get something cool to drink. (Looking back, I regret that I didn't stop and see more farms along the route.) I ended up stopping at an absolutely beautiful farm, with a big yard and benches for bikers to sit under the shade of trees.

There was a smoothie stand in the front yard. I ordered a "swirl" -- strawberry and peach. It was so good after biking in the heat.

The farm had an antique store inside an old barn. There were lots of cute lawn decorations everywhere.

Inside the barn, there was a line for the bathroom. I immediately joined the end of the line. Free use of indoor bathrooms is a rarity on RAGBRAI, so I didn't want to miss this opportunity to avoid the porta-potty lines! Inside the bathroom, people wrote "Thank You's" on a dry erase board next to the loo. So funny!

I got back on the rode and biked another 5 miles before reaching the host town. It was only 9 a.m., but I was starving. The crowds were so thick, I couldn't find the pancake stand. So I gave up and stopped at the local fire station, where they were grilling pork chops as a fund-raiser.

In addition to the typical grilling fare, they were offering free pickle juice! They said it was good for replenishing electrolytes, but I passed.

I'm so glad that I couldn't find the pancake stand because I ended up having the best breakfast food ever -- pork chops on a "stick"! Seriously, this was the best pork chop I've ever had. So tender and juicy. It's cut so that the bone extends out from the chop, creating a "handle" for eating the chop without a fork.

Then I spent about an hour just walking around town, gawking at all the bikers. I couldn't believe the size of the crowd!

Even after eating the huge pork chop, I was still hungry! I guess biking really works up an appetite. I ended up buying a homemade ice cream sandwich at a local boy scout stand. This treat was amazing!

I also ended up finding a free homemade Dutch letter pastry at the Central College stand. I've never had homemade Dutch letters, only the bakery version. This was extra sweet and stuffed full of almond paste. Yum!

After giving my legs a rest, I rode a couple miles along the RAGBRAI route, then met up with bike trail and rode home. The 9-mile ride home was the hardest. My adrenaline was starting to wear off. When I got home, I promptly took a 2 hour nap, then spent the rest of the day lounging. I was beat! But I had an absolutely blast. I'm already looking forward to joining RAGBRAI again next year. If you've never been on RAGBRAI before, I highly recommend you give it a try. If I can do it on a 20-year-old Wal-Mart mountain bike, anyone can ride it!

RAGBRAI: Part 1

2011-07-29T15:31:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week, I met up with 10,000 cyclists traveling the state as part of RAGBRAI, the Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. I was sent to cover a Farmers Feed Us event for our ag newspaper. This was my first time I caught up with the RAGBRAI riders on the country roads, and I was thrilled to see it in person. It's hard to imagine the scale of that many bikers on the roads unless you see it first-hand.

Western Iowa farmers were shaking hands with the riders and serving up free beef samples under the shade of a grain bin.

I met so many interesting people! There was a Michigan man who rides the entire week of RAGBRAI across the state by himself. His wife drops him off in the starting city and then picks him up at the ending city a week later. I learned from him that "sport kilts" are very popular with the male bike riders. He told me the kilts were very comfortable when the temps hit 90 degrees!

Spandex-wearing cyclists checking out the farm equipment on display.

I met a couple of father-son teams who were biking the entire route, statewide, together. The sons were under the age of 13! Can you even imagine doing something like that at such a young age?

Yet what really surprised me was how many baby boomers were riding RAGBRAI. I just pictured that the cyclists were college students looking for a summer party. But many of these cyclists were grandpas and grandmas, also looking for a party! So inspiring!

Fun to see all the team jerseys.

The farm I visited was a "pit stop" half-way between two towns. Several vendors set up shop on the farm's front lawn, including a homemade ice cream vendor that was cranking out ice-cream on gas and solar-powered churns.

Back behind the grain bins was a cattle feedlot. Several cyclists stopped to take pictures of the cattle. I wonder what the cattle thought of all the commotion -- there were hundreds of bicyclists who stopped at the farm!

I'll be posting more photos from RAGBRAI soon. I grabbed my bike and joined in on the fun earlier this week. Can't wait to show you what I found!

Iowa recipes: Cherry pie

2011-07-26T16:00:00.002-05:00

About a month ago (Yikes! Where has the summer gone?), I visited Berry Patch Farm in Nevada, Iowa, first thing in the morning to pick pie cherries. I wasn't sure if there would be many left. Cherry season is short on their farm. Usually, the cherries are gone in a little over a week's time. I didn't have time to visit their farm until the weekend, which was about five days after their U-Pick cherry season opened. And it turned out to be slim pickings. I had to pick cherries from my tip-toes, since another woman was "hogging" the one ladder in the orchard, and I didn't want to be rude and bother her. After a lot of reaching and stretching, I finally came home with enough cherries to make a pie.

Aren't these cherries beauties?

On my way home from the farm, I stopped at the Cook's Emporium in Ames (my favorite kitchen supply shop in central Iowa) and found a cherry pitter. Last year, I pitted cherries with the tip of a knife, and it took forever! I'm so glad I bought this little pitter for about $15. It cut like 20 minutes off the cherry prep time!

Place the cherry like so...

And out goes the pit! Easy!

The cherry pie turned out wonderful! By far my favorite pie, and by far worth the effort of picking cherries on my tiptoes in the heat. I'm still not great at making my pies "pretty," but they sure taste good!

A couple days after I baked this pie, Berry Patch Farm put a recipe on their Facebook page for freezer cherry pie filling. I'm totally going to try this next year. Would love to have all the ingredients ready to make sour-cherry pie for the holidays.

Here's the recipe, as it appears on their Facebook page:

Pie filling recipe: 3 cups cherries,1 1/2 cup sugar, 1/4 cup flour, dash of almond flavoring, mix & put in plastic freezer bag. Handy for pies later ! (Just mix the ingredients in the bag and pop in freezer. No need to pre-cook.)

Garden update: July 2011

2011-07-23T11:14:00.000-05:00

Oh dear! I'm so, so far behind in sharing this garden update. I've just been so busy this summer traveling, biking and enjoying the warm weather. I took these photos on July 1, and my little backyard garden looks a lot different now. But here's a recap of what I've been up to so far.

In early July, my container tomato started wilting from leaf spot, or early blight. It was fading fast, and I couldn't stand just seeing the leaves yellow and die off, especially when the plant was already setting fruit. So I broke down and bought a fungicide at the local garden center. Now my tomato plant has bounced back, and I'm being more careful to keep the leaves dry when I'm watering it.

My container strawberry plants are still growing and flowering, but the birds get to the fruit before I do. I haven't decided if I'm going to overwinter the plants or just use my stack-a-pot to grow herbs next year.

I love my herb pot. I bought Christmas basil, purple basil and curly parsley at the Des Moines Farmers Market. They are all growing very well, and they look so pretty! So much fun to brush past the basil plant just for the fragrance.

I planted begonias in these little pots my Mom and sister gave me for my birthday a couple years back. I love the pink flowers in the pastel-colored pots.

I've been having really good luck at planting cucumber a little later than normal, about mid-to-late June. It seems like they miss out on the moth season and avoid getting attacked by insects. Plus, the cucumbers grow really fast in the summer heat. They are already crawling up the trellis now.

I planted broccoli and cauliflower for the first time this year. Right away, they were eaten by rabbits. So I bought more seedlings and "caged" them inside cut-off buckets. The plants grew fast, but unfortunately, they didn't produce much. The cauliflower never formed, and the broccoli heads were small and went to flower right away. Not sure if I'm going to plant these again next year. Not really worth the space in such a small garden.

As a happy accident, I spilled a package of lettuce seeds when I was planting flowers. And the lettuce grew in the middle of my flower patch. So cute!

So far, I haven't harvested much, other than the lettuce, a few pea pods and a few radishes. The radishes and peas didn't grow very well this year. I think next year I'm going to try different varieties, although I'm sure the weather (and the rabbits!) are partly to blame.

I'm almost embarrassed to share this garden update, because I've discovered so many wonderful garden bloggers with gorgeous edible gardens. But I try to remind myself that the important thing is that I try. And I really do enjoy spending time outside tending to my little garden.

So how are your gardens growing? Do you have any ripe tomatoes yet? I've got lots of green tomatoes, and no red ones yet.

Wordless Wednesday: Biodegradable cup from Cafe Diem in Ames

2011-07-20T19:13:00.003-05:00

Osceola Community Garden

2011-07-17T19:06:00.001-05:00

I recently was invited to attend the annual open house for the Osceola Diversity Garden, a community garden on the north side of Osceola in southern Iowa. The garden is located behind the Farm Bureau and ISU Extension building along Highway 65, if you're interested in seeing it yourself. Anyone can stop and take a look at what's growing.

Once a weedy lot, this community garden is now divided into more than a dozen different plots, each measuring about 8 feet by 20 feet. Local residents can reserve their own garden plot to grow whatever annual vegetable, herb or flower they would like. The cost is $8 per plot, and garden tools and expert advice from volunteer Master Gardeners are included. What a deal! I wish I lived in Osceola. I would love to have this sunny space to grow veggies.

The Master Gardeners also have planted several demonstration plots to show off different gardening ideas. There is a "scratch-and-sniff" herb garden (loved this idea!), and my favorite -- a grocery bag garden! One of the volunteers told me I could plant lettuce now in a reuseable grocery bag (with holes poked in the bottom), then move the bag to a shady spot to avoid the summer sun. I'm going to try it out at home and see if it works.

Local gardeners have planted a wide variety of veggies in their plots. There were several plots with nothing but tomatoes. One plot was planted with green beans only -- just plain ol' green beans for canning.

Scratch 'N Sniff herb garden

I wish my garden looked so neat and beautiful! And I loved this idea -- tomato trellising.

To raise money, the volunteers were selling leftover tomato seedlings for 25 cents a piece. I couldn't resist coming home with this little guy. It's called "Mom's tomato." It's grown by one of the Master Gardeners, who saves the seeds from a variety of tomato that her mom used to plant back in the Victory Garden days. She doesn't know what variety it is, so she just calls it "Mom's tomato." It's so popular in Osceola, that the farmers' market vendors sell "Mom's tomatoes" each year. I was told it's a pinkish, meaty tomato, with an excellent flavor. And I got some tips for how to save the seeds myself. I'll share those with you if I ever get to that point.

What -- doesn't everyone keep tomato plants in their cupholders? :)