Black Bean Soup is good food

When the weather gets colder soup becomes a very attractive meal. I love making soup for guests because I make it the day before and then have very little prep when people come over. This week I made black bean soup and I thought I’d share it because it’s ridiculously simple and tastes wonderful.

1 cup (ish) chopped onion

1 cup (ish) chopped carrot

1 cup (ish) chopped celery

1 seeded/chopped red bell pepper (can be yellow or orange)

1 seeded/chopped jalapeno (optional)

1 seeded/chopped habanero pepper (optional)

2 cloves garlic, minced

4 cans black beans (sure, you can go to the trouble of soaking your own beans, but I don’t)

2-4 cups chicken stock (use vegetable stock to keep this a vegetarian dish) – amount depends on consistency you want

I happened to have matchstick carrots on hand for my salads-in-a-jar that I make for lunch at work, so I used those this time.

I like it spicy, so I use both the jalapeno and habanero peppers. The usual warnings about handling hot peppers apply! Carrots/onion/celery are a standard mirepoix that is a great start to any soup. After all the veggies are chopped, saute them in a large pot with about 4 tablespoons of butter (don’t forget the garlic!):

Once the veggies soften (this smells divine, by the way) add the black beans (do not drain) and stock:

Let this simmer a while (there is not a specific amount of time; you just want the veggies nice and soft). While it’s simmering, taste the broth – if you feel a need you can add red pepper flakes or ground pepper, but honestly I rarely need to do that. There is plenty of great flavor in the base ingredients.

This is a pureed soup. While you can now transfer to a food processor/blender to puree that is really kind of a pain. I highly recommend a stick blender so you can puree it right in the pot:

After pureeing, I let it simmer a bit longer so I can again sample for flavor. Then remove from heat, let the pot cool a bit, and cover and put in the refrigerator overnight. This really helps the flavors meld, plus it makes the next day’s meal a snap. Just reheat on the stove, and serve with some nice bread and fresh avocado (or sour cream, or whatever sounds good to you!).

Bon appetit!

Decorations Nobody Else Has

Admittedly, I have not checked every other house on the planet. I’m pretty comfortable making this assumption though. We built a planter box in our entryway. We have a bunch of small palms planted in it and it provides a nice bit of green and breaks up the open space well. In years past I have not done any holiday decorating on or in the planter, but this year I had the brilliant idea to add my large solar Christmas bulbs to the planter box. It is stupendous, if I do say so myself. And I did.

In the back you can see General Principle peeking over the top. He was also dressed for the season. He took it stoically, as he does everything.

Glitterwreaths

At the start of October I got out the bins full of orange things. While it may be impressive that I have two full bins (plus a bit) of orange things to decorate during Halloween and Thanksgiving, it’s nothing on what I have stored for Christmas. This isn’t even half of those bins:

A few years ago when my husband and I moved into the house we’d been building forever (or 17 years, anyway – and I was only around for the final 7 mind you… but that is a whole different story) I got to start decorating in a much larger and more open space.

A space with 7 square windows across the front of the house that cried out for wreaths during Christmas.

So I went shopping and got 10 (because there were three other windows that also wanted wreaths) artificial pre-lit green wreaths. They were a little dull, so I asked my mother to bring over her bowdabra and make bows for them all, which she did. Of course, that wasn’t going to be enough either. I also bought various picks and glitter covered things and scavenged picks that my mother and sister had put into bows in past years (this is why I don’t even try to compete on package wrapping; it’s a lost cause for me) and started decorating all the wreaths.

The bows are underneath and face out the window; the glittery sides face inside.

The question arose as to how to hang them all. We ended up with tension curtain rods in every window (none of these windows have treatments on them because I can’t bear to damage the beautiful wood). Those and fishing line around the wreath created a perfect solution.

I have outlets near each window so I own more timers and short extension cords than most people would find in a hardware store. One of the wreaths got a bit more of the decorations because it’s the one that graces the large dining room window. And this should explain why I find glitter in my home year round.

Oh, Christmas Tree!

I have had an artificial pre-lit tree for many years. Scoff if your want – tell me all about how a “real” tree is “better” because I care not. I don’t have to deal with stringing lights and I am assured a slim tree that fits in my space.

That said, I have often been angered trying to sort out how the pre-lit lights are supposed to be plugged in to make everything merry and bright… And last year I had a section of tree that refused to light. So, I bought a new tree this year. Turns out, it’s flipping brilliant! There is NO mystery about how to get things lit!

Oh, yeah! There is one plug at the bottom section and all the rest is handled by simply setting the poles together!

Seriously. You have no idea how happy this made me. I toasted engineers everywhere with the cocktail I had already poured in anticipation of the annoyances related to dealing with the plugs….

Here is our tree:

Of course it required fluffing and decorating but the fact that moments after being out of the box there was light? Damn impressive.

Because we don’t have kids it means we (okay, *I*) can have the tree done however we (*I*) like. All white lights have been the case for years. Last year for the first time I decided to go with all white/crystal ornaments. I love it. My tree has a glittery silver crystal-studded crown.

You’re jealous. If not of the tree itself, you’re jealous that there are wrapped packages already in place….

Here’s a close-up of the crystal-gorgeousness:

Turkey in the fryer

Yes, most people would post their Thanksgiving turkey items actually on Thanksgiving. But let’s face it, this wouldn’t do any good for anyone on Thanksgiving itself (I’ve always found those tv segments full of recipes that happen when it’s too late to be useful annoying) and I was busy eating, watching football, walking, and enjoying time with family.

A few years ago my sister bought an infrared turkey fryer and transported it to my parents’ home to be used for the Thanksgiving turkey. It worked amazingly well. After that instead of taking it back to her house she left it with us. Thanksgiving moved to my house and so did the infrared fryer. It’s hooked up to a propane tank. Once it’s heated up (about 10-15 minutes is what I allowed) you drop the basket with turkey into the fryer (turkey is oiled):

Then you put the cover on, which is important because it also heats up and helps brown the skin:

This is an eleven pound turkey; the fryer can handle up to a sixteen pound bird but we definitely don’t need one that big!

It takes just 10 minutes per pound, and you don’t do anything to it in the meantime. This means the kitchen is free for doing all the other things that go along with the meal, which is much much simpler. The fat drains out the bottom into a container drawer that can be pulled out and cleaned pretty easily. They claim you could take it to make gravy, but ick. Not gonna happen.

After 110 minutes I used a meat thermometer to make sure the bird was at least 165F, which it was. I recommend an Ove Glove or two for this stage, because it’s really really hot inside the fryer!

It does take two people to pull the basket out and get the bird out onto a plate. My husband helped here, and nearly dropped the bird. That could have been comically tragic (we wouldn’t have starved – there was plenty of other food). In the end, it looked and tasted great and there are plenty of leftovers. My apologies for this photo, but I was focused more on getting everything to the table and didn’t take the time to pull out the tripod and do this properly….

If you do a big sit-down meal for Christmas or anything else, I do recommend considering an infrared fryer. For Christmas we just lay out a ton of food and let people graze, so I’ll just be cleaning the fryer out and putting it away for next year…

Walk it off

When I was young, I was an active person. I was a cheerleader in the south, where it’s taken as seriously (if not moreso) than football. We had two-a-day practices during the summer.

(technically that one on the right is when I was in New Mexico – and now you all have proof I am a natural blonde. So, if you have comments – please type slowly.)

I didn’t actually appreciate I was a slender person until I looked back at photos from high school many years later… In college I took up martial arts, and by the time I was a senior I was taking or teaching as many as 8 classes a week. I was fit. I also collected some big-ass trophies from tournaments. I eventually threw those away, but I still have my gi and my belts. (stopped at first degree black belt, if you’re interested).

Then I went to grad school. There, my brain got the workout and my body did not – and I didn’t make the effort to change that. So, the weight started creeping up. I come from hearty genetics that says I will survive famine, I think. Over time I’d get a piece of equipment for my house, or go on a diet, or whatever – and keep relatively stable. For a while at work there was a gym onsite and a friend and I helped each other keep our commitments to working out. But then I changed jobs and moved across the country. I love my where I work and what I do, but there is no gym on site and I am simply not wired to join a gym at this point. I won’t go. I know I won’t. I have had varying kinds of exercise equipment in my home, but for whatever reason they weren’t giving the results (and I *did* use them). Weight crept up.

And up.

And came perilously close to 200 pounds. That scared me. So I tried one of those packaged food diets. The food wasn’t great, but I found some things I did like and I stuck with it. I started to lose weight and I learned a lot about portion size (gosh, I was way over-eating some foods!). I also got into a stronger habit of drinking plenty of water, which definitely matters for me. Everyone is different, of course.

After many months, I had lost 36 pounds. That was Thanksgiving 2010. I felt great. By that time I had stopped with the pre-packaged plan and was maintaining on my own. Of course, it was the holidays. My weight started to creep up and by Thanksgiving 2011 I had gained back 10 pounds – but still, it wasn’t too bad. Of course, it was the holidays again…

By early summer 2012 I was close to having regained half of what I had lost, and I was also close to deciding to get the pre-packaged food again to get back on track. About this same time, my twitter-and-real-life friend @NomdeB introduced me to FitBit:

This is a nifty little tracker that is a pedometer and much much more. It syncs wirelessly to your computer to keep a log of your activity and can also help you track your sleep patterns (depending on the version you get; you wear it on a wrist strap for that). I got mine in early July 2012. Since then, I have been quite dedicated to making sure I hit 10000 steps a day – and in fact now I push for 5 miles a day, which for me is closer to 11000 steps. I get to work early so I can park several buildings away from my office. I schedule meetings in other people’s offices so I can walk to them. I find that this also helps me mentally break from whatever task I was working on before the meeting and focus on what’s ahead while I walk there. When I am home I use MapMyWalk (a free app on my phone) and walk around my neighborhood. That is all I am doing. I walk at least 5 miles a day, cumulatively but sometimes all at once. When I travel for work I usually spend my layovers in airports walking around the terminal instead of sitting at my gate. Walking is something I do 100% for me. It is a precious gift I am giving myself every single day.

End result so far? I’ve had a net loss of about 13 pounds and dropped my body fat percentage by about 4%. That translates into losing about 15 pounds of fat and gaining about 2 pounds of muscle. And I’ve done this with zero change in my eating habits. I am not tracking calories. I am not worrying about food. I don’t go nuts, but I don’t worry either. I am sure that if I did, I could have trimmed down faster – but this is a very sustainable life for me right now. [Note, @NomdeB also highly recommends an app called LoseIt which is a food tracker, and I’ve heard good things about it. I just don’t feel I need it. These things all depend on what motivates you – and the raw data about my activity levels is all I need.]

I don’t have a target weight – I am at a healthy weight now but it’s possible I will lose more. Since I’m not dieting I figure at some point I will stabilize based on my level of activity and how much I’m eating. I’m good with that. I’m healthy. And as for Thanksgiving 2012?

Tomorrow, I will be back where I was in 2010, except with a lower body fat percentage.

I feel great!

Fossileaved

I take a lot of walks around my neighborhood. I’m very familiar with the sidewalks – and I have a personal favorite. I’m sure that sounds odd, but it’s true. Clearly this particular sidewalk concrete was poured in the autumn, and then a lot of leaves fell. Instead of erasing the evidence, the impressions are still there. Finally one day I took my camera with me so I could take photos of the fossil-leaves with the newly fallen leaves. I hope you enjoy them.

Leaves

I was walking around my neighborhood and saw these gorgeous deep red leaves. We had a gradual cool-down this year so got some very nice color. I’m enjoying it while it lasts.

Later I passed this tree – with two stubborn leaves still clinging to the branch – most of the rest of this tree is bare now:

I hope wherever you are there are lovely moments catching your eye as well.

Thanksgiving decorations

I finally got around to taking down Halloween and transitioning to Thanksgiving. I’ve been a tad busy with work and other things lately. At least I had managed to make sure the jack-o-lantern items were no longer lit up after October.

The transition is actually pretty quick. Since pumpkins are still a relevant decoration, all I have to do is remove the pumpkins with a face and any other Halloween specific items. As I type this, I’ve just realized that poor General Principle is still wearing his feathered headdress with a spider on it – I’ll have to remember to take that off of him later today… I can leave up all the non-face-sporting pumpkins, and then I add in a more Thanksgiving specific item:

This was actually filled with flowers when I got it as a gift, and I kept the wicker base just for this reason. The pine cones and things smell nice, too.

The only bad thing is that I can no longer claim the cobwebs in the house are decorative.

Halloween 2012, in all its gory

Pumpkin carving time with mom! First, we need the proper tools. For me this means the right earrings. For mom, it means the right socks.

Then, of course, we need pumpkins:

It was icky cold and rainy outside, so we did all the work – even the messy stuff – inside. Like cleaning out pumpkins:

We decided to do three this year – all rather large. Two are double-carved to cast shadows, so it’s really like doing five. Plus two little guys, so it’s more like seven. Felt like hundreds as we cleaned them out – and that’s even with the uber-cool power tool/drill attachment we use to get the guts out after the seeds are removed for roasting. Three big pumpkins leads to a giant pile of pumpkin guts:

And at this point we STILL hadn’t had any wine (because it seemed unwise with slippery hands covered in pumpkin guts). Once all are cleaned, it’s time for the carving (and some wine – and yes, the logic of wine while you’re using sharp tools is debatable but we had no injuries so it was clearly fine). Mom did a bat in a cape with shadow-bats and ghost and stars (which totally should have worked way better than they did, but at least she got to use the drill to make the holes so it was fun, if not effective):

I did an uber-cool spooky tree, with a somewhat lame shadow of a cloud-covered moon:

And because this is my blog and my pumpkin, here’s the close-up of the coolness:

Mom and I also collaborated on a new venture – a pumpkin gobbling a small pumpkin. Mom carved the victim:

I carved the eyes and nose (save the nostrils, which mom did with the drill), and mom carved the mouth and painted the glow-teeth on the cannibal pumpkin. I carved the clueless future-victim:

Here’s what it looks like lit:

And finally, we roasted and ate pumpkin guts, which may be the bestest reason of all to carve pumpkins:

@KellyOSullivan

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