WCB - Blogging our Cat on the Weekend

It's still the weekend, so we're joining in the Weekend Cat Blogging at one of our favorite food blogs - Sher's What Did You Eat!

From our earlier post, you can see that this is his favorite spot:


And here is Osiris and his new toy, a q-tip that he found on the floor wayyyy on the other side of the house. He brought it over to that favorite spot in the kitchen.



Bonus picture:

Green Soup

How do I love my hand blender? Let me count the ways…

I think I’m on a journey and that journey involves creating blended soups in all the colors of the rainbow. The color of the day is GREEN. And seeing that it is the holiday season, perhaps the next one I shall create will be RED! This soup is heavy on the spinach and zucchini, hence the green color. It’s full of veggies and vitamins and good stuffs, so if you can’t get your hubbie or kids to eat their veggies, this might be the way to go.

Sautee 1 diced onion and 3 sliced carrots in 2 tbs butter on lowish heat just so they sweat and don’t burn. Soon add 2 ribs of diced celery, and let that get happy for about 10 minutes. In the meantime, defrost your frozen spinach and zucchini. Now, if this were the summertime, I would have used fresh zucchini, but they didn’t look too good at the store, so I opted for frozen. You’ll need roughly 1 16oz bag of zucchini, and perhaps the same amount of spinach ( I honestly just eyeballed it).



After about 10 minutes of sweating, I added 4 peeled and cubed Yukon Gold potatoes to the pot. After that simmered for 5 minutes, I added the green veggies, and then topped that off with stock just to the top of the veggies. For seasoning: a big handful of fresh flat-leaf parsley chopped up. Then about 1 tbs dried basil, 1 tsp dried thyme and 1 tsp Penzey’s Shallot Salt, along with S&P to taste.

I let that simmer (low boil) for 30 minutes and then I blended it all up! You know the drill by now, if it’s too thick, add more stock! Wow, even M was impressed at how delicious this soup was. One night we had it with grilled turkey and cheese sandwiches, and the next with grilled up some Cajun seasoned chicken breasts. The potatoes added some thickening starch to the soup that would even satisfy a meat and potatoes guy!



Coming soon, red soup…

And here's my little helper:

Bloody Mary

We finished brunch, cleaned up all the dishes, folded some laundry and even gave a cat a bath! Time to relax with a beverage that is certainly unique to Sunday Brunch - and a tradition for us on football Sundays.

We actually mixed up the Bloody Mix earlier this morning - sans Vodka. That way, the flavors get a chance to mellow/mature/mix in the fridge for a little while - enhancing the taste considerably.

So! A bunch of V8 (see, it's healthy!) goes into a big pitcher, then several liberal dashes of worcestershire (maybe 10 big ones), many liberal dashes of Texas Pete's Hot Sauce, a big spoonful of horseradish, a little "dirty" oil from a jar of olives - and a couple olives, too - many shakes of celery salt, plenty of fresh ground pepper, and a big squeeze of lemon.

Take a taste and add more of anything there ain't enough of - and then get the pitcher into the refrigerator for a good sit.


The Bar

Put some ice and then a few fingers of the cheap, frozen vodka of your choice (Gordon's - the "Smoothest, Most Mixable!") in a pint glass and fill with the Bloody mix, then pour into another, larger glass and back into your original glass to mix. Add a lemon wedge and some celery and you're happy... We like 'em as spicy - but NOT bitter - as possible. Cheers!

See, a cat fresh from the bath!

Weekend Cat Blogging

We have two cats that probably should be named Yin and Yang - because they are polar opposites of each other. Cat number one is pure evil-genius, he dislikes everyone except his mom (he tolerates his dad, even though dad always teases him), he is very vocal and very bold. Cat number two is pure goodness, all-loving, barely makes a peep (in fact, he does "peep" instead of meow) and can be very shy. Yin and Yang! Can you tell who is who?

Bacchus lounging - he thinks he's pretty:


Osiris always finds the sun:


Careful or you'll step on him, he's camouflaged:




Bacchus up close:


Yin and Yang:

Irish Lamb Stew

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!

We love St. Patrick's Day! One of the Boston Chef duo is primarily Irish-American (and the other is adopted Irish-American) and growing up, St. Patrick's Day was always celebrated with great Irish gusto by our 100% Irish mother. Now, we live in Boston - a very Irish-American city - and specifically Dorchester down by Adams Village, which is one of the most Irish sections of a very Irish city! When we go down to the pub, many of the patrons aren't Irish-American - they're IRISH, straight from the Emerald Isle. Did you know America's first St. Patrick's Day celebration was held right here in Boston back in 1737? We love everything about the season - the cheerful celebrating, the traditions, the clothing, the Guinness (and the Jameson!)... and, of course, the food!

Corned beef and cabbage is the Irish-American staple of the holiday and we had some deliciously prepared by the pub mentioned earlier on Friday - boiled corned beef, turnip, a big potato, carrots, and a huge wedge of cabbage. It was the perfect start to the weekend. However, corned beef and cabbage is a specific Irish-AMERICAN invention, not a tradition in the country of Ireland. For that, we turn to a more traditional Irish recipe to help celebrate our wonderful weekend - Irish Lamb Stew.

We procured three pounds of lamb shoulder from the butcher, still on the bone, and played the butcher at home by separating the meat from the bone. The meat from the shoulder went into a big bowl to be lightly tossed with just a couple tbls of flour seasoned with ground black pepper and kosher salt. The bones (with lots of meat still clinging to the sides) go into a bag and into the refrigerator to be used to make a delicious stock the next day - boiled with veggies and spices. Plus, you get to gnaw the last of that meat off the boiled bones! Yum!!!

Meat lightly coated, we started with chopped up bacon in our dutch oven. Once that's rendered, remove the bacon and start browning the lamb in the bacon fat - we did this in two batches. Once browned, remove and throw in a diced medium onion for a minute, then a couple of diced garlic cloves. Once those are ready, deglaze the pan with red wine and scrape up the bits from the botton with your wooden spoon. Then, we're ready to simmer - lamb back in, bacon in, and add about 3-4 cups of stock (we used a mixture of beef and pork stock), some black pepper and a little bit of salt, and a big bay leaf. Combine all of this and bring to a gentle boil, then reduce heat to a very low simmer, cover, sit down and pour yourself a pint - I had a perfect "half and half" made with Guinness and Harp.. not a "black and tan" which is made with Bass!)

Half and Half


We're looking for a total of two hours of simmer time to get a wonderfully tender and flavorful result from the lamb, so work backwards adding the following:

* Chopped carrots and celery - 1 hour left (since we're simmering, not boiling, these will be perfectly done - not mushy)
* Chopped onion - 45 minutes left
* Cubed sweet potato - 30 minutes left (yes, we use sweet potato instead of traditional, our one concession to "diet" here!)

Once that time is up, ladel the chunky stew into a bowl and enjoy!



Erin go bragh!

P.S. - Here it is Sunday and we're watching Jack Hart's South Boston St. Patrick's Day Parade Breakfast and making our stock with the reserved lamb bones from yesterday. (Truthfully, I just want to gnaw on the bones after they're boiled!)


Finally, we wanted to take part in the Weekend Cat Blogging that we've watched for the past few weekends.. we have two terrors of our own!

Here, Osiris is supposed to be guarding our pears - but he seems to have fallen asleep on the job!