Oh Those Wildwood Days!

Who knew Wildwood was so nice?  This weekend we stayed with our friends, Susanne and Denny (known as America's Favorite Guests) at their sister's condo a half block from the beach.  And what a beach it is - HUGE and in front of the beach is a walkway that covers a nice expanse of the jagged coastline (who needs the West Coast) - this was gorgeous and let me just say we don't have this in Ocean City either... both mornings we had an invigorating walk greeting many Phillie clad fans along the way............we were all still wearing our Phillies garb on Sunday too!

Our other friends, Suzanne and Kelly were also in attendance.  On Saturday we made the roadtrip to Cape May.  It was a spectacular October day and many people had the same idea - to shop and walk around.  We ended up on Sunset Beach at the end of the day just in time for a beaut of a sunset .... I guess it's protocol for everyone to clap when the sun goes down because this was done in Cape May just as it was done in Carmel, Ca 30 years ago AND Key West 22 years ago - it's funny how the customs are carried on all around the place - maybe they do it in Europe and Asia too!

So we are in Cape May and what is in Cape May?  The Lobster House, of course and if Denny is near the Lobster House he must go to scope out the seafood.  We bought Grouper and Shrimp and Scallops.  Denny wrapped prosciutto around these humungous shrimp - brushed with olive oil and grilled them on this cool electric grill...in the meantime Susanne is creating this delicious rub to put on the Grouper.  Denny grilled the salt and peppered scallops and grouper....Susanne made a nice fresh salad and some baked potatoes and it was delicious!  Nothing like a fresh seafood meal at the shore.  We settled in to watch the Phillies beat the Giants - oh that's right  - the Giants BEAT the Phillies............I forgot.

We had a great weekend though!

GO PHILLIES!!!!

It didn't look good for a while because we lost on Saturday night but we all knew it was just a fluke and the Phightin Phils would bounce back - AS THEY DID - quite nicely on Sunday Night with Roy Oswalt at the helm.  We had the family over for the game on Saturday and we wanted to do something to give them the flavor of the ballpark.........our 1st thought was PEANUTS and sad to say we couldn't serve our normal Planters Peanuts in the shell from the Ocean City Boardwalk so I did the next best thing and purchased them at our local Acme - they weren't too bad!

Next we had to serve some other type of nourishment so we decided to do cheese steaks OF COURSE but because we are ALL conscious of our health and how much fat we are eating we decided to do chicken cheese steaks and smother them with cheese whiz.  It's kind of like having a diet coke with a salad?  Anyway I bought chicken chip meat from a good deli around here and the freshest rolls from a great bakery that just opened up in our neighborhood ($3 a dozen!) and I caramelized a TON of onions and we were good to go with some jarred hot peppers.  Everyone (kids and elders) loved them.

I also made some Applesauce Cupcakes with a Chocolate Glaze - we used to buy something like these cupcakes when we were kids on our way to our cousins' house in DE and in our adult years have never been able to find anything like them so I went hunting online for ANYTHING that would remind me of our childhood deserts - I found this Martha Stewart recipe (of all things) and they were pretty good....

Applesauce Spice Cupcakes

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves (I didn’t have any and the recipe was just as tasty)
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 4 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups unsweetened applesauce
• Preheat the oven to 350. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves.

With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, cream butter and both sugars until pale and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Reduce speed to low. Add applesauce and then flour mixture, beating until just combined after each. Stir in pecans by hand.

Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool completely before removing cupcakes. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to two months, in airtight containers.

Glaze ingredients:7 oz. high quality bittersweet chocolate, chopped
½ cup hot water, milk, half-and-half
1½ tsp. ground cinnamon
1½ tsp. ground ancho chile powder
½ tsp. freshly ground nutmeg
¼ tsp. dried ground ginger
1 pinch ground cloves
1 pinch freshly ground black pepper
16 Red Hots candies, for decorati

To make the glaze:Carefully melt the chocolate, either in the microwave or on the stove with a double boiler. Stir the hot liquid, the spices and the vanilla into the melted chocolate until smooth.
Spoon the glaze over the cupcakes immediately, while glaze is still hot. Decorate each cupcake with one Red Hots candy in the center.

We had a fun time on Saturday Night but the bad thing was the Phils lost and now nobody wants to come back because it might be bad luck - I keep telling them we watch every game....every pitch....every night and they USUALLY WIN!  But the good thing is they did pull it off on Sunday Night and we didn't even have dinner.......we were too stuffed from the night before!


Here are some of the nieces and nephews ready for a BIG week of baseball!

Home Ec

So last we spoke - I don't know I can't remember. I have been subbing so much my mind is in a tizzy! I have decided that I like the Middle School kids best......they are easy and fun to be with - they don't seem to mind having a strange mom around...they try to help me instead of the other way around! Today I learned Spanish and how civilization was born. I even witnessed a science experiment with fire and ice.......had some more Spanish and some lunch and then went to Home Ec where we learned how to follow a recipe....

With all this "working" I have had to plan meals a little more in advance......mind you I get out at 2 or 3 but I am depleted by then and can't do anything except schlepp home and watch Oprah.......we still have tomatoes in the garden so we are having nice fresh salads with kirby cucumbers and red onion but the farm stands also are full of butternut squash and the local papers are featuring many recipes for this fall staple.

Yesterday I bought 2 pounds of the squash already cut up at Trader Joes. We were having Pork Tenderloin so I roasted some of that squash with some sweet potatoes for a healthy and delicious side dish. Just clean and dice a sweet potato (I like the white sweet potatoes) and mix with butternut squash along with olive oil, salt and pepper and sprinkle with brown sugar. Bake 400' for 20 minutes...stir and bake 20 minutes more - the result are some tasty caramelized goodies!

For the remainder of the squash I made a Butternut Squash Soup that looked good from Epicurious.com and it turned out to be fantastic.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/107688

It was a nice thing to come home to on a rainy Thursday after a grueling day in Home Economics!

Washington DC and Soup

Yesterday we visited Johnny in Washington, DC. We were surprised he was waiting for us and actually carved out part of his day to spend time with Mom and Dad. He relocated to a new house in the U Street area of the city and we were anxious to see his new digs. We were pleasantly surprised with the neighborhood and his house. He lives in an 'English Basement' with another roommate and they share a kitchen and bath. It has all been renovated with granite counter tops and nice woods. I was impressed! The boys are even paying for a cleaning service to come in every 2 weeks  - which is HUGE for my son who still lives like he did in COLLEGE and if you saw THAT house you would turn around and yell FIRE.

I was happy to see John looking so content in his new room and clearly having a good time in this adopted city of his........he has goals and ideas and a million things going on......which is great!

We walked to lunch a few blocks from his house. I thought to myself, I would LOVE to be able to walk everywhere and live in a city - where he is it seems like a neighborhood not like center city and if you can't walk you can take the metro........there are a bunch of neat bars around there too. We ate at Eatonville which is a new southern style restaurant and was a bustling hive of people. It came highly recommended by Matt, one of John's roommates and it was a good choice. If you're ever down there here is the Washington Post review:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/gog/restaurants/eatonville,1155907.html

Today is Monday and that means ROOT CANAL for Nancy. I spent the afternoon flat on my back with my jaw wide open. And the fun is not over yet - I return in 2 weeks when the inflammation goes down. So I knew I wouldn't be eating steak tonight and since it is a cold rainy day here in Marlton I decided to make soup and this is a good thing for you 20-somethings to do out there. It's full of fresh veggies and really whatever you want to add. You can make a pot of it in the beginning of the week and take it to work all week or just heat up for dinner after your Yoga classes or your Run or your Grad School classes or your book club or your just long long day!

I started out sauteing chopped onion, zucchini, red pepper and pancetta in olive oil (don't worry if you don't have pancetta or even know what it is - I just happened to be listening to the radio at the same time that Mark Bittman from the NYTIMES was saying every soup tastes better with a little bacon and having no bacon I added pancetta from my last visit to Arthur Ave. in The BRONX) - You don't even have to have those certain vegetables - onion, carrot, celery - whatever you have in frig. Add broth - today I had College Inn low sodium chicken broth - 32oz box and half of another - a 14oz can of diced tomatoes and some type of carb - today I cooked barley in advance and threw that in there but you can use any kind of pasta or rice or QUINOA. Just make sure you cook it first. I also baked some chicken and chopped that up. You could buy a rotisserie chicken and tear that apart or buy some chicken breasts and season with salt and pepper, olive oil  and some seasonings you like - bake in 400' oven for 35-40 minutes. This soup can become your own because you can make it what you like and with experience you might become famous and have your own food show.

Now, I'm going to see if I can slurp down some of this soup.