Friday 29 August 2008
Long long weekend ahead
It's Friday and we have the Labor Day weekend before us. Hurricane Katrina and friends arrive on Monday night and hopefully we will be prepared! When blogging service returns expect to hear about the beach, the birthday celebrations and the crazy antics of Auntie Kat.
Thursday 28 August 2008
Pizza Oven Update 4
Wednesday 27 August 2008
Herb garden update
As you can see the herb garden is doing well in some areas and pretty terrible in others. On the positive side the birds are now happy that I cleaned the black gunk out of the bird bath and filled it with water for them to splash in again.
Outcomes as of mid August:
Tuesday 26 August 2008
Product of the week: Liquid smoke
We were introduced to this product by the always excellent America's Test Kitchen. Ingredients include water, natural hickory smoke flavor, vinegar, molasses, caramel color and salt.
The instructions are pretty simple - just brush onto the steak before cooking.
The result....excellent smoke tasting steak. A winner! Recommended! Go buy some!
Monday 25 August 2008
Sunday 24 August 2008
Friday 22 August 2008
Construction update 6
Thursday 21 August 2008
The world's latest birthday present
Wednesday 20 August 2008
American food
However it is easy to get some traditional American foods that I hadn't really eaten before moving here. These are the sorts of the food you read about (or see in American movies):
- graham crackers (pronounced 'gram' crackers)
- mac and cheese
- pie (like a large custard tart)
- grilled cheese sandwich
- bbq (shredded pork)
- sweet tea
Tuesday 19 August 2008
Product of the week: Chicharrones
When cruising the Mexican aisle at Food Lion I came across these chicarrones. The ingredients are literally fried pork skins and salt.
Andrew was pretty excited to give them a try. However it turns out they are fairly tasteless, almost like eating packing foam - light, airy and not very flavoursome. Nothing like Mr Porky's pork crackles. Katrina, you better bring a big suitcase full of Mr Porky's products when you come over (then again to keep Andrew's cholesterol down maybe just a couple will do!)
BTW check out this website dedicated to Hairy Bar snacks!
Monday 18 August 2008
Gold medal bricklaying
The summer is almost over! 'Over' in the sense that in the past week the humidity has dissipated and we are left with lovely 29 degree days with lower humidity. It now feels like a Sydney summer and we are enjoying the outdoors immensely apart from the bugs. It seems ridiculous to say but for some days in July/August it was too hot to go outside! Now that summer is nearly 'over' we are making the most of being outside but missed going to the beach yesterday due to tropical storms.
Friday 15 August 2008
Construction update 5
The pizza oven is also coming along nicely. The 4th layer of concrete blocks was laid last night by Andrew and Gary, with Daryl watching on. Lucy has been a little helper donning gloves and using a trowel in a rather expert way. She is really getting into her role as Pizza Slave! Andrew still thinks we can have a functional launch in October, let's hope so!
Thursday 14 August 2008
Enforced garbage collection
Wednesday 13 August 2008
Bumper stickers I have seen around here...
Tuesday 12 August 2008
Product of the week: Abuelita
Monday 11 August 2008
Friday 8 August 2008
Attention basketball fans
Thursday 7 August 2008
The digital transition is coming!
Wednesday 6 August 2008
Construction Update 4 + snake tales
In less exciting news around 8pm last night we spied a snake in our herb garden. Some of the herbs are doing great and others are doing terribly so we really didn't need a snake eating the caterpillars attacking the thyme. Andrew killed it with a spade (the snake not the thyme) and then re-killed it when it came alive again. We have no idea what kind of snake it was but Andrew wasn't taking any chances (remember this is the man who jumped behind me for protection when we encountered a rattlesnake whilst hiking in Yosemite!) In a freaky end the snake was decapitated yet the body kept moving.