Strummin' the guitar and the grill

The last few days have been pretty calm (& calming). We are finishing up the last of our "cold food" i.e. meat & cheese. I tell you what, I am becoming quite the grill master out here. I don't know how some of these woman (& men) have a full-on work schedule, family schedule, whatever other schedule and still have time to cook well rounded meals for their families. It takes me all day just to decide and figure out how to cook the damn thing, then I actually have to do it! Just yesterday it took me about 4 hours to figure out what to do with these pork chops. I don't think I've ever cooked/grilled a pork chop in my life and being out here you don't have everything at your beck and call, so you have to be creative. I got creative all right, after all of that research and many forums later, I put my own spin on some of the dishes that were recommended and I think I did a swell job! I marinaded the chops in honey, soy sauce, a lil' bit of brown sugar and some garlic salt for about 2 hours and then grilled 'em up. I just added some corn which I tried to make it taste like corn on the cob (but not on the cob) with butter and salt and stuff but it just tasted like regular corn to me. I also made a side "salad" of tomatoes and avocado with some seasonings on it mostly for J', he doesn't really dig tomatoes and I LOVE them so I had to do something for him to eat his veggies! The plate was so full of food it seemed like we weren't very far from civilization at all...I did good!

[caption id="attachment_537" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Honey Soy Chops, Corn & Toma-Cado Salad...Yummm[/caption]

Other than researching and cooking one good solid meal a day, I've been trying to spend more and more time on Claramae. Some days I think I have it and some days I can't even seem to tune her . To say the least it's frustrating but I can't expect to be Numero Uno right off the bat, it just doesn't work that way with guitar.I'll learn it...someday!

[caption id="attachment_540" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Me & my girl[/caption]

I just have to remind myself that I have to practice at least 15 minutes a day or until my fingers start hurting 'til I can't play anymore or I won't get any better.  I've got a ton of support from my friends and family (most of them do play guitar) so it's nice to have encouragement from so far away. Love ya'll!

[caption id="attachment_541" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Fire Fingers[/caption]

Tonight I made our last savory meal...Top Round Sirloin, not the best steak out there but cheap enough for us to have steak in the woods...works for this girl! I marinated the steak in Jack Daniels BBQ sauce with a bit of salt and pepper and some Montreal Steak Seasoning for about an hour. I put our trusty onion, potato and mushrooms in a foil packet, seasoned and grilled those babies up. I also made some spinach that I didn't think was going to come out any better than it was in the can...but once again I surprised myself. I drained the spinach (into Savannah's bowl of course, she needs her greens too!), I put in some salt pepper, garlic salt, butter buds (my new best friend), a packet of Stevia to cut the bitterness and a couple of slices of cheese (the last ones). I served up the plates and voila dinner was a success yet again!

[caption id="attachment_539" align="aligncenter" width="300"] BBQ Sirloin, taters onions & shrooms with the best spinach in town![/caption]

The spinach was a hit, J' LOVED it and told me to remember what I did so I could keep making it, that never gets said about canned spinach! Patting myself on the back...haha I cooked dinner so late that right after dinner we just packed it up for the night and came in. We're gonna watch a little boob tube and then J' will go to sleep and I will lay there trying to fall asleep for the next 7 hours....fun stuff! Insomnia can suck it, haha

[caption id="attachment_538" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Our sunset in Joon Van's eyes[/caption]

Have a groovy night and hopefully your bellies are as full as ours tonight!

PEACE

Enough, I say...E-nough.

Not much is going on but I figured I'd write anyway...I can always find something to write about! We need to find some more creative food/meal ideas. Here's an example of our meals throughout the day. Breakfast~ Oatmeal with brown sugar and cinnamon added to our liking, sometimes butter if we have it on deck. Lunch~ pre-made tuna sandwich; chicken salad from can sandwich; peanut butter & jelly sandwich which I cannot eat Peanut Butter anymore...yep, it's a stinker. Dinner~ if we didn't have one of the previous sandwiches for lunch, we will make it for dinner, sometimes we dive into our Mountain House for a deluxe meal. I'm just telling you, this girl (pointing to me) needs to eat more than that a day, okay! My metabolism is faster than a cheetah trying to tackle a zebra! Right now we are pretty much eating what we had stored at our house before we left or stuff that was in our cabinets. A couple of weeks ago we bought some spaghetti noodles and sauce. The sauce is long gone but we have been using the noodles to mix with other things we have like, white chicken chili or this other chipotle chili we have. We are running out of food, but we are also running out of ideas. I have been looking up recipes but I'm running into a couple of problems; 1~ the recipe calls for either baking or refrigerating or both during or after cooking/baking it. 2~ We would love for meals to go a long way, but we only have a cooler that uses ice, our 2 blocks of ice seem to be gone within 3-4 days. 3~ I don't want to buy a bunch of ingredients I will only use in the one recipe. 4~ I'm not a creative cook, I cook out of necessity, not out of a fun time. We both want to either grab and go or like ten minutes max on things...I'm willing to change this... if necessary. I have been looking into different types of milk, mostly soy or almond milk that does not need refrigeration and trying to find recipes that I can make without throwing the cookware at a tree...I told you I'm not a cook! haha We have been eating cup-o-noodles (sounds tasty huh?), the easy mac and hamburger helper mini's...I think we may just start buying regular boxes of mac 'n' cheese now that we are sitting still...the noodles are always still crunchy in those little things because we don't have a microwave. I would love to get some kind of meat. Right now, that would be amazing to be grilling up some chicken or something...yummy! And my body is always craving fruits and veggies. I would love to have a salad every single day, like I used to make back home...I can make salads! I have been having dreams of gorging myself on salad, I think it's time! Miss Cherry gave me a couple of pieces of fruit a couple of weeks ago. Eating that peach was almost orgasmic and the plum was pretty good too, she got them from the market here at Shaver Lake. You know they are good when they are grown right around the corner, literally. They smelled so good, I couldn't stop smelling them, Miss Cherry said, "I'm sure there's more if you want some." haha Like I'd never seen a peach in my life! It was pretty funny. With the whole eating thing, it's a lot easier for J' to eat than me...he'll eat just about anything. Me...I'm a picky eater but for a reason. My stomach does not digest foods the same way as everyone else, there are certain things I do not like and certain things my stomach does not like, then there's both. For a while now, I get sick everytime I eat peanut butter. I thought it was just something else I had eaten with it...I LOVE Peanut Butter. I stopped eating it for a while and the other night I had a peanut butter sandwich, and not that much so I wouldn't be that sick...low and behold, there I was... sick. I told J' to not let me have Peanut Butter again, no matter how much I said it wouldn't affect me. Eggs do the same thing and there are others but I'm not going to list all of my problem foods...bor-ing. So if I could get some recipes or ideas for stuff you don't have to put in the oven, rather not have to melt anything and all of that on the stove-top either, but I guess I might have to do some work, not refrigerate then I'd be golden. There has to be something out there than just bread that we can eat for a snack! haha I think this is the sadest post yet! As I'm posting this, a friend just sent me a link that is on this very topic. So with that I'm out!
PEACE