Once again I am out of sync with everyone. I realize that people normally pickle their cucumbers once they have hoards of them and their neighbors, friends and relatives have refused to take another single one. Here I am making pickles, pickles with purchased cucumbers.
First of all, I’ve never pickled anything in my life except my liver. Based on that I should be pretty good at pickling cucumbers and hopefully they both have a long shelf life. Why in the world would it possess me to do it now? A yearning for summer? The rebel in me? Just another complicated me thing.
There was something so enticing about these “snacking” cucumbers (that’s what they called them). Their claim was crispness. Just seemed like a good criteria for pickles. I picked up a couple of packs, brought them home and thought what the hell am I doing?
After searching the internet for pickling ideas, I had determined that 1. I was going to do refrigerator pickles (I didn’t have any canning stuff) 2. I was going to create my own unique pickles. I did that by blending the sweet and dill then throwing in a little spice.
Talk about easy! Talk about dillyicious! Talk about sweet! They reminded me of a bread and butter pickle at first, then the sweetness faded and I got a subtle dill aftertaste, then the crushed red peppers hit the edges of my tongue and I went gaga!
Sweet pickles are a mood thing for me, and these were maybe a tad bit sweet for my taste. I think next time I’ll cut back on sugar. I might even wait until someone kind decides to unload their cucumbers on me before I go all rebel again.
Recipe
Sweet and Dillyiscious Pickles
2 lbs. pickling cucumbers (or mini snacker cucumbers)
3 Tbs. pickling spice like McCormick’s
1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes
1 1/2 cups apple cider vinegar
1 cup water
1 cup sugar (or less)
3 Tbs. Kosher salt
3/4 oz. (1 pkg.) fresh dill weed
Wash cucumbers and cut into 1/2” discs or into spears. Tightly pack into 2 or 3 sterilized quart jars and top with the dill weed.
Lightly crush the pickling spice with a mortar and pestle. Place in a medium non-reactive pan. Add cider vinegar, crushed pepper, water, sugar and salt. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and cook until the sugar and salt dissolves. Pour over the jarred cucumbers and dill weed.
Let cool completely, cover and refrigerate for 7 days for best flavor.
I’ve been eating S.O.S. since I was a wee little Navy Brat. That’s how it all got started, the U.S. Navy. Travel back in time with me, just for a little while…
My father is one of the most interesting people I know, he’s from a small, nay, teeny tiny town in West Texas. He used to tell me the only thing between Texas and the North Pole was a barbed wire fence. If you’ve ever been to west Texas and felt that cold breeze that comes from the North, you’d be inclined to believe him. In his young days, my daddy was pretty good at sports. Despite the fact that he was from this teeny tiny town, he scored a football scholarship to a Junior College.
Picture a young handsome man (I thought he was handsome from the photos), a football player from a teeny tiny town going off to a big school. A school with lots of girls, girls he didn’t grow up with. Lets just say that one too many panty raids and he wasn’t allowed at school anymore. Sigh…I know where my kids get their mischievous streak from.
That was the 1960’s, that meant the Vietnam War was going strong. Daddy knew that no college meant he would be drafted into the Army and sent to Vietnam. My daddy loved the water, he was a life guard and a competitive diver throughout high school, the Army was not the place for him. Before the draft papers came in, he preemptively joined the U.S.N.
He may be going to war but he was with his first (and still) love of his life, the water. I’m not sure if that love of water came from the lack of water of West Texas or that his name literal translates to “ruler” (first name) and “lover of the sea” (middle name). For whatever reason, the seas were for him, he’s never stopped working on or near them since.
Being in the Navy meant that my daddy would go out to sea for long periods of time. That meant that after a few months, fresh food was not in abundance. I remember that when he was home with us, we’d have a salad every night so he could have fresh crispy vegetables. He used to tell us that he would get “fresh” carrot sticks on board and he could hold them out and they resembled a limp…uh, use your imagination here.
Maybe through self defense, my dad did find himself enjoying some of the food that wasn’t fresh. One of the dishes was S.O.S. What the heck is that? Besides meaning “Help” in the nautical world, in this case it refers to “Shit on a Shingle”. I believe the more politically correct name for the dish is Creamed Chipped Beef over Toast. Sorry, to me it will always be S.O.S.
S.O.S. is typically served for breakfast. The “Shit” part is composed of a cream gravy (medium white sauce) with chipped dried beef in it. The “shingle” part consists of the toast that the gravy is poured over. The toast is layered much like shingles on a roof. There you have it, S.O.S.
If you do any camping or have a cabin or just want to reminisce over your old Navy days, this is a perfect and easy breakfast. The chipped beef has a shelf life of 10 or more years maybe more, (not really sure) and the rest of the ingredients are easy to pack or they are kept in your pantry. Just make sure that you rinse the chipped beef before you cook it, it contains a lot of sodium (hence the amazing shelf life).
In my version, I used bacon fat and cooked it with flour to make the roux. I cooked the roux until it was lightly brown to give the dish more flavor. I used fat free milk to save on calories and fat, but I didn’t miss it because the roux added so much flavor.
Are you ready? Sing with me to the tune of “In the Navy” by the Y.M.C.A.
“In the Navy, you can sail the seven seas,
In the Navy you can eat S.O.S.
In the Navy, In the Navy”
Recipe
S.O.S.
1 Jar or package of dried (chipped) beef, rinsed and diced
2 tbs. bacon fat, butter or oil
2 tbs. flour
2 cups milk or cream
1/4 tsp. pepper or more to taste
Salt if needed (taste first as the dried beef is very salty)
8 slices of toast
In a non-stick pan over medium high heat, melt bacon fat or butter. Once hot, add flour and whisk. Continue to whisk until flour/fat mixture is hot and bubbly and becomes the color of caramel. Slowly add milk, continuously whisking to blend. Add diced and rinsed dried beef, boil for one minute than remove from heat. Season with pepper and salt if necessary. Cut toast on the diagonal, and lay 2 slices on each plate slightly overlapping each other. Ladle a 1/2 cup of gravy over the toast. Serve immediately.
Just in case you’ve never seen dried (a.k.a. chipped) beef, here’s a picture courtesy of Hormel:
If you want to see a great motorcycle cartoonist I recommend your visit Bikers are Animals Blog. Paul Jamoil does great work and he posts more than just cartoons.
It’s pizza two ways, made for picking up with your fingers. Perfect for a family pizza night or the big game, or when a bunch of teenagers are coming over to play video games all night and they don’t want to stop playing. It just doesn’t get better than popping a little pizzatizer in your mouth without interrupting your play.
Teenager boys are notoriously NOT picky, so why invest a ton of time making fresh dough? I’m not even sure if they taste the food they consume. I made two types, one used refrigerator pizza dough and the other wonton wrappers, short cut preparation but no shortcut on taste.
These are as fun to make as they are to eat. Make a double batch to freeze (or feed teenagers). I used the traditional pepperoni and sausage mix but you can use any kind filling you like.
Recipe
Mini Pizzatizers
1 can Pillsbury Pizza Crust
1 package eggroll wrappers
1 lb. Italian sausage
4 oz. pepperoni, diced
1 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella
Pizza Sauce
1 can (6 oz.) pizza sauce
12 oz. water (2 cans worth—saves on dishes)
1/2 tbs. garlic powder
1/2 tbs. onion powder
1 tsp. oregano
1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes
1/2 tsp. salt
Preheat oven to 425F. Roll out the Pillsbury Pizza Crust on a lightly floured surface until its 1/4” thick. Cut into 2 5/8” circles and line mini muffin pan, pressing the dough into the wells, set aside. Cook the Italian sausage over medium high heat until browned, drain and set aside to cool. Mix all the ingredients for the pizza sauce, add the diced pepperoni and cooked sausage, mix well. Fill each of the dough lined muffin cups with the mixture, set remaining mixture aside. Top with 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until the edges of the dough are brown and the cheese is hot and bubbly.
Heat frying oil to 350F. To the remaining pizza filling mixture add 1 cup of shredded mozzarella and mix well. In each eggroll wrapper, add 1/4 cup filling and roll up, use a water moistened finger tip along the edge of the eggroll wrapper to seal, repeat until all the filling is used. Deep fry the stuffed egg rolls for 2 to 3 minutes or until golden brown.
I mentioned during this post that I was lucky enough to deploy to Tunisia while I was in the Air Force. It was a joint Medical operations. We flew down from RAF Lakenheath, UK in the not so comfortable jump seats in the back of a cargo plane.
Our mission: To share/exchange some of our medical/dental knowledge and then practice a mass casualty scenario, which involved buses, helicopters, burning tires…which created real life emergencies from the toxic fumes. Let’s just that wasn’t the best planning on the Tunisian side, but it did give us an opportunity to practice for real.
We were housed in bunkers right next to the Mediterranean. Although we didn’t have windows, or heat or AC, I didn’t have a single complaint. Except that there were only two showers for something like 18 women. Two showers, say what? Then I found out that we were lucky to have toilet paper as it is not used normally. So fine, a shower schedule was worked out and we all rejoiced in the toilet paper instead.
I was selected to go because they needed a dental assistant to accompany the Oral Surgeon, I happened to work with Oral Surgeon that was slated to go. They also needed people to teach CPR and EMT-B course. I was both a certified AHA BLS instructor and an EMT-B instructor. They hit the trifecta with me and that meant it saved the Air Force money and it scored me a trip to Tunisia. Don’t you love it when a plan comes together!
Since English was not their primary language, we were going to have to do our best to teach in their secondary language, French. Understand this, I had one year of French like 15 years before this deployment and I sucked at it. Here would be my biggest challenge. I created slides and had them translated in to French, then I memorized them in French, and I studied crammed as much French into my head as I could. You are probably thinking that I’m going to say, it all came back to me? Well it didn’t, but I muddled along and had the help of one or two students that spoke decent English.
A Tunisian Field Drill
I loved it, every moment of it. Waking up at 0’dark thirty to heat up tinned sausages and rehydrated eggs, creating unique meals with my MREs (Meals Ready to Eat = three lies for the price of one), teaching, sharing, experiencing. This was why I joined the military, to go to another country and work together to do something amazing!
While we were there, the Tunisian’s hosted a dinner and opened a bar for us. Their beer is served in tiny cans so I made sure to grab two at a time to avoid the lines.
For dinner they made Tunisian Couscous. A dish so flavorful and wonderful. I gorged myself on it, I couldn’t get enough. The depth of flavor was wow-mazing! I just made that word up since I couldn’t think of another that could describe my experience.
Tunisian Couscous is their version of a stew, it is traditionally made in a couscoussier. The meat and veg are cooked in the bottom pot with all the spices and the couscous is steamed on top. I do not have couscoussier, I probably won’t ever, so I used a large stock pot and cooked my couscous in a separate pot.
The ingredient list is long…so is this post, but it is worth the time and effort. I made this particular one with chicken, in the future I would use skinless boneless chicken. The skin, after cooking for so long just cooked off the meat and ended up getting tossed (you’ll need to adjust cooking time accordingly if you use boneless chicken). Tunisian couscous is especially good made with lamb.
The recipe came from a compilation of recipes I found on the internet and my memories of the wonderful first taste back in Tunisia. A critical ingredient for Tunisian Couscous is Harissa, you can purchase it at a specialty market or you can the recipe here.
Did you know that Tunisian couscous is served in a single bowl that everyone eats from? And that the spicier it is the more the wife loves her husband?
Recipe
Tunisian Couscous
1 (4 lb.) chicken, cut into pieces (or skinless boneless chicken or lamb)
3 tbsp. olive oil
1 onion diced
1 1/2 tsp. cumin
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp. paprika
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cayenne
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 oz. tomato paste
2 cups water or more if needed
2 tbsp. harissa (or more to taste)
2 carrots, peeled and cut into 3” pieces, then halved if large
4 cups cubed butternut squash
2 zucchini sliced 1/2 “ thick then quartered
1 16 oz. can Garbanzo beans (chick peas)
1 cup golden raisins
10 oz. plain couscous, uncooked
In a large pot, heat olive oil over medium-high heat. Brown chicken in batches (if necessary), return chicken to the pot. Add the diced onions and all the spices. Stir and cook for 1 to 2 minutes, or until the onions start to sweat and the spices become very fragrant. Add the garlic, stir and cook for another 30 seconds.
Add tomato paste and 1 cup of water, stirring to deglaze the pan. Add just enough extra water to cover the chicken. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer and cover. Simmer 30 minutes, adding more water if necessary.
Add carrots and cook 15 more minutes. Add harissa and butternut squash, cook for 10 minutes. Finally add the zucchini, garbanzo beans and golden raisins. cook until the butternut squash and zucchini are tender about 10 more minutes.
During the last leg of cooking, prepare the couscous according to package directions. Place couscous in a large bowl, stir in one cup of the cooking liquid from the stew. Stir well to mix. Make a well in the center of the couscous and add the chicken and vegetable stew.
Serve with extra cooking liquid and harissa on the side.
Thought you might find it funny that I had to use a step stool to stir my pot. Either the pot was too tall or I’m too short.
It started to warm up here, the snow melting away, the roads clearing up, my hopes of riding soon increasing. Then the temps dropped and we got another dusting of snow. It makes it real tough to do a motorcycle bit sometimes.
Since riding and recipes is what I do, I thought I’d feature a recipe from someone who does the same. Alton Brown, one of my most favorite Food Network Celebrities. He somehow manages to be geeky and cool at the same time. He’s kind of a Bill Nye the Science guy meets Monty Python meets Biker dude.
I wasn’t sure which way I should shoot this picture.
In 2007 Alton Brown rode his motorcycle, along with his crew along the Mississippi River starting from Venice, LA and ending at Lake Itasca, MN. He basically ate and rode his way on this great river run. I happened to be living along the Mississippi at that time so I followed his show, didn’t miss a one, waiting to see something familiar.
And I did, it was great watching him go off the beaten path and into the heart of the local areas and find “Good Eats”. As soon as his memoir/cookbook of the adventure was released, I purchased it. I highly recommend it for motorcycle lovers, Alton Brown lovers, or folks that love honest to goodness local fare.
Expect to see more recipes from me via “Feasting on Asphalt”.
This recipe is “road inspired” which means that no one would give up their secret recipes and Alton Brown made it as close as he could.
Loose Meat Sandwiches are also known as Loose Meat Burgers, they more closely resemble a Sloppy Joe than a burger but they taste more like a burger than a Sloppy Joe. If you haven’t heard of them, probably means you haven’t been in the Midwest.
Recipe by Alton Brown
Loose Meat Sandwiches
1 1/2 lbs. ground beef
1 medium onion, very finely minced
(This is important: a fine chop won’t do. but don’t be tempted to use a food processor or you’ll end up with a watery mess.)
1 Tbsp. prepared mustard
1/2 cup water
1 Tbsp. Worcestershire Sauce
1/4 tsp. Kosher salt
Place the beef and onion in a 4-quart saucepan over medium heat. Cook until the beef is completely cooked through but not browning, 8 to 9 minutes, constantly mashing the beef with a potato masher in order to break the pieces into the smallest possible. Add the remaining ingredients and continue to simmer for another 15 minutes. Remove from the heat. Using a hand mixer, mix for another 2 to 3 minutes on high. Serve on hamburger buns with ketchup, mustard, cheese and pickles.
Note: All the sandwiches I’ve had used Cheez Whiz as the cheese. I mean the cheese food product. If you want authentic, I highly recommend it.
I was on my way, finally I was going to see the famous Ree Drummond better known as The Pioneer Woman, blogger, photographer, home schooler (like how I used a made up word for that), gardener, cook, novelist and celebrity. I had carefully picked out my clothes, this was not an affair to dress to the nines in, yeah she’s famous but she’s a rancher’s wife and lives in yoga pants and jeans. I went for cute and casual and finished it off with a fabulous orange purse, it had a huge flower and rhinestones. I was sure it would be PW approved.
Make-up refreshed, a quick curl in my hair (I worked earlier so there wasn’t much time for primping) and I was almost ready. I just needed to grab my “Black Heels to Tractor Wheels” and my cookbook that Leah bought me. Only, I can’t find my cookbook, McGyver can’t find my cookbook.
I knew I should have got stuff ready the day before. For an organized person, I’m a horrible procrastinator. Especially when I think I know where everything is. As I frantically conduct my search and released the blood hounds to sniff it out, I suddenly remember that I took it to the cabin. Seemed like the perfect cookbook for the cabin…Pioneer/Mountaineer Woman, all the same (in my head anyways).
*Sigh* oh well, I was sure they would have one for sale there. I intended to arrive 45 minutes to an hour early. Not likely to happen, but I scurried about and was out the door and made my way to the venue in a decent amount of time. As I was driving I was thinking, do I have any questions for Ree? I mean ones that would make me sound intelligent and blogger savvy? All I really could think of, was “do you still shoot in JPEG only or have you gone back to RAW format?” For the life of me that’s all I could think of…I was as nervous as a schoolgirl about to get her first kiss…my brain wasn’t thinking. I decided I wasn’t going to ask any questions, for once I was going to keep my mouth shut.
After a massive cluster of cars and parking lot(s) tribulations, I found a spot on the street, cut through the back door and I was IN. I was 30 minutes early so I thought I should get good seats, after all I had a VIP ticket. I ended up only two rows up from regular seating (at double the cost) but I did score an aisle seat with a direct view to the podium. Plus I was feeling fortunate that the Pioneer Woman had come to Great Falls.
After a few mandatory comments and introductions of sponsors, etc. It was time to get to the main event.
Look! It’s a bird, it’s a plane…..Heeeere’s Ree Drummond.
The crowd roars, a standing ovation before she even begins, no really. You all need to understand, we only get people past their prime time to visit not in the height of it. This was exciting stuff.
Ree began by saying that she is not a speaker, she’s a blogger and when you think about that, they are polar opposites. As a blogger who’s used to print and pictures to help them along, Ree used a slide show, it was live blogging…so to speak.
I managed to snap photos of her in all her best faces and poses.
In case you are wondering when she was born (see below)…for those of you trying to count, that makes her 42 years old.
Ree’s speaking style was warm and friendly. I could hear her blog in her voice, seeing the face, the person, the voice, it came together. She was very entertaining and 45 minutes went by amazingly quick. She talked about the difference between Herefords and heifers (it was an educational program too), cool stuff she’s done, and her blog.
She ended her speech, not with the end (pictured above…although I would have been happy for her to leave that slide up) but with a duet with Charlie with Ree singing (almost singing) both parts of my endless love (see above picture, bottom right).
Immediately afterward was the book signing. There must have been 300 or more people there just to have her sign their book(s). She promised to stay and sign every one of them. After being directed and re-directed to stand in line, we found our places and waited. This is the line behind me, I never did see the end of it.
This is the line in front of me, see the screen, she was sitting just to the right of it. It was just a couple of hundred feet from where I was at. It took 2 hours, no I said it took 2 hours. Unfortunately the first hour I moved only 5 feet which meant that my position was somewhat in a path for a long time.
This entire weekend was “A Sale to Benefit the Charlie Russell Museum”, that means a Western Art Sale with guest speaker Ree Drummond. There were a ton of people at the venue for that, that ton of people choose right where I was standing to be their way to travel from one side of the sale to the other. Even when I moved up, the traffic diverted to that space and I was still in everyone’s way. “Excuse me, I’m just cutting through”, “Pardon me, I’m sorry, just passing through”. I was bumped and jostled, fortunately I was standing with a group of nice people getting the same treatment. We talked for hours and the time passed a little more pleasantly.
Oh yeah, they were sold out of cookbooks by the time I got to the kiosk…
Oh my gosh, I’m next, Oh my gosh it’s my turn. The security guard offered to take my purse “what?” my cute orange purse, the epiphany of my outfit? No way, it was going in the photo with me. A nice lady took my book and I gave her one of my business cards to sign also. And I nice lady took our picture.
And my hair was funky (probably from all the jostling in the line), and my purse fell off my shoulder, and I had it on backwards so you couldn’t see the cute flower and Ree looks perfect, *pumpfh*. I should have let the security guard take my purse.
Wouldn’t you know it, Ree and I hit it off right away. It was like BFF at first sight. She liked me right away, she told me she’s heard of my blog and she asked to keep one of my business cards and then she invited me to her hotel room afterward. I had to work the next day, but I didn’t care. It was late but we a great time, we sat up and talked about ranching, and losing weight and kids and blogging and she gave me some advice and we sipped wine together and I got tipsy so I stayed the night. We had a girls slumber party! She totally gets me. It was great.
Whoa, sorry that was my fantasy. Actually, I just told her how Leah, at Leftovers for Lunch, bought me her cookbook and got me started reading her blog and how Leah and I both have one. However, she really did say that she’s heard of my blog and asked to keep my business card. She also said to tell my daughter “Hi”.
So I left with this, and I was satisfied.
Because my purse didn’t get in the picture and because I wanted it too and because I can, here’s a picture of it. With it’s fabulous orange color and outlandishly large flower with rhinestones. I bought it at the fair, who would of thought?
Sometimes you read something, watch something on TV or someone says something and it just brings back waves of memories. It’s not that you’ve forgotten, it just hasn’t been front and center on your mind. Then BOOM, you can’t get it out of your mind. The stories and the reminiscing begin…
Almost all of my memories and my stories seemed to have food woven through them. Most people talk about the sites and people of their past, or their travels, I do too, but then there is the food. The glorious home cooked meal, the traditional food for that region or something exotic and tantalizing that I experienced. It permeates my thoughts, the food becomes the memory maker.
My foray back to Tunisia began when Leah at Leftovers for Lunch posted a Tunisian Couscous recipe, it made me momentarily think of Tunisia. Now, with Tunisia regularly in the news, frequently hearing and reading the name, it has naturally been in my thoughts a lot more. Except I’m reminded of a better time, a time without all the turmoil that is going on now.
I had an experience of a lifetime, I deployed to Tunisia for a joint medical adventure, but I’ll tell you more about that later. Tunisia is a favored vacation spot for the Europeans. Located on the Mediterranean in Northern Africa it offers a beautiful climate and scenery.
Tunisia is an “Arab” country that went bankrupt in the mid 1800s. Shortly after that, the French invaded and brought their influence to the tiny country. As a matter of fact, French is still Tunisia’s second language. Tunisia only regained their independence from France in 1956. Tunisia has also been influenced by the Spanish and the Italians. Imagine a North African cuisine with a major French flair and some Spanish and Italian influence also.
In the short time that I was in Tunisia, I mostly ate MREs (Meals Ready to Eat; three lies in one!), and other military pre-packaged deployment food. However, it was supplemented everyday with fresh baguettes and blood oranges. We were also introduced to their most popular condiment/seasoning: Harissa.
Harissa is basically a red chili paste not unlike Sriracha, the spicy Thai chili sauce. Harissa is made with dried red chilies that are soaked, then pureed with aromatic spices, herbs and garlic. It can be purchased in some specialty markets. Not having a specialty market here in Great Falls, I would have to make my own. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I looked to the internet to provide a recipe. The one that most resembled the flavors I remembered came from Saveur.
Although the recipe called for guajillo chilies and New Mexico chilies, I could only find the guajillo chilies, so I substituted pasillo chilies for the New Mexico ones. The flavor was fabulous but it gave it a darker color, versus the bright red you would typically see. I also used fresh mint instead of the dried.
Recipe
Harissa
8 dried guajillo chilies, stemmed and seeded (about 2 oz.) 8 dried New Mexico chilies, stemmed and seeded (about 1 1⁄2 oz.) 1⁄2 tsp. caraway seeds 1⁄4 tsp. coriander seeds 1⁄4 tsp. cumin seeds 1 tsp. dried mint leaves 3 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil, plus more as needed 1 1⁄2 tsp. kosher salt 5 cloves garlic Juice of 1 lemon
1. Put chilies into a medium bowl, cover with boiling water, and let sit until softened, about 20 minutes. Heat caraway, coriander, and cumin in an 8" skillet over medium heat. Toast spices, swirling skillet constantly, until very fragrant, about 4 minutes. Transfer spices to a grinder with the mint and grind to a fine powder. Set aside.
2. Drain chilies and transfer to the bowl of a food processor with the ground spices, olive oil, salt, garlic, and lemon juice. Purée, stopping occasionally to scrape down the sides of the bowl, until the paste is very smooth, about 2 minutes. Transfer to a sterilized 1-pint glass jar and fill with oil until ingredients are submerged by 1⁄2". Refrigerate, topping off with more oil after each use. Harissa paste will keep for up to 3 weeks.
It came to me, out of nowhere, a drink for St. Patrick’s Day. I tried to ignore it; it would be empty calories that I don’t need. Then I was at Bed, Bath and Beyond and they had Irish Coffee Mugs…cheap. I bought two. Just in case. But I won’t use them.
I searched the internet, has anyone created a drink like this? Irish coffee, check. Grasshopper coffee, check. Thin Mint Irish Coffee…no where to be found. It doesn’t matter, I’m not going to make it anyways.
At work I throw the idea around; does it sound good? “Oh yes, and are you going to post it?” I probably shouldn’t. Well, maybe. After all, it can’t just be a coincidence that Girl Scout cookies come out so close to St. Patrick’s Day, right? I mean, it’s like, destiny or something, isn’t it?
There is probably something just a little wrong with mixing Girl Scout cookies and alcohol. I can’t help it, they were my inspiration. It could have been Andes mints or a York Peppermint Patty, but it wasn’t. I haven’t been known as an politically correct person, so I’m going with my original inspiration: The Thin Mint.
Humor me for a moment as I share my tribulations. I rushed home after buying the booze and picking up the Baby boy from school. I needed to hurry while I had some natural light. I ground fresh coffee, made a half pot, made my drinks sans whipped cream and started practice shooting. (I wanted to practice before the I put on the whipped cream…for melty reasons.)
Just as I was ready…major cloud cover. I tried all my viable spots in the house, but I only got dark, bad pictures. So I took it outside, the light was better but the 15 mile an hour Chinook winds did not make it easy. It’s a good thing I made two of them for the photo…they were quickly consumed after I was done…and all was well again.
I have to say this drink was Feckin good! If you’re Irish you know what I mean, if you aren’t, it’s the ummm brand of Irish Whiskey I used. You don’t have to save this drink for just St. Paddy’s day, I think that you would enjoy it anytime!
Note: I used some green sprinkles to give it a festive flare, or you could dye the whipped cream green for an even bolder affect. Or just skip it altogether.
Recipe (for one drink)
Thin Mint Irish Coffee
1/2 oz. Kahlua Mocha or Crème de Cacao
1/2 oz. Crème de Menthe
1 oz. Irish Whiskey
1/2 cup strong coffee
Whipped Cream
1 Thin Mint, chopped for Garnish
Green sprinkles or green dye if desired
Mix Kahlua Mocha, Crème de Menthe, Irish Whiskey and coffee in an 8 oz. mug. top with whipped cream (colored green if desired) and garnish with Thin Mint cookie crumbs and green sprinkles.
There she is, my old girl (she’s 12 this year), with her nose pointed to the garage door, just waiting to be ridden. She knows Spring is coming and soon the snow and ice will melt and she’ll feel the black top beneath her rubber. She waits impatiently.
The saddlebags are ready to be packed, unpacked, repacked…they know it takes at least 3 times of rearranging to get it just right for a trip.
The V-Twin is ready to feel the energy coursing through it, to unleash the power.
The handle bars and hand grips ready to be gently gripped, squeezed and rolled.
The mufflers are ready to be heard and go from “potato, potato, potato” to vroooom; ready to turn heads as we ride by.
The tail is ready to be the last thing you see as we escape one life and ride the life that we love more than any other.
