Month: May 2015

Shhh… don’t tell the 14-Year-Old Boys I’m Watching Marvel’s “Agent Carter”

Because they think it is FUNNY to tell you SPOILERS about the shows you may be catching up on. THE TWERPS! No lie, The Boy and his friend texted me a bunch of things that would happen during the finale of “Agents of Shield.” I’m still mad…

image from google.com
image from google.com

Needless to say, I wasn’t about to tell them that I started the “Shield” prequel “Agent Carter,” which picks up the Marvel universe storyline from shortly after we lose Captain America in the 1940’s. The show follows the life and adventures of Agent Peggy Carter, fighting for respect from coworkers almost as much as fighting to uphold the ideals of the free world. IMDB sums it up so: “In 1946, Peggy Carter is relegated to secretarial duties in the Strategic Scientific Reserve (SSR). When Howard Stark is accused of treason, he secretly recruits Peggy to clear his name with the help of his butler, Edwin Jarvis.” You can watch the last four episodes, including the season finale, on abcgo.com, if you are so inclined.

Some of the best lines from the show are given to Angie, one of the girls who lives in the apartments for women with Peggy Carter:

Angie Martinelli: These rolls keep for three days. Four if it’s cold and you put them out on the windowsill.
Peggy Carter: Oh, glad to hear it. I don’t often steal food.
Angie Martinelli: Are you kidding? Carol once fit a whole chicken down her sweater.

and:

“(Showing Carter around the apartment building) Hi, Mary! That’s Mary. She’s a legal secretary at Goodman, Kirksberg and Holloway. Evelyn. Evelyn is a lounge singer at a club in midtown. Hi, Sarah! That’s Sarah. She’s a slut.”―Angie Martinelli

and more:

“I got a bottle of schnapps and half a rhubarb pie; let’s see which one makes us sick first.”―Angie Martinelli

I began writing this post after starting “Agent Carter” early last week, intending to finish it and the series in about 10 days or so. Nope! All done! Great show, lots of fun. Looking forward to season two. It is on the high end of violence for me… as a matter of fact, there was a scene in the penultimate episode that reminded me of a (terribly violent, awful) scene in the movie “Kingsman- The Secret Service.” If you have seen both, you know what I’m talking about. Ugh. I’m more of a Rom-Com fan, and really surprised how much I’m enjoying this Marvel Comics universe.

Now… on to “Daredevil?” Just DON’T tell The Boy and his friend, please!

Chocolate Wafer Cookie Recipe- Yes, You CAN Make These Yourself, and THE BEST Ice Cream Sandwich, too!

…and they taste WAY better than store bought wafer cookies, or Oreos, and this only leaves me to wonder. What kind of dessert Nirvana would I arrive at by crumbling these cookies into a high quality vanilla ice cream?

I had a goal to hunt down a chocolate cookie recipe because I thought I could make a better one than those that make up the basic ice cream sandwich. No problem. One internet query and voilà. 3,000 recipes to choose from. Overwhelmed, I retreated to my Pinterest board, “Sweets,” where I knew I had a few promising candidates.

Simple Ingredients
Simple Ingredients

I don’t know if I will try any others, this one was great- SeededAtTheTable.com has a simple, super-chocolaty wafer recipe with butter, vanilla, sugars, flour, baking soda, cocoa, and milk. That’s it.

Sugar and Butter, ready to cream; dry ingredients, ready to whisk together
Sugar and Butter, ready to cream; dry ingredients, ready to whisk together

Butter goes into the mixing bowl with the sugars, cream these ingredients, then add the vanilla (I added two, an extra one just for my mom). Into another bowl goes flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt to whisk together. Two Good Tips: I usually use regular butter, not unsalted, then add less salt than a recipe calls for; and if you want to be smart, always strain your baking soda or powders through a fine sieve… no one likes biting into a cookie to get a lump of baking powder… yuck.

Butter and sugars, creamed, with dry ingredients and milk ready to add
Butter and sugars, creamed, with dry ingredients and milk ready to add

Cream the heck out of the butter and sugars to get a nice, fluffy texture- you know, this takes at least a couple of minutes, don’t give up if it takes even five minutes to get that lighter, fluffy consistency- add the vanilla and cream a little more, then add the dry ingredients. I alternated the dry with the milk, mixing only until just combined as everything came together.

IMG_6667
Dough all done, ready for fridge time…

All that remained was to roll the dough into a couple of logs about 1 1/2 inches wide and wait as it chilled in the refrigerator for an hour.

Sliced into coins about 1/4 inches thick… baked for 10

Almost 4 Dozen Cookies ready to become ice cream sandwiches!!!
Almost 4 Dozen Cookies ready to become ice cream sandwiches!!!

minutes at 350 and HO BOY ARE THESE GREAT!!!

Today, they are being dunked in my milk. Tomorrow these will become ice cream sandwiches. Or… maybe tonight after everyone else has gone to bed…

Little Bits of Fun on a Long Weekend…

-An attempt at trying to make my own Nutty Irishman at home. Verdict: mine wasn’t as good as the bartender’s.

-A garage full of teenagers working out how to build a boat out of cardboard for their AP Physics project. Their only goal is to do better than their friends in the other class. Good luck to them…

-And one last bonus: neighbor friend of The Husband had a grilling get-together this weekend. Thanks to them, I was able to meet people right around the corner who’s home I pass nearly every day. What a nice group of people! Lesson learned: get out there and meet the people in your neighborhood. Mr. Rogers would be proud of you.

Taking the Triplets to the San Diego Symphony for a Musical Triple Play

IMG_6647We took “The Triplets” out to the symphony last night. “The Triplets?” Well, the family joke is that The Girl is 18, The Boy is 14, and between the two of them it is like having twins of 16. Now throw in The Boyfriend, and you get… 15-year-old TRIPLETS!

When I was young, I don’t remember going to the symphony, the theater, or operas. I don’t think we ever visited any of the cultural venues of Los Angeles County. There’s a lesson for aspiring parents- decades later, your kids probably won’t remember if you took them to specific activities! Save a boat load of cash and make up trips, and add in some family anecdotes to make it all seem real: “Oh yes, child, don’t you remember going to the Big City Ballet to see ‘Die Fledermaus?’ Strauss was your favorite as a toddler! Yes, you were three, and so excited to meet the Prima Ballerina backstage that you were sick all over your father’s shoes, so we had to take you home immediately after the show.”

IMG_6656No, seriously though, we went to ball games, on fabulous camping trips all the way up the coast to see redwoods and old family friends, and so many field trips as a school child, my parents didn’t need to revisit the La Brea Tar Pits or Natural History Museums with us. We’d covered that with the schools. My father usually had one of the great Southern California Jazz stations playing on these drives thereby placing a love of Coltrane, Davis, Bill Evans, and Brubeck in my heart. Thanks, dad, I am forever grateful!

IMG_6652I did, however, want to go to symphonies, ballets, operas and other events as I came into my own adulthood, and wanted to bring my children. When they were very young, both accompanied us to Indianapolis’s wonderful outdoor jazz festival- the Indy Jazz Fest, but no symphony or theater. Poor children, no Die Fledermaus for them, they had to settle for B.B. King, Keb’ Mo’ and more of our family’s favorites, like Los Lobos, Buddy Guy, Susan Tedeschi… the list went on.

IMG_6655Last night’s concert was the season finale for the San Diego Symphony. What a fabulous choice of pieces they performed! We love Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3 and Brahms’s Symphony No. 2. We were also introduced to a newer composer, Aaron Jay Kernis. His 1990 “Musica Celestis” was amazing- particularly because I don’t tend to like newer compositions.

A wonderful evening overall. And I love the architectural details found in the symphony hall and snapped a few photos to hold me over until next season. I hope you enjoy them, too!

IMG_6651

Ever Have Corn Casserole?

I never did, until Friday evening… the only reason I was able to try this stuff is that I took a new friend up on her offer to get together. When you tag the mother of The Boyfriend on Facebook, it can result in all the moms and dads hanging out to share favorite family dishes while they dish about their kids. Ha!

I brought the pulled pork and cookies- she shared cookies, caprese salad and this casserole. Her cookies were better than mine AND we found a new side to serve. I count that as a winning day.

This is Jan’s dish that her family always wants at their gatherings- Corn Casserole. I have never even heard of it, and like many family favorites around the world, it has only a few simple ingredients. I dug around on Pinterest this morning to find a version and landed on this one: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/59250551321439494/ that linked to KeyIngredient.com

Corn Casserole:

1 8 oz box of Jiffy Corn Bread mix
1 15 oz can of creamed corn
1 15 oz can of regular corn, with canning juice
1 8 oz carton of sour cream
1 4 oz stick of butter, melted

(other variations add a little bit of sugar, various amounts of shredded cheddar, or an egg or two)

Combine all ingredients, pour into a buttered casserole dish, bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

From KeyIngredient.com click for the link!
From KeyIngredient.com click for the link!

That’s it! Really. And it was unbelievably good. I know just what my father would do to this recipe- he’d break out five different peppers from Bells to Chipotles. My mom would add sugar. Then double it.