Thursday, April 2, 2009

Blog Ramblings.

I was at Mama Hawthorne's this past weekend and took a picture of her grass since it was so beautiful.
The fellow that cut her sycamore tree down put in sod and it sure was nice to see green when we went home. I don't have green at the beach. I usually winter seed with rye grass, but last spring I put centipede sod down and was told not to put the rye down. I miss the green during the winter, but I don't really miss having to cut the grass in 30 degree temperatures.
We saw these lovely trees blooming all the way inland to Danville. Mama Hawthorne identified it as a Judas tree, also known as an Eastern Redbud, or Cercis canadensis. I looked it up I found out that the Judas tree, or Cercis siliquastrum, is a specific redbud from the Mediterranean, named after Judas Iscariot, the betrayer of Christ, who is said to have hanged himself from the tree, after which the white flowers turned red with blood or shame. I don't know why they call it a redbud tree. The buds are not red. They're purple.
This tree was next to Mama Hawthorne's house and had a little bird house in it. While I was shooting pictures, one of the neighbors stopped to ask what I was doing and where I was from and what my business was. That Neighborhood Watch Group is a tough bunch.
I've never seen one of these trees on the Outer Banks but they seemed to be growing everywhere inland. Youngest Hawthorne dropped in for a visit the other day. He called yesterday and asked if I had anything for him to eat for lunch. "Is spaghetti OK with you?"
So I got out a ball of my semolina pasta dough, ran it through my pasta machine, and ended up with these noodles.
INto a pot of boiling salted water they went. And homemade pasta cooks in a fraction of the time store-bought does.
I made a quick spaghetti sauce. I thawed out a large chunk of hamburger meat and browned it, then added it to the pan with sauteed chopped onion, green pepper, and minced garlic. A can of tomato sauce, a can of chopped tomatoes, and a small can of tomato paste were added, along with a few paste cans of water to get out all the paste. Add in some thyme and oregano, cover, and let sit over very low heat.
Youngest Hawthorne's favorite part of spaghetti is my garlic toast. I minced a few cloves of garlic and chopped fresh parsley from the garden. Rosie's tip for mincing garlic - Run your knife and fingers under warm water first. Helps the garlic from sticking to the knife.
I added equal amounts of butter and olive oil to the pan.
Add in the parsley and garlic, a few grinds of salt and pepper, and just heat through. You never want the garlic to burn - it gets bitter.
I always have packages of Schwann's French baguettes on hand, so I pulled one out of the freezer, and baked in a 375-degree oven for 13 minutes.
I sliced the cooked loaf, dipped in the butter/olive oil mixture, then put in back in the oven at a low broil until nicely toasted.
And within 40 minutes, I had a delicious meal on the table for Youngest Hawthorne. And if I wanted to pull a Rayturd and put dinner on the table in 30 minutes, I could have used store-bought pasta and sacrificed flavor and texture, but I'm just not a Thirty-Minute-Meal type of gal. Doesn't that pasta look good? Nothing like homemade pasta.
A nice salad rounded out the meal: different types of lettuces from my garden hard boiled eggs toasted walnuts croutons bacon and ham ricotta salata cheese The dressing was very simple. I just whisked together some lemon juice, cider vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, coarse grain Dijon mustard, salt and pepper, and canola oil.
Oh, and because Dixie was feeling left out, here she is being cute.

6 comments:

Marilyn said...

Eastern Redbud trees grow everywhere here. They are just beginning to bud out now and in a week or two, the white Dogwoods will join in the festivities. Those two trees blooming together makes this my favorite time of year.

Anonymous said...

Can't go wrong with sod, looks beautiful!

Kathy said...

The Appalachians are covered with them, and very soon, the mountains will be covered in a purple haze. Beautiful. But I can never see them now and not think of the Virginia Tech shootings, because when I drove out there like a bat out of hell, they were in full bloom, and just everywhere. The image in seared on my brain.

Oh, and spaghetti is my favorite food ever.

Rosie Hawthorne said...

Kathy, Sorry to cause you pain about that.

Pissghetti is good.

_A_

Marilyn said...

Hugs to Kathy. How horrible for you.

And that pissghetti does look yummy (growing up, I had a friend who was born with a severe cleft lip and palate who could only call spaghetti that).

Kathy said...

Pshaw, don't be maudlin. It was just an observation. But I appreciate the thoughts. I had pissghetti for dinner tonight. Sauce from a jar (sorry Rosie, but I 'dolled it up'. Does that count?), whole wheat angel hair & grated cheddar cheese.