Bath Time For Dixie. This Is For You, Laney.

I've never known a dog to love her bath as much as Dixie does. At the very mention of the "B" word, she immediately starts barking and running up the steps to the bathroom.



Here, she's barking at the slider to open, and magically, it does.

She likes to start out with a shower first while she jumps up to catch the water.


More fun and frolicking in the shower.

Dixie finally settles down for her bath.


Here, she's all lathered up.


Rinse.





More rinsy.

After her bath, Dixie likes to wrap up in hot towels straight from the dryer, that is, after she's turned around in circles about 40 times to crush all those twigs, sticks, and leaves in her bed.

After she's rested a bit, Dixie likes to have her fur back-brushed.

She likes to be blow-dried.

Then I sprayed her with some stuff Mr. Hawthorne bought at the Elizabethan Gardens gift shop. It smells like somebody's grandmother's potpourried parlor.
She likes it.

So here's washed, blow-dried, coiffed, and perfumed Dixie resting on her cow hide which she knows not to get on when Mr. Hawthorne is home but knows she can get on when it's just me.

Dinner At The Hawthornes.

Here's part of my mise en place for dinner tonight.

On the counter at top left, I have my beef stock, then some cornstarch,
then a cup of rice.

On the cutting board from top left, I have fancy-dancy-sliced carrots, celery, sliced T-Bone (that would be some tenderloin and New York Strip), second row, I have sliced radishes and some sliced red, yellow, and green peppers, then third row, I have broccoli, onions, and snow peas.

Here, I have edamame, garlic, and ginger.
This was ginger from a jar. I guess that would be jinjer.
I threw it out since it smelled like ammonia, and I had real, frozen ginger root waiting for me in the freezer.

I started out stir frying the carrots and broccoli in peanut oil.

Then I threw in the rest of the veggies. The edamame went in last since they had some defrosted water in with them, and that gave for a good steam.
I took all the veggies and put them in a large bowl with a plate on top.

I heated the wok back up, added some peanut oil, garlic, and ginger, then added in half the beef.

Did I mention that I added just a bit of sugar to the meat so it sears nicely?

Here, I'm adding the mixture of beef broth and cornstarch to the barely cooked beef to thicken up.

Add in the rest of the veggies.

Ahhh... This looks good.

This is Mr. Hawthorne's plate. He's extremely anal, so his rice and the rest of the food really aren't supposed to touch.

Here's my plate. The meat and veggies are on top of my rice.
I don't have a problem there.

Baby Hawthorne wanted a Big Plate.

I believe he liked it.

Lunch At The Hawthornes.

I decided for lunch today I'd make the Blue Crab and Parmesan Encrusted Flounder with Citrus Beurre Blanc sauce
that the chef at my last cooking class made.

Except NOT.

Blue crab is out of season now and I didn't have any flounder.

I DID have rock shrimp and about 8 ounces of mahi mahi
I got from Harris Teeter yesterday.



So, let's start with the encrustacean:

Mince some garlic.

Mince some basil.

Mince some cooked rock shrimp.

Here, I have about a cup of grated Parmesan cheese, a cup of bread crumbs, and a cup of the minced shrimp.
That's butter slathered over on the right hand side.

I added in the minced garlic and basil, about a stick of softened butter,
and one aig.

Here are the mahi mahi fillets and the mixture ready to be pattied on top.

The mixture adheres very nicely to the fillets.

I seared the fillets shrimp-side down first, in a mixture of butter
and light olive oil.

After two minutes on each side, pop INto a 350 degree preheated oven
for about 8 minutes.

While the mahi mahi was cooking, I started my spinach.

Steamed spinach.

Earlier, I had started my Citrus Beurre Blanc sauce:
Juice of one lemon
1/2 cup white wine
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream.

Cook down by one half.

Then add 1/2 pound of unsalted butter in,
about a tablespoon at a time.

Here's the plated meal.

Now, I didn't have heavy cream, so I substituted half and half. And I didn't use the half pound of butter. So my sauce was not as "thick, rich, and delicious"
(TRD to you Sandraphytes)
as it might have been.

It was still very good.

It was particularly good with the spinach.

Rosie's Got Ova.

Youngest Hawthorne loves stuffed hard-cooked aigs, so Rosie made him a batch the other day. With a bit of a twist.
As Aunt Sandy would say, I dolled them up.

Aren't these pretty?

Now, a lot of people don't know how to hard boil an aig. "Hard boil" itself is a misnomer since you don't boil an aig. You bring it to a boil but that's it.
I started off with my aigs in a pan of cold water to cover.
Bring the water to a boil. Cover. And turn off heat. Let set for maybe twenty minutes. And that's all.
I tap the large end with the air pocket, roll the aig around to crackle it, and start peeling under cold running water. Now, if the shell ever sticks, it's because your aigs are too fresh.
Difficult peeling is characteristic of fresh aigs which have a relatively low albumen PH which causes the albumen to adhere to the inner shell membrane rather than to itself.

Well, enough science lesson. On to the aig.
I pop out the yolk into a small bowl, and slice a sliver of white off the bottom so the aig sits steady and doesn't roll.
Add mayo, sweet relish, mustard, and salt and pepper to taste, then fill the stuffing back in the aigs.

Oh damn! Why didn't I fill a baggie with the aig-mixture and pipe it INto my aigs?
This is why I could never by a Fandra.
Too little too late.

Here, I've sliced some scallions on top of the aigs.
And I added some of my infused oils. The red is my pappereeka oil, the green is celery oil. The greenish blob is Wasabi Sauce.

The light colored sauce on this aig is my Mustard Emulsion-
4 TB Dijon mustart, 4 TB vegetable broth, then whisk in about 6 TB of a light flavored oil. Salt and pepper to taste.




These were gone within minutes.