And the Winner Is . . .

I hope you had a wonderful Valentine's Day. I did. I worked an early shift. Got home early enough to take a nap and then DH and I made this wonderful dinner for ourselves: grilled porterhouse steak, loaded smashed potatoes and green beans. For dessert I made triple chocolate cupcakes. What a yummy dinner!
After I ate I went to Random.org and set it to choose a number between 1 and 7. Thanks to everyone who signed up for the drawing. I enjoyed reading your answers. The generator chose #3. That means Karen at Quilting with Grace is the winner. She loves her kitchen. I love my kitchen too. I love my whole condo. I would find it hard to choose my favorite room. I'm glad I didn't have to answer my own question. If I was really pressed to answer I think it would be my kitchen. I love to cook and our kitchen is the perfect size for DH and I to cook together.

Until next time, Happy Cooking!
Sweet P

Do You Fondue and a Give Away

DH and I had beef fondue for dinner tonight. You'll have to ignore the miscellaneous items on the table as we are in the middle of a home improvement project and have stuff everywhere. Anyway, we had Beef Fondue, crispy Cole Slaw and Squash with Gorgonzola and Maple Syrup, another wonderful recipe from Closet Cooking. The meal was wonderful and well deserved.
Here was the focus of our home improvement project this week - our living room. We hated the color it was. We called it something you would find in a baby's diaper. The gray swatch was one color we thought of using on it. The gray is going to be used on another accent wall and the stairwell going up the stairs.
This is the color of the room now - Warm Sienna #1203 from Benjamin Moore. My DH has a great eye for picking out paint colors. When this paint is wet is looks very girly dark rose and dries to this wonderful deep rusty red. This is the fourth and last room we have to paint, other than the stair well. The only other remaining painting is all the white trim and wainscotting in the house. We decided we wouldn't do any of that painting until all of the rooms were done.
And now, on to the Give Away. It will be one-year next Saturday, Valentine's Day, that we bought and moved into our condo. In honor of the big day, I'm having a Give Away. Leave me a comment about your most favorite room of your house is and why you like it. If your name is drawn I will put together a goodie package to help you enjoy that room even more. If you'd like an extra entry in the drawing, please link to this post. I will take names until Valentine's Day and announce the winner on Sunday morning.

I'm also doing a similar give away on my Coffee Time Stitches blog. You can feel free to enter in that drawing too.

Happy Cooking and Home Owning!
Sweet P

Thursday Night Pot Roast

I remember having pot roast nearly every Sunday after church. When my children were young they didn't like pot roast so I stopped cooking it.

Now with the children moved out I often crave pot roast. I've been searching for the perfect recipe for years. I've finally found it at Closet Cooking. The recipe is easy and the smell of the roast baking in the oven for 3 - 4 hours is enough to drive one insane! The roast was so tender I could scoop a serving out of the pan with a spoon. I also made his Peas and Pancetta and Shallots. I substituted bacon for the pancetta since I forgot to buy it at the store this past weekend.

Doesn't my plate look scrumptious? You can even see the steam rising from this wonderful meal. It was the perfect meal for a day when the temps didn't get above 20 degrees F.
Tomorrow I'll be trying his Roasted Squash with Gorgonzola and Maple Syrup as our side dish. Three of my favorite foods in one dish!

By the way, the Banana Cream Pie I made for DS #2 on Sunday was fantastic! The photo doesn't do it justice. It was even better the next day, but it didn't last any longer than that. I'm thinking of making a chocolate version of this pie for Valentine's Day. Should be yummy!
Happy cooking and eating!

Sweet P

Super Bowl Sunday

What's Super Bowl Sunday without food? And in my house, it also means we celebrate DS #2's birthday.

Later I will be making his requested meal: teriyaki steak and chicken, Velveeta Shells and Cheese and green beans. However, the dessert is going to be the star of the meal.

His choice of dessert allowed me to use my new mixer I got for Christmas.
Here it is whipping the heavy cream:

With the addition of vanilla and banana pudding mix, a pie crust and bananas the heavy cream became this:

Doesn't the pie look yummy? I can't wait to have some! Happy Birthday DS #2!

Go Cardinals!
Sweet P

Food Coma Sunday

Some days DH and I have "food coma" days. These are days when we eat so much food that we can't eat anymore (think Thanksgiving) and by early evening we are struggling to get off the couch.

Today was a food coma Sunday. This morning when I got home from grocery shopping I made blueberry pancakes, sausage and bacon for breakfast. This afternoon I made Short Ribs with Chocolate and Rosemary. I found the recipe on Megan's Cookin blog. I've never cooked with chocolate and beef together and couldn't wait to taste these ribs.

The ribs look yummy. The sauce smells yummy. But I can't say I was totally impressed with the meal. Everything was cooked, but the taste wasn't there. It was a blah meal. I'm not sure what I missed or what I didn't do correctly. My only thought is that I used a food processor to chop the vegetables and I think I grated them too finely instead of chopping them. I'll try the recipe again sometime just to make sure.
We got another 12 inches of snow today. The plow guy is running out of room to put the snow. I'll have to get a photo of the pile outside our condo. Soon they'll be plowing my car in instead of plowing it out!

Sweet P

My Least Favorite Household Task

Ivy at Home Ec 101 has asked the question: What are the household chores you hate? I enjoy household chores. I enjoy making our home clean and comfortable. Granted, I don't have pets and my sons are adults and there is only DH and I in the house so I don't have a lot of messes and laundry like many people. Nevertheless there is one household chore I hate: cleaning the refrigerator.

I hadn't cleaned the fridge since Thanksgiving and it looked and smelled like it! Can you see the following items: three yogurt containers (one unopened and old, one almost gone and one with leftover Chicken Marsala from Thanksgiving weekend); carrot ginger soup (in the white bag), several bags of grated cheese in the meat and cheese drawer, all the beer? The lunch bag had a few items leftover from a meat and cheese gift pack from my mom. There was also a container of leftovers from New Year's Eve dinner.
I didn't take a before photo of the door, but here it is all clean. I didn't have to throw out too many bottles but I did organize it. By the way how many bottles of mustard and/or salad dressing do you have in your fridge? I have four types of mustard and three bottles of salad dressing.
Here is the fridge all cleaned out. The beer is still there. The old leftovers are gone and it doesn't smell anymore.
What's your least favorite household task?
Sweet P

What I Like About Hotels

Who doesn't enjoy staying in a hotel? I'm fortunate my DH travels extensively for work and earns many free hotel points that he likes to use one weekends away for us. There are some pieces of a hotel stay that always interest me.

First, the bed. I love a king-sized bag with fluffy pillows, a pillow top. crisp and warm linens. Our bed had all of these features. I just wish I had taken a photo of it made up. Oh well, you can assume it was perfectly made.

The more unique the furniture in the room is, the better I like it. We had room service breakfast on Sunday morning. Now you see the table . . .

Now you don't . . .

The table slides under the desk when not in use. Isn't that cool? I would love a set up like this in my sewing room. Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed with all the furniture in my sewing room and I wish I could put some of it away.

Hotel art is something else I love. Have you ever really looked at hotel art? It can be very beautiful. This piece was in the hotel lobby. A collage of photos of Providence, mixed with two dimension blocks of glass. Wouldn't this idea work wonderful with family photos? I may have to try and recreate my own version of this. Of course, I would probably use fabric instead of glass, but it would still be a fun project.

Some of the other items I enjoy in a hotel is a jacuzzi tub in the room (we didn't have one this time). Breakfast is a big meal for me, especially if there is a hot buffet included. The breakfast in the hotel was only a B this time. Free internet is great. However, when you stay at high-end hotels paying for internet is assumed. I guess I shouldn't complain since we didn't pay for the rest of the weekend.

What do you enjoy in a hotel room?
Sweet P