Use Your Stuff

Lunch with the Ladies

Grilled Chicken Salad Sandwiches

Spring Mix Salad w/ Tomatoes

and Creamy Raspberry Dressing

Fresh Fruit - Cantaloupe and Pineapple

Dessert - Individual Amaretto Cheesecake Mousses

Little embroidered napkins I got at flea markets in Germany.
 The punch cups I found for 75 cents and 50 cents at a local antique malls -
just the right size for a bit of dessert.

I got this cheesecake recipe* from my friend, Karla, in 1989, when she brought it for dessert to our annual Christmas get together.  It's easy to make and over the years I have experimented with the flavors -  Irish Cream, lemon, vanilla - it's fun to play with food. 

Recipe  -  AMARETTO CHEESECAKE MOUSSE

Serves 12 - more or less

3 packages (8 oz. each) cream cheese, take them out of the fridge about two hours before you start to create this dessert. Go ahead take them out of the wrapper, put them in a big mixing bowl.


Put 3/4 cup heavy whipping cream and 2 teaspoons of sugar  in a small mixing bowl and put them in the fridge for 3 minutes.  Take the bowl out of the fridge and whip (stiff, but don't turn it into butter).

Put 1/2 cup of cold water in a small sauce pan, sprinkle 1 envelope Knox Unflavored Gelatine over water, let stand 1 minute.  Stir over low heat until completely dissolved (about 3 minutes), remove from heat. 

Back to the big mixing bowl and to the cream cheese add 1 1/4 cups of sugar.  Using an electric mixer (yes, you can do this by hand - but life is short) beat cheese and sugar mixture until fluffy (about 4 minutes).  Gradually add 5 oz. evaporated milk (just buy a 5 oz. can - it will make this much easier) and 1 teaspoon of lemon juice beat on medium high for another 2 minutes. 

Add 1/4 cup of Amaretto Liqueur and 1 teaspoon of vanilla to the gelatine mixture and gradually pour these ingredients into cream cheese and sugar mixture, blend well - beating another 2 or 3 minutes. 

You're through with the mixer.

Now fold the whipped cream and sugar  into cheese mixture.  Fold gently, you  want to have 'spots'  of whipped cream lightning up the heaviness of the cream cheese mixture.

Pour into individual punch cups or dessert glasses and chill at least 4 hours.

Enjoy.

My punch bowl cups would wait a long time for punch - but using them as
dessert cups gives them a chance to get out every now and then.

Everyone enjoyed the lunch and (I'm happy to report)

there was a little dessert left over. 

Life is sweet.

*Yes, you may prepare a graham cracker crust and pour the mixture into it.  Chill at 8 hours if you're making it a 'pie.'


*

Sherry or Port

We are the proud owners of this little beauty.  A hand painted wine decanter set complete with little glasses that were also hand painted. 

As the weather starts to cool down, I like to put sherry in the decanter.  And at Christmas I like to have port in the house.  Using these glasses is a great way to have just a bit of alcohol.

We keep it on the same stand that it was kept on in my in-laws house, and they kept it on the same stand that it was on in the house my mother-in-law grew up in.  Wish I knew more about it.  When did her family use it?  What did they drink?  My husband tells me it was kept in the dining room.  Period.  No fun family stories.

In the years to come, my children will have stories to tell their children and (I hope) some of the stories will be about what we were doing when we were using "Grandma Joy's" wine decanter set.

Short and Sweet

Someone in my husband's family liked to paint.  It's the same flowers, maybe even the same paint on this set of glasses and pitcher, on some pink silk, on a picture taken over 100 years ago, and on a wine decanter set. Family myth and legend does not give this person a name, too bad, I would love to know who this talented person was.  

This set came to me with five glasses - the pitcher holds 72 ounces,
each glass hold 7 ounces (8 if filled to the rim). 
Wonder how many glasses came with the original set...

I enjoy using them every now and then.  Yes, even though they are old and beautiful and have to be hand washed, they still get used.  If we don't make memories with them, who will?  All we have is today, let's take care of each other and make each day as sweet as possible.

Today I'm making Fuzzy Navels.

Why? Because as Bing Crosby used to say, "A day without orange juice is like a day without sunshine."

3 oz Orange Juice
3 oz Peach Schnapps
1 oz Vodka - (optional - your drink will be much sweeter without)

Hand full of ice

Put everything into a cocktail shaker. Shake until top is frosty.

Pour into your favorite glass.

I like how each glass reflects different colors.

Or, if you are fixing more than one, you can pour the ingredients into a pitcher and stir. (James Bond won't mind, he's busy tonight and can't stop by your place - don't let that stop you from having a sweet evening.)

Enjoy.

It's Thursday, join me at ColoradoLady's Vintage Thingie Thursday. 


cJoy

Carrying On...

From a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to Charles Willson Peale, August 20, 1811 -

...I am still devoted to the garden. But though an old man, I am but a young gardener.

Your application to whatever you are engaged in I know to be incessant. But Sundays and rainy days are always days of writing for the farmer.

Think of me sometimes when you have your pen in hand, and give me information of your health and occupations; and be always assured of my great esteem and respect.

Check out http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/P/tj3/writings/brf/jefl211.htm  if you'd like to read the entire letter or other letters by President Jefferson. 

Years ago I heard his garden quote ("though an old man, I am but a young gardener") and it floated into my brain sometime yesterday so I googled what I could remember of it and Jefferson's entire letter collection popped up.  This particular letter is almost 200 years old, yet it could have been written by any of us and the ideas and thoughts could be our own. Reading this letter was like stumbling across a new blog, now I'd like to read another and perhaps 'follow' him. What else did he have to say about gardening?

I don't remember a time in my life when someone was not concerned about their garden -  vegetable plot, flowerbed, corn, cotton or soybean crop, window box, or hanging basket.  As a child I thought all the vegetable gardens were Dad's and all the flower gardens were Mom's.  I'm pretty sure Mom worked in both gardens, I just don't remember Dad working in the flower beds.

My dad left us with one of his best gardens ever -  the harvest so far includes tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, and blueberries.  This week my mom is canning salsa, she's already put up lots of stewed tomatoes.  Her freezer is full of blueberries and now she's giving away blueberries to everyone who stops in for a visit. 

My dad turned 79 this past March.  He enjoyed gardening, not just for the end product, I think he enjoyed trying to 'trick' nature.  He planted way too early every year, there was always a killing frost after his first (sometimes second and third) planting.  Still he planted.  The last few years he had been creating a blueberry patch.  A few plants added every year, spaced just right so you have plenty of room to pick the berries and not hurt the plants.  On a slight hill, so you can stand in front and pick from the lower branches then go behind the plant and easily pick the berries on the top of the plant.  Also, his berry garden can be seen from the kitchen window, so he could see the deer when they came by for a quick meal (sometimes he would stand and watch - they are beautiful - sometimes he would step outside and make noise to scare them away). 

My love of gardening is just one of the many things I learned from my parents.  Everywhere they called home Dad planted a vegetable garden, Mom planted flowers,  and the world was made a little prettier thanks to my parents. 

I want to leave the world a better place - prettier and more comfortable - and I plan to do it all with a bit of humor.  I've returned to my Texas home with a sense of urgency to weed my garden and give away the treasures and/or junk that I no longer use.  I'm finishing that baby quilt and getting my guest room in order.  I want to visit with people and share ideas.  I'm going to do some traveling.  I'm going to spend more time with my mom and my family.   I don't want to waste a minute of this life God has given me. 

What are your plans for the future?  Today, next week, next year....

Evening Primrose, Mom's flower garden, July 2011

Estate Sales & Such

I would like to go to my estate sale.  No rush, sometime in the distant future.  Someday.  What would people say about the things I have surrounded myself with? 

I can't get too close or you'll see the tea stains and the scratches on my well used (and loved) treasures.

I enjoy watching PBS' Antiques Roadshow. It makes me a bit sad when an expert looks at a piece and declares it in mint condition, worth hundreds or thousands of dollars, and the owner says they'll never part with it because the whole family (or granny) loved it so. Really? It was loved and never used? A Picasso, sure, I can believe that wasn't 'used,' but what about the china, furniture, silverware, tea pots, Tiffany Lamps, jewelry?   The family Bible?   How do you love things and not use them?  If you're not using a set of dishes you own - maybe they own you. 

Maybe Purgatory is a theater-like waiting room where you spend a few weeks listening to what your fellow man thought of you and your life.  A place to see the true value of your earthly treasures.  No, that might actually be Hell - the sadness of watching yourself treat things better than people.  How would you explain loving a television show about friends visiting with friends more than making, having, and spending time with actual friends of your own?


I can't show you my real treasures, I just hope they will read this and remember some of our adventures.  This year is almost half way over, stop now and call someone you love (don't text them or email - actually listen to their voice).  In the next few days have your favorite meal with the people you love best and use your favorite china or stoneware or whatever dishes make you happy.   Life comes at us pretty fast, it's up to us to figure out how to slow things down. 

Now is always the best time to enjoy life.