28 Miles of Memories

Les and I celebrated our 28th wedding anniversary on Saturday.  We decided to take a close to home getaway to Solvang.  We have been going to Solvang for many years.  We use to go in March for the Solvang Century but hadn't been back since 2014.

I made our reservations about two weeks ago, so most of the hotels in town were sold out.  We ended up finding a gem just about a mile out of town.  The Meadowlark Inn was perfect for us - very quiet and relaxing.  Our room had its own private patio.

The grounds were beautiful.  The breakfast was more like what you find at a B&B, with a special hot dish each morning.

When I made our reservation, they had the option of adding a box of Danish chocolates.  These yummy treats were waiting in our room when we arrived!

Our favorite inn, The Inn at Petersen Village, sold a few years ago.  I made dinner reservations in their restaurant for our anniversary.  Unfortunately, the new owners did not keep the old world charm.  In the past it always felt calm and relaxing.  The owners set a "mood."  It seems the new owners have decided to set a "vibe" instead.  The background music is edgier.  They also bought the location next to the lobby and have turned it into a bar.  The food was delicious but the restaurant was much noisier.  We weren't tempted to just sit and enjoy the ambiance like we have in the past.

Solvang as a town has really changed in the last few years. What was once a tourist town with lots of bakeries and souvenir shops, has become a wine tasting destination.  When we were going on a regular basis a decade ago, there might have been two or three wine tasting rooms.  Now there are more than a dozen.  Naturally, the clientele has changed as well.

All was not lost, we visited our favorite cheese shop, The Vinhus, and ended up buying four bags of freshly ground coffee!

We also found some amazing gelato.  Les had Butterscotch and Ginger Vanilla, while I had Dark Chocolate and Coconut Stracciatella .

The highlight of our trip was taking our bikes with us.  I told Les, "We should ride a mile for each year on our anniversary," and that's just what we did!

As miles passed, we reminisced about what that year was like.  So many wonderful memories.  Just like the bike ride, there have been hard climbs, cold winds, and twists and turns.  There have also been times when the wind was at our back and we were flying down hill.  One thing that never changed, on the ride or in our marriage, we've always stuck together!  Les could have dropped me or I could have given up, but we both kept working and we made it, together.

We didn't take any pictures of the two of us.  We have changed a bit in the past 28 years but I love this guy more than ever!

Friday Foodie ~ International Picnic Recipes

As promised, here are the recipes I used for my Irish dishes last week.  These were both very tasty.  Also, I tried something new to keep my food warm.  I always take my dishes in disposable aluminum pans, covered with foil.  I did that, then wrapped them in large beach towels.  I kept everything wrapped until just before we started eating (about 1 1/2 hours from the time I took the food out of the oven) and it was still very warm.

Banger and Mash
Bangers and mash gets its name because sausages used to burst (or bang) while cooking, due to rusk (dried bread) being added to the meat. Mash, meanwhile, refers to the mashed potatoes.

Ingredients
4 links pork sausage
2 pounds potatoes, peeled and cubed
1/4 cup butter
2 tablespoons milk (optional)
1 teaspoon dry mustard powder
salt and ground black pepper to taste
1 tablespoon butter
2 large onions, chopped
6 cups beef broth

Directions:
Preheat oven to 200 degrees F (95 degrees C).
Cook the sausage links in a skillet over medium-low heat until browned on all sides, about 5 minutes per side; transfer to an oven-safe dish and move to the preheated oven to keep warm.  *I sliced the sausages in half.
Place potatoes into a saucepan over medium heat, cover with water, and boil gently until potatoes are tender, 10 to 15 minutes. Drain and allow to steam dry for a minute or two. Mix in 1/4 cup of butter, milk, dry mustard, salt, and black pepper; mash until fluffy and smooth. Set aside.
Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a skillet over medium-high heat; cook the onions until translucent and just starting to brown, about 8 minutes. Pour in the beef broth; boil the mixture down to about half its volume, about 10 minutes. Season with salt and black pepper. *I used the same pan that I cooked the sausages in and added the sausages to the gravy at the end for a few minutes.

To serve, place a sausage onto a serving plate with about 1/2 cup of mashed potatoes. Pour the onion gravy over the sausage and potatoes.  Or, place a mound of mashed potatoes on a plate and top with sausage and gravy.

I didn't take a picture of the finished product, but it was very tasty!

Irish Apple Cake with Custard Sauce

Serves 12
FOR THE CAKE:
3 C. Flour
2 t. Baking Powder
⅛ t. Salt
¼ t. Cloves, ground
¼ t. Nutmeg, ground
6 oz. Butter, (cold is fine)
¾ C. Sugar
4 large Granny Smith apples(I used golden delicious to great effect)
2 Eggs
¾ C. Milk
2 T. Sugar(for sprinkling on top of cake)

FOR THE CUSTARD:
6 large Egg Yolks
6 T. Sugar
1½ C. Whole Milk
1½ t. Vanilla

Instructions
FOR THE CAKE:
Grease and flour an 8" or 9" round springform pan. Using an 8" pan will give you a taller cake.
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
Sift the flour, baking powder, salt, cloves and nutmeg into a large mixing bowl. Make sure the bowl is very large to allow room for the apples to be folded in.
Cut the butter into the flour using your fingers or a pastry cutter until the mixture resembles fine crumbs. Add the ¾ C. sugar to the flour mixture and mix in.
Peel the apples and slice them into uniform pieces. This cake works best and gets that 'chunky apple look' if the slices are about ¼" wide and then cut into 3 pieces. Toss the apples into the flour mixture and combine them thoroughly.
In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and milk together. Add to the apples and flour and mix in with a large spatula until just combined. Batter will be thick and dough-like.
Transfer the dough into the prepared cake pan and flatten the top surface using the back of your spatula. Sprinkle the sugar over the top of the cake.
Bake for 45-50 minutes. Test the center for doneness. The top of the cake should be golden brown. Serve slices with custard sauce.

FOR THE CUSTARD SAUCE:
*note that this sauce is not a thick, pudding like sauce. It should have a pour-able, just thickened consistency when done.
Place the egg yolks and sugar in a bowl and whisk until pale yellow, 2-3 minutes.
Place the milk in a medium saucepan and bring just to a boil. Slowly whisk the hot milk into the egg/sugar mixture.
Transfer the mixture back to the saucepan and stir over medium heat until custard thickens, about 4 minutes. Custard should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Mix in the vanilla.
Transfer to bowl or serving saucer. Serve warm or cold over apple cake.

This was another winner!  I thought four large apples was going to be too much, but it ended up being perfect.

For the Pineapple Lovers

If you are a fan of fresh pineapple, do I have a tool for you!  I read it about it on another blog and knew I needed to add it to my kitchen.

The Pineapple Slicer does an amazing job slicing the pineapple.  When placed properly on the pineapple it cuts straight through the core and slices the pineapple into beautiful rings.

There is zero waste when cutting up the pineapple!  And it happens in under 10 minutes.

The one I bought is here.  It is the OXO brand.  I didn't notice that there are a variety of others available for cheaper when I bought mine.  I don't know what the quality of those brands are but they would probably be fine.

One Hawaiian tip when purchasing pineapple: Before you cut it up, twist the top off and flip the pineapple upside down.  Let it rest on the counter for about an hour, this allows the juice to be distributed more evenly in the entire pineapple.  Then cut it up and enjoy!

2019 International Picnic

We had our annual Missions Conference at Victory Tabernacle this past weekend.  Elder Tommy Johnson from Colorado was our guest speaker.  There are a lot of ministers that I enjoy hearing and Bro. Johnson is one of my favorites. Along with being a great preacher, he also plays the guitar and is one of those people everyone enjoys being around.

Sandwiched between service on Friday night and two services on Sunday we had our International Picnic.  This is a great time to sample foods from many lands and enjoy fellowship with our church family.  Les requested Irish food this year.  I made Bangers and Mash for my main dish and Irish Apple Cake with Custard Sauce for dessert.  I'll share my recipes on Friday.

My morning started early, really early.  Les and I were up at 4:45 and out the door around 5:30.  We hopped on our bikes and rode together for about 6 miles.  At that point, I turned around and headed towards home ~ I took the long way and ended up with about 20 miles.  Les continued on to Santa Clarita where he collected six other riders.  This is the largest group to take him up on his annual, "let's ride to the picnic" appeal!  His total mileage was about 60, with 28 miles of that as the leader of the "Magnificent Seven."

Many years at the picnic we have a costume contest.  This year they changed it up and made it a crazy hat contest.  There were some really cute and creative hats.  With my Italian heritage, I couldn't come up with an Italian type hat so I got a Venetian mask from Amazon.  I found a leprechaun's hat for Les.  I also got these cute tops with maps of Italy and Ireland on them.  My top ended up being a great conversation piece since one of our guests was from Italy!  It was a fun connection to make.

There were a lot of games and three pinatas for the children.  Les even got in a game of basketball.  I believe it was the over 30 gang who was called "old."  30 is not old in my book at all!  But age didn't stop them - they taught those youngsters a lesson by winning!

We had perfect weather - it rained last Thursday and again yesterday, but Saturday was partly cloudy and not too hot.  I didn't take a lot of pictures because I was just enjoying sitting and chatting!  That's what I call a winning picnic.