 |
| Our Valentine Day supper table |
Though Valentine's Day has come and gone, I hope everyone continues handing out the love. I love cooking and decorating; hence, our Valentine Day supper table. Simple, but pretty. Hubby and grandson both seemed to appreciate the effort. I enjoyed doing it. Doing the simplest of things for those you love brings a warmth within your own heart. They love it. You love it. Another of those "win, win" situations. :)
Though Grandson, Christian, received a "bought" gift (a Hex Bug), his Papou (my husband, John) received a baked gift. A heart-shaped banana cake. Of course, Papou had to share it with us, too; but he didn't seem to mind. Besides the pretty rose-bud corsage my husband bought me, he also gave me a reproduction tin sign. Okay, I know some of you may not understand a tin sign as a Valentine's Day gift. However, I like "rustic, old, antique, unusual". I also like "new" mixed with "old", though I sometimes have to argue with my husband about that. So I love the sign, which advertises "cream separators" and shows the various kinds of cows that make the cream! The only problem is where to put it - this house doesn't have much space for wall-hanging, and what there is is pretty much taken up. I did, though, manage to hang it today - I switched it with something else, and moved the "something else" (grandson's framed pastel tennis shoe he did in art class) to a space on the living room wall. It works. Both tin sign and pastel shoe look happy. I am happy, too.
 |
| My tin sign Valentine gift |
 |
| Grandson, Christian's, pastel tennis shoes | | | | |
|
|
|
|
Now ... if you have a Valentine supper, it stands to reason that you must have some Valentine Supper food. Since I love cooking, we had food. :) Our menu: green salad with homemade ranch dressing ... fish baked in a cream sauce ... a mixture of rice,cabbage,onions,dried cranberries and pecans ...homemade biscuits with homemade apple butter ... banana cake and peach herbal tea. Have to say it was good.
 |
| My spur-of-the-moment recipe |
The rice and cabbage mixture was one of those spur-of-the-moment recipes. You know, look and see what you've got and put it together to see what it comes out to be. Well, it turned out to "be" SO good. Really. Try it, you'll see. It's a "save and do it again" recipe - sometimes I can't "save" a made-up recipe because I don't remember what I put in it, if I don't write it down. This one, though, I will remember without writing down. It's quite easy to do and to remember. I'll just tell you what I put in it ... maybe someone of you has already used the same ingredients to do the same thing!
Sandy's Spur of the Moment Rice and Cabbage ..... I used red and green cabbage, since I had a half a head of each ....I heated a little olive oil in a large cast-iron skillet, dropped in about a half an onion, chopped, used a paring knife to cut the cabbage into shreds into the skillet, added a little salt and black pepper, to taste, along with a lot more garlic powder (love it!) - stir-fried it all a few minutes, then threw in a handful or so of dried cranberries and chopped pecans. Stir-fried another couple of minutes, then added the cooked rice (left over from another meal), maybe two cups, stirring some more to mix in the rice and let it get good and hot. That's it. Simple. Fairly quick. And really good.
 |
| The "Love You" gift cake |
I hesitate to put up a photo of the dessert/gift banana cake. Well ... why not!? The cake was good; the decorative writing was not. I'm a novice at writing on cakes, but had bought one of those frosting cans with the decorating tips on them to use; so I gave it a try. Can't say I love the taste of that frosting either. Ick! But ... you can at least make out the words, right?????? Hubby loved it; that's what counts.
Until NEXT Valentine's Day ...................................................................................................................
