Right Now: Outside & Inside

Outside

Inside

My Favorite Time of the Year

Days like these just make me feel good—the beautiful fall weather, the sun shining, the air crisp (but not cold), the leaves changing to vibrant reds and oranges, and the smell of smoke coming from chimneys.

I love the view of our house through the two big burning bushes.  The red of the leaves will only continue to become more saturated, which leaves an almost electric confetti on our walkway.

These will likely be the last of the dahlias as we keep getting closer to the first frost of the season.

The stream of Christmas presents ordered online has begun.

The yawning dog is growing more and more fur in preparation for the winter (which means her neck is disappearing and her head is look smaller and smaller).

It's like she doesn't even notice the new curtains!

And it is awfully hard to be in a bad mood when wearing a tie with elephants and palm trees.

This is definitely one of my favorite times of year.  Time to take out the hooded sweatshirts, put the blankets back on the couch, stock up on hot chocolate mix, and be a happy homebody.

I LOVE our backyard.

Something Yummy: Potato Pancakes w/ Eggplant Béchamel

Our DVR is filled to the brim with episodes of Chopped.  If you aren't familiar with it, it is a cooking competition/elimination show on the Food Network where contestants are given baskets with totally random ingredients.  For example—make an appetizer using watermelon, canned sardines, pepper jack cheese, and zucchini in 20 minutes (Season 1 Episode 5).  After watching so many episodes, I stop and think "there is definitely something I can make here" every time I walk into the kitchen.

In my pantry I had: a tupperware of leftover potato dumpling dough, 3 carrots, 1 eggplant, and milk.  I wanted to have a mixture of flavors, textures, and colors.  I first planned on making a spicy potato pancake for the base of the dish.

The pancakes were made up of shredded potato, onion, salt, red pepper flakes and black pepper and were held together with some egg and flour.  I wanted to get them just cooked through with a nice crisp on both sides.


Then I decided on some type of light cream sauce.  Looking at the eggplant, I thought of moussaka with a nice creamy béchamel sauce.  I figured why not combine the two?


I heated a little oil, whisked in some flour, slowly added milk to the desired consistently, and added salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

I grilled the eggplant with just a little salt.  When the eggplant softened it was added to the food processor along with the béchamel sauce (I also added a spoonful of tahini to bring out some of the earthiness of the eggplant).


Next, I wanted to add a little crunch to the meal with the carrots.  I cooked them just briefly in some butter, garlic salt, and dill.  Potatoes, carrots, and a creamy sauce?  I'll eat it.

Carrots, potato pancakes cooking, sauce, and pancake mixture to be fried

I stacked the potato pancakes, sauce, carrots and repeated.  I really think the Chopped judges would have enjoyed it—except maybe Geoffrey Zakarian, who really dislikes spiciness!

I'm a big non-blogging jerk

If I had a blog entry for each top level terrorist or despot that has been killed over the last two months, I would have infinitely more entries.  However, this is not the case and I once again return to the promise that "I swear I am never going to go this long without blogging again!"

Wait, I know I have made promises like this before....
"I swear the kitchen is never going to be this messy again."
"I swear I'm never going to leave my sweatshirt in the basement and let a spider nest in it again."
"I swear I'll tie my shoes, even when I'm running late, so I don't fall in the parking lot again."

Yeah.... right.....

I'm going to pretend that this is just a normal post like the tons before and after this one, and I'll tell you about what has been weighing on my mind heavily as of late.  I really want to build something.  I have spent the last year planning out my dream chicken coop—it is super awesome.  But I am starting to have second thoughts about my phantasmagorical poultry plans.  I have fears that I will be saying to myself....

"I swear I'm never going to let the chicken poop pile up like this again."
"I swear I'm never going to end up with 20 dozen eggs in the fridge again."
"I swear I'm going to stop annoying my wife by asking, 'Do the chickens have large talons?'"

So... I still want to build something, but what?  What about a miniature gypsy caravan?  Yes, I can understand how you might not understand how I went from point A (chicken coop) to point B (gypsy caravan), so let me try to explain.  I want something that: 1) we can add to our yard, 2) will be fairly low maintenance, 3) is family friendly (just thinking of the future—this is NOT an announcement!), and 4) is really cool.

A while ago I discovered something called a "roulotte."  It works really well as a canvas for creating a really funky and creative outdoor play space.

This is the sweetest playhouse I have seen in a long time, and you can see a lot more pictures of it on the mikodesign website.  This is what the designers at IKEA dream of: high quality/high use super functional spaces.  When you look at pictures of the inside, you would swear that this was some type of magical tent from Harry Potter that is boundless on the inside despite its outside appearance.

Another thing that I really like about the above roulotte is that it is relatively simple.  Classic roulottes have hours of craftsmanship poured into them, but the key elements I'm focusing on are the relative shape, size, and functionality of roulottes in general.

Picture stolen from HERE

Picture stolen from HERE

Picture stolen from HERE

Picture stolen from HERE

Part of me wonders if I was a traveling artist in a previous life.  Not only am I really drawn to roulottes, but a few years ago I was a little bit obsessed with Pakistani truck art.

There are bunches of people in Pakistan who make almost nothing and put almost everything into their trucks.  Take the cabs in New York City that are all filled with trinkets, then enlarge them and put hundreds of hours into their planning and implementation.  I mean, how good would it feel to go to work driving one of these?

Picture stolen from HERE

Picture stolen from HERE

Picture stolen from HERE

Picture stolen from HERE

I know that relations have been tense lately between the US and Pakistan, but I highly support the efforts of these people who have tricked out their trucks.  In fact, it is generally a good reminder that there are people doing some amazing things—and that the narrow portraits painted on the news on so many nights cannot adequately portray the many facets of foreign cultures.

Let's just pretend that I'm going to post again within the next week.  

(Vegas odds aren't looking great.)