Raige Creations

Well, it seems the best laid plans of mice and men  are in play here. We are weathering a storm just 2 days days before a planned trip to a wonderful mountain retreat for a wedding. A wedding we CANNOT MISS - it is our daughters wedding!  Despite my huge effort to travel BEFORE the storm (see above - daughter's wedding I CANNOT MISS), an argument with the poor airline customer service rep, and hours on the phone, we are stuck here with a storm,  now named IAN , I had just finally convinced the airline to waive the change fees and fare difference exorbitant price, as at the time there were no warnings yet, it was all for nothings as just then we found out the last seat was taken. No more empty seats before the storm was due to arrive. At some point, between closing hurricane shutters and filling water vessels, hubby shared this gem of a song with me. Hurricane Gilbert hit Jamaica in 1988. I don't mean clipped, I mean went across the entire country from one end to the oth...

It was a long work week this week. After the emotional  last few weeks, I had to be knee deep in year end reports. Ah the financial world. Though there is some satisfaction when the spreadsheets balance, it is often a long road to that point. Add to that, there has been no exercise for the last 3 WEEKS! Yes, that is correct. 3 friggin weeks. And it wasn't like I was eating carefully either. It seems when one goes out the window, the other follows. My lame and completely wrong justification,  "Well I am not working out anyways....so why not have those fries, and yes I may as well have another cookie while I am at it!" It was thus proved I have NO willpower. At all. None. And I was feeling really crappy about it. The evidence is, I ate 2 boxes of my favorite Girl Scout Cookies in 2 weeks. No willpower. At all. Had them for dinner one night. Feeling like big fat crap. My kryptonite, I don't care if they are called Caramel DeLites or Samoas , I am too weak to...

Photo Courtesy of Raige Tea, those deliciously 'evil' hazelnut and chocolate sticks, and the chili stirring spoon makes for a lovely Sunday. It means all the chores were done by the time football starts. The laundry folded and put away, the dinner prepped (just stirring intermittenly throughout the afternoon), showered and in Sunday comfy clothes.  You might not understand the big deal of the Pirouline's  . These, once upon a time way back when we were a younger family who was content with enough to be able to treat ourselves with yummy treats and the time for tea, were our favorite. A very fancy to us, decadent treat we allowed ourselves when times were good financially. When we took the time to enjoy tea, sweets, and each other.  We then hit tougher times, busier times. We were working harder, for less rewards. We cut back, we skimped, we scraped by. No chocolate hazelnut goodness. No tea time.  Years went by living under these circumstances. We accepted...

If you haven't heard, the south has had a bit of a snow storm . (and if you haven't heard, I would ask what rock you have been under) Now, having grown up in the Buffalo area, then moving BACK to the Buffalo area (after my other life in the Caribbean) before moving here, to the mountains of NC, I am quite familiar with snow. I grew up with snow, and my kids spent 5 'love-slash-hate' years dealing with it. This? THIS is snow. photo: Raige Creations I can drive in it, I can shovel it, snow blow it, and basically deal with it. I have even shoveled it off a roof when we got more than 5 feet of snow in one day. (yes, that happened.) Nothing closed up there unless there was a blizzard or sub zero temperatures AND a blizzard. School was open that day we had 5 feet of snow in a day.  Yes, that is several FEET of snow. and there still was school, and everything stayed open. photo:  Raige Creations So now we are in the mountains of a 'southern' state. (...

As we sat comfortably in our living room on Wednesday night, watching Cloud Atlas (which I have been wanting to see for some time), we had a criminal in our garage. Hubby went out for a smoke, came back in and asked why the garbage can was between the cars, with the lid off. Huh? I said "I put a bag in it earlier today, with the lid on, and certainly not between the cars!" He said the dog was sniffing by the door just as he was going out, so we assumed that he just missed the culprit. Tracks showed that it could very well be a bear.  Fairly Large Footprints photo: Thoughts of Raige This morning, we investigated further.  We followed a trail of egg shells,  Egg Shells in the Driveway photo:  Thoughts of Raige onion tops and napkins,  Onion and Egg Shells photo:  Thoughts of Raige More onion photo:  Thoughts of Raige and the tissue box right in the middle of the driveway. Tissue Box The criminal went off to the left, near...

My daughter had been asking for meatloaf for days (!), as we all get so tired of the same old meals, and we hadn't had meatloaf in forever! So meatloaf it was. (I just said meatloaf way too many times.....) As you know, hubby can't have any dairy, so milk was not an option. So here the easiest, milk free, recipe for a great meatloaf. Ingredients: 2 lbs Meat - I used a mixture of ground chicken and ground pork 4 Green Onions - or one regular would do just fine 1 heaping tsp Garlic - I used jarred, but fresh or powdered is fine Ketchup - a squirt - then about 1/4 cup for topping 2 tsp Pickapepper Sauce - then 2 tsp more for topping 1 Egg 1/4 cup Breadcrumbs Salt and Pepper Dried Basil and Parsley to taste Crushed Red Pepper to taste Olive Oil cooking spray Instructions: One reason I love meatloaf is that it is so easy! Just throw everything in the bowl and mix. That is basically it. But I took pictures so you can see the progression. Slice the green onions...

I get tired of roasts. They are just boring sometimes. I sometimes want something more cozy, comforting. Less dry.... So this time I decided to try a slow cooker stew.  I found some good recipes (like  this one that I AM going to try  when I get some squash), but ended up using several as a reference and tweaking, as usual. Potatoes and onions in the Crock-Pot photo courtesy of Raige Creations I started with using the same ingredients I would with a roast. Ingredients: Potatoes, onions, carrots, meat.  I cut up the potatoes and onions and popped them into the Crock Pot dish. Meat photo courtesy of  Raige Creations I got a Pork Loin Roast, it seemed like a better deal, and tried to cut off some of the fat. Leave a little, it adds to the flavor.  Cut that into cubes, about 2 inches square-ish. The supporting cast photo courtesy of  Raige Creations Then I assembled some spices and the juice needed to make it more stew-like, and ad...

Huh? Wha? "You look like you need some water" she said to me. I stopped in my tracks. Did I look that bad? photo courtesy of world pics dot com Kosovo   Yes, I did misplace my bottle of water 4 hours ago. Okay, I hadn't showered that morning either, so my hair was a little frizzy, and perhaps the makeup I put on had worn off with the sweat as I was unloading boxes and unpacking and tagging.    "You need to eat something too" she said again. Well, yes I didn't eat any breakfast that morning, and that doughnut hole just gave me sugar rush 2 hours ago. But was it that obvious?    "We have a drinking fountain over there by the men's room, you know." No, I didn't know that!!!    I have spent the last 2 weeks, almost every day full, moving our business out of its downtown location. My days, each one, for these past 2 weeks has looked something like this: get up, coffee, run maybe, clean something in the house, shower, blog, ...

This song came up over dinner. It is funny how slight word combinations can bring up songs, and then dinner takes a turn.  It happened something like this: I had picked up some macaroni and cheese from the deli at the grocery store for dinner.  (I made a kick-butt Kung-Pao Chicken last night and didn't have the gumption to be too creative for dinner tonight. Thus, it was grocery store deli dinner night) This mac-n-cheese was loaded. It had ham and broccoli in it, which sounded like it would be a hit. But when my son was coerced into trying some, he picked through it to find just the broccoli.  Mind you, the broccoli was well mixed in, and therefore appeared as little green dots throughout the mac-n-cheese. Once in a while, you would get a big chunk of it, but mostly it appeared as little tiny specks.  We knew he loved broccoli, and ham. So we were teasing him for picking through the dish to find the tiny specks of broccoli, and saying after each bite e...

For me, it is hard to find a good recipe I can follow directly. I scoured the internet for chicken and dumpling recipes, but wasn't satisfied with any I found. For one, hubby can't have milk or cream, so that ruled out half of them. Second, I didn't happen to have any biscuit mix and I wasn't about to go to the store at 7:30am to get some. Besides, growing up in the 1970's I have had my fill of Bisquick . (my mother didn't use flour at all that I can remember, only Bisquick .) So I found if I took ideas from these recipes, and tweaked them to suit our needs and tastes, I could create my own perfect homestyle meal, and make my own comfort food recipe.  I love slow cooker meals ( I have raved about them before ). There is nothing better than coming home from work with dinner ready. No stress for me and a wonderful meal to enjoy with the family.  For this meal you will need: Big Ass Chicken One whole Chicken (I got a big ass chicken from Sams Club) salt ...