Happy Valentine's Day (writer's workshop).

Aren't these bags adorable?! I won them from The Mandatory Mooch.

Happy Valentine's Day! Whether you are celebrating with friends, a new fling, a long time love, family, or even treating yourself to a quiet night alone, I hope you are enjoying yourself and treating yourself well. This year I'm sharing with you the highs and lows of my Valentine's experiences over the years.

Peperoncini refrigerator pickles (testing Pinterest).

I apologize for my lack of posts last week. My mom and step-dad came out to visit from NY and we were far too busy to spend much time on our computers. However, I do have a few awesome recipes that I can't wait to share with y'all from when they were here (lemon cream pie, and cheesy coins). First, though, I want to show you this super simple tip that I came across on Pinterest. The original pin called for adding onion and vinegar too, but I wanted to see if I could make it even simpler (although I bet the pickled onions come out delicious too).

I love peperoncinis, but I always hate throwing out the jar of pickling liquid at the end. It's so full of flavor, I just knew there had to be something yummy that I could do with it. I wanted something quick and easy (there are some amazing looking beef crock pot recipes out there that use pepperoncini juice too, and I will have to try them sometime). When I came across the idea of simply slicing cucumbers and putting them into the jar to make refrigerator pickles I was delighted. Three days later, when took my first taste, I was over the moon. I really had to restrain myself from eating the whole jar right then and there. They are crispy and tender, and the flavor has that perfect spicy and vinegary balance of a peperoncini, but a little bit milder. I'll never throw my peperoncini juice away again!

 

Peperoncini Refrigerator Pickles

Ingredients
1 jar of peperoncini juice (mine was about half full after the peppers were gone)
1 cucumber

Instructions
1) Slice the cucumber into thin rounds.

2) Put the rounds into the jar; fill the jar almost completely with cucumber, but leave a little space so they can move.

3) Let marinate in the fridge for several days, shaking occasionally.

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Sweet music (treasury Tuesday).

In honor of Valentine's day coming up next week, I wanted to share these sweet heart themed treasuries that I've been featured in recently. Enjoy!

Play that Funky Music, Valentine by Holly Tamales

So Sweet by Jacquie Summer

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Quick beef & broccoli (recipe).

This is a super simple recipe that can be made in a hurry. I love that it incorporates vegetables, meat, and starch in one dish, so you don't need to worry about side dishes. This also tastes great using chicken or pork instead of beef.

Quick Beef and Broccoli

Ingredients
10 to 12 ounces broccoli (fresh or frozen)
10 to 12 ounces thin cut beef rump round (or chicken, or pork)
1/2 cup ponzu
2 tbs Sri Racha
1/4 cup teriyaki sauce
rice

Instructions
1) Combine the ponzu, Sri Racha, and teriyaki. Marinate the meat in this mixture (I like to start marinating the meat in the morning if I remember, but even a 30 minute marinade will do the trick).

2) Lightly steam the broccoli.

3) Remove the meat from the marinade, and saute over medium high heat for one minute. Add the remaining marinade and cook for an additional minute.

4) Stir the broccoli and meat together. Serve over rice.

Serves 2 to 3 people


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January instagrams (photography).

Overall, January was a beautiful month here. We had some rain, but we also had many gorgeous warm sunny days. Despite getting sick (twice! ugh) I still made it out a few times to get some pics of our fantastic city.

We had lots of blue skies. My friend from back home jokes that in San Diego "partly cloudy" means there's one or two small fluffy clouds floating around in the distance; today the weather on my phone said it was "partly sunny," and I didn't see a single cloud all day. We're spoiled here (you should see the fuss - and traffic - that a few drops of rain creates!).

My tiny kitchen (writer's workshop).

I'm back for another week of the writer's workshop. This week I'm choosing Kat's third prompt: Show us your kitchen! Don't get me wrong, I'm not choosing this prompt because I think I have a beautiful kitchen. On the contrary, I want to show you that you don't need a huge fancy kitchen to cook your heart out (although I do dream of double ovens, six burner stove tops, and islands full of storage; heck, even a few feet more counter space or a window would be amazing, but I digress).

We've been in our place for three and a half years by now, so I have the kitchen set up just how I want it, and I am comfortable in it. One nice thing about having a small kitchen is that everything is always within a few feet of you (never mind that sometimes that means a few feet above my head causing me to climb to reach it... these are the perils of being vertically challenged). Anyways, the moral is that you make do with what you have. I've even made Thanksgiving dinner for 8 people in this kitchen. It took some planning, good timing, and a lot of stacking, but I made it work, and you can to.

Okay, enough talking, now I have to go clean the kitchen so that I can take some pictures to share with you (at least since there's no window I don't have to worry about taking pics during the daytime!).

 Here's the overview shot; you can see that I wasn't kidding when I called it small. It's long(ish) and narrow, so there's not much space for more than one person in there at a time. Matt and I are always sidestepping each other trying to get to the fridge or microwave.

Pastry wrapped pears (get your chef on).

I love participating in the Get Your Chef On challenges. So far I've competed in the lemon, coconut, and apple challenges; it's always fun to be challenged to use an ingredient in a new or unusual way, but what I really enjoy is seeing what everyone else comes up with. When I saw that this rounds theme was pears I had no idea what I would make. Honestly, I don't know if I had ever cooked with pears before (I don't know why - they are delicious poached, in tarts, and even in jams). I turned to Pinterest for inspiration, and I was not disappointed!

 

This dish was inspired by the beautiful picture in the recipe for Pera in Crusta. The only problem, is that the recipe is in Italian. With the help of Google translate, I was able to get an idea of what it said. I adjusted the recipe (the original calls for brandy, and what's the point of cooking with alcohol if you can't have a few sips while you're doing it?!), gave it a try, and was delighted with the results. This is an impressive looking recipe that is actually very easy to put together (15 minutes of prep work, tops), and can even be put together ahead of time. The only changes I will make next time are 1) add a little cinnamon to the honey and butter mixture, 2) cut the pie crust into thinner strips so that it wraps around more times, and 3) not flare the edges before putting it into the oven (I think they will flare on their own while baking).