the sultry scribe

Recipe Wednesday – Stewed Chicken with Andouille

My favorite is cold weather cooking – you can turn on the oven, the stove and warm up the kitchen with spicy aroma.

This recipe is taken from the Food Network site.

Ingredients

6 skinless, boneless chicken thighs (about 1 3/4 pounds), trimmed
Kosher salt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 link andouille sausage (about 3 ounces), chopped
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1 3/4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
3 medium red potatoes, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1 10-ounce package frozen whole baby okra, thawed
Juice of 1 lime
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
Directions
Cut each chicken thigh into quarters (or 1 1/2-inch pieces, if large). Pat dry and season with 1 teaspoon salt. Heat the vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the sausage and cook, stirring, 1 minute. Add the chicken in a single layer and cook undisturbed until browned, about 4 minutes. Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is golden brown all over, about 5 more minutes. Sprinkle the flour over the chicken and cook, stirring, 1 minute.

Stir in the broth and potatoes and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, covered, until the potatoes are just tender, about 10 minutes. Stir in the okra and cook, covered, until the chicken and potatoes are cooked through, 5 to 10 more minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the lime juice and cilantro.

Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/stewed-chicken-with-andouille-recipe/index.html?oc=linkback

5 Fandom Friday – My Five Gateway Fandoms

Color me super excited! I am so pleased to throw my blog in the link-up with The Nerdy Girlie and Super Space Chick for this Friday’s topic – Five Gateway Fandoms.

Now, if you’ve read my blog, you know that I like a looooot of stuff. But, even little Dahlia had her predilections (I love that word) and exquisite tastes. Which of course, were the gateway to even more predilections and super exquisite tastes. So sit back, dear reader, and find out what made me what I am today!

1. Girl Rockers – Joan Jett and Pat Benatar

Back when I was a wee impressionable one, they didn’t have a lot of ladies to identify with. Sure there was Babs and a folk singer or two, but the roof was really raised when Joan Jett and the Blackhearts hit the scene with “I Love Rock and Roll” and “I Hate Myself for Loving You.”. The heavy, recognizable guitar riff (wielded by a girl!) along with the tough look of black jeans, eyeliner and cool-ass hair…well, you can’t get any better than Joan Jett!

While Pat had a sweeter, smoother voice and her husband and band did most of the heavy musical lifting, “Hell is for Children”, “Promises in the Dark”, and her “breakout hit”, “Love is a Battlefield” had me singing in front of my mirror with a hairbrush and cutting my hair short!

2. The Police

I don’t even know where to start when these fellas. Suffice to say that I’ve seen nearly every movie Sting was in, even if he was simply there like…Dune (all I can say is….whaaaa? about that movie.) I even tracked down a 1983 Playgirl magazine to read his interview and I’m sure there’s a stack of magazine cut outs, Tiger Beats and Rolling Stones with them on the cover. That’s not counting the magazines my friends and I would BEG to order from England because just had to have the latest Police news. Also, purchased Carl Jung’s Synchronicity.

3. Star Wars

1977 in a movie theater that has since long closed. Feet sticking to the floor (of course) I watched the spectacle unfold. I had a remote control R2D2 robot. I was Darth Vader for Halloween. I was a Han Solo girl to the max and even have an autographed picture of Harrison Ford somewhere at my mom’s house. Before les Internets, we sat down and wrote our fave stars letters….and sometimes got and answer. I remember standing in the RAIN to line up to see Return of the Jedi. Wow. When they came along with those….other films…I kinda ignored the whole thing. However, I will sit down and watch Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and to a lesser degree The Return of the Jedi when they are on.

4. Mystery Science Theater 3000

This was what Saturday mornings were all about! Terrible movies with people actually cracking jokes about how terrible they really were. My favorite of ALL TIME? The Pod People. Awfulness at its finest. You can’t beat MST3K.

5. The Chronicles of Narnia

Who hasn’t, after reading these books, gone and knocked on the back of a closet or two? I firmly believe in the “you never know” and that magic can always around the corner. I’ve gone through so many sets of these books…I order a new set every two years, so they’re always a complete set around. My son had picked up an appreciate for Narnia also, and I certainly hope it brings magic into his life.

Some Honorable Mentions

Frank Sinatra – That’s cool music, baby!
Duran Duran
The Sims
The Little House Books

Most of these in this post, I still read and listen to today.

Train Your Brain

Train your brain and live longer.*

“A body at rest tends to remain at rest”,the old saying goes. The same can be said for the brain. When you do the same thing over and over again, it affects you. Falling in to a disliked or boring routine can render you brain-dead, an automaton who lives for Fridays and hates Mondays.

What kind of existence is that? I don’t buy into that psychology. Every day is a gift, to be heralded, valued and used.

I keep my brain active by being on the lookout for learning something new. “Oh, Dahlia,” you might say, “as a woman of a certain age, with children and a husband, you’re much too old and busy to learn something new.”

Oh, but dear reader, how I disagree. It’s a pleasure to wake up in the morning with a new skill under your belt.

Knitting, crocheting, bracelet-making, origami, WordPress, sewing, gardening, fantasy football, re-upholstering dining room chairs – these are all skills that you can learn and have fun doing so. Why not take some time out of your busy television-watching schedule (where you are viewing other people’s creativity) and do some creating for yourself?

But learning something new? That takes work, time, dedication. It also puts your brain into high working gear, which in turn may give you the joie de vivre that we a look for.

For example, earlier this year, I worked with my daughter on making bracelets. They were pretty simple things, a little plastic rope, some beads and a dab of super-glue. Not quite so simple and easy if you needed to figure out a pattern that wouldn’t render the bracelet too large or too small. Or to tie a knot that wouldn’t slip apart when you stretched the bracelet to slide on your arm. Even the “look” of the bracelet: did you make something you would want to wear?

Between the online tutorials and our experimentation, I think I learned quite a bit. Now I can add “bracelet-making hot mama” to my list of “hot mama” accomplishments.

What have you accomplished today? Make a promise to learn something new this weekend…and put it in the comments.

Keep that brain working. Learn something new everyday.

*may or may be true, but if it is…you don’t want to miss out, right?

Summer Fun Tips and Tactics

Fantabolous bag — My bag from Barnes and Noble, $10 with purchase.

It’s the end of June, school’s out and summer is in full swing. Because of the storm in October that resulted in power outages of over a week, area schools didn’t release for summer until this week.

Rejoice! As Alice Cooper sang, “School’s out for summer!” Picnics, games, hanging out on the back deck or in the back yard, and summer camp. It’s a great season for the outdoors and for one, I do enjoy it. It’s lot less pressure in the kitchen, and the children aren’t inside as much.

However, with increased outdoor activities comes other hazards. Sunburn, mosquito bites and heat exhaustion can make even the most fun summer outing miserable.

Here are some summer tips that may keep you problem free so that you can snuggle up with a loved one and watch the fireflies at night.

Mosquitoes

These little buggers love, love, love, standing water. To keep them from multiplying and biting you to death, empty any standing/stagnant water you may have outside. This goes for empty flowerpots and/or plant containers to recyclables waiting to be picked up.

To keep from being bitten at an outdoor festival or cookout, leave the sweet smells at home. Don’t wear any scented hair-care or body-care products if you can avoid them.

It’s not an official insect repellent and is not sold as such, but I’ve found that the original scent of Skin-So-Soft (the green bottle) from Avon is rather effective at keeping away bugs.

Picnics!

Picnics are a staple of summer, but can often be difficult to pack for. A good idea is to keep a ‘picnic go-bag’ handy for those times where you want to take the family on a impromptu adventure. Your picnic go-bag should contain:

Start with a large, lightweight bag with straps. Yes, a picnic basket looks cool, but is rather unweildy and may or may not trap crickets from Connecticut that end up in Times Square….but I digress. Get yourself a good bag that will be easy to carry.

Nix the picnic blanket. Get an old sheet to use for ground cover. Or you can get a water resistant outdoor blanket such as the “Neat Sheet” Ground Cover. (Check eBay for the best prices).

Wet wipes. Essential for wiping the dirt and dust off hands before eating and the sticky goodness off your hands after.

Box of plastic cutlery with plastic plates. Make them re-usable if you can.

Trash bags – Use those from the grocery that you can’t seem to get rid of.

Once you’ve got your picnic go-bag, all you need are drinks and food!

Happy Summer!

Haven’t stopped by my blog yet? Check out thesultryscribe to see what I’m up to over there!

Dahlia