Rarely does a sequel (prequel) equal or surpass the original. A couple of weeks ago, I  read Half Broke Horses (after reading The Glass Castle a few years ago). I was interested in reading ‘Horses since GC had so easily became one of my favorite memoir books. I enjoyed the author’s voice, the way she could still find ways to make me smile while while reading about her challenging circumstances. I was excited to dig into HBH, hoping it would be even half as good as GC.  I can honestly, and happily, say Half Broke Horses lived up to The Glass Castle; I ate it up just as easily.

After reading both books, it still seems to make sense to read Glass Castle first, even though Half Broke Horses is about the author’s grandmother (who is not even a main character in Glass Castle). To connect and understand Jeanette first, by reading GC, gives the reader a special appreciation when reading about her maternal grandmother in HBH.

Bottom line: If you enjoyed The Glass Castle, you’ll like Half Broke Horses.

Rating:

New Years Eve my cousin’s husband Jason’s contribution to the spread was a big old bowl of shrimp Ceviche. I had never tried ceviche before, but just eyeballing it up, I knew I had found another food love.

Whatever the serving size is for ceviche, I’m pretty sure I ate 3 times as much that night. Firsts, seconds, and then later on in the evening – thirds!!!

Flash forward to this weekend, they had a cookout over at their house. I was hoping so badly that Jason’s ceviche would make an appearance on the menu. But, having just flown into town, and feeling under the weather, Jason spent much of the night stretched out on the couch just trying to feel better.

I made it through the gathering without crying, since there was many other foods to be It took me one day to satisfy that craving. Today I googled and found many recipes, some with more of a tomato base, some made up with other sea-foods like fish, mussels, scallops. But I wanted the shrimp. That’s what was calling me. Not to mention, that’s what I have on hand. I found this recipe on Food Network and though I could easily work with it. A quick run to the Super Walmart got me the cucumbers, cilantro and extra lime juice I needed.

It took less than 20 minutes to throw it all together; we ate it immediately. I doubled the recipe and eyeballed most of the ingredients. The changes I made:

• Used frozen, cooked shrimp. Thawed them about 1/2-way and then tossed them with a half cup of lime juice and set them aside while I chopped.
• Did not use ketchup.
• Did not use olive oil.
• Used red onion.

Result:

Yummy. Frank and I had two bowls, straight up. I washed it down with a Bud Light Lime. Mmm. Very good, but I have no craving whatsoever for it today. Killed it. Perfectly.

Doesn’t it look like he’s smiling?

This stuff is delicious, just to let you know.

As my mom would say, One of the gals brought this to bookclub last month. Everyone raved. Seconds were inevitable. Recipe request rippled around the table. It’s super easy, she told us.

She obliged.

Pea & Peanut Salad

1 pkg frozen peas (10 oz)
1 cup dry roasted, salted peanuts
1 cup chopped celery
6 bacon strips, cooked and crumbled
1/4 cup chopped red onion
1/3 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup prepared zesty Italian salad dressing

In a large bowl, combine the peas, peanuts, celery, bacon and onion. In a small bowl, combine the mayonnaise and Italian dressing. Pour over salad and toss to coat. Chill until serving.  About 8 1/2-cup servings.

Note: If you can only find 12 oz bags of peas, then use all 12 oz.  You can make this salad 1 hour before you need to leave, or make ahead. Personal opinion is that it is best soon after making (because the peas are more solid), but you could make a day ahead and nobody would care because it tastes great. I doubled this for a BBQ we went to.

Hello gorgeous.

I know it has been a while. So I’ll break in with some ice cream talk.

Summer’s here again (not officially, yet but the kids are out the air-conditioning’s been on, so it’s summer in my book). And what screams summer like ice cold treats? I’m not a huge ice cream fan, though I admittedly eat my fair share of it. I just don’t crave it and turn to it when I want to pork down.

Frank and I used to get the small tubs of some specialty ice cream. This was years ago. But since then the kids have grown and those small tubs are too small for the lot of us. I still get them sometimes (like this Häagen-Dazs fiveâ„¢ ice cream, mint, good stuff). Generally I go for the Bryer’s All Natural. Frank likes that it is “real” ice cream. We all like the taste. And often it is on sale. But a few years ago we had one of those obnoxious Super Wal-marts open very close to our house. As much as I hate it, I find myself there almost daily. It is a matter of convenience and an emaciated checkbook. Can’t win every battle.

Anyway, I’m all for checking out the generics/store brands, and have done the same with the Wal-mart Great Value brand. I think we may have started with the all natural ice cream. To make a long story short: it’s a winner. The Blueberry Pomegranate is one of my favorite ice creams hands down. It is delicious and it saves me a few pennies. Score.

A few weeks ago, a church member passed through my office. As she set her tote down, readying herself to dig in to some volunteer work, she grabbed a container of pecan pralines and placed them on my desk. I think I heard her mutter something about them being really good, or addictive, or something like that. Not sure, as it is all a blur now. But I do remember looking into the container, fishing out a fat-looking nut, and popping it into my mouth.

Butter+sugar+nuts+salt=instant addiction for me.

“Did you… did you make these?” I asked. She smiled and said they were from Trader Joe’s. Mental note to myself — never ever shop there again. Trader Joe’s was now a dealer to me. I had to avoid it at all costs.

She wandered off somewhere in the building, leaving the container with me. It was a staredown. Only shame kept me from flying under my desk, container in hand, devouring each and every salty, buttery, sugary, nutty little glob. I picked out four more nuts, closed the container and swiftly took it over to her tote. Set it down. Patted it. Walked back, sat down and enjoyed my pecans.

It took me 2, maybe 3 weeks before I made my visit to Trader Joe’s. Really I was looking for their pie crust dough. Really!!! But while I was there… I mean, a little container of pecan pralines wouldn’t hurt, right? Besides, the kids would help eat them.

I popped a few on the way home, “accidentally” left them in the car after unloading the groceries, a few more on the way to Walgreens, a couple on the way to pick up the kids from the library… a vow not to at another one until home. The ability to keep that vow until I was in the house for 3 minutes, popped a few more, peddled them to the kids (who pretty much all said “eww”) and the fear that I will devour the entire contents very soon.

By the way, they are just delicious with a glass of red wine.

5 packs of ramen (4 chili lime, 1 chicken)

5 scrambled eggs

1/4 of what was left of a “seasoning” bag of frozen veggies (chopped onion and peppers).

Dinner for less than $3 bucks. Hel-lo. (And NO complaints!!!)

First off, hello stranger. February 10th, first Groovy Mom post of the year. Facebook has been my friend, as well as some time away from the ‘puter.

Jumping in with two feet on the ground, I’m interested to find out if anyone has Google Buzz in their Gmail yet? I was reading this blog post regarding the Google service, but have not yet found anyone who is able to utilize it. With Facebook’s new (and constant) changes, I’d like to see something rival it. Though I wonder how many people will actually have the desire/energy to switch over. Personally, one thing I like about Facebook over Myspace is that it is relatively simple (functionally and aesthetically). But their continuous forced changes are a bit hard to stomach.

UPDATE: Once I signed out and signed back in I was able to access (activate?) Google Buzz. It didn’t get me very far, and is very bare bones right now. There’s got to be more to it?

(As posted over in my foodie collection…)

At my last bookclub meeting, one of the ladies brought some “Homemade Bailey’s” (as she called it). I wasn’t sure if I had actually had Bailey’s before, to be honest. I’d had Kahlua, which I thought was similar. I’d always imagined Bailey’s to be minty. I don’t know if it is the whole Irish-green-mint association process that sparks off in my mind or what.

At any rate, I tried Kelly’s concoction and it was good. I told myself that I, too, would make some Irish Cream.

Today was the day.

In anticipation for New Year’s Eve tomorrow, I wanted to mix up something a bit festive. Normally I’m one who strays from the recipe card, finding ways to insert my own twist to cast of characters. This time, I was good, and followed the recipe. I figured if I was going to spend close to $30 on a bottle of liquor, I didn’t want to waste it with one of my haphazard “interpretations” of a recipe I had not even tested yet.

I found many variations for Irish Cream, but decided to go with this one from One Perfect Bite:

Irish Cream Liqueur

Ingredients:
1-1/2 cups whiskey (i.e. Jameson’s Irish whiskey)
1 (14-oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
2 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoons chocolate syrup
2 teaspoons instant coffee
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract

I mixed everything in a 4-cup glass measuring container that had a small spout, anticipating the pouring process from the container to my rinsed and empty cherry DaVinci syrup bottle. See, I’m an eager, impatient lady sometimes, when I’m bustling about the kitchen. I had to remind myself to be slow, stir careful and pour patiently. Good girl.

End result? Yummy. It’s a whiskey-tastin’ treat, yes it is. I filled my syrup bottle nearly to the top, and had about 1 cup of leftover. Frank and are sipping the extra right now over ice.

Frank wanted a coffeemaker for work. Nothing fancy, nothing expensive. At home we’ve had a percolator (electric) for years, but he wanted a drip one for ease of use. He’s been keeping his eye out for one for weeks. One day I was at Goodwill and saw an old coffeemaker that brought back childhood memories with its beige color, brown and orange “coffee brew strength” accents. My eyes lingered on it, and I moved on.

Wouldn’t you know, my husband nabbed it and slyly brought it to the checkout? Ten bucks. “Hey, a guy at work brought one of these for the breakroom a few years ago (at his old job), and it was the best drip coffeemaker.”

Normally I would have let it leave my house and not complained. I have no problem using cups, plates, bowls from Goodwill. I do have a some reservations about using things I can’t scour clean, that have inside mechanisms that I can’t inspect with my own eyeballs… Irrational thoughts of someone running their own urine through a coffeemaker. You know, things like that.

So, being the good wife I am (and having a strange magnetism towards this happy-looking little coffeemaker), I took it upon myself to clean any imaginary urine out of it by running vinegar through it 8000 times. It honestly didn’t look like it had been used at all. Although each time I ran the vinegar through there was always a bit of sediment (looked like dust) floating on top of the water. Finally I just went to the store and got some official coffee cleaner. Ran that through a few times and the water was crystal, spanking, clear.

After all that cleansing care, it seemed right to also do a “test run” and make some coffee.

“You like the coffeemaker, don’t you?” Frank sighed, seeing the signs on the wall.

I ignored his insinuating question.

In turn it seemed right to actually drink the coffee.

Frank’s eyes rolled, accusing me of latching on to the maker, and also assuming his search for a coffeemaker was not over, as it seemed it was when he walked out of Goodwill with his Norelco DIAL-a-BREW II.

Thankfully, we found a cheap-o special deal during the Christmas Special Frenzies a couple weeks back, ’cause that DIAL-a-BREW makes one mean cup of coffee, and I’m not letting it go.