Welcome!

Welcome everyone! This originally started out as a blog all about cooking and food. But just as everything else in this world, it has now evolved to include some travel adventures as well. This is mostly because in June of 2013 Matt, our 2 dogs, and I hopped on a plane in Chicago and moved to Ireland to work with the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation. I still want to keep food as a part of this blog so I imported all of my old posts and will now weave some travel and exploration posts in with the food posts. So before I start chatting all about food, eating and my love hate relationship with cookbooks, I should first introduce myself and give a run down of my credentials starting with the foodie in me.

I grew up in St.Louis Missouri and went to school at the University of Missouri, Columbia (GO TIGERS! MIZ-ZOU!) where I got a BS in Animal sciences, and met my wonderful husband Matt. Matt grew up on a farm in Sedalia Missouri, raising cows, pigs, corn, soybeans and a variety of veggies in their garden. I grew up in the suburbs with a small "garden." My garden was more like a rock pit where I tried to grow various vegetables that I had no intention of eating but was interested in how the whole grow your own food thing worked. My garden was about 3 feet wide and 6 feet long, and some how I managed to grow tomatoes passably, some corn (the stalks grew nicely, the ears... eh, not so much), a few scraggly carrots and peppers that would be perfect for a teddy bear pick nick. Not exactly a bounty of harvest, but since I didn't want to eat them anyways, I didn't mind.

Falling in love and marrying Matt has widened my pallet quite a bit. I have come along way from the girl who thought that only corn and potatoes were OK for your veggie repertoire. Don't get me wrong, I cooked with other veggies, I'd just pick around them when I ate the meal, but staring in college and more so with Matt (and his family), I learned that there are more to veggies than just corn and potatoes! I have also broadened my horizons by "butchering" a calf. I put that in quotations because it was mostly just hacking off parts of meat from a blind calf my Father-in-law had killed and labeling the meat, Steak, Roast and Chunk Meat. Chunk meat turned into Kabobs and the best ground beef I'd ever eaten!

That's some GOOOD meat!

Around this time in my life I began canning. Matt and I had planted three 20'x25' plots in the backyard and I had produce coming out of my ears. What in the world do you do with more veggies than you can eat, or pawn off on unsuspecting co-workers and friends? You can! I had tried making pickles with my mom as a kid (Thank you Mrs.Grothe for the book that got this started!) and did well, but that was one summer and I wanted to try again. I had a few other friends who were interested in trying this out too, so we had a Pickle Party! This entails a number of friends you trust with sharp knives, salt and a boat load of cucumbers who help slice the cucumbers, fill the jars with brine and seasoning and then who are willing to play board games with you as you process the jars. One night of this resulted in over 70 jars of pickles. After 3 nights of this we had more than 200 jars.  Soooo seems I need to work on my scaling or just know a whole bunch of people who love pickles. I went with the latter and 3 years later, they were all gone! That's the joy of canning, this stuff lasts forever! Since the pickles worked out so well we started having Salsa parties. To most people this would include some Latin music and dancing. For us it meant 40 lbs of tomatoes, 30 jalapenos, 10 onions, Cilantro, garlic, lime juice adobo, and a few Salsa starter packs. Everyone got to make their own special blend, and take a few jars home at the end of the night. LOTS of fun! Lastly we decided Jam was another way to go. Especially if you have 240 linear feet of Black Raspberries and Black Berries growing in your back yard. Similar party theme and SO MUCH FUN!

Getting ready to make some salsa!

Look at the varieties and colors. This was the year of the Tomato jungle where Matt planed 36 tomato plants because I couldn't decide which varieties I wanted

 Jams & Jellies!

During this time we also helped some friends with their goats and made cheese with the milk. It never failed, that when the temperatures reached either the highest or lowest of the year, that was when we were taking care of the goats and milking. Even though that is a true statement I really enjoyed it! Well, most of it. Evian the goat is a glorious girl and a sweetie, but her herd mate Xandie (the goat with the name of a stripper) was ROTTEN. By the time we caught her I was pretty sure I'd be getting milk shakes out of her! Rotten rotten goat, but I still had a good time. As much as I have fun milking the goats and making the cheese I still can't bring myself to eat it because I really don't like the taste of goat milk, but everyone else liked it! We made chevre rolled in lemon rind, garlic and dill, mozzarella and tried making cheesecakes, ice cream, lotion and soap from the milk.

I'm milking a goat!

We spent some time in Baltimore and the DC area doing Post-docs, exploring the local landscape and took up Fox chasing with the Goshen Hounds. A great past-time and a fantastic group of people who we miss terribly. This is where I started this blog, but got so busy I ignored it for nearly a year. So sorry!!! So that was last year, what are we doing now, and how the heck did we end up in Ireland??

I am currently a chubby blonde research analyst with a PhD, working in Bandon, Ireland. The reason I mentioned chubby is because I've been told NEVER EVER trust a skinny chef! Therefore I am the one of most trustworthy chefs online! So now that we've got the food part out of the way time to mention the adventures. Since moving over to Ireland Matt and I have tried to go somewhere new or see something interesting each weekend. During the week we work at the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation where he works on a variety of genetic based projects and I have my hands in a bunch of health and disease projects, something new that's taking off at warp speed. Lots of new things all very interesting and with the common goal of producing the best beef and dairy on the planet! We also enjoy the sport of fox hunting  here, so be prepared for lots of horse and hound photos! Nearly every weekend during the hunting season we go out with the hunt and listen for the music of hounds in full cry.

In this blog I'll be sharing my Pinterest cooking adventures, some tried and true recipes, visits to various places around Ireland and do I but dream? Maybe other places in Europe??? I'll also probably be sharing a variety of "cheats" because there are a lot of items I can't find in Ireland so some of the recipes I share may come out a bit wonky, which makes them all the more fun!

I am so thrilled you have chosen to visit and hope you check back frequently to find out what's going on in my kitchen or where our adventures will take me next.