MaryIsobel

Shared that picture with my mainly Pacific Northwest friends and the comments were definitely x-rated.

Saw this tree in Costa Rica. Wonder if it is realted?

Lovely setting. When a restaurant dish is salty enough that you don't find it palatable, do you send it back or mention it to your server? With the price of restaurant meals these days, I struggle with whether or not to send a dish back - my reasoning for not sending it back is that my fellow diners already have their meals so would make the pacing of the dinner akward. At 50.00 a plate at least, I feel like I shouldn't just suck it up.

That looks fabulous! I can smell them from here!

Not a huge fan of milk myself. I drank the obligatory glass or two when I was a youngster. When I was pregnant with our twins, I was told that I should drink about 2 lites of milk per day or the equivalent in cottage cheese or yogurt. That got old really fast and the best I could do was to chug chocolate milk. Both girls were born just fine although one is lactose intolerant but I believe that is just luck of the draw) I've always thought it odd that we drink milk past weaning. I do love cheese in all forms, even cottage, I can abide yogurt and I love sour cream on a baked potato but I could easily go dairy free.

Yellow onions are the norm around here most of the time. We do get vidalias or walla walla (sweet onions) for a month or two every summer. I buy red onions to pickle and although they are a fine subsitute for white or yellow onions, they can lend an odd purple hue to some dishes. I am seeing great deals on 50 pound bags of yellow onions - works out to about .35 a pound. Thinking I will pull up my bootstraps and buy a bag, Carmalize a bunch and chop the rest and freeze. Every night, when starting dinner, I start with a chopped onion. Would be a great time saver. Just have to kick myself in the butt and do it.

Wow - everthing looks amazing - well done Norm!

I find that a bit of fat or dairy in spinach takes away the weird coating on your teeth.

I make fromage fort every year after Christmas because that is the only time that we have leftover cheese. I love it - I put it in ramekins and freeze. Great to pull out of the freezer and serve with baguette slices or crackers. I use Jaque's recipe.

Staff note: This post and responses to it were split from the Dinner 2025 conversation, to maintain topic focus. I'll try to keep this PG but what an ass! Reminds me of getting together with an old roommate of mine and her realtively new husband. I suggested a local restaurant but was told that her new husband was an "amazing cook" so we should eat at their house. Fine said I. Got there, were poured a glass of wine and were told that "John" was making us his warm shrimp and scallop spinach salad for out first course. As we stood around the kitchen, he added small shrimp and bay scallops to reduced white wine, shallots butter and garlic. Sounds good right? Then he said "let's go sit down, this takes about 40 minutes to cook... yup - beyond rubber.

Found these candy strips at dollarama today so the rainbow ones will look like this but I think I will pipe the clouds rather than use marshmallows and use a sky blue as the base frosting.

I volunteered to make 60 cupcakes for a cast party of Wizard of Oz. My daughter is a high school musical theatre teacher and I have volunteered to make cookies, cakes and cupcakes for a few years now. I've made the 60 cupcakes (1/2 chocolate and 1/2 vanilla.) Will decorate the day before. Chocolate ones will be frosted in green and topped with a witch's hat and then vanilla ones will be frosted in pale blue and top with clouds and a rainbow. Did my prototype witch's hats today.

Good for you, getting back out there. We have a 32' fifth wheel. We joke that I can drive it but only in a straight line with no backing up! We have camped for about 40 years. Initially on our own with a truck and slide-in camper, then upgraded to a larger truck and camper, then when our twins were born, we bought a small motor home while keeping the truck and camper as my husband had made friends with guys that liked to go boon-docking while fishing. When we retired, we sold the motor home and bought a 5th wheel - in January 2020! It was our salvation during the pandemic and we have used it every year since. We have refer to our duties as minister of the interior (me) and minister of the exterior (him.) That being said - while I know the basics of the water, electricity and sewer, they have never been my responsibilty. Long story short, I admire your tenacity along with your ability to take care of the rig. I am very much looking forward to hearing about your travels,

Oh my gosh - your meals aare far from boring Shelby - a lot of varitey and all made from scratch! My husband and I gave up long ago on going out for dinner on Valentines Day. For a fraction of the cost, we choose something a little bit special to have at home. This year was a striploin steak (which we shared) a few clusters of crab legs, asparagus and a baked potato. The crab was snow crab, which is not my favourite but Dungeness (which is my favourite) is not in season right now.

Using the self-clean feature blew up the "motherboard" in my oven. Independent tech who came to repair claims that self-clean should be outlawed. Apparently it is the main cause of most of his service calls.

What a great service to have available to you!

I hear you. I have a great lasagna recipe that the family loves but it is a sh*t ton of work. Plus when I am going to put in the effort to make it, I usually make three 9x9 pans and these days that costs me almost 100.00 for ingredients.

One of my daughters is a passionfruit fanatic - this would be her dream dessert. Fresh passionfruit is almost unheard of in these parts however, I did get a package of frozen passion fruit pulp a while ago. Would you share the recipe for the curd. I've made lemon curd many times and cranberry curd once but passion fruit curd sounds divine.

Good to know. As much as love Mexico, I do miss my white wine when I'm there. I have tried some Spanish wine from Chedraui, but last year sent my sisters a picture of a bottle of wine with one drink out of it and told them that "this is how bad the wine is - I have had this bottle for a week!" Funny but Mexico is one vacation where I drink very little.

We buy farm eggs from neighbours. 6.00 CDN/dozen. No shortage,

Using cottage cheese instead of salad dressing is brilliant. I usually just eat it with fruit or tomatoes and basil or spread on toast with lots of pepper. I really, really like cottage cheese - always have.

Welcome from a fellow Canadian. We are very familiar with the Island - lots of friends and relatives there. My husband landed in Ucluelt from Ontario. He fished commercially for a year or two and then realized that that life would kill him early!

I have two mister bottles - one for olive oil and another for vegetable oil. I bought ones for my daughters for Christmas; you can either pour from the spout or mist. No idea how long they will last - but they weren't expensive. They were from the big A.

Wow - that is calling my name!