Passionate Cooks FREE Cookbook ...

Available NOW!

Very exciting. This free cookbook is available now at www.allromanceebooks.com

https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-passionatecooks-944744-174.html



There are over 150 fantastic recipes in the cookbook. My recipe is the Deliciously Decadent Crab Cakes.

Seriously, these crab cakes are to die for. They are always a huge hit when I bring them to parties. They can be appetizer size or main dish size. Yum, yum!

end of summer and the apocalypse garden

The end of summer is almost here (no matter what my misguided friends think :) ) and I thought you might like a picture of my garden now. It's needs a little fertilizer (yellow leaves give it away). Some things were an amazing success. I've had plenty of zucchini. And one in particular that got away from me. It hid under a leaf right next to the box and I didn't see it until it was the size of a baseball bat (seriously--okay not completely serious. It was as big around as a baseball bat tho).



The lemon cucumber is really yummy. Now something seems to be attacking the leaves and it's looking a little sickly. The beans never really took off. I'm about to harvest them and have one decent side dish. The corn was a bust. I have ears that are small but the ants got the corn so I'll have to figure out what to do about that next year. However, I'm going to have a great front porch decoration with those stalks so all is not lost. :)





I've got watermelon, honey dew, and canteloupe that has yet to fully ripen. And if the damn squirrels would leave my tomatoes alone I'd be ready for my own Tomatina.

We've had a great time eating from our garden already this year. Although I'm thankful we aren't really headed for the apocalypse because while we had some tasty meals, we'd starve if we had to live on my gardening. :) But hey, it's a start.

And I've been bitten by the gardening bug. I'm looking forward to planting my winter crop soon....

The Apocalypse

I've been remiss in my blogging duties. All I can say is it's been a heckuva month. End of school, parental visit, launching a grog, turned in a book, plotting another series...I've been *busy*.

My friend Martha believes in being prepared and her comments a few weeks ago totally spurred me to take action. I started my apocalypse garden. Prior to this awakening, I had a couple of tomato plants in a pot and some herbs by the back door (which if I don't say so myself, for a plant killer are looking pretty good) I've discovered a secret--fertilizing them regularly makes a really big difference. This isn't to say that I didn't fertilize before but clearly I didn't fertilize enough. Now look at these tomatoes!



So this past weekend we (and I use the term 'we' loosely, I picked the stuff out, figured the dimensions, and how to construct then left the actual construction to the husband) built a 3 x 3 planter box. Then today I forced, er, asked the kids to go with me to pick out food plants. We planted green beans, lemon cucumber, zucchini, cherry tomatoes (someone stuck those in the cart when I wasn't looking), green bell pepper, and cantaloupe. And look how great it looks.




Now I just have to convince the family that they will love eating everything in that box. And since I'm prepared for the Apocalypse, I can get back to writing...happy Summer!

food obsessions

why is it that diet change for the worse is easier than change for the better? i've decided its food chaos theory.

i'm trying to be healthier. of course, i hope this will lead to a loss of pounds as i really don't want to have to buy new clothes, but what i really want is to be healthy.

i've eliminated diet coke from my food choices. soda is bad for you, whether diet (aspartame--very bad chemical, my son will tell you it changes to a toxin when heated above 70 odd degrees) or regular (high fructose corn syrup is clearly from the devil according to every health advocate everywhere). but i like fizzy, so i now drink soda water.

there was an interesting study done recently about women and body image. the basic gist of the results that there was little correlation between how women felt about their body, what they were doing about it, and what was reality. many of the women were unhappy with their body image but unwilling to change their diet or their exercise habits. but the world doesn't work that way. you have to be committed to yourself. i think we try to change too much at once and then when we fail (eat whatever it is that we are trying to eliminate) we decided it's too hard and fall back into the easiness of chaos.

so, why obsession? i've figured out that i am not a moderation kinda girl. i either have it or i don't. i don't do well with the only one a week, because slowly that one a week turns into one a day and then one in the morning and one at night, and then what the hell, all day long....

so i'm trying to change...one food at a time. :)

Lisa

ps. one thing i don't like is that i used to take a break from working by going out to get a diet coke from the local fast food place...i miss that mini-break. i had a purpose but it was a quick jaunt and then i was back to work. somehow pouring a glass of tea from my fridge doesn't have the same feeling. oh, well....