Well, if the new steroids I’m taking for poison ivy start kicking in as they’re expected, we’re still planning to host our 2nd monthly Casa de Blundell Dinner Club tomorrow night.
Tomorrow night’s theme is “My Big Fat Mediterranean Dinner.”
I’m looking forward to it. I’m a big fan of Greek, Lebanese and Mediterranean meals. It will be fun to see what everyone comes up with.
We’re planning to fix Fattoush (one of my favorite meals in Nigeria) as well as Kofta – another favorite while I was in Nigeria.
Funny how my favorite meals in the middle of Africa were Lebanese 😉 although I did love the red stew we had during several meals.
We’ll let you know how everything turns out – as long as the steroids kick in.
Category: eats
recipes and dinner club news and general eats from Casa de Blundell
Laurie showed me up
“Let’s just say we know who is going to make the pancakes for our kids when the time comes.”
Keeping things weird
Well they always say “Keep Austin Weird” – I don’t know if we did that but we did keep our weekend weird.
If I could summarize in a line or two, I’d say, “All Because of You.”
We had a number of disappointments this weekend but each of them were things that weren’t detrimental and I had a lot of fun because it was all with Laurie.
We planned to head to Austin nearly a month ago but with our busy schedules we avoided committing to the trip.
Finally, Thursday afternoon I think we both just wanted to get away and committed to the trip.
The weekend started off off-schedule as I had hoped to get off work a little early but ended up working all the way till 3:15.
We didn’t hit the road till 4 but it wasn’t detrimental to our trip. We hoped to arrive in Austin between 7 and 8 p.m. and made it to the hotel by 7:30.
After checking in we were a bit disappointed with the room because of a musty/moldy smell in the room and the fact that it was advertised as a “corner room.” They meant corner room. It was in the corner of the hallway, not the corner of the building. We had a “fabulous view of Interstate 35” and all the traffic we had just sat in.
We laughed about it and then our friends Wayne and Kara came and picked us up for dinner.
We had a great time with them at Matt’s El Rancho Restaurant on the south side of Austin.
After dinner Laurie and I went out and snapped some late night photos of the capital. She got some great shots of the capital.
We got back to the hotel and got ready to head down to the hot tub and pool – one of the main reasons we picked the hotel.
Just our luck – the pool and hot tub were drained so they could “renovate” the pool area.
Great. Excellent. Wonderful. So much for paying extra money for a nice hotel that’s “situated in the heart of Austin.”
We weren’t impressed and probably won’t spend the night at one of their hotels again. But oh well. Another thing to laugh about.
We did enjoy a fairly quiet night and sleeping in a bit in the morning.
We got up around 9:30 and checked out and started our day in Austin.
Right off the bat we went and grabbed some photos at a cool guitar outside Austin’s Whole Foods Market.
Then we were on the road to our first Geocache hunt of the day.
We searched for 20-30 minutes once we got to the location and had no luck. Bummer but we had a good time hunting and laughing about it.
It’s hidden somewhere around this cool gate at the Austin Botanical Gardens.
Luckily we avoided these guys while we were hunting…
After our unsuccessful hunt we headed over to Frank and Angie’s for some “great freakin’ pizza.”
Laurie had a basic 10″ cheese pie and I had a great 10″ pie with sliced tomatoes instead of sauce, provolone cheese, portables mushrooms and fresh spinach leaves on top. It was a great meal to top of our visit to Austin.
We headed back out on the trail for one more Geocache before we headed back.
This time we were a whole lot luckier as the rain held off until we were back in the car and we actually found this one – even though it was full of water and the log book was soaked through and through.
It was in a great location in the Austin Nature & Science Center near 6th Street and Mopac. It’s a very cool place and I think our nephew Jake would love it. Brooklyn would probably love digging for dinosaur bones in the sand as well.
After our dig we decided it was time to head out before the rains started and we began our trek back north along I-35.
Of course along the way we made a number of stops including Ikea – which could be a post all in it’s own – the Round Rock Outlet Mall and a tour of my old stomping grounds in Belton, Texas and UMHB.
After all our side trips it was nearly 4 hours later and time for dinner around 7 p.m.
We made a stop in Waco to eat at a local burger place and refreshed our tastebuds before we hit the road again.
The trip home was uneventful but fun as we talked about the weekend and various other topics.
We pulled back into the parking lot at Casa de Blundell around 9:30 p.m. or so and were glad to be home.
But then it wasn’t long until Laurie realized her purse was missing. The last place she had seen it and used it was in Waco at the burger place – now 65 miles south of us.
We immediately called the restaurant, unloaded, grabbed some caffeine and headed back south.
Laurie took the wheel this time and I think we made it in record time, arriving just after the restaurant closed.
We got her purse back but quickly realized that while someone had turned it in, they had helped themselves to whatever they wanted inside the purse. A LARGE amount of cash that had been given to us as wedding gifts was missing as well as Laurie’s cell phone. It was indeed a sickening feeling.
We checked with the employees to see if they had any further information but as things go, we had our suspicions about who probably took things.
Luckily they took the cash and not any debit cards or credit cards. We did however quickly begin canceling the cards in her wallet in case they were “smart enough” to write the numbers down.
But through it all – it could have been worse. If I’m going to be “robbed” I’d rather have it done while I’m not looking than at gunpoint or knife point. Also, they could have gotten a hold of our debit card or credit card and cause a lot more damage and luckily the cash was simply extra money we had set aside for weekend trips and random fun purchases so it won’t hurt our monthly budget any with the loss.
We decided that apparently they needed the money a lot worse than we did and God just wanted us to hold on to it for awhile so they could get it when they really needed it. I guess that’s the best way to look at these types of situations. Cause getting angry and punching someone or something just doesn’t seem to bring the phone or money back – unfortunately.
I was so proud of Laurie and the way she calmly handled herself as well. I know she’s just as upset as I am and she remained cool and calm through the ordeal. We finally made it back home around 11:30 and quickly crashed into our own beds.
Today’s been a somewhat normal day — compared to the past two days. Nothing eventful other than the power going out several times, buying a new router so Laurie’s Mac can access our Wi-Fi network again, trying to set the router up while the power keeps turning off and well… just another weekend at Casa de Blundell.
I’ve definitely gone on long enough for one post. Laurie just came downstairs and kissed me good night. I guess it’s time to put this weird weekend to a rest.
In the meantime be sure and check out photos from the weekend on Laurie’s Flickr page.
Love you Laurie – glad I got to spend the weekend with you. It was fabulous – all because of you.
Update: Laurie now has her thoughts on this weekend as well. Check her blog for more.
Jonathan sets out the napkins
Jonathan sets out the napkins
Originally uploaded by Jonathan D. Blundell.
We just wrapped up our first monthly “dinner club” at Casa de Blundell. We had a great time 13 adults and one baby Gracelyn. Our last guests left just before 11 p.m. and we enjoyed some great Mexican food made by all. Aaron and I also partook in some good imported Mexican beer before it was all said and done.
Tonights menu:
Cheese poppers and bacon wrapped jalapeños – Shane and Sarah
Chips, queso and guacamole – Richard and Amber
Beef enchiladas – Blundells
Chicken enchiladas – Josh and Shalyn
Beef fajitas and guacamole – Smiley and Shari
(amazing) Apple cinnamon wraps with vanilla ice cream – Aaron and Keri
We were surprised we were able to get 13 people seated in our humble abode, but we did it and then played a game of Boxers or Briefs afterwards.
We also took two of our old digital cameras and set them out for everyone to snap random photos as they saw fit. One of them has a busted LCD screen on it – so it made for some fun interesting pics. You can see them all on my Flickr account.
A great time had by all I do believe. We’re ready to start planning our next monthly dinner club meeting for next month. Check your e-mail you might be invited. Spaces are limited – we’ll start drawing names from the hat again soon.
Broccoli Chicken Dijon
Here’s a recipe I think we’re going to try out on Monday night. Looks good – and it’s South Beach Phase 1,2 & 3 acceptable.
Broccoli Chicken Dijon
1/2 cup reduced-sodium chicken broth
1 Tbsp. lite soy sauce
1 Tbsp. olive oil
4 cups broccoli florets
1 clove garlic, minced
1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into thin strips
2 Tbsp. Dijon Mustard
MIX chicken broth and soy sauce; set aside.
HEAT oil in large skillet on medium-high heat. Add broccoli and garlic; cook and stir until crisp-tender. Remove from skillet; cover to keep warm.
ADD chicken to skillet; cook and stir 3 to 4 min. or until cooked through. Add broth mixture; mix well. Bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low. Stir in mustard until well blended. Return broccoli mixture to skillet; mix lightly. Cook until heated through, stirring
Cream Soda
Jonathan measures out the special sweatner
Originally uploaded by Jonathan D. Blundell.
From our kitchen to yours…
Well the Cream Soda is now tucked away in our secret brewery, AKA pantry. We have to wait and see if it’s any good.
It takes 24-48 hours to brew/ferment, depending on how fast acting the yeast is.
We’ll let you know how it turns out.
Here’s the recipe we used:
1 cup of sugar
4 tbps of vanilla – we used 4.5-5 tbps to cover any yeast flavor
4 small pinches of yeast (about 1/4 tsp)
pour the ingredients into a 2 liter bottle
fill the rest of the bottle with water and shake until the ingredients have dissolved
screw the tap on tightly
leave the bottle to sit and ferment for 24-48 hours (or until the bottle feels hard when squeezed)
open and enjoy