I AM BACK, MAYBE

 I had forgotten all about this blogg. That can happen when you are 86! I am thinking about picking it up again. 

A lot has happened in my life since 2018. My family has grown by leaps and bounds - many more grands, greats and great greats.We have done some international travel and if I continue, I will share some of it. 

In 2018 I ran for Congress in Utah as a Democrat and withdrew when a better, more experienced candidate entered the race. We supported Ben McAdams and he won by about 100 votes. Prior to my congressional run, I served as a marketing consultant for Alliance Association Bank, based in Phoenix. We successfully built their UT business by millions. 

We moved from Salt Lake City, UT in 2020 to Tucson AZ during the pandemic and live in the county just outside Oro Valley, in a home that is over 20 years old. It has a lovely view of a valley and overlooks an wash. We get all kinds of local critters visiting. 

I volunteer for Tucson Habitat for Humanity and serve on their Selection Committee and as a Family Partner, coaching those who qualify for homes during about a 10-12 month period while their homes are being built and they put in 450 hours of sweat equity.

My husband Collie Bowers and I live with our dog Red, an emotional support dog, and two cats, Abby and CB, the latest addition to our family. CB also goes by Little Shit and PITA (pain in the ass). Perhaps I will get into some of his adventures.

I took up art about a year and a half ago. I love doing portraits, but am branching out some. I learned to draw, then did charcoal, charcoal painting and now do watercolor.

View from our backyard

Backyard at night

My watercolor of above

CHRISTMAS PROMPTS A STROLL THROUGH MY RECIPE FOLDER

I have never kept an organized book with all of my favorite recipes. Instead, for the past 55 years all the recipes collected from friends, clipped from newspapers and magazines, and, in the last few years, downloaded from the web, have been shoved into an ancient manila folder. 

With a few exceptions, typically for a baked goodie, I follow a recipe once, and never recreate it exactly, rather using it as a guide. I have been told by some who eat something I have make that they really like, "I will never see that again." True, but the surprise is usually better! I call myself a "dump, stir and taste" cook and think that would make a great title for a recipe book someday.

This morning during conversations with my daughters who are doing Christmas cooking (I am not), we discussed the fruitcake that we made as gifts years ago. You can find the simple recipe below. One daughter hated the cake, one loved it and asked for the recipe.

This prompted a quest to find the ancient recipe in my folder, turned a darker and more brownish color than the original manila, stained by who knows what foodstuff ingredients and the passage of time. As I thumbed through stacks of unorganized recipes my cooking life passed before my eyes. I found “Bon Bon’s Fruitcake Recipe,” towards the back, a recipe given to me by a friend when I lived in Hawaii as a young woman. Bon Bon was her daughter’s name.

I made a delightful discovery of a Christmas Eve dinner menu from the 1980s. This was printed in a fairly (for me) legible hand on a page from a legal tablet with a list of 19 family member guests, including two of my children, two sisters and their families, my parents and in-laws, and a brother-in-law and his wife - who was bringing what dish, and a timeline as to when I would prepare the bulk of the traditional turkey and stuffing meal. At the bottom was a shopping list with everything crossed through.

Following the Christmas Eve menu was a similarly organized page for Christmas brunch the next day, also attended by 19 guests. The guest list wast slightly different from the Christmas Eve group. One sister and her family who attended Christmas Eve did not come, but my third sister and her husband came and a son-in-law brought two grandchildren.

Paging through this folder triggered memories of years of feeding family and entertaining friends.  I nostalgically looked at recipes gathered when I worked with home economists that were constantly testing recipes and gathering others from famous restaurants. I noted the changes in food preferences and eating habits. Towards the top was a recipe for humming bird syrup, which sustains our summer deck visitors, and many chicken and pasta recipes. Those containing beef and cheese had inched down into the stack. I need to find that recipe for Peking pot roast, a long ago favorite.

Merry Christmas to all.

Bon Bon's Fruitcake

1/2 lb. S&W glazed cherries

1/2 lb. Glazed pineapple

1 lb. Shelled pecans

1 Cup Sugar

1 Cup flour

4 Eggs

2 Tsp. baking powder

1 Tsp. vanilla.

Cut up fruit with scissors into not-too-small pieces. Cut dates in four pieces. Add chopped pecans. Add sugar and mix. Sift flour. Add sifted flour and baking powder. Add beaten eggs and vanilla and work mixture with hands until fruit is all coated. Press mixture firmly into pans lined with heavy wrapping paper, well greased.

Batter should come to within 1 1/2 inches from top. Bake at 325 degrees until a toothpick comes out clean. (Approximately 1 hour 15 min.) This recipe makes two loaf cakes, small size.

Note: I think I put the batter into three small loaf cake pans for gifts.

POST THANKSGIVING THANKS

I missed being with family yesterday. Collie and I enjoyed a 10:00 AM viewing of SkyFall, the new Bond film along with about 10 other early morning risers.

I cooked Thanksgiving lite while counting my many blessings and enjoyed messages and phone calls from children, grandchildren and sisters. I also did my budgets for 2013 - that always gets me into reality.


This morning it was time to think about those less fortunate and do a little about it. Collie and I will enjoy an afternoon outting.

REFLECTIONS ON FOOD, FALL, FAMILY AND OTHER MATTERS

Inspiration!

This was the first weekend in a year that we have not been traveling or at Rainbow Ranch in Huntsville (understand there was a rainbow there this morning). It was a little strange but comforting to revert to an old routine and also do something new.

This is shaping up to be a foodie day. I fixed Collie one of his favorite breakfasts - sauteed potatoes, onions, turkey sausage, red, yellow and orange peppers, topped with scrambled eggs flavored with smoked paprika. The fruit cup made up of fresh  a summer bounty of melons, blue berries, strawberries and banana, topped with yogurt and mint helped with digestion, served with a side of toast. And of course a cup of Collie's Jack Mormon Coffee Company (In Search of the Celestial Bean) blend made it special.

We ate on the deck and watched the hummingbirds guard their feeder. If we are in the bedroom or living room and their feeder is low, they fly to the windows, look us in the eye and give us a good scolding. It's interesting how they seem to recognize our voices and respond.

Chocolate-Peanut-Butter-Banana Upside-Down Cake

The four extremely ripe bananas with skins darkening and aroma heightening - you know, over ripe and just on the verge of rotten - were screaming at me not to throw them away. I found a recipe for Chocolate-Peanut-Butter-Banana Upside-Down Cake in Food and Wine's Annual 2011 Cookbook. What decadence, with 3 cubes of butter and 3 cups of various sugars, plus the chocolate and peanut butter. Wish family were near to indulge with.

Collie has a wonderful afternoon planned for us - a film (our first since Sundance in January) and dinner at Flemming's.

This last week I made two trips to the Ogden Valley. The trees are just beginning their fall color show. There is that "fall is in the air" feeling that heightens each day.The temperature is cooler. All this seems to make me want to reflect and nest, cook, sleep, read and fight exercising. I need to beware of sloppy habits, like too much of the wrong foods (that cake cooling in the kitchen) and being a couch potato. There is always too much to do in a day, but I do I deserve to slow down for a day or two.


Tuesday I have my second breast biopsy and have had some feelings of anxiety lately. Collie asked if it was in connection with the surgery. I will have a general anesthetic for the first time since meniscus surgery in 2003. Perhaps, but I am sleeping well at night and feeling quite centered.

As I close this post, I am thinking about my cousin Sue's husband Ed, who has been hospitalized for cancer. He wants to go home, but so far, the medical team has not been able to control the pain. Ed is in our prayers daily.

First Day of Labor Day Vacation on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina

Thursday, September 1, 2011.

We arrived in Savannah, GA from our home in Salt Lake City, UT, landed at the charming Savannah/Hilton Head airport and passed through a plantation-like courtyard to baggage claim. Milton, a gracious porter helped us retrieve bags, escorted us out to the rental car, loaded everything in the trunk and gave us directions to a local seafood restaurant. We ate our way through a southern fried meal of hush puppies, scallops, and oysters, all dipped in a either a spicy Utah-like fry sauce or tarter sauce. This was digested with iced tea and lots of fresh lemon wedges. Ugh!

Our waitress was a young woman training to be a nurse. We asked her about eating at Paula Dean's, the lovely southern bell cook who is on the Food Network. After hearing her report of the crowds, confirmed by locals from an adjoining booth, eating there slipped from our priority list.

Drove to Hilton Head Island and checked into the Metropolitan Hotel.