Joe and Betsy

Looks like we disappeared for a week, sorry about that. I’m not gonna lie and say I missed blogging, though. I’d much rather sum up everything in one giant post than blog every day…. so here we go!

Last weekend we took a trip to Jekyll Island, GA to visit with Joe’s side of the family and enjoy the heat of the south. It was 95+ degrees nearly every day so we did a lot of pool lounging and relaxing. It was wonderful.

Here’s some trip highlights (mostly food)…

Low country boil.

Peach cobbler.

Tomatoes! Fresh from Don Corleone’s garden. They’re a little ahead of us in terms of produce this time of year.

Crabs & oysters from the Rah Bar.

And a trip to the Georgia Sea Turtle Center.

It was a great trip that ended with an unexpected 6 hour layover in Atlanta due to some crazy thunderstorms. We made it back to the ‘burgh around 3 am on Wednesday morning and were happy to be home instead of sleeping in the airport.

Luckily Wednesday is our CSA pick up day so later that afternoon we got a box of goodies. We also stopped by the farmer’s market at Phipps for some extras.

Sonny is absolutely LOVING having a kitchen full of greens. We constantly find him gnawing on them.

We got kale this week so Kale & Potato Hash made two appearances, as well as some strawberry rhubarb compote. This is just a sliver of all the wonderful produce we have.

On our back deck our own little container garden is starting to flourish. Everything is very green at this point but any day now we should have lots of colorful blossoms, cucumbers, tomatoes and strawberries everywhere.

Top Row: Cucumbers (first 2 photos), Tomato plants (last 2 photos)
Second Row: Parsley, rosemary, thyme and cilantro
Third Row: Basil, oregano, flowers (not sure what kind), and 2nd basil plant
Fourth Row: Flowers (first 2 photos, not sure what kind), dill, and our strawberry plant upside down

I’m kind of obsessed with our little garden and move my pots around several times every day to get the most sunlight. We’ve grown stuff in containers for the past 4 years but this is our biggest and best attempt yet. I’ll keep you updated!

And lastly, our new activity from last night: Sidewalk chalk drawings.

It was a beautiful night and this was the perfect activity to combine with our evening walk.

I drew the world and some random fruit while Joe did a robot and Homer Simpson.

Twas a great time.

See you soon, I’ll try not to let another week go by before you hear from us.

Last night was a beautiful night so we decided to make some magic. All the tools we needed were found right in our kitchen.

In addition to these fancy items we had a roasting pan filled with water, dish soap, and a bit of sugar. Don’t ask me why there’s sugar in there – I just followed the directions from several websites on how to make homemade bubbles.

Bubble love!

This week’s CSA was glorious. Lots more greens and radishes but also strawberries, broccoli, chard, scallions, potatoes and herbs. A nice healthy bunch of parsley was my inspiration for a dish I’ve always admired but never made…

Tabbouleh! Delicious, simple and satisfying. It’s almost a raw food too!

I also made rosemary focaccia in an effort to use up our gigantic herb collection.

We’ve been eating salads galore and I need to start taking more photos of our CSA haul. We love it so far!

Earlier this week we met up for lunch at a new hot spot in town, the Conflict Kitchen.

If you’re not familiar the Conflict Kitchen is a storefront next to the Waffle Shop in East Liberty and is a project by some people at CMU. It’s a take-out place that serves one dish from a country that the U.S. is currently in conflict with. It’s current country is Iran but I think they’re going to be switching it up every couple months or so.

The dish you can get is the kubideh sandwich.

The sandwich is kubideh (spiced ground beef I believe) in freshly baked barbari bread with onion, mint, and basil. It was a bit small but very tasty.

I love the building facade and their whole design scheme. Can’t wait to see what country is next!

I recommend making your way over to East Liberty and giving it a try!

A couple treats from our cookout the other night.

Strawberry Rhubarb pie from Food Glorious Food.

And homemade strawberry shortcake courtesy of one of our guests. With milk poured over top!

Later that night we also cracked open a new fruit: the coconut.

A drill was the appropriate tool to make some holes for drinking…

Blech. I was not a fan of the milk, room temperature coconut water.

After a few failed attempts with hammer and screwdriver, Joe’s brother busted the coconut open with brute force.

The meat was then scraped out and we all had a taste.

Quite an entertaining experience, to say the least.

Last night we headed out as soon as Joe got home from work with plans to pick strawberries at a farm out in the suburbs. We ended up making it there 5 minutes after the picking had ended and were turned away with frowns on our faces. It was a lot of driving for nothing!

We ended up getting a bit lost on the way home and decided this ice cream joint would be our new thing.

We both got flurries and they were extra delicious.

A failure that turned into a semi-success.

On the drive home the sugar got me pretty jacked up so I started dancing in the car which started a dance party in the car in front of us! I guess they could see me in the rear view mirror. All 4 guys in the car started dancing with me and waving their arms around. It was pretty hilarious and made up for all the time we had spent in the car.

That’s all for now, see you soon!