Love

August 16, 2010: Birote Salado Guadalajara

Dave served his mission in Guadalajara back in the mid to late 90s. He was really skinny before his mission. Then he discovered these babies. These are Birote, otherwise known as of yesterday to me as "Beer Bread". They are very specific to Guadalajara, apparently, and one of his colleagues at work told him the real name because he had been trying to make bolillos. It's in Spanish, and then even converted it is in grams and milliliters, so it took the poor guy a long time to make them.

I call it beer bread because the recipe calls for beer. This was entertaining even in itself, since he doesn't drink beer, and has never bought beer before Saturday night. I asked my trusty neighbor what he should get and he gave me a fancy name (that I ignored because it sounded expensive). Then he said, "You could get Coors Light and be fine." Ahhh, that was familiar. Except Dave came home with Busch something or other. And then discovered that it was non-alcoholic.

Leave it to Dave.

So then he had to go back and ended up buying Budweiser. So we now have a six pack of non-alcoholic beer and a five pack of Bud. Good for slugs and snails...or birote.

These suckers take a long time to make. You have to mix all of the ingredients and THEN let it sit for 18 hours to have enough acidity. He had to count the hours so that it would coincide with coming home from Church. By the time dinner was done and the bread was done it was 9:00 pm. Almost 24 hours later and we had 5 mini-footballs of bread to show for it. Kind of like gardening when you get squash bugs.

Anyway, he forced me, literally sat me down and forced me to try the bread. And I'm on a diet (which I am always on) and it was 9:00 pm and he was asking me to eat BREAD? Is he completely insane?

I got out the butter.

And let me tell you, the calories I am going to have to burn today to make up for it makes it completely worth it. If this bread didn't take so dadgum long to make, I would have him make it for me every week and I would give up my waistline (what waistline?) for it. Instead I think it will just be one of those special occasion breads. Something to look forward to.

July 7, 2010: Eight Years of Liking Each Other...and Produce

Eight years ago today, Dave picked me up at the airport late one night. I was flying back to Virginia after spending Independence Day in Utah. On the way home he said, "I like you, and I want to date you, but not exclusively, yet." I'm paraphrasing, but he had someone else in mind that he thought he should probably ask out before devoting himself to me heart and soul for eternity....To Be Continued.

Below is are updated pictures of my garden. It's too close to the house and I think the stucco is making things too hot. I should be growing jalapenos. Next year I am moving them to a better location. I have harvested some of the lettuce heads over the past few weeks, and now they are growing back again.

The onions will be ready soon I think.

Second round of strawberries

Lots o' basil, a big head of romaine, and kale galore. I put a leaf of kale in my smoothie every morning for extra whatever it is that kale has.

Green beans and more basil. I think we'll be having basil in something tonight for dinner.

Tomatoes are starting to grow, green beans, onions, romaine, and a bell pepper. And more kale.

This garden isn't doing as well, but has zukes and stuff in it. I think it actually has too much shade because it doesn't really get much sun until 10am and by 4pm it is in the shade again. Next year...

My early girl has one lonely tomato. This is compost, peat moss and vermiculite. It should be growing like crazy! I also have used miracle grow on it. Not sure what the deal is.

This tree has finally really taken off. It is supposed to ultimately be a shade tree for our patio and I think it might actually get there by next summer.