1. Debbie and I hosted family dinner tonight and I could hardly wait to get going on preparing the food. One part was really easy. Debbie had already combined whole kernel corn, cream-style corn, sour cream, butter, and corn muffin mix, and poured it in a baking pan, topped with grated cheese. All I had to do was pop this corn casserole in the oven.
I had decided over the weekend that I would, for the first time, serve up baked apple pork chops for dinner. The preparation was simple. I had four pork chops on hand and went to Yoke's and bought a couple more. I left them out for a while to reach room temperature. Later in the afternoon, I peeled, cored, and chopped up some apples. I also measured out the brown sugar and cinnamon I'd need and chopped up some butter into small pieces.
When the magic moment arrived, I put the four pork chops in a baking dish and two in our cast iron pan. I seasoned them with salt, pepper, and rosemary. I covered the dish and pan with aluminum foil and popped the pork chops in the oven at 350 degrees for just over a half an hour.
I took them out, covered the meat with apples and sprinkled brown sugar and cinnamon on the chops and put butter pieces over that.
Now the chops baked uncovered for another 15-20 minutes and were ready to eat.
2. I also prepared tonight's cocktail. It's called a Gold Rush. All I had to do was combine honey and boiling water to make a honey syrup, add the juice of about five lemons, and then add about a cup and a half of George Dickel Rye Whisky. I transferred the drink from a small bowl to a glass pitcher, put plastic wrap over the top of the pitcher, and let it sit in the fridge until it was time to serve them.
At that point, I put ice in the cocktail shaker, poured the cocktail into the shaker, shook it until it was mighty cold, and poured the cocktail over a large ice cube in everyone's glass.
It's a good drink, nicely balancing the citrus bite of the lemon with the spicy nature of the rye whisky with the sweetness of the honey syrup.
3. Paul is in rehearsal for an upcoming production in Wallace, but Christy, Carol, and Molly all arrived at 5:30. For an appetizer, Carol and Molly brought a platter of celery, carrots, cucumbers, cauliflower, and other vegetables accompanied by ranch dip and included some bread and butter pickles. Christy contributed a bottle of Merlot and a white wine. For dessert, I served us each some vanilla ice cream and we passed around a jar of Trader Joe's Cinnamon Bun spread to add to it.
Today, Christy met with the participants in a writing workshop she's leading. She was stoked. The workshop got off to a roaring start. She told us about how she got the workshop rolling and what general kinds of things they talked about and tried out together.
There's a lot of teaching going on in our family right now! Carol and Paul are both leading projects. Paul is subbing at the high school once in a while. Debbie is teaching third grade full time at Pinehurst Elementary. Christy got this workshop going.
Any teaching I do this fall will be self-education as I inch my way back to taking and editing photographs again and continue to teach myself more about movies.
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