Eat your Greens for Good Luck in the New Year

This Gumbo works nicely in a crockpot. Serve in soup bowls with Rice and Louisiana style Hot Sauce. Easy to do and tastes fine.

Throw it together and let it simmer for hours. Yes, you can do it on the top of the stove, but why? This is more you-have-to-cook-dinner-365-days-a-year cooking.

Forgive the brevity and lack of direction - sometimes I get these recipes written down on the backs of envelopes. The Greens are the best part of this Gumbo for my taste. Green for Good Luck.  

Gumbo Verde

1 pound smoked or garlic Sausage, sliced in bite size pieces

2 cans of Navy Beans

1 can Beef Consomme with 2 cups Water

1 package frozen chopped Mustard Greens (10 ounces)

1 Onion, chopped

1 Bell Pepper, chopped

2 clove Garlic, chopped (optional)

Salt and Pepper to taste

Saute the Sausage with Onion, Bell Pepper and Garlic. Combine Sausage mixture with the Consomme and Water, Beans, Greens. Add Salt and Pepper to taste. Simmer slowly until the Beans become very soft and the Gumbo is thickened thereby.

Feel free to substitute cannellini or pink beans. You can use turnip greens or collards.

Potluck Panic? Make Xmas Eve Salad.

This is the time of year when Folks throw ( office, church, garage, AA, bowling team, study group, etc.) POTLUCK parties. That can be a problem if you cannot cook, or if you are too lazy to cook much, and some other fortunate Soul snags the Chips & Dip or Beer & Soda contributions.

This Salad can be your saving grace. You do not have to cook but only prepare the fruit with care and combine carefully. Everyone will think you are a whizbang gourmand. And if you are Vegan, you will have something you can eat. Use the videos on you tube on how to cut up fruit or not. There is more than one way to skin a Potluck. Happy Holidays!

Ensalada de Noche Buena

4 small Apples, cored and sliced
4 medium Oranges, peeled and separated in sections
3 cups of canned Pineapple, drained
4 small Bananas, sliced
3 tablespoons Sugar
2 tablespoons Lemon Juice
Romaine Lettuce leaves
2 cups canned Beets, drained
1/4 cup Peanuts

Combine the first six ingredients in a large bowl, cover and refrigerate until they are cold. At the moment of serving cover a salad bowl with the Lettuce leaves, mix carefully the Fruits and the Beets, and place the mixture over the Lettuce. Sprinkle Peanuts on top and serve immediately. Serves 12.

NOTE: Always wash your hands before you prepare food. Be sure to drain the canned ingredients thoroughly.
Some folks, my friends remind me, may be allergic to peanuts. So I would offer them on the side, roasted and salted, as a garnish. 

Merry Christmas Megan Pasty Pudding!

I have not watched even a clip from The View in a year. I cannot bear to look at Megan McCain or hear her petulant voice. I had to watch this one because I heart Nancy Pelosi.

Truth? I am a Roman Catholic. I want to bury my size 8 shoe, with ferocious joy, so far up Ms. Fatty Tit's dupa my shoelaces would tickle her uvula. There. I said it. doG forgive me. Tell your truth and shame the Devil.

I know - I am an evil body shamer. An rude intolerant slut. Sue me. I am also bipolar. On a bad day and presented with the opportunity, I might succumb to an evil impulse. I must avoid the "occasion of Sin." Ergo I do not watch the show. No point in arousing My Beast. Discretion is the better part of valor.

I wish my family and church had been the kind of Roman Catholics who taught "heart full of love." I think that oversight was a sort of "lace curtain Catholic" jawn. I remember terrifying Nuns and princely Priests. The Priests had these cords with big knots around their waists they beat themselves with at night, we were told meaningfully. All the better to beat you with, my wee Pumpkin. No one actually ever hit me. I was scared all the same. 

There were so many of us kids. Nuns had little clickers we were taught to obey. Click click = genuflect. Click click - stand. I went to Bethany Presbyterian to be a Girl Scout. I was taught Art and Basketmaking by Republican Miss Petty of the Junior League, social justice warrior. I remember sane Republicans. 

I have no shame. God loves me absolutely. I had to learn that from Nancy Horan, AA and the Quakes. God bless us everyone. Merry Christmas. I am working at Peace on Earth. It has to start with me.

Organic Rum and Jasmine Liqueur

I am gifting myself with a bottle of organic Jasmine Liqueur this Christmas. And one of dark Rum. Corporate distillers use additives that ordinary folks would not use, if we made our own spirits.

Making liqueurs and wine at home used to be common in American life as this scene from Arsenic and Old Lace attests. An excellent cookbook which has a chapter on home liqueur making is Spoonbread and Strawberry Wine.

Greenbar Organic Distillery makes their own Vodka, Gin, Tequila, Liqueurs and Bitters without additives, using classic distillery techniques and all organic ingredients.

A bottle of anything Greenbar makes would be a welcome hostess gift. I have nothing to gain from any transaction you make with Greenbar beyond the success of the company. Quality counts.

TRU Jasmine Martini

Ingredients:

1 1/4 oz TRU vodka
1 oz FRUITLAB jasmine liqueur
1/4 oz simple syrup

Glass Types: (Martini/Coupe)

Instructions:

Shake + strain into a martini glass
Garnish with an edible flower