New Favorites

New favorite way to chop an onion:

Score the onion horizontally and vertically, then just slide over your mandolin. (You do have a mandolin, right???) Magically, perfectly sized onion pieces appear below.

New favorite way to cook a turkey:
With mayonnaise!

Some thoughts on mayonnaise: So I know certain people exist who do not enjoy foods such as mayonnaise, cream cheese, and sour cream. I don't know how you survive. I'm sure you've heard it before, but you are missing out on A LOT. Mayonnaise may be my current favorite ingredient. (Have I told you that my 30s are going to be my binge decade?) And, just so we're clear, there is only one brand of mayonnaise. That would be Hellmann's. And there's only one type. That would be in a jar with a royal blue lid. Get that squeezable low-fat crap out of here. And to all you mayonnaise haters, I recommend behavior therapy. Life is just better with mayo.

So I made this turkey breast last week, and it was positively perfection. I used chicken stock instead of the wine/beer. I recommend this technique to any and all turks out there. With my leftovers, I paid homage to my old Kentucky home. The Hot Brown honors my roots while simultaneously disgracing my arteries. Gotta love it. Once a year. (Unless it's #bingedecade)

New favorite salad dressing:

Yep, it's got mayonnaise in it. 

Some thoughts on salad dressing: I am generally not a fan of store-bought salad dressing. I tend to get bored with one jar after a while, and then it ends up wallowing in expiration purgatory. When I eat salad, I usually just prescribe to this recipe:
   1 part acid (rice vinegar, citrus juice, or a combination thereof)
   1 part sweet (brown sugar or honey)
   2 parts oil (olive, most frequently)
And then I load it up with a couple of other flavors I happen to on hand: mustard, herbs, ginger, garlic, sesame oil, soy sauce, peanut butter, etc.

I knew I wanted a kale salad last night, but I thought I would need a pretty robust dressing to stand up to the robust greens. I mixed together a squeeze of dijon mustard, the juice of half a lemon, and about a tablespoon of mayonnaise. Drizzle it on the kale, add some tomatoes, capers, and parmesan cheese, and yum!

Championship Samosas

Last Friday evening, I made samosas for the first time. Samosas are savory Indian pastries with potato filling. They were good, and perhaps with some tweaks*, blog-worthy. The implications here are ostensibly minor, right? Except for the fact that Kentucky beat Louisville in the NCAA Sweet 16 game that same evening. 

Fast forward two days to the Elite 8 game versus Michigan on Sunday. What did I do during the game? Munch on the leftover samosas, of course.

So yesterday evening, as I was anxiously wishing away the minutes until the Final 4 game against Wisconsin, I got cooking. It's an unlikely pairing, Kentucky basketball and Indian pastries, but it obviously works, so I'm not questioning the basketball gods.

Now I'm going to give you my recipe for samosas, and while I won't require you to make them Monday night, if Kentucky loses, I will blame you.

Samosas
I've had these at Indian restaurants before and really enjoyed them. I have no idea how they are traditionally made, but this is my version. I think it's pretty tasty.

Ingredients:

2 smallish Yukon gold potatoes
1 T butter
splash of milk
salt
handful of frozen peas
half a small onion, minced
1 carrot, minced
curry powder (maybe 1/2 teaspoon)
garam masala (little more than 1/2 teaspoon)
coriander (dash)
oil
puff pastry (I used about 3/4 of one sheet)
egg wash

Procedure:
1. Start by making mashed potatoes. (I peeled and chunked the potatoes, put them in salted water, and boiled them for about 15 minutes or until soft. Then I drained the water, added the butter, milk, and salt, and then mashed it all together.)

2. While the potatoes are boiling, saute the onion and carrot in the oil on medium heat. Add in the Indian seasonings, and let those cook as well. I apologize for the lack of exact measurements. I would season them way more than you think necessary though, as these seasonings are really for the entire dish.

3. When the potatoes are mashed and the onion/carrot mixture is soft and fragrant, combine them with the peas. Taste, and if you need to season more, go ahead and do it now. (The heat of the potatoes should defrost the peas pretty quickly.)

4. Roll out the pastry and cut into squares. (You can make them big or small. I made some of each.) Spoon some of the potato mixture on the square. Wet the edges of the pastry before you fold them over to get a good seal. Brush the tops with the egg wash, so they gleam when cooked. (This step is not really necessary, so don't go running out to the store if you're out of eggs.)

5. Bake at 400 for about 10-15 minutes, or until they are toasty brown.

6. Go Cats!

*See what I did there, BBN? 

Craft Life

is really similar to thug life, in case you were curious. 

This week is Spring Break, and I decided to exercise my crafting muscles. I completed three projects; two are already hanging on my walls. One is hanging out in the trash bin. Not bad for two days work, right? 

1. Kitty clock, check it! This clock screams crafter 4 daiz, which, by the way, is a new phrase the kids are saying. Aren't you glad to have a high school teacher in your life? Pattiwagon 4 daizzzzzz, yo! I found clock making to be very pain-free. The kit cost $7.99, which I also found relatively pain-free.

 2. Next artwork is blank canvas, purple paint streaks, and gold leaf. I loves it. 

 3. And finally, this is the one salvaged part of my failed craft. I bought six boards boards and painted them shabby chic style. (This technique is super easy - paint one coat white, then rub candle wax all over the edges or anywhere else you want to look rustic, paint gray, and then sand.) I had six signs like this printed at Staples, and I was going to decorate my kitchen entry way with them. Well, this is the only one that turned out, so be it. It reminds me of the subway art I did last year. 

Informal poll, which one is your favorite? And, could you envision something like this on etsy? Asking for a friend. 

Beans, Bears, and Bulletin Boards

Beans:

Being a 31-year-old woman, it seems like every other day someone is popping out another kid. And being the aspiring chef that I am, I always look to take advantage of opportunities to cook for people. So, it actually works out quite nicely for all involved.

I have recently found the best recipe for enchiladas, and it's the perfect thing to take to a growing family. I've made it three times, and each time, I've had to make two pans, lest I eat the one earmarked for Mama before I can give it to her.

I start out by roasting a chicken. (You could also just buy a rotisserie chicken. I don't judge......a lot.)

Shred the meat and combine with a can of green chilies and a block of cream cheese in a pan. Stir so that the cream cheese melts and everything gets nice and combined.

You know the drill: enchilada it all together. Prepare your assembly line. Pour a layer of canned green enchilada sauce onto your baking dish and onto a plate. Dip a tortilla into the enchilada sauce and fill with the meat mixture. Roll up and place into the baking dish. Repeat until you're out of something. Cover the top of the tortillas with enchilada sauce and cheese (I like quesadilla cheese.) Bake it in the oven covered for 20 minutes and then uncovered for 15 minutes, until the cheese is toasty brown and bubbly. I serve it with tomatillo salsa and sour cream mixture. And then I melt.

VARIATION that is >>>>>

In life, I always choose meat. But I think I actually like the black bean version better. Instead of chicken, use two cans of black beans. (I drained the black beans first, then heated them with a little bit of water and red pepper flakes. After that, keep everything the same.) I did not realize this, but black beans + cream cheese = heaven.

Bears:

What's the best bear? The black bear, obviously. Who else is ready for March? While (I guess) I've (kind of) become an Ole Miss fan in recent years, I'll be bleeding blue for the next three weeks, Tiger blue that is. (Blasphemous, yes, but I foresee an early exit for my dear Cats.)

(If you don't get these references, you need more Dwight K. Schrute in your life.)

Bulletin Boards:

Speaking of March...

Treat Yo self

Are there people out there who don't love breakfast? I would put them in the same category as those who don't like rainbows and internet cat videos and baby pandas and Otis Redding. What's wrong with you weirdos? On the weekends, I plan my days around breakfast, thinking about breakfast, planning for breakfast, making breakfast, eating breakfast, thinking about my next breakfast, you get the idea. A Patti Wagon breakfast is the sine qua non of a good weekend. (Take that, SAT vocab section!)

My birthday fell on a Saturday this year, and celebrations commenced on Friday with a long-awaited trip to the grocery. As I walked the aisles, contemplating how I could treat myself, my mind wandered to a much beloved but long absent breakfast from my life: the smoked salmon bagel.

A life with accouterments is a life worth living. Chisel that on my gravestone. 

I had successful Patti Wagon birthday, finally completing my art wall and making a batch of cheese. You can read all about my exploits in cheese making here. 

The ricotta did not disappoint; in fact, it produced such a surfeit of deliciously creamy cheesiness, I have been slipping it into everything I eat, including these Sunday morning pancakes. I used my sourdough pancake recipe but stirred in about 1/2 of the ricotta before cooking them. 

(You know how some people are against gay marriage because they conjecture that men would start marrying dogs? Umm, how would they feel about me marrying these pancakes? 'Cause I'd like to.) 

A Gem at the Bottom of the Barrel

A couple years ago, I documented my attempt at a no spend month. I wasn't entirely successful, as I found myself making excuses to eat out with friends, ergo spending even more money than I would have on groceries.

Well I had a quite large, unexpected expense at the beginning of February (Prius batteries are expensive, yo!), and I decided to give the no spending month another try. Now at the beginning of the month, my cupboards were already bare, so I purchased the following:

18 eggs
1 jar of peanut butter
1 bag of fresh spinach
3 bananas
1 bag of flour
1 box of spaghetti
1 package of shredded mozzarella

I've gone out to eat twice. Once, I did not pay (ahem, #blushing), and the other was a dinner I've had planned for the last month.

And that's been it since February 1st. And I've been making it work. My meals have been less than exciting, and I haven't eaten meat in a couple weeks, but I'm okay with that. Especially because I discovered the most amazing substitute for PB&J. Now I don't have much meat, but I do have A LOT of jam, so much that I've actually gotten sick of it. So I had to make a change for lunches this week. I looked no further than my pantry and a beautiful, glistening can of sweetened condensed milk.

To meet the sandwich of your dreams, take two slices of sourdough bread.  Spread one with peanut butter and the other with a heavy helping of the SCM.  Join the slices together in holy matrimony, let the sandwich sit out for a few hours, and then devour. I'm not claiming this to be the healthiest alternative to jam, but it sure is delicious. The SCM pairs nicely with the peanut butter, but the best part is the soaked through bread. Hmmm...SCM french toast, anyone? Hello, Saturday morning breakfast!

Necessity truly is the mother of invention. Either that or just getting sick of eating jam every day. I also consider austerity a mother of creativity. Speaking of, my mom is doing fabric fast, and it seems she's been very successful with creative use of what she has. You can follow her crafting on Studio Adventures.

Gold Medal Refashion

I got sucked into ice dancing this lazy Sunday afternoon (Yes, I agree.  Whhhhyyyy???  But it happened.)  I'm officially over Candy Crush.  (That is, until I'm not anymore.)  So I found myself looking for something to do.  A huge pile of potential refashions languishing in my sewing room shouted out to me, so I went foraging.  I actually can't even remember where I bought these pieces (perhaps Bargain Barn of Bartlett), but they went very quickly from drab to fab. 

I attacked the t-shirt first, turning it into a tank top. As you can see, I used an existing tank as the pattern and just sewed new seams. I didn't even bother hemming the neckline or arm holes, as it's jersey. We'll just see how long it lasts. 

For the skirt, I ripped out the back zipper, took it in about three inches, sewed the zipper back in and hacked off a couple feet off the bottom. Overall I'm very pleased with the look. 

This is probably how I'll style it. Note, I turned the couple feet I hacked off from the bottom into an infinity scarf. So easy!