Christmas Break

Hi everyone! I hope you are all doing well and having a great holiday season! I want to apologize for not posting much since Thanksgiving. Since then and now, I have had finals and now Christmas break which has made it hard to cook meals because so much is going on. I am back in Denver right now until after the 1st of January. Once I get back to Laramie in January and school starts up again I will absolutely start the cooking and sharing again! Until then, I wish all of you a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year!

Dinner With The Hughes Clan

Dinner with the Hughes Clan

Cheesy and spicy

So good you'll want to eat more

Save room for dessert

Hi everybody! This is an extra special dinner post because on Thursday night we had Juli's family with us! They are in town for Juli's graduation! She graduated yesterday from the University of Wyoming with a Family and Consumer Sciences degree; congratulations Juli! So it was a real treat go get to meet all of her family and have them all here to celebrate. So upon their arrival, Juli prepared a fabulous dinner for everyone. She made sausage and broccoli pasta with warm bread, roasted garlic, and a crunchy green salad. It was incredibly tasty. And for dessert, we enjoyed a Marie Calendar's raspberry pie and vanilla ice cream. A complete meal that was perfect for hungry travelers.

Earlier this semester Juli made this dinner, so I won't post the recipe because it is already in a previous blog titled, "S-s-s-sausage and Broccoli Penne with Crusty Crust Bread". As for the salad, it was made with Romain lettuce, carrots, celery, tomatoes and croutons. The bread was a loaf of sourdough that I cut in half and buttered the inside. Then I put the halves back together and wrapped it in foil and placed it in the oven at around 400 degrees for about 20 minutes. By doing this the butter melted on the inside and the outside crust hardened a bit. It was the perfect crunchy-soft combo.

As a spread for the bread, we had roasted garlic that had a flavor that was out of this world! What Juli did was spray a glass baking dish with some non-stick cooking spray, and place whole bunches of garlic in it. About 5 or so. Then she placed it in the oven at 425 degrees and roasted them until they were tender and began to brown slightly. Once out of the oven, she cut them up in small pieces so that they could be spread easily over the bread. Roasting garlic in the oven is special because it does something to the garlic that gives it a great flavor, and the potency of it is minimized.

The real highlight about dinner though was not the food. It was all the people that we had joining us for dinner. We had: Juli's mom Judy, dad Randy, brother Willie and his girlfriend Miranda, grandma Pat, Aunt Andrea, Aunt Chris and Sam. It was the biggest dinner we've done here this year, and it was one of the most fun! I loved meeting everyone in Juli's family, and they are so welcoming and some of the greatest people I know.

Dinner that night was filled with laughs, stories and joy. We talked about all sorts of things and everyone shared funny stories they had from the past and it was great to see everyone smiling and having fun. We sat around the table well after dinner and eventually watched a video of Juli when she was on the show "Figure It Out" on Nickelodeon. It was back in 1998 and she sure dressed like it! The concept of the show was that there were about 4 judges that had to guess what your "talent" was. They had 3 rounds of 1 minute to ask you yes or no questions, and then from that had to 'figure it out' as to what your talent was. Juli's talent was that her family constructed a maze in their cornfield. So the judges had to guess, and they couldn't figure it out! So Juli won the grand prize which was a trip to Florida and got to swim with dolphins and all that jazz. But the video is hilarious and priceless, so it was necessary to watch with her whole family.

I really loved dinner this night and it is so simple to make, and the flavor is dynamite. Added with the salad, bread, and family it's a complete meal! I recommend trying this dinner, and again the recipe is posted on a post from October titled "S-s-s-sausage and Broccoli Penne with Crusty Crust Bread".