A new identical fan cost only 39.99, however,  I ended up spending much less money for something better looking.  Here’s what I did:

• Removed the fan completely.
• Cleaned all grease and dust from the fan with a household degreaser and an old toothbrush.
• Discarded the fan blades and glass shades.
• Using thin cardboard and painter’s tape, cover all electrical components and moving parts on the fan base.
• Apply a coat of spray on metal primer
• Apply two to three coats of a textured spray paint.
• Replace the fan shades that best fits the room.
• Purchase a sew set of blades.  Paint them if you like.  To achieve an even application, use spray paint and a small foam roller.

Here’s the view from the railroad tracks behind my house.  I have a hill filled with buckthorn, honeysuckle, small trees, and weeds.  At the very bottom a 10 foot r basin to divert water from the tracks.   Depending on precipitation the basin may be full.  The slope is prone to erosion so I have to use caution when making large scale changes on the hill.

In past summers, I’ve removed only a small percentage of trees and weeds from the hill.  This year will be different.  Sometime in late April I’m going to remove all of the unwanted plants, shrubs, and trees on the hill.  Since buckthorn is difficult to get rid of, I’ll have to use herbicides on the stumps.

Once everything is removed I’ll sow a cover crop of oat seeds mixed with short grass prairie seeds.  I purchased my seeds from Prairie Moon Nursery which is based out of south eastern Minnesota.  I found both their staff and website to be very helpful.  You can download their seed catalog here.

I chose the Short Grass Echinacea Seed Mix, which should look something like this in a few years.

The stores are always packed on sale days, but everyone leaves with a bag full of something.  Anyway, one President’s Day sale I found 2 yards of lightweight plaid wool for $4.50 and couldn’t resist buying it.

I decided to use the wool to make a lightweight fall coat.  Instead of buying a pattern, I drafted one off of a coat I already owned.  (I haven’t decided if this was a good idea or not…we’ll see when it is finished.)

Here’s what I’ve done sofar:

• Made a rough pattern by pinning newspaper onto the coat and tracing the seams, section by section.

• With the paper still pinned on, I carefully cut around my tracing lines, smoothing the paper over the contours of the coat with my hand.

• I traced each newspaper section on to pattern trace,  adding an inch around all seams.

Here’s what I ended up throwing into a 9 by 9 baking dish:

1 small onion, chopped

1 1/2 cup matchstick carrots

1 clove garlic, minced

1/2 tbsp canola oil

3 chicken breasts, fat removed, cut into 1 inch cubes

1 can of reduced fat cream of mushroom soup

1/2 cup 0% greek yogurt

1 cup chopped swiss chard stems

1 cup shreaded swiss chard leaves

3 cups of cooked stuffing

Head canola oil in a non-stick skillet,add garlic, onions, and carrots, cook until softened.

Put all ingredients into the baking dish and cover with stuffing.

Bake in a 350 degree oven for 45 min, or until bubbly.

Nori ended up eating three servings! He told me that if I were to open up a hot dish restaurant in Japan I could maybe be rich.

I’ve been very busy and have a lot of backlogged posts.

Here are a few of the things I’m working on lately:

Honey Mustard Dressing:

2 TBSP homemade spicy mustar

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2 TBSP honey – I use Country Gold Clover Honey from Wolf Honey Farm. It’s sold at the St. Paul Farmer’s Market.
Juice of 1 Lemon
1 TBSP olive oil
1 TBSP flavored or cider vinegar (I recommend The Golden Fig’s vinegars which are also sold at the St. Paul Farmer’s Market)
1 TSP salt

Combine all the ingredients in a canning jar or something with a tight lid and shake it up, baby.

The dressing turned out fresh and tangy. I would not recommend using any mustard greens with this dressing…way too much spicy mustard flavor.

I threw the dressing on what I had in the refrigerator and garden: Lettuce, scallions, parsley, avocado, yellow pepper, tomato, flax seeds, goat cheese, a little shredded Parmesan. Turned out well and looked nice too.

In the summer entertaining issue from Cook’s Illustrated there are a variety of recipes for middle easternish appetizers like tabbouleh, falafel, humus, and baba ghanoush.  I’ve been putsing around with these recipes for a few weeks with much success, especially with tabbouleh.

After the first round of making tabbouleh, I started experimenting with ingredients and other online recipes to see if I could get something I liked better.

Here’s what I ended up with:

1 cup bulgur wheat
juice from 2 lemons
3 cups parsley leaves
2 small tomatoes – minced
1 red onion
5 scallions
15 fresh mint leaves
3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp sea salt
1 TSP cayenne pepper

I thought the red onion looked nice, also I really like onions. Most recipes I found don’t call for any.
To make the dish simply rinse the bulgur in a strainer and drain. Throw it in a bowl with the juice of two lemons and wait 45 min. Cut or mince all the remaining ingredients and throw them in the bowl.

It tasted fine to me but I wanted to get a more educated opinion, so I called up the man who runs LuLu’s Deli at 1626 Selby. I see him often because I enjoy his spinach pies. He said he would be willing to try the tabbouleh and let me know his thoughts. He told me good job but next time I would need more olive oil, lemon, and tomato as well as use much less onion.

After cooking I laundered a few pieces of bark cloth which I picked up at Swank Interiors. If you have an hour or so to spare I would highly recommend going to their store to browse. It’s just like stepping into a time machine. Now I have to decide what I want to do with the bark cloth…maybe make a dress or do some interior decorating in the living room.

The dress took around 13 hours of work from start to finish. This is far more than I spend on most projects. Special thanks to the Stash Whackers who helped me figure out how to drape the front and straps.

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Saturday’s lunch consisted of a variety of summer salads.  Mom made an easy peanut chicken salad:

a little Linguini,

a little angel hair pasta,

chopped red peppers,

scallions,

chicken,

store bought peanut sauce

I’m sure that I forgot something but she can correct me if I’m wrong.

Grilled Buffalo Burgers

Home made burgers never interested me as a child, I would have rather eaten the McDonald’s variety.  In college I stopped eating meat for a year or so and grilled patties of ground beef seemed disgusting.  Even when I started eating meet again, I still was not interested in burgers unless they were from my Dad’s family farm.  A few years ago I saw this in the “City Pages” and it changed my opinion of burgers alltogether.  Shortly after reading that article I found my self with my own KitchenAid mixer, a meat grinding attachment, and a grill.  I started experimenting with just about everything and here’s one recipee which works out well for me:
1 Lb Ground Buffalo
1/4 Cup chopped cilantro
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp sea salt
2 tbsp malt vinegar
1/4 cup bread crumbs
1 large eggs
1 tbsp chipotle chili powder
1 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp Mexican oregano
4 cloves pressed garlic
1 bunch minced scallions
(If the mix seems dry add some chili flavored vinegar)

Mix ingredients and form into patties, grill.

Serve on a whole wheat bun with malt vinegar sprinkled on the inside top, blue cheese, and arugula.