Tag: Lunch

Delicious Proportions And Peculiar Partings

Thursday Dec 28th –

 

 

The sister and nieces came over for the day, so that pretty much tells you the amount of stuff I got done 😏

One thing…😜

That ‘thing’ was one of delicious proportions though because it was making caramel popcorn.
The gooey kind, not the kind that hardens and gets crunchy 🤤🍿

 

 

I wanted to make some to try sending with the husband for my father-in-law and ended up having a ‘little’ extra for us here 😜

 

It was overly sweet and overly addicting so I call that a success though I won’t know how it traveled 🙈

 

I made poutine with three types of cheese and bacon for Mike and my dinner and then he rushed out to go play soccer, not wanting to be totally out of practice pre-Europe 😏😜 Continue reading “Delicious Proportions And Peculiar Partings”

South Africa Chicken and Rice Salad

During our trip in South Africa, I ate a cold, chicken and rice salad and though very different than what I was generally used to, I loved it.

So naturally I tried to replicate it once I was back in Canada 😉

Here is the recipe I came up with and I hope someone is brave enough to attempt it and that it’s enjoyed! 😁🍴

 

South Africa Chicken and Rice Salad

Serves four.

Ingredients:

Brown rice to serve four

10 olives*, diced

Half a cucumber, diced

1 heaping cup Arugula leaves

12 cherry tomatoes to serve beside

4 medium chicken breasts

Roasted sunflower seeds (optional)

1 lime sliced in four

Plain yoghurt or tzatziki to serve with as a sauce.

 

Seasonings:

 

1/2 tablespoon garlic powder
1/2 tablespoon onion powder
1/2 tablespoon thyme
1/2 tsp pepper
1/8 tsp cayenne
1 tablespoon paprika
Dash of salt

 

 

 

Directions:

 
Prepare rice as directed.

Mix seasonings together and set aside.

Lightly coat a frying pan with the oil you use for cooking and heat over medium-high heat.
It should be hot enough to singe the chicken when it’s laid in as you want a blackened chicken effect.

You will sprinkle the spice mixture evenly on one side of the chicken and lay the seasoned side, down, into the oiled pan, causing the seasoning to slightly char onto the meat, about 2 minutes.

Sprinkle the remaining spices on top of the chicken and flip over to singe that side as well.

Once both sides of the chicken have been seasoned and singed you can turn the heat down for the rest of the required cooking time, so the meat doesn’t dry out.

Dish the prepared rice onto the plates and spoon the olives, cucumber and arugula leaves on top.

*** I know olives aren’t everybody’s thing so they CAN be left out of the recipe… but as a so-so olive person myself, I still enjoyed the extra salty/pickled flavour they gave.

A roasted sunflower seed could be an add in with the olives or used as a substitute for them, so you still get some salty crunch in there 😉 ***
Once the chicken is done it can be added to the plate.

Serve with cherry tomatoes, yoghurt or tzatziki sauce and a slice of lime for some extra zest!

(and bread if desired, which it always is, in our house 😉)

 

This meal can be eaten hot, or cold!
I found the cold version to be very refreshing in the South African heat.

 

Looking forward to hearing what you thought of it! 😁

 

A Taxing Morning

Wednesday Dec 21st –

 

 

 

We set Mike to work that morning, getting him to prepare the dinner for that night😋
He’s that slow 😏

No, not so much slow as overly precise in his chopping/measuring and he enjoys using every counter space 😜
Hey, neither mom nor I had to cook though so really, what’s a little extra mess?

Becca had gotten him the ingredients to make the Dutch chicken dish and we would be in town throughout most of the day so we needed a readied supper for once we got back.

We enjoyed a moose meat smoke (compliments of the bro’s hunting) for lunch before we headed to town and dropped off mom so she could go enjoy a massage while we did the errands 😋
One of which was to purchase the parents some new speakers so it wouldn’t sound like some awful trumpet player was playing loudly in everything they listened to 😜🎺

In one small store Mike was giving a sales pitch for a product he doesn’t even sell yet himself and as we left the store I laughed at how he just couldn’t help himself.
He said that was true and I should be happy he hadn’t tried to sell me yet!
The turd head 😏

Town was finished with and we headed back home where mom made us some tasty Clamato juice to sip on pre Mikes supper.

Which was very good 😉

 

 

Maybe a tad too onion-ish/curry-ish for some of us, but we aren’t ones who fear trying new and for Mike to have made it for us meant it was appreciated either way ☺️

 

 

 
Thursday Dec 22nd –

 

 

 

Taxes and GST and one very aggravating phone call made up our morning.
We had to call to figure out some number stuff/give information that the government was asking for since our marriage hadn’t been reported soon enough during assessments.

No biggy right?

Wrong.

Since I’m rarely here and well taken care of by my mother, she looks after my book work and what needs to go where, therefore I didn’t know the answers to the security questions the lady was asking.
She proceeded to tell me to ‘tell your mother to stop giving me the answers, that’s illegal and I will have to hang up’. 😡
Sorry that I wasn’t aware of what tax accountant my family uses lady! 🙄

All in all, it was not a nice start to our day and we were all in a rather non delightful mood afterwords.

Our day cheered up when we got a phone call saying our niece Emily wanted to invite us over for lunch 😉

Her meal choice was shrimp and soup, a choice we think she didn’t realize the consequences of because shrimp isn’t her thing but hey, the rest of us liked it 😋

We visited there for a while and I was honoured to receive some newspaper wrapped presents (wrapped and chosen by Emily herself I’m sure😉).

I was super happy to get a set of watercolor markers, ones I truly needed and had been trying to decide which to get👌🏻🖊

Some macaroons, a photo of Emily and a few other goodies filled the bag and it seems like I’m the spoiled Aunty more so than spoiling the niece 😋💕

Once we got back to the house it was time for me to test my markers, mom to write her daily things out and Mike to complete his car drawing that will go in the kids play room here. 

They both succeeded better than I 😬

Supper was taco salad and then Mom, Dad and Mike went out for Thursday night pickle ball and I stayed at the house.

Not ready for that much excitement 😜

No, I stayed back and straightened up a little and then sat down to test my markers until they returned 😊

Upon which return we ventured downstairs to watch a movie and have a listen to what the new speakers sounded like.
The speakers worked good… the movie was about 2.5 hours too long.
Full of confusion and no point in the end 😜

Much like that mornings phone call…

Sand, Sun And Souvlaki

Monday Oct 3rd –

 

 

 

 

We left Villa Levante and headed back down the road to find a coffee/pastry place we had spotted the day before.

It’s awesome sign made it easily remembered and we went expecting good things, which we got 😄🍴☕️

The guy running it didn’t speak much English but he still seemed kind of funny, we’d point at a menu item and ask if it was good or what was better and he’d shrug a little and answer ‘ meh, I don’t like it ‘.
Not really trying to rack up the business it would seem 😜
But he did like one thing which was ‘espresso on the rocks’ so we ordered that, along with classic Greek pastry with vanilla filling, cheese pie and a tasty sesame seed roll with a creamy cheese inside, close to feta but softer and not as strong.

It was all really good and we planned on going back, but right then, the beach was beckoning!

Non tourist season and it being Monday meant that luckily for us the beach wasn’t even too crowded and we were able to rent lawn chairs and a sun umbrella for 6€ and use them the whole day 😊🏖

It turned out to be a completely perfect day at the beach💙

I don’t think I’ve ever seen Mike so relaxed and content to be doing nothing 😜

Not long after sitting down, a few different people selling things came up to us and chatted, offering purses, foot massages and more.

Most were refused but Mike couldn’t resist striking a deal with a man from Nigeria who was selling bracelets.

We soaked up the sun for a while and then ventured into the water.

 

Photo Creds go to Mike for this pic. ^ I could have taken it I just didn’t want to take my phone out into the sea 😏

It was easily one of the nicest beaches I’ve ever been too!
Soft sand with no chunks of coral or seaweed in sight, calm and super clear aqua colored water, staying shallow enough for me to stand in for a long ways out.

Though I found it best to use Michiel as a buoy since I’m not a strong swimmer and also a tad creeped out after I spotted a creepy little flat fish that blended right in with the sandy bottom he was swimming sideways along 😁

Curtesy of Google ⬆️  That is close to what we seen and it was probably around the size of my palm, maybe even a  little smaller but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t freaky 😎

After our swim we decided it was high time to try the food service available to us.
Not only was it the one of the nicest beaches I’ve been to, but the only one with (super affordable) food delivery right to your beach chair.

Talk about living like royalty 😳😄💙🍴

The grilled pork souvlaki was amazing.
Juicy but with edges crisped to perfection and a creamy tzatziki sauce to dip it in, so good 😍

I really don’t remember what else we did in what order, it’s vacation, stuff isn’t meant to be kept track of 😏

I know we sat more, relaxed and got another plate of souvlaki 😏
Also ordered was a Greek coffee which was extremely strong and sweet and had a texture like someone had let the grounds go right through 😬

We went for a small walk and a few odd shells were found, though they really are lacking here… the one fault of Greece 🙄

One more dip in the sea and we called it a day and packed up our belongings.

It had been mostly cloudy all day but still very warm out, I didn’t think we had got much sun, until the evening came and the redness of skin with it 😬

We had an early morning planned to go and discover shipwreck beach, so bedtime was decently early and that was okay with us, there’s nothing like a day in the sun and sea to tire a person out.

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