take pictures of the food I cook, attach the recipes and make an awesome altered cookbook to hand down for generations!

It would have been 11-layer dip, but the tomatoes had gone mushy.

AND I made my own refried beans for the first time! So quick and easy, I should have tried that a long time ago. :)

So here’s what I put in mine . . . today.

• Refried Beans
• Spanish Rice
• Guacamole
• Two kinds of homemade salsa
• Sour Cream
• Scrambled Hamburger seasoned with garlic and black pepper
• Grated Cheese
• Finely Shredded Lettuce
• Thinly Sliced Scallions
• and topped off with another layer of cheese

My Dearest thought my presentation was strikingly beautiful, too!

We used to call it Indian Fry Bread, or Navajo Tacos, and around here, yes, the Native Americans do make it, but so do our Tongan friends, and lots of other people, including us, so now we just call it FryBread.

Anyway, it was delicious. My Dearest made the bread from scratch. Then all we had to do was cook some refritos con jalepeños and some chili meat, shred some cheese and chop up some lettuce. Topped with salsa, our FryBread turned out oh, so tasty, and it was fun to work in the kitchen together!

We make a few different kinds of tacos around here, so there will no doubt be more pictures of tacos on this list, but tonight was the easiest—the simple taco bar. I cook the meat with onions, green chiles, chili powder, garlic, cumin and a few other things. Then I set it out with shells, lettuce, cheese, and salsa. Sometimes we fry the tortillas ourselves and sometimes we have other stuff with it. Usually we even make our own salsa, but this way was great for the two of us tonight.

I’m getting serious about this goal! I even checked out a couple books on culinary photography. I decided to go through my list in alpha-order, starting TONIGHT! :D

So this is my first “artistic” photo of what I made for dinner. My niece came over and ate all my leftovers, so I guess if I want some more, I’ll have to make it again. That’s fine. There’s plenty of lettuce, spinach and brocolli in the garden and carrots and celery in the fridge.

This salad is a good replica of a certain “neighborhood grill’s” Oriental Chicken Salad, and my dressing is just as good as theirs! So succulent, you don’t need much to accent the wonderful mixture of tastes already on the plate.

I thought I had already written about stroganoff because I made this dish a few months ago, but whatever.

The Dearest SAYS he doesn’t like stroganoff because it’s “too noodle-y”. Oh…kay. Suckitup, mister, I’m hungry for stroganoff! :) So I scrambled the hamburger with a chopped onion and some garlic, added a handful of flour and browned it all with some spices and a little beef bouillon. Then I added a water/milk mixture with a healthy shake of Worcestershire sauce. After I took it off the heat, I added the cooked noodles and a scoop of sour cream.

It was delicious! He even ate two bowls of it the first night and had another serving of the leftovers for lunch the next day.

This photo of Meat Muffins was taken of the leftovers the next day. I even said out loud that I needed to take a picture before we ate, but then I was busy serving up and I forgot until the food was devoured. So oh well. Such is life. I can change the picture the next time I make them. For now you can picture these unassuming little objects next to some buttery whipped potatoes, green beans, corn, and applesauce. It’s a nice dinner. Everyone loves it.

So my daughter’s boyfriend told her he didn’t like meatloaf, which she took as a personal challenge and came home to ask me to make meat muffins for Sunday dinner, which I gladly did. He ate 5. FIVE! And now he loves meatloaf. The way I make it, anyway.

He’s not my first convert, however. My Dearest’s brother came over for dinner one day and I didn’t ask him what he liked or didn’t like. I just made the meat muffins. They don’t taste like “yo mama’s” meatloaf, so he didn’t recognize them as being in the same category . . . until I asked him if he wanted more meatloaf.
~ What?! That was meatloaf? Uhhh. Yeah! I want some more!

That’s what they all say. :) Bwah ha ha!

Are these not like the cutest things EVER?!

First of all my deviled egg recipe is so good, people actually close their eyes and let out soft little moans of pleasure when they eat them. So the recipe itself will have to go in the book (but, sorry, not on the Internet).

THEN, as if feeding people morsels of goodness isn’t enough, I make them cute, too:
OK, so the whites are ready for any color dye, but the yolks are already yellow, so I only dye them green and orange. Yes, I do put a touch of yellow food coloring in the yellow ones, too, just enough to brighten them up a bit. That leaves pink, blue and purple for the whites.

Six separate bowls does the trick, and then it’s just a matter of assembly. I take them to my mom’s family gathering. Everyone expects them now. :)

Sure, we set aside enough for sandwiches, but this is what I serve for dinner the day after Thanksgiving!

I used to roll all the enchiladas, but layering a casserole lasagne style is so much faster, and even more tasty, since the cheese and the sauce are throughout all the layers. Plus, if I’ve been up all night for Black Friday, I need something easy to put together.

Turkey, onions, green chiles, cheese and my own succulent sauce recipe. Good for chicken enchiladas, too, when it’s not Thanksgiving Friday!

. . . but it sure is tasty!

I opened the fridge. There were some yellow bell peppers, red roma tomatos, and green onions. OK, do we have any meat to go with these vegetables? Well, we have some sausage links, some ground sausage, and some pepperoni, so OK.

• scramble all the sausage until completely done.
• add pepperoni, stir.
• add a little flour, stir.
• add some water, stir to make sauce.
• then add some spices: chili powder, hot pepper flakes, garlic, ginger, salt & pepper, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar, black sesame seeds, and soy sauce.
• stir everything, add more water if needed, and simmer till the rice (in the other pot) is cooked.
• cook the rice.
  The sortoflike goulash sauce can be served OVER rice, or have the rice mixed in. I also added pineapple at the last minute because that is when I thought of it.

. . . or Kim Pahp, sushi (not sashimi), or California Rolls, depending on where you’re from:

This is not just dinner—it’s a fun family activity. The Korean cousins come over, or anyone else who wants to learn, and we have a great time slicing the many ingredients into long thin strips while we wait for the rice to cook.

I do my rice a little differently than at restaurants: I season it with soy sauce, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar, sesame seeds, and ginger before I spread it on the kim (nori), so it kinda looks like fried rice instead of being all pristine white. Also, I use broken rice because it cooks fast so we don’t have to wait around for long.

I mix the wasabi milder, too, because only my Dearest likes it hot. I use the powder because it lasts in the cabinet, mix it with equal parts water and then mix in some mayo. There’s still quite a kick to it, it just doesn’t knock us off our chairs.

Once everything is ready, all there is to it is to spread, fill, roll, slice, and enjoy!