Happy St. Patrick's Day

Top o' the mornin' to you! Of course, everyone wants to be Irish on St. Patrick's Day, and many of us are. My paternal great grandfather was an Irish immigrant. I'd say he immigrated during the potato famine, but it was probably later than that. I have an Irish menu planned for dinner tonight. We don't generally go all out celebrating St. Patrick's Day, but it is a good excuse to try some new Irish recipes. On tonight's menu: Irish Potato Soup, Irish Brown Bread, and Irish Apple Cake. I'll tell you all about it tomorrow.

For now, let's back up to yesterday. I spent some extra time on my embroidery. Mike and I are still adjusting to the time change...I think the change in Spring is harder than the one in Fall. He'd gone back to bed, and I didn't want to disturb him (she says, thinking it makes a good excuse for sitting in her pajamas all morning). I'm about 2/3 of the way across the bottom now.

The kitties are wrapping up their mouse-capades adventures inside the house. Now, they're going to be dancing with the squirrels. The squirrels have been running pell mell across our deck during the past week. When I let the kitties out yesterday, Smitty sat watching them, planning his attack. 

Sadie has been driven crazy watching them, running from the living room windows, to the dining room windows, to the catio, and then back again. After a while, she joined him, and they plotted their strategy together.

In the sewing room, I completed the fusing for the New Mexico Kitchen block. It still needs top-stitching.

I'm hoping I'll have a little time to work on it again today, but not really counting on it. There's cooking to do. I was hoping I'd get back to it yesterday, but then Mike was driving into town, and it seemed like a good time to drop off my camera for repair. As it turns out, that was a complete waste of time. It seems Nikon is no longer doing business with any third-party repair shops, and won't sell them parts either. My camera probably needs a new part, and so it looks as if I'm going to have to ship it to their factory in Los Angeles for repair. I've written an email requesting further instructions, but I don't expect to hear back from them before tomorrow. It's frustrating, for sure.

We were home later than I'd hoped, and I was still planning to make Stuffed Cabbage Rolls, which is a time-consuming proposition. A friend posted some she'd made recently, and it gave me a yen to try them again. I used to make them many years ago. I had a recipe to make them in my slow cooker. This time around, I decided to try the recipe I found in Cook's Country. Here's the picture from their page:

I didn't think to take a picture of mine until we'd already finished dinner, and so I took a picture of what remained in the baking dish. Mine aren't as pretty as theirs, but they were tasty. The sauce for this recipe is especially good, and easy to make.

So, the reason I haven't made these for so long is that they are a major painus in the anus. They tasted *really* good though, which is why I decided to give it another try. While I was making them, I told Mike, "I hope you enjoy these because it's the last time I'll ever make them." But then, they were so yummy, I decided I might not have minded making them so much if I hadn't been pressed for time by our late arrival at home. And so...maybe I will, and maybe I won't. For now, there are leftovers for at least another meal, and maybe two. And, again, this recipe is from Cook's Country, and so you'll need a subscription to access the website. If that link doesn't work for you, just email me, and I'll be happy to send it to you. 

Also, there's another option that's less time-consuming and labor intensive. I've tried this recipe for "One-Pot Unstuffed Cabbage" before, and it's pretty good too. In this case, the meat filling is rolled into meatballs and cooked in a skillet  along with the sauce and the cabbage. It's a good alternative if you don't want to mess with the cabbage rolls.

Okay, so there's a lot of cooking and baking to be done today. It's time to get going. Before I go, though, I'll leave you with this Irish blessing. 

Happy St. Patrick's Day, everybody. Don't drink too much green beer (yuck!), and don't forget to wear green. You don't want to get pinched!