Because it was a hard week... Almond French Silk Pie!

Almond French Silk Pie, oh my!!

Raise your hand if you had a bad or hard week...


Raise your hand if you had a good or easy week...


Raise your hand if you like CHOCOLATE...


Raise your hand if you are a living thing...


Okay, if you raised your hand to any of the things above, you deserve a piece of this scrumptious pie... ALMOND FRENCH SILK PIE.


Here's the recipe for you, make it this weekend, do not delay!

ALMOND FRENCH SILK PIE

1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
6 tablespoons melted butter

Combine above ingredients in a pie pan until thoroughly blended. Press firmly to bottom and sides, bringing up crumbs evenly up to the rim. Bake in 350 degree oven for 8 minutes and cool.


2 cups sugar (softened)
3 sticks butter (not margarine, only butter will do, trust me)
6 squares (6 ounces) unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon almond extract
6 eggs (farm fresh of course!)

Heavy whipping cream
3 tablespoons powdered sugar
toasted slivered almonds


In a large mixing bowl cream sugar and butter about 4 minutes or till fluffy. Stir in cooled chocolate, vanilla and almond. Add eggs, one at a time, beating on medium speed. Scrap sides of bowl after each egg. Turn into graham cracker crust and chill several hours or overnight. When ready to serve, whip heavy cream along with powdered sugar until stiff peaks form. Dollop a huge portion of the whipped cream on the pie and sprinkle toasted almonds on top! To cut easily, use a knife dipped into hot water.


If you are a wimp about eating raw eggs, then this recipe is not for you. I have made it a gazillion times and have never gotten ill from the raw eggs.

Warning: This pie is extremely rich and insisting on a large piece is only asking for trouble. Cut your pie into 12 pieces, and that should be plenty big for everyone.

Enjoy!!!

Don't forget to enter the "name that calf contest"!

One more picture for you to drool over.





PS If you actually make the pie, you can drool on your fork as you put the pie into your mouth.

Spring is Coming!

Spring is creeping up on us and here at the ranch, that means the babies are coming, the babies are coming!

Up above is a picture of #924 when she was about a month old. Here she is below almost a year old now. My how she has grown. I think that she needs a name.

We should have a contest... Name #924!

If you have any ideas on a name for this little cutie, leave a comment. I'll pick a name by drawing the entries out of a hat on Sunday. How does that sound?

Let's see, most contests have prizes for the winner. What could we do for a prize?

Well, probably nothing except for knowing that you were responsible for this little sweetheart's name! Sorry! But please don't let that keep you from entering!

Here are a few more pictures I've taken of the 2009 calves.

Partners in Crime!
Look so innocent until you want them to go into the corral!

What's with that single piece of hay hanging out of your mouth?

The 4 Amigos!

Country Chicken Girl emails Dan the Man

Dan the Man and I have been busy working on our website for the ranch.

Neither one of us are very educated on website design and half the time we don't know what we are doing.

I sit in the driver's seat at the computer while Dan the Man sits right next to me in the passenger's seat. I won't let him touch the keyboard or the mouse so he has to sit there and tell me what to type and what to click on.

He is a great back seat driver when it comes to what I should be typing, inserting, hyperlinking, html'ing and other stuff that I don't even know is let alone what it is called.

Most of our design is all done on trial and error.

Dan the Man tells me what to do, I tell him that won't work, he tells me to do it anyway, I do it and it doesn't work.

I get mad and we start all over again!

I've learned to save frequently!

Things would be easier if one of us knew what we were doing.

We inserted an "email reply form" on our contact page.

I decided to try it out.

I'm sitting here on the couch with my laptop while Dan the Man is sitting in the kitchen at the computer.

I send a email to Open A Bar 2 Ranch which goes directly to Dan the Man's email.

It reads:

From: CountryChickenGirl

Subject: Important Message to Dan the Man

Message:

Just wanted to tell you that I love you!

Do you love me?

Your loving wife and partner,

CountryChickenGirl

I just got a reply back from dan@openabar2ranch.com.

It reads:

My love for you is deeper than the chicken litter on the floor of the chicken coop.

Your Man, Dan

What a romantic!

RECIPES: Kathi's White Chili and Heavenly Buttered Rolls

The other night I made CLASSIC BBQ CHICKEN (click for the link to that recipe.) I love this recipe! And since I have made a pack with myself not to waste the chicken carcass (because it makes wonderful broth and can make one more meal with the chicken) I decided to make White Chili using the left over carcass from the BBQ Chicken. I served the chili with these addicting Heavenly Buttered Rolls. Did I say addicting? I meant ADDICTING!

Once again, I think my MIL (mother-in-law) will be proud of me. Can you believe it Penny, I haven't thrown away a carcass since I started this blog. I admit it, I use to throw away the carcass because I didn't want to mess with it. My mother and grandmother would probably have a fit, like Penny did, if they knew that I did that. Actually, Penny didn't "have a fit," she's not like that!

Anyway, I found a recipe in my "Crème de Colorado Cookbook" but as you know by now, I have a hard time following a recipe without doing things "my way" so I decided to give it to you the way I did it and call it Kathi's White Chili.



KATHI'S WHITE CHILI

One Chicken Carcass

Put the lonely chicken carcass in a large pot of water and place on stove. Add 3 or 4 peeled carrots and 4 to 5 stalks of celery cut into quarters. Then add 1 tsp. salt, 1 tsp. pepper, 2 tsp. onion powder, 2 tsp. garlic powder, 2 tsp. basil and 2 tsp. chicken seasoning along with any other seasoning you think would add nice flavor. I'm guessing on the amounts because I usually just go through my spices and add what ever jumps out at me, I never measure, I just dump it in and hope I don't ever do it on any one spice! Call me reckless, but that's the way I do it! Bring to boil, then turn down the heat to a strong simmer (is that a cooking term?) and cover with the lid.

If you don't have a carcass laying around in your kitchen, you can do this with a whole chicken!

Meanwhile, dump 1 pound dry White Northern beans into another large pot, bring to a rolling boil, turn off the heat and cover with a lid. I don't wash or sort my beans, once again, there's that reckless side of me, and I've never had a rock in my meals, at least I didn't find one as I was eating the dish!

Now go to a "Herd Quitters" meeting like I did for 2 1/2 hours with Dan the Man. Or just find someway to kill 3 to 4 hours. Ohh, hope the house doesn't burn down while I'm gone. Reckless again, I know...

When you get back and if your house is still standing, take the chicken carcass or whole chicken out of the broth and turn off the burner. Chicken should be falling off the bone. If it is not to that point yet, turn the heat up a little, put the lid back on and check back in half an hour.

Let the chicken cool and then when it is cool enough to work with without burning your fingers, pull the meat off the bones and put in the refrigerator.

Strain the broth, keep the carrots, but toss the celery. Strain the beans. I guess if you see a rock or other foreign object, you can remove it. Dump the beans into the broth, cut the carrots into chunks and add to the broth and place on the stove. Simmer and cover until the beans are tender, somewhere around an hour or so.

Meanwhile... If you did the whole chicken, shred what ever chicken meat you want to add to the chili and put the rest into a bag and freeze. You can use the left over for another meal. You need about 3 cups of chicken for the chili. I got my other chicken from the freezer, out of my shredded chicken stash I have in there. It was my last package so I'll have to boil up some more chickens soon.

Anyway, this recipe sure is long....

After the beans are tender, add the chicken, lots of cumin (I love, love, love cumin) like 2 or 3 tablespoons, two cans (you know those little cans) of diced green chiles and anything else you want to flavor the chili with. You could add onions, jalapenos, whatever... The secret to a great soup is the spices you add so be sure to taste the broth and add some if you think that it needs it. Cook for a half hour or so on low heat. Let those flavors meld together.

Yummmm, smells so good!

Serve with sour cream and shredded Monterey jack and cheddar cheese. Oooo, sliced black olives would have been good, too bad I didn't have any.

Delish!


Then I also made these rolls.

They are heavenly, addicting, so good they should be outlawed!




HEAVENLY BUTTERED ROLLS

Generously spray a cast iron skillet with cooking spray. Put seven Rhode’s frozen dinner rolls in the skillet. Cover with a towel and leave for 5 hours or so, or until the have risen and are touching each other in the skillet. They should completely cover the skillet if they have risen enough. Brush with melted butter. Use real butter, don't skimp! Sprinkle with course salt like kosher salt or course sea salt. You can stop there or add more flavor by adding sesame seeds, poppy seeds, garlic powder, dried onion flakes, rosemary... You get the idea. Bake in a 400 degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes until deep golden brown on top. Serve in the skillet and try to behave yourself. You don't have to eat four of them, but you can if you want to!



I baked mine just a little too long. Hate it when that happens, but they were still delicious and I had a hard time behaving, actually I didn't behave at all! I ate three! Oink, oink!

It was just Dan the Man and myself for dinner that night, so I didn't want them to go to waste!

There I feel better justifying my weakness.

oink!

Tator in his basket with His Piggy

(my mom gave me this little pig about 30 years ago,
it oinks when you squeeze it and Tator has adopted it.)

Weekend Getaway: Colorado Garden & Home Show

A few weeks ago, Dan the Man's sister, Carla, asked me if Dan the Man and I wanted to spend a weekend in Ft. Collins, Colorado with her and Geologist Jim, her husband. We always have a great time together so of course I was game for a weekend away. We planned it for this weekend with nothing really in mind to do except to stay a couple of nights in Ft. Collins and just enjoy each others company and do a little shopping.

Geologist Jim and Carla live in Casper, WY. We usually get to spend holidays with them, or at least some time during the summer months at the cabin with them, but this last year was so crazy for all of us that we didn't get to spend much time together at all. We always laugh until our stomachs hurt when we get together, so I was really looking forward to a fun weekend. It didn't matter what was in store, we always enjoy each other's company.

Carla was in charge of getting the hotel and as we often do, used priceline.com to get it. She bid $50 and we got the Fort Collins Marriott on Horsetooth Road. It was really nice and a great bargain for $50/night.

Fort Collins Marriott

Lobby


Fireplace in Lobby

Room


Room with suite (we didn't have a suite, so we didn't have a table like
that but our desk and TV area looked like this.)


Restaurant at the hotel, but we didn't eat there. Looked nice though!

After our chores on Friday, Dan the Man and I left for Ft. Collins which is about 130 miles from our place. I think it's around 220 miles from Casper to Ft. Collins. Skyler and Chris would be in charge of the ranch while we were gone.

We met up at the hotel after lunch and decided to hit "Old Town" Ft. Collins which is downtown. I love "Old Town"! It is full of unique shops and great restaurants. The older I get the more I like shopping unique shops verses shopping in malls. Here are some of my favorite in Old Town:

The Cupboard is a WONDERFUL kitchen store, two stories full of everything you could possibly need for your kitchen. When you walk in you are hit with the most delicious aroma of freshly ground coffee. The top floor is all cookbooks!

The Perennial Gardener is a fantastic garden decor store who has a court yard out the back door of the store. Love gardens? Then this store is for you!

EsScentuals is a bath and body kind of store that has a fantastic basement that you have to go see just because it is decorated so cool! They also do spa treatments down there.

White Balcony is a cool boutique that carries "a huge mix of accessories, gifts and greeting cards, specializing in unique and edgy merchandise. The store has to be experienced first hand to truly understand how much inventory there is.. everything from chandeliers and lamps to hats, candles, handbags, jewelry, and other great whimsical gift ideas." I love, love, love this store! Even Dan the Man and Geologist Jim found it entertaining!

And last but not least we stopped at Nepal Tibet Imports. Carla was on a mission to find a Turkish coffee pot thing so she could start making Turkish coffee. I was surprised The Cupboard didn't have anything, so we saw this place across the street and decided to give it a try. We didn't find anything that dealt with coffee, but we did find some wild belly dancing outfits that we kept trying to get Dan the Man and Geologist Jim to buy us for Valentines Day. Lots of laughs were had at this store! We finally had to leave before we got kicked out. Also the smell of all the incense was about to kill us all. Just so you know, this store is not on my list of stores that I adore, I only added it to the story because of the belly dancing stuff. Too bad I don't have a video of Carla and me trying to get the boys to buy us those belly dancing things. Dan the Man was turning red every time I held an outfit up and tried to simulate belly dancing. As his father would have said, "knock off the nonsense!"

After all this shopping, we were getting hungry and it was supper time. We found a quaint little Irish Pub called Lucky Joe's to eat at. Good food! Dan the Man and I had Fish & Chips, Carla had Irish Stew and Geologist Jim had Chicken Strips.

On Saturday we went to the Fort Collins Winter Farmer's Market. Very cool! It is held every other Saturday from 10am to 3pm at the Opera Galleria 123 N College Ave. They had everything from late season produce, confections and baked goods, wine and cider, eggs, local and artisanal cheese, mushrooms and meat, and handcrafted products. There were several vendors and several shoppers!

For the rest of the day we decided to go to Denver, which is 65 miles from Ft. Collins, to go to the Colorado Garden & Home Show. I heard about this show several years ago, but just never made the time to go. When Carla said it was in Denver this weekend we decided that we HAD to go. It would be something that both the boys and the girls would like. I knew it would be BIG, but I wasn't prepared for how BIG it actually was!

You've got to read the Fun Facts about the show. It will give you an idea of how BIG and cool the show is! There are 14 created gardens displayed, many with water features. There were something like 650 vendors! Oh my aching feet and back from all that walking! We spent at least 5 hours there. Thank God that Dan the Man and Geologist Jim are such great sports to do all the walking and looking with us girls. We love you guys!

Here are a few (actually quite a few!) pictures from the show.

My favorite picture of the show!
Love the shadows on the sculpture!

Weird animated prehistoric animals to delight the children!

Who doesn't love a gerber daisy?

Dan the Man and Geologist Jim

More gerber daisies!

Geologist Jim and his lovey wife, Carla.

Wouldn't be the COLORADO Garden & Home Show without the columbines!

Adorable little crocheted hats.
Someday I'll have grandchild to buy cute little things like these for!

Ohhh, la, la!

A little photoshop effect.

I'll take one of these for my back yard!

Weird twisted plant.

Adorable petite daffodils!


Ohhhh, la, la!

Egads... who is that with Dan the Man.
I look horrible, but I didn't want Geologist Jim to think
that his picture taking skills weren't good enough for the blog!

It's a chair, can you see?

Hey, it's the Bread Man's Bakery!
Those of you who shop at the Scottsbluff Farmer's Market know this vendor!
I wanted to get some bread, but resisted the temptation.

Carla, is that the bus to the Drunken Monkey?
Sorry, inside joke...

Cathedral downtown Denver.
Just a parting shot.

For Dinner that night we ate at Austins American Grill in Ft. Collins. Yummy, delishous, highly recommended! Carla had a Smoked Salmon Burger. I had the Short Smoked Pork Tenderloin. We both had a cup of the Fat Tire Beer Cheese Soup. Geologist Jim had Prime Rib Au-Jus with Chipolte Shrimp and Dan the Man had Rotisserie Sirloin Roast. It was all scrumptious! We would definitely eat there again. Two thumbs up for food, service and ambiance!

Well, that was our weekend, what fun! Thanks Carla and Geologist Jim for a memorable weekend we won't soon forget! Looking forward to the Thermopolis weekend getaway to come hopefully in the near future!

Bald Eagle, Golden Eagle and Tiger Turkey!

Dan the Man and I had to go to town yesterday for a meeting. I strategically scheduled the meeting for 10am so that it would be close to lunch time when we got done.

Unfortunately, the meeting didn't last as long as I thought it would so it wasn't really close to lunch time by the time we were done. I had to buy time so that we would still be in town when the hunger monster hit Dan the Man. That was the only way I would be able to get him to take me out for lunch.

I desperately tried to think of places I had to go, but couldn't come up with any reasonable stories or excuses as to why I had to go any where especially since we had just been to town the other day.

We still had to stop at the bank which is in Mitchell. I was already plotting that maybe we could stop in Morrill on the way home and eat at Subway, but that wasn't really what I was wanting. After we got done with our business at the bank it hit me as we were getting into the truck that we could stop at the Coffee Cabin and maybe at least get a latte or some kind of coffee drink for the drive home. I figured that it was still too early in the morning for Dan the Man to eat lunch, but maybe he would go for the coffee idea.

So off to the Coffee Cabin we went! I have been meaning to stop there for a long time, they've been open for months now, like maybe 6 months, or longer. Honestly, I don't really know, I just know that it was way past time for me to check it out!

When we got there I casually mentioned that they had sandwiches for lunch, did you want to eat lunch here? To my surprise, Dan the Man said that would be okay! Maybe he was as tired of working on the website as I was and was also not wanting to get back home for another fun afternoon of working together on the website. (That my friends is a whole other story in itself!)

They don't have an extensive menu, good thing cause it takes Dan the Man forever to read a menu, especially if he has never been to the place before! LOL! Anyway he settled on a roast beef sandwich and I settled on the Tiger Turkey sandwich. $5 for the sandwich, chips and a cookie!! Great deal! My Tiger Turkey sandwich was the bomb! Delish with a capitol "D"! Not sure what was all on it, but I want another one! Dan the Man really liked his roast beef sandwich as well.

We scoped out the gift shop, Pick N' Hammer, that is also part of the Coffee Cabin. Or is it the other way around, the Coffee Cabin is part of the gift shop? Wow, I thought it was just a rock shop, but they have way more than just rocks. They have jewelry, purses, rock art and much more.

On the way home we saw one of the resident bald eagles sitting in a tree pretty close to the road. I've been telling Dan the Man that I am bound and determined to get a good picture, one that makes you say WOW, of those eagles. So far I have been unsuccessful. Of course I didn't have my camera with me so I sweet talked Dan the Man into driving home (3 miles was all), getting my camera, driving back to the spot where the eagle was so I could get a few shots. He must have been in a good mood after his mocha latte, cause he was willing to go back with me. But he was going to sit in the truck while I tried to get close enough for the WOW shot.

I didn't do too good. The eagle wasn't willing to cooperate! Darn him! I told him I would be back and he would cooperate some day! Maybe I should have brought him a mocha latte and he would have hung around a little longer!

Remember to click on the photo for a full screen view of it. Click on your browser's back button to return to the blog.



Since I had the camera and the sky was so blue, I wanted to drive to the other spot where we always see two bald eagles. Dan the Man was still willing so off we went.

I had to get closer to get a better picture which involved going into some one's pasture. We stopped at the house and I asked the neighbors, who we've never met, if they would mind if I went over their fence with my camera to get a shot. She said no, not at all. Dan the Man waited in the truck.

This guy didn't cooperate either. Only got one shot before he left and I didn't get near as close as I wanted to.


As we were heading back I saw something on the powerline tower. As we got closer I could see that it was a golden eagle! How cool was that. Dan the Man drove up the ditch road towards the tower and I got these pictures before the eagle had enough of us interrupting his lunch. There was another golden eagle sitting on top of the tower watching this guy, but I didn't get a picture of him.









What a way to spend the lunch hour!

I still don't have my WOW picture, but I'm not disappointed, yet, that is!

Antibiotics in Your Food, Part 2

This is part two of the story Katie Couric did on antibiotics in our food source.

WATCH THIS CLIP!

Is anyone reading these?

Is anyone watching these clips?

Because very few people are talking about it!

There have been only a couple of comments on my Facebook page and NO comments on the blog.

Doesn't anyone care?

Doesn't anyone believe that this is going on?

Are you all in denial that it will not affect you?

Maybe you guys just have better things to do than to be concerned with this...

Okay, I'll stop, for now.

Next post will be on a lighter note, I promise.