Broccoli, cheese, and chicken soup (with a few other veggies thrown in too) served in bread bowls. We will be having this again. Oh yes, we will.

Being carefully inspected by Tora, of course!

Bacon, Canadian Bacon, pepperoni, mushrooms, and about six different cheeses with a splash of tomato sauce.

Can’t wait to dig in when it cools off a bit!

Chicken fried pork cutlets (with mozzarella and tomato sauce), a garden salad (almost 100% from my garden), and wheat berries with garlic butter.

This was the first time eating wheat in this form. I think it could have been boiled longer, but they’d already been boiling for almost three hours, and I hadn’t noticed any change in consistency since the two hour mark. Are they supposed to be so chewy and solid? I’ve never eaten them this way before, so I have no idea. They were really good all the same, but next time I’ll boil them longer to see what happens.

Finding myself with a few too many cucumbers than we can eat fresh (happy, happy, joy, joy), I decided today I’d make those long-awaited home-grown pickles!

Found myself with a bit too much brine too, so I went ahead and pickled some onion, garlic, and (home-grown) carrots. Woo hoo!

And of course, I also burnt the hell out of part of my left hand. Had I not been wearing protective gear, it would’ve been worse, but let me tell you, boiling hot water and vinegar is, well, boiling hot. Ouch!

Tonight’s dinner was rather multicultural. Homemade Mexican flour tortillas; couscous (with peas) from Israel (actually FROM Israel); mushrooms, onions, garlic, corn, and tomatoes sauteed in olive oil, roast Halil (free range and organic) chicken breasts, and a ton of Tzatziki (a Greek yogurt/cucumber sauce). Tonight’s dinner was also something of a production number. I spent forever in the kitchen!

It was worth it though, as everything turned out tasty!

Now for some bonus food porn … last night’s pan fried pork chop, oven-roasted asparagus, and a mushroom, onion, and cucumber salad soaked in balsamic vinegar and olive oil. It was also tasty!

As the time for making dinner approached this evening, I found myself with a pound of ground beef and a strong desire not to make meatloaf or spaghetti or chili, which are the things I would normally do when confronted with a pound of ground beef. Lin had asked me a few weeks ago why I hadn’t been making tortillas, and since I was feeling bored with my usual meal choices and somewhat adventurous, I bounced off to the kitchen at 7 pm to make tortillas … and thus have tacos for dinner.

Two hours later, after much gnashing of teeth and a few tears, we were eating tacos on homemade flour tortillas. I will admit those two hours were filled with the gnashing of teeth and even a few tears. I was almost certain I was failing to make edible tortillas. When I served them to the spousal unit, I warned him I had NO idea if the plate of food I had just handed him was edible or not.

Well, it turns out … my tortillas were certainly edible.

The tortillas were thicker and a little chewier than I would have liked them, but I’m thinking I can improve on that when I try again. I could probably use all purpose flour instead of my bread flour, for a start, and I could let the dough rest a little longer. And I will be trying again, because these may not be perfect tortillas, they weren’t at all bad. They had the proper flavor and smell, they held the taco ingredients without falling apart or getting soggy, and they are satisfyingly filling. I just need to tweak things a bit.

I will probably be trying again tomorrow. I suspect that once I get the recipe right and the process down, making a batch for a Taco/Enchilada Night will be no more stressful than making a pizza crust on Pizza Night, which means not at all stressful and mostly carefree –unlike tonight, which was a non-stop ball of stress. When I was in the midst of my second nervous breakdown over the state of the tortilla process, Lin said “You can’t expect them to be perfect the first time you make them.” Why, yes … yes I can expect them to be perfect! I haven’t actually had a cooking failure in so long, no matter what hair-brained thing I decide to throw together, that naturally, I would expect my first batch ever of flour tortillas to be perfect. Why wouldn’t I? LOL!

Also, I really didn’t feel like having fast food tonight, so I am glad everything turned out well.

Notice I haven’t been complaining so much about the garden lately? Well, it’s always nice to eat the fruit of my labor, which we did tonight. Tomatoes, lettuce, and cucumber all fresh from my garden.

I’m stuffed. So stuffed I can’t even eat a single one of the cookies I made for dessert!

Friday’s pizza: pepperoni, artichoke pesto, black olives, two varieties of tomatoes, and mushrooms. Mmm…

Last night’s dinner: Couscous salad (with pork sausage for Lin). Soaked some of my cucumbers in balsamic vinegar with minced garlic (yummy on its own), added that plus tomatoes, black olives, red onions, and basil to the couscous … and pigged out. Very thrilled there’s leftovers for my lunch today! I am really liking couscous.

Look. Cucumbers. The first ones in years, and there’s more coming! Also two huge tomatoes and one small one to spend some time in the kitchen window finishing up with the ripening (they came off in my hand, so they’re edible now, I imagine), some basil for tonight’s pizza, and two peppers I know are two hot for any human to eat (my lone MILD pepper plant is making peppers too hot for even Lin).

Good harvest today, but will it keep up? Guess I better be happy with what I’ve got!

Tried something new tonight. Couscous! Lin was non-committal about liking it, which means he at least didn’t NOT like it, and I love it. There’s great possibilities with couscous! Definitely adding it to our regular diet. I was getting so tired of pasta, rice, and potatoes. I had to find something else.

Now I need to find a store that sells it in bulk, because the little packages at my worthless grocery store are just a little to precious for the budget. Surely I can find it somewhere cheaper.

Owner Aaron Hines couldn’t open his shaved ice trailer within the Round Rock city limits. Right now the city doesn’t have an ordinance allowing mobile food vendors in a permanent location, so Hines leased an acre of farmland in unincorporated Round Rock. He leased it before the harvest and spent days shucking the corn himself to make way for his shaved ice trailer.

When your trailer ceases to be movable, it is no longer a trailer, and the food you are serving from it is no longer “trailer food” … it’s just some cheap crap food served out of a makeshift restaurant with low health standards, wobbly picnic table, and no cover for sun/rain relief.

This trend of people opening immovable food trucks and food trailers in permanent locations has got to stop. It’s ridiculous.