Crockpot chicken and wild rice with mushroom sauce.

I refuse to use canned cream of mushroom soup for anything, so this is what I did instead.
( under the cutCollapse ) This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1517570.html. Comment wherever you would like.

These just used a few canned pantry staples but came out really good.

6-7 small or 4-5 large tortillas (corn or flour, whatever your preference)
1 container (1 cup) Minute brown and wild rice
1/2 package of Uncle Ben's Zesty Mexican Beans
2/3 cup (approx) frozen corn
1 15 oz can green enchilada sauce
1/2 cup shredded mexican cheese
2 tbsp canned green chilies (optional)
1 tsp hot sauce or zhoug sauce (optional)
black olives for the top (optional)
more cheese to sprinkle over the top (optional I guess but you probably want this)

If using corn tortillas, heat them each with a dab of oil in a sautee pan over medium heat for about 1-2 min per side so that they won't crumble or break when rolled.

Preheat oven to 350.
Take the plastic top off the rice and heat in the microwave for 1 minute
Put the frozen corn in a microwave safe dish with some water and heat for 2 minutes, drain
Warm the beans according to directions (90 seconds in the microwave)

Mix together rice, beans, corn, 1/2 cup cheese, about 4 tbsp of the enchilada sauce, green chilies and hot sauce if using. Layer a bit of oil or butter onto the bottom of a glass pan (so the tortillas don't stick) that will fit all your enchiladas and then spread a thin layer of enchilada sauce over that. Fill the tortillas and place them folded ends down in the pan. Top with olives (if using) and pour over the rest of the enchilada sauce. Bake for 20 minutes until the sauce is bubbling. Sprinkle cheese over the top and bake for another 5 minutes. Serve. This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1515232.html. Comment wherever you would like.

Made turkey stuffed peppers tonight, Italian style. Winged the recipe and it's cooking now but it smells good anyhow. It has some carbs from the rice (but you can use brown or wild) and the bread crumbs (but there aren't many of those).

So before I forget ( this is what I didCollapse )

I shall report back on the outcome.

Verdict: the flavor profile was great, but there was too much moisture for the egg/rice and bread crumbs to work as a binding, would need way more bread crumbs. So next time I will probably leave those out and just have it be crumbly (since it was crumbly anyhow). The other option would be to put way more cheese in them and have them stick together that way. This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1513320.html. Comment wherever you would like.

I know usually salad isn't the star of the show but I wanted to share this one I made that was really really good. I got inspiration from a poached pear and goat cheese salad that we had at an Italian restaurant in Siesta Key:

I used a bag of forelle pears; they are like 1/3 the size of regular pears and were a good size for a small serving of salad.

Champagne Poached Pears:
12 forelle pears or 4 big pears (sturdy and firm)
1 bottle dry champagne (I used prosecco)
1 cup orange juice
some freshly grated cinnamon (I didn't use a whole stick b/c I thought it might overpower)
handful of dried cranberries
~1/2 to 1 cup of sugar (to taste)
water to cover

Peel the pears (could also core them but could do that later as well). You can put the peeled ones in a bowl with some lemon juice mixed with water in order to keep them from browning as you peel more and do the other steps. Mix orange juice, sugar, cranberries and cinnamon in a stock pot or dutch oven and stir to incorporate the sugar. Stand the pears up on end in the pot, put on med-high heat and pour in the prosecco and enough water to cover. You can also put a "top" on the pears of parchment paper cut to the shape of the pot, with a hole cut in it to let steam escape and to keep the pears completely submerged. Boil until pears are tender, approx 15 minutes for little pears, maybe 25 for big ones.

Remove from heat and store pears in the poaching liquid in the fridge.

Salad:
50/50 mix of arugula and organic spring mix
poached pears (cut in half and cored, 1/2 pear per serving if the servings are small, could use more)
a few sliced strawberries
Toasted pecans
Salted/roasted Pepitas
crumbled Goat Cheese
diced roasted pumpkin (with enough water roasted out of it that it has a good consistency and isn't mushy)
Raspberry walnut vinaigrette dressing. (This was what I had in the fridge, "Newman's Own" brand. It worked well. If you want to make your own champagne vinaigrette or something, that would work well. Salad does not need a ton of dressing, just a little bit).

It was really good. This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1502353.html. Comment wherever you would like.

10 days to Get your guesses in!

I am trying to see how well crowdsourcing will work to estimate the number of M&Ms in a bowl, so the more answers I get, the better! This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1501477.html. Comment wherever you would like.

How many M&Ms are in this bowl? Tell me your answer in the comments (without looking at others' first).

(Full disclosure, I don't know the answer, it's a contest for a "fun event" at work and I figured I'd try crowdsourcing as my strategy) This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1500657.html. Comment wherever you would like.

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-58682472

RTD is back! Um, I don't know what to think about this, actually. I hope he can take the show in a cool new direction. I don't want to see Rose again. And probably not Jack; I feel like his character is kind of done. OTOH It would be absolutely lovely to have characters I actually care about (the Doctor included). But does this ever actually happen? I feel like maybe the Beeb is squirrelly about all of this, or just generally uncomfortable, to ask someone back who left.

Then again, we will be able to see if RTD can ignite the same level of ratings he did at the show's start.

I'm curious, anyhow. First big question is will he stick with a female doctor or go back to tried and true? (And *that* might be something the Beeb would weigh in on, IDK. Especially if they are feeling vulnerable and squirrely). This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1495396.html. Comment wherever you would like.

Main Post and Chapter Index

( Interlude V (4200 words)Collapse )

Part 13 | Part 14 This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1453485.html. Comment wherever you would like.

snowflake_challenge number 7 is to create your own challenge!

I have no idea if I will get to this or not, But I think personalized Fandom Flowcharts would be fun.

Kind of like a timeline but also sort of referential, if there were any "Gateway fandoms" that got you into one or the other (same actor, same genre, rec from friends). Nothing so complicated as Univariate probability distributions (yes, I own this poster and have been pencil-coloring it for a while), but something personalized that shows your own Fandom Journey, be it simple or complex.

(And I really, REALLY want to see thisbluespirit's chart, just for the explosion of 70's British TV and the links that follow actors from one show to another!)

You could have color coding on the charts for your engagement types -- making fic, vids, just watching/reading, etc. Or like, if you were shippy about it or not, etc.

I wonder if there are any free online flowchart makers that could help someone visualize this kind of thing. Then you could have your own personalized fandom graph or timeline or sankey diagram or what-have-you out of it.

I have no idea if this counts as a challenge. It's a challenge to me to come up with some kind of viz for it, I suppose. This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1451332.html. Comment wherever you would like.

I'm behind, I know. Challenge #6 is to rec 3+ works by other people. So here are some things I've read recently that I have not yet extolled to the ends of the universe :)

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and they did live by watchfires by picnokinesis. 20345 words

In some timelines, Captain Jark Harkness rescues her from prison. In others, she escapes on her own. In many of them, she makes it back to New Year's Day in Sheffield, 2021.

This is not one of those timelines.

Thirteen onscreen has not been all that appealing to me, but luckily there are some fic authors out there who are doing her justice. This story is everything I wanted from the setup at the end of the last series--it makes the Doctor's incarceration mean something, it is a mindbending twisting tale where the lines of what is real and what is a dream are blurred, it is a sometimes brutal but ultimately redeeming fairy tale. With countable infinities.

She knows she left people behind. People she needs to get back to. A family. But time is stretched thin, distorted, the seconds and minutes and hours and days and months and years blurring into one. Past and future have traded places – what has come before is cast into uncertainty and what will come the only thing she knows for sure. Without a doubt, she will be here.

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the very last inch of us by hellynz. 6978 words.

River spends years in Stormcage. Her only visitor is the Doctor. Him, and a blonde stranger, a fellow inmate, who keeps appearing in the corner of her cell.

oooh, another Thirteen in Prison fic, but this one has River Song in it. It's timey wimey, with despair and hope, and of course, a love story.

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The Light by vailkagami. 402 words.

Nothing is in sequence.
Some things just Are.

A beautiful TARDIS POV ficlet. I have a soft spot for the Old Girl and her perspective. This is a short journey through her life, non-linearly.

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forever is the sweetest con by dollsome. 4719 words

River drops in during the Doctor’s year with the Ponds in “The Power of Three.

Is this me recc-ing fluff? OMG it is. Because it's fun fluff that is so true to the characters, with laugh-out-loud dialogue and at the same time it has that bittersweet tinge because we know how things turn out.

"Hello, hello; gorgeous to see you, slightly slime-covered bride of mine," he says, pulling her dramatically back up into his arms. When they’re cheek to cheek, he whispers in her ear, "Please do explode something. I’m so bored, I’m— and this is in no way an exaggeration—going to die of it in five seconds, and you’re far too foxy to be a widow."

River kisses his earlobe. "Everybody feels that way about visiting the in-laws," she whispers back. "Suffer."

* This entry was originally posted at https://eve11.dreamwidth.org/1450559.html. Comment wherever you would like.