Yesterday afternoon, Brad and I spent the day catching up with my family who I haven’t seen since we returned from our honeymoon two weeks ago. My aunt has people over every Labor Day to grill out and swim.
Hi Mamaw! (my grandmother on my dad’s side)
Brad told all about our trip to Italy to his captive audience.
Rascal refused to get in the pool but stole kisses if you got to close to the pool’s edge (my brother Wess).
I snacked on this apple around 4:30 pm.
My mom had been calling Rascal all afternoon and finally he decided to rest on her lap for a few minutes.
He did require a little payment in the form of a kiss. He’s sneaky like that.
This butterfly hung out with us all afternoon.
Brad and I decided to leave around 5:30 pm, but not without sharing this bowl of homemade chocolate chip ice cream. Nothing beats homemade ice cream….well, except maybe homemade cake and ice cream.
I had been thinking about tonight’s dinner since I made fish on Friday night.
On the menu: Fish Tacos with…homemade corn tortillas!
All you need: 2 cups masa, 2 tsp. salt, 1 1/4 cup cool water.
Masa Harina is just ground corn flour + lime, not lime the fruit, lime the powder. I used 2 tsp. of salt because that’s what the directions said that Brad’s dad Wally included with our tortilla press. I failed to notice that he had made a note that he only used 1 tsp. of salt. No matter.
Stir masa and salt together.
Slowly add water and stir. You might not use it all. If you do a lot of baking with different types of flour, you know humidity can totally affect the amount of water needed. I needed all 1 1/4 cups tonight.
Brad got to work pressing out the dough into tortillas. For corn tortillas, you don’t need heat so we left the press unplugged. The corn tends to stick to the press so we covered the inside of the press with plastic wrap. Now, row your dough into a ball, just as I did when I made whole wheat tortillas. Then place the ball just north of the center (towards the hinges). Press for five seconds.
This is what you’ll get.
While Brad pressed the tortillas, I got to work on the inside of the tacos. I chopped up half of a bright orange bell pepper and half of a huge jalapeno and sauteed in EVOO from the Misto until they were soft. I then added the remaining two pieces of the Mahi Mahi from Friday night, added cumin, salt and pepper and sauteed until the fish started to brown.
While the fish and peppers were browning, I chopped up some purple cabbage and a small avocado and snacked on a little piece of cornbread.
Brad browned the tortillas on the oven. My father-in-law says you can do this on the stove top without a pan if you have a gas oven. Sadly we do not, for now…
I also made okra fries, which turned out so much better than I ever could imagine. I’m not sure how much okra I bought at the Farmer’s Market, but I do remember it was four big handfuls. I washed the okra in a collander, then placed on a baking pan, spritzed with EVOO from the Misto, and then heavily sprinkled kosher salt, fresh ground pepper, and half a teaspoon of Garlic Gold. I roasted these for about 25 minutes on 400 degrees F.
What goes best with tacos? Beer of course.
Brad picked some up at the store to go with our colorful meal.
I assembled my taco in the following order: tortilla, fish/peppers, avocado, cabbage, salsa, Greek yogurt.
I also made Brad some black beans, but I wasn’t hungry enough for them. When we have Mexican or Southwestern food we always heat up a can of black beans with about 1/4 of the liquid from the can + a big dollop of plain or Greek yogurt + a big dollop of salsa. Very delicious.
While I was making dinner Caitlin g-chatted me (you know, like instant messenger through Gmail?) to see if I wanted to come over to watch college football. We were in!
We snagged the last of the lemon bars, to share with the group (recipe is now on the original posting).
Sweet Margaret (Caitlin’s doxie).
After some water, Brad and I caved into red wine, graciously shared with us by Nicole of the Yuppie Yogini blog.
James…who is so sweet but I think was a little over the college football party.
The whole gang, from the back side.
Then a side shot with Diana peeping over a chair. If I were taller, you probably could see more of her. 😉
Rascal of course, followed me into the kitchen while I was photographing the group because he’s a professional food beggar.
Whew! What a long post. If you’re catching up from the weekend, here’s a run down of what you missed.
I made baked oatmeal for the first time.
I tried Yoforia for the first time.
I hosted a dinner party for four.
I went running with Brittney and met Cassie, a reader.
I started posting wedding-related photo galleries: Pub Crawl Part I.