Roast Beast Dinner

The gardening efforts of late have been restricted to plugging in lights at dusk and unplugging them before bed.  But life goes on through the holidays and there's time to cook.  Earlier in the month were rounds of Scottish shortbread, homemade chocolate candies, and several batched of Chex mix.  With the heart of the Christmas holidays, it's time for the savory specials.

We planned a special Christmas dinner, but by Christmas day we were too tired to cook it.  So we held off for a couple more days and last Friday I cooked our slightly delayed Christmas dinner.

The Menu

Standing Rib Roast

Asparagus with Dried Tomato Pesto

Sauteed Mushrooms

Mashed Potatoes

Pan Gravy

Scottish Shortbread & Homemade Candy

We picked up the roast about a week early and put it (unwrapped) in the spare refrigerator to let it age for a week before I cooked it.  I used Alton Brown's recipe for standing rib roast and it was very successful.

 Successful - OMG Delicious! It was tender and moist with a great crust.  The aging had intensified the flavor of the meat by letting some of the water in the roast evaporate.  Then it was cooked in a very slow oven, 200 degrees for about 5 hours in a stoneware covered roaster. Finally it was put into a 500 degree oven (still in the stoneware) for 15 minutes to develop the crust.  After the high heat, it was placed on the cutting board and covered with foil and allowed to rest for 15 minutes before carving.

The asparagus is a recipe I came up with last summer.  I melt some butter and oil in a large pan. Once it's melted I stir in a couple tablespoons of sun dried tomato pesto sauce.  Add the asparagus and toss and let it saute in the pan.  We like ours to still have some body, not overcooked and limp.  For this thin asparagus it took about five minutes.

The mushrooms were sauteed in butter and when they were brown I added some brandy and let them sit in the sauce while I turned my attention to the other side dishes. I added a little espresso salt after they were done to round out the flavor. They absorbed the butter and brandy while they were sitting.

The mashed potatoes and gravy were not given a lot of attention - I had too many other pots on the stove - but they were good.

I didn't get any pictures of the shortbread or the candy, maybe next year - there won't be anymore this year.

For next year - who knows.  But we have been making it a tradition for the last couple of years to have a crown  rack of lamb on New Years Day.  Here's a picture from 2 years ago. This is on my parent's wedding china.  Each of the kids have two place settings and we divided up the serving pieces.  It only come out for very special dinners with the love of my life

I don't want anyone to forget that this blog is not only about gardening and dogs, it's about cooking too.  

You can wipe the drool off your chin now.

December Snow

I heard someone this week say, "Any other time of year everyone would be cursing the weather, but in December it's 'Christmasy.'" We had our first snow storm, and the government was nice enough to close for the day, so I was able to get out with my camera before the early sunset of mid December.

I love the colors of the season, so I had to capture the red berries on a couple different Nandina bushes around the yard.

But I couldn't let the Nandina upstage the holly grove.

That's 4 of the six trees we had planted a couple years ago.  I'm giving serious thought to adding holly berry bushes (probably about 5 [4 female and a male] and in a few years we can start decorating with fresh holly cuttings and berries in the house.)

But now it's time for the close-ups outside. :-) 

Looking around the yard brought a few more colors popping out of the snow.

And a few more stark shots.

And for a chuckle, I had to do a double check when I looked at the way the snow was settling on the grill. He didn't look happy at being left out in the cold.

The Garden Glows

The phenomenon started on Veterans Day weekend (prompted by fine weather for November.  It spread on Black Friday and has taken over the yard and garden.

Before the infestation, there were simple natural decorations in place:

Then the lights started making an appearance. They'taken over the backyard. It's sent tendrils out all over the yard and has taken root at the outside outlets. The whole house is surrounded from rooftop on down.

We've added more lights to the backyard than we've done before.  All the work on the garden this year makes me want to add to what we've done before.  We usually use a lot of white lights around the side and front and save the color lights for the backyard. So we've kept with that color scheme and I've made several trips out for more colored lights.

Here is the front and side. In the forefront is a weeping cherry tree.  Until we bought the house I had never heard of a weeping cherry tree. It is so stately that I reserve simple white lights for it; even though our general plan is anything close to the house is done in white while trees and shrubs farther out in the yard get colored lights.

I have to say that I had fun last week on one of my trips to Lowes for more lights when another shopper asked me if I knew much about putting up lights and if I could give her some help picking out what she needed. She said it was their first year getting serious about lights...

I guess I've been serious about lights for a few years (decades?)

While I was busy outside, Gloria was busy inside, more pictures to follow. But here's one of my collection that only comes out for the holidays.