Fridays :-)

Today's Recipe: Crockpot Pear Loveliness

So, Friday nights in my family are 'Steak Night'. When my dad joined the family, he had been a bachelor for quite some time, and he ate steak and pasta pretty much every night. He would have happily continued this habit if my mother had allowed it, but she feels that he will live longer if her adds in a few vegetables - and because he loves her, he acquiesces. The exception, is Friday nights. We are all hard working adults, and the fact that as a family, we are able to come together at the end of the work week to enjoy good food and each others' company is a blessing that we do not take for granted.

Since Lily Ruth's birth, Don & I had been mostly unable to attend. We made the effort several times, but we always end up eating late, by that time of the evening she was always so tired and starting to be a MAJOR crank pot, so we had basically bowed out. We all missed it, so now that we have Lily's bedtime under control (at 5 months!), we have started inviting them over here, and I LOVE it!

Oh, so speaking of crank pots, I AM IN LOVE WITH MY CROCK POT! After the stunning triumph of Thursday night, I decided to go for two in a row. I totally winged a pear crumble dessert, and it was awesome! What was that? You say you simply MUST have the recipe? Alright. Here goes... but there's no picture, because I forgot to take one :-(

Rachel's Crock Pot Pear Loveliness

7 ripe pears - peeled, cored and cut into small-ish chunks
6 oz dried cranberries
4 oz chopped walnuts
Butter - well, I used 2 whole sticks, but it was (dare I say it) too much (yet still yummy) - I'll bet you can use 1/2 stick & be fine
1/2 Tbsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cardamom (I actually used 6-8 cardamom pods and finely chopped the seeds)
1/2 tsp ground ginger

dump it all into the crock pot, mix it up, and turn that sucker on. I left it on 'high' for 3 hours.

THEN, when we were ready to eat it, I crumbled a package of Pepperidge Farm 'Bordeaux' cookies over the top & drizzled the whole thing with some caramel topping that I just 'happened' to have in the fridge and served it before the cookies got mushy - you could make a crunchy topping if you want, but that seemed like a lot of work to me... It was amazing.

In Lily Ruth news, her new favorite thing is to grab my hair, pull my face in to hers and chew on my nose (her version of a kiss) while attempting to shove her thumb in my mouth (she's obsessed with thumb sucking, and thinks we should ALL suck her thumb). It tends to look something like this:



That's all for now! Bon Appetite!