Summer Delciousness Pt II

Tonight is hot. It's muggy. And the Brewers are getting their arses handed to them by the Cubbies once again. Who wants to cook?

Well, me, because I'm going to Chicago for Lolla this weekend and anticipate spending more money than I should.

Last night I made a salad out of much of my CSA offerings, but after eating it for lunch today, I only had a bit left:

I used CSA lettuce, radicchio, swiss chard, tomato, carrot and radishes and added green pepper and onion that I bought at the Cathedral Square Farmer's Market. I mixed in shredded Sartori Bellavitano Cheese, BelGioso Romano cheese and oil & vinegar.

My entree was truly brilliant though:

The bottom layer is my attempt at "quick" risotto and I'll be if it didn't work! I needed to use up leftover chicken broth, so I boiled it as my base for Brown Minute Rice (which I picked up free as a promo at Summerfest--just adding to the economy of this meal). When I added the rice to the broth, I also added a pat of butter, a tablespoon of yogurt, some 1% milk, shredded Sartori Bellavitano Cheese and the romano cheese. I stirred it all up, turned off the heat and went and got my laundry.

When I came back I sautéed up my Italian pole beans and zucchini from the CSA, adding a bit of the Farmer's Market onion. After they browned a bit in the olive oil and butter, I threw in the romano cheese. Bellisimo!

Back to the rice, I threw in a bunch of rosemary, a sprig of basil and a touch of coriander flower.

Assembling my dish, I added the final touch -- shreds of rotisserie chicken (it was too hot to cook meat!). I topped this with romano cheese and rosemary and voila! One damn fine looking and damn fine tasting meal. Wisconsin's bounty is truly spoiling me this year:

Delicious? Yes. And better than the worst food offering at GermanFest last weekend:

Yup, that says "herring funnel cakes."

Cheese Blog Found

God, I love the Internet. Almost as much as I love cheese.

Thanks to Craig sharing a link to Eat Wisconsin in his Google Reader, I discovered a link to Cheese Underground, which covers Wisconsin cheese news. Heck yes!

Fortunately to balance this all out, Ben shared a LifeHacker link to the best online workout plans.

I Added a Fest

In my 10 years in Milwaukee I've tried to take advantage of everything my adopted city has to offer. Since there are about a billion ethnic festivals, I haven't hit them all...yet.

This weekend, however, I added GermanFest. I'll admit, it was a little disappointing after Festa Italiana, where I successfully ate my way through the grounds. I didn't expect to find too much at GermanFest, especially since I don't eat red meat or pork. I also am not a huge fan of German culture, preferring Mediterranean and the British Isles. I was amused however, by the Glockenspiel, so the 66 cents I spent on two canned goods to get in was not wasted.

The Glockenspiel is that big clock that has leiderhosen-clad men come out carrying and drinking beer, chopping wood, and "slappy" dancing.

At four p.m. they start the show:

I was a little disappointed it didn't begin EXACTLY at 4 p.m., considering the Germans reputation for efficiency.

At about 4:00:32 this guy came out:

He was soon joined by a few friends who provided plenty of entertainment for about 15 minutes. Here's 20 seconds of that:

I did find a couple things to snack on. I had some rotisserie chicken, although it was accompanied by German Potato Salad, which despite the food service girl's claim, did indeed have bacon in it. I also split some potato pancakes and applesauce with my friend, and those were QUITE tasty.

Hopefully next year I can make it to the YNPN-Milwaukee outing at GermanFest. This year I missed it since Phil and I went to see The Police. My that Sting is one fiiiiine looking man. But like I said, I prefer the Mediterranean and British Isles :)

Summer Delciousness

Before I head to the kitchen to combine my CSA-focused (a lovely salad) for the evening. I thought I'd post some photos (which I just uploaded) of other delicious summer creations.

First, this scrumptious Bloody Mary, which was a joint effort between myself and Becky, with a little help from our friend Neil's girlfriend Kelly. We enjoyed this at the 4th of July Brewers game and two of them got us sufficiently drunk.

Yes, those are mozzarella whips. Just like the Wicked Hop!

My other photographed accomplishment was a wonderful salad I made with the last CSA box (before my fridge went on the fritz -- it's thankfully now fixed). I used strawberries AND blueberries and made a dill/sour cream dressing, topped with an edible flower from the borage in my herb garden. It looks pretty and tasted great too!

They're Heeerrrrrree

Even though it said 5-6 weeks, the business cards I ordered from GigglePrint.com arrived today! Just a little over a week since I ordered them.

My scanner pretty much sucks, but here's proof that they made it. I'm a nerd, I know, but I'm excited to start handing 'em out.

Cheese-us, Can't I be a 21st Century Consumer?

A few months ago I attended the Moo & Brew event at the Milwaukee Public Market. I gathered a lot of brochures that night (in addition to eating delicious cheese and getting smashed on beer samples). Well those brochures littered my living room until tonight when I decided to toss them. Trying to be a responsible consumer -- and salivating over the memory of that tasty evening - I decided to visit the websites of the various vendors I sampled.

Good God. It was like taking a virtual road trip to 1997.

I'm about halfway through my pile. I have found no blogs or RSS feeds, only a couple e-newsletters and only a couple modernly designed sites. I know this is Wisconsin and people have lower expectations, but come on!

It did make me realize that I really need to push the blog concept at work. I may have a lot going on, but I gotta find time in my day to make that happen. I hope no one is going to our website and wondering where the interaction is.

Accidental Wisconsinite Business Cards!

I am a sucker for free stuff.

Also, for years I've been pondering getting business cards for personal use. (So people I met socially could have my cell and gmail versus my work number and work email).

My prayers were finally answered and tonight I found a site called Giggle Print that offers 250 free business cards with just a $5.25 fee. For those not overly graphically inclined you just use a template to plug in your info and you can preview everything right there.

I found out about Giggle Print (yeah, kind of a goofy name) through BzzAgent, which is an online-based viral marketing project I've done for about three years now.

Anyway, I'd say about 80% of the stuff I try out I don't bother others with, but this was such a unique site I thought I would share.

PLUS, now if I see you out and about I can give you a business card. Woohoo!

Visit GigglePrint