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Meet Amy
I have struggled with the answer when asked, "What do you do?" and it isn't work-related. Ultimately, we settled on that I find things and untangle things. But I also read (a lot), pretend to wake surf, and watch Hallmark films.
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Several years ago, Coscto carried a Raclette grill by Trudeau. Scott had memories of eating around a Raclette as a missionary when church members would have them over for dinner. Because of awesome memories, Scott bought one and we were excited to try it. The first thing we realized was that our fancy grill was only good for4-6 people. So we searched and purchased a second. Amazon carries them now.
Over the years we have have had several dinner parties centered around these table top grills. And they are dinner parties that are talked about for years and asked for a repeat.
Here’s how it works…
There is a granite side and a non-stick side of the grill and under the grill are individual non-stick pans.
The granite side is for beef and chicken, the non-stick side is for seafood and the bottom side is for the vegetables and anything else that you want cooked in cheese and butter.
On our table we had plain steak and chicken, teriyaki steak and chicken, peppered steak, shrimp, halibut, grilled onions, mushrooms, spinach, sliced potatoes, steamed zucchini and steamed broccoli.
Everyone gathers around the table and cooks and eats and cooks and eats and cooks and eats – it is AWESOME. There has never been a time that it didn’t taste amazing. Nor has there ever been a time that the conversation stalled. Every time we’ve done it, the kids eventually leave the table and the adults are left to continue indulging themselves with shrimp cooked in butter with some cajun or lemon pepper seasoning and cheese melted on top. Delicious. Even picky eaters or those with special diet needs can indulge and eat the foods they want with the seasoning that they like.
It is an all day ordeal/event. We started cutting and marinating 4 hours before dinner. Dinner takes about an hour from start to finish. Then after dinner, there are two dishwasher loads full of dishes and granite grill plates that are soaked and scrubbed before the grills can be put away.
A few pointers – only use tongs for the meat, have separate tongs for raw chicken, have two butters (one for cooking and one for spreading on rolls), DO NOT scratch the non-stick surface or your grill won’t last you very long, use LOTS of butter. The last pointer – use olive oil on the granite slab while you are preheating it.
For $100 you can purchase a great tool that will be the source of dinner parties and excellent meals for years to come. Totally an investment in awesome memories.
PS – My Teriyaki Sauce recipe…
1/4 cup Kikkoman Teriyaki
3/4 cup Soy Sauce
2-3 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tsp garlic clove (minced)
pinch of ground ginger
  
Growing up in Utah always meant winters full of snow, wind and freezing cold temperatures. When I moved to Kiev Ukraine, I learned what it really meant to be cold. It was farther north, right on a major river and I had to wear a skirt – all the time. Living in Kentucky brought a completely different winter than I was used to. Church, school, work all would shut down because of the ice storms that would create a beautiful, yet dangerous sheet of ice. And then there was Michigan. Holy cow that was cold. The humidity, the snow, the wind, the ice – brutal. After all of that, I’ve returned to my roots and get to enjoy the “mild” winters of powdery snow and the occasional single digit temperatures.
Winter means to me…
Days that are too short.
Adorable little girls bundled up with bright colors and fur.
Extra blankets when I’m watching TV, cuddling with the girls (or Scott), working on my laptop and just about any other excuse to curl up with a blanket.
Hot chocolate made with marshmallows and whipped cream.
Wearing my boots and bulky sweaters.
Gaining just enough weight that I have to do a real serious diet before swimsuit season comes back around.
And the one that always gets me some of my favorite pictures…
Snow ball fights between Scott and Jade
There are more photos that just might make you a winter lover over at I heart faces.
***What do you love about Winter?
Sometimes the girls play “Make Believe” and it is absolutely adorable. Other times they play and I find myself struggling to roll with it.
Sunday was one of those times, as adorable as they were being, I still struggled. See, every once in a while they pretend that Jade is Ivy’s mom and I’m called “Grandma” and I get in trouble if I don’t answer when they holler for Grandma. And if I answer when Ivy says “mom” then I get the eye-roll.
Jade was “Queen Heaven” and she has pets of every kind of animal because “lots of animals die and go to heaven.” Her daughter, Ivy, is “Princess Bubblegum, but you can call her ‘Ivy'”.
They had so much fun with their pretend reality.
I don’t love it because it makes me feel old. I feel like I only get to be a mom to two little girls for such a short time, and I feel like they are rushing it when they make me go by “grandma”. Sure, I know it’s goofy. But every single time they say “grandma” I get a pain deep in my chest that the future is just not very far away. I want to hold on to those beautiful little girl faces for as long as I possibly can.
I can’t believe my baby is 5 years old and my big girl is almost 8. Ugh – where has the time gone?
What makes you feel like time is slipping away?
It was my second semester of my freshman year. I walked into my Tuesday and Thursday Speech class. It was a general education class with a student teacher and I wasn’t all that excited for the class. I found a seat on the second to the last row in the middle of the room. Little did I know that the girl with the curly black hair sitting to my left on the back row would one day become my best friend. By the second week, I was sitting on the back row and the two of us were giggling and chatting through much of class. Soon we were eating lunch together with the girls. Vanessa, Melissa, Alisa and Erin all welcomed our new friend.
Over the years, Mel has always been there for me. Even when our lives took us in different directions, I always knew I could count on her friendship.
Today is her birthday and it is also marks 20 years of our friendship.
Over the years we’ve been through lots of boyfriends, a mission, graduation, 4 states, too many jobs to count, anxiety attacks while learning to SCUBA dive, a cruise, a wedding, a painful engagement, 2 kids, some tears, and many many years full of talking and laughing.
One day, 13 years ago, Mel and I wanted to make Spinach Artichoke dip. Today, with all of the food blogs, that would have been an easy search. Back then, we’d looked at the couple of cooking websites (like William-Sonoma and cooking.com). They didn’t have anything that we liked so we headed to Barnes and Noble. We went through dozens of cookbooks looking through all of the ingredients in each recipe. Finally we found it. Both of us still use this recipe. Sometimes Melissa will add a little kick to it, but I still stick to the recipe. (Melissa wrote it down on a piece of paper from my Franklin-Planner that I still have).
2 T butter
½ onion, chopped
1 clove garlic
1 can artichoke hearts, drained and chopped
1 small pkg frozen chopped spinach, thawed
1 8 oz cream cheese
½- ¾ pint sour cream
2 shakes WHITE Worcestershire Sauce
½ tsp white pepper
2 c parmesan cheese, shredded
Sauté onions in butter, add garlic when onions are almost clear. Once clear add artichoke hearts to sauté pan. Mix in spinach. Continue heating until warmed through out. Add cream cheese, stir in until melted. Add sour cream until desired consistency. Season with Worcestershire sauce and pepper. Stir in 1 c parmesan cheese.
While it is cooking on the stove, put wonton wraps in mini muffin tins. You’ll have to be careful, because it is very easy to put a fingernail through the very thin wraps. Then fill the shells with a little less than a tablespoon of the dip. Sprinkle remaining parmesan cheese on each cup.
Bake at 350 for 8 minutes. Watch them so that they don’t burn.
Melissa, here’s to another 20 years of friendship. Can’t wait to see everything else we get to go through. I love you and thank you for all that you do. Happy Birthday!
and Lolli
Ivy has the funniest little smile. It is the perfect little shape if you were to draw a simple face.
I often wonder if she has a little bit of elf in her. She does seem to have that little bit of magic that makes everyone love her. On Saturday she had a church party, and one of the women in the ward was just so tickled by Ivy and how sweet and adorable she had been the whole time. And every day that she gets picked up from school, she has to make sure she hugs all of the girls (not the boys, just the girls).
Although it isn’t Valentine’s Day just yet, I think I just might have to use this picture as her “funny valentine”.
Swing by I Heart Faces for some other fun SMILES.
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