Citrus Crock Pot Christmas Ham Recipe

I thought I'd offer a quick suggestion for a great recipe if you're making ham this year for your holiday celebrations.

I found this recipe last year and it was delicious and so easy! I substituted orange juice for the ginger ale and added a few extra cloves and brown sugar for a larger ham, but otherwise stayed pretty much with the recipe.

The awesome thing is that you can do it in a crock pot and have it cooking while you're at church or opening presents or busy with other things, then its' ready when you are! It has amazing flavor and doesn't dry out!

Give it a try and let me know how you like it.

Citrus Crocked Ham Recipe  (compliments of BetterRecipes.com)

Enjoy!

Holiday Baking - Cranberry Nut Bread Recipe

Those of you who know me, know that I don't do a lot of baking, but it doesn't stop me from appreciating excellent baked goods when I see (and taste) them.

My friend, Cathy made this Cranberry Nut Bread and shared a slice with me.  It was delicious!  Moist and full of flavor but not too sweet.  Now is the time to make it because cranberries are in season and often on sale. Mmmmm...it would be great for gifts too!

She got the recipe from "A Taste of Home" magazine and you can find it on their website here.

And here are some fun ideas for ways to wrap the loaves if you give them as gifts!

Try it - you'll love it!

ZIPLOC OMELET - Has anyone tried this? It sounds very interesting.

I just got this in an email from my sister. It looks like it might be good for when all your family is together. The best part is that no one has to wait for their special omelet !!!)

Have guests write their name on a quart-size Ziploc freezer bag with permanent marker.

Crack 2 eggs (large or extra-large) into the bag (not more than 2) shake to combine them.

Put out a variety of ingredients such as: cheeses, ham, onion, green pepper, tomato, hash browns, salsa, etc.

Each guest adds prepared ingredients of choice to their bag and shake. Make sure to get the air out of the bag and zip it up.

Place the bags into rolling, boiling water for exactly 13 minutes or until done. You can usually cook 6-8 omelets in a large pot. For more, make another pot of boiling water.

Open the bags and the omelet will roll out easily. Be prepared for everyone to be amazed.

Nice to serve with fresh fruit and coffee cake; everyone gets involved in the process and a great conversation piece...
Imagine having these ready the night before, and putting the bag in boiling water while you get ready. And in 15 minutes, you've got a nice
omelet for a quick breakfast!!!

Simple Summer Pleasures...
I don't know if you like food as much as I do, but there are certain kinds of food that have etched indelible memories in my mind.

I have always loved summer and the promise of fresh fruits and vegetables! Growing up in Ohio and having a grandmother that sold produce at her roadside stand for a living, made me appreciate it even more. We often had fresh picked melons, tomatoes, beans, and more straight from the garden. Have you ever bit into a Beefsteak tomato that's bigger and deeper red than an apple and let the juice just drip down your chin? There's really nothing that compares to it.

And to this day, some of my favorite meals were the summer corn roasts that we used to have at our neighborhood HOA clubhouse overlooking Lake Erie.

My dad would build a grill about 6 feet long and 4 feet wide from cinder blocks and metal grates and he and the other neighborhood dads would roast corn (in the husks) until everyone had their fill. That aroma was so amazing and the taste of sweet corn picked that morning, swimming in butter was to die for! Did you know that the longer the corn is off the stalk, the less sweet it is? So the sooner you can cook it after you pick it, the better it will be.

At those corn roasts, the women would all bring their best picnic dishes, potato salad, watermelon, hot dogs, baked beans, apple pies, chocolate cakes and the works. The kids just enjoyed the feast on extra long picnic tables topped with red checked cloths. We'd skip down to the beach every few hours to take a dip, cool off and work up an appetite, then come back up the hill for more scrumptious food! What a day it was! Summer and corn season always reminds me of those special days.

Anyway, I digress...down memory lane.

Today I'm talking about a few other simple treats. I've been trying to take more healthy food to work for lunch lately and have been buying more celery. I really like celery. It's nearly the perfect snack, after all. My problem is that if I don't cut it up all at once I'm too lazy to do it in the morning when I'm putting together my lunch. So, I cut up these stalks yesterday and just LOVED the way they looked in the container. You know that if you store them in water they stay crisp and fresh and you can just grab a few whenever the urge strikes.

I also bought this little pot full of fresh Basil from our local Sprouts store. I love having these around to pinch off a few leaves for salads, sandwiches or other recipes. I'm hoping to be able to start my own little herb garden soon, so I have access to other herbs all the time. Once you've had fresh herbs, you never want to go back to the dry kind.

The Desert Botanical Garden here in town has a class on Herb Gardening that I'd love to take the next time it's offered. Would anyone like to take it with me?

Little Updates Around the House
The last time Amy and Andrew were here, Amy was giving me a hard time about the fact that I didn't own an apron. I'm not sure why, but I've never really used one in the kitchen. My mom never did either, so I guess that's why I never really thought about it. At some point along the way, Amy has started using aprons, so she was disappointed that I didn't have one to use when she was here. Anyway, I was checking out the new Goodwill store down the street on Saturday and came across this one for just $1.98. Isn't it cute? And it looks like it's never been used! So now, I just need to start using it and Amy, don't let me forget that it's in the bottom drawer in the kitchen when you need it.

Here's another treasure that I found recently at a yard sale down the street for $2. It's an accordion-style shutter with working louvers about 20" wide and a little over 3 feet high. If you notice the Wheaties box on the shelf in the background you can get an idea of the size. It's a little dirty and I'm planning to paint it (black, I think). I plan to put it in the corner of my living room, behind my birdhouses for now. You can see that the corner needs a little something to add height & interest.

An atypical Wednesday night dinner:

Tonight we had a great meal just for fun! We were really low on groceries last week, which is unusual for us. So I went grocery shopping (to 3 different stores) over the last week. I ended up at Sprouts when I was hungry and they had some awesome deals and delicious looking food, as usual.

Because of that we had all this wonderful stuff in the fridge for dinner. Grilled jumbo shrimp, grilled fresh asparagus and clam chowder. Plus Easter chocolate for dessert!

I love the fact that Terry's not afraid to grill things that he hasn't tried before. This cookbook was one of the best investments that I've ever made. I bought it at Half Price Books for Terry for his birthday (or Christmas) a few years ago. He refers to it all the time for instructions on how to grill various kinds of meat, vegetables, etc. He even commented tonight on wanting to try one of the grilled dessert recipes. Love it!