Our home gets a makeover

We FINALLY took the plunge and put in laminate flooring in the house. We are in love. The new flooring went into the kitchen, dining room, living room, and hallway. The house looks bigger and brighter with the new floors and new paint. We painted in teal and soft grey; we decided to keep the brown because we felt that it anchored the room. The kitchen cabinets got a new stain which blends into the brown very nicely. We've gotten lots of compliments from those of you that have come over so thank you. The hard work was all worth it.

Feta Update

Feta is officially edible. Will post again with recipe and raw milk vs. pasteurized milk comparison.

Homemade Feta

I'll have to try it to make sure that it doesn't kill anyone. Keep you posted. Not made with goat's milk which makes this REALLY cost effective. This first batch was made with raw milk, but I will make some feta with pasteurized milk to see which one has the better texture. I'll let you know, but I suspect the raw milk will win. Check back at casaclarkcooks.blogspot.com to see what happens.

Mid week box

Went to the garden this morning and was able to harvest some food. The tomatoes are finally turning and are quite delicious. It's like getting a CSA box mid week. You'll see the dragon tongue beans (which I plan to pickle; hopefully they retain their amazing color), yellow cherry tomatoes, currant tomatoes, Italian heirloom tomatoes, one tiny Martino roma tomato, eggplant and garlic. It's totally awesome and we are all really excited about planning our fall plantings.

Chloe is finally a big girl with pierced ears. It's going to fast.

Look at those beets

Went to the garden today because I didn't have room to pull some beets that were ready to go. Yesterday I came home with butternut squash, eggplants, spaghetti squash, zucchini, cucumbers (which I'm pickling), arugula, and some chard. Back to the beets; aren't they gorgeous? They are called chioggia and they are Italian heirlooms. You are able to keep the rings if they are cooked whole and cut right before serving. Just gorgeous!

I made homemade cornmeal!

In order to concentrate properly, and let's be honest, have my VERY OWN food blog, I've decided to launch casaclarkcooks.blogspot.com. Visit this blog to discover our culinary adventures.

Grateful for....

Well it's been a bad week at Casaclark. My dad was hospitalized, a story a bit long to get into, and was released after 5 days. I am grateful to have him around. I am not ready to be fatherless. Hooray.

I'm also grateful for my mini pot garden at home. We have a ton of basil, sage, rosemary, and beans (the picture is of our dragon tongue beans) . The tomatoes were planted later than I wanted, so they are off to a slow start. I know that we'll have a ton of tomatoes from mom's garden though. It's exploding! We've been eating squash, zucchini (basically the same), eggplant, arugula, chard, and daikons. We are expecting tons of tomatoes, carrots, beets, and peppers. I'm excited to be there more now that Chloe is done with school.

Lastly, I am grateful for my wonderful bosom of friends. I love you guys. Thank you for being such a good support system.