Monday, September 19, 2005

Garlic fingers and a smelly house!

This weekend my husband and I canned salsa. Yeah! We did it! This is the first time for him for ever even seeing this kind of thing done and this is the first time for me for actually doing it without a friend or family member helping. So yeah, we're pretty proud of ourselves! Garlicky smelling fingertips and a spicy smelling house later we had canned 23 jars. If we wouldn't have ran out of a couple of rings, we would have had 25 jars, but that's okay. And my fingers still smell like garlic.

It's funny how the weekend worked out though. We were supposed to go to my sister's house for a BBQ on Saturday and she lives like two hours away so it would have been an all day event. Well she and I were supposed to can some tomatoes and possibly juice depending on how much tomoatoes I would have brought up from mom's garden, but turns out she had canceled Friday night, after I picked the tomatoes. So here Charlie and I are with a box full of tomatoes in the pantry that needed to be used within the next couple of days. Of course we wanted to take our shot at salsa, and since we had mom over for dinner on Sunday and she brought some green chilies with her and more tomoatoes so we could make use of them and take our hand at trying it. Funny thing is after all those tomatoes we had, I forgot to save one for our hamburgers this week! DANGIT. I guess I will have to stop at mom's for one measley tomato on my way home from work.

For dinner we had my yummilicious basil rub roasted chicken. I just love that stuff! The breasts are so flavorful and tender and the drippings make the best gravy too. Mmmm...I hadn't actually planned on mom being over for dinner until next weekend, but with the change of plans we made it a week earlier. It's funny how things end up working out, but it sure makes the weekend feel productive even if does fly by when there are too many things packed into it. Here's the recipe for the chicken:

Roast Chicken Sweet Basil Rub

5 lb or close to Whole Roasting Chicken
Stuffing (if desired)
1 Tablespoon Salt
1/2 Tablespoon Lemon Juice
2 teaspoons Sugar
1/2 teaspoon Black Pepper
1/4 teaspoon Garlic Powder
1 Tablespoon Basil
1/4 teaspoon Onion Powder
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
1/4 teaspoon Paprika

Mix salt, sugar, garlic, onion, paprika, and lemon juice together. Next, add black pepper, basil and oil. Mix into a paste-like consistency. Rub mixture on breast and thigh area of stuffed whole chicken and cook 20 minutes per pound in a Reynold's roasting bag.

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