Chicken Curry Soup

This week I digress from what I had planned. I have looked for a few weeks and cannot find short ribs at any of my local grocery stores. Is this a seasonal thing?

So I happened to have a lonely, boneless, skinless chicken breast in the freezer and decided to make this recipe instead of the Korean Barbecued Short Ribs. If I ever find them I will revisit this cookbook and make them.

Chicken Curry Soup

2 tblsp butter
1 1/2 tblsp flour
2 tsp curry powder
3 cups chicken stock
2 egg yolks
1/2 cup light cream
1/2 cup shredded, cooked chicken
3 tblsp Mango chutney
2 tblsp chopped cilantro*

Melt butter in saucepan over low heat. Stir in flour and curry powder; cook for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Gradually add chicken stock and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Reduce heat and beat in egg yolks and cream. Cook over low heat until thickened. Add chicken and cook until heated through. Serve hot or chilled.

Garnish each serving with 1/2 tblsp of mango chutney. Sprinkle with cilantro.

Makes 6 servings.



I had problems with this recipe,,where to start. First off it never got "thickened". I even added more flour than called for and eventually it simmered down to only 2 servings and it still was not thick. I am baffled. I added an entire chicken breast and that made it rather hearty.

We ate most of it before I remembered about the chutney on top. Richard, once reminded, put a dollop of chutney on his soup and stirred it in. He said it made it some better but it was very good tasting without the chutney or the cilantro. Then again we love curry so from the start it had a lot of promise.

I would make this again on a chilly fall or winter afternoon. Very tasty.

Can You Spot The Difference?

Have you ever looked at those pictures in the papers or magazines and they ask you if you can spot the differences?

Well here is our version of one for you. There are 4 changes that I noticed. If you find more let me know.






The biggest one was this guy. "Zippy, the Nobel Beast". He was a gift from a friend.

Weekend Follies

This past weekend, May 21-22, we had a great time both days.

Well let me rephrase that, after Richard was done working we had a great time. He was working most of Saturday while I got the house ready for a guest and then started getting things organized for Memorial Weekend.

This lovely Rhododendron is at the foot of our back deck stairs.


During sundowner time Richard started to relax and really enjoy himself.


Morgan of course always knows how to relax and unwind.


Kele was going her best manatee impersonation, what a cutie. Lili was off somewhere looking for a toy.


On Sunday we had more work to do around the house. One big project was scraping some of the silt out of the large pond in the front yard. Here is Richard backing the tractor into the pond,


Bucket down, 4 wheel drive engaged, first gear, GO.


After he was done I went out to look at what he had accomplished. There used to be a drain and a lot of water plants in this part of the pond,,,I wonder where they are now?


He left the driveway a mucky mess.


While he was playing in the mud I was playing in the dirt of my raised garden. I got our sweet basil, sweet red bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, sweet banana peppers and okra planted here. (Due to technical difficulties I'll have to add this photo later)

Here is a corner of the deck with more herbs and cayenne pepper plants. We are ready for the summer now.

Lemon Chicken

Lemon Chicken

1 lb. boned chicken
2 tblsp soy sauce
1 tblsp sherry
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp. ginger, minced
1 tsp sugar
oil for frying
1 egg white
2 tblsp cornstarch
1 tblsp flour
Lemon Sauce**

Pound chicken lightly with back of knife blade. Cut chicken into pieces 1 1/2x1 inch. Combine soy sauce, sherry, garlic, ginger and sugar; add chicken and marinate for 30 minutes. Heat oil to 375. Drain chicken. Combine egg white, cornstarch and flour.; coat each piece of chicken with batter. Fry until golden brown; set aside and keep warm. Prepare lemon sauce. Place chicken on plate and pour lemon sauce over it.

**Lemon Sauce
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/3 cup sugar
2 tblsp vinegar
juice of 1 1/2 lemons
2 tsp cornstarch
1 tblsp water
2 drops yellow food coloring

In a saucepan combine broth, sugar, vinegar and lemon juice; bring to a boil. Mix together cornstarch and water; stir into broth mixture. Reduce heat and cook until thickened and clear. Remove from heat and stir in food coloring.



I doubled the egg white cornstarch and flour mixture as what the recipe called for was not enough to coat my chicken. I used one large boneless, skinless breast and I did not pound it. We had this on rice because we love rice, the cookbook suggests placing the chicken on shredded cabbage.

Kalua Pig and Cabbage

Many years ago before there was a Tropical Storm Kele there was Hurricane Liliuokalani,, three of them to be exact. The cover of the month's cookbook was the result of one of those hurricanes which explains the missing pieces of the front cover. Thankfully nothing on the inside was damaged.



The book has some neat things in it, here is a collage of photos from the people who used to work the Dole pineapple fields.


It gives you some illustrations and definitions of certain local foods for those who don't know what things are.



Kalua Pig and Cabbage
1 small head cabbage (1 1/2-2 lbs)
2 tblsp butter
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 cup shredded Oven Kalua Pork**
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 tsp salt

Cut cabbage into 1 inch chunks. Melt butter in large skillet; saute onion until tender. Add cabbage, pork, broth and salt. Cover tightly and simmer 10-12 minutes or until cabbage is tender. Serves 6



**Oven Kalua Pork
6 lb. pork butt (I use a Boston Butt)
1 tblsp liquid smoke
2 1/2 tblsps Hawaiian salt-divided (can substitue Kosher salt)

Preheat oven to 350. Rub pork with liquid smoke and rub with 1 1/2 tblsp of the salt. Wrap pork in foil sealing completely. Place in pan and roast for 5 hours. After baking shred the pork and sprinkle with the remaining salt. Serves 12

Here is part of the roasted pork,,,,


it comes apart in chunks and falls off the bone,,,,


once shredded it is ready to use,,,,,


My one proble with this entire book is that several of the recipes call for Hawaiian Planation products which I suppose you could get via mail order. I however will substitute something found locally for one of their items.

With the leftover pork, you can mix in some barbeque sauce and have pulled pork sandwiches.

May Flowers

Last weekend was very nice and I got to play outside. I got all my hanging baskets planted for the summer,





and I got all my planter boxes planted,


our Tulips were really great this year,

Kelekona's Eyes

One of the issues with Shar Peis is that they need to have surgery to lift their eye lids or they will go blind. We had Kele go in for her surgery on Monday May 2nd.

Here is the clan resting on Sunday night. From left to right: Kele, Morgan, Lili (as a pillow) and Richard.


The vet only did her lower lids and is pretty sure that will do the job. Kele has 6 sutures in the bottom of each eye and has to wear this lampshade for 2 weeks until her stitches come out. Richard refers to her as a bull in a china shop as she is running into everything. It is getting better the more she wears it. At least she has figured out how to drink out of the water bowl without us holding it for her.


In these next two you can see where they shaved the skin around her eyes and the stitches in the outside bottom of each eye.

What is most impressive is that you can actually see her beautiful eyes. Am not sure what color to call them,,, maybe a silver gray?

Lowes, Let's Grow Something Together

Lowes,,how do I love thee,,,let me count the ways,,,,actually I do not want to count the ways nor the number of dollars we have spent so far this year on herbs and veggies.

Since here in the mountains we are strongly advised not to plant outdoors until Mother's Day weekend and since by Mother's Day weekend most of the plants left at Lowes are picked over we have turned our kitchen into a greenhouse.



We bought some cilantro and rosemary this year and we planted them in these large round wine tiles.We have done this before and had great success with them.


On the left from the back forward are 4 sweet basil, 2 okra and 2 sweet banana peppers. The tray on the right is all petunias for our flower boxes around the back deck railing. If we get a good crop from the okra we are going to pickle it for martinis, yummy.



Here are our 8 tomato plants. 4 are roma and 4 are cherry varieties.


Farthest away are 4 small jalapeno and 4 small cayenne pepper plants, the next ones towards you are sweet red bell peppers.


Now mind you we were going to cut back on what we grew this year. Somehow 10 pepper plants was not what I had in mind, more like 4. We did make the decision not to grow green beans, onions or attempt eggplant again this year. For some reason the eggplant grow and get lots of blossoms but no fruit ever sets. Maybe they don't like altitude.

Now we just have to hope that Tuesday's possible wet snow on the mountain tops will be the last snow until the fall. Please, please let it be so, I want my kitchen counter space back.

Tomato and Goat Cheese Tart

Tomato and Goat Cheese Tart
original recipe from Cindy Price

1 pkg puff pastry
4 ozs goat cheese, crumbled
5 large tomatoes, sliced
1 jar pesto (optional)
salt and pepper
Olive oil
large or individual tart pans

Lightly roll out pastry; line tart pans and trim excess. Sprinkle pastry with olive oil. Top with sliced tomatoes. Cover tomatoes with goat cheese, salt and pepper, olive oil and pesto (if desired). Bake for 15-20 minutes at 325.

I was really looking forward to this recipe since we love tomatoes and goat cheese. However I had a few issues with this. First off the pan should have been lightly greased so the pastry crust would not stick to it. Secondly, after 30 minutes this was no where near done so I turned up the heat to 350. It still took about an hour before the sides of the crust were done,,,however upon serving we realized that even though the sides were done the bottom was still doughy and partially uncooked.

Next time I will cook the pastry part way and then put the tomatoes and cheese on top before finishing.

My one change was that I sprinkled the tomatoes with sweet basil before putting the cheese one.


Ready to go in the oven.


This had a really nice taste.