What to do with leftover nachos??

BREAKFAST!!

Meant to get a picture once I broke the ooey gooey yolk.. but I was hungry.  also no pic after the salsa topped it off.

I can never have eggs benedict again

I had the PERFECT eggs Benedict at brunch today. We took the red line up to Hash House A Go Go. I had salmon Benedict. Chunks of smoked salmon, jalapeños, spinach, sun dried tomatoes a chili cream sauce all pulled on an amazing biscuit! It has forever ruined me for eggs Benedict anywhere else.  I had about half and I think Curt may have to roll my stuffed butt out of here.

Monday Ramble...

Since my catphew is clearly impatient...  After spending a fun day with the Angie on FRIDAY (must buy Fe a calendar)  we spent the night (Doubletree gives you warm cookies when you check in.... just saying...) and we met Fe's mom for brunch at The Gold Standard Cafe (just imagine snow and ice)

 
Food there is delicious... even if some of the veganish choices scare me a bit...  I had chopped lamb steak with sunny side up eggs... really good!  There was a very bizarre older clearly anti-social couple at the table next to us.  The woman barely got off her phone (they say teenagers and millenials are bad???  OMG)  The grumpy old man next to her mostly just stared out the window.  She had a large glass of orange juice, and then when it was barely 1/4 emptied got another one.  Then she drank about 1/4 of the new glass and tried pouring the old glass into the new glass.. repeatedly.  My theory is the hand we weren't seeing had vodka in it.  (Curt in these situations is very unhelpful) She sent back her plate, it came back looking exactly the same as when it went back.. and she looked seriously put out that she had to put down her phone and use a fork... the HORROR!!!!. By the time they left she had picked all the egg off and left  it in a pile on the plate.  (When the Angie was young she hated eggs... there is a solution .. tell them you don't want the damn egg!!!)

But here's the anti-social part (other than I think they maybe spoke 4 sentences to each other and I'm pretty sure 3 were to bitch about us being happy at brunch)  Now it's brunch... it isn't 5am (although 5am is not a bad time for me..) there weren't a lot of people when we got there, but it filled up quickly ( I almost forgot that Min and I needed to seat ourselves strategically, because Curt is a very unhelpful people noticer)  People are talking and laughing and having fun... it's Saturday Brunch!  Well every time we laughed, the woman turned around and glared at us... we turned it into a drinking game, and Curt ended up imbibing way more coffee than normal!  I think we were at 14? but we weren't sure how to categorize the one really long glare she gave us before she left...

There was man there as well ( well a few but we needed outside help with this one) who came in with 4 boys about the same age - none of whom appeared to own a comb.My best guess is sleepover & Dad either can't or didn't want to cook, or Mom wanted them out. Tue man was wearing a BLACK shirt and on the back in white letters it said MARCH 17.  Since it was 17 days until March 17th, we were trying to figure out why.  Why was it not green? Was he so Irish he celebrated all month? was he confused about the date? was it from a previous year's pub crawl?  Here Curt  proved helpful. After getting a waitress (not ours)  to refill our coffee (woman wouldn't stop glaring!- - come to think of it , it's very rude to force people to drink so much they can barely eat or talk!) Curt got her to go back over to the other table and see what was on the FRONT of his shirt.  Which turned out to be a pub in Boston.

AFTER we finished, we walked back to Min's house to hang out with Felix and exchange Christmas/birthday presents.  Mr Sleepy Head (yes you FE!) didn't want to wake up and then when he saw us, he decided to act all happy... hmmf.   He was VERY interested in sniffing my Barnes and Noble tote (makes me wonder what exactly it was recycled from.. one never thinks to ask that question.  Then claimed all the wrapping & tissue paper and of course the box for himself.  He decidedly DID NOT approve of the Carl head we got his mom.  He seemed disinterested in the cast iron skillets we got her as well  (his grandmother is a retired Home Ec teacher!!  Clearly Home Ec is different in MO. How do you not have a cast iron skillet as required kitchen basics???)  And of course when it was time for us to leave (couldn't stay as long as our normal visit.. it was BOWLING night you know) Fe went in the kitchen and refused to say goodbye.


I guess that was longer than I thought it would be, not a huge amount of time left for my ramble.  I'm in a really, really, really, dark, angry hate everything kind of mood the last couple of days.  I don't like when my head get's this way, but I don't know how to fix my head until it sort of runs its course.  Works been pissing me off, but realistically not more than normal, I'm just reacting to it more, so I really can't blame that.  Knitting isn't relaxing me.  I want something to change, but I don't know what.  It may just be my normal winter is almost over sadness amplified a bit. (yes, I get sad that winter is ending.  I really do love winter. I realize after all the snow and ice we've had for the last 7 weeks - I don't really like the ice and freezing rain and wintry mix part, it ruins the snow - I'm probably the only one who feels this way... but summer... is... hot... yuck) My friends know it's bad when even the fact that my favorite driver is bringing me 4 rolls of carpet on Braun's and 2 need to get racked which means playing with the boom won't cheer me up....     

Breakfast cheesy grits.

I love good Southern food.  I love shrimp 'n grits.  I love cheesy grits.  Curt makes great grits when he makes me breakfast on the weekends when I'm home, but he's not really into cheesy grits.  It's easier to make a pot of grits than one serving of grits.  Recently though, I think I've got it figured out - and instead of shrimp (Curt's allergic, so I'd have to decide I wanted shrimp 'n grits and go buy shrimp... sometimes I use chicken)  I decided to use my breakfast wrap ingredients instead ( when I do the wrap there would be feta or goat cheese and egg whites)



First the grits, Curt uses Quaker Old Fashioned grits (quick grits have a different texture... and if you ever saw "My Cousin Vinnie" you know about the stuff called instant grits)  I like these stone ground grits for when I make something 'n grits for dinner.  They are more like the texture of polenta - only white.  If you have stone ground polenta that works exactly the same - it will just come out yellow.

In a small (hopefully heavy bottomed) sauce pan  put
 2 TBSP of grits 
 1/4 cup + 1TBSP water
 1/4 cup + 2TBSP milk or cream ( I used skim because that's what I have)
 2 TSP of butter ( I use unsalted)
 and a pinch of coarse sea salt

Bring to a boil, and then turn down to a VERY LOW simmer, whisking often.

Start some water heating for the poached egg.

While that cooks, I cut up 7 baby portabellas, a 1 1/2 inch piece of andouille (you can use any meat, or skip the meat) and minced a clove of garlic ( you can add some onions, I didn't when I made this) cook them over medium heat until the meat starts to brown and the mushrooms caramelize.







Don't forget to occasionally stir the grits!!!  Add about 2 cups of fresh spinach/greens or 1/4-1/2 cup frozen and a palm full of Herbs de Provence (those are my go to herb blend - you can use Italian or whatever your favorite herb is)   I use these greens, I go through about 3 bags a week by myself for breakfast:

While the greens cook down, we're going back to the grits for a minute ( at this point the grits should have been simmering about 20 minutes ) I add in:

1 TBSP (ish) goat cheese
1 TBSP (ish) cream cheese
1/4 cup (slightly heaping) of shredded cheddar ( I used Mexican cheese blend that was left over from chilli on Sunday)



Stir often until cheese melts and incorporates into a creamy cheesy grits.



(I took the picture before I added the pepper- my real life friends will tell you that I use a LOT of pepper.. Lots..)

 

Now, add a splash of stock or even water to the mushroom/meat mixture - just enough to get any bits off the bottom and create a bit of pan sauce.  Add a spoon of vinegar to the water and drop in the egg to simmer.  Once the egg is poached to your liking (in my opinion poached eggs should always be super runny - then you get the yolk oozing onto the mushroom/meat topping and into the grits) make sure to drain it well put the mixture on top of the grits and topo with the poached egg ( I took the picture on  top before peppering the egg - pictures of egg look funny with as much pepper as I use)  I also use a dash of hot sauce - but that's just me.