Palma of Palmabella's Passions picked ginger as this week's ingredient. This should be interesting!

I checked out a bunch of potential recipes and found a couple that sounded interesting to me.

The first one was given to me by my friend Marianne. I don't know where it came from originally, but it was really GOOD!

Candied Ginger and Rosemary Squares

4 sticks (2 cups) softened unsalted butter
1 3/4 cups sugar
4 cups al-purpose flour
1 t. salt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten, divided
1 cup (5 1/2 oz) finely chopped crystallized ginger
3 T. dried rosemary, crumbled or 2 T. chopped fresh
1 T. water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large food processor fitted with the metal blade, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Into a medium bowl, sift together flour and salt, then gradually pulse into butter mixture along with three-fourths of the eggs.

Beat in ginger and rosemary.

Press dough evenly into a 13 x 9 inch baking pan lined with buttered tin foil.

In a small bowl beat water into remaining egg to make an egg wash and brush on dough.

With back of knife, score dough (about 1/4 inch deep) in a cross-hatch pattern and bake in the middle of oven 35 to 40 minutes or until tester inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan completely. Lift out by edges of foil, and cut into squares on cutting board. (May be made 5 days ahead and chilled covered. Let come to room temperature before serving.)

Garnish with rosemary sprigs if desired. Serves 16 to 20 as a hearty hors d'oeuvre.

I halved the recipe and used fresh rosemary. Then I completely forgot to score the dough before baking.

The squares were really good, but next time I would probably put in more ginger and more rosemary.

Like a lot of other Slow Travel bloggers, the last couple of days have been an on-again off-again situation in accessing my blog. Internet Brands (which owns Slow Travel) has had major network problems which filtered down to the Slow Travel website and all of the blogs it hosts.

Yikes! I feel so isolated! Luckily, Slow Talk has not been affected, so we were able to commiserate with other STers and get updates on the network problem.

I am wondering if Friday the 13th has anything to do with it . . .

It is about 4 pm PST as I write this, and we are up again, for awhile at least. And for this I am grateful!

Today on Veterans Day I want to honor all of our veterans - past, present and future.

November 11th was named as Armistice Day in 1919 and was known by that name until 1954 when it became Veterans Day.

It is the day we salute all of our veterans and the wonderful job they do to protect our country.

My Dad, Earl Gillians, was so proud to have served in the U.S. Marines - he was at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and was also at Iwo Jima when the flag was raised.

Thank you, men and women of all of the armed services - we are proud of you!

I made another mushroom recipe today that deserves to be posted. It came from FineDinings.com

Cheese Stuffed Mushrooms with Horseradish Crema

20 large button mushrooms
4 garlic cloves, roasted
2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons Chipotle bacon (or regular bacon), cooked, crumbled
4 ounces herbed goat cheese
2 ounces Parmesan cheese, finely grated
3 ounces cream cheese
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
2 tablespoons fresh basil, finely chopped
2 to 4 tablespoons heavy cream
1 cup Manchego cheese, grated
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon hot prepared horseradish, add more if you like it spicier
pinch of salt
1 to 2 tablespoons milk
1/2 cup scallions, sliced, for garnish

Use a melon baller to scoop out then discard insides of mushroom (use for soups, stews, sauces) being careful not to break the sides.

Enclose garlic cloves with extra-virgin olive oil in foil on ovenproof pan. Bake at 400° for 30 minutes. When cooled squeeze out pulp and combine in a food processor with bacon, goat, Parmesan and cream cheese, thyme and basil. Add just enough heavy cream to make a smooth yet firm consistency and fill mushrooms. Top with Manchego and bake at 375° for about 10 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes.

Mix together sour cream, horseradish, salt and small amounts of milk until it can be drizzled across the baked mushrooms. Garnish with scallions and serve.

Makes 20

I LOVED this recipe! It was easy to make ahead and bake when ready to serve.

I used an aged Gouda cheese instead of Manchego, but other than that, I followed the recipe. Highly recommended!

It doesn't seem possible that we could already be at Week #10 on our Sunday Slow Bites! Time goes by so fast these days!

Mushrooms is the "secret ingredient" this week, and Candi of Candi's Corner: Wanderlust and Passions was the blogger to choose it.

I searched thru the internet cooking sites for a recipe and found several possibilities. The one I chose is from Food Network and a creation of my favorite Food Network star, Giada De Laurentiis. Here is her recipe:

Mushroom Parmesan

Recipe courtesy Giada De Laurentiis

Prep Time: 15 min
Cook Time: 25 min
Level: Easy
Serves: 4 to 6 servings

Ingredients:
* 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for greasing the grill pan
* 4 to 6 portobello mushrooms
* 1/2 teaspoon salt
* 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
* 1 cup marinara sauce (store bought or homemade)
* 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
* 1/4 cup grated Parmesan
* 2 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces

Directions:
Place a grill pan over medium-high heat or preheat a gas or charcoal grill.

Drizzle 3 tablespoons of olive oil over both sides of the mushrooms. Sprinkle the mushrooms with salt and pepper. Drizzle olive oil on the grill to prevent the mushrooms from sticking. Grill until the mushrooms are heated through and tender, about 5 minutes per side.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Spread 1/2 cup of the marinara sauce on the bottom of a 9 by 13-inch baking dish. Place the grilled mushrooms on top of the marinara sauce and top with the remaining marinara sauce. Sprinkle with the cheeses and top with the butter pieces. Bake until the cheese melts and the top is golden, about 15 minutes. Serve.

When I shopped for the ingredients, the portobello mushrooms looked way too big to be a "Small Bite", so I used Baby Bella Caps, which were about half the size of the portobello mushrooms.

Here are my ingredients:

And here are the mushrooms after they came out of the oven:

It's hard to be a woman driving a long distance alone. Especially when the car decides to have a problem.

On my way back from Paso Robles yesterday, I had a flat tire on the 210 freeway just past Pasadena. I had an inkling that there was a tire problem before I left Paso because the tire was way down low, and I filled it with air when I got gas in Paso.

Flat tire just past Pasadena and Arcadia, but I wasn't sure which exit I had passed when I called the Auto Club. I stopped right by a call box on the freeway, and I gave them the call box number, but they couldn't determine the location.

Finally a tow truck pulled up in back of me and a very nice young man changed my tire after we unloaded all of the stuff out of my trunk that I was bringing back from Paso.

I asked him if he needed my Auto Club card, and he said he was NOT from Auto Club but was from a free service called the Metro Freeway Service Patrol, operated on Los Angeles County freeways. Luckily, I had not yet crossed into San Bernardino County, although I was very close. The driver wouldn't even accept the money I tried to give him.

Wow! I had never heard of such a thing! But, I was very glad to see that tow truck. Auto Club called a few minutes later to say that they still hadn't found me, and I told them it was OK because another tow truck HAD found me.

So, today I am thankful for free services that arrive in the nick of time!

I decided to make a quick trip to Paso Robles this week. When my sister and I sold our folks' house in August, I asked the next door neighbor to keep some of the gardening tools for me, so I knew I had to go and get those.

The weather had been beautiful, but I knew that winter would arrive here one of these days, and I hate driving in rain or snow (over the Grapevine on I-5)

But the determining factor was that my Slow Travel compadre and fellow "Wine Snob" Shannon was going to be in Paso for a couple of days, and I wanted to help convince her to put Slow Bowl IV on the schedule for 2010.

I stayed at my friend Marianne's, but it was really strange not to have our own house to go to. I did get to meet the man who bought our house when I picked up the gardening tools, and he was really nice, so that made me feel good.

But, back to Slow Bowl and wine . . . Shannon and Marianne had never met, so the three of us went to Villa Creek restaurant in downtown Paso for Taco Tuesday. Had some very tasty tacos with a bottle of Albarino and lots of wine-related conversation. Here we are:

On Wednesday, both Marianne and Shannon had to work, so I drove over to Cambria, my very favorite little beach town. On the way I stopped at Peachy Canyon Winery to see if they still had their great Viognier - I had tasted it at the Slow Bowl dinner last February and loved it. It must have just been released at that time because they still had it - in fact, it was the only white wine on their tasting list.

Peachy Canyon Winery is known for their red wines and specifically for their Zinfandels. They had seven Zins on their tasting list, only one of which is distributed widely (Westside). I liked them so much that I went ahead and joined their twice-a-year Zin Club and picked up the shipment of six wines that had just gone out. Zin is Bill's favorite red wine, so he will be happy!

On to Cambria for lunch! The morning fog had still not lifted by the time I got there, so I stopped at the little bakery in the East Village (they have a dynamite onion-dill bread that I love) and then headed down to Moonstone Beach Drive to sit outside at Moonstone Beach Bar & Grill for clam chowder in a bread bowl. Really yummy!

I had some seagulls to keep me company, but they had signs all over not to feed the birds, so I waited until I left and took the remains of my bread bowl across the street for them to eat. It was a lovely setting , even with the fog.

This week's ingredient is olives! It was chosen by Jerry (JDeQ) of Jerry's Thoughts, Musings and Rants! He just returned from Greece and wanted to use some of the wonderful olives he brought home from there.

I found two recipes that I wanted to try, both from Abbyskitchen.co.uk One was a cheeseball with two kinds of chopped olives, but I had already done a couple of cheeseball recipes, and I didn't want to get in a rut, so I chose the second recipe.

Oven Fried Bleu Cheese Olives

(10-15 servings)

2-15 oz cans jumbo pitted black olives-drain well on paper towels
3 oz bleu cheese-crumbled
4 T cream cheese
1/4 t black pepper
2 eggs-beaten
1-1/2 c Italian bread crumbs
Cooking spray

Preheat oven 400*. Coat a 13x9 dish with cooking spray. Mix bleu cheese, cream cheese and pepper in a small bowl, blending with a fork. Fill a pastry bag with cheese mix. (I use a Ziploc bag, put filling in one corner and snip off a small hole in the end for all of my "filling"). Beat eggs in a bowl. Pour crumbs in a pie plate. Dip stuffed olives in egg, then roll in crumbs, coating well. Put in Pyrex and spray with cooking oil lightly. Bake 12-14 minutes or until golden. Cool and serve. YUMM!

Here are my ingredients:

Waiting to be served:

This was my first time stuffing something and then coating and frying/baking it, so my olives don't look as good as they could. Next time I will do better.

We liked the olives a lot and would try them again, with a few little changes.

Our Gratitude Fridays began in July when Diana of Creative Structures inspired us to write weekly about the things in life that we are grateful for.

Coincidentally, my post this week is based on our visit to Diana's B&B in Acqui Terme, Italy. I am grateful for the dogs we met while we were there.

There was Max, of course, the wonderful and beautiful mascot of Baur Bed & Breakfast. He greeted us when we arrived and was always around to say hello.

We knew we would be meeting Max, of course, but we had no idea about meeting another wonderful dog when we went on our winetasting at Diana and Micha's friend Domenico's place. His dog is called Kika, and she joined us around the dining room table for the winetasting. She loved the sausage we were eating with our wines.

Here is Bill with Max before the two of them took one of their walks. Max liked having his ears rubbed.

And here is Bill with Kika at the winetasting.

Dogs are wonderful friends to have, and we are grateful for the Italian dogs that we met on our trip.

Just wanted to let you know that I have FINALLY posted the final two episodes of our Italy trip. Plus I have gone back to the first few posts and added the pictures. Here are the links in case you are interested:

Milano to Home Sweet Home

Alba to Milano

Milano - Second Day

Milano - First Day

Atlanta Airport - A Pleasant Surprise!

On Our Way - A Bad Start

Preparing to Leave Town

Deborah of Old Shoes - New Trip picked this week's ingredient, Pumpkin. It sounds like a good choice for this fall season, with Halloween coming up and Thanksgiving being right around the corner. So, check out the blogs of all of my Slow Bites compadres - you might find some great Thansgiving recipes!

I found my recipe here. It sounded kind of unusual, so I thought I would try it.

Pumpkin Cheese Ball

From AppeizersRecipe.net

8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup canned or cooked pumpkin
1 (8 ounce) can crushed pineapple, well drained
2 cups (8 ounces) shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
1 (2 1/2 ounce) package dried beef, finely chopped
1 tablespoon finely chopped onion
Celery leaves
Crackers and/or raw vegetables

In a mixing bowl, beat cream cheese, pumpkin and pineapple. Stir in Cheddar cheese, beef and onion. Shape into a ball; place on a serving platter. Score sides with a knife to resemble a pumpkin and add celery leaves for a stem.

Serve with crackers and/or vegetables.

Yields 3 cups.

The only changes I made to the recipe is using whipped cream cheese instead of regular and substituting chopped prosciutto for the chopped dried beef. The whipped cream cheese probably made it too soft to form into a ball - I will know after I let it rest in the fridge for awhile. I will post a photo a little later today.

After refrigerating the Pumpkin Cheese Ball for several hours, it did firm up, but probably not as much as one with regular cream cheese would. It was nice and spreadable, but probably not firm enough to form into an actual ball (I used a round bowl for the shape, but I probably couldn't have formed it with my hands). It was very tasty, though, and I would make it again!

Gratitude Friday was started by Diana of Creative Structures to encourage us to appreciate the good things in our lives rather than dwelling on the problems.

This week I am grateful for the continuing good health of my sister's second daughter Patti. October 21st marks the 9th anniversary of Patti's heart/lung transplant at Stanford University Medical Center.

Patti was born with an inoperable congenital heart defect, and she wasn't expected to survive past her teens. She was put on the transplant list in 1998 for both heart and lungs - her lungs, which included no true pulmonary arteries, had been compromised by her failing heart. Her health was declining by 2000, and she had to carry a portable oxygen tank with her a lot of the time.

After 16 months on the waiting list, a matching heart and lungs became available on 10/21/00 and Patti's transplant surgery was performed. Here she is 30 minutes after the surgery - her sister Kathleen is watching over her.

This photo was taken in the first 24 hours - they have her up eating jello.

For two months she had to live in an apartment close to Stanford for her follow-up care. My sister stayed with her there to be the resident nurse.

This photo was taken early in 2003 and shows Patti with celebrated transplant physician Dr. Norman Shumway and Patti's own doctor, James Theodore, who was extremely proud of her progress. Both doctors have since died. Here is the story of that day.

And, miraculously, at one of the transplant gatherings, Patti even met the family of her donor. It was a bittersweet moment for all of them, but Patti has kept in contact with them and has even visited their home. Can you imagine meeting the person who has your loved one's heart?

Another miracle in this story was the fact that two years after her transplant, Patti ran in the Maui Marathon and raised over $6,000 for the benefit of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. She was never allowed to exert herself physically during her growing-up years, so this was truly unbelievable to everyone who knew her.

I am so proud of my niece - she has been through a lot and has had the courage to press on. She is my hero! And I am grateful for the heroes in my life!

Go to page 2 to read the San Jose Mercury-News story on Patti when she ran in the Maui Marathon.

Have you heard Adam Lambert's new single yet? It has been leaked in advance of its release on October 27th. For those of you who don't know, Adam sings on the soundtrack of the new movie "2012".

Adam Lambert single leaked online

So, I headed over to YouTube and found several versions.

Here is the one that shows the movie trailer for "2012":

And here is Adam's own video of the song, with scenes from the movie "2012" in the background.

It's pecan week, and Sheri (scg of As The Seasons Change) was the cook who chose that ingredient for this week's Sunday Small Bites.

I have eaten this appetizer many times because my friend Marianne got the recipe from the old Maison Deutz Winery in Arroyo Grande (now known as Laetitia). Back in the "old days", in the Maison Deutz tasting room, you would be served a little dish of this spread with some crackers to accompany your wine. Marianne improved upon the recipe by serving the spread in Belgian endive leaves. I remembered that it had pecans in it, and Marianne was kind enough to share the recipe with me.

For a little history of Maison Deutz and Laetitia wineries, check out this link.

Maison Deutz Blue Cheese Spread with Pecans

3 Parts Cream Cheese (I used a 12-oz carton of whipped cream cheese)
1 Part Crumbled Blue Cheese (I used a 4-oz piece)
Chopped Pecans (I used 1/2 C)
Chives
Cracked Pepper
Basil, rosemary or garlic oil
Sparkling wine

Mix all ingredients with a mixer. Add enough oil and sparkling wine to bring it to the right consistency (I think the whipped cream cheese helps to do that because I didn't add too much extra oil or wine).

Warning: One part blue cheese may be too strong - try 1/2 part and add more to desired taste. (I used the entire one part and it was fine, but it probably depends on the blue cheese you use).

Spoon onto endive leaves or serve with crackers or veggies.

All I can say is that if you like blue cheese and pecans, you will LOVE this spread!

Yes, I AM glad that it's over! No, I don't mean the week, like TGIF - I mean tax season.

Some people think that tax season ends on April 15th. Wrong! Lots of people file tax extensions and then have until October 15th to file their tax returns.

So, being a tax preparer, I finished tax season yesterday. It was a close call this year - guess I shouldn't have taken a three-week trip to Italy in September. Oh well, it was worth it!

This is Gratitude Friday, and I am grateful to be a free woman again!