Sewing Block

I have had a sewing block since I came home! I usually sew a little everyday and haven’t ventured upstairs in my sewing room at all! The deal is I can’t make any of the clothes I want to right now.  My trip to the north earlier this summer seemed to have magically increased my girth size. My mother is a wonderful cook and she made fantastic food on a daily basis which always was accompanied with a loaf of homemade bread!! Who can resist right?? So I need to be good and lose a few pounds before I start on my clothing projects.

The weather in Northern Ontario Canada was also very cool this year and we had plenty of rain. Rain is a good excuse for staying in the house from dawn to dusk and sew. We got a lot of sewing done!! I made a pair of capris for my mother, a pair of jeans for my best friend Amy and we threw in some quilting in the mix as well!! This was Amy’s first glance at how hard core my mother and I are when it comes to sewing.  She thought we were completely insane  we were very fabric obsessed serious sewers 🙂 It was great sewing all day with my mother and best friend. 🙂

So now that I am back I think I am going to turn my sewing block in to a literal sewing block…….check out these squares I abandoned many, many, many years ago!!

These log cabin squares are made in this fashion to resemble ridges of autumn colors. Half your square is for example red, the other half yellow, than yellow and green, green and brown, brown and yellow etc do you see the ridges in the picture? Fall is around the corner and I think I am going to work on this quilt although I think instead of quilting it I will make it into a duvet cover 🙂

I also have a few wall hangings and table runners that I bought  for the fall ages ago! I shall put these projects to good use.

Heirloom Tomato Salad

This is so easy I think my pics will tell you the recipe 🙂

Fresh heirloom tomatoes chopped.

Add Salt and Pepper, drizzle of balsamic vinegar and EVOO

Add Fresh Basil

Cheese of choice, traditional Mozzarella or I used Feta here 🙂

ENJOY!!

 

Oven Roasted Meatballs

Homemade meatballs are indeed time-consuming, I won’t lie ……. BUT once you have eaten homemade meatballs  you just can’t possibly go back to store-bought!  I hate the messy greasy job of  frying them in the pan, so I eliminated that step by throwing them in the oven instead.  To get the softest meatballs I have used a ratio of 3:1 (3 eggs for 1 lb of ground beef) Also this is where you want to splurge on calories and get 80/20 ground beef. Of course the addition of milk and bread crumbs also adds to the texture.

I usually buy a huge package of ground beef from Costco 7 lbs or so and I make a huge batch and take the morning to cook them up and then I have many meals of meatballs that I freeze.  I love just eating them with a bit of marinara sauce and fresh cheese, meatball subs, spaghetti and meatballs, sweet and sour meatballs etc 🙂

• Servings: 15-20
• Time: 3hrs
• Difficulty: easy
• Print

Ingredients:

• 4 lbs of ground beef 80/20
• 12 large eggs
• 2 cups of milk
• 2 cups of panko bread crumbs
• 1/3 cup of fresh garlic chopped fine
• 1 1/2 cups of finely chopped onions
• 1/3 cup of parsley finely chopped
• 1/4 cup of basil finely chopped
• 1 cup of grated parmesan cheese
• 2 tsp of freshly cracked black pepper
• 1 tbsp of kosher salt

Directions:

Turn oven on to 375 . Mix all ingredients in a large bowl.  In this instance clean hands will be your best friend to really get it mixed up well.  I use a cookie size scooper for getting the perfect amount of the mixture every time.  Roll in a ball and place on a lined half sheet pan.  Cook for 20 minutes. Allow to cool slightly and enjoy 🙂

TIPS:

• If you have a food processor use it for all the chopped ingredients, it really goes soooooo much faster.
• I take tinfoil to line my half sheet pans and use pam spray so they don’t stick!
• A small ice-cream scooper really get the perfect amount of meatball mixture every time so they cook evenly
• Don’t overcook! If you want that soft melt in your mouth texture watch the clock! I actually under cook them a bit because once you take them out of the oven to rest the heat will still be cooking them as they sit! Also if  I am going to freeze them, well-done meatballs will give you a firmer texture when you go to rewarm them.