The Food Network Lounge Party in NYC!!!

PJ and I had such a great night last night! I was invited, with a guest, to the Food Network Private Lounge Party at Thalassa Restaurant in NYC. What an honor!!!
We arrived 40 minutes early so we took a short walk to the Hudson River to see what New Jersey looks like from this side of the river. We checked out the menus from the different restaurants in the area.

As we walked in the door, I heard someone behind me say "Here comes Aarti" (winner of the Next Food Network Star and show Aarti's Party). I pushed PJ through the door, whipped out my camera and yelled "STOP"! I got the picture! I think I scared her in the process!
There were a couple of photo shoots and interviews with Aarti and other chefs.
There was so much food there. There were 2 big stations but we went into a different room where there was a smaller station and not as crowded with people.
The blond curly haired girl is Candace Nelson of The Cupcake Wars.
PJ chatting with a server about all of the delicious food.
Aarti
Cupcake Tower from the Cupcake Wars
Lindt Chocolate
Mini Marbled Stuffed Potatoes
Shrimp with Greek Saffron Sauce Skewers... these were to DIE for! They were soooo good. I just kept going back for more and more of these!

Fried Eggplant and Zucchini with a Greek dipping sauce

It was definitely a young city type of crowd. I actually think that PJ and I were the oldest people that were there!
Sunny Anderson mingling with the press

Sunny and Me
When you first walk in, across from the bar is a really long, maybe 20 feet, sofa. There were Food Network pillows all over the sofa. As we were leaving PJ asked if he could have one to give to me and she said YES!

I told PJ that before we leave, I have to get a picture with Aarti. We couldn't find her so we decided to find the bathroom before heading out. Who should I meet in the bathroom but Aarti!
What a fun night we had and quite a different experience for us! I hope we get invited next year!
Everyone that was there left with a bag of goodies... WHA-HOOOO!

Check out this blog... http://www.maggielamarre.com/2010/10/lets-do-lunch-red-lobster-restaurant.html
Maggie is giving away 2 $25 G.C. to the Red Lobster!!!

Balsamic-Baked Onions and Potatoes with Roast Pork

Last night I made a delicious meal.
These recipes are from Jamie Oliver. I saw him make this on his Jamie At Home show on the Cooking Channel the other day. He said that this dish will fulfill every mans dream! It did not fail. PJ loved this meal. I served it with spinach on the side. It calls for 1 1/2 CUPS of Balsamic Vinegar but don't be afraid to use all of it! It ends up caramelized and just delicious! He recommends using CHEAP balsamic vinegar. The recipes can be found on my cooking blog.... www.mamazukecooks.blogspot.com

Yesterday was a beautiful sunny crisp fall day. After working in the yard, PJ and I decided to go for a spin in the MGB. I got my pocketbook and went outside to wait for him. The MGB key is on PJ's regular key chain so I didn't have to take a set with me. PJ came out the door, took a few steps and proceeded to say " OH SH*T"!!!! He asked if I took my house key and I said that I didn't. I said "no problem, we'll go through the door in the garage". With that he replied "I locked it"! Now why would you go and do that if it's been unlocked for the last 25 YEARS? He didn't kike that I asked but his reply was that he didn't want Alyssa's cat to get out! Is Huckleberry so talented that he can turn the doorknob to open the door to get out????? OMG!
Everything was locked except the 2 bedroom windows. He went and got a ladder to be able to get above the hedge and into the window. BUT there was an obstacle... the windows were both broke where they don't stay up. The pulleys or whatever they are were both broken. We never bothered to do anything about it because we don't open the bottom, just the top. So he had to pry the window up a bit with a screw driver and then put a brick in to hold it open a little.
Now in the meantime, our neighbor pulled up in his car, said hi and gave us a funny look like what the heck are you doing but then went into the house. Another neighbor was having a party and a lot of people noticed that something was going on. Plus the mailman stopped to watch!
PJ asked me to hold the ladder tight so he could 'push off' and propel himself over the window box and into the bedroom, head first. I did just that but couldn't miss this adventure so I snapped a picture of him! As he landed on the floor he yelled out to me "Did you get your picture"? It wasn't meant to be nice though. He was making fun of me. He ended up having a nice cut on his leg but all ended well. He got the house key and off we went to Robert Moses State Park to look at the beautiful beach, deer and light house. While we were driving I made a point of sending the picture to the kids. They all got a huge laugh out of it!
That's my finger in the picture in case you didn't know!

BLOOM DAY SCAN

This is my entry to the Bloom Day Scan contest on Gardening Gone Wild
http://www.gardeninggonewild.com/?p=12809

These are so much fun to make. My problem is that I was lacking foliage and flowers that weren't scorched or totally brown from the lack of water here. Also, my photo editing software is NOT working so it is what it is! I think I may do these monthly next year to have a month by month view of what was growing in my gardens.

I've narrowed down my choices of my Bloom Day Scans to just 2 scans. Now I have to figure out which one to submit to the Gardening Gone Wild Blog contest.
#1
#2

PJ planted a purple bean plant to grow up the trellis where our grape vine is. It looks pretty neat right now because the bean pods are a beautiful deep purple. They are mixed in with the green grape leaves and really stand out. Too bad my grape leaves were attacked by the Grapeleaf Blister Mite. They're look prettier had we sprayed them. Too late!

BLOOM DAY SCANS

*** I can't get rid of the large print so please ignore it!!!

I've been busy today playing with my scanner. I've always wanted to make my own Bloom Day Scan instead of looking at the beautiful ones on Ellis Hollow's Blog.
http://remarc.com/craig/?cat=55
This month, the Gardening Gone Wild Blog ,
http://www.gardeninggonewild.com/?p=12809
is having Octobers Picture Contest as a Bloom Day Scan theme. I don't have any excuses than to try this! I don't have much in the way of flowers or any foliage for that matter that's not brown from being dry! So I found what I could. #'s 1 & 2 look almost identical but one has a little more light peeking in. Also #4 I think, needs to be cropped. I don't know which to submit but I'm leaning towards #6. I still have time though.
These were really a lot of fun and I'm sure I'll be making quite a few of these!
#1
#2
#3
#4

#5

# 6

Yesterday PJ and I took the MG out for a spin and went out east to a Garlic Festival at The Garden of Eve Organic Farm. The traffic on Sound Ave was horrendous! We said to each other that this better be a good festival or we'd be a little upset. We're a little spoiled in having enjoyed the Garlic/Harvest Festival in Bethlehem, CT and the garlic Festival in Saugerties, NY for the last few years. The parking lots were mobbed but we found a spot.
There was a $3 admission. When you first walked in there was a bunch of pumpkins in a roped off area. These were for sale but no one was even looking at them.

There were about 15 vendors in the whole place! THAT'S IT! The JD Gourmet Balsamic Vinegars (the BEST in my opinion and we always buy a bottle in CT) http://www.jdgourmet.com/ and Sweet Melissa's Dips let you sample their products and maybe one or two more. There were 2 people selling Garlic Soup for $3 and $5 a cup but there were no samples to see if you'd even like it or not. To us, part of the fun of a festival is sampling the food! So the people selling pickles, jams and honey hardly got any business from what we could see. At the other festivals, EVERYONE has samples, even the people selling just garlic. They let you taste it before you purchase the bulbs. There were 2 vendors selling Garlic bulbs. How can they call this a Garlic Festival I'd like to know!!! There was hardly any garlic in sight and no smell of garlic!!
We walked around the rest of the property and both of us commented what a mess the ground was... not with litter but HUGE holes, rocks etc... It was a law suit waiting to happen. That was it, we were out of there. It was a waste of our time. We did buy the Balsamic Vinegar though. It's soooo good... like no other!
We decided to drive a bit more east to see if we could find a farm stand with fresh veggies but a good price. We ended getting off Sound Ave because there was just too much traffic. We went down to RT 25 and started heading west. We ended up stopping at Schmitts Farm. They had beautiful sunflowers.


Inside, they had lots of vegetables, pies and fresh breads. Years ago you could get local produce for pretty good prices. These looked no different than what was in the grocery stores and yet double the price! We laughed when we saw the loaves of Banana Bread. They were $12 a LOAF! UNBELIEVABLE! When we go up to Ithaca, every Jan there's a fair at the local Lions Club. We've hit it 3 years in a row now and the ladies actually now bake extra bread just in case we show up. The first year I bought 2 loaves and PJ came up to me when I was in a different row and showed me that he bought 3! Last year we bought everyone that they had! They are $1 per loaf and the same size as Schmitts $12 loaves! We always freeze them when we get home.
The one thing that I thought was a good price was their Mums. They were large plants in 8" pots and they were 4/$20.

This was just sitting amongst the gourds!
All in all we had a nice day, even though we were disappointed in the festival. We came home, made a nice dinner and had a bottle of wine. A great way to end the day!

I got bored with being home today so I decided to some garage sales. Our town is having a big garage sale but I will avoid it for various reasons. I decided to go to a bunch of other sales that were in our area plus one 2 towns over that advertised an annual BLOCK sale. The first 6 sales that i went to in my area were horrible. I didn't get a thing. Then I headed to the block sale... HORRIBLE! I couldn't believe how high their prices were... $5 for their books!!!
I decided to save my money and just go home. I got stuck at the light on Wantagh Ave and sat through 3 of them to make a turn! I noticed a sign for a sale to go to Harold St. I decided to make a left instead of a right and head there.
WHA-HOO. I hit a GREAT sale! I first spotted a big wicker basket. My thought was that this is just what I've been looking for to put all of PJ's millions of pairs of sneakers and shoes in that he just leaves on the living room floor. $1. That was all I was going to get but decided to ask about the Lia Sophia jewelry. I never go to Lia Sophia parties because I refuse to pay their price for their jewelry. I like some of their items but mostly I don't. Alyssa just went to a party and said she liked the items but it was way past what her budget allows but bought a pair of earrings anyway. So when I asked about the jewelry, I expected her to say ridicules prices and I'd spend my one dollar and leave. She said she is selling it cheap and just wants to get rid of it. She used to sell them but is out of it now. I'm sure the items that she had were a few years old. Who cares!
I saw a pair of earrings that I liked and asked how much? $2... OK I'LL TAKE THEM!!!!

Then I picked out this bracelet... How much? $2 !
Then I stopped asking and just picked out items that I thought Alyssa and Brooke might like before the lady next to me got her hands on them!


I had her add up everything including the basket. $14!! I felt like I hit the mother load! I hope the girls at least like SOMETHING!

*******
I had to show Alyssa these pieces. She wanted to go to the sale now so we went back and the lady put more out! She got a nice necklace and I got 2 bracelets and a necklace for $10!!