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A second throwback “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe

As I mentioned in the first “Tasty Tuesdays” post of November, I’m going to be busy with NaNoWriMo, so I’m going back to the past for inspiration when it comes to these posts. In the previous “Tasty Tuesdays” post, I featured my first such post — one that was originally published back in 2014. For this second throwback “Tasty Tuesdays” post, I’m going to feature one that was first published in my LiveJournal on 22 December 2015. Here is that post in its entirety:

12/22/15

Food for a “winter picnic”

location: In my office

mood: goofy

Last week, I had made arrangements to get together with a family member, and it wasn’t too long before the topic of food arose. Tired of the usual fast food, I decided to indulge my love of picnics — even though it was almost winter!

So I promptly did some research (Thanks, Google!) to find out what kind of food would be appropriate for a “winter picnic” — and what wasn’t. It didn’t take me long to figure out that I needed to serve something hot. The trouble was I don’t have a Thermos, something most of the sites I visited recommended for serving hot food. Well… I decided to go for what I thought was the next best thing: a Crock Pot, especially since the one I’ve got has a locking lid AND my vehicle has an electrical outlet in it!

Once I’d decided to use a Crock Pot to keep the food warm, I then searched for an appropriate recipe. First, I checked my cookbook collection, but didn’t find anything that I though my picnic companion would like. At that point, I did another Google search. Thankfully, I found quite a few potential recipes, so the next step was to narrow down the choices. To do this, I looked at the lists of ingredients and selected the one for which I had virtually all of the ingredients in the pantry. And this recipe was…

Wait for it…

Betty Crocker’s Slow-Cooker Vegetable Minestrone!

Without further ado, here is this week’s “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe:

Ingredients

4 cups vegetable broth (which I used) or Progresso chicken broth (from 32-oz carton)

4 cups tomato juice

1 tablespoon dried basil leaves

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano leaves

1/4 teaspoon pepper

2 medium carrots, sliced (1 cup)

2 medium celery stalks, chopped (1 cup)

1 medium onion, chopped (1/2 cup)

1 cup sliced fresh mushrooms (3 oz)

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 can (28 oz) Muir Glen organic diced tomatoes, undrained (I used 2 14-oz cans of diced tomatoes that I already had in the pantry.)

1 1/2 cups uncooked rotini pasta (4 1/2 oz)

Shredded Parmesan cheese, if desired

Directions

  1. In 4- to 5-quart slow cooker, mix all ingredients except pasta and cheese.
  2. Cover; cook on Low heat setting 7 to 8 hours.
  3. Stir in pasta. Increase heat setting to High; cover and cook 15 to 20 minutes longer or until pasta is tender. Sprinkle each serving with cheese.

Note: This recipe was tested in slow cookers with heating elements in the side and bottom of the cooker, not in cookers that stand only on a heated base. For slow cookers with just a heated base, follow the manufacturer’s directions for layering ingredients and choosing a temperature.

My Notes:

Although I wasn’t entirely sure what kind of slow cooker I’ve got, I just dumped in all of the ingredients (except the pasta and cheese, as directed) and mixed ’em all up rather than digging out the manufacturer’s instructions to figure out how to layer the ingredients.

As I was typing this post, I realized that I forgot to bring the cheese with me when I left the house, so I couldn’t “sprinkle each serving with cheese”. Good thing the cheese was “if desired”!

Regarding the pasta… I followed the directions by stirring in the pasta, increasing the heat setting and cooking for an additional 15 to 20 minutes longer. Had I been serving the soup right away, these instructions would have been fine. The trouble was I ended up not being able to serve the soup until almost six hours later!

At the end of the additional cooking time, I set my slow cooker to “Warm”, loaded it into my vehicle, picked up my picnic companions and finally arrived at a suitable park. When I took off the lid to unveil the main course of our picnic, I was dismayed to find that my Vegetable Minestrone looked more like a stew than the soup I was expecting to see! The pasta had absorbed most of the liquid, leaving very fat spirals and chunks of vegetables. It still tasted fine, but… The next time I make it (especially for a picnic), I’m going to pre-cook the pasta before I leave, pack it in a separate container, and then add it to the soup just before serving. I’m pretty sure that should alleviate the “very fat spirals” problem I encountered the first time I made this recipe.

In addition to the Vegetable Minestrone, I served grilled cheese san’iches (wrapped in foil to keep ’em warm), fresh fruit (apples and pears) with a caramel dip (Pears and caramel = an awesome combination!), and some frosted sugar cookies since we were getting together to do some holiday shopping. I’m please to report that my picnic companions enjoyed the food that was served. The only trouble was the weather… It’s hard to enjoy the food when there’s a cold wind blowing!!

As always, I’d love to hear how this “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe turned out for you. Please take a moment to leave me a comment about your experience with this recipe — or even a similar one, for that matter.

I hope that you’re enjoying these throwback “Tasty Tuesdays” recipes! Looking forward to hearing what you think about (1) my idea of going back to the past for inspiration and (2) this particular recipe, so please leave me a comment below.

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November 2024’s GWIC Event Update!

Well… This month’s GWIC event is now history, which is sad because it’s such a FUN event! After updating my word count yesterday, I did a bit of GWIC “housekeepinng” by “tracking miles” (aka words written) for each of my fourteen (of thirty) GWIC stops, and I’m pleased to say that, as one of the 167 total registered passengers during this event, I wrote 16,300 of the 791,386 total words written!

This month’s GWIC event REALLY “jump-started” my NaNoWriMo word count! In the past (pre-GWIC days), I often struggled to “meet my quota” during NaNoWriMo, especially in the middle and towards the end of the month. However, this changed when a fellow writer told me about GWIC! With GWIC being the first full weekend of NaNoWriMo event months (April, July, and November), I’ve never failed to “jump-start” my word count during these months, and this month was certainly no exception! During this event, I wrote 32.6% of my 50,000-word NaNoWriMo goal!!

Here’s the day-by-day breakdown of my word counts for GWIC weekend:

Friday, 11/01/24 — 3,760 words/12 pages

Saturday, 11/02/24 — 2,663 words/7 pages for a total of 6,423 words/19 pages

Sunday, 11/03/24 — 4,909 words/16 pages for a total of 11,332 words/35 pages

Monday, 11/04/24 — 4,968 words/16 pages for a total of 16,300 words/51 pages

So, there you have it: my update for November 2024’s GWIC event. A great time was had by all AND, as you can tell from the graphic above, LOTS of words were written in a single long weekend!

One more thing… Since I’ve been participating in GWIC events for quite a while now, I think it’s high time I started “paying it forward” by becoming part of the group of AWESOME volunteers (including my writer friend who first introduced me to GWIC) known as the “Conductor Team” (since the event does have a “train” theme that I absolutely love). So… I have decided that my next GWIC goal is going to become a “Signal Operator”, which is the first step in being able to host my very own two-hour stop during a future GWIC event — my ultimate GWIC goal, one I’ve had ever since my very first GWIC event! Wish me luck on this grand GWIC adventure!!

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A throwback “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe

Since I’m going to be busy with NaNoWriMo this month, I thought I’d go back to the past for inspiration when it comes to “Tasty Tuesdays” posts, and it seemed fitting for the first throwback “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe to be the one I featured in my very first such post I ever wrote! It was first published in my LiveJournal on 4 March 2014. Here is that post in its entirety:

Tasty Tuesdays… 4 March 2014

mood: excited (about something new)

While browsing through some blogs yesterday, I came across an entry in one that was subtitled, “T stands for Tasty this Tuesday”. This particular entry featured something called Cajeta (Mexican caramel) that the author found to be very tasty. Although I’ve never had Cajeta (and don’t even know where I might be able to get some), the combination of the words “tasty” and “Tuesday” got me thinking.

Perhaps it was because I was hungry, but this combination of words led me to the idea of posting “receipts” (an old-fashioned word for “recipes”) of tasty things on Tuesdays. Although I’ve posted a variety of entries about food throughout the years, I thought this would be a fun way for me to share some of my favourite recipes… and recipes that I want to try.

This inaugural “Tasty Tuesdays” post features a recipe that I found in one of the cookbooks that I checked out in honour of January being “National Soup Month”: “Lee Bailey’s Soup Meals: Main Event Soups in Year-round Menus”. I decided to go with this one because it reminds me of one of my favourite recipes (“Hamburger-Sausage Soup”) AND it’s one that I wanted to try during the recent winter weather (but didn’t because the pantry was bare). Without further ado, here’s the first of my “Tasty Tuesdays” receipts:

Black Bean and Macaroni Soup

(from “Lee Bailey’s Soup Meals” by Lee Bailey Copyright 1989)

I am especially fond of the combination of beans and macaroni. And with sweet red peppers — oh, boy!

1 cup dried black beans

8 cups Chicken Stock (I plan to use Vegetable Stock instead.)

2 small bay leaves

1/4 cup olive oil

1 large onion, coarsely chopped

1 small garlic clove, finely chopped

1 cup drained and chopped canned tomatoes (not in paste)

2 tablespoons red wine

1 teaspoon sugar

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

1 1/2 cups elbow macaroni

2 very large red bell peppers, roasted, peeled, and cut into medium dice

Garnish

Finely chopped flat-leaf parsley and green onion

Wash and pick over beans. Cover with an inch of water and bring to a rapid boil. Boil for 2 minutes and turn off heat. Allow to sit, covered, for 1 hour.

Drain beans and cover with 3 cups of the chicken stock. Bring to a boil and turn heat down to a simmer. Add bay leaves. Simmer until the beans start to get tender, about 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat the olive oil and saute the onion until wilted and starting to brown, about 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic and continue to cook for another minute or so. Scrape the onion-garlic mixture into the beans and add the tomatoes. Continue cooking, adding more stock if necessary, until the beans are done. This can take up to another hour. Add wine, sugar, pepper, and balance of the stock.

To serve, boil macaroni in very well salted water for 6 minutes. Drain and add to the bean mixture along with the diced red pepper. Simmer just long enough to completely cook the macaroni. Allow to sit for about 5 minutes before serving. This probably will not need but correct seasoning if necessary.

If you have cooked the soup too rapidly, you may have evaporated too much of the liquid. In that case, add a bit more stock. However, this should be a very thick soup.

Sprinkle with chopped flat-leaf parsley and green onion, if desired. Serves 6

So, there you have it… The results of my thinking. I plan to try this recipe for the first time once my pantry is no longer bare (read: after my next trip to the grocery store probably within the next week), and I will post pictures to prove it! If you get around to trying this recipe before I do (or even after), I would love to hear whether you thought it was worthy of the “Tasty Tuesday” label. If it’s as good as my favourite “Hamburger-Sausage Soup”, I think it’ll definitely earn that label, but only time will tell, at this point. Bon appetit, mes amis!

Well, that was my very first “Tasty Tuesdays” post ever! I wonder how this recipe would work in my Crock-Pot, my friend during NaNo-vember… Might have to give it a try — after I do a bit of online research into cooking beans in a Crock-Pot, of course!

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November 2024’s main writing event (NaNoWriMo) has begun!

That’s write… er… right! NaNoWriMo 2024 has begun, and this means one thing: “Update posts”! In the past, I published this kind of post on a daily basis, but that was before I became a full-fledged “night owl”! As such a “bird”, my writing schedule doesn’t always jive with NaNoWriMo’s Web site for updating word counts. Traditionally, the NaNo Web site required all word counts for a particular day to be posted by midnight of that day. Midnight is often when I start writing, so that isn’t usually a deadline I can meet. To combat this problem, I’ve decided to continue doing something I started to do during July 2024’s Camp NaNoWriMo: writing “weekly” update posts as opposed to the “daily” posts I used to publish. So…

Every Saturday, I’ll publish one of these weekly update posts, which will work out well since the last day of this year’s NaNoWriMo event ends on a Saturday. As always, I’ll continue using the same format I’ve been using for such posts — with the only difference being that I’ll list a week’s worth of data instead of just a day’s worth as I’ve done in the past. So… Without further ado, here are the stats for this “week” — from 11/01/24 to 11/02/24:

Friday, 11/01/24 — 3760 words/12 pages

Saturday, 11/02/24 — 2663 words/7 pages for a total of 6423 words/19 pages

As with the first weekly update post back in July, the main reason why the daily word counts are so high for each of these first two days of November is because I am participating in November’s GWIC (Global Write-in Crawl), which always takes place during the first full weeked of a NaNoWriMo event. It’s an event that is extremely FUN, AND it never fails to help me INCREASE my word count tremendously, which is definitely a great thing at the beginning of the month! The “jump-start” in word count that GWIC gives me early in the month is VERY helpful, especially towards the end of the month when I often struggle to “meet my quota” of at least 1,667 words per day.

So, there you have it: my first weekly update for NaNoWriMo’s main event in “NaNo-vember” 2024! If you’re a writer, you should consider participating in a GWIC event — OR all of them, like I do! Need more information about GWIC? Please don’t hesitate to contact me about this event! I’d love to welcome you aboard the GWIC train for a FUN writing adventure in the future!!

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LAST Weekly Update (#4) for July’s Camp NaNoWriMo

Well… This is it. Today is the LAST day of July 2024! Therefore, it is also the last day of July’s Camp NaNoWriMo. So…. here’s my last weekly update for this event, using the same format that was used in previous updates:

Thursday, 07/25/24 — 431 words/1 page for a total of 22879 words/89 pages

Friday, 07/26/24 — 365 words/1 page for a total of 28244 words/90 pages

Saturday, 07/27/24 — 726 words/2 pages for a total of 28970 words/92 pages

Sunday, 07/28/24 — 380 words/2 pages for a total of 29350 words/94 pages

Monday, 07/29/24 — 252 words/2 pages for a total of 29601 words/96 pages

Tuesday, 07/30/24 — 789 words/3 pages for a total of 30390 words/99 pages

Wednesday, 07/31/24 — 641 words/2 pages for a GRAND total of…

Wait for it…

31,031 words/101 pages!!

Now that July 2024’s Camp NaNoWriMo is now history, I realized something: Even though I’m a “winner” (by accomplishing my goal of writing at least 25,000 words) at Camp this month, I didn’t come very close to accomplishing my secondary goal: creating an outline for my current work-in-progress that I would be able to use during NaNoWriMo’s main event in November. I’ve got LOTS of events/scenes in mind (both historical AND romantic), but this month, I have been quite distracted, and therefore, unable to make any progress on putting all of those events/scenes into some kind of logical/coherent outline!

One of the distractions this month was using the “meeting my quota” entries for working on getting this Web site of mine up-to-date by drafting these “update” posts — instead of working on my outline. In addition, I’ve come up with the idea of another type of post for this Web site, but I’m still trying to finalize it, Therefore, I won’t be discussing it any further now, so check back often! Wouldn’t want you to miss out on what I’m hoping will be a valuable addition to this author’s Web site. Speaking of which… I would love to hear — and see — what kinds of posts you publish on your author Web site, so please leave me a comment below.

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Camp NaNoWriMo — Weekly Update #3

Here’s my third weekly update for July’s Camp NaNoWriMo, using the same format that I’ve been using for previous updates:

Thursday, 07/18/24 –392 words/1 page for a total of 24332 words/77 pages

Friday, 07/19/24 — 403 words/1 page for a total of 24735 words/78 pages

Saturday, 07/20/24 — 902 words/4 pages for a total of 25637 words/82 pages

Sunday, 07/21/24 — 404 words/1 page for a total of 26041 words/83 pages

Monday, 07/22/24 — 289 words/1 page for a total of 26330 words/84 pages

Tuesday, 07/23/24 — 714 words/3 pages for a total of 27044 words/87 pages

Wednesday, 07/24/24 — 404 words/1 page for a total of 27448 words/88 pages

Even though the majority of this week was spent just writing a page to prevent holes in my chart, there were a couple of days when inspiration must have struck — as evidenced by the four pages written on Saturday and the three pages written on Tuesday. I’ll take inspiration wherever — and WHENEVER — it comes! Are there things you do that help you find the inspiration you need to keep writing, especially whenever you don’t feel like writing? If so, please take a moment to leave a comment below. I’d love to hear some of your inspiring stories of perseverance and pushing yourself to write!

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Camp NaNoWriMo — Weekly Update #2

Here’s my second weekly update for July’s Camp NaNoWriMo, using the same format that I used in last week’s update:

Thursday, 07/11/24 — 425 words/1 page for a total of 21544 words/70 pages

Friday, 07/12/24 — 411 words/1 page for a total of 21955 words/71 pages

Saturday, 07/13/24 — 377 words/1 page for a total of 22332 words/72 pages

Sunday, 07/14/24 — 431 words/1 page for a total of 22763 words/73 pages

Monday, 07/15/24 — 411 words/1 page for a total of 23174 words/74 pages

Tuesday, 07/16/24 — 347 words/1 page for a total of 23521 words/75 pages

Wednesday,, 07/17/24 — 419 words/1 page for a total of 23940 words/76 pages

As you can tell from the data above, all I did when it came to my writing was to write enough so that I wouldn’t have a hole in my current “Meeting my Quota” chart since I REALLY don’t like seeing holes in these charts! If you’re participating in Camp NaNoWriMo (or even if you’re not), I’d love to hear if/how you track your progress: Word count, page count, or a combination to maintain momentum?

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Camp NaNoWriMo — Weekly Update posts

Because this month is starting to get away from me, I think I’m going to switch from DAILY update posts to WEEKLY update posts, beginning today (07/10/24). This will actually work out quite well since the last day of this month’s Camp NaNoWriMo happens to fall on a Wednesday, too. I’ll continue to utilize the same format I’ve been using for such posts — with the only difference being that I’ll list a week’s worth of data instead of just a day’s worth as I was doing at the beginning of the month. So… Without further ado, here are the stats for 07/04-10/24:

Thursday, 07/04/24 — 1539 words/5 pages for a total of 4593 words/16 pages

Friday, 07/05/24 — 1210 words/5 pages for a total of 5803 words/21 pages

Saturday, 07/06/24 — 6033 words/17 pages for a total of 10890 words/38 pages

Sunday, 07/07/24 — 4620 words/14 pages for a total of 16456 words/52 pages

Monday, 07/08/24 — 3879 words/15 pages for a total of 20335 words/67 pages

Tuesday, 07/09/24 — 382 words/1 page for a total of 20718 words/68 pages

Wednesday, 07/10/24 — 402 words/1 page for a total of 21119 words/69 pages

I imagine you’re probably wondering why I wrote SO MANY words between Friday, 07/05/24 and Monday, 07/08/24! I know I was while transcribing the data above — until I realized that this was the first weekend of July, which meant that it was the weekend for July’s GWIC (Global Write-in Crawl) event. GWIC is a full weekend of camaraderie with other writers, but, more importantly, it’s chock full of WRITING SPRINTS! The event is organized as a series of global train stations during which the local hosts introduce writers to their area of the globe AND conduct writing sprints of varying lengths (anywhere from 3 minutes to 20 minutes in length) for two-hour blocks of time — with an hour-long break between stops. It’s SO MUCH FUN, AND it never ceases to amaze me just how many words I’m able to crank out during the GWIC weekend! I’ve got the stats (see above) to prove it!

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July 2024 Camp NaNoWriMo — Day #3

Today’s stats: 5 pages, 1201 words

Camp totals: 11 pages, 3054 words

Yay! I just surpassed my November “progress update post” count, AND I earned a badge for updating my word count 3 days in a row! Going strong, and with this month’s GWIC event starting right after tomorrow’s (USA) holiday, the progress should stay strong, too!

Today, I started skimming through a writing book that I checked out from my local library (and might eventually purchase). It’s called “Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success”, and it was written by K.M. Weiland. I’m REALLY hoping that it will help me accomplish my secondary goal for this month’s Camp NaNoWriMo: create an outline for my current work-in-progress, so I’ll be able to “hit the ground running” on the first day of NaNoWriMo’s main event in November. Only time will tell…

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July 2024 Camp NaNoWriMo — Day #2

Today’s stats: 3 pages, 929 words

Camp totals: 6 pages, 1853 words

Yay! With this post, I have matched the number of NaNoWriMo progress report posts that I wrote during November 2023’s main NaNoWriMo event, and this month is still young! Hopefully, I’ll be able to continue the run I’m on now.

As I did in November 2023, I will be participating in the GWIC (Global Write-in Crawl) event this month, and today was “Packing Day”. Although I missed the actual event, I didn’t miss much — and didn’t mind the fact that I missed it — because this event was primarily for the purpose of introducing the basics of participating in the event to those who haven’t participated in it before. Even though I’m not a new participant, I did check out their presentation, and I loved the continuation of the train motif in the presentation’s slides.

Glad to see that you checked for another Camp NaNoWriMo progress update! Writing will be keeping me busy this month, so I’m curious… What will be keeping YOU busy in July? Please post a comment to satisfy my curiosity! Looking forward to hearing from you!