MUTE MONDAY - RED

EDIT: Special Good-Night Wish for Kym

MUTE MONDAY - WHITE

Frank White: There are some things I don't do.

Dim Sum Sunday - Snowdays

This weeks Dim Sum Sunday challenge (and the first one of the new year) is snowdays. Big Shamu over at The Karmic Kitchen begged the questions - Do you have a special, warm the kids up after an afternoon of sledding hot chocolate? (I personally wouldn't care if they never came home) Do you heed the call of a huge bubbling soup pot? (when the soup pot is bubbling, it's usually bubbling over causing a flash fire) Have you ever made snow cream? (WTF?) What is your favorite thing to make and/or eat in the dead of winter?

Well, I pondered this for about 10 seconds. The kids want Swiss Miss or Campbell's soup and grilled cheese when they come in from playing in the snow. Not much of a challenge there. I thought about Chili because I like chili and we have the Karl's Korner inspired Beef and Beans Trowdown coming up in a couple of weeks. Two birds with one stone (again), but that would be just what they would be expecting me to do. Everyone made a big deal during the "Leek Throwdown" that no one went with the obvious potato and leek soup and I almost did that. So I guess I have to go with one of my childhood favorites.

My mother use to make us Navy Bean Soup starting in October. It was sort of a traditional Trick-or-Treat halftime meal. Thinking about it now, my mom was pretty sadistic in that she would load us up with beans and send us out into the neighborhood. I don't remember having any accidents but I sure could have. Anyway, I don't have my mom's recipe. I'll have to check with my siblings in the future to see if anyone has it. In the mean time, I gleaned this from Allrecipes.com. It's called My Navy Bean Soup

Here are the Navy beans soaking after I first rinsed them. I actually soaked them for 2 days. I was going to make the soup on Saturday but the schedule went to hell, so I made it on Sunday. The beans seamed nice and firm.

The only deviation I made from the recipe was substituting diced ham for the bacon and adding some ground pepper. Yeah Shamu, I know but my mom always used ham.

Here's the finished soup. It's thinner than my mom's and not as hearty tasting, but not bad. The carrots were a little on the mushy side and for the life of me I can't remember if my mom's recipe had carrots. On Saturday (when the schedule got away from me), I was visiting one of my sisters and she said the recipe is around somewhere and would get back to me. If she ever comes up with it, I Will make that soup and let you all know how I fair.

MUTE MONDAY - CHASE

And, if you know Buzz, you had to have seen this coming...

Position Players report to Spring Training Camp in 36 days.

Go Phils!!

MUTE MONDAY - BLUE