Holiday Grand Kids

Tallia and Carter came over before Christmas

Tallia makes a Nativity.

Washington Christmas

This was just the start.

Big Christmas

Makinze and Valerie go to Wilkenson School. Such a cool vintage experience.

The town is also vintage.

2016 Holiday flavors

My wine experience started as a simple hobby. Each year it has expanded

to more flavors and more bottles of wine. Aside from fermentation and aging,

the process of wine making and bottling requires a lot of work, especially (washing&sanitizing).

I bottled 5 varieties this fall. The Rhubarb was favored among the bottling party guests.

The Crab Apple will never be duplicated, at least not from it's donor tree.

Julia had me cut it down. She is tired of raking up Crab Apples off her lawn.

Holiday Wine Bottling

It begins. 

I still have Rhubarb/Crab Apple/Apricot and Wild Grape to bottle.

Early Christmas for the Russell home residence.

The City of Idaho Falls widened Grandview Dr.

behind our home to 4 lanes. They also created

a walking and bike path.  They had to tear down

all the fences facing Grandview Ln. for worker access.

They built an 8 foot high Cedar fence in my back yard.

It stretches from Saturn to Skyline.

Raging Youth Jam

She is a VERY good girl

The other day, we were on a family stroll to the O'Neal household (some family friends in the neighborhood) to drop off some wares. We had Boo with su and, to keep her occupied, we were throwing her ball with the chucker. After arriving at our destination, Greg (the patriarch of the O'Neal family) was throwing the ball into the wilderness behind their house (it gives Boo an opportunity to use her tracking skills, rather than simply brute force and speed). After a few throws, we noticed that Boo was taking longer than usual to retrieve the ball, and was actually nowhere to be seen. Within a few moments, Boo came bounding out of the thicket with a foreign object in here mouth. At first, I was terrified that it might be some putrefied animal like a skunk or a possum, but after she laid it at our feet, it was clearly a rabbit. In fact, it was a fresh rabbit that she had just caught and killed.

Now, I'm not sure about you, but I'd never tasted rabbit before, and it was right about dinner time, so I told Rachel that I was going to take it home and grill it. A few YouTube videos later, I cleaned the carcass and set it in a BBQ marinade while I started the charcoal.

Here it is after reaching critical temperature on the grill.

As a wild, woodland creature, it was tough and a little gamy. That being said, Makinze and I ate about half of it and we fed the rest to Boo. In all it was not bad just very different, and I really enjoyed the experience of cleaning and preparing game that Boo so thoughtfully brought to us. She is a very good girl!

Half way through May

The 1950 Chevy Pickup is running good enough to run errands.

My good friend Paul Chaffe is breaking up some running boards for me.

I buffed out the oxidized paint. It looks pretty good.

A couple hot rods at Tuesday cruse night.

Extoling the virtues of the Flat Iron

I don't care if you are all fed up with my Sous Vide posts, this is another one. Earlier today, I sent mom a text with the following image.

I asked her if she knew what day it was. Around the Russell house in the PNW, the first day of the week is known as Sous Vide Sunday. Today's culinary masterpiece was centered around the flat iron steak. This has become one of my favorite cuts for a number of reasons. The marbling on a good flat iron easily rivals some of the best ribeyes (proof below).

The flat iron also has a distinctly different taste that other "traditional" cuts of meat. The big drawback to this cut is the streamer of connective tissue that usually runs through the center of the steak along its length. It is tough like cartilage, and can be off putting to saw around. That is why this particular cut is well suited for the Sous Vide method. By cooking the steak at a lower temperature for a longer period of time, this cartilage breaks down, and becomes nearly as soft as the rest of the meat. In tonight's steaks, for example, it was nearly unnoticeable. Rounding out the benefits of the flat iron steak is the price. I usually find them, pound for pound, to be half to a third the price of a similar ribeye. Today we paired our meat with some seasoned green beans and canned peaches. In other words, we ate like kings!

PS, Julie, I am going to put together a write up on how to use your Sous Vide box with your rice cooker or Crockpot. I'm sorry I haven't gotten to it yet.

Summer days

We may have a few more stints of rain before it is official, but as far as I am concerned, it is summer here in the Pacific Northwest. After a week of rain, this weekend is simply gorgeous. I had the hot rod out running errands. I'm not sure what it is, but there is something intoxicating about the power and unrefined finesse unleashed on the winding roads around my place.

Summer also means BBQ! We stoked the flames this evening and had shrimp and sweet potatoes. As simple as it was, it was phenomenal. The shrimp were basted in EVOO, Old Bay, and diced garlic. The sweet potatoes were pre-baked in paprika, salt and pepper before roasting on the grill. Paired with a salad, we ate like kings.

Like I said, it was a beautiful day today, only a light breeze and clear skies. It was a good day to be cultivating our garden as well. We started tomatoes from seed this year, so that is exciting!

We've got a bunch of adventures planned this summer, and I hope to be better about sharing them with the family on the blog. Have fun and stay safe, from Rainier with love!