My occasions

As you may have guessed from the description, this blog is going to be about food.

At least for me, food needs to be truly economical (contrary to what the food network might say, $10 a plate is not economical when you're serving a bunch of people), impressive to the average person, and perfect for the occasion. That's what I like best, occasion cooking (usually I try to keep it safe while getting people to try new things that they would naturally love).

For instance, earlier this summer I had to cook for Mark (my husband), his fam, and Chad (his best friend). They were going to be working all day on an extensive new brick patio at Mark's parent's house, so they needed something hardy. But Mark's mom warned me that Dad doesn't like to take long breaks while he is focused on a task, so it couldn't take a long time to eat. Mark likes meat (I'm sure Chad does too). To Mark "hardy" means meat. Mark's family would prefer not to eat meat (they are mostly vegetarian). In fact, hardy for them might mean a huge salad with beans. So what do I serve?

As you can see, the blog will really be about my life and the events of my life but also the food I cook to go along with those events and those people who will be eating it.

In case you are wondering, after hours of thought (cause that's what I do) I decided to serve pasties (savory hand pies.) and a basic greens salad. The pasties were perfect, if I do say so myself.

I used this recipe only I used half whole wheat, half white flour. I also doubled the recipe...it made almost 30...we ate them all (5 adults, 2 kids). I was hoping to have leftovers because I know that they freeze well, and my oven is out of order (I made them at the fam's house). Oh well. Everyone was very hungry.
Instead of rolling out all the dough really thin, the recipe recommended rolling the dough thick (1/2 inch) and cutting 2 1/2 inch circles (I don't have cookie cutters so I used a small juice glass) and then rolling them thin one by one as you fill them. That method worked really well for me (and I'm terrible at rolling out dough). It also helped that the dough isn't crumbly and delicate like normal pastry dough...it has baking powder in it, and you actually kneed it.

I filled some with leftovers of corned beef and cabbage (with potatoes and carrots) that I had at a Irish pub the night before and some with potatoes, carrots, and turnips (raw with half a small onion, minced and salt and pepper...no liquid). I liked the vegetarian ones best. The turnips gave them a really good flavor. In short, they were fantastic...not as much work as I was expecting... very economical (1 potato, 1 turnip, and 1 carrot made almost a whole batch)...and very impressive. I'll have to make these again when my oven get's fixed (it's been broken since March).