Best of luck to Brandi! With an update...

On Saturday, Brandi competed in the Wildcat Invitational Archery Tournament at West Ashley High School.  Results from the all-day tournament should be available today ... I'll post an update when I find out.  She scored 253 points, her all-time high.


UPDATE;  She came in 4th place overall, out of 150+ archers, with only one point out of 3rd place.  WAY TO GO! 

Brandi shooting at 15 meters

Tomorrow, Wednesday, March 25, she is competing in the SC State Archery Tournament in Sumter, SC at 11:00 am.  

Best of luck to you, Brandi!

Mmmmmm...breakfast

Isn't this just so pretty? I don't even like runny yolks but the younguns and Bill do!  

Griddle one of two full of eggs!

  With some mini chocolate chip studded pancakes, too!  

Griddle one of eight full of pancakes!

With this yummy breakfast, it gave us a good start to a full, yes, full day of playing Risk.  World domination awaits.... 

Tour of Fifty States: Minnesota's meal

Minnesota, chosen by Brandi, is another state that Laura Ingalls Wilder lived in!  That’s just too funny.  She is re-reading the books one at a time, just like I did at her age. 

Food Network is on just about all the time at our house, and one of the shows we don’t really like but we can’t stop watching (LOL) is Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.   We recently saw an episode that made us all say we want to try what Guy Fieri was eating – Juicy Lucys (MMM hamburgers stuffed with molten cheese!) That is exactly what I picked for Minnesota.  J

With the burgers we’re having Hotdish, which is cooked and served hot in a single baking dish and commonly appears at family reunions and church suppers.  Senator Al Franken holds an annual Hotdish competition.

Dessert will be Kolackys (also spelled Kolach and Kolache) due to Minnesota being the “Kolacky Capital of the World” and the state holds an annual Kolacky Days festival. Hmmm…what jam to choose for the filling?   

Menu:  Juicy Lucys, Hotdish, Kolackys

Outcome:  Oh, the burgers were so good!  Everyone really liked the Hotdish and the kids asked us to make it again.   The Kolackys filled with strawberry preserves were just right.  Not too big and very easy to make. 

Next up:  Bridget’s turn!  She chose Massachusetts!

Minnesota's Meal!

Food Category Breakdown

Below is a breakdown of the different types of foods we'll have when we are finished with all 50 states and D.C.!

Our state meal progress!

Just thought I would share this: I have a Power Point map of the U.S. that I fill in when we randomly choose our next state meal.  Notice that Brandi is the only one of us who has picked states that share a border with another one she picked...and she did it again this week!  

23 have been chosen so far...

Tour of Fifty States: Pennsylvania's meal

For the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s meal, we knew we needed to have Philly Cheese Steak Sandwiches. I found that in Philadelphia, they aren't called “Philly” Cheese Steak Sandwiches, just Cheese Steaks! There are so many ways to prepare a Cheese Steak – the choice of cheese and the types of veggies that are added make for lots of combinations.

I chose Shoofly (or Shoo-fly) Pie for the Pennsylvania Dutch, or Amish, that live in the rural areas. I don’t recall ever having Shoofly Pie before but I love, love, love molasses. (I think that the sticky molasses that attracts flies is how the pie got its name.) There are 2 different kinds of Shoofly pie – wet bottom and dry bottom. The dry bottom pie is baked completely and is cake-like and the wet bottom pie is baked a little less, with a custard-like consistency. The wet bottom one sounded good to me!

In keeping with the Pennsylvania theme, for breakfast we had French toast stuffed with Philly Cream Cheese. For Saturday night's dinner we had some Amish Potato Salad and for a treat, I broke out some surprise Hershey bars ... with nuts, because we’re all a little nutty.

Menu:  French toast stuffed with Philly Cream Cheese, Hershey Bars, Cheese Steak Sandwiches, Fries, Wet Bottom Shoofly Pie

Outcome:  Who doesn't love a Cheese Steak?  All of us did a 50/50 combination of 2 different cheeses --Provolone, White American, or Cheez Whiz.  We had sautéed mushrooms, onions, and bell peppers, too.  I found some “Philly Cheese Steak” rolls at the store, but these were sliced completely through.  We all agree that the next time we have Cheese Steaks that we’ll use a regular hoagie roll that is split but still hinged at the bottom to better hold the sandwich.  Lesson learned!  I also opted not to use ribeye $teak$ because wow they are pricey!!  Instead, I used a round roast that I froze and then sliced paper thin.

The Shoofly Pie was interesting.  We feel that the crumb topping was just too much and should be reduced by a third.  The texture was a little too “floury” to us and it overpowered the molasses flavor.  Perhaps a little more butter would have made a difference.  I’m including the original, unaltered recipe below.

Next up:  Brandi’s turn!  She chose Minnesota!

Cheese Steak!