   To celebrate the venerable tomato and to support our favorite tomato packagers, Red Gold Tomatoes, and along with out favorite chili creators, Willis Chili Seasoning, we are having a giveaway that will make your mouth water. The winner will receive a can of Red Gold tomato sauce, a package of Willis Chili Seasoning and a lovely Red Gold Tomato apron to wear while making chili. I know it is summer, but we eat chili all year round and it is one of our summer favorites. So leave a comment below and on following posts and your name will automatically go into the drawing that will be held on August 20th. Good luck! Grandchildren are such a blessing!! They remind us of our younger days, teach us patience and understanding and give us hours of laughs and stories to tell for years. I have a friend who quips, “If I’d known having grandchildren would be so much fun, I’d have just skipped the kids and gone straight to the grandkids!” I won’t go THAT far, but I do love my granddaughter and her antics. Her name is Claire and she is 2 1/2 years old of mischief, curiosity, brains and snuggles. She has Mr. Fix-It (An-Daddy) wrapped around her little finger and the other ones too. She says, “Sit”, pointing to the floor and he sits immediately to play trains. Yep, trains. She is obsessed with trains – all trains – but Thomas The Train is her favorite. She will play for hours watching Thomas go ’round and ’round the track and I will spend days trying to get the stupid song out of my head!! ♪♪ They’re two, they’re four, they’re six, they’re eight….. ♪♪ And then, there was the other day, while spending the day with us, that Claire asked if she could take Thomas to bed with her for her nap. Thomas was evidently sleepy too. I said, “Of course!” and tucked them both into bed, with every pillow that I could find in the house put around her on that big bed so that she would not roll off. I tickled Claire with our routine, “Night, Night. Sleep tight. Don’t let the bedbugs bite” and shut the door to the bedroom.  It wasn’t very long before I heard my granddaughter wimper, then cry out and then, offer a long, pitiful wail. Quickly opening the door, I found the munchkin sitting in the middle of the bed with head down and Thomas the Train hanging from her head. It didn’t take me a second to figure out what had happened. I’m not totally dense. She had put the toy in her hair and turned it on. The wheels wrapped her hair around the axles and it was not a pretty sight!  I did NOT want to send my little precious home to her mother with a big chunk of hair cut out of her head and so I diligently pulled one hair at a time out of the train but eventually, hair got pulled and broken. Claire was amazingly still and did not make a peep. When I finally removed the toy she flatly proclaimed, “Thomas bite me.” Yep, he sure did! And as a result, Thomas would not run because of all of the hair wrapped into the wheels. But not to worry. Thomas has been saved. It took Mr. Fix-It and me working in concert to perform the delicate hair removal. A scalpel, fine tweezers and a screwdriver did the trick. I wiped Mr. Fix-It’s forehead and closed. And Thomas is now running around his little track. ♪♪…”Shunting trucks and pulling freight..red and green and brown and blue. They’re a really useful crew…♪♪ Claire has another favorite and that is Veggie Tales with Bob the Tomato. The other day, we went to the garden to pick veggies and she got so excited at the first large tomato that she spotted. “Bob!” she squealed and picked it, carrying it around lovingly, as if it were going to break out into the Veggie Tales song (which is also stuck in my head). We gathered many tomatoes and went in to make her other favorite thing, and mine, – spaghetti. Below is my recipe as taught to me by Marilina, a college student from Italy, who lived with us for a summer way back when I was in high school. It really is good! I promise. Don’t forget to leave a comment to enter the giveaway! Ingredients 12 tomatoes or 24 roma tomatoes 2 tbsp olive oil ½ cup chopped celery ½ cup chopped onion ½ cup chopped green pepper 5 cloves garlic crushed or chopped ½ tsp fennel seed 1 tbsp dried oregano or 2 tbsp. fresh oregano 1 tsp thyme 1 tbsp fresh basil or 1 tsp dried ¼ tsp black pepper 1 cube chicken bouillon ¼ tsp soda Sprigs of fresh parsley chopped ¼ cup fresh parmesan ½ lb Johnsonville Sweet Italian sausage or homemade Italian Sausage ** 2 tsp corn starch mixed with 2 tsp water. Directions  Drop tomatoes into boiling water just until the skins split on about half of them. Drain and drop into ice water until tomatoes are cooled. Skin and slice.  Brown meat in a sauce pan and place into a bowl to set aside. Saute onions, celery and peppers in olive oil until tender.  Add garlic and toss to release the flavor.  Add tomatoes and cover to cook for 15 minutes.  Add seasonings, basil, thyme, parsley, oregano and fennel seed. Stir. We love our herb garden with two different kinds of fresh basil (green and purple), thyme, parsley, rosemary, sage, oregano, spearmint and peppermint. The fresh herbs really make the spaghetti sauce spectacular.  Add soda. Stir. It will bubble up and fizz. Just stir into the sauce.  Add bouillon and parmesan and stir. Allow to simmer for 10 minutes uncovered.  Add meat and simmer 30 more minutes. Thicken with corn starch mixture or, if you like thinner sauce, skip this step. You can also allow this to simmer for several hours to reduce and thicken, stirring occasionally and making all ingredients become a uniform sauce, but I am giving you a quick meal alternative.  Serve over pasta and garnish with fresh, grated parmesan cheese and fresh parsley.  |
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