BACON!

Today I realized that I had bacon in my refrigerator.  I wanted to eat the bacon, but couldn't be bothered to stand in front of the stove cooking it.  So I decided to bake the bacon :D

But I wasn't going to settle for just plain old bacon, I added maple syrup to one batch, and ginger syrup to a second batch!

To Bake Bacon:

Asian Food Kick

I've been craving Asian food recently.  I don't know why... but I want everything with rice, soy sauce, and all those other "typically" Asian tastes and flavors.  I got a jump start on the week when my friend had us over for dinner and served Vietnamese spring rolls.

At least, I've always heard them called Vietnamese spring rolls, they are also known as fresh spring rolls, Vietnamese salad rolls, and sometimes summer rolls.  They look very pretty and are really not so difficult to make.  Ingredients vary based on what you want/like.  My friend made vegetarian rolls, using vegetables she had on hand.  I made mine with chicken.  They make a great meal and can either be pre-made, or you can have your guests make them for themselves.  It would be really fun to have a roll making party, and everyone can put in or leave out whatever they want.

My friend generously gave me the rest of the rice paper and rice vermicelli that she had left over, so I decided that tonight was Spring Roll night.  Really, the only mandatory ingredient is the rice paper, everything else is up to your taste and what you want to put in, quantities are also flexible for whatever size group you have.

My relationship with Pineapple

I love pineapple.  It's delicious.  I love it on pizza.  I love eating it out of the can.  So when I saw a pineapple at the store for a decent price I had to have it.

I brought my beautiful prize home.

I cut it into pieces and peeled some kiwis to go with it (they were also at a good price at one of the fruit stands near by).

I started eating the pineapple.  And I couldn't stop.  I ate more and more and then this happened...

Yes, those are my taste buds crying there...

 
and I started to think that there might be a problem.

I did some research, and apparently I'm not the only one with this problem.  I thought maybe it was just the acidity, but then again the Husband doesn't have any problem eating all the fresh pineapple he wants.  I can eat cooked pineapple (like on pizza) with no problem at all.  So I think I've narrowed it down, and since I know I'm allergic to some kinds of pollen, it's not totally unusual that I would also be mildly allergic to fresh pineapple.

I still have some of that delicious pineapple left in the refrigerator... I guess I could cook it, but really, I'll probably just force it down and deal with the feeling that I've rubbed my tongue against a cheese grater, and the mild sore throat.

That is my current relationship with pineapple.

What I did this week...

 At first I thought I was just being extremely lazy... then I thought I was suffering from something even worse and much more sinister than laziness...

I've also been mixing some delicious cocktails inspired by watching Jeeves and Wooster... but it's not a good idea to add rum to your sloth... you end up with a drunk sloth... which, if I could draw, would be a very funny picture indeed.  I'm not sure why I feel slothful though, because I have So Many Projects.  Here, just to show a few:

Not sure what the flowers will be for, but they're cute :D

I had to use up the Baileys frosting :)

Bacon, Cheddar and Broccoli quiche

The cake was just boxed yellow cake with chocolate chips, but I had to have something to put the Baileys frosting on... Here 's the quiche recipe for those of you that might like to try it (really the filling could contain any number of delicious things, I just picked three things I liked:

It wouldn't be St. Patrick's Day without Corned Beef and Cabbage

I would have posted these pictures yesterday, but I had eaten several cupcakes, drank two whiskey sours, and one Irish car bomb.  This was over a period of hours, but after that I had an epic two person solitaire game (I'll post rules later) with the Husband.
You may be wondering, why would cupcakes have affected my ability to post pictures.  They didn't... but they would have affected my typing, so I put this post off to today to make sure none of you had to suffer through the even worse grammar that would have resulted from my slightly inebriated state.

On to the cooking.

First, Corned beef and Cabbage (and carrots, for alliteration):

Corned beef - cooked to package instructions, cabbage and carrots added to the pot after the meat is removed to cool, and cooked until fork tender.

Now for what you really want, Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes :D

These take some work, but are SO worth it.

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Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes with Cream cheese frosting: Makes 12