Category: Thoughts on a Subject

A Tribute to my Beautiful Mom on Mother’s Day

My mom wasn’t the easiest person to get along with. At least not for me. The last conversation we had, I brushed her off. She wanted to go to lunch and spend the day together. After all, it was my birthday. It was also a work day. “Playing hookie” as she put it was not something I was willing to do. I wasn’t sick, and I wasn’t about to call in sick just to spend the day with her. “Some other time, mom. I have to work today.” I could hear the disappointment in her voice. She had called bubbling over with excitement and hung up hurt. Two weeks later, Mom died in her sleep. For us, “some other time” never came.

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Prayers for Paris

There are no word to express what I feel at this moment. The world is weeping.

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Knights Ferry Civil War Reenactment

Wow – just attended our first ever Civil War reenactment. What a hoot! We hiked up a hill, spread out a blanket and just watched. The Yanks came marching through the covered bridge. The Southerners opened fire with cannons and a charge, but in the end it was the North that took the hill. If you ever get the chance to see a reenactment, by all means do. The roar of the cannons shakes the ground. The smell of black powder fills the air. It’s amazing!

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Happy Day After Valentine’s Day

Normally, I don’t do follow ups to a prior post unless I’m making changes to an already existing recipe. Those of you who have been following along know that this year for Valentine’s Day I decided to build an entire Surf and Turf menu around Pink Margaritas. I’m here to tell you, the night could not have gone better. One of the biggest reasons for success was that I had spent the entire afternoon doing as much prep work as possible. I even had the dessert organized and ready. That’s a good thing, because those cute little Pink Margaritas at the start of the evening were killer. I don’t think I could have managed wheedling a knife after drinking margaritas – at least not safely.

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Early Morning Reflection

One year ago today, on February 8, 2018 I brought together three of my favorite pastimes, cooking, photography and writing in one modest blog. With the launching of Rosemarie’s Kitchen, I dared to invite strangers to pull up a chair, help themselves to a cup of coffee and chat a while as we cooked together. Food was always the number one subject, but not the only one. There were memories, and rants and thoughts that floated out across the pages. Many of you have been here from the beginning, others joined in later as the adventure continued. It’s been one heck of a year.

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Food for Thought

I know, this is a food blog – but every now and again, I am not in the mood for sharing a recipe so much as I feel the desire to invite you in for a visit and to chat a while. I don’t know about you, but looking toward the new year makes me think about the past.

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Whatever you do, Don’t Over Do It!

Leading up to Christmas Day, I kept hearing the same thing from my home health nurse, from my doctor and most of all from my family. Don’t over do it. I’m only now reaching the half-way point in healing process from open heart surgery. The only restriction that remains (besides stretching and bending) is the “don’t over do” rule. What does that mean exactly?

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Need I say More?

I give thanks every day for life. I give thanks every day for the people I know and for those I have yet to meet. I give thanks every day for everything.

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Give Thanks for Life is Good

Can we chat a moment? Rather than share a recipe from the past or cook something special for you today, I’d like to take a moment to share a few of my favorite photographs as we simply talk about life in cyber space and reality.

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How to be a Good Guest this Thanksgiving – REALLY?

One morning while wandering about the house, I had the television on for background noise. It was the morning news, and if something struck my interest, I stopped to listen. The local station was doing a fluff piece – instructing the viewers on the finer art of being a good Thanksgiving Dinner Guest. Really? I had to stop in my tracks. Have we reached the point in our social evolution that we need instruction on proper behavior from the television. Aren’t manners taught in the home anymore? Or have the rules somehow changed? They had my attention.

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CABG Times Four

To begin with I need to make a confession to everyone. In my spare time I write. I write a lot. Then I set everything up to post automatically at a later date. When I first retired, I went a little nuts. I didn’t know what to do with myself, so I wrote hundreds of future posts. I had been photographing my recipes for nearly four years, attaching photos to recipe cards. There was a wealth of recipes to pick from. One thing about writing so far in advance was that I had time. Tons of time for reads and rewrites and fact checking and research. By nature, I am a perfectionist. It is what drives me. It is also what makes those around me drive me crazy.

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The Virtues of Home Cooking

parking-orchard-1024x768Last fall, we drove up to Apple Hill. Nestled in the Sierra foothills of El Dorado County, Apple Hill was born of necessity. The rich soil around the tiny community of Camino was a major producer of California pears. Some sixteen or so orchards flourished in the area around the turn of the century. But by the early 1960s the pear farmers were struggling – their crops depleting and toiling a living from the soil was nearly impossible.

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The Casualization of America and Eclectic Entertaining

I’ve been giving this subject a great deal of thought. When Kiddo was a number of years younger, (and the task of setting the table fell squarely upon his shoulders) he once asked me why we went through all the trouble of setting a “fancy” table. Granted, a fancy table setting wasn’t something we did for every meal. Everyday dinners involve a plate, a fork, an occasional knife, and a napkin. Rarely is the table set beyond the basics anymore. Yet “fancy” settings still made an appearance in our home – reserved for “Sunday Best” or whenever we had company at the table for a meal that did not involve barbecue or center around a particular “theme”. I felt it was important that he knew how to set a proper table.

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Serving up Leftover – No Fuss, No Muss and No Dishes

Not long ago, I shared an easy crock-pot recipe for barbecued pulled pork – Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ-Coca-Cola Pulled Pork. It was yummy good, and there were plenty of leftovers for a second meal. The perfect thing to make with leftover shredded pork is Pulled Pork Sandwiches.

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Burnt Offerings – When Things Don’t Go as Planned

So often, we post only our successes – beautiful pictures of perfectly cooked foods. But let’s face it, we’ve all experienced our bombs – mistakes in the kitchen that render food hardly worthy of eating much less blogging about. I think it would be good to see those flops every now and then, as a reminder that everyone makes mistakes. It’s a humbling admission. Yeah, you should have seen my 7-layer Leaning Tower of Cake with a cherry on top!

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