Happy new year!

I wish you love,luck and a long life

Hailey visits Santa

Jen and Hailey

Hailey is ready for winter 2012

Merry Christmas

Phyllo Curried Vegetable Samosas

from Everyone Can Cook Everything by Eric Akis

　

Preparation time 40 minutes.

Cooking time 15 minutes per sheet of 14 samosas

You can make the pastry from scratch or use phyllo or egg roll wrappers, shallow fry or deep fry or bake as i did, maybe to each her own.  This was my first attempt to make samosas and they turned out great for me so use this easy fool-proof recipe or another healthy version after checking out all the possibilities at you tube.com

Frozen phyllo pastry sheets replace the knead--and-roll-your-own pastry usually used to make samosas, however one pkg. was too many layers to use for this recipe. And since i purchased it frozen then left it to thaw for 3 or 4 hours i didn’t think it was right to refreeze the leftover sheets. I used up the extra sheets by inventing a butter, cinnamon and sugar rolled up cookie concoction and with the addition of a few raisins it turned out ok and so no waste was involved.

On to the samosas; i highly recommend watching a you tube video to see how to fold them up….i didn’t and it’s obvious in the picture how mine went wrong and now after eating them i can see how odd little layers of pastry sticking out here and there just ain’t right; it flakes off easily when not rolled up in a properly organized fashion, making the samosas difficult to eat as a hand-held appetizer because you get crispy little flakes all over yourself and the floor. Especially not good if you don’t have a dog. So too late i watched the videos and saw how when rolled up correctly there will be no flaky pastry excess jutting out all over the place. Yours will be nice and neat if you look at this video rather than figuring out the weird instructions which i am including anyhow as in the original recipe.

The video is short and sweet at 1 minute long and you will learn to make fabulous samosas especially if using egg roll wrappers or your own real dough. For me using phyllo wrappers perhaps a practice session with a strip of paper would have helped to understand how to enclose the filling in a neat 3 sided pkg.

http://youtu.be/kWjg3zdEx3w


2 cups potatoes, peeled and cut into ¼” cubes. (2 - 3 small potatoes)

1/3 cup finely diced onion

1/3 cup finely diced red bell pepper

1TBS. vegetable oil

1tsp. finely chopped ginger

2tsp. mild curry powder

1 TBS. lime juice

1TBS. brown sugar

¼ tsp. salt

½ cup frozen peas

¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro or mint or green onion

1/3 cup melted butter

8 sheets phyllo pastry

Mango chutney for dipping

*****************************

Boil the potatoes until quite tender but still holding their shape.

Drain and place in a bowl

Place oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add the onion, bell pepper and ginger

Cook until tender, about 4 minutes.

Mix in the curry powder, lime juice and brown sugar and cook 1 minute more.

Spoon this mixture over the potatoes

Add salt, peas and cilantro or mint and mix to combine.

Let mixture cool to room temperature.

Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper.

Preheat oven to 375º

Place a sheet of the phyllo pastry on a large work surface with a wide side horizontally in front of you. Brush the sheet lightly with melted butter, top with another sheet of phyllo pastry and lightly brush it with butter as well.

Cut the layered phyllo widthwise into 7 strips, each about 2 ½” wide (this was where i went wrong, it might be better to think of it as vertically rather than widthwise)

Place 1 TBS of the potatoe mixture at the bottom end of each strip.

Fold one corner of the phyllo over the potatoe mixture so the bottom edge meets the side edge and forms a triangle. Continue folding the triangle sideways and upwards to the end of the strip completely enclosing the potatoe filling. Set the triangle on one of the baking sheets and layer, cut and fill the remaining phyllo sheets the same (you should end up with about 28 samosas)

Brush tops of samosas with melted butter and bake 15 minutes or until puffed and golden brown. Alternately the samosas can now be frozen and baked another day without defrosting.

Serve with mango chutney as a topping or dipping sauce.
This is the kind of chutney i bought and it was excellent. Hope you enjoy this fall weather appy!

　

　

My grandaughter Jennifer and great grandaughter Hailey

Isn't Hailey the sweetest little thing you've ever seen

The proud mama my grandaughter Jennifer

Sunbeam Hailey at 52 days old
Dig the cool hat too.

now, admit it.....she IS the sweetest little thing you've ever seen!

Hawaii day 15 and it's time to go home

Made a pot of complimentary Kona coffee and cinnamon buns hot from

the microwave for breakfast and now at 10:30a.m. relaxing and enjoying

this rad condo until the very last minute when we must leave at 12 noon.

Our flight home isn't until 10 p.m. tonight, yikes, whatever will we do

with 10 hours and nowhere to nap or to call home. Whoever made these

stupid arrangements kinda sucks; oh yeah, it was moi, note to self; don't

ever do this again..... 

 So off to visit the Fort DeRussy Army museum next door to learn more 

of the history of Oahu and to look at pics and artifacts and read and see

the info. Videos were playing here and there, even a Disney Donald Duck

version. Too bad we saw only old folk in there who already knew more or

less what happened here; the young 'uns are surfing and playing volleyball

on the beach and that's ok, i guess they already know. I find the refreshing

of memory and history to be always gut wrenching but valuable as it makes

one appreciate it more i think. It breaks my heart knowing what happened

here on this beautiful island but i don't want to ever forget it either.  

Fort DeRussy Park from our condo

Pearl Harbor

We then walked west down the beach the opposite way and found a

cool place to have lunch outside (why does the chicken in Hawaii 

taste so much better than anywhere else? Prior to this my best chicken

was from the General Store in Paia, Maui) Fed some of

the birds that came to our table even though the sign said not to but

one was a friendly semi-invalid who needed to rest often; he had a

wing a little of of whack so who wouldn't? A huge soft ice cream cone

topped me off then we looped back through Fort DeRussy Park and 

spent some time sitting in the cool shade of a beautiful big ol' tree.

What to do now and it's only 4p.m. and 6 hours until we fly and Bob

doesn't want to get on a bus, especially one with a free trip to Hilo

Hattie's lol,, although i suggested it as a way to at least kill some time and so

 i could check out her neighbourhood.

i surprised a little gecko on a big plant, well actually he surprised me

we sat awhile under a big shade tree in Fort DeRussy Park

Back at Starbucks in the Reef i ordered a salty caramel mocha and was given

hot coffee; aww sheesh, my mistake i forgot to say Frappacino again but it

was good so not really complaining; note to self - make sure to always say

Frappacino or you'll get it hot dammit!

Vacation is almost over....7:45 p.m. and we are waiting at our gate already

and it feels like a sauna in here. A sign says this is a WiFi zone and again i

can't get on it; how the heck do people figure this out. Pop-ups of strange

sounding sites that i've never even heard of like Shaka or something and

they want my password? Then there's pop ups with games and then up pops

Visa and Mastercard etc. saying i should pay which i didn't expect; i thought

WiFi was supposed to be free. Ok, so much for this WiFi stuff, IPad 2 is way

 beyond me and it's sort of stressful because i see people all over the place

looking all comfy and in the know using them but i won't bother them to ask,

after all they're on vacation and i can wait until we get home and back on the

desktop. Do IPads or phones even get virus'es? I'll have to take the time to

learn all this before we go to Hawaii again which hopefully won't be too far

off because it's just the most awesome place to be.

Aloha everyone and mahalo for reading!

Hawaii day 14

Can life get better than this? Started off the day with Starbucks; their
coffee frappachino is much better than at home or maybe it just seems
so and that's ok when you're in Hawaii; their coffee is by far the best.
I love this place so much and for many years Maui was my fav.
Island and Oahu second best. Now on this trip i realise the things
i enjoyed doing on Maui are not really things i can do anymore but
Oahu will always have tons of things to see and do no matter how old
and feeble we get we'll still be able to enjoy visiting here so Oahu is
#1 now. Waikiki Beach is especially cool; i love being amongst
crowds of people and the whole tourist scenerio here.

hustle and bustle in Waikiki

The Royal Hawaiian Pink Palace; we saw a beautiful wedding party walk
thru as we stopped to have a little rest in their lobby

Near our doorway looking down 5 floors. Is it a surfboard graveyard?

Nice wide sidwalks for strolling along the beach

Arrowhead plant

Gianormous swiss cheese plant

Walking through the Royal Hawaiian shipping center today i got
caught by a guy selling beauty creams with gold flakes in 'em and
special salts to defoliate the skin. Truth is he sort of captured me
and by the time i realized i was caught he had placed a scoop of
these salts in my hand and Bobs too so we had to go along with his
sales pitch. The salts did make my hands feel nice and soft and then
he said i looked so young as he slathered stuff all over one side of
my face so then i was hooked for sure and thought i'd have to buy his
products because (A) i'd want to or (B) only one side of me was
being improved and i'd end up half beautiful and half not. When he
was finished fussing on me he raved on about the improvement
pointing it out in a mirror and i was starting to believe him but Bob
insisted i looked the same, just shinier on the one side and he said his
hands didn't feel any different so that made the get-away a little easier.

We stopped for lunch and i had a chicken and avocado sandwich, pop
and a cookie and just now remembered i had ordered fries as well but
didn't get 'em and it's just as well. Back in the condo Bob was down for
a nap so i went up to the penthouse floor to get the fabulous classic pics
of Diamond Head at the end of the building on the opposite side then
went downstairs and got a manicure; fuchsia pinkish with one glittery
nail on each hand.
No, these arn't professional picture postcards; i took 'em myself....
IPad is pretty awesome after all

another view from the 14th floor

Dinner at the same place as last night and another good band, this one
with white girl hula dancers so not quite as good as the all Hawaiian
group.We now both agree that Maui is out and Oahu is in but i added
the stipulation that a longer stay and a car would be a must for next
time so we can get out of the city and do it at our own pace and
have enough time to look for "Lost" film locations, Dog the
Bounty Hunter and such and maybe by then it'll be time revisit the
Polynesian Cultural Center, Chinatown, the north shore and botanical
gardens etc. We both love Hawaii and hope to visit again in the next
year or two, God willing.

After dinner Bob surprised me by walking to the jewelry store where
i had mentioned that yesterday i spotted an unusual ring and he must
have liked it too and he bought it for me probably because of it's cool
smoothness, and the blue, green, purple and aqua patterns coming from
within it like soft neon lights shining through the dark. It's a simple
band design, glossy yet silky feeling; made of tungsten, so hard as steel, a
ring that somehow fits all my fingers and even my thumb and it feels so
right; a beautiful unique piece that i loved upon first sight to add to my
Hawaiian collection.

We walked out onto the beach and admired the ocean with it's white
ribbons of surf gently rolling in and it's an unbelievably beautiful
sight. One of the best things ever is Waikiki at night, walking on the
beach, listening to Hawaiian music drifting on the breeze and stopping
at each hotel along the way.The place even smells fabulous, all the time!
As we gazed out at the stars we counted 6 planes in the night sky within
our view and even that seemed extra special. People come and people go
and fortunate are those who experience beautiful blue Hawaii.

Back in the condo a rerun of Mary Tyler Moore that must have been
about 40 yrs old and it was a great ending for our second day in
beautiful Waikiki Beach.