Sunday, July 1, 2012

Oh, Canada!

It's been ages since I've updated. I have my reasons, and only one of them is sheer laziness (June). In April, SS fell on the first. I'd been waiting years for it to line up that way so I could play a joke on everyone and make pizza in honour of April Fools Day. The Southerner and I have given up dairy though, so pizza was out (at least the way we make it). We decided the opposite of dinner is breakfast, so we made stuffed French toast and filled the crockpot with berry compote. Then we wore our silk pajamas. Oddly, our island has become such a casual place, no one even noticed our pajamas, and most guests were simply confused by the breakfast for dinner and stood around looking at us like, "Okay, when are you going to bring out the soup?" So...that fell sort of flat and I didn't really feel like blogging about it. That'll teach me - don't mess with people's Sunday Soup!

Then we didn't have SS in May because I was on the road promoting my brand new book!

And as stated previously, I was just lazy in June. I think we had spinach soup and honey cornmeal bread.

Today, is Canada Day, so it seemed logical that we should either have a red soup or a white soup, or a combo. We decided to go with Roasted Cauliflower & Red Pepper. And the Southerner made it himself, from start to finish! Including roasting the peppers. The soup was absolutely yummy, and the last-to-arrive guests were lucky to get any, and they finished it off. In fact, they might not have scored any, but the Neighbour and the Actor couldn't eat anything spicy, so I defrosted some mushroom-onion soup for them. I thought the spice was just right, but if you decide to make this recipe, the Southerner advises going easier on the cayenne than it calls for.

Due to lack of planning, we realized at the eleventh hour we didn't have any bread made, so I whipped up some pizza dough, and made garlic-basil twists (just roll a piece of dough into a piece about the thickness of your finger, and twist it or tie it like a pretzel - then brush with basil-butter & fresh ground pepper when it comes out of the oven). They were a big hit and went fast. Luckly, the Fleece Lady and the Fixi-it Guy brought extra snacks, as did a few other guests, so once the bread was gone, there was still stuff to much on.

In just four days, I will hit my 5th year anniversary of landing in Canada as an immigrant (the Southerner landed a few months later), and next year, assuming our paperwork goes through, we should be citizens, but we'd like to take a moment here on the blog to say, "Hey Canada, thanks for having us! Thanks for a wonderful community that lends itself to creating Sunday Soup, and thanks for all our new friends. Happy Canada Day, everyone!"