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Saturday, March 16, 2013

Aldi special this week: Bulbs for the garden

I want to call attention to Aldi as a place to find great garden supplies. Last year I bought tulip bulbs and Asiatic lilies. All bags were very reasonably priced and the flowers actually showed up in my yard. Big difference to bulbs I had bought in the prior year at Walmart; the iris that I purchased were a definite no show and I had my doubts when I put them in the soil because the bulbs seemed old and very, very dry.

I will post pictures of my tulips and lilies later on this year when they bloom. Right now the biggest enemies to the tulips are the deer, but a little bit of aluminum foil will do the trick. Deer do not like to bite on foil when going for a nice green tulip leaf. ;)

So this week, I purchased some gladiola bulbs and planted them this morning. I should have pictures to show later this year and this will be my first gladiolas!

Here the relevant weekly specials from Aldi for your garden:

Gardenline Fruit or Vegetable Bulbs each $2.49
Gardenline Spring Bulbs or Perennials each $1.69

So go to Aldi and get some garden supplies. As with most food items, Aldi has very reasonable prices for garden supplies as well!

Food review: Alter Eco Gourmet chocolate from the Chocolate Goodies box

As part of the Box of Chocolates win from Goodies Company, I received three bars of Alter Eco chocolate. Included in the box were Dark Coconut Toffee, Dark Mint, and Dark Twist. Dark Mint as the name states included peppermint crystals, whereas Dark Coconut Toffee had extra butter and sea salt in the form of coconut crunch bits. My favorite kind by far was Dark Twist, which contained crystallized orange peel.

For those of you not familiar with Alter Eco products, here is a video that talks about the philosophy behind Alter Eco as well as introduces their line of products. The original source of the video is the ActerraBEA channel on youtube (http://youtu.be/qxdnpuW8Cb8).

Each chocolate bar has all natural ingredients. So the Dark Twist can be summed up as just eight ingredients, namely Cacao beans, raw cane sugar, candied orange peel, cocoa butter, orange oil, and vanilla beans.With a cocoa content of 60% minimum, all 100% organic ingredients and close of 90% of the ingredients Fair Trade certified (87% to be precise), the bar is not the lowest prized chocolate you can find. But to me the perfect combination of dark chocolate and strongly flavored orange peel would be well worth the price charged on the Goodies Co. website $7.98 for 2 bars (each pack is 2.82 oz). The direct link to the Dark Twist ordering page is here.

I encourage you to visit the Alter Eco website as well as the Goodies Company website and have a look at the products available at both sides. To me the Alter Eco chocolate, carefully rationed to make the bliss last longer, was a wonderful treat that made the winter go away for a few moments.

Aldi Chinese Food - aka meal starter: Fusia Asian Inspirations Crispy Sweet and Spicy CHicken

I rarely eat microwave meals and always want to add items, especially fresh vegetables to ready to eat meals that I pick up in the grocery store. This week, I picked up the Crispy Sweet and Spicy Chicken from Aldi's line of Fusia Asian Inspirations. I was intrigued by the name, Sweet and Spicy. Before preparing the meal, I tasted the sauce that came in a separate package and the name is well chosen, the sauce is very spicy. That gave me the idea to turn this into a meal starter rather than a meal per package instructions.

The package contains a sauce package that needs to be thawed under hot water. At the same time, you add the remaining contents, frozen, to a wok or skillet coated with a little bit of oil. Truly, you do not need to add much oil. A simple coating of a nonstick pan will do and nothing will burn since you are supposed to stir the contents as you heat them. The contents themselves are crispy chicken, coated in a crispy tempura batter. Also included are a vegetable mix of broccoli, onions, red bell peppers, and carrots. Lastly, there is white rice.

As I was heating the mix, I could definitely smell the onions and saw the broccoli and carrots. The bell peppers were red and so they are only visible until you add the sauce. I could not really taste them in the end when plating the dish. The same was true for the remaining vegetables, the sauce is that spicy. Looking at the ingredients, the sauce is spicy because of chili paste added as well as cayenne pepper. If you like spicy Chinese food, this sauce will not disappoint. But it was so spicy, it actually overpowered the vegetables and reduced the flavor complexity that I am accustomed to when eating freshly prepared Chinese food.

Because I had sampled the sauce beforehand, I felt it needed diluting to allow the flavor of the remaining ingredients to come through. I added a layer of white rice to the dish and then added the actual dish on top. This allowed the sauce to cover the remaining rice and brought down the spiciness, allowing me to taste the remaining ingredients a little bit more. Plus, it stretched the portions out a little bit.

Price for the bag was $2.99 and contains three servings of one cup with 300 calories each. That seems like a reasonable meal, but I know that one cup servings will not make a lunch in my household and I doubt that most husbands and teenage boys will settle for one cup either. In my opinion, the package can be used better used as a meal starter. Add some freshly cooked rice, either white or brown, to stretch the contents. Aldi has a very good white rice that can be cooked in parallel to this dish. I would also encourage readers to add additional vegetables or even pineapple pieces. Even though the name of sweet and spicy, the sauce contains pineapple juice and so the flavor is reminiscent of the standard sweet and sour, making additional pineapple a good choice. Believe me, you still will taste the spices from the sauce and there is plenty of flavor left in the dish.

Overall, the dish was good. The chicken was crispy indeed and had good chunks included. The vegetables were good size, but the rice seemed a little bit scarce.

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Book Review: The Survivor by DiAnn Mills

I came across this book of all places on Booksneeze.com, which usually caters to books with a Christian theme. The summary for this book made it appear an odd choice for such a website.

The author DiAnn Mills is one of the founding board members of the American Christian Fiction Writers and I think her works show that Christian books can be just as entertaining and gripping as books by any other author. Because this book is both action-filled and a real gripping mystery story that keeps you turning the page, wanting to find out whether the heroine can be saved.

available on amazon.com here

The summary can be briefly stated as Kariss, our heroine, meets the survivor of a brutal childhood attack, who is finally ready to tell her story to Kariss. As Kariss begins to jot down the traumatic events of long ago, she becomes deeper and deeper entangled into a mystery of her own that ends up posing mortal danger to her. Too bad that Kariss had previously broken up with FBI agent Santiago Harris. But as Kariss gets closer to the danger, Santiaga, called Tigo for short, comes into the story again and the author does a very good job of interweaving the story line with the personal struggles of the protagonists. Even the biggest heroes are not without fault and so we learn about parenting, lies, infidelity as Tigo tries to save Kariss from the evil that seems to haunt her now.

I like the way that DiAnn Mills add Christian themes to the storyline without ever becoming a preacher. While she clearly tries to paint examples of Christians that overcome struggles and turn out to be better people in the end, she also tells a very good thriller that just happens to involve people, whose religion is an important part of their character.

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary book through booksneeze.com in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed in this blog are solely my own and have not been influenced by booksneeze or any third party.

Sunday, March 3, 2013

New Orleans in the Triangle - semi-homemade Beignets

One of my favorite spots in New Orleans is Cafe du Monde. While anyone that loves coffee will enjoy New Orleans, what sets Cafe du Monde apart from the rest of the outdoor cafes in New Orleans are their phenomenal beignets.

Thanks to the name recognition of the Cafe du Monde brand, the beignet mix is available in local grocery stores, such as Kroger, and allows everyone to experience the beignets right at home. This weekend, I felt like enjoying some beignets and coffee rather than cake or other pastries. Beignets are light, not as greasy as donuts. With their light sprinkle of powdered sugar, a couple of beignets together with a nice cup of coffee and cream is the perfect way to relax while reading the newspaper or doing the crossword puzzle.

Here is the website of the Original Cafe Du Monde in the French Quarter of new Orleans. Here you can order your beignet mix, if you do not find it in the local grocery stores. While even the best homemade beignets can not bring New Orleans to your home, they still go very well with a nice cup of coffee and a light, tasty snack! By the way, for those readers familiar with the Cafe Du Monde Beignets, yes mine are round not square, but I did not have a square form to cut the dough with.

So if you are looking for a quick snack, grab some of the Beignet mix from your grocery store. The preparation is very easy. Add some water to the mix, roll the dough out thinly on a flowered surface and cut out beignet size pieces (either square or round). Then drop the dough into an inch of hot oil and the beignets should become puffy and pop up from the oil in about 8 to 10 seconds. Turn them around to ensure that the beignets are golden brown on both sides. Take them out of oil onto a wire rack for cooling and sprinkle the beignets with some powdered sugar right before serving with a good cup of coffee. Enjoy!

My new favorite bag: Francesco Biasia

One of my weaknesses are handbags. I do not buy a lot of them and usually buy one every three or five years, but I do like nice quality handbags that can last me many years.

This is a bag from a new Italian designer, at least new to me, Francesco Biasia. His main website is still in Italian, so I hate to link to it because I cannot make real sense of it the content, but it does have nice images of handbags.

So enjoy some images from his current collections here. I got this handbag online and of course used a coupon to make it affordable. I had done plenty of surveys to earn a $100 off coupon to an online discount site that made this nice leather handbag actually quite affordable. I love the color and the leather is so soft; it feels wonderful when carrying the handbag. The handbag is very spacious; it can fit a 15inch laptop and still does not look like one of the boring laptop bags.

Here you can get a better view of the size of the bag. The handles are quite comfortable, but I usually wear it on my shoulder and the nice, broad strap makes the bag, even fully loaded with laptop and files, comfortable and the strap never cuts into the shoulder.

What is not seen on the images is the inside of the bag. The material inside is made in contrasting color with a very light, pale pink, almost blush colored. There is large zipped pocket and two smaller pockets for keys and smartphone. In addition, the bag can be closed with a zipper to secure all the contents.

Overall, I am very happy with this bag and the price was in the end very nice. It may not be designer name like Coach or Dooney and Bourke, but in terms of quality, Italian elather handbags are hard to beat. In addition, this design is very unique and the bag is extremely comfortable and useful for taking to work everyday.

Cheap, but good eats: Spaghetti with ham, eggs and cheese

This week, Aldi had pasta on sale earlier this year. Their Reggano Linguine or Fettuccine at 16 oz was only $0.99. I love pasta because it is such a versatile ingredient and can always be used for a quick dinner that can filling, but light.

Today, I fixed one of our favorite dishes. A light version of Spaghetti Carbonara. I cooked the linguine. Then in a large pan used some buttery spread to create a nice, liquid base. You can use real butter or one of the reduced fat spreads, depending on how low fat you want to go. Once the spread is melted, add the cooked pasta. I like to now add a generous amount of freshly ground black pepper to add some flavor.

Then I used some of the ham lunchmeat that Aldi has regularly stocked. It comes in the 16oz package and is less than $4.00. I sliced it into the thin strips that I added to the pasta. Then I scrambled one egg, added the egg right before serving and cooked the mixture enough to just scramble the egg lightly in the pasta. I never add the egg too early because it tends to get very dry and I feel that leaving the scrambled egg a little bit soft creates a better egg flavor.

Adding the pasta mix to each bowl, I add some shredded cheese and Maggi, which is an MSG-containing meat extract and very popular in Germany. Instead of Maggi, you can try adding some soy sauce for some additional flavor.

In the end, you have a filling, but light dinner and at a bargain price! I usually serve some fresh fruit salad or canned fruit, such as peaches, with the meal.