I like Pork Butts and I Cannot Lie...

I totally cooked something in the crock pot today.

All by myself.

And it was good.

I know millions of people do this all the time, and for some people it is a way of life, but I spent the past 12 years with a crazy food obsessed dog who would stop at nothing to get at a tiny morsel of anything, so a crock pot full of simmering meat was definitely off limits. Norm could leap 2 babygates high with no problem, anything on the counter was always in reach if the mood struck him, and short of putting it on top of the refrigerator (which still might not have deterred him)I just couldn't make a crock pot work. So we never tried it. This is a whole new world for me.

I got a $10 pork butt and threw it in my like new crock pot (I think I used it once for Halloween) with a cup of apple cider and 1/2 cup of water, let it sit on low for 8 hours and it shredded up pretty nicely. We ate it on wheat buns with a little bbq sauce, and there are at least 4 more meals left, so I'm doing AWESOME on my budget with this meal.

Crock pot confidence level: rising.

Fair Time: Round II! DING!

The kid was in great spirits for her second day at the fair (yes, it's so good we go multiple times. Plus it helps to spread out the walking and overeating). The weather was GORGEOUS - cool, with a light breeze - and it was pretty uncrowded for the fair, we could actually get around okay most of the time even with the stroller.



Food the adults ate this time (less Cupcake-friendly fare, I'm afraid):
teriyaki chicken noodles
blackened Caribbean chicken
a couple of beers in the Bazaar, a milk, and a Sun Drop soda
wild rice cheeseburger
corn on the cob
Sweet Martha's cookies
free sample of sparkling cranberry juice

Stuff I bought:
(much more reserved this time!)



I only spent $6 on "stuff" this time, I couldn't resist these two little sea horses. When she's old enough TC has a few matching mermaid dolls from the same vendor. Maybe next year I'll get the octopus and sting ray :)


Stuff the kid did get to try:
strawberry shake
nitro ice cream sample
sweet corn ice cream
and then there was the chocolate cream puff, clearly the highlight of the evening:




I like to think she was in a state of perfect happiness with her first taste of the creamy chocolate filling:



Holy smokes, those eyes!



She liked it right away, and actually got fussy after a few bites when I stopped sharing!



Yes ma'am, more cream puff filling coming your way...and then the silly kicked in...



She was in QUITE a delightful mood!



She had a fit of the giggles!



I totally understand, chocolate cream puffs make ME happy too...



Then she slowly wound down...



And fell asleep soon after. Another fantastic evening at the fair!

TC's First Day at the Fair - in Pictures!

I promised more photos, and who knew, I'm actually delivering! I never said the were GOOD photos, but this is not one of those slick mommyblogs where everything is is photoshopped and staged. This is REAL, and in REAL life we have bad hair and a lot of the same photo of a kid in a stroller with spoons in her mouth. So here's a look back at TC's first day at the fair (we went again last night actually). We live walking distance from the fairgrounds. TC probably had no idea this wasn't her usual evening stroll to the zoo...


She was SPELLBOUND watching all the people and activity!


She had her first bite of fair food and first sample of fish - walleye cakes from Giggles Campfire. Her standard reaction to all foods so far is to look horrified, but then beg for more, so we never know what she really thinks of anything :)

Strawberry milkshake, which she seemed to like, but mostly she just wanted to eat the paper cow hat. I never did manage to keep it on her head long enough for a photo. Mom fail.

Then came the ICEE...She had an ICEE once before and LOVED it, so we figured that was a good route to go again. First came awe (you're going to let me touch that?)



She proceeded cautiously (Can I really?)


But quickly decided it was hers (Hey, where did it go?)


If we would have left it within reach, she would have been purple in no time, I think an ICEE would work as well as a cake for a 1st B-day smash party. So we spoon fed instead:


And she was very pleased (GLEE!)


She didn't seem as fond of the lemon Italian ice, but she wasn't going to let it go either (MINE!)


I thought we might be in trouble after all that sugar, but TC was great the whole time - particularly after her final drink: (ZzzZzz)

The Great Minnesota Get Together

The Minnesota State Fair is a BIG deal. Perhaps you gathered that from the State Fair Bridal Shower I helped throw earlier this summer, or maybe you've been there before. If not, you really have to experience it - it is unlike any other fair you've known, it is really like a sub culture of its own. The people watching is amazing. There are 400lb women in tube tops, mullets along side goth kids, hipsters and soccer moms - all floating around sweetly (we are Minnesota Nice, after all), waiting in long lines for overpriced unhealthy food.

Mmmmm, I love it :)

Last year the State Fair had it's ups and downs - literally - as I passed out in the line for sunflower ice cream (and never ended up getting any, boo!). We had just found out that The Cupcake had girl parts at our 20 week ultrasound, and I couldn't really eat much by that point between the nausea and heartburn. I did temporarily forget I wasn't supposed to eat hot dogs and buy a corn dog, and then felt bad when I realized it halfway through (so far, TC shows no ill effects of said corn dog). I wasn't allowed to ride on the sky glider, but I did have a LOT of fun catching up with Ryan. It was at the State Fair that I bought TC the ONE item of clothing I couldn't resist before her birth - seriously, I managed to stay strong in the face of all the beautiful dresses, costumes, and other finery, but I caved when it came to this:



And then guess what?!?!? SHE NEVER WORE IT! I was so crushed! The hoodie said "3-6 months" and silly me, I waited till 3 months to try it on her...and it was WAY too small! New mom fail :(

But that's okay, because I think it might fit an American Girl type doll (oh yes, I am counting on building an American Girl wardrobe and accessory fleet. Might as well mortgage the house now). And guess what? TC got a NEW tie dye garment that DOES fit her, because it is so much easier to size things on outside babies:



TC's first fair - CHECK! More pics to come if I ever have a chance to upload them - and just so I don't forget, here's what we (the whole family) ate (I like to put a list in the scrapbook each year):

Walleye Cakes (TC's first taste of fish, I abstained from these)
Pronto Pup
Free Juice Samples
Caribbean Jerk Chicken
Cinnamon Roasted Almonds
Strawberry Milkshake
ICEE (TC LOVES icees)
BBQ Beef Sandwich
Luigi Fries
Lemon Italian Ice
Big Fat Bacon
S'more
A Coke, a Root Beer, and an RC Cola
some kind of beer
Strawberry Smoothie
CinnieSmiths to take home

Stuff I bought:
tie dye dress for TC
AWESOME night light for TC's room
Stamped Metal Ring for myself with TC's name on it

The weather was wonderful, and if I weren't so tired we could have really made a night of it, since SOMEONE was abnormally good:

State Fair Bridal Shower - MORE FOOD!

I may have saved the best for last when it comes to the State Fair food we served, and all the credit here goes to GrammyCupcakes and her support team who spent days peeling potatoes and assembling kebabs. Everything was SO YUMMY! Here's the "rest" of the menu:



Lunch on a stick! Everything that can be is on a stick at the MN State Fair, so beef and chicken kebabs were a wonderful choice. They were marinated in seasoning and grilled to perfection.





Next up was a mashed potato bar with all the fixin's:



"Champion Croissants", lightly toasted:



And my mother's famous turkey salad, clearly "Best in Show":



As usual, there was WAY too much food, so I got to take home a LOT of leftovers :) I forgot the signs for the beverages, but we stuck with the State Fair theme there too - "fresh squeezed lemonade" (not really) and "All the milk you can drink" (and you didn't even have to pay the $0.50!):



And there's some coffee in between there for good measure too :) The beverage dispensers were a great deal at Costco, but the real stars of the beverage station were the cups! Those are official MN State Fair cups, which the staff ever so kindly allowed me to purchase (for a GREAT deal even) when I called and explained the party. Thanks MN State Fair, you are definitely the epitome of Minnesota Nice!



And that brings me to the end of my State Fair Bridal Shower projects - by all accounts it was a rousing success and the bride was quite smitten with her unique and special day. If you missed any of my recaps, you can click on the "StateFair" label to see all of the posts related to this party, and please if you find any of this inspiring, drop me a line

State Fair Bridal Shower - Sweet Treats!

Any State Fair go-er knows the main attraction at the Great Minnesota Get Together is THE FOOD! Best way to experience the fair is to taste it, so we had a lot of fun defining the menu for this State Fair themed bridal shower. My favorite was the dessert table:



First of all, the signs were just laid out in PowerPoint - the rainbow is an option under "format background" and the font for both the large "FAIR FOOD" and the individual food signs is Coffee Tin from 1001FreeFonts (look under western). We kept the serving pieces simple in white and glass so that the food really stood out, such as:



Kettle Corn! This is one of my favorite fair (and ballpark) foods. My mom makes really good homemade kettle corn, but due to time constraints we "outsourced" with Amy's Organic Kettle Corn and holy cow is that good too. And a LOT easier. The large popcorn bowl we've had forever, and the smaller boxes are leftover from thehttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif Hollywood Halloween Party I held a few years back. We also set up a secondary kettle corn station downstairs to make for easy snacking:



The above popcorn box was actually packaging for the zebra popcorn I was forced to buy on sample day at Costco when I fell for it head over heels :)



There's an entire booth at the MN State Fair that sells only cereal bars in every flavor imaginable - Rice Kristie Bars - so we made rice krispie bars on a stick (just the traditional recipe cut into long strips and speared on grilling kebabs). Cotton candy was another must-have fair food, and while you can rent or even buy machines to make your own, we weren't quite ready for that mess, and mini bites would be more suited to the occasion. So instead I bought bagged cotton candy from Target (just $1 for two flavors!)I cut it into strips and carefully wrapped it around lollipop sticks (in the cake and candy making aisle of Michael's or JoAnn's). We displayed both treats by poking their sticks into a block of styrofoam wrapped in tissue paper and taped to the table for support.



Those aren't really Sweet Martha's Cookies, but I swear I've seen the dough in the freezer case - we just couldn't find it when we were shopping for supplies. So we faked it. Costco cream puffs were a bite-sized reference to the giant State Fair cream puffs, and the eclairs just seemed to compliment the cream puffs :)



And rounding out the smorgasboard were a selection of "blue ribbon pies", a fun alternative to cake, and a nod to the folksy baking competitions in the Creative Activities building. We cut the slices small so you could freely sample more than one :)

Mmmm, I'm hungry again just looking at it all!

Click on the "StateFair" label to see more posts related to this bridal shower, and stay tuned for more pics and projects from the event!

State Fair Bridal Shower - Fair Food "Appetizers"

"Appetizers" was GrammyCupcake's description of this table when she was planning her menu, and most of the cute cred here is all hers - namely this fantastic veggie display:



That's "Farm Fresh Veggies" and "Down Home Dill Dip," representin' the agriculture showcased at that thar State Fair.



"Make Your Own" Pickles on a stick - it's like a snack AND a game :) And the chafing dishes on either side held mini corn dogs and battered cheese curds, perhaps THE most iconic fair foods in convenient bite sized servings :)



YUM! And just like the State Fair, there's plenty more to eat...Keep watching for the "main courses".

To view all the posts to date related to this State Fair themed bridal shower, click on the "StateFair" label.

State Fair Bridal Shower - Butter Bride

When you think of the Minnesota State Fair, there are a few main images that spring to mind. Corn Dogs/Pronto Pups:



Cheese curds, and the insane line for them that stretches around the booth several times:



And, of course, butter heads:



Butter PRINCESS heads to be exact, AKA the "Dairy Queens". Every year, each of the candidates for Princess Kay of the Milky Way are sculpted out of a giant brick of butter at larger than life size scale. They're displayed in a rotating cooler and each day of the fair one of the princesses gets sculpted live while sitting in the center of the cooler (with mittens and earmuffs and a parka - it has to be cold to keep butter firm!)

So we simply HAD to have a butter carving at the State Fair Bridal Shower. While we didn't have 40lb blocks of butter at the ready, I was able to make due with a 1 lb brick:



Butter Bride! Armed with a paring knife and a butter knife (which actually didn't work as well as the paring knife) I whittled myself a crude little wedding dress, a hint of a bouquet, and the stub of a neck. I knew that I couldn't do the bride's lovely face justice, and besides, this was a lot more fun! I cut her smiling face out of an existing photo, taped it to a toothpick, and embellished with a marabou poof that had fallen off of a boa. Voila! Butter Bride! She was the belle of the ball:



It was a really fun touch and so easy to do - imperfections and crude renderings actually make it even more fun than a really professional sculpture would have been. Or maybe I just mean funnier :) Make sure to keep her in the refrigerator until party time so she doesn't melt away, and use an actual photo on photo paper for the head as it's slightly more grease resistant than regular paper. Our butter bride made an excellent topper to our dessert table, which gives you a sneak preview of the rest of the goodies:



See also: Blue Ribbon Invitations

More State Fair Party pics to come, keep watching!

Preliminary Menu Sneak Peek: The "real" food

Can I get a drumroll? Or maybe a first line jazz parade? (I'm not really sure what that is, but I saw it on one of the few episodes of "Treme" I watched, so I know it's something N'awlins related). After much hard work and deliberation, I think I've finally narrowed down my menu, and assuming that it all works and I can stay awake long enough to pull it off, here are my preliminary plans for the "real" food (sweets sneak peek still to come) :



Chicken & Sausage Jambalaya

Crawfish Gumbo

Cajun pork sandwiches

Hush puppies

Cajun potato wedges*

Confetti rice*

Cheddar biscuits*

Veggies & creole mustard dip*

*denotes vegetarian dish

What do you think? It will be partially catered, and partially prepped by my loving hands, and of course subject to vetoes and adjustments as the party nears, but I think I have a pretty good spread going! Two things I've tried to improve on each year are:

#1 focusing more on food than sweets, though everyone loves the sweets and I feel more confident making them, it's the non-sugary dishes that really go first,

and

#2 really spending time crafting the menu according to the theme. This was a little scary with Cajun cuisine, which I don't think I've ever tasted, but I think this could work! And I even managed to find some good vegetarian options for my meat-challenged friends! :)

Check another big item off my planning list!