Eggs! and hiking

What a crazy weekend. First, on Saturday, we're running around doing errands until we can pick up our veggies at 12, and of course we run late. Then we stop for gas on our way home, so we can get ready to go visit my parents, and Rich's battery dies. Wait for an hour until AAA is done putting in a new battery (yes, it really did need a new one.) Go home, put away veggies, feed cats, drive an hour and a half to get to my parents' place.

So finally we get to the fun parts of the weekend. We cook up some of the awesome fries to go with dinner, and use the bunch of spinach and one of the two strawberry baskets we picked up for a salad. We should have cooked the fries just a little longer, but they came out tasty, and my little sherry vinaigrette worked well on the salad. The smoked salmon my parents made was fantastic, as were the steamed mussels we had for an appetizer.

The next morning we went hiking. Mt. Major isn't a big mountain, but it has rocky parts, dusty parts, root-filled trails, and anything else you'll find on a hiking trail in New England. Rich and I survived all of it in our Vibrams, although my feet were definitely tired at the end of the day. I also got one small blister that worries me a little. So far the plan for Mt. Washington in a couple weeks is still the Vibrams, and we're still going to bring along our old hiking boots. I'm hoping to get another hike or two in before we go for more testing; I'd like to feel comfortable enough to leave our hiking boots behind. We'll see.

Then we had our cooking class, and it was all about eggs. It was a lot of fun, and mostly paleo-friendly. The soufflés had a little flour in them; it was only 3 tbsp for 10 portions, so I didn't let it bother me. They were awesome, and now that I know how to make them, I can make them without the bechamel sauce. By the way, Oopsie rolls? Essentially a soufflé. (In case you haven't heard of Oopsie rolls, they're used as a paleo-friendly bread substitute.) I also made an olive oil mayonnaise, which came out quite tasty, although a little thick; I'll add water next time. The hollandaise - also paleo-friendly - came out quite good, too, although it wasn't quite restaurant-quality. I'll have to play with that one. We also made quiches, scrambled eggs, crepes, eggs benedict, and frittatas. Once I make the almond crust in my almond flour cookbook, I'll have a perfectly good quiche recipe to bring to family gatherings.

Last night we made lunch again for the next few days. We used up our mayos (Rich made a canola-based one, I used my own olive oil mayo) to make chicken salad wraps. We used the scallions, garlic scapes, and tomatoes from our veggie basket in the salad, and used the field lettuce as our wraps. They came out pretty good, but they'll only last us two days; they're just not very big. All we have left from our basket now is the bok choy, a bunch of baby romaine, a little field lettuce, and half a basket of strawberries. And, of course, a dozen eggs, but I'm sure we'll go through that quickly. Eggs don't seem to last long in our house, and now that I know how to make a dark-chocolate soufflé - with strawberries - well...