Curing Cabin Fever: Tomato Soup

At some point, it happens every winter.  I'm going along just fine and then the day finally comes. 

Last Thursday was the day. 

I opened my door in the morning to let the dog back in and saw, for the 1,436th time this winter, this:

And that was officially It.  I am SICK OF WINTER.

I am sick of having to bundle up and step out into the cold to untangle my dog's leash.
I'm sick of shoveling.  I'm sick of sloshing through slush and slipping on ice.  I am REALLY sick of water leaking into my boots.
I'm sick of walking into work in my nice clothes only to find I've kicked up dirty snow water on the backs of my legs.
I'm sick of eating stews and roasts and squash while I shiver under a blanket on my couch. 
I'm sick of looking out into my backyard and seeing this:

I've got Cabin Fever and I've got it bad.

But there's March, April, and most of May to get through before it's officially spring in Wisconsin.  So, in the meantime, I've got some projects planned to get me through. 

First, is tomato soup.  Which doesn't sound like much.  Unless you have REAL tomatos.

And I don't mean the pink, hard, tasteless Faux-matos that are in the grocery stores now. 

I mean these:

Those are REAL tomatoes picked from my garden last summer.  I grow more than I can eat while they're fresh.  So I toss the ones that are ripe into the freezer for later.  Thursday was officially "later". 

I took them out to defrost over night in a pan. 

Aren't they beautiful in their Real Red goodness?  I love homemade tomato soup but peeling tomatoes is a pain.  I like freezing them because they get gooshy when they defrost and I can just squeeze the meat right out of the peel.  Here's what they looked like in the morning. 

You can really just rip into them wih your fingers a bit and let the meat plop out into a bowl.  I was left with this in skins:

But more importantly, I had a beautiful bowlful of this:

{Steps onto soapbox}:  People open my freezer in the winter and see the big pile of tomatoes and exlaim, "You just throw tomatoes in your freezer?!?"  Yup.  Let me tell you, even after these babies sit in the freezer for months, with no plastic wrap or anything to keep them sealed, the minute I start squeezing out the meat, it smells like I just stepped outside into the hot summer sun to pick them right then.

Does a storebought faux-mato do that? 

THAT is the difference between real, homegrown produce and the plastic crap they sell at the grocery store.
Any food that can maintain it's natural scent - even after months of unprotected freezing - is REAL FOOD.  Why would you settle for plastic? {Steps off soapbox}.

Back to the soup.  To the bowlful of meat, I added about 2 Tbsp sugar, 2 tsp salt, 2 Tbsp basil, 2 tsp oregano.  I stirred it, covered it, and let it sit while I went to work.

After I came home, I sauteed a bit of spring in some olive oil:

Mmm!  Leeks are pricey now, at $2.49/pound (and you only use the bottom part!).  But I didn't care.  I'm sick with cabin fever and food is my medicine.

When those were sauteed, I poured in the tomato mix and also added:
a tsp minced garlic, a cup of canned broth, 3 Tbsp blue cheese, 2 Tbsp srirachi sauce.  (The srirachi adds a wonderful kick and the blue cheese smooths out the heat - fabulous!!)  Once that all cooked, I used my immersion blender to smooth it all out then stirred in 1/2 cup of cream.

To help bring more summer in, I used my indoor Lodge grill to fry up some lamb burgers:

I put out a simple sauce of Greek yogurt mixed with lime juice and dill.

And, while I was defrosting summer, I also took out the last of my bucket of frozen raspberries.  After defrosting I was left with this:

Enough raspberries to mix with apples for a pie and just over a quart of pure raspberry juice which, I gotta say, is like ecstasy in a glass when you drink it straight up.

A Greek salad, some oven roasted potatoe "fries", and some rolls rounded out a delicious REAL summer meal in the dead of winter:

Stay tuned for more Cabin Fever relief! 
As a sidenote, I'm drinking Pepsi with my dinner there...my mom never, ever allowed soda water with dinner.  Even though I'm a grown-up and I can do what I darn well please, I still feel like I'm doing something bad when I'm having a soda with supper.

Vogue 2787

I made this dress back in February, intending to wear it to the symphony.  I tweaked it over the weekend and I finally got to wear it out on the town. 

I used Vogue 2787 which is a reprint of a vintage pattern from 1948.

The pattern is labeled "advanced".  But fortunately I checked Pattern Review.  All reviewers said to mark pieces carefully and make good use of all markings.  Because of the design, there's really no way to do much altering either.  Thankfully I used markings - even notches which I tend to not bother with.  And it turned out to be a perfect fit. 

Here's my version

I actually didn't think it was all that advanced.  You just really have to pay attention to your cutting and use the markings just like the reviewers said.  I asked the Conductor's opinion and he said the skirt would look better a little shorter on me.  My sister Carrie always tells me to wear my skirts shorter, too.  I briefly thought of shortening it...but it's supposed to be a vintage design and this version falls just to the length of women's skirts from the mid-40's.  So I'll have to think about whether I want to stay true to the era - or go for a cut that's more flattering. 

The fabric has small, white polka dots on it so I got the idea to use piping to make the dots pop out more.  In retrospect, I shouldn't have done this.  The top portion, where the S-shaped seam is, involves the top of the left side being under the right....up until the bottom tucks.  Then it flips to being on the top. 

So, because of the switch in the middle, it was impossible to get the two ends of piping to meet up in one flow.

A noticeable flaw.  My only recorse was to cover it with a button. This, naturally, will draw the eyes right to one of my problem spots - my potbelly.  Ugh!

Pattern Review posters all said they wouldn't make another version of this dress, but I would.  Next time I'll be smart and not use piping!

So!  The show!  First we started out with dinner at Mader's - a German restaurant.  I'm German.  I've lived in Milwaukee more than half my life.  But I've never been to Mader's.  Boy, what a treat!  Milwaukee has a ton of really good restaurants.  But Mader's is one of only two or three that draw out of towners and celebrities.  So you know it's awesome. 

We started out with (what I thought would be) a before dinner cocktail of brandy old-fashioneds, a southside Milwaukee tradition.  This is what we got:

Holy Horseradish!  They were huge!! Like three cocktails in one.  I was drinking mine all through dinner and finished the last of it after my meal.  And it was well made too - considering the size, it was mixed right and didn't have any overly boozey taste.  Plus, they put a TON of cherries and oranges in it so by the time I got to the bottom, there was a crazy-delicious sludge that I ate as my dessert. 

I got the German sampler which came with five favorites - wiener schnitzel, sauerbraten,  sauerkraut, a smoked pork cutlet (that totally reminded me of my Gramma Nancy's smoked pork butt) , and red cabbage that tasted like candy.  Man!  If cabbage didn't make you do what it makes you do, I'd've eaten a plateful of just that. 

But the most exciting part of the meal was I got to have a food adventure.  I always keep my eye out for flavors or dishes I've never tried before and at Mader's I found one.  Take a guess what it is:

It looks like an unassuming bowl of beef or veggie soup, no?  It's really:    Oxtail soup!!  Contrary to Saturday morning cartoons, it does not come with two cut off, hairy ox tails draped across the top of the bowl.  (That was a childhood vision totally shattered).  This soup was amazing.  Very deep, loaded with barley, the ox-y meat was yummy (tasted like really great beef).  And the broth!! The broth was like liquid silk.  If I can find a way to duplicate that, I'll be as close to nirvana as a person can get.

After dinner we went to the symphony which featured a crazy mix of wonderful music - a fanfare by John Adams, a ballet suite by Aaron Copeland, and Beethovan's 9th which ended with the famous Ode to Joy.  Which they sang in German.  I don't speak German, so I found myself making up words to the music in my head.  It was pretty much a song about all the good German food I just ate. 

And for as much as people talk like Milwaukee is so uncouth, and as though we're all just a bunch of working class slobs that don't have any class or appreciation for the arts....this was the second symphony in a row the Conductor and I have been to where the seats were sold out.  So take that, all you snoots!