Seven Layer Dip for Liz

Well, as I am sure you can tell from the dates on this blog, I have not been posting. Please forgive me, gentle reader. I was feeling really strange last month and thought it was just stress, so I took some time to relax and cut out anything extra, such as this blog. It didn't help, so I ended up going to the doctor and found out I have hyperthyroidism - basically, my body's metabolism is going WAY too fast. Thankfully the doctor put me on some medicine and I am starting to feel better now. One upside to the condition (kidding here, of course) is that I can eat whatever I want and still lose weight!

My dear friend Liz sent me a request for a recipe I used to bring to potlucks occassionally - Seven Layer Dip... or as my Mom used to call it "Bean Plate." Which sounds awful, but is a pretty accurate and concise description of the dish.

Seven Layer Dip (Bean Plate)

1 can refried beans
1 small container sour cream
1 can salsa
shredded lettuce
2 cups (or more) shredded cheese
1 chopped tomato
2 or 3 green onions, chopped
One bag of tortilla chips

Layer all of the ingredients, starting with the refried beans and ending with the onions in a oblong cake pan or any other pan or plate you might like. Serve with tortilla chips.

Variation: leave off the lettuce and add guacamole... or add taco meat, or whatever you like on tacos - make it 10 layer dip if you like!

My Mother, Queen of Substitutions

That's a picture of my Momma and me as a baby. Isn't she beautiful? She still is today... in fact, if you know any nice single men, let me know.

I learned to cook from my mom and my dad, but mostly from my dear Momma... which is funny, because I don't think she likes to cook all that much. But she let me play with the pots and pans on the floor when I was very little, and she made sure we all ate together as a family when dinner time came around every night. She managed to feed a family of six plus any stray neighborhood kids on a shoestring budget. The kids I went to school with were always kind of amazed we ate together around a table every night without turning on the T.V.

I have a lot of memories of my mom in the kitchen - she used to grind her own flour with a grinder that clamped on to the kitchen table, and I remember she had a hand grinder for coffee beans. When we would go to the grocery store she would let me have one coffee bean from the bulk containers so that I could smell it. Maybe that's why I love coffee so much - I associate it with my mother.

She also taught me substitutions for recipes when I would try to cook something and we were out of an ingredient... Mayonnaise can be substituted for egg; allspice for cinnamon, nutmeg, or cloves (I think Momma actually thought that allspice was made from "all spices" but it's not. I learned that a few years back and was actually quite amazed that it was a spice in and of itself.) I think all of "substituting" had a pretty big influence on my cooking - I can make something out of a bunch of nothings... oatmeal for breadcrumbs, yogurt for sour cream, lemon juice and milk for buttermilk... even coffee creamer for powdered milk.

Here's the most recent thing she taught me to make. It's good, and I wouldn't make any substitutions:

Turkey Wraps

Tortillas (or rice wraps)
Turkey
cream cheese
cucumber slices
alfalfa sprouts
cranberry sauce

Just wrap everything in a tortilla and eat it. Simple enough.