Breaded Steak, White Rice,Tostones & Tomatoes

This is what I made for my hubby last night. It is one of his favorite things to eat. He loves plain white rice with just about anything, (don't ask me why). If you don't like the rice alone, then by all means top the rice with red beans or black beans, or any other of your favorite beans.

Here's what you'll need, which is not much. This is a very economical meal. I didn't put the amounts on the ingredients because it really depends on how many you are cooking for. You would buy a nice cubed steak for each person. One plantain can be enough for two people, three plantains would be enough for four people. One bag of cracker meal is enough for four to five steaks. The cracker meal I use is found in the bread section of my supermarket in plastic bags. It is very fine. Rice amounts is usually one cup per person.

Ingredients:

Cubed Steak
Green Plantain
Cracker Meal
3 Eggs
Salt, Pepper, & Garlic Powder
Corn Oil
White Rice
Nice Ripe Tomato
Dressing of your choice

Take the green plantain, cut off the ends, make 2-3 slits from one end to the other, and peel by sections. You have to put a little thumb into it.

Slice into one inch pieces like this.


Heat the corn oil in a skillet and fry on medium heat. Oil should cover about half way up the sides. You don't want them to get brown, this is just to soften them on the inside. So turn them a few times.

Take them out and set aside so they can cool a bit for handling and smashing.

Meanwhile season your cubed steak with salt, pepper and garlic powder.


Whisk 3 large eggs in a bowl.

Spread a layer of cracker meal on large plate, coat steak with egg and then cracker meal.

Set aside.

Now back to the tostones.

This is a plantain smasher. They come made of wood or plastic. You can usually find it at your local supermarket in the Spanish utensil and cookware section.

Take each cooked piece of plantain, one at a time please, put it in the middle of the smasher and smash.


They should look like this.

Smash all of them and set aside.

Return to skillet and fry on medium heat until crispy on both sides.

Drain on paper towel and add salt to taste. Salt should be added immediately after you remove from frying.

Now, back to the steak.

In the same frying pan and oil, on medium heat, fry the steak until it's golden brown.

Turn it and cook it on the other side.

To make sure the steak cooks completely on the inside, after I turn it, I cover it, turn down the heat a bit, and let it finish cooking for a few minutes.

Slice up some tomatoes and top with your favorite dressing, and there you have it.

I hope you enjoy this recipe.

I Wish You Love and Good Eatin'

Joyce

"Mirror, Mirror on the Wall"

In the eighties I read a book called "Mirror Mirror On the Wall", by Gayelord Hauser, and pretty much it became "my beauty bible". Not that I do everything the books says. I keep it very close to me on my bedroom night stand for reference. Mr. Hauser wrote this book in 1960. He was an American nutritionist and self help author, who promoted the 'natural way of eating', and believed that beauty came from mostly what you put in your mouth. The book contains many beauty tips, and a lot of the ingredients are natural and you may have them right in your own kitchen or medicine cabinet. If not, they are usually very inexpensive to buy. He was a nutritional advisor to many celebrities which included Grace Kelly, Ingrid Bergman, Greta Garbo, and one of my favorites Ava Gardner. Even though it was written long ago, I do recommend this book to anyone who wants to eat healthier and obtain a lot of good beauty tips utilizing what you already have at home.

So with this said, I wanted to talk to you about what I use to moisturize daily.

I don't know about you, but I don't spend a lot of money on moisturizers. It just doesn't make sense to me. I just can't make myself pay $30 for a little jar of face cream. I'm a label reader, and I always find that when I read the ingredients the first one is usally water, and a lot of times its mineral oil, blah, blah, blah, and way down at the bottom of the list is the most important ingredients. If you want Collagen & Elastin, these two ingredients are always last and in very small amounts. And besides, I don't have that kind of money. So for many, many years I have been mixing up my own concoctions. Plus I like the idea that I have had a hand in what I am applying to my skin.

So this is what I do. I buy St.Ives Collagen & Elastin Cream, or Fruit of the Earth Vitamin E Skin Care Cream, which is very inexpensive. They are made in the USA and not tested on animals. I find them at Walmart or K-Mart. The pharmacy's around here don't carry them. When I get them home I mix in a couple of teaspoons of olive oil, the oil from about six vitamin E capsules, give it a good stir and it's ready to use. It is so creamy and a wonderful way to moisturize your skin. Apply to face, hands, arms, legs, and everywhere else you can reach. Use is sparingly because it didn't cost you and arm and a leg, but it will make your arms and legs softer. Sometimes I add Vitamin A oil too. If I want to put it into a dispenser, I mix it up the same way, and add some lemon juice or a little more olive oil to thin it out a bit. I read in Mr. Hauser's book that the stars little secret was to mix olive oil and lemon juice and put it on their faces to moisturize and keep dark spots away.

Ordinary women who live ordinary lives apply creams and moisturizers to their skin in the morning and at night hoping to slow down wrinkles we know are coming sooner or later. I hope that you can use this little tip. I find that it works well for me. I also believe that "good genes" are a plus. Take care and don't worry, because they say worrying causes wrinkles too.

I Wish you Love & No Wrinkles,

Joyce

The "J" Logo

I asked KTN if they could design a logo for me. I wanted a five pedal flower, five is my favorite number, with the letter "J" coming down as the stem. Here is what each of them came up with. Notice their names on the drawings. I think they came out awesome!

They are so artistic!!!!!

I love them so.

Mimi

Patsy & Betty Were Sweethearts

1930

My grandfather Pasquale "Patsy" Rosania arrived at Ellis Island from Naples, Italy on February 24, 1906 with his mother and siblings. Mama Concetta age 35, Pelligrino 11, Salvatore 9, Agostino 7, Ricardo 6, Pasquale 4, and Rosina 2, were met at Ellis Island by my great grandfather, Papa Cotello. He arrived at age 29 on February 14, 1903, three years earlier. They came to reside in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

Serino, Province Avellino, Italy is were my family was born.

The Citta di Napoli is the ship my great grandfather came over on.

The Brasile is the ship my grandmother and her children came on.

Patsy became a carnival man, and was a member of the Miami Showman's Association. He traveled all over the country with the carnival. On one of his trips through Tennessee he saw my lovely Irish grandmother, Betty Meek, grabbed her up, took her home to Connecticut and married her. (The Italians do not mess around!) A couple years later my mother, Barbara Joyce Rosania, was born.

I never met Patsy. He died a year before I was born. My mom says he was very jolly, and loved cooking for family and friends. She has his recipes for lasagna and spaghetti sauce tucked away somewhere. She says he always walked around with a dishtowel over his shoulder, and cooked a lot for the carnival workers. He resembled Lou Costello, and used to sing all the time. One song she remembers him singing was "Amapola". He used to let her put her feet on top of his feet and dance around with her. She remembers him being a really happy and loving guy!

It would have been really nice to have known Patsy Rosania.

I Wish You Love,

Joyce

"Gonna let you in on a little secret."

Just thought I'd let you in on two little secret ingredients for "Black Beans". If you buy black beans in the can, which I do all the time, don't by the seasoned ones, because they are so much better when you season them yourself. All you have to do is put a little olive oil in the bottom of a pan, throw in some diced onion, green pepper, and garlic,(which by the way is the Cuban Trinity), cook it a few minutes. Add a pinch of cumin and dried oregano, the canned beans and salt and pepper to taste, bring to a boil, turn down to low, and the secret is to add one teaspoon of "sugar" and one teaspoon, of "Apple Cider Vinegar", put a top on it, and let it simmer for fifteen minutes, and you're done. And the taste is wonderful.

And that's the secret and I'm stickin' to it.

Con Mucho Amor!!!!
With a lot of Love,
Mimi

I GREW UP ON SOUTHERN COOKIN

Listen here now, I was raised on Southern cookin. My granddaddy, the first love of my life, called me "Cookie". He would sit me on his lap at the dining room table, get a glass of milk, drop pieces of fried cornbread in it and feed it to me with a spoon. At that dinner table in my grandparents house, constantly surrounded by all of my aunts, uncles, and cousins, I indulged in eating the most wonderful, delicious food of my life. My Grandma Daisy had her dinner ready at noon. She started cooking at six in the morning. My Uncle Chic made the best damn biscuits you ever tasted, he literally sat by the stove while they cooked. Family and friends traveled hours to eat his biscuits. And, my Aunt Louise made the most wonderful banana pudding you have ever tasted, my mouth is watering just thinking about it. I ate grits, eggs, ham, and biscuits for breakfast. And......we would pour some real cane syrup on our plate, mix some real butter in the syrup with a fork, and sop it up with those biscuits, and take a bite of ham, and oh my goodness, now your talkin baby!!!!!

So, since my whole family lived on the same block, I could go from house to house grabbing something to eat. On the kitchen table at Grandma Daisy's you could always find a piece of bacon, or ham, or biscuit left over from breakfast. Dinner would be cooking on the stove. We had homemade cobblers, pound cakes that weighed ten pounds, collard greens, fried chicken, chicken and dumplings made from scratch, fried okra, green beans and tomatoes that they hand picked and canned themselves, homemade canned peaches from Georgia, pecans, peanuts, and so much more I can't remember it all. I'm just drooling about now.....

Every evening we gathered under the big tree behind Grandma Daisy's house. The grown-up's talked about their day, and the kids would play hide-n-seek. Aunt Louise would make homemade ice cream in the old type ice cream maker, the one you had to add rock salt and turn by hand. When her arm got tired she'd complain so we would help her turn. On many of those nights, and there were many, practically until I was a teenager, they told us the scariest stories about ghosts and goblins, and "Bloody Bones" who lived behind Aunt Florie's shed. We never played around that shed, never!!!!!

My paternal grandparents, Quinnie & Daisy Zeigler. Both born in Georgia, came to Miami, Florida in the 40's to start a new life with their seven children. Gran, that's what I called him, was a blacksmith for the City of Miami. Grandma Daisy took care of the home. The dress she has on she made herself, including the belt. She made all of her dresses. I never saw her in pants, and she always wore the same type of dresses, just different designs of material, with an apron on top. Grandma Daisy was a big, strong, loving, God fearing woman, and nobody messed with her. Family and friends who came to Sunday dinner could never find her when it was time to go home. Grandma Daisy never liked saying "goodbye", so she would go hide in the backyard until everybody left.
Here they are with two of their sons, Uncle Boby and my dad, Buster. They look like they'd been working in the yard or something. They were very hard working people.

Top row left to right, my dad Buster, Uncle Judson, Uncle Valder, and Uncle Boby. The oldest son, my Uncle Mims passed away not too long after they arrived from Georgia. Bottom row is my Aunt Nell, Grandma Daisy, and Aunt Louise.

Here you have four goodlookin' men.

Uncle Valder , my dad, Uncle Boby , and Uncle Judson.

Now give me some sugar,

Love, Cookie

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

"The most wonderful of all things in life is the discovery of another human being with whom one's relationship has a growing depth, beauty and joy as the years increase. This inner progressiveness of love between two human beings is a most marvelous thing; it cannot be found by looking for it or by passionately wishing for it. It is a sort of divine accident, and the most wonderful of all things in life."--Sir Hugh Walpole

I Wish You Love,

"Mimi Blingee"

Picadillo & Sheperd's Pie

These were truly budget meals because I made both of these dishes with three pounds of ground chuck. One and a half pounds for each recipe.

I'm editing all the pics and will post recipes tomorrow.

XOXO, Joyce