I have been a bad, bad blogger...my job started again this week and because of this and other odd occurrences in my life, I have not had time to write....I apologize and promise to do better! I am posting pics of a diner I made last week for my wonderful husband, J. He and I went to our local 5 points farmer's market and picked up some really great purple and gold oyster mushrooms from a local grower, some wonderful nitrate-free bacon, potatoes, tomatoes, etc. I am sad to say that the market is still quite small and I really wish they would add some local seafood but all in all, they had a decent variety of fresh ingredients. Here are a few of the dishes I made.... an oyster mushroom chicken marsala over rustic root veggies (yellow potatoes, scallions and carrots with Yoder milk and garlic butter). The addition of Yoder Dairy garlic butter really made the dish....here are the pics, enjoy! 
I also found some really fresh hothouse cukes and organic carrots and made them into a salad w. sesame vinaigrette with our standby quick dinner favorite, sashimi tuna w. sesame coating. To jazz the dish up, I also added sesame shrimp with a sour apricot sauce. Loved the sauce and the fish was wonderful...if anyone has ideas on how to jazz up the rice, I am all ears...I have tried fried rice but am in a bit of a creative slump when it comes to asian rice dishes. The apricot sauce for the shrimp was a mixture of rice wine vinegar, dijon mustard and apricot preserves....delish!
I am not a baker. I burn toast, I overcook pie crust, I have actually had things blow up in the oven, therefor I choose to make non-baked deserts...here is my attempt at a cheesecake (that turned out really good, surprisingly!) For desert, I made an almost sugar-free strawberry cheesecake. This recipe was super fatty, super easy and super good! I did cheat by using a pre-made graham cracker crust (the almost part).Almost sugar-free strawberry cheesecake
1 block cream cheese softened
1 small container sour cream
1/4c organic milk (the other stuff freaks me out a bit but can use whatever you like)
1/4 tsp vanilla (or any flavor you like)
1/3 c splenda (or to taste)
8-10 strawberries sliced
1/2 c fruit spread melted in the micro (no sugar any flavor you like)
1 graham crust
mix together cream cheese and sour cream with milk to soften the mixture. Add milk a little at a time to incorporate. Add splenda and vanilla and mix to incorporate. Pour mixture into the crust and top with sliced strawberries. Paint fruit spread (jam, etc) over the top of the berries and the pie to completely seal and coat. Chill for at least an hour then serve cold....MMMMMMM!
