So on the second day of our vacation we got up early to see the sun rise (actually we were up already thanks to our sweet kitties, more on that later.) As I was saying, we woke up early to watch the sun rise and we were not disappointed.
For breakfast I made english muffins (crazy, right? But they were very tasty and easy to make) and tofu benny, both from Vegan Brunch. Even though I had to improvise on the hollandaise sauce because I didn't have enough of some of the ingredients, we both liked the dish quite a bit. I'll definitely make this again and at some point I'll purchase a round biscuit cutter so that my can look at pretty as Isa's. So here is my not so pretty but delicious version.
The rest of the day was spent napping and hanging out with the cats and trying to get them acclimated to the new and very strange surroundings. Our cats are definitely city cats and these strange new sounds and lack of sounds freaked them out a bit too much. Unfortunately, we ended up bringing them back to DC last night and we're both pretty sad about it, but ultimately it was the right thing to do. Moving on..
So now we're on to vacation day three. On the way back to the house we stopped at a farmers market and scored some peaches, heirloom tomatoes (super cheap) and bird egg beans. I'd never heard or seen these beans before but who am I to turn down fresh beans.
Later in the afternoon we drove to Lost River State Park and went for a hike on what seemed like a tough trail to me. I was cursing at Grant during part of our hike for not warning me about incline and bugs, you'd think we were in the woods or something, but in the end after the hard part was over and I was breathing normally again, I told Grant I was happy we did it. It was a pretty walk and we saw lots of deer.
For dinner tonight I cooked up the bird nest beans, collard greens and brown rice. I didn't really know how to cook the beans and couldn't find much about them online. However, I found one recipe that I modified a bit and they turned out yummy. Here's a picture of the fresh beans before being cooked.
Aren't they pretty? And they do look like tiny speckled eggs. I love the purple color. It's a bummer the color cooks away. Speaking of cooking beans. here's my recipe. For about 2.5 cups of beans, I put the beans, a chopped medium onion and 3 minced garlic cloves in a pot and covered it all with water. I simmered the beans for about 45 minutes and then added salt, pepper, and liquid smoke at the end. I also flash cooked some collard greens with onions and served it all over brown rice.
I should also mention that dinner entertainment was a series of thunder/lightening storms that made Grant quite happy. I was even fascinated and a little scared of the intense thunder and lightening. Ok, off to bed. Tomorrow we go canoeing.
