You asked

I got a request for some appetizer recipes last week and so I thought I'd make one and post it today. I was deciding between one of two recipes to do...both were spreads and both had goats cheese. How did I pick? Well, it all began last night when we went to Baraka Pita Bakery on Main street for supper. If you have never been to this place you must go. Here are the details. They have homemade lebanese food that is SO good. I ordered the Chicken Shawarma (a pita filled with chicken, garlic sauce, vegetables, and pickled turnips. Zach and Mom shared a few different things including a spinach pita pie (garlic-y, lemony spinach on a pita), which I had a bite of. It was so yummy that after eating my whole shawarma I went and ordered a spinach pita pie! This appetizer is similar to that pita pie in that it has spinach, lemon and garlic and I ate it on pita chips. It is a recipe I found while perusing my mom's old recipe book. And it satisfied my lemony spinach craving just as much as that pita pie last night!

Give this recipe a try and let me know how it goes!

The flavors in this spread are very Spring-y...but sometimes you've just got to follow what your mouth is craving, and for me this week it is anything acidic (you don't even

want to know how many pickled carrots I've eaten this week!)

Spinach and Lemon Spread with Pita Chips

8 oz goat cheese, room temperature

6 tbsp crumbled feta

1 garlic clove, chopped

1 tsp lemon zest

2 tsp fresh mint, chopped

Salt and Pepper

1 10-oz pkg frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed to drain off that liquid

In a food processor puree the two cheese, garlic clove, lemon zest and mint. Add the spinach along with a few pinches of salt and grinds of pepper. Puree to combined. TASTE and make sure it's yummy, if you need add more salt, pepper or lemon.

You can serve this on any kind of bread, I used pitas that I bought at Baraka (yes, go!). I brushed the lightly with olive oil, sprinkled them with some salt, cut them into triangles and baked them for about 5 minutes in a 350F oven so that they were "chippy".

Enjoy!

The Wiener!

The winner for the 2nd Pleasure of a Prairie Girl giveaway is Lisa (Ant) who submitted this picture of her creation...a kitchen!

Very lovely! Lisa wins this handy-dandy i phone case...

The other submission was from my Gran, who submitted this picture of only some of her Christmas baking!

Thank you for participating you two!

Grandmother's House

I'm fairly certain for all the grandchildren in this family Granny and Gramps' house is the closest thing to heaven on earth you can get. It is such a good place to be. I was lucky to get to be there for the whole weekend...time to do my usual baking for my favorites there as well as finish up some Christmas presents! We listened to Christmas music constantly, except for when we were cozied up in front of the fire watching movies.

Hope you all had great weekends too! Christmas is coming...are you feeling that spirit?

Mini-Hiatus

I seemed to have taken an unintentional mini vacation from the blog...one of my dear friends from the North was down for the week and I spent every evening and the weekend with her, prime bloggin' time! And now I am off to visit my Grandparents for the weekend. It will be a much needed time for some quiet and some christmas prep!

Before I go though I want to announce another giveaway...it is another creativity giveaway! Here is the info:

Send a picture of something you created (remember that means the sky

is the limit) to pleasuresofaprairiegirl@gmail.com

by Monday November 28th

and you will be entered in to win another handmade prize.

Have fun creating!

Happy Birthday Sarah Jane!

Today is Miss Sarah Jane's fifth birthday...we celebrated on both saturday and sunday, but today is the day!

And what a cutie she is! She also LOVES chips!

That concludes the busiest birthday weekend of the year for me! Stay tuned for another giveaway.

Day 2 of Birthdays

This is a picture of my cousin Chantelle and I, it is her birthday today!

We haven't seen her for a while...but miles nor months seem to matter with this one. I love her LOTS and hope she had a fantastic day!

It was also my Grampie's birthday today...his 73rd! My grandfather, or "grrrandfatha" as he is affectionately called, is one of the most generous, smart, and kind people I know. Happy Birthday!

One more day of birthday-ing tomorrow!

Birthday Weekend!

November 13, 14, and 15 are all birthday days in our family...it makes for a pretty great weekend/week! Today is Stacey's birthday, brunch and presents started the day!

Sarah Jane's 5th birthday is on the 15th but we celebrated today...with incredibly delicious cupcakes!

Stay tuned for tomorrow's birthdays!!

Love Snacks

My Grandparents, Ant, Uncle, and Cousins all packed into the van yesterday and headed for the border to do some shopping this weekend. But before the left I handed this bag over to Coz...

Inside the bag was this...

LOVE SNACKS!

There is a huge difference between packing your own snacks and someone else packing you snacks. First off, you never know whats going to be in it, the element of surprise is always great. Secondly, when you're going off somewhere you don't usually have a lot of time to focus on snack packing, which means you might just throw together something boring. Like dry cereal (which can actually be yummy) and baby carrots (which are also yummy but not exciting). Thirdly, there is the love factor, if someone is going to make you fun/homemade snacks it's probably going to be dripping in love.

This snack pack was filled with G.O.R.P (good ol' raisins and peanuts), jujubes, hat buns, and cookies!

What are your favorite snacks that you make or people make for you?

Carrying on the tradition

The night after my Grandma taught me how to make meat buns I went to Zach and Stacey's for dinner. When I got there Zach was sitting at the table flipping through the Mennonite Treasury Cookbook and talking about making this cabbage recipe. That's when I whipped out my copy of the same book that I had, on a whim, packed into my purse before coming. So we sat at the table and planned our meal...

I find lots of food comforting, but Mennonite food is the ultimate comfort food, at least the stuff I'm used to. I think it's in the lack of fresh vegetables and the high butter/white flour content. Or maybe like most foods there is a story or a memory behind them which makes them richer than any amount of butter could.

Yummy Traditions

Today I went to visit my paternal Grandparents, they are getting older and I offered to bring them soup this week. And as an exchange I asked my Grandma to teach me some of our family's favourite traditional Mennonite foods that she doesn't have the energy to make anymore. Today we made Fleische Perishki, or meat buns, I haven't eaten them for years but have very fond memories of them.

It is quite the thing to have someone teach you something that they have been doing for years and years. I feel lucky to have the time to take these moments and learn something that could very easily be lost.

Another reason I love being home...

I can go visit Stacey and Zach anytime!

Finally a recipe! ~Cranberry Bars~

Hi Everyone! Sorry I have been M.I.A. for, oh my, over a week!! But it was a good thing, really. I was able to earn some cash by doing a major catering job!

Are you ready for a recipe?

This one is perfect for this time of year when fresh cranberries are everywhere and yummy!

Cranberry Bars

1 lb fresh cranberries

7 oz sweetened condensed milk (that's not quite a full can but I adore sweetened condensed milk so I threw in the whole can)

1/4 fresh lemon juice

3 egg yolks

3/4 cup flour

1/3 cup whole wheat flour

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 tsp salt

6 tbsp butter, melted

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1. For the filling: Bring the cranberries and 1/2 cup of water to a simmer in a saucepan. Reduce the heat to medium and cook for 1o minutes, until the cranberries burst. Cool slightly. Blend in a blender until smooth. Strain the mixture through a sieve. Cool.

2. While the cranberries are cooling make the crust. Preheat the oven to 350F. Line a 8-inch

pan with foil or parchment paper.

4. Whisk together flours, sugar, and salt in a bowl. Stir in the butter and vanilla. Press into bottom and prepared pan and bake for 25 minutes. Reduce the oven temperature to 300F.

5. While the crust is baking, whisk the condensed milk, lemon juice, and egg yolks into the pureed cranberries. Pour into the baked crust and pop back into the oven for 25 to 30 minutes. Cool, and then chill in the fridge until firm (a few hours).

6 .Use the foil/parchment to lift the bars out of the pan and then cut them into 25 squares, or 12, or 4 :) They're good.