It's FriYAY!!

Good morning, good morning!  So dang happy that today is Friday.  I have been bumping up against the maximum comprehensive leave balance I can carry at work and I have a friend in town so I am taking today off of work!  I think we are going to make the trek over to Trader Joes today and see what kind of fruits and veggies we can find.  Wild times in Texas! 

Yesterday, was a busy work day and I was trying to wrap everything up since I was going to be off today. I didn't eat much and only added one plant to my list for the day!  Not very impressive, but you have to keep eating what you have to use it up!  It is a balance! 

Breakfast, was avocado toast, which is always one of my favorites.  The avocado was perfect! That just hardly ever happens! Sprinkled it liberally with Everything But the Bagel seasoning. Delicious!

Sheri dropped off her things at my house early in the afternoon and left me with a bag of Buccee's Sea Salted Caramel Beaver Nuggets.  OMG!  No plants in this bag unless you count sugar and whatever remnant of corn these nuggets are made out of.  Not much of a lunch in the plant game, but son of a gun, they were good and so addicting! 

For our dinner, I made Minimalist Baker's Vegan Eggplant Parmesan! Click the link for the recipe!  I made this a few weeks ago for me and Chip and we loved it.  I had never made Eggplant Parmesan, but was looking for a way to use an eggplant so I could add it to my plant list and came across this recipe.  Why didn't anyone tell me how good this was and how easy it was to make!  Chip loved it, too! 

There are a few steps to the process, but I did them incrementally through the day and it came together really quickly at the end.  Perks of working from home. Sliced, salted and sweated (is that a word?) the eggplant about 2:00 pm.  Strained it about 3:00 and rinsed it really good.  Laid the eggplant out on a cookie sheet lined with a kitchen towel and then put another towel on top of the eggplant to soak up any moisture.  On top of the towel I put another cookie sheet and my heavy containers of flour and sugar to really press out the moisture.  When we were ready to start dinner, I did an assembly line of flour, milk, panko breading and then fried them and finished them in the oven. I don't know if this is how everyone makes eggplant parmesan, but the coating was so delicious and so crispy it would be easy to just eat the eggplant without any pasta!  

Dinner was a big hit and I added eggplant to the plant list, bringing me to 42 plants this week.  

Otherwise, The Worst Dog in the World behaved himself reasonably well for having free roaming company in the house.  I was pleasantly surprised.  Way to go, Coop! 

Sheri and I had some beverages and a lovely visit and and went to bed just a little past 10 p.m.  That is my kind of company!  

I went on a long walk with Martha early this morning and it was a perfect way to kick off this Friday.  Came home and whipped together this asparagus, pepper, onion, tomato, sesame seeds, parsley puff pastry beauty for breakfast and am about to dig in.

No new plants to add to the list because I have already had all of these this week!  Come on Trader Joes - bring on the new plants! 

Hope your day is fantastic....even if you aren't taking a vacation day like me!