Author: ajeanneinthekitchen

As I mentioned in my last post, Bonaire – The Chibi Chibi Restaurant the restaurant was named after the chibi chibi bird, also known as the Bananaquit. It is one of the most popular birds on Bonaire. It got its Dutch name (“Sugar thief’) because it has adjusted so remarkably to the human environment that it has become a well-known raider of sugar pots on breakfast and coffee-tables. It also likes to build its nest in lampshades and decorative trelliswork. In a more natural environment it collects nectar from flowers, snapping up small insects as well. If they cannot reach the nectar in the normal way they will puncture the base of the flower to get at it. This robs the flower of its chance of pollination of course. Fruits are also pierced to get at the sweet juice. They breed the whole year round, building one nest after another.

Have a great day Everyone. ‘Til next time.

There were two restaurants at the resort, the Chibi Chibi and Pure Ocean. We dined at both of them a couple of times. The food at both places was good and the servers were a lot of fun with a lot of personality. Usually when we travel, we like to try as many different places as possible, but this time we dined at both a couple of times each, mainly out of convenience. We went night diving almost every night and both the Chibi Chibi and Pure Ocean were right there, on the premises and they were open after diving. When doing night dives, it is always an important thing to know what restaurants are open later.

The restaurant Chibi Chibi is actually named after the bird chibi chibi, which is one of the most popular birds in Bonaire. The chibi chibi bird is also known as the Bananaquit.

The chibi chibi bird.

The Chibi Chibi Restaurant, located right on the water’s edge, with a spectacular view of the ocean. Both restaurants share the same kitchen, so they often alternate their days. When one is open, the other is closed.

The first night we got there, we were just tired and hungry after traveling all day, and I almost forgot to take pictures of the food. Nancy and I both ordered the fish ‘n chips. It was very good and hit the spot. I also ordered a Caesar salad to share with Larry as well. We always eat a lot of fresh seafood when we travel to ocean and/or diving destinations. Sometimes when we see all the fish in the sea, we are also thinking of delicious ways to cook them up. I know, it sounds kind of cruel, but sad to say, it’s true.

Larry went with the Caribbean ribs instead.

The singing staff. They were all a lot of fun.

With very full, satisfied tummies, it was time to call it a day. We needed our rest because we knew the hard core diving was about to begin.

Stay safe and stay well Everyone. ‘Til next time.

I’m back from Bonaire. It seems like our trip flew by in the blink of an eye. Our first day was a travel day, and those are the necessary “evils” for anyone who travels. We started off early in the morning, leaving the house about 4:30 AM to catch our flight at 6:50 AM. First stop, Houston. We barely had enough time to get from one flight to the next, but after running across the airport, from one terminal to the next, we made in time to connect to our flight that took us straight into the airport, into the main part of the island, Kralendijk. By the time we landed and got ourselves situated, we were beat and we all turned in relatively early. But after that, we went for it with gusto and a vengeance. 🙂

Bonaire is an extension of the Netherlands. Everyone there speaks 4 languages – Dutch, English, Spanish and language of the Caribbean Islands, Papiamento, which is a combination of Spanish, Portuguese, English, French, Taino Indian, and African languages. Bonaire has a complicated and colorful history. It has been a Dutch province since 1816.

We were welcomed to the island by these two lovely ladies in their original traditional island attire.

Today, the main industries are #1, by far the MOST lucrative of their industries, is tourism, especially dive tourism, followed by a very distant second with bird watchers and nature enthusiasts. The #2 industry for Bonaire is salt production for the world, followed by the #3 industry, shipping, but more on those later.

Bonaire is a diver’s paradise. If you are not a diver, most probably, you will not enjoy Bonaire. The whole island is one big dive site and is a beloved dive destination for divers from all over the world. This was our second time to Bonaire.

Because the whole island is one giant dive site, this is a popular sign saying “Beware, Divers crossing”.

Most of the dive sites look something like this, and the entrances and exits are NOT for the weak, in any way, shape or form. Once you get into the water, all is great, but getting in out and out is very challenging, to say the least. This was one of our favorite sites, Andrea I, and we dived it about 5 times in the course of a week. This was one of the easiest to enter and exit, but it was still an adventure. All of the shore dive sites are recognized by yellow rocks with the names painted on them.

This is NOT us, but it was us on many other occasions. Nancy took the prize for the most dives out of the three of us, with 30 to her credit for this trip. I had 26 and Larry had 25. I wanted more, but had a tummy bug for a little bit, and that prohibited my from accomplishing more dives on that day. We were shooting for 5 dives per day, and did pretty well with that goal too. For anyone who is a non-diver, this is a very aggressive dive schedule.

We did not dive 1000 Steps this time, but Larry and I have dived it before. We chose NOT to dive it this time because those steps are killer, especially with all of our gear, and it doesn’t help to have bad knees either. Nancy and I both have really bad knees, with three knee replacements and zero ACL’s between us, so 1000 Steps was definitely out for us. Legend has it that even though there are really only 87 steps from top to bottom, it seems like 1000 with all your gear on, and that is how it got its name.

Yes, the water really is that blue. 🙂

None of us had any underwater cameras, AGAIN, for this trip, but the diving is phenomenal. We still have not replaced ours yet, and our friend Nancy, who was traveling and diving with us, flooded hers on the first day. You will just have to use your imaginations on all the fabulous things we saw. The reefs are in excellent condition and are vibrantly filled with lots of life.

This is a mural that is very representative of the abundant sea life that Bonaire has to offer. Other than the dolphin and the wrong kind of Angel fish they have represented here, we saw everything all the time, and much, much more.

You can do boat dives too, but all of our dives were shore dives. We dived a few different sites over the island, but our own house reef, the Calabas, was where we dived most of our dives this trip. It was so easy just to jump right in from the dock, with an easy entrance and exit. Plus we all were assigned lockers to store all our gear, which made it even easier because we did not have to haul it all around.

Our home for the week was the Divi Flamingo. We traded in one of our timeshares and stayed in a little studio apartment all week.

This was our view from our room. We enjoyed it before, after and in between dives.

Even when we were in between dives, for the most part, we were still wet and still in the water. What can I say? I am a mermaid and the water is my domain (when outside the kitchen). The water is my happy place. 🙂

I have oh so much more to share, but this is a good place to end for now. You know there will be a whole bunch more to come later. Stay tuned. 🙂

Find your happy place and live life to the fullest. Stay cool, stay safe and stay well Everyone. ‘Til next time.

“I’m leaving on a jet plane. Don’t know when I’ll be back again”, John Denver. Actually, I do know when I’ll be back again. I’ll only be gone for a little over a week, and then I will be back to reality. But in that’s week’s time, I will get in A LOT of diving. If all goes as planned I should get in about 30 dives. WHOOOOO HOOOOOO!!!!!

We’ll be in beautiful Bonaire, diving to our heart’s content. Bonaire is one of the Dutch ABC Islands just north of Venezuela. It’s been quite awhile since we last dived (yes it really is dived) in Bonaire. We have been all over the ABC’s. They are all great dive destinations.

These are stock photos, but hopefully soon, you will see my photos. 🙂

Stay safe and stay well Everyone. See you soon. I will be off the grid and out of contact with the world above water. You will only be able to communicate with me if you speak ocean talk.

We are beginning our vacation countdown. It won’t be much longer until we will be doing nothing but diving. Before we go though, there are still a few things that need to be done, such as cleaning out the refrigerator. We are down to almost nothing in the fridge, which is always our goal right before a vacation. But we also still have a couple of days left before we leave.

Last night, “The Queen” and I got creative and made a delicious salad that used up some of my greens, chicken, oranges and olives. I topped it all with an orange vinaigrette too. I still have more greens, so I see another tasty salad in our immediate future before we leave. 🙂

I like the combination of oranges and olives, and actually use these two together fairly often when making up quick appetizers and tapas. So it sounded really good as a salad too, especially with an orange vinaigrette to top it all off. I made my orange vinaigrette ahead of time and let it chill and mix together before using.

Orange Vinaigrette

1 cup orange juice

2-3 TBSP orange infused olive oil

3/4 cup olive oil

2-3 TBSP white balsamic vinegar

1 sprig or two of each fresh thyme and fresh oregano

1 tsp red pepper flakes, or to taste

Whisk everything together well and chill.

The salad itself was like a delicious Mediterranean salad you could find anywhere along the Mediterranean coast. I like using mixed greens a lot, especially when making more “artistic” and creative salads that are not your common everyday salads.

The Salad

This salad is for two.

mixed greens

1 cooked chicken breast, sliced

1/4 cup toasted almond slivers

1 orange, peeled and diced

1/2 green pepper, diced small

1 shallot, minced

1/4 cup olives, sliced thin

toppings – feta cheese, dried cranberries

I layer most of my salads, starting with whatever greens I am using and then work my way up. Larry likes cheese on his salads and I do not. I like a variety of tastes and textures on my salads, Larry does not. I love mixing something salty and/or crunchy on my salads to give them a real taste explosion in every bite. I also like to add a lot of color to my salads. I learned a long time ago, that the “more colors” you use in your foods, the better. This ensures a lot of different nutrients all at the same time.

Once the salad is ready, and made just how you like it, top it off with your selection of toppings and then the dressing is last. I am still using up the zucchini cheddar muffins I made Zucchini Cheddar Muffins and of course, had a glass or two of a rich, buttery chardonnay to complete the meal. Perfect!

Stay cool, stay safe and stay well Everyone. ‘Til next time.

I love my herons, and I get so excited every time I see them, though this year I haven’t seen as many as we normally do. I did see one the other day though. He was playing hide ‘n seek in the reeds. He thought he was hiding from me, but I saw him and I got some got shots of him too. 🙂

I guess when he realized he was still seen and in plain site, he decided he had had enough and flew away.

Have a great day, stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time

Our squirrels are out again now that the oppressive heat seems to be fading a bit and the weather is getting a little cooler. They are always so much fun and so full of personality. Often times, they look like they are just posing for the camera. They seem to love being the center of attention … until something distracts them and they run off to be, well the squirrels that they are.

It’s OK to be squirrely sometimes. It makes life much more interesting and fun.

We had our friends Eric and Shannon over for a steak dinner last night. Even though everything was super simple, it was all delicious too. One of the elements of the dinner was a batch of zucchini cheddar muffins to compliment the steak. This recipe came to me, via our very own My Meals Are On Wheels, https://beatcancer2010.wordpress.com/ once again, and The Rockstar Mommy https://therockstarmommy.com/. I find many great recipes from our friend in Ohio.

Silly me though, I misread the recipe, and they were supposed to be made as biscuits rather than muffins, but there isn’t much difference between the two, muffins and biscuits, and I actually liked them as savory muffins. Sometimes my best creations come from my mistakes. 🙂

Zucchini Cheddar Muffins

These muffins came out so light and fluffy. Almost like clouds. They just melted in our mouths. We all loved them.

2/3 cup or 2 medium zucchini, shredded

2 cups flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup or 1 stick cold butter, cubed

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

3/4 cups buttermilk

1/4 cup melted butter

1/3 cup fresh parsley, chopped fine

Preheat the oven to 400* F or 200* C.

Spray cooking oil into a muffin pan.

Combine the flour, cold butter, baking powder, baking soda and salt together, either with your hands or with a pastry cutter until it resembles coarse sand. Then add the shredded zucchini, cheddar cheese and parsley and mix together again.

Combine the melted butter with the buttermilk and add to the mix, then gently fold together just until blended. You do not want to over mix to or your will have tough muffins.

You can use regular buttermilk, or you can do like I do and use the dried buttermilk. I HATE real buttermilk, and if I buy it, it will only go bad, because I do not use it enough to justify the purchase. When I was a little girl, my grandfather used to drink buttermilk all the time, and one day, I decided to try it since he enjoyed it so much. I almost threw it up right one the spot and have never liked it since. So I buy the dried buttermilk and mix it with regular milk. The directions on the package say to mix it with water, but I like the richness of mixing it with milk better.

Once everything is thoroughly combined, spoon the mixture into the prepared muffin pan and bake for about 10-15 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean when inserted in the middle and they are lightly golden brown.

No matter what you serve these with, they are going to be a big hit. They are so light and fluffy and will just melt in your mouth. They are even better with melted butter too.

Have a great day Everyone. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

We are doing our best to empty out the refrigerator since we are about to leave for vacation, so I won’t be cooking much this week. Since I won’t be in the kitchen much, I thought I would share some funny food quotes with you to start your week off off with some good laughs.

Ironically, this happens to me all the time. I am always cooking, as you all very well know, but often times, there is nothing to eat, just ingredients to do more cooking. 🙂

This is SO very true. This seems to be my favorite diet.

Have a great day Everyone. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.

As you all know I love to bake. But unfortunately, I love to eat what I bake too, and that wreaks havoc when I am trying to lose weight, and believe me, I have a lot of weight to loose. But making things for others is a great way for me to still be able to bake, and to try a lot of new recipes, but without the guilt, especially when it comes to cookies. Cookies are ALWAYS my weakness.

I tried a new batch of cookies that I am calling Lemon Poppies. They are lemon poppy seed cookies that are very delicate lemon shortbread styled cookies, but I call them poppies because I made them in a floral shape. You can make them in any shape you like.

These cookies are delicate, but are also deceivingly decadent as well, because you can’t stop at just one. I am not going to lie, these were a pain in the neck to make because my petals kept breaking and I had to handle them very gingerly. But in the end, they were a big hit too, which makes it all worthwhile. They won’t be so much of a headache if cut in different shapes instead of a flora shape, but when do I ever take the easy route?! 🙂

Lemon Poppies

The Dough

1 cup or 2 sticks softened butter

1/2 cup sugar

1 large egg yolk

1 TBSP lemon zest

1 tsp lemon extract

1/2 tsp vanilla

1/8 tsp cardamom

dash of salt

2 cups flour

1/3 cup poppy seeds

Mix the butter and sugar together until creamy, then add the egg yolk. Add the lemon zest, vanilla and lemon extract.

Combine the dry ingredients together then mix in 1/2 at a time into the butter and sugar mixture, blend, then repeat. Blend just until everything is mixed together. Do not over mix or you will have tough cookies.

On a lightly floured surface, mold the dough into a rectangle, then wrap with plastic wrap and chill for at least one hour before using.

Candied Lemon Peel

As the dough is chilling, make the candied lemon peel. Peel the lemon rind off a lemon with a zester or a peeler and cut into very small, thin strips.

1 lemon rind

1 cup sugar, divided

1/3 cup water

Boil the sugar and water together then add the lemon zest and boil for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. This will set very quickly, so time is of the essence.

Remove the lemon zest with a slotted spoon and add to the reserved sugar. Roll it all around to thoroughly coat. Let it set for at least 30 minutes. After the sugar has rested, pour it through a strainer to remove the excess sugar.

When the dough is ready, preheat the oven to 350* F or 180* C. Gently roll 1/2 the dough out onto a lightly floured surface to about 1/8 inch thickness. Cut into your desired shapes with a cookie cutter. Repeat with the remaining dough.

Place them on a cookie sheet and bake for about 15 minutes or until the center is set.

Let the cookies cool completely before adding the lemon glaze, then top with a few pieces of the candied lemon zest.

Lemon Glaze

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1-2 TBSP lemon juice

1 TBSP lemon extract

Mix everything together until it is smooth and creamy, then gently ice your cookies. Top with the candied lemon peel immediately. I did one cookie at a time.

These cookies are deliciously delicate as well as decadent. They are just sweet enough with a bit of a tarty zest as well. Enjoy! I know I sure did. 🙂

Have a great day Everyone. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.