Another low carb breakfast, Valley style

Hello, everyone.

Today's post is a breakfast that is low carb and tasty and very much in tune with the Rio Grande Valley's culinary heritage: huevos con barbacoa y nopal.

For my non-RGV readers, this relies on previously prepared items: leftover barbacoa from the shop and leftover nopal.

I bought the nopal as a bag of cleaned, raw pieces. The drill is to rinse them, boil them, and then rinse them again as the sap has a somewhat vinegary taste. (Anyone who really loves green beans with vinegar poured over them might skip the last rinse or make it a pro-forma rinse.) After the pre-boiling is done, you can treat them as any other addition, mixing with bulk sausage and eggs as a scramble, or with other meats like this, or heat with a sauce as a vegetable on the side of your meal. The general texture and experience is rather like tender green beans.

I heated up the meat and nopal pieces in the skillet, set aside, fried 2 eggs over-medium (cooked whites and runny yolks), then plopped the goodies on top of the eggs.

Yum.

The cactus pad pieces, AKA nopal, are said to be good for regularizing blood sugar. They are also a seasonal menu item in this part of Texas, as the cacti make new, tender pads in the springtime.

 

The Zipper Holder

 Hello, everyone.

I mentioned a couple of posts ago that I was using scraps of a pretty fabric that had been used in a zipper holder.

Then I noticed that the zipper holder, a Sewing Club project, was never posted.

Here it is. The green and blue stalagmites-layers fabric captured me when I saw it in my local quilting shop. 

The zips are hanging from drapery hooks. There are hooks on both sides of the hanger. Using a swivel coat hanger makes it easier to get at the zippers once the holder is loaded.

This was a fun project, and it is perfect for using up your stash fabrics and ribbons. With the shift in window fashions over recent years, the drapery hooks are probably also in stash for many of us. 

 

A finished project: the Spring Table Runner (updated)

 Hello, everyone.

As the title says, the spring table runner is now finished.

When the class met, I had in mind to turn the rectangular panels into a hanging banner 2 panels by 3. In the end, laying the panels side by side after the applique and embroidery was finished, it just didn't look right. I laid them out side by side as a long runner instead and that worked fine.

The original plan had also included pink for the outline. But the fabric choices kept going to jewel tones and intensity--in the end the green was the only choice.

All fabrics are from stash. 

Updated to add: The Blogger system informs me that the "follow by email" widget is going away. If you are following my blog by email with the widget, thank you so much!, you need to make a bookmark and check in instead. They say it will disappear in June, so there is time. 

A new applique project in process

 Hello, everyone.

It's been a bit hectic around the Olde Homestead, contending with the Easter holiday and also plumbing surprises, but there has also been a little bit done in the sewing studio.

The panorama of the project in process. 

Detail of the butterfly with the faux-dupioni wing portions.

This is one of the seasonal banners from Sweet Pea. It was a class at my local quilting shop.

We completed the first square, the 'S', and then took the instructions home to work further on our own. 

I think, in retrospect, that I shouldn't have trimmed the batting early on, as the instructions recommended, but instead should have kept it in place until later in the block assembly. The rectangular border stitches came out a bit wobbly on all of the blocks and it was more difficult than strictly necessary to trim them to a proper straight-edged rectangle. 

This project is a great stash-buster. Not only are the foreground applique pieces findable in stash, the background blocks are also small enough to pull from stash as well. The S and G are both from the same print, a fat quarter that had also been used for the hanging zipper holder project. (Though I loved that stalactite layering look so much I bought another FQ for future use!) The butterfly's lower wings are from an offcut of ribbon that was used for Advent wreath bows. 

You know, looking at this strip of fabric has shown me an unexpected thing: the G is upside down! The letter is supposed to be on the top half of the block. Oops. Back to the seam-ripper and sewing machine we go! I will be getting those daisies down to the bottom in no time.