what I've been reading

I've just finished this true crime book...
"The Prince of Paradise" by John Glatt

It's about the murder of Ben Novack Jr and his mother, Bernice...but the story begins with Ben Novack Sr , a self made millionaire who built and owned the famous Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach..

This first section of the book is the best part.  Novack Sr. grew up in New York...raised by immigrant parents who ran a small hotel. As an adult he started up and owned several different small businesses and ended up in Miami with a hotel of his own there.

He really started making a lot of money quickly in 1942,  when the US Army took over Miami Beach to use as a training center...requisitioning over 200 hotels to house the troops, with the government paying the hotel owners a generous amount to rent the rooms.

Novack Sr.  was able to buy  four more hotels during that period...each rented out for the troops every night. That's how he really began building his fortune.

When a large tract of beach front property went up for sale, Novack Sr seized the opportunity and bought it. He hired an architect to design the biggest and grandest hotel on the beach, and named it the Fontainebleau.

Meanwhile he divorced his first wife and married Bernice, and when the hotel was completed, they lived in an apartment there with their son, Ben Novack Jr.

I don't want to give away all the details of the story, but Novack Jr grew up and was a successful and shrewed businessman as well, building a large event planning company.

He married and divorced, then remarried a woman named Narcy, who assisted him in his business. His mother also worked for him and the two women did not get along well.

The rest of the book describes how Narcy, the wife, becomes unhappy with her situation and asks her brother to hire someone to murder her husband and his mother.

The writing in these chapters really bogs down with names of those involved in the killing, what cars they drove, telephone calls they made, who they stayed with, and on and on.

There are graphic descriptions of the murders.  Then we learn how the police and FBI solve the case and how things went at the trials of the killers, Narcy, and her Brother...and the legal wrangling over who should inherit the family fortune.

I have to say this author isn't the best...but if you like true crime stories you would probably like this book.

frosted banana bars

Between the two of us, my husband and I usually eat one bunch of bananas each week (or is it a hand of bananas?).
Sometimes though, a few get to that over ripe stage, so I peel them and keep them frozen to use later in recipes like this one.

Frosted Banana Bars
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup mashed ripe bananas

For frosting....
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
8 oz. cream cheese
2 Tbsp. butter, melted
1 tsp. vanilla

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat the eggs in, one at a time, then stir in sour cream and vanilla.

Combine flour, baking soda and salt in a separate bowl, then add to batter and mix well..

Stir in the mashed bananas...

Spread mixture in a greased  10" x 15" pan.  (I do not have a pan this size so I use a cookie pan that's a bit bigger...which makes thinner bars).

Bake in a preheated 350° oven for 18 to 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare frosting by mixing cream cheese and melted butter until creamy, blend in powdered sugar and vanilla. Spread on cake layer when cooled.

Caution: leaving small amounts of frosting in your mixing bowl may attract Sasquatches!

Slice into generous squares to serve.

They are good and moist!  Good at room temperature but I think the flavor is more intense after they have been refrigerated.

trees can be scary

Remember that scene in the "Wizard of Oz" movie, where Dorothy picks an apple off a tree, then the tree comes to life and is mean and nasty to her?

Or what about the tree in the "Poltergeist" movie? It comes alive and breaks right through the window and grabs the little boy.  So scary!

Well, I am keeping an eye on this tree of ours, it is definitely developing a face!

A few years ago, people were buying those kits that you could hang on a tree to look like a face...but this one is completely natural.   It's a lot more distinct when gets wet on a rainy day (like today).

It's looking right in our upstairs bathroom window!

So far it doesn't have a mouth.  If I start seeing any signs of one - it's goodbye tree!

Just kidding of course.

tortilla pizzas

Pizza with thin crispy crust is my husband's very favorite kind.  I can't remember how we got started making pizzas on flour tortillas...it must have been his idea... but  I like them too. You can taste the toppings more so than with a thick crust.

Quick to put together!    He likes sausage, onions and peppers (yellow peppers on sale this week).

We use this little counter top pizza oven. This is the type of oven my husband sold to customers when he first started in the wholesale pizza business years ago.  It has coiled heat elements top and bottom, so it bakes the crust and melts the cheese at the same time.  

Did someone say melted cheese ?!!!     This one is about ready. It bakes right on the rack. There is a pull-out tray below for cleaning.

Lonnie likes it cut in squares...party cut.

I had just enough leftover cooked spinach to top this one, along with Canadian bacon, peppers and onions.

The house sure smells good when they are baking!   

These tortilla pizzas can be baked in a regular oven but you have to be very careful that the edge of the tortilla doesn't  flop down between the lines of the rack and dump a bunch of  toppings off in your oven.

It's a mess. Experience speaking here!

friend's special quilt

My last charity quilt is ready to be pin basted and quilted. I will show it when it's finished.

Meanwhile, I want to show you a quilt my friend Linda made.  It's a memory quilt to be given to a family friend, a teenage girl who lost her father. The quilt is put together using the father's clothes.

Linda with her quilt

Before Linda began work on the quilt, she brought the clothes in to the quilt group meeting to see if anyone had ideas on how to use them.

She didn't have a lot to work with...some jeans and flannel shirts...some tee shirts, printed ones and plain ones. 

I couldn't imagine how she would be able to come up with a quilt using that assortment...but she is so creative! She made the best and most interesting memory quilt.

She made some blocks by cutting the words and picture parts from the tee shirts.

Other blocks had strips of the flannel shirts combined with pictures of the young lady and her dad copied onto a special photo transfer fabric.

I really like these blocks that combine the jeans and flannel shirt fabrics, with the pockets and labels sewn on.   

This quilt will be such a special gift for the young lady...something she will cherish always.

Linda has told us that she hasn't been quilting very long, but that she has been sewing for many years.  She makes really cute toddler outfits...and other clothing...even shirts for her husband, matching up plaids and everything.  
That amazes me, but it doesn't make me want to try it myself!

son's hammock tarp

The Sasquatch had on his Christmas wish list, a tarp to string up over his camping hammock. He had told me where I could get a pattern and the materials to make one and I  wrote a post here , about sewing it together on Christmas Eve.

Before the weather got nasty, he had a chance to set the tarp up with the hammock to see how it works out.
The gray tent-like covering is the part I made. Underneath is his yellow hammock. It looks pretty cozy!

Would you sleep here?

He actually didn't sleep there at the time, either. Just trying out the set-up...right beside the Salt River.

It wasn't too far from the abandoned camp houses that I wrote about last week...but below these rock cliffs.

One of the camp owners made a set of steps from concrete blocks in an opening.

I like this photo of a huge boulder nearby. Wonder just how many thousands of years it's been sitting there?

All these pictures were taken by the Sasquatch.  If you want to see any more of this area and the abandoned camps, you can go to his online photo album and scroll through.

To see the album...

click here

soup on a snow day

It was just like the weather forecasters predicted...lots of snow had fallen overnight.

This is looking out the back door. See how it has drifted above the bottom of the door glass?

There is a swimming pool under there somewhere!

We didn't have to go anywhere but I cleared a path to the Jeep in case something came up.

The night before, I made a big pot of soup using a bag of red lentils that I'd picked up at the grocery a couple of months ago, and had forgotten about.

After looking online for a recipe using  lentils, I settled on this one, since I had the rest of the ingredients on hand. It sounded different and interesting.

Red Lentil and Sweet Potato Soup 

1/4 cup butter or olive oil

2 large sweet potatoes, chopped

3 large carrots, chopped,

1 apple, chopped

1 onion.chopped

1 lb dry red lentils, rinsed and drained

ginger , salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, paprika

4 cups (or more as needed) of vegetable or chicken broth.

Melt butter in a large open soup pot, Add chopped vegetables and saute until onions are soft. The original recipe said to peel the apple and sweet potatoes, but I did not. The skins are good for you!

Add spices, broth and lentils. 

Bring to a boil, the reduce heat and simmer until lentils are fully cooked, about an hour...adding more water or broth if needed.

It's a filling and healthy soup...I really liked it.  My husband wasn't so thrilled with it.  He only took about half a bowl and he drenched that with hot sauce.

That's okay, he usually eats about anything I cook.  Maybe it just isn't a "man soup"...there's no meat in it.

I'll just put some in the freezer and save it for another snowy day.