My dad had shoulder surgery to repair his rotator cuff last Friday. He has been recuperating at our house. His favorite meal is pot roast. Since his every wish and need is my command, I made it for him.

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Do you like liver and onions? I do not! But my dad and Dave are fans, so every now and again, I treat them. Valentine’s dinner was one such occasion. Although I enjoy pâté and a few other liver dishes, the bad taste of liver and onions has stayed with me from childhood, when we were forced to eat them.

Oh, the stories I could tell about how I would “dispose” of the food I disliked from my childhood. The various methods I used to get rid of my oatmeal, on nearly a daily basis every winter, are genius by my account and legendary in my family.

The liver was more difficult to avoid, the dogs were my only saviors and my parents picked up on that one early and the dogs were put outside during the dinner hour when the liver or other undesirables were served. My list of undesirable food was long; lima beans, sauerkraut, all cereal (cold and hot but especially oatmeal) spinach, most vegetables (they were all canned) with the exception of corn, and the list goes on.

Liver and lima beans were at the very top of the list. So the fact I even make liver for others is a testament to my love for them.

I will admit that this gravy smells darn good though. The addition of Worcestershire sauce is the trick.

It’s difficult to make liver, onions, and gravy look good in a photo (all that brown on brown on more brown) so please look beyond that. If you or your loved ones crave liver, give this recipe a try, I’m told it’s excellent. I wouldn’t know, Connor and I had beef tenderloin for Valentine’s dinner this year.

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I love the thick cut bacon from Costco. It’s the only kind I buy, so it is what I used to make these yummy tater tot poppers. That was a big mistake! By the time the bacon baked enough to get crispy, the tots were nearly falling apart. Be sure to use cheap thin-slice bacon … my mistakes are all for your benefit. You’re welcome!

These poppers are spicy-sweet. You can amp up the wow factor by replacing the maple syrup used in the brown sugar glaze with jalapeño jelly. I didn’t think of it until after I made them, but I’ll be doing that next time, for sure! For some unknown reason, the jar of pickled jalapeño didn’t make it into the “ingredients photo” but be sure to include them when you make this ~ otherwise, they are not poppers at all ~ just boring bacon-tots.

Lastly, I don’t give you quantities here so make as many or as few as you’d like. I suggest many. They are addicting.

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My dear friend and colleague, Kim Howard, sent me this recipe from the NY Times for my week’s worth of slow cooker recipes. I was very grateful for the recipe since it was for a pot roast. I had a serious need for a new pot roast recipe because my dad loves pot roast and had already requested it for our Sunday supper.

My “go-to” slow cooker roast recipe for my dad is This One, I was beyond excited to try something new. A huge plus was that it is by far simpler and even tastier than the old standby.

I minimally changed the original recipe, but the change I made was a major health change. How I did that was to remove a majority of the fat after cooking.

Kim, I thank you!

My dad thanks you.

Basically, we all (Dad, Dave, Connor, my visiting brother-in-law, Roger, and I) thank you for the great recipe! xoxo

By the way, the recipe for the lovely asparagus you see on the plate above will be posted later this week. It is A. MAZ. ING!

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For Valentine’s dinner, Dave requested a version of these potatoes, which he had seen in the food section of the Arizona Republic.

The original recipe did not call for the half-and-half or thyme, but I felt it needed both for extra creaminess and flavor.

They were divine!

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Did you enjoy the Super Bowl? It was very low-key at our house. A few weeks ago, Dave and I received an invite to a party, but we turned it down because we didn’t want to leave Connor and my dad hanging out to dry.

A few days ago I talked to my dad and was asking what time he wanted to come over and he informed me that he was going to a Super Bowl party! How do you like that? Too funny really. So it was just the three of us chilling at the house all day.

I had some chips and salsa on hand, so that was snack #1. I needed something more but I had no intention of going grocery shopping, so I came up with this tasty treat.

I’d baked a few potatoes the other night and had two left. Plus there was leftover prosciutto and cheese from last weekend’s bridal shower. That’s all it took!

The recipe made 16, I ate 2 of them, and the rest quickly disappeared, so I guess the boys really like them!

Prosciutto Wrapped Cheesy Potato Wedges

• 2 baked potatoes, cut into 8 wedges each
• 16 pieces of Port Salut or Brie cheese (cut into 2-inch long sticks)
• 8 thin slices prosciutto, cut in half lengthwise

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Besides the deliciousness of this old-fashioned potato salad recipe, I also love that when Sheila sent me the recipe she named specific brands of mayonnaise, pickle relish and seasoning salt.

All three of the brands are true Red, White & Blue Americana, all created in the early 1900’s!

Hellmann’s Real Mayonnaise

In 1905, Richard Hellmann from Vetschau, Germany, opened a delicatessen on Columbus Avenue in New York City, where he used his wife’s recipe to sell the first ready-made mayonnaise. It became so popular that he began selling it in bulk to other stores. In 1912 he built a factory for producing Mrs. Hellmann’s mayonnaise. It was mass-marketed and called Hellmann’s Blue Ribbon Mayonnaise. It was so successful, that Hellmann closed his delicatessen in 1917 to devote full-time to his mayonnaise business.

Lawry’s Seasoned Salt

The seasoning was originally created by Lawrence Frank, the original owner of the Tam O’Shanter and Lawry’s The Prime Rib Restaurant, where the seasoning was used and sold to patrons of Lawry’s. In 1938, Lawry’s began marketing its seasoned salt in retail stores.

Vlasic Dill Pickle Relish

Frank Vlasic immigrated from Poland to Detroit in 1912 and started a small creamery with savings from his factory job. His son Joseph acquired a milk route in 1922, which eventually grew into the state’s largest dairy distributor. In 1937, Vlasic was approached to distribute a home-style pickle, later marketing their fresh-packed pickle in glass jars. A star was born!

The mention of a “milk route” reminds me to show you one of my 4th of July “Americana” centerpieces.  Made with three Vintage Milk Dairy Porch Delivery Boxes.

In case you’re too young to know what these are, they are boxes that were left on people’s porches and a milkman delivered milk and other dairy products right to the door. Here is a little history from the Historic New England exhibit – From Dairy to Doorstep.

After World War II, change came to the milkman. The milkman was a familiar character in the neighborhoods of small towns and cities alike, and dairy products now held an unquestioned place in the American diet. Yet, refrigerators, supermarkets, suburban sprawl, and automobiles threatened home delivery. Consumers chose to live in different places and get milk in different ways. In fact, by the end of the 1950s, home delivery fell into a decline and never recovered. By the early 1950s, reliable power refrigeration replaced ice boxes and revised the homemaker’s job of buying and cooking for the household. Perishable foods like milk could now be bought in greater quantity and kept longer without spoiling, more meals could be made from leftovers, and frozen foods could replace fresh. The milkman did not have to arrive every day in order for the family to have unsoured milk.

I am just barely old enough to remember the milkman. These boxes (purchased on eBay) make me really happy!

Speaking of happy – check out this lovely spread of food. The potato salad is in that huge yellow stoneware bowl in the upper left corner. YUM!

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By far, our favorite tapas while visiting Barcelona were jamón ibérico and patatas bravas. If you’re interested, you can read more about jamón ibérico HERE.

And if you happen to have $630 to spare, you can purchase a whole bone-in jamón ibérico de bellota (the highest quality of jamón ibérico) HERE. If you go to that extravagance, I hope and pray that you’ll invite me over!

When we had our Spanish party over a week ago, we did not have jamón ibérico. I could not find it, so we had to settle with prosciutto. Prosciutto is delicious in its own right, but a sorry substitute for the fabulously famous Spanish ham.

Luckily, we did not have to settle when it came to the patatas bravas (brave potatoes) – they were just as good as those we enjoyed in Spain. What makes them so tasty and crispy is the double-frying of the potatoes along with the spiciness of the pimentón sauce.

You’ll use two varieties of pimentón; smoked sweet and smoked hot. Both are easy to find and well priced at Home Goods or Amazon.

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Along with Arugula & Strawberry Salad with Chèvre, Pistachios and Horseradish-Maple Vinaigrette and Pomegranate Molasses Leg of Lamb and Lemon-Limoncello Meringue Pie I made this scrumptious potato dish for our Easter supper.

One quick tip:  When shopping for leeks, look for a leek with as much white as possible. The white and pale green portions of the leek are the only parts used, so try to get the most bang for your buck. I found these two perfect leek specimens at Trader Joe’s.

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I have a confession. It is really hard to get back into the swing of cooking and cleaning and real-life after nearly 3 weeks of being out-of-town and having company. I have no drive or motivation to do … ANYTHING!

Dave is knee-deep in tax season, so we are like ships in the night.

Connor works from 2:30 PM to midnight, five to six days a week, so he’s rarely home for dinner.

And although I didn’t have jet lag in the usual sense, I now realize that although I wasn’t waking up in the middle of the night… I am tired all day long!

I mean, when 3:30 or 4:00 hits each afternoon… I’m ready for bed! It takes all my power to stay up. Seriously, I feel like I need toothpicks to hold my eyes open! I think the latest I’ve hit the sack since our house-guests left is 8:00 PM. My usual bedtime is 10:30 or 11:00.

Enough of my first-world woes. I did get somewhat inspired by a package of sausage, of all things.

It’s a really good sausage! Aidells sausage from Costco. And one of my favorite flavors ~ Habanero with Pepper Jack!

I went on the Aidells website and found a recipe to zip up to our liking. Here is one of the two sausage dishes we had for dinner on Sunday night…

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