I'm buying a crock-pot

Raise your hand if you gained the sophomore 10, found your first "big kid" job and gained 5 more... and then joined the gym?

Oh, just me? Liars.

Unfortunately, that statement is true. I ran my hiney off in highschool, gained a little bit in college, discovered every local establishment in the downtown Oklahoma City area - and now I'm a proud member of the local gym.

However, it must be stated that even though I go to the gym 4-5 times a week, if you're not eating healthy, you're in a lose-lose situation.

So I'm assembling a grocery list. Healthy items. Fresh Produce. Pork.

I'm buying a crock-pot.

The Basics.

Three hundred four emails, 14 phone messages and a lot of paper work later - I finally get to share with you the most basic cooking experience of my life. So you should note, we were sleep deprived, hot, and excited to be in Nicaragua. Here's the scenario, we had about 2 minutes to come up with 3 recipes. all using goat meat.

First. We washed our hands. As primary as this concept sounds, it's just as important to cook in sanitary conditions in rural Nicaragua as it is to cook in sanitary conditions in your own kitchen.

Also, you can disinfect your cutting board with a solution of one part vinegar and two parts water. Although, in the states most plastic cutting boards are dishwasher safe.

Back to the cooking. We picked fresh limes from a tree right outside of the agricultural center. [This center served as an agricultural extension office for demonstrations and classes for the community.] The meat was allowed to marinate in the freshly squeezed lime juice for a few hours.

Look at Kyla working so hard - while I'm taking a picture of a lime. Ha! Bet she wanted to kick me out of the kitchen!

For those of you (all 4 of you who publicly follow this blog, as well as the others who would rather send an email or text message to comment) who know how limited my cooking skills are right now, this may seem bazaar. I knew I was going to grill the meat; but I really wanted them [the lovely guinea pigs who didn't know I wasn't a cooking expert] to like it.

So - I made a rub. From scratch. From the limited ingredients our interpreter bought at the market.

Salt, chili powder, garlic powder, and something..... greenish. (there wasn't a label) I really wish there was more to it, but there wasn't, it was simply basic.

And this is the only picture you get to see of the sweaty, makeupless, sanitized hands, Goat-Meat-Grilling-Fool. But, just look at that rub! I guess my time watching the grillers during tailgating season is paying off!

The meat was then slowly cooked using an open fire. The idea was to imitate living conditions outside of the ag center so that the participants would know these dishes could be made in their own home using limited resources.

I understand you're probably not going to harvest your own goat and grill over an open fire anytime soon; however, if you take one thing away from this post [and no, it's not that point-and-shoot cameras are horrible for food photography] I hope it's that you don't have to prepare fancy dishes with crazy ingredients to make delicious foods everyone will enjoy.

Oh, and have fun. And take pictures.

Back from Hiatus.

I'm back in the office. To conclude my Master's program in International Agriculture, I spent a week in Nicaragua.

I was a part of a 10 person agricultural team from Oklahoma State University, which was a part of a bigger team with Builders for Children: A project of Feed the Children. Our mini-team had the opportunity to work with small agricultural communities and their agricultural projects, while the others in our team [shout out to Arkansas, South Carolina, & Hawaii] helped build relationships with the people living in the community, by providing arts and crafts projects, vacation Bible school, and participating in Leadership Conferences.

The OSU team during a pit stop at the Pacific Ocean.

How does this fit into a Basics with Brooke post? Let me just skip right to it.

In rural Nicaragua, the need for sustainable agriculture is important, and the need to feed your family is even more important. We saw an opportunity to help the local communities in the latter by recognizing the availability of goats and their limited use of them.

We taught them how to make goat cheese, as well as, how to harvest "cabra" [goat] and cook 3 dishes with the meat. My job: grilling. Not only did they eat it - they asked for seconds!

During the cheese-making class, our interpreter skipped class.
So, we translated the class ourselves. This was team work at it's finest.

Don't get too excited - I've only been back in the office for 4 hours - I'll get that post up asap, though. Promise.

brooke.

Backyard Barbecue.

Dominated the Backyard Barbecue. Freddie's brought the most amazing pork chops I've ever sampled - ever.

This was my last one for the year - the Emporess will be representing OPC next week while I'm in Nicaragua.

Also - I lost my phone today. And then I had a flat tire. Did I mention I lost my cell phone.

At least I had great barbecue. :-)