It made them berry happy

We had dinner last night with our friends Dave and Roxanne. They had moved last summer and invited us up to the new place for dinner and drinks and some good 'ol laughing and catching up. Dinner was super. I was going to take photos, but didn't want to freak them out-I later explained about the blogging. Dave made smothered pork chops in the crock, some mashed potatoes, some kind of bean that was white but tasted like green beans (I don't like beans so I was rude and didn't take any) and rolls. It was delish. The pork chops just fell apart. He said the recipe came about by accident. He had grilled some chops and they got a little dark and I think he said not quite finished and didn't want super dry pork, so he threw them in the crock with some cream of mushroom soup and said he would deal with them later. He check many hours later and fished them out and declared them good. I believe he named them Burnt crock chops, of course, there was wine, Goldschlagger and rum and coke so he have said Nerded sock hops. Dude drove since he has OT tonight.


I made a mixed berry crumble for dessert. I had planned on making Dawn's cinnamon and espresso cake or Heather's lemon blueberry bars, but I couldn't find espresso powder in our local store and the blueberries were 4 bucks a pints and didn't look all that blueberry-ish, so I pulled out the frozen berries. It was a medley of strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. I am going to make both of the aforementioned desserts as soon as I find all the ingredients :)



Mixed Berry Crumble


3 -12 ounce bags of frozen mixed fruit, thawed and drained
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup flour, divided
1/2 cup old fashioned oatmeal
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg





Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8x8 pan. Mix drained berries, sugar and 1/4 cup of the flour in a bowl; mix gently to incorporate all the dry ingredients into the berries. Pour berry mixture into the prepared pan.


In a medium bowl, combine the rest of the ingredients. Use a pastry blender or fork to blend the butter into the dry ingredients so you have small pea sized crumbles (I used my hands-it turned out fine). Sprinkle on top of the berries. Bake at 350 for 30 to 40 minutes.






I saved the juice from the berries and heated it on the stove with a tablespoon of rum, 2 tablespoons of raspberry preserves and about a half of tablespoon of cornstarch dissolved in some cold water. I thought it would be good over ice cream with the dessert, but I wasn't feeling well on the way up and didn't want to stop at a store to get some so they just ate it the way it was. The Dude said it was really good, but he thought it would be better with whipped cream. I have some whipping cream in the fridge so maybe I will beat some up for him to take to work tonight.


We spent many hours laughing (especially when we tried Wii boxing. I looked like someone had attached electrodes to my body and they kept pushing buttons to make me jerk and flail about!)
I hope we can see them again soon and not have it be two years again.


Oh, and their new house? Freaking gorgeous! The rooms flow together so nicely and they have really high (two story high in two parts of the house) ceilings and in the living room there are some niches built into one of the walls. Her closet-it was like a boutique. One wall was lined with a grooved type of wall board that she can slide hooks and stuff on. Covered with jewelry and hats. Two sides had clothes on double racks, all in color order and a high rack for her dresses and the other short side had a tall open cabinet with her shoes tucked in. If you saw my rinky dink closet you would know why I have such envy. It was every girls dream come true. I know, envy is a sin, but I'm sure my other sins outweigh this one, so I'm not too worried-hee hee.