Cleaning Up After The Easter Bunny

Has this happened to you? Be honest now. It's Monday and you've opened the fridge actually thinking it was the coffee cupboard (because you're nursing that Mimosa hangover from brunch yesterday) and found these colorful, odd shaped droppings in your fridge. It's a shock, right?
The first shock being that this is not the cupboard that you intended to open and admitting that you were cleverly deceived by an unfriendly and unsympathetic synapse in your sleepy brain.
The second shock is being forced to determine what the hell is shining all bright and pastel at you where the milk is supposed to be. (Where is that guy from CSI or maybe this is more of a job for inspector gadget). Anyway. There is shock. There is awe. And finally, hopefully, there is coffee.
But you still have this problem. How do you "dispose" of these delicacies. Because it seems terribly rude to just throw them out (like kicking Santa Clause). So you bring one to work but you forget about it in your bag and three days later your favorite bag is covered in shattered pink disaster and smelling like THAT mat at your gym. That idea sucked.
OK, so how about making something delectable and disguise the fact that these were your experiment to recapture memories of the past and then you drank too much and forgot that there was even a holiday much less a colorful token to commemorate the extravaganza. Great! Let's suppress.

Egg Salad

Ingredients:
6 eggs (peeled, ya, of course, and sliced anyway you want)
3 ribs of celery (peeled and diced very small)
1 small shallot (also diced)- you could also use red onion here or scallions
1 t dill
1 t yellow mustard (what out for the "node" at the top. EEW)
1.5 t (to taste) Garlic Ailoli Mustard (Trader Joes rides again)
1 C mayo
1 t worcester
white pepper
sea salt

Mix all of these fabulous ingredients together and refrigerate your beautiful ensemble. I usually give it at least a couple of hours. To serve it, I like making sandwiches on fresh sour dough bread with red leaf or romaine lettuce, finely sliced tomato, and Jarlsberg cheese.

What a delicious way to clean up the crap.

Guacamole

It's a staple of life here in Southern California, but I can't discount the origin of my love of this great stuff...the many greasy (more like grimy) spoons, dives, and stands of Chicago.
My mom first gave me a fork, some over ripe avocados, and access to the spice cabinet when I was five and I've been experimenting every since. I'm sharing my (current) favorite recipe for this green treat.

Ingredients:
3 Hass Avocados 1 Clove of Garlic 1 Clove of a Shallot 1 or 2 Limes 2 Roma Tomatoes Cilantro (chopped) Cracked Black Pepper Kosher Salt *Other great ingredients are ground cumin, ground coriander, onion powder, sour cream or creme fresche, and even finely chopped jalapenos.

Peel and mash your avocados to a nice pulp with a fork or pestle. After you have released all pent up anxiety, stress, and anger by the prior step in this process, take a cleansing breath and make sure that your utensil, er weapon, is still in the bowl and not lodged in any innocent bystander's eye. Then, crush your garlic and finely chop your shallot and add to the mix. Add your tomatoes, cilantro and salt and pepper and stir. I like to add the lime last. Sometimes you only need a quarter of a lime and sometimes you might need the whole thing. It depends on the consistency of your guacamole. If you are adding sour cream, you'll need less lime...you're making a dip after all, not a soup.

My favorite way to enjoy this (that is in fact that the guacamole has sustained the mixing process and managed to escape my eating the whole bowl) is to put this into fresh corn tacos, topped with shredded lettuce, cheese, and tomatoes!