Bringing the Tropics Home: Recipes for a Fiesta-Inspired Gathering

In the midst of winter, the constant chill and wet weather can put even the most upbeat person in a dismal mood. Instead of stretching your budget to jet away to a warmer locale, why not bring the tropics home? Host a Hawaiian or Mexican themed gathering for your friends and they will all thank you for their temporary get-away.

With the availability of out-of-season fruits and vegetables in grocery stores, you can celebrate summer any time of year, making a fiesta-themed event easy. Plus, you can use these recipes when your own harvest of warm weather fruits comes around. Favorites that will make it onto my party's shopping list include: fresh papaya, mango, and pineapple to flavor fruit drinks; ripe avocados for guacamole; and peppers for a spicy salsa. Here are Carla's recipes for festive tropical fruit salad, guacamole, and salsa. If you don't have loquats for the fruit salad, substitute your favorite tropical fruit.

Tropical Fruit Cup Mix 1⁄2 c. sugar and 1 c. water, boil 5 minutes, chill, and add 1⁄4 c. lemon juice. Gently mix 3 peeled, sliced kiwi fruits; 3 peeled, sectioned sweet citrus fruits; and 3 c. fresh, sliced loquats (or 1 c. canned). Pour syrup over fruit. Chill and serve. Fancy: Add some sliced ginger root to syrup before boiling. Remove the ginger before adding fruit.

Guacamole Peel, remove pit, and mash 4 avocados. Thoroughly mix in 1 chopped tomato, 1⁄2 t. garlic powder, 1 T. lime juice, plus hot sauce to taste if you're so inclined (I prefer it without). This is great in almost any sandwich combination or with chips, in a salad, or as a side dish (without the hot sauce). It can be frozen.

Homemade Salsa Chop 3 fresh jalapeno or Serrano chilies, 4 ripe big tomatoes, 1 globe (or 6 green) onion, 2 garlic cloves, and 1⁄4 c. fresh parsley (or cilantro) leaves. Mix together. Stir in 1⁄2 t. salt.

Calling All Dog Parents: Homemade Treats to Please Your Pup

Two years ago, I found the second love of my life. He is blonde, likes long walks, and has ears so big that they sweep the floor. His name is Mogley and he is the English Cocker Spaniel that my fiancé and I rescued from the pound. My, or rather "our," dog has taken over our lives in the best way possible.

At first, we were going to be strict dog parents. No sitting on the couch and don't even think about getting on the bed. Little by little, these rules disappeared. Moges, as we call him, now sleeps on the bed and has become a constant companion in nearly every aspect of our days.

With this overwhelming love in mind, imagine how worried and guilty we felt when we learned that he was allergic to the food that we were giving him. Itching all the time, Moges' handsome blonde coat wasn't what it should be and he certainly wasn't living as comfortably as he deserved. Instantly, we started scrutinizing the ingredients in what we were feeding him and transitioned him to an all-natural dog food with extra skin and hair vitamins to help him recover from his bout of allergies.

For convenience, we buy our dog's food at the store and try to seek out the most natural brands of dog food and treats. If you really want to know what's going into your dog's food, Carla Emery has a dog biscuit recipe to try. Of course biscuits can't substitute the regular kibble that you feed your pet, but these make a nice treat to give to the canine in your family.

Dog Biscuits You can use the excess broth from any old hen recipe to make this, or you could cook the chicken specially to get broth, use the meat in another recipe, and use the broth for dog biscuits. (Actually you can make this recipe with other types of meat broth, too.) This recipe will yield 60 medium-sized dog biscuits which your pet will consider a great treat. Mix together 31⁄2 c. unbleached flour, 2 c. whole wheat flour, 1 c. rye flour, 2 c. cracked wheat, 1 c. cornmeal, and 1⁄2 c. skim milk powder. On the side, dissolve 1 T. (or 1 pkg.) yeast in 31⁄2 c. lukewarm chicken broth. The richer this broth is, the more your dog will like the biscuits. Let yeast-broth mixture sit 10 minutes, then stir in the flour mixture. Roll resulting dough out 1⁄2 inch thick. Cut dog biscuit shapes from dough. Brush biscuits with egg wash. Bake on greased cookie sheets at 300˚F for 45 minutes. Then turn oven off and leave biscuits in there overnight to finish hardening.

A Special Valentine's Day Feast

With Valentine's Day coming up next week, you may be fretting over what to get that special someone in your life. If you're like me, you want your gift to be unique and you need to find a way to do it without breaking the bank. Flipping through the pages of Carla Emery's Encyclopedia of Country Living, I found numerous inexpensive ideas for handcrafted gifts to give to anyone from your husband or wife to your next-door neighbor. What caught my eye time and time again were the recipes for sauces, vegetable dishes, and, let's be honest, every other food in her 900 plus page book.

Knowing that my fiancé loves a home-cooked meal, I decided to treat him to a Valentine's Day feast complete with appetizers, a tasty cheese plate, and his favorite Spanish wine. The star of this spread will be pasta made from scratch. After hearing about their delicious eggy flavor from friends, homemade noodles are a dish that I've always wanted to try and why not surprise my beau with something out of the ordinary?

Carla provides several pasta recipes, but these are the two that I'm most likely to attempt. She suggests rolling the dough without kneading and advises that once cut, the pasta can be put directly into a pot of boiling water or dried and frozen for up to a year and half.

With a dash of olive oil and some Parmesan, I'm hoping this pasta dinner will become my new family's February 14th tradition. See the recipes below to try making pasta on your own or peruse the pages of Carla's book for more gift inspiration.

Basic Noodles This makes more than enough to thoroughly noodle up a stew: 2 eggs, a pinch of salt, and all the flour the eggs can absorb.

Green Noodles Cook a small batch of your garden spinach or other greens. Drain and put through a sieve. Drain again. Combine 3 eggs, 1⁄2 c. of the spinach, 2 t. butter, and enough flour to make the dough.

Do-It-Yourself Cosmetics

Who doesn't love the bubbly, cleansing effect of shampoo? The ingredient that produces this satisfying sensation, sodium lauryl sulfate, may seem like a harmless addition to cosmetic products. However, it is rumored to be a carcinogen and many consumers have taken steps to avoid using shampoos, toothpaste and other products that contain it. Whether or not the concern over the ingredient's long-term life threatening effects is valid, why not go the natural route and make your own cosmetics?

On a recent trip to the grocery store, my sister and I discussed doing just that. While wandering the aisles, we considered whipping up our own concoction of hair cleansers, toothpaste, and cleaning solutions. Not knowing where to begin or which recipes would be most effective, we found ourselves perusing the organic section for a chemical-free solution to our worries.

Avoid potentially cancer-causing ingredients and save some cash too with Carla Emery's easy recipes for homemade cosmetics. She answers the call for consumers who are looking for an inexpensive, safe alternative to store-bought toiletries. Mix them up yourself or make a spa day out of it with your sister and friends.

Chamomile Shampoo

Barb Ingram, Santa, ID, says she uses this formula: Put 1 T. soap flakes, 1 t. borax, and 1 oz. powdered chamomile flowers into a basin. Add 1⁄2 pint hot water. Heat until thick lather is formed. Wet hair with warm water, massage, rinse, and wash again.

Homemade Toothpaste

Create a mixture of 4 t. baking soda, 1 t. salt, 1 t. mint flavoring, and just enough water to get a toothpasty texture (about 1⁄2-1 t.). Keep any moist homemade toothpaste in a covered container so it won't dry out.

Oatmeal Mask

Mix together 2⁄3 c. oatmeal and enough honey to make a pasty consistency. Optionally, add 2 t. rose water.