Soccer Practice

Guest post written by my buddy Aldo Mays

My kids are really into soccer and for whatever reason their school practice has been outside this summer. I don’t know if you guys have been watching the news but it’s been over 100 degrees every day this week! I’m really worried about them working themselves too hard and I do all that I can to make sure they stay hydrated and get cooled off every so often. I keep the AC pumping at home thanks to Http://Newyorkenergyrates.com so that when they get back they’re not complaining about it being hot inside the house. I wish the coach would move at least their cardio training into the house but there’s nothing really I can do about it since I’ve complained to the school and they say the practice field is the only space they have money to give the soccer department this summer. I should have bought a house with a bigger backyard – then maybe they could have had practice out there and everyone could have used the pool to cool off!

Dirty Potatoes

I don't know what was more frustrating, trying to spell to the word potatoes and not misspelling like an ex-vice president or the fact that my clothes dryer broke. Lucky both were easy to look up on the internet, one being on the online dictionary and the other at http://www.canadapost.ca/shopper/. My friends have been begging me for this "dirty potato" recipe so I'm gladly posting it now. I try to explain the ease of making it, and though it may not be as easy to look up in the dictionary or at an appliance site, it is just about as easy. This recipe fluxes a lot when I make it as I adapt to what happens to be in the fridge at the time. Feel free to add or subtract things as you desire. Key ingredients are always some sort of breakfast meat, onion, pepper, potatoes, and mushrooms. I don't quite lay this recipe out in normal recipe form.

Slice 3 strips of bacon and place in a large frying pan at medium to medium low heat. Continue to place all the following items into the same frying pan as you cut them. Cut 5 breakfast sausage, I prefer the maple kind, into little 1/4 to 1/2 inch bits. Dice half a medium size onion. Doesn't matter the type of onion as long as the onion is of average size. If you prefer scallions for this, and I sometimes do, make sure to dice about five full scallions. Dice half a sweet red pepper and half a green pepper. Yellow is fine too if you want to add. Just cut about a third of a pepper each type if you are adding all three. Next slice about 4oz of mushrooms. Place this entire mixture into a large frying pan. Brown it all so onions are about clear with the bacon and the sausage browned on both sides. The peppers and mushrooms should be fine by this time. Remove them all from the pan into a bowl while keeping the liquid from the mixture in the pan.

Add a little canola oil to the pan just to barely cover the bottom. Slice 4 potatoes into home fry size wedges. Place into the large frying pan at medium heat. Cook til brown on one side and flip all the potatoes. Add your veggie and meat mixture on top of the potatoes. Cook til brown on the other side of the potatoes. Remove into a bowl. Season with a sprinkle of salt and pepper that barely covers the top of the mixture. Mix your bowl with a spoon. Lightly sprinkle hot Hungarian paprika over the top and remix. Add about 1/3 of a cup of pepper jack cheese and do your final mix with your spoon. Serves approx. four hungry people. Great with any type of eggs for breakfast.