Flowers, Phoebes and Fishing

Just before the rain hit today (hurray!), I wandered outside and took some pictures of my flowers. This is the wild section of my split-rail fence garden: daisies, phlox, irises, yarrow, tired chives with fading purple heads all bloom freely here.

My miniature roses don't usually bloom until fall but this year they came out early.

One of my first lily blooms - and I have many in all colors. I look forward to them one by one showing their pretty faces.

These wave petunias re-seed themselves every year in my pots. No work there!

And my zucchini plant is flowering.

On to the phoebes!

Phoebe and Phil built themselves a nest under our porch by the back door. It is now home to 4 more phoebe's - Phillip Jr., Phyllis, Phylicia, and Floyd.

Not necessarily in that order.

I know it looks as if there are only two birdettes, but believe me there are four.

They are waiting for lunch.

Mama Phoebe is hanging out on the shepherds hook in search of bugs which she swoops out and catches in her beak. Voila! Lunch!

The alpaca fiber hanging in the picture was what she partially used to build her nest. I also caught a finch in there this spring digging out scraps for its nest. 

Lunch is served!

And this is what we've been doing in our spare time - herring fishing! 

We smoked some herring and ate fillets for dinner the past two evenings. So good! 

The first night I placed the fillets on a prepared foil lined cookie sheet. I spooned a layer of store bought spinach dip over each side of the fillets. I baked them in a preheated 350 degree F oven for 7 minutes. Then I turned the oven to high broil, sat on the floor in my jammies (it gets late when we arrive home from a day of fishing and then cleaning and then processing and then showering the scales off of me...) and watched it closely through the oven door window. It took almost 3 minutes for it to get yummly bubbly. So very good and easy I will put it on Cabin Cleaver soon! I've gotten away from posting recipes and need to return. Sorry about that! I'm in the process of putting together a blog about Steve's and my recent project. Will share that soon, too!

Okay, onward...the second night I tried a version of what my son had suggested to me recently. I cut the fillets in half and put them on a plate. In a bowl I mixed italian Panko crumbs, parmesan cheese and a little lemon pepper together. Meanwhile in a skillet I poured in about 3/4 inch of extra virgin olive oil and let it heat up to medium low. I dipped each side of half of the fillets into the crumb mixture, then placed them in the warm, not popping, olive oil. They simmered until I could see the sides browning up, I flipped them, and browned the other side. Once finished I placed them on a paper towel lined platter and repeated the whole process with the fish that was left. Serve with tartar sauce. Very yummy!

Hope you all had a happy fourth!