Channa Masala and Raja's Cup

Yesterday was the Farmers Market on Historic First Street. I walked downtown with Parker (rare one-on-one time with my eldest) to buy some kale, onions, and salad mix from our favorite vegan vendor, The Gray's Farm. We also picked up the last pint of blueberries from another vendor because I can't pass up berries. On the walk home, we discussed what I should make for dinner and Parker mentioned our lovely dinner last Friday night at our friends, Gita and Seth's house. Gita made a marvelous Indian meal starting with samosas, going on with three different curries with bread and vegan raita (which is really a treat since we never get to eat the raita at restaurants and rarely make it ourselves), and ending with homemade pineapple sorbet. They even sent us home with leftovers in our To-Go Ware. Great food and wonderful company (Loretta with her beautiful family and my sister were also there). We finished up the night at Cynthia and Ernie's (all a block away...I love my neighborhood!) for highly entertaining music by Amy Rigby and more great company (including Dave who lives next to C and E and never ceases to put a smile on my face and who held Josie for a long time as they listened and waxed poetic about Josie being a surrogate grandchild). It was such a lovely night.I have no pictures from last Friday, but as Parker and I reminisced about our great night, he suggested we eat Indian food. Well, I had just seen a recipe for Channa Masala on The Voracious Vegan that I wanted to try out and thus diner was set. I used Roma tomatoes from our garden (they have been ripening a few at a time so I use them up as we go, but I expect before long I will need to can or freeze some). I forgot to take pictures that night, but this is leftovers for lunch today which the kids devoured. I mixed the brown rice together so it doesn't look pretty or saucy, but check out The Voracious Vegan for great pictures. I subbed panch phoran for the fenugreek and the kalonji since I had neither on their own and both are in panch phoran and I used hot curry powder because we like things spicy. We made some sun tea from our stash of teas my dear highschool friend, Julia (we recently reconnected, gotta love Facebook) brought to us from her new business July 4th weekend. The Raja's Cup tea iced was the perfect drink for a summer lunch of curry on the porch. I will definitely be stocking up on Raja's Cup. The kids loved it too. We drank the tea ou of canning jars which always reminds me of my fraternal grandfather, but his tea was probably Nestle and filled with sugar, but he was a farmer and even after he retired he worked three hard jobs which made him thirsty in the summer for his gallon of iced tea. Making sun tea in my glass gallon jar is so much fun. The kids look forward every morning to choosing what type of tea, filling the reusable organic cotton teach pouch with loose tea, filling the jar with water, and setting it outside in the perfect sunny spot. Then in the afternoon, they love enjoying a cold glass (or mason jar) of their tea. Scrumptious plums and the remaining farmers market blueberries were eaten as well, but not shown in the picture.
Today Josie is one month shy of two years old! She loves to plan her birthday party with her brothers. She already stated that she wants a cake made by the magnificent Kris with her two favorite beings as decoration (human babies and pigs...she loves them both so much). Here she is today in all her messy "tomboy" glory sitting in "her" tree trying to ignore me taking pictures with my iPhone.