The Launching

Our magazine, The Midwest Argonaut, has finally launched! Please take a look and tell us what you think! It is absolutely free to download, and if you happen to get lucky, you might find one sitting around in public. If you're feeling generous, you can get your own copy for $6 (that's a $1.20 profit for us). 


View the issue here: http://www.magcloud.com/browse/issue/771928

Cabin Trip

On Monday, some friends and I went up to Maddy's grandma's "cabin" (it's more like a lake house) for the week. We lived on our own there for five days. Most of our time was spent lazing around, hanging out in the lake, and exploring Detroit Lakes. I especially enjoyed cooking, binge watching Orange is the New Black, and kayaking. I made sure to take plenty of pictures along the way:

Sharon took this one

Lakeside Kitchen Adventures: Onion Buns, Spam, and More Caramelized Veggies

Ingredients:

• Onion buns, diced spam (I used original flavor), lettuce, sliced onions, sliced bell peppers, cream cheese, salt, sugar, garlic powder, chives

Directions:

1. Leave buns in the oven to warm up a bit.
2. Add cooking oil to a frying pan and wait for it to heat up.
3. Add sliced white onions to the pan and caramelize them by adding sugar, salt, and a bit of garlic powder. Wait for the onions to turn a light yellow/golden color while mixing it every now and then.
4. Add chives or whatever seasonings that float your boat. Keep mixing until it looks even.
5. Add bell peppers and mix vegetables evenly.
6. Take buns out of the oven.
7. Spread cream cheese on one or both buns.
8. Add the mixed spam, caramelized onions, and bell peppers on top of a bun.
9. Add pieces of lettuce.
10. Finish!

Lakeside Kitchen Adventures: Pancake and Eggs Breakfast

Ingredients:

• Pancake mix (or you can make homemade ones), milk, eggs, sliced white onions, sliced red peppers, chives, salad herb mix, sugar, salt, garlic powder, turkey 

Directions:

1. Mix eggs.
2. Caramelize onions, add bell peppers, then chives and salad herb mix (or whatever seasonings tickle your pickle)
3. Once vegetables are cooked, add pieces of turkey.
4. Pour the eggs in and make them scrambled eggs.*
5. All the meanwhile, make the pancakes. Pretty easy to do— mix the batter, cook it on a frying pan, stuff like that.
6. Set the table and bring out as many things that go well with pancakes that you can think of: peanut butter, jam, butter, maple syrup, cream cheese, you name it. And if you happen to have some sitting in the fridge or feel like making some, Hollandaise sauce is the bee's knees with omelettes!

*If you're cooking for a group and using a lot of eggs, like say, a dozen, don't be dumb like me and dump it all in the pan at the same time. Just don't do it.

Lakeside Kitchen Adventures: Eggs Benedict and Mixed Vegetables

Ingredients:

• Eggs, hollandaise sauce mix, sliced bread, bacon, sliced bell peppers, sliced onions, salt, sugar, garlic powder and chives

Directions: We ended up multitasking with three different pans on this one. 

      1. In one pan, poach the eggs. And if you fail like we did, sunnyside up is the bomb.com     

           too.

      2. In another pan, cook the bacon. Make sure you don't cook it too quickly, otherwise it'll 

          shrivel up in inconvenient ways.   

      3. And in the last pan, work on the veggies. Caramelize the onions by sprinkling sugar, 

          salt, and garlic powder on them (I usually do about 75% sugar, 15% salt, and 10% garlic 

          powder but as long as you don't screw up the balance it'll be okay). Wait to add bell 

          peppers until the onions are a delicious golden shade. Once the bell peppers are added, 

          mix the veggies for a minute or two. Feel free to add chives or cilantro or whatever it is 

          that rocks your boat.

      4. Make that toast.

      5. Once everything is all cooked— the eggs, the bacon, the veggies, the sauce, the toast— 

          set the table. Each item gets its own plate or bowl (or in our case, a pot). Everyone can 

          build their own breakfast and dig in as they please!

Lakeside Kitchen Adventures: Creamy Pesto, Caramelized Onions and Bell Peppers on Pasta

Ingredients: 

• Shell pasta, sliced white onions, sliced bell peppers, pesto, cream cheese, sugar, salt, garlic powder, olive oil, and chives

Directions: 

1. Cook the noodles. Dump that stuff in a pot of water. Make sure it gets all nice and soft. Once it's all good, use a strainer to empty the water out and put it in a bowl.
2. Make the sauce. You can grab a pesto mix from the grocery store or make your own. Both are pretty easy to do. We added a bit of cream cheese for some extra flavor. 
3. Cook the vegetables. Caramelize the onions by adding a mix of sugar, salt, and garlic powder. Make sure you're not too heavy on the garlic powder. Keep the onions in the pan until they're a nice golden color. After caramelizing is complete, add sliced bell peppers and chives to the mix. 
4. Mix everything together. Use a large bowl to mix the cooked noodles, sauce, and vegetables.

The Muddy Moose

We stumbled upon The Muddy Moose at a roadstop on our way to Detroit Lakes, MN. We weren’t expecting much more than an average sandwich joint, but I was delightfully surprised when I took the first bite of my beautiful turkey sandwich. I was so impressed that at the end of the day I was still craving some more. I would foshizz recommend this place to anybody.