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Monday, December 12, 2022

Weather ~ Picture of the Day ~ Coffee History ~ Italian Layer Bake ~ George Collins ~ Gingerbread House Day

  

Good 35º dark cloudy foggy morning. 
 
 
Yesterday we topped at 42º.
 
 
Picture of the Day 😀
 

 
Interesting about coffee.......
 

Coffee is a drink prepared from roasted coffee beans. Darkly colored, bitter, and slightly acidic, coffee has a stimulating effect on humans, primarily due to its caffeine content. It is the most popular hot drink in the world.

 

Seeds of the Coffea plant's fruits are separated to produce unroasted green coffee beans. The beans are roasted and then ground into fine particles that are typically steeped in hot water before being filtered out, producing a cup of coffee. It is usually served hot, although chilled or iced coffee is common. Coffee can be prepared and presented in a variety of ways (e.g., espressoFrench presscaffè latte, or already-brewed canned coffee). Sugarsugar substitutesmilk, and cream are often used to mask the bitter taste or enhance the flavor.

 

Though coffee is now a global commodity, it has a long history tied closely to food traditions around the Red Sea. The earliest credible evidence of coffee drinking in the form of the modern beverage appears in modern-day Yemen from the mid-15th century in Sufi shrines, where coffee seeds were first roasted and brewed in a manner similar to current methods. The Yemenis procured the coffee beans from the Ethiopian Highlands via coastal Somali intermediaries and began cultivation. By the 16th century, the drink had reached the rest of the Middle East and North Africa, later spreading to Europe. In the 20th century, coffee became a global commodity, creating different coffee cultures around the world.

 

The two most commonly grown coffee bean types are C. arabica and C. robusta. Coffee plants are cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in the equatorial regions of the Americas, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, and Africa. As of 2018, Brazil was the leading grower of coffee beans, producing 35% of the world's total. Green, unroasted coffee is the most traded agricultural commodity and one of the most traded commodities overall, second only to petroleum. Despite sales of coffee reaching billions of dollars worldwide, farmers producing coffee beans disproportionately live in poverty. Critics of the coffee industry have also pointed to its negative impact on the environment and the clearing of land for coffee-growing and water use.

 

The word coffee entered the English language in 1582 via the Dutch koffie, borrowed from the Ottoman Turkish kahve, borrowed in turn from the Arabic qahwah. Medieval Arab lexicographers traditionally held that the etymology of qahwah meant 'wine', given its distinctly dark color, and derived from the verb qahiya, 'to have no appetite'. The word qahwah most likely meant 'the dark one', referring to the brew or the bean; qahwah is not the name of the bean, which are known in Arabic as bunn and in Cushitic languages as būn. Semitic languages had the root qhh, 'dark color', which became a natural designation for the beverage. There is no evidence that the word qahwah was named after the Ethiopian province of Kaffa (a part of where coffee originates from: Abyssinia), or any significant authority stating the opposite, or that it is traced to the Arabic quwwa, meaning 'power'.

 

The terms coffee pot and coffee break originated in 1705 and 1952 respectively.

 

According to one legend, ancestors of today's Oromo people in a region of Jimma in Ethiopia were the first to recognize the energizing effect of the coffee plant. However, no direct evidence has been found earlier than the 15th century indicating who among the African populations used it as a stimulant, or where coffee was first cultivated. The story of Kaldi, the 9th-century Ethiopian goatherd who discovered the stimulating effect of coffee when he noticed how excited his goats became after eating the beans from a coffee plant, did not appear in writing until 1671 and is probably apocryphal.

 

Another legend attributes the discovery of coffee to Sheikh Omar. According to an old chronicle (preserved in the Abd-Al-Kadir manuscript), Omar, who was known for his ability to cure the sick through prayer, was once exiled from Mocha in Yemen to a desert cave near Ousab (modern-day Wusab, about 90 kilometres (56 mi) east of Zabid, Yemen). Starving, Omar chewed berries from nearby shrubbery but found them to be too bitter. He tried roasting the seeds to improve the flavor, but they became hard. He then tried boiling them to soften the seed, which resulted in a fragrant brown liquid. Upon drinking the liquid, Omar was revitalized and sustained for days. As stories of this "miracle drug" reached Mocha, Omar was asked to return and was made a saint.

 

If you want to read a whole lot more, go here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee

 

 
From Mr. Food
 

Our recipe for Italian Layer Bake is a Mediterranean delight. This recipe features layers of Italian meats, peppers, and bubbly cheese under a golden crust. When you bring this dish out for lunch, everyone will be asking for seconds!

 

  • 1 (8-ounce) container refrigerated crescent rolls
  • 8 slices deli turkey (about 1/2 pound)
  • 8 slices deli ham (about 1/2 pound)
  • 12 slices deli hard salami (about 1/2 pound)
  • 8 slices Swiss cheese (about 1/2 pound)
  • 1 (12-ounce) jar roasted peppers, drained
  • 4 eggs, beaten

 

  1. Preheat oven to 350º. Unroll crescent roll dough without separating triangles. Separate dough into 2 squares along center cut line.
  2. Place 1 square of dough into an 8-inch square baking dish. Using your fingertips, press dough to fit bottom of dish.
  3. Layer with half the turkey, ham, salami, Swiss cheese, and roasted peppers. Pour half the beaten eggs over the peppers and repeat  the layers with remaining meats, cheese, and peppers. Place remaining square of dough over peppers. Pour remaining beaten eggs over dough and cover lightly with foil.
  4. Bake 20 minutes, remove foil, and bake an additional 20 to 22 minutes, or until golden and heated through. Let cool 5 minutes, then cut and serve.
  5. Ialian Layer Bake is a Mediterranean delight. This recipe features layers of Italian meats, peppers, and bubbly cheese under a golden crust. When you bring this dish out for lunch, everyone will be asking for seconds!

 

**For even more flavor, you can add 1/2 teaspoon of Italian seasoning, along with 1/4 teaspoon of salt and pepper. Feel free to try another cheese too - like provolone!
 
 
 
Special birthday today, George Collins (LASD ret.) is celebrating. Happy Birthday George! xo
 
 
Historically this date.......
1787 – Pennsylvania becomes the second state to ratify the United States Constitution, five days after Delaware became the first.

 
1901 – Guglielmo Marconi receives the first transatlantic radio signal (the letter "S" [***] in Morse Code), at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland.

 
1911 – Delhi replaces Calcutta as the capital of India

 
1917 – In Nebraska, Father Edward J. Flanagan founds Boys Town as a farm village for wayward boys.

 
1941 – World War II: The United Kingdom declares war on BulgariaHungary and Romania declare war on the United States. India declares war on Japan.

 
1941 – Adolf Hitler declares the imminent extermination of the Jews at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery
 
 
1985 – Arrow Air Flight 1285, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, crashes after takeoff in Gander, Newfoundland, killing all 256 people on board, including 236 members of the United States Army's 101st Airborne Division.
 
 
Births this date include.....
1881 – Harry Warner, Polish-American businessman, co-founded Warner Bros (d. 1958)
 
 
1893 – Edward G. Robinson, American actor (d. 1973)
 
 
1900 – Sammy Davis, Sr., American actor and dancer (d. 1988)
 
 
1915 – Frank Sinatra, American singer, actor, and producer (d. 1998)
 
 
1923 – Bob Barker, American game show host and producer
 
 
1938 – Connie Francis, American singer and actress
 
 
 
 
1940 – Dionne Warwick, American singer and television personality
 

1952 – Cathy Rigby, American gymnast
 
 
 
 
All I know. Nuff said. Have a good Monday. Ciao.
xo Sue Mom Bobo

Gingerbread House Day on December 12th recognizes a family tradition for many around the country.
A favorite food of an Armenian monk, Gregory of Nicopolis, brought gingerbread to Europe around 992 AD and taught French Christians to bake it. Since gingerbread was often used in religious ceremonies, monks baked to be sturdy to molded into images of saints.
We can thank the Brothers’ Grimm for a gingerbread house, though. Through their tale of Hansel and Gretel, they introduce an evil witch who lives in a house made of gingerbread. It didn’t take long for the German gingerbread guilds to pick up the idea. Soon, they put gingerbread houses to a more festive use making snowy cottages made from the spicy-sweet treat.
Today, we can spend the day baking, cutting, and building to our heart’s delight. Kits take some steps out of the process so we can get right down to constructing our winter wonderlands.

HOW TO OBSERVE

Gather the family together, bake up some gingerbread and start building and decorating your very own gingerbread house.  Give the recipe below a try.....

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