We have been enjoying the Colorado summer. This year we decided to explore local events. We decided we had to go to the Tast of Fort Collins. We met up with some friends on a hot Sunday June 9th. We had no trouble finding parking, and followed advice we found on the web, that the north and west entrances had less crowds than the other entrances. Or, perhaps it was the heat that kept the crowds away?

One can't have a festival without a street performer...

We moved from one shady spot to another. We were envious of the water bubbles game...

 We then decided to sit under the trees and listen to the music.

The best part was the people watching.

For more about the Taste of Fort Collins, visit the site here.

Last week Kevin decided he was going to make his own pasta (without any pasta making machine.) Kevin has great stories about his Italian grandmother making pasta, and as a little boy he would stand with her watching and helping out. Thanks to the joys of Google, he found a very simple recipe which used all purpose flour (easier to use and recommended for beginners.)

Here's the recipe Kevin found on Allrecipes.com

1 egg beaten,

1/2 teaspoon salt,

1 cup all purpose flour,

1 tablespoon water

1 tablespoon olive oil.

Kevin, relying on childhood memories, used the basic ingredients except the olive oil, which he didn't remember his granny using, so we omitted it.

We made the pasta taking it in turns to roll it out. (Quite a work out!) Kevin had doubled the quantities because we wanted to test what it tasted like the next day. We did cook one half of the pasta and ate it immediately. It was delicious. We did not quite like eating day old "fresh" pasta.

After mixing the ingredients together, Kevin rolls it into a stiff dough.

Kevin remembers his grandmother resting the dough with a glass container covering the dough. The recipe calls for covering the dough and leaving for 30 minutes. We halved the amount, and then after much upper body working out, we rolled out the dough, using plenty of flour to stop it from sticking. Kevin remembers his gran rolling the pasta before cutting it.

Here is Kevin following his childhood memory and rolling the dough.

Kevin insisted on the sharpest of our knives (newly sharpened - but that is another story) and started cutting the roll.

After cutting the rolls gently unroll them to prevent sticking. Then let the pasta rest before adding to rapidly boiling water (add salt and cook to al dente.)

 We cooked up some butternut pasta sauce (which Kevin bought at our local Costco.) Delicious!

I received a comment about Pepperdews on a previous post. Here is the response:

"Pepperdew is the first new fruit to be discovered in 25 years.  It is grown in the Limpopo region of South Africa and is imported into the UK where it is sold in most supermarkets.

The fruit itself is naturally spicy, but also sweet and it is packed in a salt/ sugar /vinegar /brine- 

The plant is quite peculiar in as much that it grows very tall and bushy, the fruits develop from capicum like flowers are green then turn balck and then turn red, when they are picked by hand.  A necessity due to the different stages of crop growth on the plant at any one time.

Hope that helps

Gillian "

Kevin and I found Peppadews in a South African store in Provincetown on our recent trip to Massachusetts. I have been really behind in posting on our trip. Blogging will resume soon and it will include photos (I promise.)