I’m not as familiar with Indian foods and flavors as I am with some other cuisines, so I generally end up ordering the same thing: chicken tandoori. And that’s what I had last night. The chicken was nice and tender and the tikka masala sauce was tasty. There wasn’t a lot of heat, though. Next time, I might ask for some hot sauce. I also ordered garlic naan – that was delish!

Barbara had lamb biryani and offered me a taste. It was very good, with a bit of heat. Nice flavor. I forgot to bring my camera in, though, so no pix. This post is primarily a reminder for me, so next time I go out for Indian, I can look back and see what I liked.

I’ve been watching the new show Aarti Party on the Food Network, to learn more about basic Indian cooking. Now I need to actually try some of the recipes And I already have all five of her basic Indian spices.

This week’s Photo Friday challenge is Travels, and those of you who know us know we love to travel. So for this challenge, I went back to the photos from our 25th anniversary trip to Europe in 2009. We had purchased train tickets for traveling from Rome to Florence and then from Florence to Zurich to Frankfurt to go home, and we had an extra day of travel on the tickets. So while we were in Florence, we took a side trip to Pisa.

This is when you find out how important prior planning is Since the tower isn’t stable (it’s leaning, after all), they limit the number of people who can climb it at one time, and you have to buy tickets in advance. We had no tickets, so we spent a beautiful afternoon wandering the grounds and taking pictures of the tower, the cathedral and the baptistery.

I was hungry after we traveled to Pisa and walked several blocks from the train station to the grounds, so I bought a local specialty as a snack – marinated seafood salad – and ate that as we sat and admired the beautiful marble that comprised the buildings.

Marinated seafood salad and Pisa guidebook

The popular thing to do in Pisa, apparently, is to hold your arms as if you’re preventing the tower from falling over. I can’t tell you how funny it was to see dozens of people from all over the world all posing the same way.

“Holding up" the Leaning Tower of Pisa

The tower *is* leaning to a frightening degree. It was definitely worth the side trip to see it again (for me – Dan had never seen it before).

This one is an especially interesting mix: honey, ricotta, dill – and an egg.

A recipe came immediately to mind when I saw those ingredients, though. In 2008, I won a cookbook called “Covered in Honey” in a recipe contest at Joelen’s Culinary Adventures, and made Scones with Honey, Rosemary and Goat Cheese. So I thought, why not replace the rosemary with dill and the goat cheese with ricotta, and see what happens?

I was afraid the dill would be really strong, so I used a rather light hand with it – should have used more. The scones have a very light dill scent and flavor, but I think I could have doubled it and had a better result. The ricotta gives the scones a very creamy texture and the honey sweetens them just perfectly. This one is well worth repeating, with some extra dill – I doubled it in the recipe below.

Savory Scones with Honey, Ricotta and Dill

2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup herbal honey
1 large egg
1/2 cup cream or whole milk
1 tbsp. dill, chopped
5 oz. ricotta cheese
Additional cream or milk for glazing

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. In another bowl, lightly whisk the olive oil, honey, egg, cream or milk and 2 tsp. of the dill. Use a pastry cutter or fork to blend the ricotta cheese with the flour mixture until the mixture makes pea-size crumbs.

Make a well in the flour mixture and add the olive oil mixture. Stir with a wooden spoon until a dough ball forms. Remove the dough ball to a lightly floured surface and knead lightly, just enough to form a workable ball.

Pull off about 1/8 cup-size pieces of dough, roll each in your hands to form a ball, and lightly flatten a bit. Place dough pieces on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper or a Silpat, about 1 inch apart. Brush tops with more cream or milk and sprinkle with the remaining 1 tsp. dill. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until golden brown.

At Admiral’s Landing on the riverfront, we were treated to a rousing call to revolution, circa 1779, and a gun salute to each of the rebelling colonies. It was great fun.

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Dad, Brad, Uncle Steven and I were talking about health care policy at dinner and the question of how much money can be saved by using electronic medical records came up. Turns out … a lot.