Almost skunked by skinks

This has been a lovely Easter weekend. Aunt Kathy's daffodils (the white and orange inside ones) are rushing to bloom, hyacinth stems are getting taller, and there is a breeze knocking petals off the fruit trees. The breezes also tip over the heavy flowers, resulting in my picking them for the house.

A while ago, I had decided to create a 'new' sort of burger treat my sister had suggested. Bacon lizards. When I googled to see if they had been made before, I discovered something rather surprising. There are real life bacon skinks out there! They are actually called sulawesi water skink. I'm not impressed with the link I added, it does have a great deal of information on the critters, though. 

So, I decided to make some myself. Turtles are fun, lizards couldn't be that difficult. As Tony reminded me, the creations tend to get better over time. I should have paid more attention to the blog post I wrote when Steve visited AK one May. We made bacon dogs and those were easy and yummy. I anticipated the lizards would be similar. Nope!! 

 The first thing I did was to play with burger. I was going to make one of my favorite meat loaf recipe mixtures and forgot a few things. The most important is that my meatloaf uses a LOT of burger and this was just a little over a pound, so my eye ball ratios were off by a lot. My meat was sloppy. I added flour (it is an approved method of making hamburg more sturdy), but next time, I will leave it be after removing it from the wrapper!

 After mixing the meat, I made appendages. This takes quite a while. These, also, will be done a different way. I think next time I'll get a bun length dog as the core and trim one end for a tail and the other cut for the head. Jon suggested not cutting the legs in half and using a long piece as a 'cross piece'.  I did cut bits out of the inside of the 'leg' to simulate an elbow. Eons back, for fun meals, I would slice a hot dog all along the length almost through. As it cooked, it would curl up and they could be served on burger bungs. So, I knew heated dogs would bend! When I cut the toes on any amphibian, I press down on the meat bit and make triangles  using a sharp knife. The leftover bits can be put inside the turtles, but it is harder to add to the lizard.

 The below lizard was almost the last one, and it was much easier to make than the others. I used a tupperware patty maker to portion out the meat. A bit more than half went into the base and the rest was put on top. They kind of resembled a hamburger twinkie before wrapping it in bacon. The cheese was a sliced piece cut into sections. I had hoped to use quarters of a cheese stick, but it was too much inside with this meat mixture. Messy, messy, messy.

 The lizards were not that difficult to wrap, except when the sections broke apart. In the longer lizards, the tails and heads wrapped in burger broke away as I wrapped the bacon around the meat. Smaller ones were less fiddly.

 I didn't add eyes while they baked. Cloves are a strong spice in one small section of meat! I baked them for almost 30 minutes at 375 degrees F. The bacon wasn't as crispy as I'd like, but the legs were!!! I think I'd cover those with foil to keep them from burning, similar to what you can do with pie crust edges.

I wanted the mouths to open, because the turtles look incredibly cute after baking. However, as mentioned above, they were a bit fiddly. Actually, another difficult part was keeping the heads and tails facing the right way after wrapping. Often, I'd look and discover the tails were upside down or the mouths were vertical! Toothpicks soaked in water and snipped off close were necessary for keeping the legs in place. 

They definitely looked unusual when placed on a hoagie bun!!! Long pickle slices, spinach leaves, and condiments made the little beasts taste stellar! 

Because Janet asked this about the turtles, Jon took some photos, I took the rest. I did not take the photo of the real lizard in this blog post. As a general rule, if I make it all photos are from in the family! My next foray into lizard making should be less work, but it will remain delicious! I'll never get completely skunked by these skinks! 

A Walk Around the Lake-lots of photos.

I really should have an account for these photos, there are so many. I kept the better ones for this!!! It was super fun to walk around the lake. I haven't done that in decades. AND I also found it neat to see things from shore, rather than from the kayak. Most of the lake shore in the summer months is not good for walking. Today, this uncertain day before Easter in 2017, it was lovely. 

I took several photos of objects melted into the snow and ice. The snow around most of the lake was sturdy enough to walk on. I only sunk into a few spots and about a third of the way around, I was wishing I had worn my winter boots and not mud boots! 

 I saw a dragon shape in this---

A serene bowl of ice and snow.

 Cool spot I wanted to sit in for a bit, but the log really was a bit too unstable.

 These photos are fun because I have many pictures of this log from the water. It was cool to see it from above and beside.

 Shattered shapes in the ice!!!

 
 Here, I was VERY glad to have my spring boots on. This spot moved as I bounced on it. I didn't bounce long and I was very careful. As you can tell, it is close to shore.

 Ice coming off the water on the edge of the lake. Look how much is embedded in it!

I was sad when I reached this spot. This is my lake phone booth. But, the branch has broken off and is in the water. I can still 'park' here to talk, but it won't be as hidden. 

 More fun ice shapes!

 I ran across a bit of trouble and had to figure out how to circumvent this really wet patch. I tried to go under the trees, but what little hair I have left ended up tangling in the branches! So, I found a different way.

 I went around the little grove of trees. You can really tell how hard the ground is when you walk in the moss and there is not a smidge of give in it. But, at least I didn't get wet!

I found my favorite kind of diamond! One made of ice and snow! 

 I was seriously annoyed. I had hoped the dogs were not out, they always are, but I could still hope! They didn't discover me until I was almost to the nursery part of the lake. Silly dogs started barking like crazy!!!

 Crevasses in the ice. Small and deep.

 Looking up the lake from the 'nursery' portion where all the lily pads are in the summer. The ducks often raise their babies in this area because it is safer than the other end of the lake.

 A shadow selfie! I was back where I started. Thankful and very impressed I could walk on the ice and snow as easily as it if was normal ground. I saw things I would not see in the summer and got a bit of exercise.