angry chicken

favorite canning/preserving resources?

Hey you all,
I just got an e-mail asking about my favorite canning how-to books, with recipes for all that canning and preserving goodness. I don't have a ton of experience doing this really. I freeze a ton of food (I have Grammie's huge freezer in our garage packed full) but love the idea of canning and preserving more, with equipment and all that, especially pickling. I really love brine-y salty foods. I have checked quite a few out of the library and they all seem good. I got this book from the library and loved it.

Any more suggestions? Thank you!

**Update~!

Oh, thank you!! Seriously, how amazing are you people!? It makes me want to just hug you all and make pickles at the same time. Thank you for such awesome suggestions, links, and book recommendations!

the pitting of the cherries using the new gadget

So, this was made, a cherry crumb cake, after the following gadget was used in the amusing and mildly boring video below—with much enthusiasm, I might add. If you can't film the use of random kitchen gadgets and upload it on your blog—what good is it for, anyway? Baby was at it the longest. She's got a real strong work ethic, that one. The gadget was a hit. It works great and made the girls very happy. And this recipe was so very tasty. I divided it between two 6" round pans, one to eat right now and one to freeze for later. I added 7 minutes to the cooking time and used about 1/3 cup fewer cherries. I will be making this again.

tea in a jar

I was fretting about fridge space while making 3 different types of iced tea and thought of a simple solution that has given me much pleasure. Instead of making large amounts in big jugs that are unruly, cumbersome, and seem to strain my wrists, I make 3 small batches in mason jars, highly concentrated. Very highly concentrated. Then I just pour a tiny amount in a glass with a ton of ice and water. Done! The jars of this concentrated tea last about a week in our house because really, you only need a tablespoon or so. And the beauty here is 3 mason jars take up no room in the fridge at all. I like to make a peach/hibiscus batch, a green tea/peppermint batch, and a berry/black tea batch. I also am crazy about jasmine tea, and love it iced just as it is. I am trying to have less of the iced latte kind of afternoon snack and more of the iced green tea kind. It's better for me—so they tell me. And I swear coffee (and fried food) are getting harder for me to deal with as I get all old lady. I find this tragic, but true.

*Updated:

More specific information about the water/tea ratio has been requested. I think it's "to your personal taste" but to not be totally annoying here's what I do (which varies every time, but this comes close.)

I put 5-6 bags of tea in a mason jar that is size of that one there in the photo. How big is that? Not sure, but it's a normal mason jar size. Sorry. Then I fill it with cold water and let it sit in the fridge overnight. Then I squeeze the heck out of the bags and use about 2 tablespoons of this concentrated tea per 12 ounces of water. If you like it stronger you can add more of the tea, or less water, you get the idea. I like it unsweetened. If I wanted sweetener, I'd add that to my glass, not to the master batch. I also love to use loose tea, so if I do that, I use about 3 teaspoon of loose tea and about 3 teabags. I strain the next day when I take out the bags. And regarding creepy tea funk, we drink it pretty fast and don't leave the bags in, nor do I let it steep outside the fridge, so no barfing yet! (Sorry if I made it all sound gross, it's really really good, I promise.)

Unrelated:
-I loved this article about vintage sewing machines over at The Collectors Weekly.
-I really really think this needs to be made as soon as raspberries are here. Imperative.
-The Tie One On aprons are coming in and look awesome—and so do the pie recipes. So rad. I have posted the book I will giveaway to a lucky apron maker for this theme, so take a peek.

a very cute cherry pitter

 

This cherry chomper is going to get used very soon. For something like this. Or this.

We got ours here in town at New Seasons. I know that the cleaning/de-cluttering/simplify-your-life experts are all anti kitchen-gadget-with-only-one-use, but what's the fun in that? My pineapple cutter and apple slicer are the best gadgets ever and we are all very excited by this ridiculous new one. I actually didn't have a cherry pitter, just a paperclip unfolded and a lot of swearing. And this pits olives, too. So there!

Plus it looks like my daughter, so I had to buy it.

summer soup

I made this summer soup this morning. It's based on a vegetable root stew that I made long ago from a copy of The Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook which I got from the library after posting about my favorite cookbook. There are wonderful suggestions in the comments of this post, which is where I learned of this author.

I only made this soup once, and it was over a year ago—almost two actually, so I have no idea if it's very close, but I do remember I liked it a whole lot and this soup I like a whole lot—so there you go. It's an excellent cookbook. I should buy it. I actually am not a huge Italian food fan. I could never have pasta again in my life and be just fine, but this cookbook is about a different type of Italian cooking that is very exciting to me. Anyhoo, here's what is in this soup:

-1 fennel bulb sliced super thin
-1 onion sliced
-1 carrot diced
-2 leeks sliced
-3 new potatoes diced
-5 cloves garlic sliced
-3 radishes sliced
-a bunch of fresh herbs and a can of diced tomatoes (fresh tomatoes would be best, but they aren't ready here yet.)

I sauteed the fennel, onion, carrot, leeks, garlic, and radishes in olive oil and salt and pepper for about 15 minutes. Then I added the can of diced tomatoes in their juice, covered it all with water and simmered it for about an hour. Then added about 1 cup corn and chopped herbs from the pots outside-rosemary, basil, dill and oregano. I served it with little toasts from the homemade bread from Friday and a lot of grated Parmesan on top. It made a boatload, about 4 mason jars full. Really yummy.

We have a crazy week ahead of us. 3 b-days (including Grammie and Liddy!), 2 doctor appointments, father's day, summer solstice celebration—and I know I"m forgetting about 3 more things. More homemade bread, butter, and jam will be needed for sure.

Unrelated, I saw Hangover and laughed hard. It's no Anchorman, but really, what is?

strawberries in a bowl with stuff added

I am a fiend for fruit, fruit desserts, and fruit paired with chocolate. I get a little hoard-y about chocolate dipped strawberries and was looking for a lighter (and quicker) version and found it. This is a bowl of sliced strawberries (no sugar added) with the tiniest amount of chocolate sauce drizzled on top. I added a sprinkle of fancy salt and one thinly sliced basil leaf. Pure heaven.

I would never serve this to friends because many many people I know would feel the salt and basil ruined a perfectly good bowl of strawberries. That's fair. A bit of brown sugar and a finely chopped mint leaf would be nice too. The chocolate sauce was not homemade but some hippie organic stuff I had on hand. I need to make some, though. Maybe something like this? There are so many recipes for chocolate sauce out there. I'd steer clear of the corn syrup ones. What say you? Any favorites? It would be rad if it didn't require heating to use. I'm thinking pourable—not a glop that needs to be heated. Many things to consider. I could put it in a squeeze bottle and get all 1980s with my dessert garnishing. Remember when every desert was plated with that chocolate sauce drizzle? Sometimes in two colors even, if it was extra cool. So what if I just wrote about food trends from 1986.

Unrelated but important to mention:

• Two wonderful zines out there—the newest Mixtape #9 is available, with a beautiful cover design by the ridiculously talented Lisa Soloman. And I always look forward to the newest Small. Very cool.

kefir & quark

I got this wonderful book, The Home Creamery, last week and it's pretty awesome. It's very simple and clear. There are no photos inside, but I don't mind that in the least in cookbooks. At different times, I have made creme fraiche, yogurt, sour cream, butter, buttermilk, yogurt cheese, and paneer, all from recipes I found online and in various cookbooks, and loved them all. But it's so nice having them collected in one book. Also, the trouble-shooting guide is helpful, detailed, and offers alternate methods. I want to try the mascapone, farmer's cheese, kefir, cream cheese, goat cheese, ricotta, and mozzarella next. The bonus in this book comes after all the cheese-making recipes. You also get recipes, savory and sweet, using all these dairy items--and they look so flippin' good and there are over 70. Seriously, I counted.

Here's some sour cream sitting next to some buttermilk. Labeling is so important, as I discovered, 'cause all this stuff is white, man. (The labels are from here, and I love them dearly.)

I use either Noris or Strauss whole milk or cream, I haven't  tried any of this with raw milk. I don't have a source right now. I've heard making dairy products with raw milk is much less predictable, and the book confirms this--so of course I feel compelled to try it. I'd like to get a source for raw goat milk, too.

I love the idea of all these homemade dairy products, but in reality I find that we really eat only the homemade yogurt and butter on a regular basis. The rest is more for special occasions. The yogurt I make about every 5 days. I'm convinced my family is made of yogurt. There are worse things to be made of.

 

It's sort of a cookie.

I made these cookies this morning and they are really tasty. They do have that "this is a hippie cookie" taste, especially the first bite, but after that they are quite nice. Not too sweet, more like a muffin-top than a cookie. I used milk chocolate chips because that's what the girls like. They ended up liking them okay. I suspect they will like them more the second time around. These don't have the super-sweet zing that "normal" cookies have, you know? So, it takes awhile for the kids to get used to that. I'd add cinnamon next time. Actually, orange zest, nuts, dried fruit, and different spices would all be good mix-ins. The recipe is cobbled together from 3 different vegan/low-sugar recipes I have, except these aren't vegan and do have refined sugar, so go figure. Still, they are a nice sort-of-healthier version of a normal cookie.

Pretty Dang Good Cookies That Aren't Horribly Bad For You

• 2 cups whole wheat flour (or pastry flour, or white whole wheat)
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• pinch salt
• 1 cup applesauce (unsweetened)
• 1 cup chocolate chips
• 2 tablespoons oil (or melted butter)
• 1 egg (or ground flaxseed, about a tablespoon? Not sure, you might have to experiment.)

Pre-heat oven 350 degrees fahrenheit. Mix all this stuff in a bowl—it will be pretty sticky. Drop about a tablespoon of dough onto your cookie sheets (these are prone to stick, so grease or use a silpat) and bake 12-15 minutes. They are better over baked than under baked, because they are so cakey. I feel coffee or tea is a mandatory accompaniment. Makes about 22.

possibly my favorite type of food.

I bought a signed copy of Rustic Fruit Desserts: Crumbles, Buckles, Cobblers, Pandowdies, and More, by Cory Schreiber and Julie Richardson over at Sweet Wares here in Portland last week (they sell it for 20% off the cover price) and have been reading it like it was a summer novel. I have so many recipes like these already, but not in one book and not with the utter perfection of these combination of flavors. I am basing this on the fact that I frequent Baker & Spice quite often and have tried just about every dessert they have and they are all outstanding—and quite a few of them are in this book. The desserts are organized by season, which is brilliant, and there are so many good tips in here for this style of down-to-earth, homey baking. The authors suggest freezing a lot. Both before you bake and after—which is key for me when I want to make something but don't want to eat the entire dessert in 2 days. Better to bake and freeze half, or make 2 smaller ones and only bake one—freezing the other for later. For that unexpected brunch party I am known for throwing together. (heh.)

Here's the Rhubarb Buckle with Ginger Crumb Pete made for Mother's Day. Good lord.

Some other desserts in this book: Fresh Strawberry Ricotta Tart, Rhubarb and Bing Cherry Brown Betty, Double Crusted Plucot Crisp, Stone Fruit Slump, Quince and Apple Brown Butter Tart, Pear Cobbler with Shingled Hazelnut Biscuits, Caramelized Pear Bread Pudding, and an Apple Pandowdy.

Better than a birthday cake! (Which I should be receive in about 2 weeks). Can I ask for a birthday pandowdy instead?

cobbler.

hey, thanks so much for the new book props!!

I got the first rhubarb of the season and was all set to make hand pies, and then thought, no—a regular pie, and then changed my mind to a crisp and then, at the very last minute, switched to making this outstanding cobbler. I just think this recipe is perfect. I followed it exactly and am now ready to add a cobbler topping to every fruit imaginable. I would suspect that you could use arrowroot powder instead of the corn starch, if that's your preference. I'm going to try that next time. Look out fruit—you all will be wearing biscuit hats soon.

baked eggs

Here's a very tasty dinner made from the April 2009 Everyday Food. I love it when they post the recipes from the current issue. Here it is and if you like eggs, it's just crazy good. But crazy hot! I burnt my tongue really bad, which almost ruined the dinner for me. I didn't technically make it, husband did. Everyday Food is his go-to for cooking. Clear, easy, one page, and pretty dang solid. We have had very few misses. It would be a nice dish for an Easter brunch I think, a bit different, but still egg-y. Speaking of Easter brunch, I need to make the yummy dough from the bread book (I have been using this book all year, I pretty much have it memorized) for the hot crossed buns for this weekend. Or maybe a braided bread. Can't decide. Both?

I forgot to mention that the children thought this was the stinkiest dinner ever and they almost started crying because it smelled so bad (it didn't). At one point Sadie said it smelled like Liddy's dirty diaper and Delia said it smelled like her vomit. Wow. Tough crowd. Needless to say, they didn't try it.

friday cake

I made this cake last Friday and am tempted to make it today. It is incredibly light. It has no butter, just eggs, a little flour, sugar, and almond paste—which is where I got the recipe.

It's just heavenly with a strong cup of coffee at about 2:30 pm, right before the back-to-back ballet classes. The thing is—it's so light and airy it's not filing in the least, so eating half the cake seems like a reasonable thing to do. I used restraint and it was wonderful for breakfast the next morning with berries on top. I should try to make my own almond paste. I usually buy it, but I'm sure a little internet research will yield some homemade options. And I know someone out there has made it, right? It's basically almond butter with sugar added? I have no clue, but plan to find out.

smallish pies

We got back from the coast last week and the re-entry was hard. A short week always feels long, you know? It was pretty nice weather considering it was the Oregon coast in March, but there were a few rainy episodes, so I found myself baking. These small apple pies were made with Sadie, whose New Year's resolution was to learn how to make pies. For real. So, we did. We used 3 apples and these sweet Pyrex bowls I found in the kitchen, which were so perfect I was tempted to take them home. Different than hand pies, but equally life altering.

We seem to have brought back a flu-barfing thing. I thought it was some funky clam chowder, and am still not convinced it wasn't, but now that 3 out of 5 of us have been ill in the last 4 days, I wonder if it was also a bug. Sorry to mention barf and pie in the same post.

Unrelated—I am sewing belts. More soon on this development, but I am very excited. I also just found this site, Goop, by Gwyneth Paltrow, which I can't stop reading. It's new to me (did everyone know this was out there?) and I especially am fascinated by this post about her clothes. Slightly unrelated but still about clothes—I really want these shorts. There's a sentence I really never thought I'd write—shorts?? But really, these are so vintage-y cute. I have already had trusted friends completely veto these, but they are so good in the 1940s/80s way.

butter was made and eaten

Thanks so much for all of your tips about making butter! You all rock. So, I made this fabulous butter today and have since whipped about half of it with honey, which tastes amazing—especially when the butter is lightly salted. Here it is all made (I was a fancy-pants and gave it an extra whipping after washing it which is why it looks nice and fluffy) along with the buttermilk which I saved.

I went with the food processor method. I wanted to be all prairie-cool and do the mason jar thing, but was impatient and to be honest, wanted to try it first fast-style, just to see what it was all about and know when it was really done, etc. before I set the kids to shaking a jar—which I fully intend to do. For the cream, I used Strauss, one 16 oz jar, and left it on the counter to warm for about 2 hours before I started. It must have made a huge difference, because instead of 15-20 minutes, this butter was made in about 2 minutes, seriously. I am really glad I went with this method, because the kitchen-aid thing seems a bit messy, and this wasn't at all.

Here it is after washing. Okay, seriously yummy.

I need to research more about the buttermilk left over. Is this buttermilk, like the kind you buy? I am curious, because I have made my own buttermilk by adding buttermilk to scalded milk and letting it sit, but I have only done this using purchased cultured buttermilk, which I am assuming is different than what I have here left over from the butter making process. Clearly, I need a dairy making book or need to befriend a cow owner.

And the husband got the wrong size of weck jars, but they will be exchanged, and the butter willl be housed in the smaller size soon, don't you worry.

who has done this?

Terribly excited to make butter. I know you all have done this. Tips? It looks too good to be true. And I just got a tip that Weck jars are in Portland at Canoe! Oh, it's a good day, can't wait to put some homemade butter in a Weck jar!

when you have these, why leave the house?

I made these macaroons last week with the girls. I had never made them before, or macaroons of any kind really. It's was the easiest recipe ever. A little coconut, sugar, egg whites and chocolate chips. They were really really good.

I would have never even thought to make these 2 years ago. I never liked coconut when I was little. I always thought it tasted like I was eating sun tan lotion. I loved the smell, but didn't identify it with food at all. And then after a few attempts at trying to eat almond joys from the bottom of my halloween bag (way too sweet) I was done. But a few years ago, I started to dabble in coconut. Just barely—mostly with the unsweetened flaked variety. And coconut milk, for curries. It's been a slow attraction, but it has grown steadily.

As it turns out, the girls won't eat these, so it was just Pete the baby and I eating these all week, which was sort of crazy, but yummy anyway. I saw this Martha recipe today which I might have to try, they almost look too good. Almond orange and coconut, is that too good? I must test and find out.

Grammie, I found out, loves coconut. I never knew that. Isnt that weird? When you find out a type of food your parents love, but you had no clue about it? We never had coconut anything in the house. I also just found out she always hated fig newtons, which we always had in the house. Hmmm. I know what kind of cake she is getting this year for her birthday. (And it's not fig newton.)

shortbread love

Chocolate hazelnut shortbread was made for a friend and shipped out—it keeps really well so it's one of my favorite cookies to mail. The recipe is here on my cheat sheet. I used the shortbread recipe and then sprinkled about 1/4 cup chocolate chips on the top while it was still warm. After about 5 minutes I spread the chocolate in a thin layer (it melts beautifully) and then I topped it off with chopped toasted hazelnuts and a little fancy salt.

The new apron theme is up over on Tie One On, and I spruced it up over there too—with a new banner, links, and books.

clouds

I finally made little meringue thingies. What should I call them? The girls call them clouds. I guess little meringues works, or mini Pavlovas? Anyway, I made them for the very first time and they were really tasty and fun to make. I had to make an emergency call to someone who has more experience with these than I do to talk about doneness, but they all went well. Crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside.

I drizzled chocolate sauce on the plate and then spooned a raspberry sauce on the top. Heavenly— although I wonder if this style of garnishing is too 80s/90s when it seemed everything was garnished with a squeeze bottle.

The meringue recipe is similar to the one I used here, the raspberry sauce is just frozen berries stewed with a bit of sugar over heat and then mashed through a strainer, and the chocolate sauce came from a bottle.

Completely unrelated, I am worried about my Australian friends and thinking of them all a ton. I wasn't sure what to do and was told about this great site—2009 Victorian Bushfire Appeal that provides ideas on how to help. Thanks to those of you who e-mailed me about this.

so bad, yet so good.

A heaven log. A loaf of happiness. It's zebra cake—or chocolate wafer icebox cake. We made this a bit back and I forgot how incredibly good it is. I found myself thinking it was my favorite cake ever. I think this about many types of cake. This one is dang good, though. It's also perfect for kids to make if they don't mind a little whipped cream on their fingers.

I followed the recipe on the famous chocolate wafers box. I use real whipped cream just barely sweetened, not cool whip or some other freaky stuff. You just layer the whipped cream between the cookies. I used the cookie wafer as a scoop for the whipped cream and pressed another cookie on top—much easier than using a knife and trying to spread it. Then let it sit overnight in the fridge. Slice it on an angle, drink a cup of strong coffee, and get ready to get totally sick. It's not very sweet and very rich, so it's completely awesome. The cookies are very dark and almost bitter and if you just barely sweeten the whipped cream, it's actually a pretty sophisticated tasting dessert. And the retro appeal goes a long ways with me, of course. Don't get impatient and try to eat it before it has completely softened—wait at least overnight. Not that I have done this before (ha.) but it doesn't slice. I'm just sayin'.

I am waiting for some hippie company to make these chocolate wafers without hydrogenated what-all, but I haven't found any yet. I think I might have to make my own chocolate wafer cookies if I want them less junky, but making these thin enough would be a challenge. I might try it. I have heard these cookies are hard to find in some parts of the country, but I seem to find them easily here in Portland, so I am less tempted to make them from scratch. Plus, the beauty of this cake is the simplicity and ease. Like 'smores, you know? Here's a lovely round version, I have only made the log style, but this might even be easier. Here's a nice one too, along with a recipe (it's double the quantity I usually make) but I still stand behind my log shape. It's what is on the box and I just love it.

I think this would be such a good Valentine's Day dessert and I might even get all crazy and tint the whipped cream a light pink. Oh, and lightly flavor it with peppermint! That would be very tasty.

And thank you so much for all the new banner love.

more stuff in a jar-

More random food in jar photos. This one has really made me happy this week. It's pureed chipotle peppers in adobo sauce. I always see this called for in recipes and it's always in very small quantities. Straight from the can, it's a mess. It's hard to save, a pain to freeze, and so I leave it out and just add cayenne pepper. But the taste so different than cayenne pepper—so nice and smoky, I needed to stop avoiding it out of sheer laziness.

 

I got a tip from a great cookbook (which I will blog about soon) to dump the whole can in a cuisinart, puree it, and then just keep it in the fridge—scoping out what you need. It's so good. Now it's in eggs, soups, stews, rice and beans—all that. I'm sure I will burn out on it soon, but I haven't yet. A little goes a long way and this method makes it so easy to not use too much. This is the brand I buy, the only type I know of, actually. An amazing soup recipe using this will be coming soon, but right now I am dealing with a diaper-less baby who is suspiciously quiet.

Thanks for all your eMailorder #9 orders!

old bread

So. Old bread. I have tried making croutons before, but they weren't perfect. Just not crispy enough. They are so easy, but I just never got the system down. Now I have it. I am addicted to these and it is so pleasing to use up the last 3-4 old pieces of bread. I save bread bits all the time—freezing them usually, but then only want to make bread pudding. The problem with this is I am the only bread pudding eater in the house, so it's not good for me. The bread bits sit in the freezer forever and get all gross and freezer burnt. I know I can make breadcrumbs too, but I seem to never use them, to be honest. Now croutons— I use those, but can't justify buying them, of course.

Okay, this is so simple, but the key for me was adding olive oil and baking it in the toaster/convection oven.

I cube up 3-4 pieces of bread, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper (and garlic salt, cheese powder, or some other nasty thing is you are feeling crazy—but plain is really nice too) and bake for 20 minutes in a 350° oven. I use a 9" x 9" pan and never use more than 4 pieces f bread in this size. I don't stir, just bake, and let it cool. Perfect. I use these on salads and in soup. I feel a bit silly writing about this, because you probably already do this, but who the heck knows—it's made my life better.

easy yummy dinner.

the sticky orange stuff

I found myself inundated with oranges in the last few weeks (a good problem to have) so I was thrilled to see the orange themed January Martha on the stands and boldly tried the marmalade recipe. I have never made marmalade before. I like marmalade, I don't love it, but I like it a lot. One recipe called for a split vanilla bean and so I made that one, and now I do love it. A lot. Okay, can I just say I got a ridiculous thrill out of making this stuff? The 8 oranges made a ton of marmalade. More than I know what to do with. I have about 8 jars in the freezer. I gave some to mom and great grandpa, both of whom like marmalade, but not a lot of people do, so I think I will have a lot extra. Even my one good Canadian friend didn't help me out by taking a jar. Bad.

There's the vanilla bean—the sticks in there. So, you use the whole orange to make this, peel, rind and all— you just cook it with some sugar for a bit. That's it. I mean, read the recipe in the magazine, but that's really all there is to it. Amazing and so wonderfully frugal. Celebratory scones are in order.

I liked marmalade as a kid, at least I think I did, we never had it much in the house. My first introduction to marmalade was from the Paddington Bear books, which I haven't read since I was little. I need to revisit these, I have no copies in the house. I remember really liking them, but that's all.

And why are there no shops locally that carry the coolest canning jars ever, Weck jars? I am trying to get a great new baking shop to carry them here in town and I think I may have convinced them—I will report back.

a new tradition for the holidays

This is our new Christmas cake. It's an almond bundt cake made using this crazy almond filling and a recipe from the inside of the label on the can. It's amazing. I found it at New Seasons here in Portland when I was looking for almond paste. I was struck by this can and am a sucker for recipes on cans, so I ended up with this in the cart instead. Even my not-so-into-almond-flavor husband said it was amazing. I served it Christmas Eve to my family with softly whipped cream and stewed berries and it was lovely, but the real treat was eating it the 2 days afterwards as a moist hand-held-coffee-cake-type thing. It got better each day and then was declared a once a year treat, because it's that good.

Here's the can of happiness. I love the way the logo looks more like an airline company than a food product. The recipe is here. I wouldn't try this with any other almond product, this is not almond paste nor is it marzipan. The almond flavor is not too strong and no almond extract is used in the cake (and I didn't use any in the glaze either, even though it called for it) so there no almond-y bite that can get overwhelming at times. I think this is the best site ever, by the way, it's way high on the random scale.

Happy 2009!

cookies and the like

I have been baking. I made a chocolate gingerbread and it was heaven, but was slightly overcooked by me. The recipe was in our local paper in FOODay, but the link won't work, sorry. Today I made these linzer style cookies with raspberry jam. This is a standard sugar cookie type dough with an egg yolk and the addition of allspice and cinnamon. It's one of those doughs you can use for like, 101 types of cookies. I have a huge lump of it in the fridge and am making different types of cookies with it in between unpacking boxes.

And here's a little group in martha's scalloped cookie boxes that are so stinkin' cute. You can see the same boxes here as well, looking even dandier. Just two kinds are in this box—some Russian teacakes (XL-style) and some milk chocolate marshmallow fudge. Simple and sweet. I actually have yet to give any away. The weather has been dicey causing holiday visits to be spotty. The post office has been hard to get to as well. So, they are being eaten in-house. The dark chocolate salted walnut fudge is totally gone. Oh, well.

I need to point out the holiday goodness over here, which caused much envy and made me both super inspired and wishing for a clone.

chocolate hazelnut spread—a case study

This is not salted caramel sauce, which is what I had planned to put in these swell jars. (They came from the Meadow, here in Portland, and are super heavy and very pleasing to hold.) I opted for this chocolate hazelnut spread instead because 1. Grammie made some and it was delicious. 2. My kitchen mojo isn't good right now and couldn't face using a candy thermometer 3. I had all the ingredients already *sort of.

I realize looking at this photo now that it looks a bit—turdy. Like turd in a jar. Well, nothing like homemade gifts. Moving on—

I found 3 different recipes for this homemade nutella type stuff. All pretty different. Here's the lowdown:

1. This recipe is what Grammie used. It's basically a chocolate ganache with hazelnut paste in it. The flavor is excellent. You actually use melted chocolate, not cocoa powder, and heavy cream, not oil, so the mouth feel is really nice and smooth. (Mouth feel? Sorry, that sounds pretentious.) It's from a New Seasons flier, which I can't find online so here it is:

1/3 cup toasted hazelnuts (use the toasting directions from the next recipe)
3 oz chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup heavy cream
3 Tablespoons brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp salt

Pulse hazelnuts in a Cuisinart forever. Like a long time, about 5 minutes, until it makes a butter. Then add the chopped chocolate and pulse again. Meanwhile, heat up the cream, sugar, vanilla, and salt in a saucepan until just boiling. Add this to the pureed nut and chocolate mixture and pulse again until it's super smooth. It will firm up as it sits and then you can store it in the refrigerator.

2. This recipe is what I have photographed here. This version is the easiest to find and seems the most common. It uses cocoa powder, powdered sugar, and a little oil, blended with hazelnut paste. It's fine—but really, doesn't compare at all to the recipe above. The chocolate flavor just isn't there and the powdered sugar taste is too sweet. It is vegan and because there is no dairy it might be a better candidate for shipping. It is good, it's not like I wouldn't eat it, it's just not as smooth and powerful as recipe #1.

3. This version uses melted chocolate and sweetened condensed milk, much the same way my favorite fudge recipe does. I think it's my favorite because I do always have a can of sweetened condensed milk on hand, but not always heavy cream, and it uses honey, which tastes really good, I think. I really like using melted chocolate in recipes rather than cocoa powder. I always think the taste is much better.

A few tips:

-Don't overcook your hazelnuts when you toast them. It will make a burnt tasting spread.
-Don't try to substitute half-and-half* for heavy cream in recipe #1, it won't ever set up.
-Don't try to use hazelnut flour (like what they have at Trader Joe's) instead of grinding your own. The flour is too dry and won't make a paste when you pulse it, so it will always stay a bit grainy.
-You might try a little less salt if you use recipe #1.

Yum. Thanks for your help, grammie!

not a tooth breaker, I swear.

I am not on my A-game this week. I have made a coffee cake forgetting 3 cups of flour (Oops. I threw it back in the mixing bowl and added the flour when I noticed the batter seemed to be the consistency of water, and no one was the wiser, thank god.) and then I botched a half-batch of gingerbread cookies today (forgot salt and was crazy/metal with the oven timer. Curses. I blame my new kitchen.) However, I did successfully make this candied ginger orange biscotti last week and it turned out great. Better than great. I changed the mix-ins but it's based off of this lemon anise recipe. So, I think I will be making more of these. Hopefully no recipients will chip a tooth, which has actually happened before. Not with my cookies, but I think with my fudge. I know that sounds really bad.

We got our Christmas tree at Loch Lolly this weekend with my brother (toting an amazing pocket chainsaw!) and Grammie. It was really fun and we magically missed the rain. Here's my husband-woodsman cutting down the tree with the pocket chainsaw and the impervious-to cold little helpers. They have a very strong jacket aversion. (It covers up their outfits, which is lame, they tell me.) The tree is up and decorated and hasn't fallen yet. Woot!

During tree activities we put on a little of John Fahey's Guitar Soli Christmas Album and it felt nice and cozy. And how rad is this cover art? Rad.

Thank you so much for all your very informative comments on the last post. So, I will say yes to adding the moonshine to the homemade vanilla extract and adding a vitamin D supplement to my body. It's good to have a plan. Also, for you bloglines folks, I have a new holiday banner up.

apple crisp from before the move

We made it. This house we moved into is so cool. It's like tree house. Every view looks into trees. And we have a broom closet. And a coat closet. Our old house had neither of these things and this created terrible clutter. Actually, the storage here is amazing. I keep feeling like we won the storage lottery until I remember we loaded up an huge POD 2 months ago and we keep forgetting about it. Like, "Oh where did the 4 chairs and table go? Oh yeah, they are in the POD." So, we still need to face that. I did some sewing already, of course. Straps on a new tutu needed to be repaired.

This crisp (from the cheat sheet) was the last baked item in the old house. Goodbye old house! We loved you and you were only 7 minutes from IKEA!

We haven't baked yet here, but I feel it coming on. Pete made this last night (thanks Hillary) and it was surprisingly good. Definitely add the chocolate chips and don't burn your mouth. And I am still geeking on the music suggestions! Thank you so much. Grammie is now obsessed with Fleet Foxes. For reals.

again with the soup.

Homemade tomato soup. So easy, yet it's taken me forever to start making this. Growing up, I was in love with the too sweet weird taste of Campbell's, but now I make it from scratch, mostly because I always have canned tomatoes, an onion, and milk in the house—but not always tomato soup. Also, it's so basic, easy and healthy made from scratch, now I feel kind of guilty buying it. Got to keep up with the guilt, you know.

Here's the basic recipe-

-1-3 cans of whole tomatoes (depending on how much I want. I often use one can of fire roasted canned whole tomatoes. I sometimes add a can of tomato sauce if I only have 1 can of whole tomatoes.)
-1 big yellow onion, diced
-3 cloves of garlic
-olive oil, salt, pepper and a bit of homemade pesto, if I have some
-milk (whole tastes best)
-a little honey

Dice the onion and garlic and saute it in olive oil. Then after 10 minutes, add the canned tomatoes and cover with water if needed, and bring to a boil. Then reduce to a simmer, cover, and keep it on low heat for about 20-45 minutes. Puree it with a stick blender (or throw it in the blender) and add enough milk to make it a nice light red color, probably about 1 cup or so. Season with salt, pepper, and pesto (only about a tablespoon) and a little honey if it needs it.

I make this in big batches and freeze it because my family gets really sick of it after day 2 (I don't) so I have to give it a rest for a bit and bust it out later. Ina has a good recipe for a tomato soup also. And there are a ton of other tomato soup recipes on this link. Like—how many variations can there be? A lot I guess.

sweet potato goodness

I got my seasonal sweet potato fries last week at Burgerville and they were so good but made me feel not so good. As I get older, I realize (with horror) that fried foods don't agree with me. Fried dough of any kind is so close to my heart, so this has been hard to accept, but I have learned my lesson. Fried vegetables? I figured I was still safe—but not so much.

So, after receiving a copy of Ina's new book, which is really great, and seeing a recipe for baked sweet potato wedges—I made these homemade baked sweet potato fries, with homemade blue cheese dressing. (The dressing wasn't in this book, but she has a great recipe here.) The blue cheese dressing is the real key in enjoying these, for me anyway. Since they are not fried, I have to get sick somehow.

One large potato made enough for 2 servings, which I had for lunch and then dinner. No shortage of beta carotene in my body now. Once again, the blue cheese dressing is kill, please make it or at least buy a good one, 'cause these just aren't the same with out it.

I have Ina's first 3 books and they are household favorites. I skipped the next 2, but this newest one, Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics: Fabulous Flavor from Simple Ingredients, is really great. Simple and straight forward. Like many good cookbooks, she reminds me of things to cook, not just supplying a ton of hard recipes with too much text. And her whole gig is about little prep in the kitchen, but with stellar ingredients, so that's great. I will say, some of her dishes are so over-the-top rich, (this is true in all her cookbooks) they seem almost criminal—but it's pretty easy to cut the fat/salt/sugar from many of her dishes. Usually her super rich recipes are reserved for parties around here anyway, so it's fine to go whole hog. This new book is already at Grammie's in time for Thanksgiving.

Unrelated, thanks for the new banner love! The scene is heavily borrowed from a wonderful illustration in this book.

a sort of cake-like cookie

I don't make frosted cookies very often. Except for the standard frosted sugar cookie for easter or Christmas, I usually don't think to make frosted ones, but why not? They are so over the top. I actually think they are better for you because they maximize the sugar-sick feeling so much, you eat less. How's that rationalization?

These are insanely good pumpkin spice cookies with a cream cheese frosting. With hot cider or coffee, they are the food of the gods. The girls chew off the top layer and leave the gross decapitated cookie hidden in cupboards around the house. At least they tell me this, so I can find them right away. The recipe is here and the frosting I used is pretty much the same glaze they list with the addition of cream cheese.

I can't believe Halloween is so soon, I feel very unprepared, except I spookified my banner. We only just got the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack out 2 days ago. We did see the spooky NW Children's Theater production of Hansel and Gretel Sunday and it was so good—nice and creepy, the girls really had a good time. They were too warm, so there was lots of lying down in the seats and removing of shoes and tights and all that.

I broke down and got this dress that I have been eyeing for about 2 months now. Here's the thing—I couldn't have sewn it, not with all the ruffles and details (zoom in please, it's really great) without going crazy. That's what I have told myself. And the seams are bound on the inside with such a lovely fabric. And it looks killer on. Photos soon.

why is toast so good?

I had a craving for homemade toast last week. I was at one of my favorite coffee shops (Ristretto in Beaumont) and asked when their new location was opening. They said it was already open. Awesome, I thought. I asked if they were going to serve more than just a few pastry items— and they said yes, actually, they are serving toast.

Toast.

That was it. I didn't question further, partly because I found it so amusing they felt this statement was enough and partly because I didn't want anymore information about it. It was too perfect and too random. So off I went, with the 3 girls in tow, to get my lovely 6 oz. double cappuccino and toast at the new location—and man was it good. Thick-cut white bread, toasted—served with butter and jam. The girls got homemade rice krispy treats. It's Portland, so you have to mix high-brow with trash around here, it a regional hip-food rule. The cappuccino was amazing. The bread was not white sandwich bread really, but it wasn't a fancy french bread either. More like a country white? Anyway, I made 2 loafs at home and have recreated the toast here, but sadly, have no fancy coffee drink to go with it. The french press provides a good second best, however.

The recipe I used is here and although white flour is bad and all that, I did make this with 100% white flour and dang. I know you know how good it was.I have been using the recipes from the bread book for so long, I wanted to try a different method and I'm glad I did. It was fun doing the double rise again and the loaf did taste different, which was a nice change.

And the previous comments about the teen books are so great, another reason I love blogs. I was remembering what I was reading (and all the other girls were reading) in middle school—V.C. Andrews. Which makes these other books seem like they are full of white fluffly clouds, rainbows, and unicorns. Amazing. But then, I think the average teenage girl has a unsacaiable appitie for gothic drama that has nothing to do with pop culture. I am thinking of Weauthering Heights here, talk about a stalker novel. I love that book. It broke up my book group years ago, have I mentioned that before? I should re-read some V.C. Andrews, but I am almost afraid too. There was also a very disturbing trend of all the 8th grade girls reading Sybil. Ha! So not funny!

broiled fruit (that sounds weird)

These are from several weeks ago—back when there were peaches. It was a recipe I was super excited about. You take peaches (or nectarines) and half them, broil them, and add a honey balsamic vinegar glaze. Then top with a little creme fraiche, which I had on hand from my homemade experiment. I actually was looking for way to use up the creme fraiche which is why I made this. Okay, they were good, but I think the balsamic flavor was a bit too much for me. I had made this before broiling the peaches with butter and brown sugar, and I liked that better.

We are sort of in a holding pattern around here. No offers on the house yet, but lots of second showings. And lots of showing in general, like more than 2 a day and sometimes as many as 4, so we haven't been home much. Lots of cafes and parks. Not so much with the crafting/sewing/cooking. I have found time to buy clothes however, and I need to stop.

I want to sew a few skirts soon—in plaid for sure and maybe a something in a nubby wool. Everything in the shops right now seem to be lighter-weight and shorter than I want. I am feeling old, or least a bit grumpy about another 1980s fall/winter season. And can we stop with the scarves? Now I do sound like a grump, but come on. I don't mean the muffler style scarves, love those, but the big fringey/glittery ones. You know what I mean. And now I need some fall boots, boots—not shoes, I think. Like ankle boots? (Now who is a big hypocrite, that is pretty 1980s) maybe like these.

I have started knitting my sweater. 6 times. I have started it 6 times. Yes, I am awesome. In the round. (Don't twist the stitches!) And um, I forgot how to do some basic stitches, so I keep starting over. I hope to progress to a 3rd row this week with the help of the eggplant. Oh! I am seeing Kay and Ann this week (who I will show none of my knitting to, thank you very much) and you local folks can out and see them in person at Powell's this Monday night, as in tomorrow. I hope to be there causing a ruckus possibly waiving around twisted stitches.

I didn't keep these for myself.

I was trolling some vintage items in various etsy shops and found this set of four tea cups and saucers which I purchased for a dear friend's birthday—they are from Pony Party, a dangerous place for me.

I am so proud of myself for actually giving them to her, 'cause um—look at them. They are too good.

random bits:

-I am finally watching the last season of Slings and Arrows, which I have been avoiding for 6 months because I love it so much I don't want it to end, but I am trying to just enjoy it.

-I am strongly re-thinking my recent agave nectar enthusiasm. Not because I have had a bad baking experience with it, but because. . .not sure why. I'd almost just rather eat bad stuff, just not very often than feel possibly disappointed with a substitute, you know? And to be honest, sweets make me want more sweets regardless of the sugar source. The only way I feel 100% not gross is with fruit, so I'd rather go whole hog when I do eat sweets (just not very often) and then stick with berries and apples the rest of the time. Don't get me wrong, I love agave, and I also love maple syrup, molasses, and honey, but when I make a classic cake or something like that, I am not sure I'd be happy with substitutions. At least I am consistently indecisive, you can say that about me anyway.

-I am looking for fall shoes and am excited about this brand, Gentle Soles which is hella expensive, but intriguing. And yet, looking at them again, they might be a little too urban hobbit for me. Not sure. And if I'm going to spend a ton of money on a pair of shoes, why not something like this? God. Why, why are these Anthro shoes so expensive? I just don't understand, and I want to—really, I do.

crepes and stuff

Breakfast from about 2 weeks ago:

Crepes with plums, blueberries, (spiced with a bit of nutmeg) and maple syrup. The crème fraîche on top is homemade really wonderful. I cut up the plums and added the spices along with the blueberries — heating it in a saucepan with the maple syrup until it was cooked through. I made a stack of these crepes on a weekend, kept them in the fridge, and ate them during the week. I shared, but not much.

I have been thinking more about the whole homemade yogurt-sour cream-buttermilk-crème fraîche thing and although I love the idea of all of it, I think in reality the homemade yogurt and buttermilk will only be the constant around here. With the homemade buttermilk I then can make most of the other items (sour cream, crème fraîche, etc) if I feel crazy, and I really don't eat that much rich dairy, or try not to. Strained yogurt, nice and thick, is as tasty as sour cream to me, and more versatile, too. Recipes to come soon, but if you are super curious to try this, the Google machine will get you recipes/directions immediately.

I am going to pick up a cookbook about baking with agave nectar today from the library, I am very curious. So far I've only used it as a topping not as a baking ingredient. Update: I now have said book and I am tempted to try something daring-- going the entire holiday season of baking with no refined sugar. There will be some trial and error, but I think if I use the agave with the right kinds of desserts, it will be seamless (she said while her yearly holiday cookie recipients gasped in horror.)

And our house is officially on the market. I am so relieved. Even if it doesn't sell soon, and I sure hope it does, I never thought we could get it together to do this. On the downside of things, along with the stress of the last 2 weeks, I am 99% sure I broke my toe. It was a stair episode. It's so blackish blue now, and unlike the previously mentioned wart, it's something I really should take a photo of. Some might suggest using this toe injury as a reason for me to slow down, no? Sometimes I think I should write all my blog posts as if English is my second language. As weird affectations go, it's one of my faves.

public service announcement

We are still up to our ears in boxes and pretending we always live in a half empty very clean house—but I had to post because I felt absolutely compelled to share with you this crazy witch-y folk remedy for removing a wart that works so well, it's almost making me mad.

Sadie has had a huge wart of her finger for almost 2 years. It's really been bugging her and freezing it off didn't work and it freaked her out and we just didn't know what to do—so after a few failed attempts with other remedies, we did nothing. Then I read somewhere, I have no clue where, that if you put a little bit of cotton soaked with apple cider vinegar on the wart and cover it with a band-aid overnight for a week or so, it will slowly turn black and then go away. Seriously, after one night of this it turned black—and now after 4 days it's half the size and is dry and just shriveling up. I heard it hurt at little at first, but she says it doesn't at all. My god, I can't believe it. It is almost gone now, so I figure it will be totally gone soon. I just had to share this.

I was going to post a photo, but I think a close-up of a half-dried up wart might be pushing it, even with my current state of mind.

Okay, back to crazy-ville. Thanks much for all your e-mails, awesome people.

a ripe tomato will clean the hands after paring fruit.

Innocently cruising around the computer machine just now, when I should be asleep, I stumbled onto this site, Feeding America, which is a project from Michigan State University Library and the MSU Museum. It looks like it has been around awhile, but is totally new to me. They have digitized 75 vintage American cookbooks form their very large collection, available to view or download as PDFs. This site is like some sort of evil drug for me.

Sigh. This almost hurts. It's not just the recipes that kill me, it's the book titles, writing style, and eclectic homemaking subjects. Throw in the old-timey layouts and beautiful fonts—I have a neck cramp and eye strain from staring at the screen too long.

These images are all from this amazing site, where you too can learn to make a mock turtle soup, if you have four pounds of meat, and a calf's head. Also, don't miss in medicinal tips, you can make a bacon bandage for a sore throat. And did you know old wallpaper may be cleaned by rubbing with a loaf of stale bread?

Come on! How rad is this?? I am at a loss for words.

*tip—When using your precious time looking at these books (if you don't want to download the very big PDFs), you can type in the exact page number you want to view in the URL line, (at the very end of the address) so you don't have to click through every page of the book. Look at the book's table of contents to give you a sense of where to skip to.

crackers.

I really liked these homemade wheat thins. The girls didn't like them. Sadie said they were too "wheaty" and Delia didn't say much. Baby liked them. Grammie loved them, and so do I. Sadie reminded me that she doesn't really like wheat thins, she likes golden rounds (TJ's version of Ritz), so they were kind of a bust. But I do really like them. They are better slightly brown, which is easier to control in the toaster oven. When they brown up, they go really fast, so you have to watch them. What's not to like here? They are basically a pie crust. Yum. I used honey instead of sugar. The recipe is here. I want to try other kinds of crackers, but if the girls don't eat them, I will probably lay off, since lord knows I don't need to snack on them all day. There are other very tempting recipes for crackers, and 100s of other amazing baked goods at the King Arthur Flour site (but for some reason they didn't have the wheat thin recipe I used from their cookbook, hence the first link.)

We are on about month 2 of not buying boxed/bagged/highly-processed food -- snacks or otherwise. There are exceptions, like pasta, but boxed cereal, crackers, snacks, all that -- gone. It's been pretty painless really. It's one of those things that just happened, without a lot of thought. I talked to a few friends who mentioned they stopped buying boxed cereal and snack food for their kids, I read Micheal Pollen's book (interesting comments on this post, BTW) and I realized that my eldest child would never try new foods if cereal/crackers were in the house as a option. So we stopped, and wow, it's so much nicer, less expensive and better all around. She is still slow try new foods, but is trying, and I can't tell you how good it feels to have only food in our kitchen. Not boxes.

I'm having fun making all this stuff and I am motivated by curiosity not by guilt. I like thinking about food and how I feed my family, but dang, there is so much money to be made out there by people telling us we are doing something wrong/unhealthy (and Micheal Pollen is the first to admit that), so while this is all fun and good, I try not to get too weird about it. Less refined sugar, more fruit and veggies, no more boxed cereal, and more homemade food. I can dig that. We have our CSA box and I feel good about trying to shop local but really, I need my walk and my time to chill out as a person. That's the big thing, 'cause who cares if my kids eat organic what-all if I am a freaky mom stressing out about all this stuff, you know? I do what I can. I think they will remember laughing growing up, not the snack food, or lack thereof.

This was supposed to be about crackers.

**update! what the heck do we eat for breakfast? A ton of different stuff-please add your favorites in the comments as well! And, we are lucky in that we have no food allergies of any kinds, so this might not work for everyone. The key for us to to bake a larger batch of things and have them ready in the freezer or fridge. Also, yogurt on homemade granola is just as fast as milk on boxed cereal:

-Homemade muffins. I make a batch on the weekend and freeze them, take them out the night before and they are thawed by morning, The kids eat them for a mid-day snack too, as well as the husband for a super quick breakfast. Pumpkin is the favorite, but they are all loved. You can use all kinds of healthy stuff and make them with butter if you want to avoid canola oil.
-Pancakes and waffles. I make them from scratch—so easy! And you can customize the flour/spices crazy style. I make them once a week, freeze the extra and toast them during the week.
-Crepes, just like above, only I keep them in the fridge and just toss them on the griddle to reheat them.
-Cooked oatmeal and a ton of it. With yogurt, milk, fruit, whatever.
-Homemade granola with milk, yogurt, etc.
-Eggs, we eat a lot of eggs, and the whole high cholesterol/eggs thing has been disputed. . .I don't worry about the kids or myself eating too many eggs. My numbers are very low and our family physician is down with it.
-Peanut butter toast and apple sauce on the side. Most popular breakfast in our house by far.
-Smoothies or just fruit
-Desserts like bread pudding/pie/rice pudding. I find these too heavy to eat after a meal, but make a perfect breakfast. No one complains.
-Really good bread and jam. This is my favorite breakfast. Also muesli.
-Porridge made of grains, like quinoa, wheat berries, millet, etc. They all taste good with honey and spices, I cook them just like oatmeal, or save a bit if I am making the grains for dinner the night before. You can search these online and find oodles of recipes.

homemade Bánh mì

We are pretty obsessed with Bánh mì. We live in a part of town were you can get these Vietnamese/French style sandwiches anywhere and they are very addictive and usually under $3. Chase it with mango bubble tea or a sweetened iced coffee and you are in heaven. It's like a lovely fresh salad on a baguette. A few years back when Pete worked at home we bought about 2 a day. We have reduced our intake significantly since then, which is probably good.

Our go-to place recently changed owners and we just aren't feeling the love like we used to—so I made some at home, realizing we had everything we needed in the house. The traditional baguette for a Bánh mì is made with rice flour, making them wonderfully crunchy and light. We only had a normal French style baguette, but it was dang tasty nonetheless. I split it, lightly toasted it, and chopped up a little cucumber, carrot, cilantro, and jalapeno.

These are usually made with pork, but you can order tofu versions too, which is what I wanted to recreate. I added up firm tofu that I soaked in a rice vinegar/soy sauce/garlic-chili sauce marinade while I chopped up the veggies.

The special ingredient in my book is a good aioli, so I made one from scratch. I actually have serious mayonnaise aversions and always hated the stuff until I started making my own. This came about because we never used it, so I never had any on hand. When I needed some I had to make a special trip to the store. But, we always have eggs and olive oil, salt and pepper, a little lemon juice and Dijon mustard and garlic—so there you go. I feel I should write a lot more words about the glorious homemade aioli experience but I am in a room with yelling children. It tastes really good—I can type that much. It's really worth the extra 5 minutes it takes in the cuisinart. I use a recipe very similar to this one. Sometimes I add chopped herbs to it to make it all fancy. It lasts for about a week.

The sandwich.

Good stuff. Next up on my list of random things I want to make from scratch are ketchup and crackers (not to be eaten together) which I still haven't tried yet.

**Update. My dear friend (mariko) who has a propensity to remind me of my white girl status has pointed out the veggies need to be pickled. Yes, they sure do—in a rice vinegar type thing. It tastes way better that way. But dang, man—I needed to make these right away. So, this is sort of honky version.

I am tired today. I am having a mommy day. All I feel like I do is clean up food. Food that is half eaten, on the floor, and is disgusting. I have food on me, on my clothes, in my car, and probably in my hair. I love my baby, but, dang. Grammie assures me this is by far my messiest baby, so that makes me feel better, because I really don't remember this with the other girls. There have been more broken bowls and glasses in this house in the last week than ever. Since I got rid of all the plastic last year, it's been great, but baby is stronger now and sort of a chucker—so I am off to find some little enamelware bowls and cups because this is getting sort of crazy. Of course the older girls sit like sweet little old ladies using their china and having a tea party with their little cloth napkins for every meal (seriously.) making the crazy gorrilla baby antics even funnier. That baby. And have I mentioned before that both older girls have British accents? I know. People comment on it a lot. They are that strong. It's odd and mildly weird, but I love it. I blame the numerous books on tape they have with British narrators and not my personal speaking style. Ahem. (I am not Britney/Madonna, I swear!)

jane's book and golden syrup

I have had the pleasure of reading Jane Broket's book,The Gentle Art of Domesticity: Stitching, Baking, Nature, Art & the Comforts of Home the last few days and can't come up with a better description than it makes me feel comforted. Comforted that such pleasure can be derived from the simple things in life and comforted that I know she wouldn't think it's odd I photograph my dinner before I serve it to my family.

We know Jane from her superb blog, yarnstorm. This book came out last year, but it was only in the UK and now we have the new US edition—with a different cover, cooking conversions, and a few anglo-references footnoted, which is funny and enlightening. Jane's style of writing is so appealing to me. I love this book—it's not a craft book, or a cooking book, but a mixture of the two, with reading recommendations, favorite movies, art history (seriously) and thoughts about creativity and color and texture thrown in. I've been enjoying yarnstorm for a long time now, so it is all warm and familiar. I am totally biased, but I can't recommend this book enough.

So, last night in a fit of Anglophile coziness, I bought some golden syrup (easily purchased locally at New Seasons and maybe Cost Plus?) and made the golden flapjacks from her book today. The golden syrup, (not in a tin, but in a jar—at least stateside) is so tasty. I am waiting for them to cool now. It's like making a toffee with oatmeal added, so I really can't rush the cooling process. I know because I just burnt my fingers. Jane is giving away 5 copies of her lovely hardbound book on her blog, so check it out. Congrats, Jane!

homemade paneer (cheese)

A few of my good friends are into yogurt/cheese making and have been getting me pretty excited about it. It's so nice when I can talk to friends about this stuff—not just look on-line/read books and then bend Pete's ear about it (he's so great at listening, but you know, I am talking about making cheese here). I started making yogurt right after Sadie was born about 5 years ago, but eventually stopped because I wasn't thrilled with it. This was back when I wasn't using whole milk and I think that had a lot to do with why I didn't love the result. Milk and cheese seem to be in my head again (making yogurt this week). I made some paneer cheese for the first time the other night and it was like some wonderful magic trick. Or science experiment. I had made yogurt cheese before, just straining yogurt, which is thrilling in itself (so creamy, thick and wonderful) but that's it. I got my recipe from this amazing book Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian. There are so many recipes, how-tos, and even videos on-line for making just paneer alone —it's mind boggling, just do a google search, but know this recipe from this book is perfect. Not too many words (no photos) just simple and clear.

I used an organic low-heat pasteurized non-homogenized whole milk (this was Straus milk for all you local folks, I need to try it with Noris milk) which was convenient because that's what I had on hand and it made a lovely cheese. I wouldn't make it with anything else (unless I got my hands on some good raw milk) so I can't vouch for this recipe if you use a normal low fat supermarket milk. Along with the milk, all you need is vinegar.

Bring 4 cups of milk to a boil then add 2-3 tablespoons vinegar and stir. The whey separates immediately, it's pretty cool. Then strain through a cloth (with a colander underneath) you get the curds. A cheese making friend reminded me to keep the whey to add to soups, etc, 'cause there's good stuff in there.

Twist up the cloth, press with a cutting board on top (this was all in the sink) and after 3 minutes it becomes a solid. Well, a soft solid, similar to a tofu block. Here it is trimmed up pretty. I tossed it cubed up in a curry along with green peas and had a party in my mouth.

So, I love this. I love paneer and had a hard time finding it, I never realized how easy it is to make and how good it is fresh. The only thing is 4 cups of milk is a lot to use for anything makes very little cheese, like this piece here is not a whole lot bigger than a business card (with some scraps on the side). It also needs to be eaten right away I think, which is no big deal because the whole process took about 7 minutes. So, it's wonderful, but uses up a lot of milk. I am getting a cheese book out of the library soon. Thanks to holly for the tip in my comments to this cheesemaking site, very cool resource.

lip balm and a sweater

We ran out of lip balm so we made some yesterday.

Actually, we lost the lip balm. I don't know where it is and neither do they, so that's why we made more. I had the ingredients handy from the deodorant. Which, by the way, is still working great. It seems to work best on a slightly damp armpit, to minimize the drag, and it still doesn't stop the sweating (I wear too much black to notice) but smell-wise, it's still a winner.

edit—I got all my supplies, including the sweet little tin, at mountain rose herbs. Just type in tins in the search area. They have a ton of packaging items.

This batch is a teaspoon of cocoa butter, a teaspoon of shea butter, a teaspoon of almond oil, a little vitamin E oil and about 15 drops of sweet orange essential oil. I melted it all and poured it in the tin. I had to put it in the fridge to get it to set up, but the next morning it was perfect and has been out all day and isn't too soft. In the past, I made this with just beeswax and almond oil, with no butters at all, but I like this batch much better.

Unrelated, I got the new j.crew and am totally going to add lace, a ruffle, or some sort of trim to a sweater to copy this way cute number they have. I'm not sure I will add anything at the bottom, though. And will it just scratch my neck? The baby won't like it and she will make it all foody. Oh, the issues.

it's been a long week.

Not a bad week but—but a long week.

Deadlines have been met and it's all good, but I am tired. I was hit by a bad sugar craving wednesday and on the way through the kitchen to the backyard made these in a foggy daze. They are crushed up cereal pieces stirred into 1/2 a bag of melted chocolate chips with a bit of salt and then scooped into mini muffin cups. They hardened in the fridge and then went in my mouth for the next few days, making me both happy and ill, depending on the time of day. Thank god they are gone now. This batch made way more than I thought it would. I saw something similar here but just made this up during my stupor. Can't really do it wrong, you know. She calls them Homemade Cereal Bonbons. I call them Day Wreckers.

And then there was the neighborhood fire that involved 6 fire trucks this week. This is from my back door. So that there is 6 firemen hacking away at the roof of a house, behind our house. Like, a house that shares our property line. Much excitement. No one was injured. We were all outside when the area filled up with smoke. The whole event caused much discussion among the girls and much reenactment. And lots of talk about sirens and smoke and some dramatic asthma-like attacks, that kind of thing.

Tabbouleh

Tabbouleh is a standard summer dish around here.

So good and so easy. I use Ina's recipe as a place to start, but it changes a little every time I make it. I always add feta.

But hold the phone! Even though these photos show bulghur, I just made this again 2 days ago with quinoa instead and it was even better! So, this is my new favorite way to make it, for sure. I use this quinoa, no rinsing needed.

Hey, thanks for all the gadget suggestions! Now I have some new ones I must try out. Totally unrelated, I saw this new press-on eyeshadow and am totally freaked out by it, yet strangely fascinated. It's so star trek. If I did competitive ballroom dancing I would totally be rockin' this look. I like to plan these things, just in case.

my indispensable kitchen gadget list

 

To avoid making this the longest post ever (I already have that covered) I'm going to try and use brevity. A few things: These items are the exact items I have. There are so many different models out there, but I can only vouch for these. There might be better kinds—I have no idea. I love these tools. Love them to death. They are an unexpected love. I wouldn't have thought they would become so important when we first met. The typical life improving gadets like a Kitchen Aid mixer, Cuisinart, coffee grinder—all that, I have not included in this round up.

First up, the apple peeler slicer. Peels, cuts, and slices apples for pie and crisp in the wink of an eye. Just make sure the apples are fresh and firm. Outstanding. The pineapple cutter. Yeah. I LOVE this goofy thing. I use it so much one might be worried about my pineapple consumption. I have almost sliced my hand off cutting pineapple. Never again. And last here, the butter pot, so I can keep fresh butter on the counter all the time. I have already mentioned these items in other posts, so you know how much they mean to me.

Whip cream whipper. Again, this has already been blogged about. Dangerous love. I probably should not admit how much this gets used. The hand blender is the only way I blend soups and sauces. We haven't had a normal blender in 5 years. And the salad spinner. Some people don't have salad spinners. I didn't a long time ago—just a lot of wet towels. I don't know what I was thinking.

Tongs. Wow. How did I ever live without these? I use them for everything. The superb zester is for lemon/lime/orange zest and grating nutmeg and ginger. Parchment paper—the only way I don't swear when I bake.

Cast iron grill/griddle and grill press. The grill press is for making panini. The griddle stays on the stove top at all times, which I have mentioned before. I have to say no to teflon (we lost a lovebird to teflon smoke poisoning years ago, have I mentioned this before?) and since I can't find a panini press in the world that doesn't have a non-stick/teflon coating, this combo is wicked phat. And last in this row, the mandoline, which has increased my our veggie consumption 10-fold. It's the crazy thin slices that do it.

Cookie dough scoop.I get a lot of compliments on my baking, which is rad, but it's not me, it's my tools. I mean it. I feel like a cookie making robot when I use this scoop, which is thrilling. A mesh drain!! Seriously, my favorite on this page. Am I insane? Well, yes, after years of fighting with my drain because it always plugged when I wanted it to let water pass though. My life has been greatly improved by a little mesh drain thingy for under 5 bucks. And, lastly, my beloved, kick-bootie turner. I can get any cookie/pancake off with this, no matter how thin, stubborn, or delicate. I can't live without it.

Okay, surely there will be a second round, (including our little pepper grinder!) but this is it so far.  Please share your favorite kitchen gadgets! I get a ridiculous amount of joy from of tools that make life easier and/or more pleasing.

grilled zucchini

So, I was making some grilled zucchini for dinner tossed with a little olive oil, fancy salt, and parmesan as a side dish, and ate all of it myself. Oops. I didn't feel bad because no one likes grilled zucchini as much as except maybe baby (because she is a baby). She loves flavors of the salty variety, and who can blame her? I'm laughing looking at these plates. They are from Pottery Barn circa 1992—our first "real" dishes from when we shacked up at 19 years old. So sweet.

I cooked the zucchini on that griddle/grill thing that I referenced in this post. I have been thinking about how much enjoyment I get out of my favorite kitchen tools. I think I will post a list soon. I love sharing kitchen tool/gadget love and hearing about friend's favorites.

We have a lot more zucchini in the CSA box this week. Good thing there are over 500 recipes for it here.
 

peas and other items

Peas. This was from a few weeks back—I don't even know what we did with them. I think they went in a salad? Or a frittata/quiche thing. But they were good. And the small hands love to shell 'um.

3 new items on the stuff-about-me list:

-I was flattered to be asked for 5 craft blog links over on Venus Zine, so I gave them some along with a random out of focus photo of myself which I was hoping would come of as arty, but I think it's just comes off as out of focus. I have been reading the Crafting a Business with Jenny Heart articles over there and they are really awesome. So much information, really and truly—I can't believe how deep she delves into so many complicated topics.

-I was interviewed a for this nice apron article over on Her Times. Thanks Erica!

-I am super excited to see my barrette/pouch project in the glossy pages of the newest Sew Simple magazine (Volume 10). There's a ton of quick and easy sewing projects in this issue, check it out!

3 words.

Rhubarb hand pie.

I want to write on and on about how good these are but I will come off as sounding weird. Pete and I had them for dinner last night (and breakfast before that) and for dessert just now. The kids don't give a hoot about these, thank god. Pete and I are just getting, um, totally insane about them. We are splitting the last one now. We have declared them to be the best fruit/pie combo ever. We keep having the same ridiculous conversation, "These are so good! I can't believe how good these are. . ." It's almost boring, and yet it's true!

These leaked juice like crazy so if you make them, bake them on parchment paper and use another sheet in the rack below to catch the juice. I used the apple galette crust recipe from my cheat sheet and for the filling combined 4 cups chopped rhubarb, 1 cup sugar, 4 tablespoons flour, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon. I doubled the batch of everything because grammie got such amazing rhubarb at the farmers market. What I just listed above is for a single batch. Bake for 15 minutes at 425 degrees, then 25 min at 350 degrees.

Add a hot cup of coffee and we think it's a complete meal.

nothing better than new art supplies

Before it felt like summer here (like all of last week) we got some new art supplies to play with. These wood heads on the pencils don't do anything special, but they sure look cute, which is enough.

We also got these rock crayons.

Here's a color sampling. These all came from Stubby Pencil Studio which sells non-creepy art supplies for kids, which is great for so many reasons—especially for the baby crayon eater in the house. My personal favorites are the wood pencil that is a eco-highlighter, the triangular pencils from reforested wood, the watercolor crayons, the rock crayons, and the soy crayons. Oh, and the pencils in that first photo. So, pretty much everything they have. I think I am more excited by these things than the kids are.

homemade deodorant (yup.)

I realize not everyone wants to make their own deodorant. It probably falls into the category of lollipops for some, and for me, crackers. I just think, "Why?" However, I found myself revisiting the homemade deodorant issue again lately, and here's a few good reasons why; I stink, conventional deodorant ingredients freak me out, the natural stuff rarely works for me, and when I have made my own in the past (using rubbing alcohol or just baking soda, etc.) it's not really done the trick.  Also, I love the way essential oils smell, especially ylang ylang and orange, which are easy to add to my own concoctions.

I thought all my problems were behind me when I started using Lush's aromacreme 2 years ago. I loved this deodorant. It's soft and smells heavenly. But, like many other users, I eventually got a rash. I had to use it less often, finally got sick of the smell, and the other deodorants Lush sells have ingredients I want to avoid.

Plus, I love making body products and get so sick of reading ingredients and worrying about all that. I also wanted to make my own because I thrive on the Stick-It-To-The-Man feeling I get when I don't have to buy basic necessities that most people assume you have to buy, you know? I find it thrilling.

And recently I have been curious about making crackers, go figure.

So, using the aromacreme texture as a goal, I made my own. I had recently bought and used Florere, which is also a cream deodorant and it's perfectly good—it just doesn't smell amazing. It's also a bit grainy. Here's what I ended up mixing together for this batch:

3 Tablespoons shea butter
3 Tablespoons baking soda
2 Tablespoons corn starch
2 Tablespoons cocoa butter
2 vitamin E oil gel caps (puncture and squeeze out the oil)
Essential Oil (I used ylang yang and orange)

I melted all the ingredients (except the oils) and gave it a good stir. This only took about 30 seconds in the microwave. Then added the oils, stirred again, and poured it in a jar, then placed it in the fridge to set. This recipe filled the jar in my hand, which is a 1/4 pint.

I bought the cocoa butter and shea butter here.  I'm on week 3 and it works so well, I am stunned. When it's cold in the bathroom, it's not as smooth, but the warmth from my fingers softens it up enough to spread on. On hot days the texture is perfect. I can scoop a little bit out of the jar, roll it into a pea-sized ball, and rub it in. I am very very happy with it. I found other recipes online for cream deodorants that have beeswax, vegetable glycerin—all kinds of combos.

It smells wonderful. I had to add a bit more essential oil than you think—shea butter smells strong, not bad, just shea butter-y. If you try this I would highly recommend splitting ingredients with a friend and having a I'm Not A Dirty Hippie party, otherwise you'll end up with a lot of ingredients that could spoil in a year or so. In the next batch I think I will add a little vegetable glycerin to make it softer.

So, next up, homemade toothpaste. I know you can just use baking soda and water, but I also want to try it with a flavor and make it into a paste.

Oh! To report back: I am on month 2 of no shampoo but only baking soda and apple cider vinegar rinse. More info here. And I forgot to mention, I haven't used shampoo on the girls' hair in about 2 years. I know this sounds insane, but the soapy bath water has always been enough. I really hate worrying about soap in their eyes and their hair is always clean and not greasy because I've never used shampoo that has stripped the oils from their hair to begin with. I swear, this is why. I'm just saying. I'm not sure why I didn't make this connection when shampooing my own hair, but I didn't until this latest baking soda kick I have been on.

Occasionally now I do use baking soda and vinegar on them (it's so great because there is no lather to worry about) but usually it's still just a good rise with the bath water. The baking soda is easy to just mix and pour carefully on their heads, but the vinegar I have to dilute a TON and then add essential oil so it smells good, otherwise they freak out. I have a bottle with a spray mister so I can just spritz on the acv and rise. They don't even notice. Sadie's hair is getting quite long, and the vinegar really helps with tangles, so this is awesome. Both girls have very different types of hair, and so far so good. I swear they aren't the stinky kids!

**update: some answers to questions (And thank so much for all the great info you all are leaving! woot!)

-Is the deodorant white or clear? sort of both. Goes on white-ish and gets clear-ish later. I haven't really tested it sleeveless. Does is really work? Yes, for me it does, but you know that's just me—we all react different to this type of stuff, but yes, I can tell you after 3 weeks of using it: 100% NO STINK. Will it keep you dry? absolutely not. I sweat buckets and always have, so I am used to it. How long will it last? Probably 2-3 months, possibly more. I would probably split the batch next time and keep half in the fridge. Do I like the no shampoo thing? Yes I do, I just got my haircut and was told my hair is in great condition, too. I will tell you, I am not super into hair/hair products, you know what I mean. I love my hair, but spend very little time thinking about it. It's not the way, say, shoes are for me, so my expectations and general level of fussiness about my hair is very low.