Our new bookkeeper brought some fresh eggs for us today. They are so
stinkin' pretty. Why is that? What makes a simple egg so appealing? I had to snap some pictures.
I would love to keep chickens at some point. Now I have someone I can go
to with my chicken questions, as well as my accounting. Checks and
chickens. This bookkeeper is a keeper.
We love to cook. Isaac is especially talented at putting together
savory recipes. I'm petitioning him to write some of these down so I can
share them with you.
One fun product I discovered recently is freeze-dried garlic. When we
neglect to replenish our fresh garlic stash, freeze-dried garlic comes
to the rescue. When reconstitued, I've found it to be much more
flavorful and enjoyable than garlic powder—which really doesn't seem
that garlicky to me in the first place. And it stores in the cupboard
with the other spices. We have tried keeping packets of fresh garlic in
the fridge, but we don't have an easy time remembering that they are
there.
Have you ever tried this stuff? Do you have a secret ingredient I
need to know about? Almond extract makes magic when added to cherry pie
filling and we just started experimenting with Chipotle powder. Along
with smoked paprika, lime, and freeze-dried onions, Chipotle powder makes a
great base for vegetable dip.
Breakfast, my one weakness.
Here's a fun breakfast recipe. Make an omelet inside of a
roll—sourdough rolls are the best. And bake them in the oven till the
eggs are set.
Yum. But what to call this deliciousness? It's begging for a cheeky
name. Egg in a Nest. Bird in a Basket. Eggy-Breadlets. What would you
call an egg in a nest that didn't result in a bird, but a delicious
breakfast? Or is that gross?
These are things I should probably work out before posting. I should
just declare the recipe name with bravado. Chick in a Tub. Chub in a
Tub. Chubby Tubbers. Ranchy Scramblers.
But I have better things to do than deciding recipe names—like brainstorming
recipe names. Brainstorming is much more fun than deciding. On-a-Roll
Breakfast Breads. Rockin' Rolls. Rolly Pollos. Huevos Nuevos.
Fun in a Bun. Egg in your Face. Ooo, I like that one.
Saucers. Disks. Pucks. All good words to build on…
…while I snarf down another Scram-bowl.
Elijah's friend, Clint, had shoulder surgery last week, a few days before his 16th birthday. He dove through a waterfall and the force of the water did the damage. Isn't that crazy?
My car was at the mechanic's, so I rode my bike to the store for his supplies. It took some clever stacking to fit everything into the basket, with the cold cream cheese packed neatly around the chocolate to keep it from melting in the intense Arizona heat.
As the old saying goes, "If you're going to spend the day baking cheesecake, make two." So I doubled the shopping list.
Okay. There's no old saying. But there should be.
Elijah's first time baking cheesecake was tied to the bullying incident I posted about last April. He has since baked a lot of pies, but not many cheesecakes. In fact, I regret not designing a little Summer of Pie keepsake book for him, cataloging the various pies he baked last summer. Truth was, his pies were always finished in the evenings, then decimated by morning. Attack of the pie people. Not ideal for photography.
This time he went for layered Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecakes with Oreo crusts. And he pulled them off perfectly. One cake went to Clint's birthday party and the other has been slowly disappearing from our fridge, one sliver at a time—it might be more fattening than bacon.
Clint is one lucky kid—though perhaps not when it comes to waterfalls.
We brought home 15 lbs of apples, half of which made their way into Father's Day breakfast. The remaining apples are still sitting on the counter in a basket, begging for attention. I'm trying to decide between apple pie, apple tart and apple muffins.
Isaac is still teasing me over our apple-picking adventure. He gets a kick out of the fact that we went apple-picking down the road eventhough we have a tree loaded with these same apples in our own backyard.
With my own tree to harvest as well, it looks I'm going to need more apple recipes. Send me your favorites or post a link. These are all Anna apples which can best be described as a mix between Granny Smith and Golden Delicious. They are great for baking. Help!
Our Saturday Morning Breakfast Tradition reached new heights today—french toast with powdered sugar, vanilla bean ice cream and chocolate. The bar has not only been raised, it has floated off into the blue, blue sky.
It worked! Here is my successful first attempt at homemade greek yogurt.
It's empowering to know how to make basic foods like this. In college, I studied up on bread-making and learned all about yeasts, starters and grains while relaxing at the pool on weekends. Making yogurt gave me that same earthy, homey feeling as baking freshly-ground-whole-wheat bread with honey. I could hear Bob Dylan singing Mr. Tambourine Man in my mind as I tied the yogurt up in several layers of cheese cloth to let the whey strain out into a wooden bowl. Hippy-dippy happiness.
Last night, I discovered that a sprinkling of brown sugar along with the raspberries hits the bullseye. I like a lightly-sweetened vanilla yogurt (nearly plain) with a swirl of honey or brown sugar—so there are bursts of sweetness to contrast with the natural flavor of the yogurt. Prepared this way, yogurt can serve as a sophisticated, healthy dessert.
Another favorite way to enjoy yogurt is with a drizzle of honey and a scoop of muesli. I swirl everything together and then wait a few minutes for the muesli to absorb a slight bit of moisture from the yogurt.
I thought about donning my Birkenstocks and loading up my VW Bus with yogurt samples to share at the next Grateful Dead concert. But then the fog cleared and I realized that I don’t have Birkenstocks, nor a VW bus, and The Grateful Dead are long-gone.
Last night, while winding down for sleep, I got a hankering to try making homemade Greek yogurt. I looked at various devices for a few minutes online before going to bed—there are several yogurt-making machines with appealing little glass jars.
I'm pretty sure I will want to strain the yogurt to thicken it, so a bunch of little containers probably won't work for me. So, instead of jumping in feet-first and ordering equipment I may not want or need, then waiting for it to arrive, I'm making a test batch with a crock pot while I work from home today. The name of the game is temperature management as far as I can tell and that only requires a good thermometer, a towel, and a gentle way to heat things back up—hence, the crock pot.
I'll let you know how it goes. I have several design projects going at once right now, so I can't afford to give the Yogurt Experiment my full attention. If I screw up, I lose a half gallon of milk and a couple of tablespoons of yogurt to the adventure. If I succeed, I manage to learn something new and squeeze a little extra fun into my day without losing pace on my design calendar.
Come to think of it, I get the learning and the fun whether I succeed or not. Well hey!
Cultures for Health has a fantastic, free PDF on yogurt-making. Sign up for their newsletter (gray box on right side of page) and they'll email you a free copy. I've only had time to skim over it, but I can't imagine this 79-page guide doesn't cover it all, top to bottom, raw milk to soy milk, acidophilus to thermophilus and back again. It looks pretty biblical.
I have THE best lemon tree. It produces footballs. Juicy, tasty footballs. And when it is hung with a full crop of fruit, fragrant blooms pop all over it again for the next crop of lemons.
My parents stayed with us all last month. The lemon tree might have been the main draw — seriously. My mother grew up in Arizona, eating fresh lemons with salt as a warm-weather snack. Salt — not sugar. My mom can't get enough of them. Can't say enough about them either. "This is the craziest lemon tree!" "I want a lemon tree like yours." Lemons, lemons, lemons. I can't even pucker up to try this treat.
I'm content to drown my food in lemon juice – salad, vegetables, fish, spaghetti, sandwiches. My siblings are the same way. Lemon on everything. I think it's genetic. If it weren't for my dad's genes mixed in there as well, we'd all be eating salt-lemons like my mom. And there's lemonade too, of course.
Thank goodness for modern toothpaste.
I might have to learn how to propagate this crazy tree and adopt out its offspring as family gifts. I should name the mama tree first — and put together a lemony recipe collection. Any favorites? Elijah had big success with a lemon-glazed pound cake a couple of weeks ago.
I’ll take any excuse to whip up some sugar-coated sugar. Of course, for Valentine’s Day no justification is needed. That’s what makes it a holiday right?
Or is it love?
Something like that.
This year Charlotte and I did a little Lucy & Ethel. We put on our aprons and our disposable food-gloves and cranked out the candy. We used a favorite Christmas Mints recipe to make Valentine hearts. Really the easiest recipe — three ingredients, plus food coloring. Normally, we just roll each mint into a ball and press it flat with a fork, a la peanut butter cookies.
This was my first go with the candy molds and they worked perfectly. Now to keep an eye out for a good Easter mold – not too big though – I like these mints small. Imagine pink, yellow, green, & blue bunnies. And if we’re not too sugared out come July, we could put together some red, white, & blue stars — but only if there is a party going on — this is a lot of sweet — definitely a great treat to share with a group.
Christmas Mints / Valentine Mints
Easter Mints / Anytime Mints
1 pkg cream cheese, 8 oz.
2 lbs. powdered sugar
1/2 tsp. mint extract
food coloring
Let cream cheese soften in bowl for 15-20 minutes. Mix in powdered sugar gradually. When a third of the sugar has been mixed in, add mint extract and food coloring. Knead* mixture till coloring is consistent throughout, then gradually knead in remaining powdered sugar. Roll into 3/4″ balls. Toss in fine sugar & press with fork to flatten. Chill mints in freezer to cool. Refridgerate till served.
Candy Mold Option: Toss in sugar before pressing mint into mold for an easy release from mold. Chill mints thoroughly before releasing from mold.
* Disposable, food-prep gloves recommended. Otherwise, scrub your hands really well, as recipe requires a lot of kneading.
