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It’s been raining constantly here so I’m in the middle of a few small projects. Unfortunately I have nothing to show yet but that’s no reason to hoard links and little updates.
- I’ve never been a huge mayonnaise fan. Again, the tanginess. Blech. But I do enjoy potato salad now and then so I picked up Hellman’s with Olive Oil due to it’s non-scary ingredients list. This stuff is delicious. It’s so creamy I could almost stir it in to my tea. Highly recommended.
- My new favourite show is Hung. O.k., that’s a total lie. While I do enjoy Jane Adams as a pimp my actual new favourite show is Gossip Girl. I started watching it when Chris was on nights and I am now obsessed to the point where I have to limit myself to sharing two to three GG related tidbits a day. Do you know how hard it is to work the fact that Ed Westwick is actually British into a conversation? Not very, apparently. I feel like a fifteen year old fan girl. Except that I tried desperately to convince my sixteen year old sister to watch the show so that I’d have someone to talk to about it and she was having none of it.
- These cinnamon oat pancakes are my new favourite breakfast. I never want to eat a plain pancake again. Waste of my time. They make a ton so I’ve been cooking them all up, freezing them, and heating them up during the week.
- I borrowed a pile of books from the Cannon Public Library, informally known as Erin and Braden’s guest bedroom and I’m plowing my way through them. I first read Cat’s Cradle, which was good, although none of his other books ever bowl me over like Slaughterhouse 5 did when I read it in university. Next, I tried Switch Bitch despite concerns that it would crush all of my childhood memories but I totally loved it. I filled my Amazon Wish List with other Dahl short story books and can’t wait to pick some up. Now, I’m finally reading The Golden Compass after hearing so much about His Dark Materials for so many years. I had already seen the movie so I was a bit bored at first but now I’m enjoying it. Hooray for summer reading! What are you reading?
- Mashed potatoes are one of my ultimate all time favourite foods. I thought I was doing an o.k. job whipping them up without a recipe so I let this one languish for months in my recipe bookmarks. I am totally kicking myself now. A-mazing.
- My dearest Robyn has a new blog. Check it!
- I am way behind on this one but if you’re interested in quilting or are a beginner like me you must check out Oh, Fransson’s quilt-along posts. So very helpful.
- I just found out that Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band have announced that they will play Born to Run in it’s entirety in Chicago in September. I wish there some way to be unemployed for the summer and still get paid so I could go lose my mind with a large assembly of WASPy, middle aged, working class heroes.
- And, because I hate a pictureless post, here’s one of the paper banner I made for Chris a few weeks back:
The grocery store here is closed on Sundays but yesterday I found myself running a little low on supplies but still needing to make a meal. As I’ve mentioned before, my self-generated recipes mostly fall neatly in the dud category so I am both intrigued and repelled by the idea of not using a recipe. It would seem, however that I’m on a bit of a roll because this tart was super delicious.
Why yes that is a huge slice
It would be perfect for a holiday brunch. I know most people don’t have smoked cheddar hanging around their fridge but I had a tiny piece left over from an easter recipe so I threw it on top. It adds a bacon-y smell and flavour that is totally amazing. But really if you don’t have it I’m sure this would still be great. I used a 9 inch round cake pan because I don’t have a tart pan. If you do have a tart pan you may need to shorten the cooking time a bit. As always please do let me know if you try it!
Whole Wheat Crust
1 cup all purpose flour
6 tbsp whole wheat flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp sugar
1/4 cup butter
5 tbsp ice water
Combine dry ingredients. Cut in butter to form course meal. Mix in water until just combined. Form a disk and wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Roll dough into a circle slightly larger than your pan. Slide onto pan, form a double crust and crimp edges. Prick bottom, fill with pie weights (I use dried beans) and bake for 15 minutes. Allow to cool.
Filling
2 potatoes, sliced into 1 cm. disks
salt to taste
pepper to taste
1 tbsp olive oil
1 cup feta
4 eggs
1 cup milk
1/4 tsp cayenne
dash nutmeg
1 package frozen spinach thawed and drained
1/8 cup smoked cheddar
1/8 cup sharp cheddar
Preheat over to 350 degrees. Boil potato slices in salted water until just tender. Drain and toss slices with olive oil, salt and pepper. Layer on bottom of pre-baked pie crust. Sprinkle with even layer of feta. Beat eggs and whisk in milk, additional salt and pepper, cayenne, nutmeg and spinach. Pour over potatoes in crust. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until centre is firm. Remove from oven and sprinkle with smoked and sharp cheddar. Return to oven and cook until cheeses are melted and slightly brown. Serve with sour cream.
A few weeks ago I mentioned this Light Wheat Bread from Smitten Kitchen. Since that initial loaf I have made probably a dozen more. We love it. It’s perfect for toast and sandwiches and croutons and feeling like a great baker. The other night I was readying myself to make another loaf but I had a sudden craving for raisin toast. How great would it be to make your own yummy version of this junk? So, I started with the Smitten recipe, which Deb adapted from The Bread Baker’s Apprentice and came up with this:
The stuff dreams (and breakfast) are made of.
I even attempted a little cinnamon swirl in the middle which you can’t at all see here, but trust me, it’s there. There are many more process pictures and helpful hints and general professional-quality writing over on Deb’s original post. Let me know what you think if you try it and have a great weekend my friends!
Cinnamon Raisin Bread
Makes one 2-lb. loaf
3 cups bread flour
1 cups whole-wheat flour
2 tablespoons brown sugar plus more for swirl
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 tsp cinnamon plus more for swirl
3 tablespoons powdered milk
1 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast
1/2 cup raisins
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups water, at room temperature
1. Stir together the bread flour, whole-wheat flour, brown sugar, salt, powdered milk, cinnamon, and yeast in a 4-quart mixing bowl (or in the bowl of an electric mixer). Add the butter, raisins, and water. Stir (I mix mine on low speed with the paddle attachment) until the ingredients form a ball.
2. Sprinkle bread or whole-wheat flour on the counter, and transfer the dough to the counter, and begin kneading (I always just mix it on medium speed with the dough hook in my Kitchenaid). Kneading should take about 10 minutes (6 minutes by machine). Transfer the dough to an oiled bowl. Cover with a tea towel.
3. Let it rise at room temperature for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, or until the dough doubles in size.
4. Remove the dough from the bowl and press it by hand into a rectangle about 3/4 inch thick, 6 inches wide, and 8 to 10 inches long. Sprinkle with a dusting of cinnamon and a light dusting of brown sugar. You don’t want too much – it’s not a cinnamon roll. Form it into a loaf by working from the short side of the dough, rolling up the length of the dough and pinching roll tight. Place the loaf in a lightly oiled 8 1/2 by 4 1/2 inch bread pan and cover with a tea towel.
5. Proof at room temperature for approximately 60 to 90 minutes or until the dough crests above the lip of the pan.
6. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F with the oven rack on the middle shelf.
7. Bake for 30 minutes. Rotate the pan 180 degrees and continue baking for 15 to 30 minutes. The finished loaf should sound hollow when thumped on the bottom.
8. When the bread is finished baking, remove it immediately from the loaf pan and cool it on a rack for 2 hours before slicing.
99.99% of my attempts to recreate a beloved restaurant recipe end up as total, abject failures. So, when I tried to unvent two of our very favourite tofu wraps; the Smoked Tofu Wrap from The Manx in Ottawa, and the Twister from Mondragon I had high hopes and low expectations. I am so pleased to announce that it was a total success. My food photography does it absolutely no justice whatsoever:
"I deserve better than this!" ~ delicious tofu
This seems like a lot of steps but they’re really not difficult and most of them take no effort whatsoever.
Southern Baked Smoked Tofu
Step 1: Cut the tofu into 1/2 inch strips. Drain and dry fry the tofu using the method described here. This is really the key to getting the chewy, dare I say meaty texture of restaurant grade tofu.
Step 2: Marinate the tofu. You can really use anything you have on hand to give the tofu some flavour. If you want the smoked flavour make sure to include liquid smoke. I used something like:
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup rice vinegar
2 tbsp. sesame oil
1 tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 tbsp. honey
1/2 tsp. liquid smoked
2 cloves minced garlic
1/2 small chopped onion
Cover and refrigerate for at least half an hour
Step 3: Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Beat an egg with 1 tbsp water. *If you want to keep this recipe vegan you can use just water or a little soy milk or whatever will glue the coating to the tofu.* In a large glass container with a lid or Ziploc freezer bag combine:
1/2 cup panko
1/2 cup flour
2 tbsp. nutritional yeast
1/4 tsp garlic salt or powder
1/4 tsp onion salt or powder
1/2 tsp salt (omit if using garlic and onion salt)
1 tsp. paprika
1/2 tsp. dry mustard powder
cayenne, salt and pepper to taste
Dip the tofu strips in egg, dredge in flour mixture.
Step 4: Coat a large baking sheet with canola or vegetable oil. Spread tofu in an even layer. Bake for 30 minutes, turning occasionally until all sides are brown.
Serve on a flour tortilla with sesame dressing and / or guacamole, lettuce and red onion. Enjoy!
The call that I wanted Stitched in Time for Christmas was heard loud and clear. I received a copy from Chris and another from Erin. No worries because Amazon has a generous return policy.
I’ve been wanting to make a recipe book for our favourite recipes like the one I made my mom and when I saw the instructions in the book for a recipe book cover I knew it would be much neater than my winged version.
Designs traced by taping fabric and print to window
This took me the weekend and the sewing was nothing compared to the embroidery time. I finally took the time to learn to backstitch properly and I’m so proud of the outcome.
I've since fixed the slouchy top
The outside is muslin. The embroidery patterns are from this cute Japanese embroidery book. Lace is from my stash, I think originally from Fabricland.
The lining
The blue fabric is a fat quarter Erin mailed me from Japan when she was still there. The red fabric is some lovely stuff I bought in Japan almost three years ago today. I kind of regret using it because you can’t see it at all once you put the binder in.
Cover
After all that effort I spent much of Sunday afternoon going through my three recipe binders and tossing recipes I had never tried and adding extra special ones to this extra special book. One that will definitely make the cut is this one for fabulous Roast Potatoes.
Unimpressive Leftovers Shot. You have to trust me.
Roast Potatoes
This is a vegetarianized hybrid of a Jamie Oliver and Nigella Lawson recipe.
1 potato per person plus a couple extra for good measure
A few tablespoons Semolina
3/4 cup butter
Fresh Rosemary
1 bulb garlic
Salt
Pepper
Heat over to 450 degrees. Put roasting pan in hot oven to preheat. Meanwhile, slice potatoes into thirds by cutting the ends away at an angle and leaving a triangular centre piece (this is a Nigella trick to mazimize surface area). Parboil potatoes until the ouside is just soft. Drain potatoes and dredge with Semolina. Remove roasting pan from oven and add butter. Return to oven just until butter is melted. Add potatoes, a few sprigs of rosemary with stalks removed and all cloves of garlic, whole. Roast for approximately one hour or until cripsy and brown, shaking from time to time. Season with salt and pepper. Serve with roasted garlic to squeeze onto hot potatoes.
This weekend I watched a whole lotta Food Network holiday shows and did a goodly amount of cooking and baking to match.
I baked Amish White Bread (good, but too much sugar), some blueberry banana muffins for the car ride to Winnipeg tomorrow, these gingerbread:
I used the recipe from the good old Betty Crocker cookbook with a little clementine zest added in and made up my own icing recipe. It was something like a couple tablespoons softened butter and cream cheese, a cup or so of icing sugar, a tablespoon of milk and orange juice each and some nutmeg.
Here are Chris’s:
He had a story to go along with each. Starting at the top middle and going clockwise I believe it was; peg leg pirate, handlebar moustache man, business man with beard, the girl and poindexter with bow tie. Bravo.
Over two years ago my aunt Susan was telling my mom and I about a girl she knew who had made her own Cherry Blossoms. I’m not sure if they’re just a Canadian thing but they’re made by Hershey and they look like this:
My mom and I are huge, HUGE fans of them so we demanded the recipe and then neither of us made them. Until now!
Maybe not so photgenic but soooooo good.
I tweaked the recipe a bit so here she is:
Cherry Blossoms
1 cup – semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/4 cup – chunky peanut butter
1 cup + 1/4 cup – icing sugar
1/4 cup – rice krispies*
12 maracino cherries
reserved cherry juice
Wash a styrofoam egg carton. Melt chocolate and peanut butter in microwave (or double boiler if you’re fancy) for approx 2 minutes, mix until smooth. Add rice krispies to chocolate mixture and add in icing sugar until it becomes a play dough texture (add more as needed). Mould mixture into each individual egg cup and place a cherry in each one. Mix cherry juice with approx 1/4 cup of icing sugar until slightly thick, add a bit to each cherry. Place a chocolate layer on top. Place in freezer until set then thaw until ready to serve.
*the original recipe calls for chopped salted peanuts. I really liked the rice krispies but substitute at will.
This would be PERFECT to make with kids as there is no cooking or hot ingredients at all and it really is like playing with play dough. The moulding the chocolate and parcelling it out evenly is a little tricky but kind of fun!
- Ingrid and I did a little Christmas swap and she sent all kind of fun handmade goodies from my home province, including this beautiful bird ornament:
The pattern is from Martha Stewart and I kept planning on making them but lo and behold Christmas is almost here and I still don’t have any Martha glitter. Ingrid to the rescue! - It is, and has been for the last four day, minus 45 degrees celsius with the wind chill here. When I read about cities in the northwest shutting down for a few snow flurries I laugh. And then I cry a little.
- You must try these apple pancakes. But do add a little cinnamon and vanilla. They taste like apple fritter without all the grease.
- Likewise, do try this Mexican hot chocolate. So good.
- I made Martha’s Mac and Cheese for Chris’s work party Sunday and it was delish. I wouldn’t think that mac and cheese should be such a gamble but I’ve had such a hard time finding a recipe that is flavourful and creamy without Velveeta. This is a keeper.
- Melina kindly sent me this Lush Cynthia Sylvia Stout shampoo to help me deal with our crazy hard water situation. This stuff is amazing. I don’t even need to condition. AND it has two kind of liquor in it. Can’t go wrong.
- I’ve decided that even though it will be a quiet Christmas for us I’m going all out in the food department. Christmas Eve will be various cheesy hors d’oeuvres throughout the day and then on Christmas day we’ll have our favourite nut roast, probably mashed potatoes, I’m going to try this cauliflower gratin, these squash tarts and these rolls. I’m not sure what to make for dessert. We’ve had our share of pies around here lately so I’m thinking maybe a spicey cake, but I’m thinking that might be too heavy. Suggest away!
This weekend was a festive blur. I shopped, baked, sewed, felted, fulled, cooked and passed out at ten o’clock.
It’s killing me but of course I can’t show you some of the output but I do have some projects to share!
On Saturday we drove to the middle of nowhere and walked out to the woods searching for a Christmas tree. Apparently the trees here grow very tall and very thin. At least the trunks can be snipped with nail clippers.
TIM-BER!!!
It doesn’t look so bad all made up.
The ugly blinds will soon be covered by homemade curtains. Thank the lord!
I also refinished an old, ugly media shelf for use in my craft room. Of course I forgot to take a before photo but pictures it: oak melamine with black plastic CD inserts.
Framed paper cut by Erin!
I spray painted it with Krylon in Buttercream and finished it with acrylic spray sealant. The paper backing is washi from Japan mod podged on and also sealed.
It’s the same spray paint I used for my little notions shelf. I think it will look great when I paint the room.
Aaaand I baked another pie.
This is the Sour Cream Apple pie from the brilliant Alicia Paulson. It was tasty although I still think I prefer the recipe from The New Vegitarian Epicure (question: does anyone know the rules for sharing recipes from books? It seems like it would be covered by copywrite but others also seem to do it all the time). I ran out of butter so I made a shortening crust. I think I agree with The Smitten Kitchen in that butter is better – pretty much always. For those of you who, like me, avoided pie making do check out her posts on pie crusts. How was I not aware of her blog until recently? That’s sinful.
I’m supply teaching in another town tomorrow, which may have surpassed getting needles as my least favourite thing to do. Wish me luck!
- Good news! The sock has been reunited with it’s owner. Linda in Ottawa is again in possession of a set. The saga was even included in Ravelry’s Forum Funnies this week.
- Bad news! I have my first sock hole!
It was inevitable really as these were the socks I grafted to within an inch of their life when the yarn was cut into a million pieces. I guess I’ll be doing some darning research. - The new Twist Collective is out and it’s brilliant. There’s hardly a piece I wouldn’t make.
- The Interweave Winter preview is also out. Whatevs.
- I think it’s time for a custom header on this here blog. Only problem is I haven’t a clue as to how to do it. Any suggestions are much appreciated. Please keep in mind I don’t, unfortunately, have Photoshop.
- I’ve been cooking up a storm since there’s little else to do around these parts. The showstoper recipe of the week is these Cottage Cheese Pancakes. Oh my. So good.
- I’ve been spending my evenings while Chris is working with all the lights on and brainstorming design ideas with a healthy dose of help from the Domino Magazine website. I’ll try to spread out the inspiration pictures I’ve been accumulating but here’s a good’un.
Courtesy domino magazine.
This is both the colour I want to paint the living room and the treatment I want to use for the headboard. I can’t wait to get started!
I’m not one of the many bemoaning the start of fall. Since I moved away from the ocean at the age of six summer has had no meaning to me anyway. Fall is my favourite season; a season in which it does not seem wasteful to do my favourite things, things which this blog is all about.
For example, on this cool day I’ve been making miles of bias binding for this dress.
Working on my Arctic Diamonds Stole, which the pattern tells me is over half way done, but which my eyes tell me is far from long enough.
I really, really need to stop knitting red things because photographing them is driving me up the wall
And baking Apple Cake.
because the only kind of apple worth eating raw is Granny Smith
I am totally, totally in love with this cake. I adapted a Betty Crocker recipe someone gave me at work years and years ago to be a little healthier because the original had a shocking 938 calories and 40 grams of fat per serving.
Amy’s Amiable Apple Cake.
batter:
2 eggs
1 1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup apple sauce
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup orange juice
1 tsp. vanilla extract
3 cups flour
2 tbsp. baking powder
2 apples
2 tbsp. sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
Stir all batter ingredients together and set aside. Peel apples and slice them very thin. Toss apples with sugar and spices. Spray a bundt pan with olive oil and pour in alternate layers of batter and apples. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour and 15 minutes.
I just got a silicone bundt pan and we never had one growing up so this is my first ever bundt cake! I think it will help to make the portions smaller which is great calorie wise but I’ll have to freeze a lot of it. I sprinkled it with powdered sugar because my oven burns everything on the outside but this is optional. I really can’t stress enough how delicious this is an how you must make it.
