Birthdays (of the Spousal and National Persuasion)

What a wonderfully busy weekend! Between Mr. Cleaver and the country - we spent our whole weekend in celebration. Not that I'm complaining :)

After a leisurely morning on the 3rd, involving the farmer's market and the bakery and a new fishing pole for Mr. Cleaver, we lazed away the afternoon ( I finished my dress) and headed out to eat around 4. We grabbed a meal and some bird watching at The Good Table (our favorite) and then drove down Highway 77 to Prout's Neck for a trek around the Cliff Walk.

The cliff walk is one of those hidden gems that I'm sure everyone knows about, but I didn't until about two weeks ago and Mr. Cleaver didn't know about it until I took him there this weekend, so maybe it is secret. In any case, to take the cliff walk find the house above, right next to the Black Point Inn,  and find the small stone path that cuts across the grass. This will take you out to the Cliff Walk.

The Cliff Walk is stunning.  There are rocky crags, pink sand beaches, and a beach entirely of smooth round rocks that rattle when the waves recede.

The walk takes between 45 minutes to an hour. Afterward we stopped at the Black Point Inn for cocktails. The bar was busy so they sent us down to the Adirondack chairs on the front lawn (too bad, right? :) ), where we sat and sipped and watched the sun set.

Mr. Cleaver declared the birthday a success. On the way back to town we stopped by the side of the road to snap a few more shots of the sunset.

For the Fourth, I spent the morning baking a belated birthday cake for the Mister, which we had delayed because we knew it would take a while to make this much cake! Though it did mean I had our tiny oven running for a few hours on the hottest day of year thus far!

After all the baking I finally got to put on my new dress!

[Dress: Vogue 8184; Modifications: made band from contrasting color, skipped boning, added in-seam pockets, added horsehair band to hem]

All snazzed up, we headed our to my Mother-In-Law's for a cookout with the family. Mr. Cleaver's older brother offered some hints and tackle for the new pole.

Once we were stuffed to the gills, Mr. Cleaver and I joined half of Portland for the Portland Symphony Orchestra pops concert/fireworks show. The addition of PSO to the festivities was a great touch!

I hope every one else had an enjoyable weekend too!

String and Strawberries

String I:

I finished this dish towel at the beginning of the month, but for one reason or another it's sat in my photos for about three weeks. It's not as though I have a backlog of a bazillion projects to post, but as cute as this piece of embroidery is (it's an ironing scotty dog!), I didn't think it warranted a whole post to itself, so I'm lumping it together with a few other bits and pieces.

The Scotty Dog Pattern is from the Hoop Love Vintage Transfers Group on Flickr, which has a treasure trove of patterns you can print out an stitch. They have an especially large collection of mostly complete days of the week patterns like the Scotty above.  I'm alos planning on doing Wednesday (mending) and Friday (baking).

I worked on this mainly while my bum wrist kept me from knitting and in the after period  when I struggled to get my knitting mojo back (which happily it has, thanks to Kate Davie's Manu and some Malabrigo Silky Merino). I haven't yet done the pattern transfer for the second towel, but if our current levels of humidity hang around for much longer I will, since they're only so much wool I can handle in humidity :)

Strawberries:

On Saturday, Mr. Cleaver and I picked four pints of strawberries at Maxwell's, two of which went to his mother and the other two which ended up on my cereal and this strawberry shortcake I made last night.

The recipe is from Posie Gets Cozy and the only changed I made/would recommend is to make 6 or 8 dough "blobs" instead of the listed 4. mine were doughy in the middle until I cut them in half and baked them some more, and the smaller biscuits (it's a very biscuity shortbread) were about all I could handle to eat at once.

String II:

I have plans for a fantastic Fourth of July dress from Vogue 8184. It's a fairly simple dress (especially since I'm skipping the boning- since my version has straps), so I 'm taking the time to do my first go at tissue fitting, especially since I fell in between two of the multi-size envelopes.  I'm somewhat obsessed with fit these days - what with the pattern drafting I've been dabbling in and all (and I'm close with another sundress I drafted). Since the Fourth is only ten days away, we'll hopefully have results soon!

Little Things

Some things I've been making lately:

Maple Walnut Granola:

• 3 cups rolled oats (not quick cooking)
• 1 cup chopped walnuts (or nut of your choice)
• 1 cup dried cranberries (or dried fruit of your choosing)
• 1/3 cup maple syrup
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 2 Tbl warm water
• 1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 250°F.

In a large bowl, mix together syrup, sugar, oil, water and salt until throughly combined. Add in oats and nuts and and mix until coated.  Pour oat mixture unto a  lightly oiled rimmed baking sheet or pan.

Bake from 1½ to 2 hours or until oats are dry and brown. Remove from oven and cool. Stir in fruit and place in a sealed container.

National Pie Day

According the American Pie Council, today (Jan 23) is National Pie Day . Loving all things pie the way I do, when I read about this in a magazine back in December, I knew I had to celebrate. So I invited all my knitting friends over for a Pie Day potluck!

We had a meat pie, chicken pot pie, two apple pies, a blueberry pie, a lemon meringue pie, a turtle pie cream pie, a chocolate pie/tart, and some cherry cup-pies (which I've wanted to make every since cup-pies were mentioned on the tv show Pushing Daisies). It was a yummy pie-extravaganza!

S'more Pie: Take Two

Back on May 14th, 2008 I posted a pie without a recipe or a link to a recipe - it was an attempt that didn't quite work out and I hadn't gotten another chance to test out a new version.  My brother has not let me live this down. He pretty much brings it up every time we talk.

In general, I just wasn't all that inspired to give it another try, but then I had the Snicker's Pie at the Great Lost Bear and found my chocolate filling. That, along with  having my company holiday potluck today, gave me enough reason to make a second go. (Oh  - and can I say my company's Christmas potluck includes a fresh raw oyster shucking station and a pound of local shrimp is the parting gift? I love Maine. )

The tart was a big hit at the party -  it turned out exactly how I wanted, chocolately without being too much like cake or pudding and a perfect balance of flavors.  And so after a year and a half of waiting,  here it is.

Merry Christmas, Big Brother.

S’more Pie

Makes 8 to 10 servings

For crust: 8 to 9 graham crackers,  finely ground (about 1 cup) 5 to 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted 1/4 cup sugar

For filling: 1 1/4 cups (10 oz.) heavy cream 9 ounces bittersweet chocolate chips (not more than 65% cacao if marked)(as always, I prefer Ghirardelli’s) 2 large eggs 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 1/4 teaspoon salt

For Topping: Half a bag of mini-marshmallows

Equipment: a 9-inch round fluted tart pan (1 inch deep) or 9-inch pie pan

Make crust:

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Shift together graham crackers and sugar. Stir in melted butter and press evenly onto bottom and up sides of tart pan. Bake until firm, about 10-12 minutes. Cool on a rack 15 to 20 minutes

Make filling:

Bring cream to a boil, then pour over chocolate in a bowl and let stand 5 minutes. Gently stir until smooth. Whisk together eggs, vanilla, and salt in another bowl until frothy, then fold into melted chocolate.

Pour filling into cooled crust. Bake until filling is set about 3 inches from edge but center is still wobbly, 20 to 25 minutes. (Center will continue to set as tart cools.) Cool completely in pan on rack, about 1 hour.

Add topping: Distribute about half a bag of mini marshmallows on the tart, until the top of tart is evenly covered and place under broiler until marshmallows are golden brown (about 1-2 minutes, but watch carefully and rotate as needed).

Best served when marshmallows are warm and gooey! (If you don't eat it all in one sitting - and I'd be amazed if you do - it's seriously rich, store in the fridge. Let sit out until room temperature before eating and if desired, microwave for a few seconds to re-gooify the marshmallows).

In other news, last weekend I made my annual batch of peanut brittle and this photo op was too good to skip, even if my hair is a little crazy and I'm wearing one of John's flannel shirts.

CHOMP!

In other, other news. I'm off to my hometown of Napa, California for a week come Sunday. I haven't been back since before I was married! I may not have internet while I'm gone, but I'll let you know all about it on my return. If you're a Napa-based reader, send me a email/comment before Sunday - I'd love to meet up!

Happy Harvest

When Mr. Cleaver and  I went apple picking a few weeks back, we came home with 21 pounds of apples. For two people. What did we do with them all?

2 Quarts Apple Sauce and 1.5 Pints Apple Butter;

3 Fat Apple Pies;

3 apples for my mother-in-law and 3 apples for my lunch.

All in all not a bad haul! It took one day to do all the canning and another day for the pies. It was a lot of work, but I'll happily be eating apples until next September!

Though this is my fourth year making apple pies, this is the first year I worked out a recipe that I was totally happy with. In the past, my pies had ended up too watery, but with a few tweaks to some recipes from family and friends, I think we've ended up with something delicious!

Streusel Apple Pie

Crust:

• 2 cups flour
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2/3 cup shortening
• 6 full Tbl cold water

Filling:

• 6 apples of choice ( I love jonagolds and rome beauties best - but any firm and tart apple will do).
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. nutmeg
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 Tbl lemon juice
• 1/3 cup flour

Streusel

• 3 Tbl butter (softened)
• 1/3 cup flour
• 1/4 brown sugar

Preheat oven to 400°F

Make crust by mixing together flour and salt. Cut shortening into flour mixture with a pastry cutter or some forks.  Add cold water until dough holds together. Form dough into two flattened balls, wrap in plastic wrap and store in fridge until filling is prepared.

Peel, core, and slice apples. In a large bowl, mix apples, lemon juice, sugar and spices. Add flour until a thin sauce is formed from the juices. Set filling aside.

Removed chilled dough from fridge and roll out into a top and bottom crust.

Place bottom crust in  9 inch round pie pan (metal or glass) and fill with apples, heaping up in center. Cover apples with top crust. Top can be latticed or vented with several cuts through the top.

For streusel, cut together softened butter, flour and brown sugar with a fork until crumbly. Sprinkle streusel over top of pie.

Bake pie at for 40-50 or until filling bubbles and top is brown.

Cool, slice and enjoy!

Sunday Baking

One of my ongoing goals this year is to cut as many processed foods out of my diet as I can. I'm looking into ways to consistently make my own bread (I've done some work with a bread machine and a friend lent me a copy of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, which I hope to try as soon as I have some room in the fridge to try it.) and I've been figuring out ways to make my favorite microwave and takeout foods from scratch (check back in about a week for my chicken pot pie recipe!). Come farmer's market season I'd like to look into some preserving.

Along these same lines, I've had a recurring thought about only eating sweets that I've made myself. Now I have the second-biggest sweet tooth I know and what with my schedule, I though that to only eat home-made sweets meant pretty much giving them up. I'm sure doctors and dentists would think that's plenty fine, but I like a good cookie, or piece of cake, brownie or slice of pie... you get the idea.

In any case, I'm thinking it's much more feasible than I originally thought. 

I'm currently working full-time and rehearsing a play about 4 nights and one weekend day a week. I'm pretty busy. But for the past month I've found the time to bake every Sunday. 

I don't own a mixer (I find mixing by hand both bicep-building and relaxing) and my kitchen is ill-designed for any kind of food-making, but I'm getting the job done. And I love putting on an apron from my collection and baking.

A few weeks back it started with "le gateau piege" from Chocolate and Zucchini, a Cleaver house-hold favorite.

Then it was the titular Chocolate & Zucchini cake from the C&Z cookbook, which was dense and moist.

Having good luck with Clotilde, I made the Honey-Spice Loaf from the same cookbook. We like it warm with butter.

Around Wednesday this week I asked Mr. Cleaver what he wanted. He didn't have any suggestion, so I decided to troll the recipe index on my other favorite food site, Smitten Kitchen, where I came across these:

Homemade oreos!

These are just like the ones in the store, but way better, especially slightly warm. As noted in the recipe, I used the lesser amount of sugar in the cookies, and if Mr. Cleaver had his way, I wouldn't have frosted any. As it was I only needed half the frosting called for, but I highly recommend them. And some soothing Sunday afternoon baking.

Do you have a favorite baking recipe? Send along recipes and links and I'll be happy to give them a go!

There is a Pound of Chocolate in These Cookies

Remember when I used to regularly post recipes on this site? Well it's been a while. Not that I haven't been cooking or baking, I've just been doing a lot of old standards or not photographing. I also like to put original or family recipes, but this one was too good to pass up.

After seeing these cookies on smitten kitchen last week I just had to make them and man are they good - if the pound of chocolate alone doesn't convince you perhaps I can. These are deep and rich and complex  - so much so that I, a cookie fiend, can only handle about a cookie and a half at a time. They go brilliantly with a glass of ice cold milk. It is a little hard to find the toffee bars, but it is so worth it. 

Chocolate Toffee Cookies from smitten kitchenAdapted from Bon Appetit

Makes around 30-36 cookies

1/2 cup all purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 pound bittersweet (not unsweetened) or semisweet chocolate, chopped (if you use good-quality chocolate chips, it saves a little work - as usual my favorite is Ghiradelli) 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter 1 3/4 cups (packed) brown sugar 4 large eggs 1 tablespoon vanilla extract 5 1.4-ounce chocolate-covered English toffee bars (such as Heath or Skor), coarsely chopped 1 cup walnuts, toasted, chopped* Flaky sea salt for sprinkling (optional)*

Combine flour, baking powder and salt in small bowl; whisk to blend. Stir chocolate and butter in a metal bowl set over simmering water or doubled-boiler until melted and smooth. Remove from over water. Cool mixture to lukewarm.

Beat sugar and eggs in bowl until thick, about 5 minutes. Beat in chocolate mixture and vanilla.

Stir in flour mixture, then toffee and nuts. Chill batter until firm, about 45 minutes. Roll the dough into a log 1.5 inches in diameter and chill it.  When ready to bake the cookies, cut it into 1/2-inch slices. You can store the dough log in the freezer, wrapped in waxed paper and then two layers of plastic wrap for up to a month, just baking the cookies off as you need. Cookies baked straight from the freezer may need an additional minute or two in the oven, depending on their thickness.

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment or waxed paper. This is a must - otherwise they will stick like crazy!!

Place sliced cookies on the lined sheet spacing tehm two inches apart. Sprinkle with the salt, if you’re using it. Bake just until tops are dry and cracked but cookies are still soft to touch, about 12 to 15 minutes. Cool on sheets. (Can be made 2 days ahead. Store airtight at room temperature.)

* I didn't bother with toasting the walnuts or the salt, but it may make the cookies even better, so give it a good if you'd like.

Can't Say It Wasn't Memorable

Okay, so this weekend was so chock-full of wonderfullness, that I'm going to have to break it down into several posts over the next couple of days. We'll do it chronologically, starting with Thursday.

July 3 :

Mr. Cleaver's birthday.

The day dawned and I did NOT want to get out of bed, I was so groggy that I was the worst wife ever and forgot to say Happy Birthday to Mr.Cleaver - who after about 10 minutes decided to jog my memory. Oops!That said, as embarrassed as I was, this ended up low on the totem pole of things to go wrong that day.

As I headed off to work, Mr. Cleaver was hunkering down to watch Wimbleton on the laptop, only to discover that our internet wasn't worked, only to call our service provider and discover that the phone wasn't working wither (same company). Mr. Cleaver is probably the first to admit that he's not the world's most techno-savvy guy, and was quickly frustrated, especially when it looked like neither phone nor DSL would be repaired for a few days.

Fortunately, I was able to come home a little early from work, due to a co-worker's going-away party. So I stopped at the grocery store and picked up some ingredients for the birthday cake and the manliest looking flowers I could find for my guy.

Well, the flowers perked him up and so did my present. We also decided to go to our favorite fancy restaurant to dinner, so things were looking up. I started working on the cake, and frosting so it could cool while we were out to eat.

The cake fell a little in the center, but otherwise, seemed to be fine. We walked up the street to the restaurant only to find it boarded up and smelling of smoke. Yes, our favorite restaurant had burned down. At this point, really, we just had to laugh. And eat Chinese, which was nearby and also very good.

When we got home the internet seemed to be momentarily working and we discovered that the restaurant had caught fire in May and didn't look to be re-opening anytime soon.

I set to assembling the cake and it seemed - well -dry. I did a quick check of the reviews on epicurious and discovered I had forgotten to include 1 cup of water.

[wp_caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="How Many Candles?"][/wp_caption]

Well, this was just perfect. Again, we could do nothing but laugh, and despite the dryness, enjoy the cake. I can't say anything about the cake itself, having not made it right, but Mr.Cleaver and I both think the frosting is to die for, so it came out all right. (It also didn't stop us from finishing off the whole thing by the end of the weekend - fresh raspberries help cover a multitude of sins).

In the eveing we headed down to the lakefront to try and see if we could catch any of the City of Chicago fireworks (they always do them on the 3rd, more on that in the next post).

Not exactly what I would have wished for my husband's birthday, but you can't say it wasn't memorable.

My New Go-To Chocolate Frosting from Nana Edie's Devil's Food Cake

• 1 ½ cups sugar
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 4 oz unsweetened chocolate, chopped
• 1 stick unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Bring sugar and cream to a boil in a heavy saucepan, stirring constantly, and simmer 10 minutes. Remove from heat and add chocolate, butter, and vanilla, stirring until smooth. Transfer to a bowl and cool to room temperature, stirring occasionally. Chill frosting, stirring frequently, until thickened and spreadable.

Prize Coffee Cake

One of my goals in life is to win a blue ribbon at a county fair. Dead serious.

I have no experience with State Fairs aside from the Rogers and Hamerstein movie, so they don't particularly interest me. But as a kid I lived in the county seat - so I had to go to the fair a lot. I'm sure this isn't actually the case, but it seemed as though we had three or so major fairs at the Napa Valley Expo center a year and I was at pretty much every one.

First there were the educational fairs. There was the one my modeling clay mission was displayed at amoungst the hundreds of other missions of the pasta, cardboard, and/or lego varieties. There was the fair that they had the city-wide science fair at: my experiment on the water purifying abilities of the sun didn't even place. There was the year I volunteered to do an anti-drug puppet show at, only to find upon arrival that the "booth" contained no puppet stage and I spent several hours sitting under a table teaching kids to "Just Say No," while the woman at the next table urged people to vote no on proposition 9.

And then there was the Town and Country fair where the 4-H kids strutted their hogs and the quilts and jams were on proud display. There were games: a friend once won a guppie and then passed it off on a happy little girl and her less than happy parents; there was food: corn dogs and funnel galore! There were the rides that only one year I was allowed to ride, which included a fun house/maze that I raced though only to be incredibly disappointed when I came out the other side that I hadn't spent more time.

But missions and guppies aside, the real reason I went to fair after fair was to dance.

Not at the Fair, but you get the idea. (That's me in the far right, front row)

From approximately 1988 to 2001 I was made to put on my tutu and blue eye shadow and dance with my classes in tap, jazz or ballet. The stage was unforgiving concrete and it was always devilishly hot. One year my teacher told us not to bother with wearing foundation, it'd just melt it off. I love dancing, but I hated dancing at the fair, it was uncomfortable and there was a good chance someone I did not want seeing me in a leotard would stroll by during my performance (and several have).

Spandex and sequin trauma aside, I always like the craft, food, and animal displays and I still hope to win a ribbon of my own some day.

This particular recipe won a ribbon for my family once upon a time (though the recipe card always said "prize" so I have no idea which prize it won - but if anyone in the family wants to clarify that'd be great) and so after that long introduction, I give you:

Prize Coffee Cake:

• ¾ cup sugar
• ¼ cup butter or shortening
• 1 egg
• 1½ flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ cup milk

Topping:

• ½ cup brown sugar
• 2 Tbl melted butter
• 2 Tbl flour
• 2 TBl cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375°F. Grease and flour a 9"x9" pan. 

Mix together sugar, butter, and egg to make butter cream. It may look good, but do not sample - it tastes terrible as a college roommate of mine discovered. Add milk and mix.

In a separate bowl, blend flour, baking powder and salt. Add dry mix to butter cream. Pour into pan.

Mix together topping ingredients. If necessary add a little more melted butter until it clumps, but we wary- too much butter will cause the topping to turn molten and sink into the batter instead of staying nice and crispy on top.  Sprinkle topping on top of the batter.

Bake 25-35 minutes or until a tester comes out clean. Recipe doubles well, just add 5-10 minutes cooking time for a 9"x18" pan. 

Surprise sleepy folks with coffee cake, eat all the crumbs.