Fidget

Aren’t these pretty? BN got them for me to celebrate our 4th wedding anniversary. That’s not all - he also made me a wooden jewelry box with embedded magnets to keep the lid on. He used some exotic hardwoods he’d gotten for Christmas - purple heart and zebra wood. I love the way the cross grains and lengthwise grains create subtle contrasting surfaces. Inside was a whole collection of silver earrings - I’d been wanting some hoops to wear all the time comfortably with no posts poking into my head.

We took a weekend getaway to Bend, which is east of Eugene. We stopped for lunch at Sahalie falls. It was a warm day but sitting within sight of the falls was cold! The rushing water really cooled the air.

Our hotel room looked out over the Deschutes river, which had a slight dam to create a calm surface for ducks and geese in Drake park downtown. We drove a short ways into downtown to find some dinner, and discovered that there was a pro bicycle racing event going on right in the middle of town - they’d closed off a several-block area and the racers did laps. Our dinner location was right at the corner of the home stretch and after we ate we watched the women’s race. It was very exciting!

From there we went to watch Wall-e. It was a sweet little movie. I appreciated that the tone wasn’t preachy (it could easily have been, with a planet made uninhabitable by garbage and the human race turned totally sedentary) and I think perhaps we were meant to identify with the robots more than the humans? It was definitely more about Wall-e and Eve than about the cruise passengers.

On Saturday morning we went to Smith Rock. We hiked up to the top of one of the formations and got some great views of Central Oregon, the various Cascade peaks, and a cute little lizard.

Smith Rock State Park is a rock-climbing hotspot, and we observed some climbers on Monkey Face, a huge pillar that’s a signature feature of the park. If you click on the image above you can see a climber right below the shadow on the lower left face.

We were very hot and sweaty after our hike, and we wanted to go swimming in Tumalo creek but we figured we’d go back to Bend first and get some lunch. A short way into our drive back we realized the car was overheating. To make a long story short, we did make it out to the creek to swim, quite a bit later than we’d planned, and after learning several new facts about the cooling system of the car, plus discovering the insider trick of pouring roadside creek water over the engine to cool it off.

When we got back to town after our swim, we cleaned up and went to check out the street fair that was going on downtown. (When we planned our trip we had no idea that Bend was going to be such a happening spot this weekend!) There were lots of booths selling art and crafted goodies, and several live bands. One of them was really groovy and we stayed to listen. The singers reminded us of some girls we’d heard singing down by the creek. I think it was the same girls.

We ate dinner at Typhoon, a very good Thai place. Best Thai we’d had in awhile, and it felt very upscale without being too pricey. Bend as a whole is so much more upscale than Eugene, astonishingly so. After a leisurely breakfast on Sunday morning we strolled in Drake park and looked at the geese and ducks.

Driving home, we took a detour to Waldo Lake, where we’d been with my family last summer camping in the Cascades. The mosquitoes were just as vicious this year, but we scampered past them as best we could and the lake was cold, clear and refreshing. I’m amazed by how many activities we fit into this trip - besides the ones we planned on, even. It was a lot of fun.

Yesterday morning I made myself a smoothie for breakfast, as I often do - but it turned out really good so I though I’d share.

Strawberry-Lime Smoothie

- about 10 small frozen strawberries (hand-picked and fresh-frozen!)

- a frozen banana

- 2 T limeade concentrate

- 6oz container lime-flavored yogurt

- Soymilk

Place ingredients in blender in the order listed. Pulse to break up the frozen items and blend till smooth, adding soymilk as needed to adjust consistency. Refreshing for breakfast or delicious for dessert.

Last Friday we went strawberry picking.

They charge by the bucket, so we picked two full buckets and felt like that was probably enough. When we transferred them into the bowls we’d brought from home, we realized two buckets’ worth was a lot!

We also saw a freaky white spider (I’ll keep the image small for arachnophobes, click if you aren’t afraid to see it larger):

We’ve had a strawberry-filled week since then. We had strawberry cocktails, strawberries wrapped in crepes with yogurt (yum!!!), strawberries with ice cream, and I froze two large bags full for use in smoothies. Cool.

This week I had another big batch of farm-fresh goodies: bok choi, shelling peas, cucumber, radishes, carrots, and rhubarb. I decided to make Thai curry. I used one of my trusty curry-paste cans from the Asian market, a yellow curry. First I aggressively sauteed half an onion, sliced, so that the edges got nice and brown. (Took those out of the pan to add back later, since I wanted them to keep some crunch.) Next step, chicken, sliced, sauteed until opaque. Then stirred in the curry paste, it’s oil-based and frying it brings out the flavor of the spices. Then I stirred in a can of coconut milk and some fish sauce. I have discovered that a good way to add root vegetables like potatoes and carrots to a curry is to roast them separately in the oven. So that’s what I did, just tossed with salt and a bit of oil.

My favorite kitchen toy recently has been the Camp Griddle that I got as a wedding gift from my grandparents. At the time, I was pleased since we love to camp. But I didn’t realize I would end up using it practically every time I cook or bake anything. The reason it’s so great is that it’s like a nonstick skillet in the shape of a baking pan. Nothing will stick to it, and one of my best tricks is oven-fried potatoes. With just a teaspoon of oil per potato, you get crispy, browned fries or hash browns. Yum. And it makes biscuits or cookies trouble-free (you have to bake them in smaller batches, but I only have 1 rack in my oven anyway.)

So, my curry was all arranged. I shelled the peas and stirred them in with the onions right before serving. These precious peas are the best I’ve ever had - they were sweet like candy. Luscious. I considered stirring the bok choi into the curry, but I hesitated. I was happy with the curry’s texture and didn’t want to throw it off… So, I decided to stir the bok choi into the steamed rice. I sliced it thin, as if it were cabbage or celery, and stirred it with the hot rice fresh from the rice cooker. A few minutes in the microwave helped get it just right - the stem slices were still crisp but the leafy greens were nice and wilted.

Earlier in the day, I had made a chopped salad for my Bible study ladies with the cucumber and radishes, plus some red bell pepper, red onion and cilantro with a lime vinaigrette. There was a bit of it left, and after I had ladled up the curry over the bok choi rice, I topped each plate with a bit of the radish “relish.”

Wow, that was the best Thai meal I’ve ever made! It tasted so fresh. I think the fresh organic veggies really made a difference, and it was really not a complex process. I guess it really supports the idea that the better your ingredients are, the less you have to do to them to get good results.

Oh, and the rhubarb - I made muffins. They came out well, studded with tart pink rhubarby goodness.

My friend LL has been sharing her locally-farmed-weekly-produce-box with me. She found they sent stuff in the box that she’s not interested in eating, and it’s just her and her husband anyway so they wouldn’t be able to use it all up themselves. As she told the other ladies when she gave me my portion at our Wednesday bible study, “… and you know, KT likes weird stuff so I’m giving it to her.”

This week I got 2 small fennel bulbs, a big bunch of rapini (also known as broccoli rabe), a bunch of basil and half a bunch of radishes - “French breakfast radishes” no less!

So tonight for dinner I cooked Fennel Risotto - carmelized the chopped bulbs to start with and sprinkled some minced fronds in at the end. It was pretty good! I also blanched-and-shocked the rapini as suggested on Martha Stewart Everyday Food. This involved dunking it in boiling water and then in ice water. Then I sauteed it with garlic. But it came out fairly bitter, so I’m not sure I’m a huge rapini fan yet. I roasted chicken thighs with a mixture of butter, garlic, lemon, salt & pepper stuffed under the skin. Mm, that came out good.

To do: make pesto (duh!) and do something with the radishes… maybe some kind of relish/salsa?

I decided to begin with the Crusty Cob recipe on page 20 of Paul Hollywood’s 100 Great Breads. It’s the first page of Basic Breads, which seemed like a good place to start, and all I have is 1 smallish loaf pan – pyrex – so I figured I’d do a baking-sheet recipe first thing and save myself any worry about the pan being too small, the wrong shape (if I decided to go with the 8×8…) or trying one of the pan recipes on a baking sheet (what if it puddles out and ruins the oven?!). Yep, I’m a worrier when it comes to these experiments.

Providentially, I was reading blogs this morning and Smitten Kitchen’s Tips of the Day for today and yesterday were about yeast and bread baking. There was a link to her Eight Tips for Less Intimidating Bread. This took such a load off my mind! I was really uncertain about the whole “punching down the dough” thing, since Paul didn’t say anything about that but I’ve always heard it’s a big step and that you’re supposed to do it when the dough has “doubled in volume.” But how can you tell? Well, SK cleared that up: just gently deflating it is the thing to do.

But, I’m getting ahead of myself… I measured my flour. I put the salt on one side of the mound and the yeast (active dry, dissolved in water as directed on the packet) on the other side, and attempted to not let them touch as cautioned by Mr. Hollywood – apparently the salt will kill the yeast. Though how you are supposed to mix things together without having them touch eventually is beyond me. Some of the yeast liquid ran over into the salt. Oops.

I “softened” the butter in the microwave but I didn’t want it to melt, so just for 10 seconds… I think it might have been a little cold in the middle. So hopefully the butter isn’t in several big lumps or only worked through 1/2 of the dough! I wonder if maybe it wouldn’t matter to just pour it in melted? Other recipes use oil, which is a liquid. And you want the dough to be warm so it will rise. Also it’s totally freezing today. “Highs in the Lows” as we like to say.

I poured in the water in a few stages and stirred with a silicone spatula. (There’s nothing creepier to me than scraping dough off of a wooden spoon. Eeegh.) Once it was sticking together well I used my hands and mixed it a bit more.

I wanted to do my kneading on the table rather than the counter, since the counter is a bit high and I thought it would be an awkward angle for my arms. I have these heavy plastic placemats from IKEA so I floured up one of those and used it to knead on the table. Both Paul and Smitten advised against adding too much flour during the kneading, so I tried to use the bare minimum. The placemat worked out kind of nice because the dough stuck to it some but I could turn the whole mat before folding over the dough for the next knead. Neat!

I kneaded for 10 minutes which was PH’s recommendation for beginners. I washed out and oiled my big blue bowl (it’s a wonderful Big Blue Bread Bowl) and put my dough ball in there and covered it with a clean dishtowl, orange for contrast. Paul says you don’t have to cover it but I don’t want dust or anything settling on the dough while it sits there for two hours! My apartment is not the most dust-free place. I gently and lovingly placed my dough bowl in the warmest several cubic feet of air in the place: on top of the refrigerator. That’s the only place that really ever gets what you could call warm. We like to keep the thermostat at 61-ish – gasp – but the way our ceiling heat seems to work the upper 1/3 of the rooms get too hot if it’s higher than that. So we’ll see. The dough did grow a lot during those two hours, and I poked it as instructed by SK and all seemed well. Yay!

I lined my baking sheet with parchment paper – fancy unbleached silicone-coated – with no cornmeal, contrary to what Smitten seemed to suggest, because that just seemed like a pain in the neck. Wasn’t in my recipe anyway. I formed my dough into a nice ball (thanks again to SK for the detailed tips!) and placed it on the siliconed-pan. I put the dishtowel back over it and put it back in its little warm zone for another hour. My feet are freezing but heck, the dough is cozy. If this loaf turns out good I won’t have an excuse to turn up the heat on bread-baking days. Though I guess if, like today, it’s also bill-paying day, I won’t let myself make excuses for using any more expensive kilowatt hours than I have to!

I moved the oven rack lower… because PH says that “the longer a loaf takes to color or bake, the drier it will be.” I don’t want the top of the loaf to get dry while it’s waiting for the bottom to bake all the way through. Also, the Crusty Cob recipe has a little anecdote saying that “this bread, which dates back to medieval times, was known as one of the oven bottoms, as this was invariably where it was baked.” So we’ll see how that goes.

One last tricky step – slashing the top. I think you are supposed to do each cut all in one slash, but I couldn’t help sawing a little.

In the little beauty goes!

… Later …

Well, it came out great! We had fresh bread and cream-of-carrot soup for dinner. It was lovely. I baked the bread for 30 minutes, exactly as the recipe said, “or until golden brown” and sure enough it was golden brown after a half hour. And it was done all the way through, but not too done. The only thing is it’s a bit salty. I thought a tablespoon was kind of a lot. Maybe next time I’ll do 2 tsp instead. But I’m very pleased, since this is my first time. And the recipe was great - I followed it to the letter, something I rarely do, but it payed off here. I’m excited to try Hollywood’s other bread recipes and work my way up to expert.

Note: this post was made possible by my darling sister SS, who gifted me the cookbooks this Christmas.

… beautiful Tahoe sunshine! And our big, crazy family. It was great to see everybody and hang out. I, for one, did not really mind that there was no snow this year. The weather was beautiful, and we found other fun things to do, like ice skating at Northstar and hiking. Thanksgiving dinner was a scrumptious success as usual, with MH and CAP doing the turkey and the rest of us chipping in a dish or two. This year, I discovered how easy it is to make cranberry sauce at home. Seriously, almost as easy as opening a can - just simmer a packet of fresh or frozen berries with sugar and a little juice or water … you can also customize with exotic flavors (citrus, spices, chili pepper?) and reduce the sugar content. Leftovers are welcome, try it stirred into yogurt for breakfast. Yum!

Yes, I saw the movie! I loved it. I thought it was so much fun. I liked the family dynamic of the rat colony, and how the skinny redheaded kid gained confidence and built character… and, Gusteau was so cute, and what a great motto - Anyone can cook!

I’d found this recipe even before I saw the movie, and afterwards I was inspired to try it. Now is the perfect time of year, when eggplant, zucchini, and fresh herbs are plentiful at the farmer’s market - I’ve been trying to go once a week this summer, and it’s been really fun to get such fresh yummy veggies that are all local and mostly organic. Very cool. I highly recommend this recipe - especially if you’ve tried making ratatouille in the classic simmer/saute method before. I have, and it was nothing to write home about. But this one’s a keeper! It’s really easy, too. The only trick is cutting the veggies as thin as you can. And, it’s flexible. My veg slices weren’t all the same diameter, so I just layered them in rows (or rounds, as in this pie dish) and it looked great. I like to eat pretty food, especially if it’s not a lot of work to make it look pretty. That’s the nice thing about cooking with lots of vegetables - it’s effortless to make it colorful. This recipe calls for goat cheese, but we used sour cream instead. Something about that creamy finishing touch, mmm - magnifique!

I made freezer jam out of my blueberries. It came out yummy! The pectin package, which has detailed instructions for making many kinds of jam, emphatically warned me that I shouldn’t mess with the fruit-to-sugar ratio or else my jam wouldn’t jell. But, seeing that they called for 4 cups of fruit, 7 cups of sugar, and a cup of corn syrup to prevent sugar crystals… I decided to mess with it anyway. I used 2 cups of sugar with my 4 cups of coarsely pureed blueberries, and my jam came out fine. It’s quite firm, too, it just has a lot of runny juice along with it. So it’s not so great for peanut butter sandwiches, though if you eat ‘em right away it’s OK. But excellent for other purposes such as a topping for pancakes or yogurt or ice cream or…

Even though my freezer was already laden with frozen whole blueberries, 3 jam jars and 4 yogurt cups full of jam, I decided to go blueberry picking again as I’d been invited by the K’s - GK and her daughters, M and A. Another friend, CO, came too. This time, the weather wasn’t nearly so hot, it was quite a cloudy day. The berry bushes were wilder, bushier, and more tangled. But, get this - the blueberries were twice as big as the ones I’d picked before, and those were big, too. Wow. I tried to restrain myself and not pick too many, because I’d run out of freezer space if I came back with another 6+ pounds of berries!

Team Blueberry

Gotta pick ‘em all!

Victory!

Aren’t they Bluetiful?

Left: normal-sized berry. Right: GI-NORMOUS berry. Told ya.

… since I started this blog! Hooray. If I was on top of my game I would have a visual re-design all ready to launch today. But I don’t. But I’ve accomplished lots of other projects in the last year - ran my first 10K, knitted my first real sweater, learned to throw pots on the wheel, designed quite a few user interfaces, and just yesterday I dropped 4 whole bags of stuff off at the Goodwill donation center. (It’ll be a lifelong effort for BN and I to keep our collector-of-stuff tendencies under control. You never know what might end up being useful someday!) Our spare room has never looked better.

Well, this has been a good week. We had quick visit from my brother and sister-in-law, and it was a blessedly beautiful day so I took them down to the river and we strolled around and checked out the geese, who were having a major convention with whole nestsful of goslings of all different sizes. Cute!

Monday evening I had my usual knitting group. Nowadays we meet at a cafe that’s sort of behind (or in front of) a restaurant. All the small tables are pushed together for a big knitting circle. (or rectangle.) We have a waiter to order dinner or drinks or coffee from, and a good time is had by all. I’ve been going to this group pretty regularly since early in the year. I really enjoy it because there’s such a range of people there - different ages, different skill levels. Even a few men. And they knit.

Today I went to my ladies’ lunch Bible study. This is pretty much the highlight of my week - everybody brings something to share, mostly salads, but sometimes we get other goodies like today was EL’s birthday so we had a not-exactly-cake confection that was constructed mostly of whipped cream and strawberries. It took 3 people to get it cut up and served because it was collapsing in all directions. Totally delicious, though. Even more than the food I enjoy the girl-time with a diverse set of sisters in Christ. I’m usually the youngest unless JM comes, and our 2 “elder stateswomen” (as GP would say) are in their 80’s.

It seems like we are squarely into spring, now, with temps up into the 70’s. we had a real heat wave a week or so ago, but the week before that the highs were in the mid-50’s again for awhile. That was weird… it’s really nice to see the sun. (At our ladies’ study we get to sit outside on TR’s deck surrounded by her beautiful garden.)

There are quite a few clothing resale stores in town, and this week I had a bit of success in selling some of my used clothing. Trading in, really, because you get more value if you opt for store credit. The first place was too LA-teen-trendyish to want most of my cast-offs. The next place was more sophisticated and the nice woman who helped me surprised me by taking one of my home-sewn dresses (those are the hardest to give away, but it never fit me right.) The last place, with a more hippie-like flair, took a record-setting 4 items, and all of them were garments I had originally gotten at thrift stores. Score! What a beautiful cycle of fashion funkiness.

So that’s what’s going on. A mixed bag of newsy items. I’ll leave you with a cooking secret: Those little tiny cans of Thai curry paste. You can get ‘em at the Asian market. They are the same shape as tuna cans except smaller, and seriously all you have to do is stir one (or part of one, they are strong medicine) into a pot of coconut milk (and whatever meat and veggies you have on hand) and you have an awesome tastes-like-we’re-eating-out dinner at home! Lemon grass helps, too. Serve over rice or noodles and you’ll knock the socks off of your dinner guests.

Well, I hope everybody’s having a good week and maybe by next year I’ll have this blog looking more customized.

Love,

KT