Tag Archives: kitchen

pie.

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Strawberry-rhubarb-basil. It could have used a little bit of sugar, as the rhubarb was very tart, but it was bright and fresh-tasting, and the basil even seemed to sweeten it a little!

Oatmeal-pecan. Pie you can eat for breakfast. You know, because of the oatmeal. (I’m baking pies for a friend’s wedding next month, so I’ve been baking and eating more pie in order to help her make some important decisions about fillings and crusts. Tough life, I know.)

Also, here’s some stuff that isn’t pie:

Dogs and books. And me. All in a big pile.

Tango, in a rare contemplative moment.

Remember what I was saying about kitchen mojo? This has been a go-to for me this summer, in part because mojo is not required. Also, the gratification is immediate. Which I like. I have been eating this on Tuesdays. And other days, too, but especially Tuesdays. I get home from the farm, slice into my weekly bread share loaf, cut up a tomato, a hot pepper, and find some cheese in the fridge. I turn on the broiler. I sliver some basil. I pile all that stuff on the toast (this week it is a rye with caraway seeds encrusted on the outside), slide it under the broiler, and wait less than five minutes, until the toast is dark around the edges and the cheese is bubbling and starting to brown. Then I take it out and make myself go in the other room, or take out the compost, or do something to not eat this right away, because I will burn my mouth. And then I take my broiled tomato toast to the porch to enjoy. Summer food, at its finest.

It is rainy this morning, and I have a hankering for knitting with handspun. Boh and I are headed to a family wedding this weekend, and amidst the packing (so much harder to throw stuff in a bag and go when you have to look pretty where you’re going) I’m hoping to find time to wind up some squishy comfort yarn. The grey, rainy morning might have something to do with that. Happy weekend!

back to life/back to reality.

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You guys remember that song, right? Okay, hold on, I need to Google it. Soul 2 Soul, Back to Life (However Do You Want Me), big hit in 1989.

Anyway, this jam (isn’t that what we used to call them?) popped into my head when I was thinking about how the routines are starting up again all around me, but that I’m not really going back to school (get it?) this semester. Instead, I have a semester of dissertation research and writing ahead of me, without any teaching obligations. (I’ll be teaching again in the spring — this time, my very own course.)

So instead of a back to school photo, you get a back to life/back to reality photo. This one’s not blurry. And it counts as a stripe-study-in-action shot! (I’m not sure it is actually cold enough to wear this out of the house, but at this very second, it is about 52 degrees outside. And on my porch. So I’m going for it.)

I’ve also got some baked goods to share:

This is Deb’s raspberry buttermilk cake (I know I’ve linked to it before) — super simple, incredibly delicious. I might have eaten it for breakfast AND lunch yesterday. Might.

And last night, when I got home from yoga, I scurried to get this tomato tart (farm tomatoes, local goat cheese, mustard, honey, thyme from my yard, and pie crust) in the oven. It took longer than usual because I was using a pie crust from a batch I made over the weekend rather than the tart dough that this recipe calls for, so I was pretty hungry by the time it came out of the oven. Leftovers for breakfast!

mojo?

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Have you seen mine? Because I’ve had a hard time finding it lately in the knitting/spinning/blogging department. (Also, the dissertation department.) But you know what? I’m newly resolved not to let it bother me. I’m sure it will come back; after all, this space is dear to me.

But enough of that. Want to see what I’ve been up to this week?

Swimming. (Suit drying on the porch.)

Eating. (More specifically, eating tomatoes: in tarts, broiled on bread with cheese, and straight from the cutting board.)

Picking flowers. (And putting them all over the house.)

Lounging with Boh.

And today? Well, today I’m taking Saturday seriously. I slept in, made pancakes, read for pleasure, and frolicked a bit with Boh. I even put on my swimsuit in order to encourage the sun to come out. See?

Still rainy, but it might clear up enough for me to take a quick dip.

I’m also macerating blueberries on the kitchen counter. Later today, they’ll become this blueberry crumble. (Berries courtesy of Laura.)

I don’t have any new pictures to share of my Whisper cardigan, but I have been knitting on it. Photographic evidence soon. Happy weekend!

baguettes.

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But first, a winner! I used a random number generator, and it picked April! She’ll receive a copy of Killing the Darlings, the latest album by Pearl and the Beard. Congratulations, and thanks, all, for commenting. [If you have thoughts about whether you’d be interested in seeing opportunities like this here from time to time, do send me an email.]

Now, baguettes.

Remember how I received a gift that keeps on giving (sourdough starter) for my birthday? Well, dear friend Ethel Louise came over last week to teach me how to make baguettes from my starter. The night before, she provided instructions for mixing the leaven and the poolish, and then I prepared the dough and gave it a few turns before she arrived. We shaped the dough, took Boh for a walk, carefully molded it into baguette loaves in a special way to maintain tension in the dough, heated the oven (and her baking stone and special beat-up cast iron pan for the bottom of the oven), and then, just before the loaves went in, she threw a handful of ice into the cast iron pan to make lots of steam. She is a rockstar. (Also, did you see that my new oven has an oven light? Fancy.)

I mean, these are awesome in normal vision, but don’t they look even more delectable in hipstamatic? (Yes. The answer is yes.)

Ethel is headed overseas for research for a few weeks, and is leaving me the baking stone, the cast iron pan, and her copy of the Tartine cookbook. We’ll see if I can recreate this magic while she’s away…

Happy Friday, folks! I’m off to campus.

ricotta in action.

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You know how I post pictures of me wearing my handknits (often when I have no knitting progress to share) and call the series “knits in action”? Well, I took one look at this photo of my first batch of Deb’s ricotta, smeared on toast and drizzled with honey, and all I could think was, RICOTTA IN ACTION! We’ll see if this becomes a companion series to my photographs of handknits.

Remember, you have until the end of today (Wednesday) to comment on Friday’s post for a chance to win Killing the Darlings by Pearl and the Beard!

More soon!

PQRS: an alphabet post.

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P. As in, peonies the size of my head. Also, Pearl and the Beard. (Have you entered the album giveaway yet? You have until Wednesday to comment on Friday’s post!)

Q. For quantity. As in, how many retro table and chair sets can I fit on my porch? Also, aQua. (4 chairs and a table for 20 bucks, thanks to Craig and his marvelous list.)

R. Ricotta. Rich, homemade ricotta from Deb over at smitten kitchen, to be precise. This is Really good. Like, change-your-plans-for-the-day good. Whole milk, some heavy cream, lemon juice, and salt. The only reason I can come up with for not making this as soon as possible is that you need to go get a meat or candy thermometer. You should maybe go do that now.

S. Salad. And not just any salad; Summer Salad. Here at Casa Rooster, a Summer Salad is a salad that is eaten out of a larger-than-normal bowl.

Yup.

S also stands for Stripes. I’ve been making progress at a leisurely pace on my handspun stripey shawl, and I am thoroughly enjoying it. Boh seems to like it too.

Happy Monday, folks. Hope your week is off to an excellent start.

FO: rhinebeck cauldron part 2.

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This is the second half of my Rhinebeck/Cauldron experiment, 188 yards of squishy 2-ply (in 150 and 38 yard skeins). My initial plan was to make this into another eternity scarf, and while I’m not sure if I’m going to to follow that pattern exactly, I think this yarn still wants to become a big squishy ’round the neck sort of thing. I’ve got 400 or so yards total to work with, which gives me lots of options. What would you make with this? (Boh clearly has no opinion, as evidenced by these photos.)

Did you see the curry recipe Andrea posted last week? I made it on Sunday night, using tofu that I browned in butter instead of the seitan meatballs. Mine is a very different color (due, I think, to my use of a can of coconut milk instead of coconut flakes rehydrated in water), but I’m guessing it was the same level of deliciousness. Oh my. So good, so easy, so going into my kitchen recipe binder.

They are hard to see, but I’m pretty sure that this is a mother Merganser and a whole slew of ducklings. A few are riding on her back, and the commotion you see here is all the rest hurrying to keep up!

And here is Boh, happily lounging on the dock next to the picnic table. It is supposed to be HOT today, so I’m guessing we’ll find ourselves out by the lake this afternoon, though not until after we do a lot of work around the house. My parents brought a truck full of furniture yesterday — things from their basement and from my grandmother’s house (she just moved into a smaller apartment in an assisted living facility), and they’ll be here for a few days to work and play. We have plans to plant some containers full of herbs, replace the shower head, decide about a dehumidifier for the basement…things like that. I’ll have lots more lake house pictures soon!

kitchen playtime.

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My allergies have really knocked me down today, so all I’ve got for you is a series of photos from my dinner prep (and enjoyment) last night. First, I made a mess in the kitchen. (And by mess, I mean Farro with Green Onion Sauce, Toasted Walnuts, and Asparagus, from Heidi Swanson’s Super Natural Cooking. I subbed brown rice for farro and lemon juice for the zest, and tried to stick to her instructions.) The outcome? A delicious, satisfying sunset meal (pictured above).

Happy weekend!

salsa and stripes.

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‘Morning, all. I’m feeling cautiously optimistic about this sore throat, and a little stir crazy from almost two full days on the couch. Time to catch up on some blogging. First up? Salsa.

I saw this super simple recipe over at A Friend to Knit With — and while I would’ve kept on scrolling in my old apartment because it called for using the broiler (and I was never able to clean that one well enough to feel good about using it), on Saturday morning I thought, what better way to celebrate a new stove? And so I ventured to the grocery store on graduation morning for salsa ingredients. And it was worth it. (I did use onions, too. They just aren’t in the pictures.)

Initially I was worried that it would be too spicy, but it mellowed a bit in the fridge. (Or maybe I got a mouthful of chile seeds when I tasted it? Either way, I was really happy with the results.)

As you can see, Boh was also worried about the spiciness of the salsa. Saturday night, a small group of friends from the department came over to hang out and enjoy the sunset. There were two different kinds of homebrew (yum!) and Boh made several new friends. I didn’t snap any pictures, but it was really nice to be social again, and I was awake way past my bedtime. Sunday was when I started feeling less than awesome, and I pretty much sat on the porch all day and worked on my Stripe Study Shawl. These don’t count as FO pictures because the lighting is bad and the ends aren’t woven in, but here’s a look at how it turned out:

I really love this, and even though summer weather has just begun, I will keep my fingers crossed for an evening or two when it is cool enough for me to sit on the porch with this shawl around my shoulders. I’ll post official FO pictures once I weave in the ends and find a better spot for photos!

 

we interrupt our regularly scheduled programming…

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to bring you information of great importance. This rooster just got a brand new oven.

On Wednesday, I went looking for a filing cabinet, but came home with an awesome, solid wood, rustic futon frame. The trouble was, I had help getting it into the car, but arrived back at the lake house in need of assistance to get it out of the car and into the guest room. I texted a few friends and posted on facebook to find help, and H. came to my rescue. Not only did she use her muscles to help me move the futon frame, but her nose detected a gas leak that I wasn’t smelling (maybe I have a bad nose, maybe I’d just not been in that corner of the kitchen). I called the gas company, and they told us to wait on the porch. We had ice cream while we waited for a technician to arrive. Turns out that in this small town of mine, everybody knows everybody. So when the tech identified the leak in a hose connecting the stove to the gas line, he called the person who does maintenance for this house to come over.  A couple of new hoses in the kitchen and the basement, and they hooked everything up again. They found one remaining leak, this one in the regulator on the stove. So they ordered me a new stove that afternoon, and moments ago, it was installed. So now I have a new-to-me lake house with a brand new full-size stove! Totally worth not being able to make coffee or heat anything up for 48 hours, if you ask me.

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming. (In other words, I will post knitting soon. Seriously.)