I hope your St. Patrick's day was as lovely as ours. I'm not Irish (that I know of!), but all of the green was a cheerful addition to our home. We had wonderful friends over for dinner & very much enjoyed their company. All are a reminder of the warmth that spring brings to our hearts and souls.
I type all of this as it is snowing outside. I remain optimistic!
Admittedly, my hobby list is a long one and it continues to grow. After checking out a few books on the subject from our library, cheese making got added to the list last month. I made several soft cheeses at home from the directions in Home Cheese Making, by: Ricki Carroll and quickly found myself limited. (This is no fault of the book, which is great. I plan to purchase my own copy soon.) For me, hard cheese is where it's at.
I took the next step forward and purchased a cheap-o mini fridge via craigslist and converted it into a cheeserator (as I like to call it), a.k.a. "cheese cave". A wine refrigerator and a cheeserator are very similar in regards to temperature and humidity. I followed this tutorial for converting a mini fridge into a wine refrigerator. The regrigerator I purchased did not have the "magic screw" so I followed the timer method. I didn't bother to purchase a separate refrigerator thermometer, I just used the pen-like dairy thermometer that I have to keep things in check. I should probably try to obtain a hygrometer, though.
Next, I'm going to be putting together a cheese press. I can't wait to get this party started.
Garbanzo beans. Just the name sounds gross, right? I fondly think of them as butt-beans, but I believe the preferred and more romantic name for them is chickpeas. I don't think I was much of a picky eater as a kid (my dad would roll his eyes upon reading this), but garbanzos were on my short list. That was where I drew the line.
Oh, if only I had had them like this; crunchy, a little flakey, spicy, and just a wee bit salty. All of my boys like them this way - even the two year old. Of course, he likes to help with them too. Staring at them in the oven makes them bake faster. Don't cha know?
Crunchy Curry Chickpeas
2 c. fresh cooked or canned chickpeas (I like to cook my own)
1T olive oil
3/4 tsp. curry powder
scant 1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. chili powder
Move one of your oven racks to the very top position of the oven, then heat oven to 425 F.
Toss all of the ingredients together in a bowl. Spread the chickpeas out on a metal baking sheet. Bake for a total of 30 minutes. For every ten minutes of bake time, give the pan a quick shake.
Turn the oven off and wedge a towel between the oven and the door. Let the chickpeas sit in the warm oven for another 10 minutes.
Dump into a bowl and enjoy! They are best served warm, but they may not be around long enough to get cold. ;0)
I asked Phoenix what kind of birthday cake he wanted this year, and he simply stated that he wanted a lollypop cake.
I had this Maypole cake idea floating around in my head a few weeks before the first of May, but I wasn't really up for putting the required amount of effort into a cake that wasn't for someone's birthday.
Sure, May has come and gone. However, turning 4 is a very special occasion. Lollipops, rainbow colors, and tons of frosting are required.
Mango flavored cake on the inside, with pineapple frosting on the outside and in between layers.
I attempted to recreate my favorite shot that I took last year. I love his fascination with trains and other large vehicles.
Logan rigged up a kid safe hot dog/marshmallow roaster with a cane of bamboo and a coat hanger, and showed Phoenix how to roast his own hot dog.
Isaiah had fun experimenting with roasting different foods... like Pirate's Booty. He swears it was good. I'll take his word for it.
Isaiah was sweet enough to haul up wet sand so that Phoenix could make sand castles. Phoenix didn't have an interest in going any where near the water.
Griffin was fixated on the graham crackers and the helicopters.
I was fixated on gooey chocolaty, marshmallowy goodness.
And the pretty lights.
"We have so much time and so little to do. Strike that, reverse it."
- Roald Dahl Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Dying play silks was one of those ideas that I kept stewing over. I would turn the thought over and over in my head, all the while keeping it on the back burner. After all, there had been so much to do. However, a certain little someone has a birthday coming up. I knew I needed to get crackin'.
So, play silks I made. Oh, what fun that was. I can think of lots of little children that would like to have these. must. make. more.
Well, we're all back home and under one roof. For that, I am thankful. Half of our house is still torn apart, but at least it's covered in plastic and deemed "habitable"; albeit inconvenient and uncomfortable. I'm trying not to use my blog as a forum for my complaints. (Insert self control here.) It's been a rough two weeks.
So about them crackers...
I swore off making crackers years ago, deeming them unworthy of my time. Then, of course, as things go, I had a hankering for crackers. The thought of interrupting nap time for a single box of crispy, crunchy goodness was more crazy than I wanted in one day. I sucked it up. I made crackers, and they were I-can't-stop-eating-them good, and extremely easy to prepare. (A new recipe this time.)
Seed Crackers
adapted from: The Vegetarian Mother's Cookbook
1 1/2 c. brown rice flour
2/3 c. cooked brown rice
1 T. flax seeds
1T poppy seeds
1 T sunflower seeds
1T black sesame seeds
1 T dulse
1/4 tsp. sea salt
1 T toasted sesame oil
3 T peanut oil
1/3 c. water
Preheat oven to 375. Lightly oil a baking or jelly roll sheet. Add all of the ingredients into a medium sized bowl. Combine with your hand until everything is evenly mixed, and the dough holds together. At this point you can add a little more water if it's not sticking together. Press or roll the dough out onto your sheet. The thinner, the crispier. About 1/8" - 1/4" is good. Score into 1.5" squares with either a pizza cutter or a knife. Bake for about 25 minutes, remove from pan when cool to the touch.
Crunch, crunch. Yum, yum.
Note: You could use just about any kind or combination of seeds you want. Get creative! Also, if you don't have brown rice flour, you can throw a handful of it into a coffee grinder and grind it up that way. That's what I did. It was still slightly grainy, but it wasn't too coarse, and I thought it gave the crackers character.
Last month I purchased a couple of sets of cupcake liners and royal icing flowers offered by Sweet Estelle's Baking Supply. I couldn't handle the cuteness. Seriously? Gingham cupcake liners? My life would not be complete without them. If you saw my post on the green tea cupcakes, you can see the orange gingham liners in action.
Jennifer, proprietor of Sweet Estelle's, attributes her great love of holiday and birthday celebrations to her grandmother, Estelle. I can't think of a more lovely way to honor those sweet memories. Speaking of sweet, everything in her shop is just that; cute, sweet items that offer a ton of baking inspiration.
And guess what? Yeah, this is the good part. Jennifer is kindly hosting a giveaway. Sweet, indeed.
One lucky reader will win a goodie bag full of these items:
12 royal sugar violets
1 Snow White topper set
1 bag of yellow sanding sugar
50 cupcake/muffin liners - 10 each of:
pink polka dot
green gingham
yellow stripe
blue retro rose
purple stripe
To enter the drawing, please visit Sweet Estelle's Baking Supply. Tell me what your favorite item is (my personal fave is the set of woodland animals cookie cutters), and drop it in a line with a comment. That's it! The drawing ends on April 1st at 12pm PST. I will then be closing comments and selecting a random winner. This post will be updated with the name of the winner shortly thereafter.
The drawing is over, and the comments are closed. Thank you all for participating! I had a lot of fun putting this together for you. The winner today is Kristen, commenter #59.
A brief history: Around 150 years ago or so, it was common of the people of Sweden to hand make furniture and useful tools to help them get through the long dark days of winter. Among the tools they made were cookie stamps. These stamps had designs inspired by daily life, nature, and symmetry, and were traditionally made from wood. They were so popular, practically every family had a set of stamps. In some cases, history has been well preserved and people are still using the stamps from generations ago today.
Cookie stamps were given away as gifts during the holidays. Christmas time was, and still is a traditional occasion on which to make stamped cookies. During the Christmas season, my family makes cookies similar to these every year in the German tradition. I plan on making some later this year, and will share my results with you then.
Since the recipe I used to make these stamped cookies requires that the dough be rolled into sugar, I thought it might be fun to make the sugar different colors. We went with traditional spring colors here.
Little hands will have fun rolling the dough around in the sugar. The dough is soft enough to where it can easily be stamped by little ones as well. Although, it may take a gentile grown up hand to peel the dough from the stamp.
There are several different companies that sell cookie stamps these days. I chose to go with Rycraft. I really liked their traditional Scandinavian designs. They have a fairly quick turnaround time on online orders too.
In this photo, you can see that the stamp in back is darker (from lots of use) and has less depth than the stamp in front. The one in back is a vintage stamp, the one in front is new. I prefer the new stamps because with them, the prints have more definition after the cookies have been baked.
Almond Butter Cookies
Recipe from the kitchen of Mrs. Rycraft
1 c. butter
1/2 c. sugar
2 c. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. almond extract
sugar for rolling (we used 3 - 4 drops of food coloring in 1/4 c. sugar).
Cream butter and sugar. Add extract. Add salt and flour and mix well. Divide dough into two equal parts, cover and refrigerate for 1/2 hour. Use a tablespoon of dough to form a ball, roll in sugar coating evenly. Immediately stamp the cookie with the cookie stamp. Bake at 325 for 12 - 15 minutes.
Many more recipes that can be used with the stamps can be found here.
Unrelated: The Bird & The Bee came out with a new album yesterday. Excitement!
I was thinking about titling this post "irish these were guiness cupcakes", but that would be lying. These are actually green tea cupcakes. The cakes have a delicate tea & lemon flavor and are really nice just by themselves. They are as fluffy as a cloud. The icing adds to the sugar rush and it packs a serious green tea punch.
I caught my husband licking the icing remnants out of the bowl. Busted.
Of course, Griff-munch wanted in on the action.
Green Tea (Matcha) Cupcakes
Adapted from: Billy's vanilla, vanilla cupcakes
For the cakes:
1 3/4 c. cake flour
1 1/4 c. AP flour
2 c. sugar
1 T baking powder
3/4 tsp. salt
3 T finely ground loose leaf green tea (matcha is the kind)
1 c. unsalted butter, room temp
4 large eggs
1 c. milk (I used 2%)
1 tsp. lemon extract
For the icing:
6 c. powdered sugar
1 c. butter
6-8 T milk
2 T green tea/matcha powder (see note)
2 T lemon zest
For the garnish:
nonpareils, lemon zest, crushed wasabi peas
For the cakes: Preheat oven to 325°F. Line a cupcake pan with paper liners and set aside. In a large bowl, whisk together flours, sugar, baking powder, salt, and tea. Blend thoroughly. Blend the butter in with an electric mixer until the mixture becomes 'sandy' looking. In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, and lemon extract. Add the liquid to the flour mix 1/3 at a time. Scrape down the sides of the bowl after each addition. Mix together until just combined. Don't overwork, or you'll loose the fluffiness. Fill cups 3/4 full with the batter. Bake 30 minutes, rotating the pan half way through. Repeat the process with the remaining batter.
For the icing: In a large bowl, whisk together all of the ingredients thoroughly. Pipe or spread onto cupcakes.
Add garnish & serve!
Note: If matcha powder is not available, just grab a bunch of green tea bags, open them up and dump the contents out into a coffee grinder. Grind the leaves into a fine powder and use a couple of layers of cheese cloth to sift out the larger bits. You really want to use a fine powder for the icing, but tea straight out of the bag is fine for the cakes.
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