mostly about food and a couple other things about the weekend
um... it's Tuesday alreay?
baked a bit this past weekend. we now have a loaf of honey oatmeal bread, a loaf of Victorian milk bread, and a honey cake in the freezer. we also have part of a peach pie in the fridge; the rest is in our tummies.
the peach pie came about because Angie from my van acquired many pounds of very ripe peaches from someone in her department on Friday. he was selling Colorado peaches for his church, and he ended up with two extra boxes that were so ripe the peels basically just pulled off. she took I don't know how many pounds of peaches off his hands for $20. I took about a dozen home with the promise of peach pie, so I made two pies - one for her and one for us. and I have to say, it turned out to be one darned yummy peach pie!
the honey oatmeal bread is, of course, a staple in our house. nothing much more to be said about it, except that this time I tried a suggestion in my cookbook to only use approximately half of the yeast called for in the recipe, and give the dough a long rise, then deflate it, turn it, and let it rise again, then turn it, deflate it, and rise again, and so on. I think overall it got four rises, including the final rise before baking. this is supposed to help the flavor develop more, and some other things I can't remember offhand. unfortunately, by the time the bread was baked and cooled and such, we were both full of dinner, so I didn't actually try any. I did slice it all up, though, and the texture was extraordinarily smooth and it was a cinch to slice - not crumbly and didn't break apart or anything. so... hmmm....
the milk bread I doubt I'd do again. I decided to try something new, but it turned out a little strange, plus it just doesn't have enough flavor to make it worth my while to do again. I tried a slice of that with plain butter, and though the crumb was really nice because of the milk, that's about all that can be said. I put some apricot preserves on it, and it'll be fine with sandwiches or something.
the cake was fun. I've been meaning to make it for a while, but having trouble with having all the ingredients together at one time. I would have made it last time I stayed home from work, but I couldn't find the stupid sliced almonds that I thought were in the freezer. I reluctantly came to the conclusion that I had used them and forgotten about it, so bought more. and then guess what I should find?
note to self: do not substitute an 8" cake pan for a 9" cake pan. it did not burble over and make a mess in the oven, thankfully, but it took a while longer for the cake to cook through, which meant the outside got quite browned in the process. think 1 cup of honey in the batter. still, I think it tastes great. next time, assuming I can make any claims to the intelligence required to learn from past experiences, I will use my springform pan! yes, the pan I have used maybe four times in the nine years I've owned it, and therefore never remember I have. still, we have cake slices in the freezer, and that was the plan, so I succeeded.
we also had Tina and Pete over again for games. Erin and Doug couldn't make it because Olivia got her first cold and they kept her home. Erin had a bridal shower to go to anyway. so the four of us played first a quick one-shot scenario with our Firefly characters, and then played also Tsuro, followed by Infernal Contraption, both of which Pete brought. Tsuro is really quick and straightforward, and pretty easy to learn. Infernal Contraption was fun, but suffered from the fact that it's a card game that requires reading all the stupid little cards. hence, much time was taken by people who haven't played it before (David and me) trying to figure out what the cards mean/do. I imagine once you have the rules down and such, it moves along much smoother, and already as the game progressed, I was able to grasp some of the strategies that are likely to help with winning.
as for winning, I think Tina won Tsuro, and David managed to make a phenomenal comeback in Infernal Contraption after being almost blown away by Pete, beating all of us. of course, it helped that everyone ganged up on Pete so he went out first. being the most familiar with the rules and cards, he was able to build up a pretty good contraption early in the game, so we had to take care of him quickly. still, as I noted to him, after he was gone we would turn on each other like jackals, which we did.
Sunday was the first official church service of the new year, given that some UU congregations still take "summer break." it was the water communion/ingathering service, and the first service with our brand spanking new settled minister, Rev. Tom. I think I have now officially joined the choir. I might have more to say about that later.
after church was a trip to Wilson's Orchard, because that was the only opportunity to go this month. and we spent much too much money. but I did bring home an apple peeler/slicer/corer. the understanding is, of course, that now I really do have to make pie from the apples we brought home. and I would have, if we didn't already have a peach pie in the fridge. apple pie will likely happen in a couple weeks, after our trip to Michigan.
we made two batches of pesto over the weekend, too. one was made from more basil from our plants, though not as large a batch. I hope our plants are able to keep growing and producing for several more weeks to come. I'm a little worried about how cold it's getting at night these days, because David and I are going to be gone two nights this coming up weekend, and I don't want it to freeze while we're gone and can't protect everything. *sigh*
anyhow, the second batch of pesto was made with roasted red peppers and pistachios, among other things. it's good, but really firey, because there's a lot of garlic and cilantro in the recipe. okay, there's a lot of garlic in the recipe, and I think I overdid the cilantro. regardless, it still tastes really good, especially with a cream cheese base on crackers; the cream cheese helps tame the fire.
um... more on cooking... oh, last night I was able to find just a few more basil leaves on our plants to make a little salad of sliced grape tomatoes from our plant, tossed with the chopped basil, some fresh mozzarella, a little bit of olive oil, a tiny bit of balsamic vinegar, and a touch of salt and pepper. oh, it was yummy!
baked a bit this past weekend. we now have a loaf of honey oatmeal bread, a loaf of Victorian milk bread, and a honey cake in the freezer. we also have part of a peach pie in the fridge; the rest is in our tummies.
the peach pie came about because Angie from my van acquired many pounds of very ripe peaches from someone in her department on Friday. he was selling Colorado peaches for his church, and he ended up with two extra boxes that were so ripe the peels basically just pulled off. she took I don't know how many pounds of peaches off his hands for $20. I took about a dozen home with the promise of peach pie, so I made two pies - one for her and one for us. and I have to say, it turned out to be one darned yummy peach pie!
the honey oatmeal bread is, of course, a staple in our house. nothing much more to be said about it, except that this time I tried a suggestion in my cookbook to only use approximately half of the yeast called for in the recipe, and give the dough a long rise, then deflate it, turn it, and let it rise again, then turn it, deflate it, and rise again, and so on. I think overall it got four rises, including the final rise before baking. this is supposed to help the flavor develop more, and some other things I can't remember offhand. unfortunately, by the time the bread was baked and cooled and such, we were both full of dinner, so I didn't actually try any. I did slice it all up, though, and the texture was extraordinarily smooth and it was a cinch to slice - not crumbly and didn't break apart or anything. so... hmmm....
the milk bread I doubt I'd do again. I decided to try something new, but it turned out a little strange, plus it just doesn't have enough flavor to make it worth my while to do again. I tried a slice of that with plain butter, and though the crumb was really nice because of the milk, that's about all that can be said. I put some apricot preserves on it, and it'll be fine with sandwiches or something.
the cake was fun. I've been meaning to make it for a while, but having trouble with having all the ingredients together at one time. I would have made it last time I stayed home from work, but I couldn't find the stupid sliced almonds that I thought were in the freezer. I reluctantly came to the conclusion that I had used them and forgotten about it, so bought more. and then guess what I should find?
note to self: do not substitute an 8" cake pan for a 9" cake pan. it did not burble over and make a mess in the oven, thankfully, but it took a while longer for the cake to cook through, which meant the outside got quite browned in the process. think 1 cup of honey in the batter. still, I think it tastes great. next time, assuming I can make any claims to the intelligence required to learn from past experiences, I will use my springform pan! yes, the pan I have used maybe four times in the nine years I've owned it, and therefore never remember I have. still, we have cake slices in the freezer, and that was the plan, so I succeeded.
we also had Tina and Pete over again for games. Erin and Doug couldn't make it because Olivia got her first cold and they kept her home. Erin had a bridal shower to go to anyway. so the four of us played first a quick one-shot scenario with our Firefly characters, and then played also Tsuro, followed by Infernal Contraption, both of which Pete brought. Tsuro is really quick and straightforward, and pretty easy to learn. Infernal Contraption was fun, but suffered from the fact that it's a card game that requires reading all the stupid little cards. hence, much time was taken by people who haven't played it before (David and me) trying to figure out what the cards mean/do. I imagine once you have the rules down and such, it moves along much smoother, and already as the game progressed, I was able to grasp some of the strategies that are likely to help with winning.
as for winning, I think Tina won Tsuro, and David managed to make a phenomenal comeback in Infernal Contraption after being almost blown away by Pete, beating all of us. of course, it helped that everyone ganged up on Pete so he went out first. being the most familiar with the rules and cards, he was able to build up a pretty good contraption early in the game, so we had to take care of him quickly. still, as I noted to him, after he was gone we would turn on each other like jackals, which we did.
Sunday was the first official church service of the new year, given that some UU congregations still take "summer break." it was the water communion/ingathering service, and the first service with our brand spanking new settled minister, Rev. Tom. I think I have now officially joined the choir. I might have more to say about that later.
after church was a trip to Wilson's Orchard, because that was the only opportunity to go this month. and we spent much too much money. but I did bring home an apple peeler/slicer/corer. the understanding is, of course, that now I really do have to make pie from the apples we brought home. and I would have, if we didn't already have a peach pie in the fridge. apple pie will likely happen in a couple weeks, after our trip to Michigan.
we made two batches of pesto over the weekend, too. one was made from more basil from our plants, though not as large a batch. I hope our plants are able to keep growing and producing for several more weeks to come. I'm a little worried about how cold it's getting at night these days, because David and I are going to be gone two nights this coming up weekend, and I don't want it to freeze while we're gone and can't protect everything. *sigh*
anyhow, the second batch of pesto was made with roasted red peppers and pistachios, among other things. it's good, but really firey, because there's a lot of garlic and cilantro in the recipe. okay, there's a lot of garlic in the recipe, and I think I overdid the cilantro. regardless, it still tastes really good, especially with a cream cheese base on crackers; the cream cheese helps tame the fire.
um... more on cooking... oh, last night I was able to find just a few more basil leaves on our plants to make a little salad of sliced grape tomatoes from our plant, tossed with the chopped basil, some fresh mozzarella, a little bit of olive oil, a tiny bit of balsamic vinegar, and a touch of salt and pepper. oh, it was yummy!