We Have Twins

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Jul 172010

OK, so my previous baby announcement wasn’t really about a baby, but about our first broccoli.  We don’t really have new twins to share, but we are ecstatic about our twin tomatoes.  Other than prolific lettuce production, our garden has been lagging.  The excessive spring rain compacted our soil and our new seeds had some trouble punching through the surface.

Rob replanted, and supplemented with additional nutrients, most of our transplants and new growths a couple weeks ago.  Most everything is happier in the looser soil, but our peppers and eggplants still seem unhappy.  We are watching and hoping.  The twin tomatoes renew our hope that we will eat more than just lettuce and a few heads of broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage from our garden this summer.

The other item that is growing well in the garden is parsley.  It was sort of on a whim that we planted it because I don’t really like it.  I thought I might throw it in here and there.  Well I have basically ignored it and it has flourished.  I needed a picnic food for last Monday night.  We were going to be away from home at dinner time and I wanted an alternative to the tuna fish or peanut butter sandwiches I usually pack for picnics.

I made the Quick Lemon and Garlic Quinoa Salad from Feeding the Whole Family by Cynthia Lair.  I cut the parsley and added the tomato.  It did not include sunflower seeds, but I have in the past.  The recipe is easy to make, can be made in advance, travels well and tastes great.  I had picked up Feeding the Whole Family a few times in the bookstore, but kept putting it down.  I was drawn in by the beautiful cover art by Nikki McClure and Cynthia’s affiliation with Bastyr, but the recipes didn’t quite grab be (and I definitely don’t need another cookbook unless it is going to be well loved.

I took a cooking class through Lost Arts Kitchen and we ate the Quinoa Salad during our snack break.  It was delicious.  I immediately bought the book and we have enjoyed everything I have made so far.  The recipe ingredients tend to be more on the eclectic side and I usually don’t have everything on hand, but if I plan ahead, it is easy enough to gather the necessary items.  I am really looking forward to trying out more of the recipes once we harvest more beauties from our garden.

Tomorrow is the East Portland Sunday Parkways ride.  We can’t wait….

Posted by Wendy at 22:28 Tagged with: , , ,

Have a Ball in 2010!

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Dec 312009

Have a Ball

We just returned from a family excursion to OMSI.  It is absolutely pouring here and it seemed like half of Portland had the same idea.  Tonight I will make homemade pizza with Shiitake mushrooms we found at the year round farmer’s market at People’s Co-op yesterday.  They look beautiful, are local, organic and were only $5/lb.  I made the crust dough this morning with a recipe from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian.  I discovered the recipe a few weeks ago and have made the pizza dough twice already.

I used all purpose unbleached white flour from Fairhaven Organic Flour Mill the first time.  It was great, but I thought it would be better to add more whole grain.  The second time I use half white and half whole wheat, per the recipe.  It was a little too crunchy for us and did not have that traditional “pizza crust” flavor.  Today I stuck with the original recipe of just white.  We will also have a green salad and sparking pear cider.  Henrik helped pick out the Cream Cheese Apple Cake from The Grand Central Baking Book.  I knew we had all the ingredients so I offered it up as a choice.  A few of the ingredients have to warm to room temperature so they are out on the counter.  I am about to get started on the cake, which can bake while I assemble the pizza.  Tonight we will celebrate as a family, but tomorrow I am looking forward to celebrating in a more solitary fashion.

I have a trilogy of activities planned to welcome the New Year.  Tonight is the full moon so tomorrow will begin a new waning moon cycle.  The transition time between the full and new moon is the best time for detoxification.  Choose nourishing activities as the moon swells from new to full.  I first learned about working with the moon cycles while learning how to make herbal infused medicinal oils and extractions when I was as an undergrad.  The pulling of the waxing moon cultivates a richer herbal medicine.  Years later when I was researching organic products to use in my spa business, and also looking for spas to visit on a trip to Germany, I stumbled upon Just Pure.  The Just Pure day spa offers purifying treatments during the waning moon and nourishing treatments during the waxing moon.

I scheduled two days of treatments during our five day stay in Munich in 2004.  The experience was amazing.  I got hooked on the idea of tailoring my home spa treatments to the moon cycles.  My current home spa program involves a slightly longer than normal shower and a facial scrub and/or mask based on the waxing or waning cycles of the moon.  If I can squeak in an extra half hour, I use the same protocol in the tub by customizing what I add to the bath water.

On New Year’s Day I plan to start on the right foot with a yoga class at The Bhakti Shop.  Later in the day I will spend an hour at Loyly.  I like to spend about ten minutes in the steam room (they also have a sauna), quench the heat with an icy shower and then return to the steam.  I repeat the cycle until I am out of time.  Rob got me a gift certificate for The Rejuvenator package for my birthday last year and I got to spend three indulgent hours at Loyly, but that splurge isn’t in the budget at the moment.  For only fifteen dollars and sixty minutes of your time, you will walk away from Loyly a new person.

Finally, I plan to start the Flor-Essence Herbal Tea Blend to make sure I detoxify internally as well.  I also used Flor-Essence during the waning moon cycle just before the Summer Solstice.  It was a great way to mark the seasonal change and to pay additional attention to the inner processes of my body.  I know I am due for some extra attention again and I am looking forward to blending all three activities into my New Year’s Day ritual.

I hope you too can find some special way to start the New Year.  I also hope you will join me in observing, or, if not readily evident, searching for the beauty around you every day.  Thank you for reading and Happy New Year!

Posted by Wendy at 16:50 Tagged with: , ,

I’m Thankful for Apple Juice

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Dec 252009

We went around the table at Thanksgiving and each spoke of something for which we were thankful.  For Henrik, it was apple juice.  We don’t drink juice on a regular basis so the apple juice was something special and it was the only thing he had sampled before telling us what he was thankful for.  My heart sank a little because this was this was the first Thanksgiving I had made almost everything on the table.  We bought bread, the stuffing mix, mushroom gravy (both from New Seasons) and, of course, the apple juice.

But once Henrik started eating, he loved everything.  So, my heart glowed again.  I did not make a “main dish” (I plan on attempting this next year), but there was no lack of food.

Salad

We had a green salad with pears, candied walnuts and a balsamic and olive oil dressing.  The walnuts were such a hit that I have made a new batch every couple days since Thanksgiving (they are also a great Holiday gift).  I did modify the recipe a bit after the first round by adding salt and I have also made them with salted butter.

Roots, Potatoes & Stuffing

Henrik and I picked up a Kraeuterbrot from Fressen Bakery at the Eastbank Farmer’s Market on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, which kept well until Thursday.  I made “traditional” mashed potatoes with whole milk, a little butter and salt and oven roasted root vegetables (garnet yams, carrots and parsnips).  I picked up a bag of seasoned stuffing mix and then added vegetable broth from a Rapunzel vegetable bouillon.  Prior to mixing together, I sautéed garlic, onion, celery and dried Bing cherries (soaked in warm water first).  A little fresh thyme rounded out the flavor and the oven crisped everything perfectly.

Cranberries, Salad & Bread

For the cranberries, I started with a bag of Stahlbush Island Farms frozen cranberries and cooked them down with some apples.  I added cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, fresh ginger brown sugar and more of the presoaked Bing cherries.  I got a little carried away with the spices and the cranberries ended up packing quite a punch.

As all of the leftovers disappeared over the next week; the cranberries lingered.  So, I took another bag of frozen cranberries and cooked the down with more apples.  I added the leftover cranberries to the mix and then poured the whole lot into a pie shell.  I prebaked the crust for about 20 minutes and then baked the whole pie for about 30 minutes.  With a little homemade vanilla ice cream on top, the leftover cranberries disappeared!  Next year I will tone down the spices, but the cranberry pie will be a repeat.

Pumpkin Ginger Cheesecake

The crown jewel of Thanksgiving was the dessert, Pumpkin Ginger Cheesecake.  I might be partial because I love dessert, but it was delicious.  I had not previously attempted such a complex dessert and I was very pleased with the results.  I basically followed the recipe, except that since I hadn’t read the recipe in its entirety before starting, I didn’t realize that the crust started with gingersnap cookies.  I had already bought graham crackers for the crust so that is what I used.

We were all so full by the time dessert rolled around that we could only fit in a small slice.  The cheesecake was great as a leftover and it continued to compliment the rest of the Thanksgiving leftovers for many meals.  Leftovers can be great as they are or they can serve as a building block for a new innovative recipe.  The cranberries were good to start, but they were even better when they became the starter for the cranberry pie.  Seemingly boring leftovers can actually be the foundation upon which to build a creative new meal.  I too am thankful for apple juice, but also for cranberries and for so much more.  Happy Holidays!

Posted by Wendy at 00:23 Tagged with: ,

Looks Can Be Deceiving

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Dec 022009
Brazed Brussels Sprouts

Balsamic Brazed Brussels Sprouts

I have been avoiding writing about food because I am not (yet) accomplished at photographing food.  I am sure it is a combination of both equipment and skill.  I dumped so many of my food photos this summer because the pictures just didn’t look appetizing.  We seem to have a failing camera and aren’t getting many good photos of anything lately so an upgrade is in the future.  I am also trying to learn more about staging food photos.

With that caveat, we had a great dinner.  I had no intention on taking a picture, but as I sat down with my plate, it just begged to be photographed.  Tonight’s dinner was inspired by the blog Smitten Kitchen.  We got Brussels sprouts and Romanesco broccoli, which I would have taken a picture of if I had actually planned on writing this post, in our last CSA box on Friday.  I had been waiting for some inspiration.  I found the Balsamic Brazed Brussels Sprouts recipe on Monday.  There is also the sweetest picture of their new baby holding a tiny Brussels sprout, which is worth checking out.

I didn’t weigh the vegetables (or flowers) and I pretty much improvised from there on.  I did sauté the green ingredients in olive oil and then added the shallots and garlic.  When those were tender enough I added the balsamic vinegar and the broth.  I used a vegetable bouillon cube from Rapunzel.  I am not sure if I properly “glazed” everything because I am not sure I possess that cooking skill.  I also completely eliminated the bread crumbs.  Instead, I served it with fresh (frozen) egg fettuccini from Pastaworks.  The grated parmesan rounded out the flavor and brought in the salt that was missing from the pancetta, which we don’t eat.  It was hit for the whole family and it was another reminder that some recipes call for strict adherence and others beg for individual creativity.  My kitchen motto is usually to “cook with what you have” and that worked well this recipe.  Thanks for the inspiration, Smitten Kitchen!

Posted by Wendy at 22:48 Tagged with:

Velvet Vanilla = Yummy Tummy

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Nov 302009

Velvet Vanilla

Velvet Vanilla

Henrik turned four at the beginning of the month (I seem to be about a month behind on posts right now).  Along the lines of the fire truck Halloween costume request, he also wanted a fire truck cake.  He had a spider cake last year that was a molasses cake under the decoration.

Henrik Turns 3

Henrik Turns 3

His response to the, “What flavor cake would you like?” question was a clearly stated, “vanilla”.  Vanilla has been a strong theme recently so I started combing through cookbooks for a vanilla cake recipe.

A few days later we were at Grand Central Bakery and there was a beautiful, uncut bundt cake staring at me from the other side of the counter.  The tag told me that it was a Vanilla Velvet Cake and that was all I needed to know.  I added a slice to our bread order and headed home.  Henrik and I shared some for lunch and we saved a small chunk for Rob.  It was velvety and had a full vanilla flavor.  I asked Henrik if he wanted that cake for his birthday cake and he said, “perfect”.

I bought the Grand Central Baking Book from Powell’s over the summer and I attended the book signing at Powell’s in September.  I hadn’t gotten around to baking anything out of the book yet and based on some of the audience’s comments, I was feeling tentative.  There were a few comments about their really wasn’t much wiggle room in the recipes for lack of precision.  After tasting the Vanilla Velvet Cake at the bakery I pulled the book down off the shelf.  I found the recipe for a Glazed Vanilla Bundt Cake.  It sounded just like the cake tasted.  The only surprise was nutmeg.  I hadn’t tasted nutmeg, but it didn’t surprise me that the nutmeg would help augment the vanilla flavor.

It was the most complicated cake recipe I had ever attempted.  And, I didn’t have a bundt pan.  I wasn’t really interested in buying one since I am avoiding nonstick cooking/baking items.  I did have a fancy loaf pan on the “get rid of” shelf in our basement and decided to use it.  The recipe made enough to fill that pan and two other stainless loaf pans.  The house smelled amazing while it baked.  And, since I had two cakes in addition to the birthday cake, we were able to sample it right away.  What a cake!  It was slightly lighter than the one from Grand Central and may have been slightly less moist, but I was thrilled with the result.  I glazed the one for Henrik’s birthday and put it in the fridge for the couple days until his birthday.  On the actual birthday I took the cake out of the fridge to warm to room temperature.  We all loved it and we had one very happy birthday boy.

Henrik Turns 4

Henrik Turns 4

Posted by Wendy at 22:18 Tagged with: ,
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