Every year, I post the first snowdrops in the garden, because it's really the most exciting event of the year. Seriously. Last year, it was March 8, the year before on March 6, 2008 and March 13, 2007. Wonder of wonders, today, February 26 - there are snowdrops up and cheery in the garden.
Even though the daffodils were purchased at the grocery store (discounted, of course!), they're still cheery. It's been a really windy, wet day, and they brought some much-needed brightness to the house.
This cake is amazing. If you're not deathly allergic to citrus (sorry, Ing!) it is heaven on a plate. The recipe is from A Homemade Life, and is on Molly's blog, Orangette, right here. You must make it, as soon as possible. It's probably best shared with other people, but I wouldn't really know. (I will not tell you what percentage of the cake was consumed by yours truly.)
I truly believe that if I didn't have something growing inside in February, I might just wither up, never to be heard from again. (Psssst- February's almost over, and for the past couple of years, we've seen our first snowdrops in early March! The sun made an appearance yesterday, so there is a spark of hope!)
I've admired ranunculus from afar for ages, (especially in Saipua's gorgeous arrangements) but have never seen them in person. (One of the pitfalls of living in a small town. My idea of near-heaven is walking down a street with a flower selection like this. Someday!) So I was tickled pink to find some boxed bulbs (I didn't even know they were a bulb, until then) at the grocery store. I tried one box (3 bulbs), and the bulbs got moldy. Eeeeew. I followed the instructions, too! And the box even says 'Easy to grow'. Harumph. There was one box left when I went back a few weeks later, so experiment number 2 is on the go. I'm hoping for success this time.
A snow day did arrive! I've been having a lovely day with P, there's one of my favourite suppers in the crockpot, and it's naptime. So I decided to whip up something non-cakey and non-soapy. Okay, this is definitely not cake-y, but it is kind of soapy.
Laundry Soap
The food processor I used (which I bought for $30; it was regularly $130 and was discontinued, so I bought it for projects like this) isn't the sturdiest on the planet, so I found that it worked well to chop up the soap (rather than try to grate it from the whole bar) and process it that way. I tried using a Simply Clean Stain Remover bar (I didn't use quite the whole thing, probably 3/4 of it - it's huge!) since it was inexpensive and really hard - I think that with my soaps, I would have needed to dry the soap a bit more after processing it so that it wouldn't clump. Now that I'm thinking of it, while the processor is out and still has soap bits in it, I should grate some extra to dry and have on hand. And of course, washing soda and borax are in the laundry aisle (usually on the top shelf).
We usually use Down East unscented liquid laundry detergent; it cleans really well, lasts forever, and it's made here in NS. But since I saw how simple this recipe is, I thought I would try it. We'll see how well it works on some of P's toddler grime, and because I didn't add any fragrance, it should be fine for Son #2's clothes, too. Let me know if you're planning to or have tried this!
This little beady-eyed little wonderbird was spotted over here.
The swan story and photo credits are here.
I just made this Toffee-Date Pudding from December's Everyday Food, and it is delicious. I've been wanting to try it since the issue arrived in November, but didn't want to have the whole thing for just us to eat. Which is exactly the situation we're in this weekend! For some reason, it's called Sticky Toffee Pudding on the website's recipe, and Toffee-Date in the magazine. Same recipe, though - I checked.
It's very, very similar to the Queen Elizabeth cake I've posted before. (My favourite cake of all time, by the way.) Both are date-y, very slightly spiced cakes with a sweet, sweet boiled topping consisting of mostly cream, sugar, and butter. This cake is a bit wetter and lighter than the Queen E cake. I think I prefer the Queen E cake because of the crunchy topping - it makes it much more interesting in the mouth, and the nuts and coconut add a few more flavours. But don't get me wrong - both are delicious.
The recipe is here, if you'd like to try it out.
Adam took all of these pictures this morning while he and P made some cookies to celebrate the Olympics starting here in our home and native land, tomorrow. I enjoy the Olympics as entertainment and cheer on Canada and all of that, but I'm really not that into them. My tune might change when we win some gold medals, though!
It's a very buttery shortbread recipe (when I, perhaps the greatest butter lover, ever use 'very' and 'buttery' in the same sentence, it means extremely buttery. I won't even say how much is in the recipe.) I tried making a Martha recipe for royal icing, from her Cookies book with meringue powder in it, since that's supposed to work well to help it stiffen up on the cookies, but it was kind of too thick. Which might be because of Adam's very clever idea (that's not being sarcastic - it's a great idea!) to turn it pink - we used raspberry juice instead of water, to avoid food colouring. It's a lovely pale pink, and tastes quite good, but it's really stiff. Too thick to easily pipe onto cookies. And it doesn't stick very well to the tops of the cookies, either. I've never made it before, and it called for leaving it to mix on low for 10 minutes, which may have been too long. And perhaps the raspberry juice was too much thicker than water for it to work properly. (I just microwaved some raspberries we had in the freezer and strained out the juice.) Either way, now I know what to try for next time!
I hope you're having a good week - I've been busily working away, and have a loooong day with plenty of driving tomorrow. But I've always got in the back of my mind a list of things that I can do to be best prepared for Son #2's arrival, and so I have a question for you:
Back in November, I saw this recipe for popovers and absolutely had to try making them. I can't think of many other things that could be such a perfect vehicle for butter. Or even better, honey butter. Mmmm. I was so dedicated to the cause that I even went and bought a popover pan ($9 at the Superstore) after the first batch didn't work out so well in muffin tins. But the second batch was kind of a flop (literally), too, despite the new pan. So I decided that I would try another recipe. Which landed in my lap this afternoon, via January's Martha Stewart Living, which I picked up at the library yesterday.
Adam laughed at my laments over the pictures of the popovers in the article - he compared it to most women reading fashion magazines and having serious body image issues. Not I - it's perfect-popover-envy for me. Still convinced that they wouldn't turn out, I halved the recipe and whipped up the batter in a matter of minutes.
And they are amazing. I poked a little hole in each one after removing them from the pan (which I also tried in my previous attempts), and they didn't deflate at all. I think that the success is primarily due to the longer baking time - I don't really know, but that's my best guess.
Here's the full recipe (I halved it), which was published in the January issue of Martha Stewart Living.Makes 1 dozen
Here is P's room; 98% done! We only have pictures to hang on the walls, and it will be complete. How's that for a snazzy dresser? Solid wood, great condition, and $60 at Frenchy's. Where else? Jute mat, slightly modified cotton curtains over the closet door (which is used for storage of extra bedding and my greatly reduced craft supplies) and Snoopy, ready for a nap on the slightly rumpled bed. (It's such a pain to make the bed with that bed rail!)
The man himself, looking serious next to his tiny closet. It's about a foot deep, and Adam's going to build shelves in it. But we don't have any stuff to put in it yet (yay!) so there's no big hurry.
But the biggest thing we've been working on over the past month or so was redoing P's 'big boy' bedroom. It had turned into a storage room, mostly for stuff we didn't use or need. Living in a 110 year old house can present some storage challenges, and my new mantra is "If there's not a place to put it, get rid of it!" Seriously - as silly as it sounds sometimes when you hear or read professional organizers or people on reality TV talking about how getting rid of stuff and organizing what you have will make life better, I think they're onto something. Maybe your whole life won't change, but you will feel better about your surroundings, and will avoid frustrations when you can't find or get to something because of clutter.
It feels so much lighter, more useful, and homey since we've been seriously purging for the past few weeks. All in all, I think we've probably given away at least 15 bags of 'stuff', as well as some small furniture. And I don't miss a single thing.
One more picture - this is a fantastic dresser which Adam picked up at a local antiques place for his very own. I love it!
