"Ample Water."

If you've never taken a tour of Alexandria's Masonic Temple (yes, I'm referring to the one Dan Brown wrote about in The Lost Symbol), do it just for the view from the top.  Because the building is built atop a hill, the top of the temple is the highest point in the area and on a clear day you can see most of the DC Metro Area from up there.  Plus it's lovely.

We did the tour with our friends, which was perfect because nobody felt like that annoying family that brings a kid on the tour, and our very nice guide was able to speed things along when she noticed the kids getting restless.

We were admiring the view when another mom commented on the size of the parking lot.  I replied, "yes, the website said there was ample parking, but I had no idea it would be THIS ample!" Ian took off like a shot and was around the corner of the building in the blink of an eye.  I caught up to him and reminded him that he was supposed to wait for me before he went around the corner.  He was not paying attention, however, because he was busy jumping up and down and shouting, "Look, Mommy! Ample water!"  He had gone around the corner to where he could see the Potomac so he could try out his new word.

You can see the Metro go by from the front steps!

Adventures in Birthday Cake, or, Green French Toast

Green French Toast.  Yes, that is what we had for breakfast on Ian's birthday.  Your color display is not off.  Why you ask?  Well, let me begin at the beginning.

First of all, it seems we have now entered an era where cake is no longer exciting in and of itself.  Or so I came to understand on Tuesday, when Ian informed me that "Mommy, I want a train cake for my birthday."  And rue the day that I decided to do a Google Image Search for ideas with him in the room.

Now, if you've ever eaten cake around here, you'll have noticed that although I strive for a taste aesthetic that is nothing short of (with apologies) orgasmic, the appearance of said cakes is distinctly... homey.  I try to do a nice presentation.  I apply whatever treatment I've come up with tidily and, I hope, competently.  And there it stops.  I don't own a pastry bag.  I never aspired to own one.  Because while I admire a fancy looking confection, they usually bore me when it comes to the eating.  And I'm all about the eating.  So please understand how appalled I was when my son looked over my shoulder and shouted, "I WANT THAT TRAIN CAKE FOR MY BIRTHDAY! I WANT THAT THOMAS CAKE!"  Because he was looking at this cake:

Which is not merely rife with piped buttercream frosting.  It also uses a kit I didn't have time to order for said birthday.  And, the clincher, the instructions for assembly include AIRBRUSHING the grass onto this cake.  Sorry kid.  Mommy has never airbrushed in her life, and while she's delighted you are turning three (and by delighted I mean devastated that my baby is gone but proud of my big boy) she is not going to celebrate it by cramming to learn how to airbrush cakes.

The next day dawned and he was still talking about this cake.  Time to gird my metaphorical loins and figure out a way to pull this off without the kit, without an airbrush, and without making and piping not one but FIVE colors of icing.  A little more googling came up with a Thomas Carnival scene that I felt comfortable laminating and using as a backdrop, and a rootle through the train box pulled up one of Ian's Thomas engines to grace the top of the cake.  Now all I needed to do was figure out how to do a respectable job of icing the cake, when my last and only experience with piping frosting was a cooking class I took during the summer of, I believe, my sixth grade year.  I created a distinctly diseased looking rose for the top.  And the cake fell. So pardon me for not feeling that I should depend on THAT background for my one and only child's birthday cake.

Thank goodness for my friend Casey, who is my polar opposite when it comes to baking.  Not only is she willing to decorate cakes, she revels in it.  And she pointed out that the tracks are just chocolate frosting.  Which led me to the nearest grocery store where I found out that you can buy chocolate icing in a pouch with a nozzle, all ready to pipe.  You just need a tip.  You can also get white icing IN A CAN with a selection of tips.  Who knew?  So now I just needed grass.

Now, back to my philosophy of baking.  People fall into two camps when it comes to icing.  You have your "I eat sugar straight from the bowl" types who can't get enough, and you have your scrapers who ask for a middle piece and push all the icing off before they eat their cake.  I'm in the latter camp.  So I'm completely against the standard buttercream icing that is normally used to decorate cakes.  It's a waste of food for me, because I'm putting it all down the garbage disposal. So I went through my cookbooks for some other kind of frosting I could dye green and came up with Fluffy White Frosting, which is a confection made from beaten egg whites and surprisingly little sugar.  I thought it sounded perfect.

Come the night before Ian's birthday and, what with wrapping the presents and a few other things that took me a little farther into the evening than I had originally planned, it was midnight by the time the cake was cool and I was ready to try my hand at an egg white frosting.  Nothing daunted, I pulled out my mixing bowl, my hand mixer, the green food coloring, and the vanilla.  I started cracking the eggs and separating them exactly as I learned in Home Ec all those years ago.  And promptly broke a yolk into the bowl.  This is when it dawned on me that midnight might not be the time.  So I put the eggs, green food coloring and all, into a tupperware container in the fridge, made green buttercream frosting and iced that cake within an inch of its life.  Then I stuck it in the freezer and went directly to bed.  In the morning, I added a little milk to the failed attempt at frosting and there you have Green French Toast.  Ian loved it.  Actually, Ian loved the syrup, and would have been perfectly happy with cardboard if he was allowed to use it to eat syrup.

As for his cake, it turned out like this:

The cake itself was chocolate chip and quite good. The icing was exactly as disappointing as I expected.  Ian apparently saw no difference between what he requested and what I actually did.  Hooray for childhood.
http://www.bigtent.com/group/forum/message/30549052?ff=1

Anniversary

 

Here we are, on this, the third anniversary of Ian's birth. Joys, in truth, never end.

Pint Size Panetteria

Lots of work and lots of love go into everything that comes out of the Pint Size Panetteria. There’s the shopping, the chopping, the measuring, the mixing… and Chef Ian is on top of it all, from charming the cashiers to Kitchen Patrol.

So, Mr. McNamara, what’s next on your agenda?

Ian: “I’m going to make some for myself.”

Microsoft Word and some Scotch Tape made the perfect loaf band.

Since we know that Daddy and Raba both love a good rye bread and that Raba loves pecans and Daddy loves raisins, a good Raisin-Rye Bread with pecans and a jar each of Peach Jam and Apple Cinnamon Cream Cheese were the order of the day.

A cloth napkin and a recycled newspaper bow dress up the basket.

Ian was SO excited and proud to give Daddy and Raba gifts he'd made himself!

Happy Father's Day

Little Helper

My not-so-little helper was so proud to carry the recycling bin all the way back to the house!

Today's quote: "Mommy, you and me are going to help other peoples together."

Apples, oranges and peaches...

 This week I was lucky enough to host a "Ball Fresh Taste of Summer" house party. We "put up" home made salsa and peach jam.  Home canning and preserving isn't as tricky as you probably think, is fairly economical once you've purchased the equipment, and is a great way to make some of summer's bounty last though the winter.  Plus, you know what's in your food, especially if you grew and picked it yourself.  I enjoyed the opportunity to get back to home canning , since I haven't done any since Ian was born.  This was a great "Mamas' Night" activity, since we set up multiple chopping stations around my table and everyone got to participate while we chatted. 

Assuming you already know the basic canning process, here's the recipe we used:

Peach Jam

4-5 lbs of peaches- just ripe, not too soft!

1/4 cup lemon juice

7 cups sugar

1 1/4 package powdered pectin

1. Wash the peaches.  Then scald them in boiling water, dunk them in ice water, and pull the peels off.  Cut and pit them, then crush them with your hands or a potato masher.  You should have about 8-10 cups of crushed peaches.
2. Stir in lemon juice.  Put peaches and lemon into a large, non-reactive sauce pan over medium to high heat.  
3. Mix your pectin with 1/4 cup of the sugar.  Add pectin mixture to pot and bring to a full boil.  This should take about 5 minutes.  Add remaining sugar and stir well.
4. Bring the mixture back to a boil and let it boil, HARD, for 1 minute.  You'll know it's done when it "jells" at room temperature.  We put a little in a saucer and stuck it in the freezer for a minute.
5. Put in pint jar, leaving 1/4" head space.  Apply lids and process in your water bath canner for 5 minutes.  

If you need more information on the canning process, a detailed tutorial can be found here.

Tinner Hill Blues Fest

Raba bought everyone's favorite budding blues man a kazoo, which is naturally his new favorite thing.

Joys will never end

I'll fly away, oh Glory
I'll fly away in the morning

When I die Hallelujah, by and by
I'll fly away.
When the shadows of this life have gone
I'll fly away
Like a bird from these prison walls I'll fly
I'll fly away.

Alison Krauss & Gillian Welch

Photo courtesy of mikebaird via flickr creative common

Billy Goats Gruff

What you see here is Ian dropping one of the "Billy Goats Gruff" over the "bridge" so they can go eat grass "in the meadow." Naturally, he is wearing protective gear for his encounter with the troll.

Carrot Bread

I came up with this recipe after hours and hours of experimentation in the crummy little kitchen of my first apartment. I know, that sounds nuts, but this was "back in the day" before you could tap your ingredients into Google and have a recipe in seconds, and I wanted to make a carrot bread.  I started with a zucchini bread and modified it heavily.  I made at least three batches before I came up with something you'd really want to eat. It became a staple of my holiday baking for several years.

My past self could use a few notes from my present self about how to put a recipe together, however... I made a list of ingredients and noted the bake time and just assumed I'd remember the rest. After I had Ian I scaled back my holiday baking, so I made this for the first time in a long time today and apparently I figured it out. So, past self, take note: THIS is how you write out a recipe.

Yield: 1 loaf

3 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 1/4 cup shredded carrots (finer is better)
1 apple, peeled, cored, and minced
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon orange extract (optional)
3 cups flour (half whole wheat is okay)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 Tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 cup raisins
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 9" loaf pan with non-stick spray.

Combine eggs, oil, and sugar in a small bowl. Mix well on low speed. Add vanilla, carrot, and apple, and orange extract if using, and combine.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, and cinnamon. Stir well.

Add the first bowl to the second bowl and mix well on low speed, occasionally scraping the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula.

Fold in raisins. Pour into prepared pan and bake for 50 minutes or until a toothpick in the center comes out clean.

NOTE:  You can also substitute grated zucchini for part of the carrots.  Zucchini is a little wetter than carrot, so my instinct would be not to substitute more than 1/3 zucchini.

PS: Little Dude LOVED it.

Herb Garden Progess

Sunshine everywhere you look

My sunny little man has been joined at last by our daylillies! My herbs are also making good progress.

We had school today...

You can read more about Ian's morning here.

Daddy Thunder... (or, Ian's Thoughts on Thunder Storms.)

Ian loves storms.  I think it's his delight in all things noisy that makes him exclaim, "Oh!  There's Daddy Thunder! And there's Mommy Thunder! Ian thunder should be coming next week, I think."

"Mommy, those birds can come in and get a warm, dry towel.  Then when the storm is over, they can go fly again."

"Look, Mommy, the rain is making puddle stompin' for me and my friends!"

PS... in case you're wondering, that pic is what you get when Ian insists I go up the steps on the playground, then he takes off down the slide and tries new things.

New Word For Today

All this driftwood is OUT of the water.