the Fairy & the Pumpkin

strawberry shortcakes

Daughters who turn 7 years old walk the brink of adolescence, precariously leaving behind the safety of childhood.  Mine was no exception.  It's amazing to me that I love her more every year and every day when I thought it wasn't possible to love anything more seven years ago.

(That beautiful dress is from my mother.  You can find it in her etsy store, vintagebaby clothier!)

I think the best thing I can do to comemorate who she is right now is to share a "poem" she wrote in school for poetry month.

I am the one who loves to collect

32 bells, 2 braslits and 3 papper clips.

I am the one who hopes the earth can be clean.

I am the one who somday I will be nothing.

I am the one whos birthday is coming soon.

I am the one whos aferid of long, pouson and biting spiters.

I am teh one who can tiy shoes.

I am the one who is lucky. 

We had another simple birthday celebration.  True to what she's been saying since fall, she asked for homemade gnocchi and strawberry shortcakes.  I realized that I've never shared this recipe before and wanted to make sure and do that!  This is a recipe you will want to try, I promise!  The flavors are impeccable!

strawberry shortcakes

The authentic shortcakes are like a delicious, sweet biscuit and everyone loved eating them plain even.  The strawberry filling is a perfectly flavored amalgumation of the natural strawberry juices mixed with homemade raspberry jam.  My sister has told me that in Italy they use a similar technique of letting the strawberries sit in some sugar and lemon juice to create a syrupy strawberry base.

The simple dessert was perfect for my sweet, pink girl who can clear the skies with her bright smile and clear giggles.  She even lost a tooth on her birthday!  I love her windowed grin.

may day

I often find that lags in blog posting occur when the blogger has been traveling abroad or preparing some of their production for a book, magazine, conference, or to present it in some nationally recognized forum.  Possibly they're off accepting some prize for their amazing blog accomplishments.  

In that spirit, I would like to announce that my long delay in blogging was the result of my charity work in a third-world country where I fed children, goats and butterflies (hand fed, mind you), then traveled to a remote tropical island that nobody in the world has ever heard of but me and built its first city from sustainable coconut hair, and then had to rush home to give a important conference to an eager audience.  And then was crowned with the royal title of Awesome by an elite committee who has power in every planet in this universe.

In a parallel universe, I might say that I have been trampled by allergies, fallen victim to the stress of an upcoming move, and the only conference speech I gave was about proper nose-wiping etiquette to an audience of two children.  Not eager.  And possibly have lost myself in a fantasy series of 13 books, each 1,000 pages long.  (Book 7, people.  6,000 pages under my belt and 7,000 more to go.)

Ah, life!  Isn't it wonderful?!  The continual revolutions of our terrestrial globe stop for no person and life marches on, day after day.  Those things that I dread arrive at my doorstep regardless of how much I resist, then blink out of existence just as quickly and the chaos settles down for a moment.

In the meantime, birthdays and spring come and go, leaving a blur of a memory.  And that's how it came to be that May arrived in Portland and I am just now waking up to that fact.

May Day has to be one of the sweetest traditions and I'm so glad that my daughter got to make a May Day basket at school to leave on the door.  Did any of you do that when you were younger?  I haven't since I was nearly her age and remembered how exciting it is to celebrate May's bounty!

I remembered sharing May Day with my neighbors and leaving baskets on their doors too.  So, naturally, the children wanted to continue the tradition and made a few for our neighbors.

I think it was very obvious where they came from since we are the only family with children in our building and the baskets and writing were very clearly child-made!  It was very nice when one neighbor thanked us for the reminder of childhood.  

I was just grateful for the daily reminders that fill my life, that keep my focus despite the constant whirlwind around us.  Motherhood is a garden where beautiful children are grown, filling the air with scents of innocence, purity, and awe.  Motherhood is an eternal May!

I hope you all had a happy May Day!

silly

Do you remember how I mentioned that I would like to learn how to make soap, like make it from the beginning like our great-grandmothers used to?  Guess what?  I'm going to make soap this week!  Not exactly the same way our ancestors managed it by making lye out of wood ash...I'm going to conveniently skip that step and use food grade lye for more consistent results.  

But the point is that I'm on my way!  My head has been in books and immersed in online discussion forums, trying to decide what to do first, how to create my own formulation, and where to gather all the supplies.  So if you've wondered where I've been, that's where.  Off, busy, metamorphosing myself into a soap-maker.  Hopefully I'll emerge from my chrysallis soon, a full-fledged-and-winged soaper.

Until then, I found these funny pictures of one of our favorite toys.  My mother brought the children this little wooden paddle back when we had our chickens.  We all thought it was so clever to swing the pendulum and make the chickens all peck their food.

We loved our chickens!  We miss our chickens still!  This toy made it through our stringent eliminations and came to Portland with us.  Such a fun and cute one that just never gets old.

It's not a toy you play with for hours, mind you.  But everytime you pull it out, you marvel at how great it is.

Wherever did my mom find this?

I miss my chickens!

a kitchen bewitching: 3 warm dinners + appetizer

The recipes I'm sharing today are dinners that we tremendously enjoyed.  Like I said in my last post, lots of great recipes in the last two months' issues of cooking magazines!  There are moments where dinnertime is my favorite time of day; you know, having warm food in the belly, (for us) the busiest parts of our days are over, and if the meal is really really good, the children might actually start shoveling food into their faces causing the most content silence to occur.  If you know my children, you know that there is never silence in our home.  Never.  So when a dinner hits home and they're so intent on eating that they're actually quiet, I feel like I've won.  I've just won!  And I feel like a champion.

Lately we've really been enjoying meals made out of quinoa.  It took the children a little time to come around to it but now we all enjoy what is really a very simple meal.  (Take this one, for example, also from Cooking Light.  It's so simple but explodes with classic Tuscan flavor, making it a satisfying meal.)  

This recipe that I wanted to share uses a delicious basil-lemon dressing that is a good one to have on hand because it would be equally fabulous with any salad or vegetable.  The night I took this photo, we happened to be out of quinoa so we used short-grain brown rice.  The good news is that if I cook my quinoa the same way I cook my short-grain brown rice (in a rice cooker), it's super easy and comes out with just a little crunch to it.  We're not fans of mushy quinoa so this suits us just fine!

how to cook quinoa

black bean-quinoa salad with basil-lemon dressing

This next recipe I've actually shared before.  Who doesn't love these Swedish meatballs from MarthaStewart.com?  We've modified it to eat it over short grain brown rice instead of noodles and I've added a teaspoon of crushed thyme to the sauce that rounds out the flavor in an amazingly subtle way.  As I said the first time I shared this recipe, the meatballs are so easy to prepare and baking instead of sauteeing them takes out all of the stress.  My children absolutely love this dinner.  And plus, how easy are meatballs to freeze?  I like to make a double batch of just the meatballs when I make this recipe and freeze half after baking.  That way all I need to prepare for a quick dinner the next time is some sauce and rice.

swedish meatballs with brown rice

This recipe for Greek Chicken Bread Salad from Cooking Light is phenomenal.  I've posted recipes for bread salad before and it always hits the spot.  I looove the combination of olives, sharp feta, and fragrant bread that has a moist crumb.  This version was even easier because more salad means less chopping.

greek chicken bread salad

And last, althought it should be first, is the appetizer.  Hot spinach and artichoke dip.  Do I have your attention, yet.  It's fabulous and I could eat all of it just on my own.  Warm, crusty bread to scoop it up with would be ideal but tortilla chips worked out fine for us when the bread ran out!  

I intended to make it entirely from scratch, starting with whole artichokes, but I'd have to buy a whole lotta' 'chokes since only the hearts are used for this recipe (and any other dip recipe).  Instead I found bags of frozen artichoke hearts from Trader Joe's and saved myself that extra cost and work.  Maybe it's not as creamy as the commercial mass-produced version (like Applebee's) but I think it scores higher on flavor.  You will definitely become a very valuable asset to your friends and family after you walk into the room with this.

hot spinach and artichoke dip

You will be relieved to know, I'm sure, that Operation Recipe Overload has come to an end.  And I think you'll enjoy any of these recipes in today's post.  Our bellies and tastebuds sure did!

3 asian one-bowl meals

I don't know about you, but I've really been enjoying my last two issues of Cooking Light and Bon Appetit.  If any of you subscribe to them, have they been making you as hungry as they are me??  We've enjoyed so many delicious dinners prepared from their ideas and pages that eating at home as become a real treat for us (as long as Oberon does the dishes for me, of course).

It was while perusing Yahoo! that I found a recipe for Vietnamese pho made in a slow-cooker.  How great is that?  We really loved it but I have to say that the noodles and bok choy get mushy in the leftovers.  Pho is a favorite of ours because it's always so delicious and comforting while still invigorating, unlike chicken noodle soup.  I think it's because of the exciting star anise that is the backbone to the flavor.  Mmmm.  When I make this again, I will keep cooked noodles separate and add bok choy to the hot soup once it's in the bowls and let it sit for a couple of minutes before serving.  

Oberon, a pho connoisseur, says this rates high on his pho rankings for flavor.  (His favorite pho is the one served with paper-thin slices of flank steak added just at the end, pho bo tai nam.  The hot pho cooks the tender beef on contact.)  He would suggest more broth, less noodles and I think I agree with him on this.  Just make sure to have your  hot sriracha sauce on hand to liven up the pho. 

slow-cooker chicken pho

In Oklahoma, there was a restaurant playing on the pronunciation of "pho" (sounds like the "fuh" in "fudge") named "Pho-bulous".  (It's actually really good.)  Sadly, success for ethnic food restaurants in Oklahoma depended on corny names.  But it got Oberon and I thinking about other possibilities like "Pho-nomenal" or "What the Pho!"    

The second soup we tried was an extremely tasty Thai-inspired soup from Bon Appetit.  The blend of curry and turmeric gave it a very bold flavor, odor, and stain that stayed with us for several days.  Not a great dish for young children who are prone to spilling but the intriguing taste is definitely worth a try.  I think our apartment smelled like this soup for nearly a week.  It was a good kind of smell though.

chicken khao soi

The last dish was such a great hit with everyone that I'm sure we'll be using the recipe frequently.  A Cooking Light recipe, it does not disappoint in flavor.  In fact, if you've ever had a Vietnamese vermicelli salad (one of my favorite meals), you'll recognize this as a salad-heavy derivative.  As far as I can tell vermicelli salads begin with "bun" and the following two words describe the meat and how it's prepared.  I am just now looking at this photo and realizing two things: the photo looks unappealing and therefore does not do justice to how tasty this dish is and second, I forgot the chopped peanuts.

vietnamese salt and pepper shrimp rice noodle bowl (bun tom xao)

What I love about these dinners is that they seem to fit right in with the changing of season from winter to spring with their bright citrus notes and biting flavors like cilantro or basil.  It feels kind of silly to be cooking Thai or Vietnamese style dinners since there are Vietnamese and Thai restaurants at every corner where we live,  but at least we save ourselves the cost of eating out this way.

a happy bunny easter to you too

Of course you all know that my mother has an etsy store, Vintage Baby Clothier, and that she makes the most lovely vintage creations for little children.  This spring she designed and created a short, delicate cape (also called a mantelet) for my daughter to wear for Easter.  After getting a smocked dress from Little Wooden Soldier (and son's clothes from Janie and Jack, hat from fall H&M), I was very excited for Easter photos.  But I wanted photos that captured the vintage saccharine and innocent look their outfits encapsulated.  

Of course that only meant one thing: we needed a bunny.  (The logic reasoning is sound here, folks.)  So we bought a bunny from a breeder in Aloha and we loved him with all our hearts for 2 weeks.  The children named him Captain Kangaroo and he was such a sweetheart!  (Don't worry; he did not meet his demise.  We agreed to take him back after taking photos because indoor bunnies are a lot of work.)  And don't you love that they named him Captain Kangaroo.  They've never even heard of the show but Oberon and I got such a kick out of it!

I don't know why more people don't keep rabbits because they make such lovely pets!  Captain Kangaroo was a mix of California and New Zealand breeds and had a wonderful, mellow and inquisitive temperament.  He would escape his box and come over to my lap looking for a treat whenever he felt underfed.  Before we brought him home, he hadn't been handled by the breeder so we were delighted with how quickly he became accustomed to our company and interaction.  He even let all of the Joy School children hold him Velveteen-Rabbit-style, body hanging and all!

Here he is, beloved by all (but Oberon, who was "kind of okay with him").

This cute, fluffy guy is going to grow to be 14+ pounds.  I've heard it said that those big rabbits, excellent for breeding and meat, are particularly gentle and easily handled.

Here are the shots we got of him in our Easter photos.  This sweet guy never once hopped out of the basket the entire time.

Do you love her cape or mantelet?  Isn't it to die for??

If anyone is thinking that a rabbit might be a fun pet, I have to say that yes, they are!  His breeder uses hers to mow her lawn; she just has to make sure they are contained and safe from predators by using a puppy pen with a corrugated roof.  I don't know that I would recommend rabbits as indoor pets because their litter does develop a distinct odor, but an outdoor hutch would allow you to collect their droppings for manure.  Their droppings don't need to be composted and are twice as concentrated as chicken droppings for fertilization purposes.  (I know you probably think this is the grossest topic and wonder why I keep coming back to this, but there are serious gardeners out there who appreciate the added help of a really good soil enhancement.)  Plus rabbits are so soft and so great to hold!  I wish I had a voice recording of my girl explaining how Captain Kangaroo made her feel so much love, like her heart was going to burst.

At the end of our Captain Kangaroo high, we celebrated Easter with a nice, simple dinner of glazed ham, roasted asparagus and roasted garlic mashed potatoes.  The day was sunny and 81F.  Who wanted to be cooking a big meal all day?  Not me.

glazed ham

garlic mashed potatoes

roasted asparagus

Of course my daughter needed Easter-themed fingernails so we made quick work of it using Sally Hansen's nail strips.

And for the first time I tried making hot cross buns.  I absolutely love them, but the family are not quite as big of fans.  I love the spice combined with the citrus and dried fruit; it just tastes so quintessentially old-English.  I prefered the ones baked with the cross paste as opposed to baking them plain and then icing a cross on top.

hot cross buns

What I loved most about them is knowing that they are entirely presented so as to remind us of why we celebrate Easter.  I think this will be a favorite tradition of mine in years to come!

And finally, just because you know that I know that you want me to, here is a trove of Captain Kangaroo photos.

I am telling you that this rabbit liked to be pet.

Oh, he's soo cute!  My voice goes into high-pitch bunny mode just looking at his photos.  Winston (our dog) recognizes this voice and would get all excited at the prospect of getting to sniff and play with the bunny.  Even Winston couldn't bear the bunny-cuteness, I kid you not!

Who can resist playing with those adorable, ridiculously long ears?

You children can be this happy and cute if you get a rabbit.

 

I don't know why I said "those grass."  I was under bunny-enchantment I guess.

playing with food

Kitchen chemistry has to be one of the coolest things ever.  Along with the discovery of new subatomic particles, children's umbrellas with eyes on the top, and "Foyle's War".  I was so excited to come across this really awesome blog all about kitchen chemistry, Curious Cook by New York Times contributor, Harold McGee!

We did one of my favorite experiments in kitchem chemistry this week, dyeing easter eggs using food.  I did this once in college and was so pleased with the results.  But, this time the results were a littl weak, probably because I only had a vague memory of how to do it.  The ideas I found online on how to do this were highly varied, suggesting cold or hot, little or lots of vinegar, no salt or use salt, etc.

Once again, I turned to Martha Stewart and found a very helpful video (here) that shows adding 1/4 cup salt and 1/4 cup vinegar to the dye that is extracted from food.  That was, for me, the turning point.  After changing my homemade food dyes, the eggs colored much better.  When using food-based colors, however, the variety and range of hues is obviously limited.

I used ideas from various online resources, like this one, and they all somewhat offered the same suggestions for color sources.  But either I did it wrong, or they're flat out mistaken.  Boiling spinach will give you a very weak muddy color, not green.  I tried boiling juices and herbal teas and the colors just came out tan and less tan.  The only colors I consider successes were turmeric for yellow and red cabbage for blue (a beautiful pale or caribbean blue!).  It was still fun and we'll definitely do it next year, trying for that elusive pink and green.  We can only improve from here!  Kitchen chemistry is both fascinating and frustrating in its complexity, but I have faith in the prevailing power of science!  It will just take patience and many years of trial and error!  Nobel prize for egg dyeing, here I come??

For more discussion on my how to use food to dye eggs or on blowing out to hollow the eggs, clink on the links.  The white stripes on the eggs are from using rubber bands to make designs.  Which only sort of worked.

food egg dyes

blowing out eggs

In case you're wondering why anyone would want to blow out their eggs, here are my reasons: first, there is zero waste involved; second, you can hide treats or prizes inside the real eggs, making the children actually crack the egg to get to the prize; third; the egg shells can go to compost or be reused as cute little seedling planters.  The second reason is my favorite.  When I was younger, my parents would blow out eggs and hide our treats inside.  It was so much fun to break open real eggs, and a much stronger connection to how hatching eggs symbolize new life and Easter.

hint: using red tissue makes it look like an olive.  No es bueno.

Happy Easter!!

a kitchen bewitching: a little bit o' spring

So many things happening at this time of year!  It's always exciting and there is nothing better than welcoming March 21st (the spring equinox) in the cheerful company of golden daffodils.  Portland seems to be enthralled in the timid and gentle unfurling of spring and it's so lovely!  Nothing warm or sunny mind you, but sweet and peaceful all the same.

And camellia trees!  I have never before seen camellias although I have this feeling that they should also be grown in the south.  (I do know they're related to the tea plant.)  Wikipedia tells me that they require high moisture and acidic soil.  Portland: check and check.  I don't need Wikipedia to tell me how beautiful they are! 

The first day of spring was a special night for first graders at my daughter's school.  They wrapped up a study unit of burrowing animals by building habitats and doing a singing presentation.  It was an exciting night for my baby!  We walked to the program so you can see her raincoat and rainboots on the edge of the photo.

This was my baby's fox den habitat.  As hard as we worked on that, we felt very overwhelmed with the other amazing projects we saw that night.

Here are some photos of the other first graders and their incredible work.

And then, of course, we had a fun St. Patrick's day eating (the non-traditional) corned beef and cabbage.  I've tweaked the recipe so that the carrots don't end up as acidic and mushy.  I also made Irish soda bread to round out the meal and we had  a fun dinner!  (btw, I read multiple times online that any bread with eggs or fruit in it is not an authentic soda bread.)  I've been meaning to post this roast potatoe recipe for a while because it's just that good.

corned beef and braised cabbage

roast potatoes

Irish soda bread

A few days later, I needed to make a cake for a church activity.  Naturally, I remembered a dessert I posted about a loooong time ago.  It seemed like the perfect time to try it and everyone was over the moon with it.  The cake, the lemon curd, and the fluffy cream cheese frosting were each perfect alone and mind-numbingly delicious together.  You'll have to excuse the unsightly appearance; I didn't understand that the whole cake needed to be iced so I didn't bother to level my layers.  Yes, it is as crooked as it looks in the photo!

layered coconut cake with lemon curd + whipped cream cheese frosting

It wasn't until later that I got to eat a piece of cake myself.  In bed.  Gotta' love those disgusting little habits.

Then we had some fun with the extra lemon curd.  My daughter wanted to have a (spontaneous) tea party with her friends and get all dressed up so I make some shortbread, some strawberry and butter tea sandwiches, and served it up with wild orange herbal tea and lemon curd.  It was so cute to see my little man join in too!

shortbread

lemon curd

a kitchen bewitching: peanut butter + chocolate = cheesecake

Yes, you read the title right and the cheesecake was every bit as exciting as it sounds!

Don't you think cheesecake is a great way to make friends?  Only a very few times has my "cheesecake-friend-conversion" tactic not worked like a charm!  I think it takes a special person to not be swayed by a rich, smooth cheesecake.  To be fair, my cheesecakes tend to be the soft, creamy kind you get from the water-bath cooking method and some people who prefer the strong-flavored, dry New York style of baking may not be impressed.  (I have yet to try the dry method because it's less forgiving but I intend to try some day.)  But then you meet those people who just don't like cheesecake or don't like the calories and they can not be won over with cheesecake, no matter how hard you try.

Luckily for all of us, most people can be converted into a friend with a good cheesecake, soft or dry.  Or maybe you're already friends with the cheesecake recipient but you want them to know just how good of friends you are.  The "cheesecake-friend-conversion" method works equally well as a "friendship-proofing" process.  And if you add peanut butter and chocolate, it can even become a "remind-husband-how-amazing-you-are" technique.  Food for thought.  Or cheesecake for thought.

This recipe was featured in the February 2013 Martha Stewart Living magazine in their chocolatey desserts for Valentine's Day section.  It's delicious and it even turned out perfectly.  Usually, MS cheesecake recipes turn out wobbly in the center and need to cook much longer than the recipe states.  This one was right on, maybe a little dry and thick actually.  It cracked a little on the top but since you top it with a deliciously dark chocolate, it's no big deal.

chocolate-peanut butter cheesecake with chocolate glaze

The light marbling is the peanut butter cheesecake and the dark marbling is the chocolate.  I used Dutch processed cocoa to make the dark chocolate glaze and it was goo-ood.  You know.  Double good.  The recipe is a simple cheesecake with the extras added in.  If you're ready to work on some relationships, this is a cheesecake you'll want to try!

the 101's: soapy days

Being a mother of young children means lots of hand-washing.  And then more hand-washing after that.  

"Oh, you've decided to clean behind the toilet with your bare hands?  Please go wash your gross little hands."

"Oh, look, you squeezed the juice out of your pineapple and then fingerpainted with your yogurt!  Please go wash your hands without touching anything else in between."

"Oh, thank you for spending the last three minutes wrestling that toy out of Winston's mouth.  So glad that you've won.  Please go wash your hands now."

"Were those boogers salty enough for you?  Go wash your hands now, please!"

"Did you have fun at the playground?  Look darling, your hands and fingernails are all black.  No, don't touch mommy's face right now.  Please go wash those hands right away."

And I seem to wash my own hands just as many times.  We go through soap like we have some kind of OCD with hand-washing and our skin often shows the dry, papery result.  So, thus initiated a quest to see if we could make an inexpensive but moisturizing hand wash here at home.

There are a plethora of websites detailing out the process so it was quite easy to find.  They're all about the same, calling for 1 cup grated soap, 10 cups water, and 1 tablespoon glycerin.  The difference in results will depend on what bar soap you choose to grate.

I first tried to make handsoap about a year ago using Mrs. Meyers soap.  It turned out thick and snot-like and would not pump out of a container very well.  We all struggled with it and to top it off, it wasn't very moisturizing.  Here are photos I took of that endeavor.

But you can see that it didn't dissolve easily...

...and then it thickened into a highly viscous slime.

It seemed that the soap had too many hardeners in it because it just wouldn't give up its resilience to be thicken.

This last summer I walked into a Lush store for my first time and bought a glittery bubble bath bar that my Pixie begged for (use only 1/4 bar for a child's bath).  We bought more than we thought: the day after using it, her persistent excema disappeared.  Completely.  We had been strugglng with it for months!  Shortly thereafter, I bought the children their bath soap and lotion from Lush and, again, her excema improved.  So naturally, I bought their shampoo there and even bought a soap for Oberon and I.  Most recently I bought a massage bar that melts against the skin and leaves a delicate lotion.

I have to tell you that their smell makes me feel happy, more than just a "this is a fun smell, sort of like fresh apples or white tea".  They evoke visceral reactions, like smelling freshly mowed grass, new rain, cut oranges, or gardenias.  My next challenge will be to recreate a similar soap myself (there are many online resources, like this).  Maybe next year.  Or the one after that.

Obviously, I wanted to choose a soap from Lush to retry this experiment.  But they do contain fragrance as well as some surfactants to create a little latherso they may not please everybody.  Something else I love about shopping at the Lush store?  If you take your own cloth, you can wrap your own cut bars and take home zero waste.   But this is about you choosing whatever soap fits your priorities; if you use a bar of white unscented Dove or Ivory, you'll save even more money.

The Mrs. Meyers bar I bought at first was about $5.  The soap I bought from Lush was about the same price for the 2.6 ounces that I used.  Plus, it was leftover from their Christmas special soaps ("North Pole") so it was 2 for 1, making it half that price.  But any other softer, natural soap will work just as well.

This dissolved much better and had a much easier consistency.  The only downside is the lack of lather but, as I've heard, the lathering agents are what can cause dryness.

So, if you would like to try yourself, click on the link below for the "how-to".  I really like it and can honestly say it was fast and easy.  I can't wait to try it as a foaming handsoap for the children.

liquid hand soap

I've heard that bar soaps are better for your hands and health than liquid soaps.  If it's true, this liquid hand soap may be better in more ways than one.  Or two.