sheppard girls

Tour de Farm

 

I am packing our bag to go to Tour de Farm this afternoon.  It is a locally run version of Outstanding in the Field, which we went to last year, at the same farm.  This event is a family picnic, which seems like a fun idea.  The little one is worried they will serve stinky cheese. 

Pickles

 

For some reason, twice in recent weeks, I decided that the best time to make pickles was just before people came over.  Hot vinegar is not super welcoming. 

First rhubarb

 

I came to the computer to find my recipe for Amanda Hesser's mom's chicken recipe, because our stove is finally hooked back up and the only thing I have defrosted in the frig is chicken.  I accidentally googled Molly Wizenberg and found myself on Chowhound.  At the bottom of the page was a recipe for Rhubarb-braised chicken.  It is probably a mistake to use the first rhubarb of the season on an untested, savory dish right?

The best laid plans

 
 
I had high hopes for elegantly surviving the kitchen remodel.  The creative meals we would eat.  And we would still use nice dishes, real glasses and cloth napkins.  But the dad had to go on a work trip, both girls have had evening activities and I got the flu.  Last night we ate D'Amicos take out while sitting on our bed at 8:20 pm.

Blenders

 
  
Our blender had been working less and less effectively.  I am not really sure where the blender came from.  I thought it was maybe one the dad brought into the house when we got married, but I recently came across THAT blender in the basement.  So this one is newer.  It was getting jammed a lot, and when you took the jar part off to pour, sometimes there was smoke.  That didn't seem like a good thing.  So I threw it away and set off to get a new blender.  I really only need it to make smoothies and salad dressing. 

I visited Target, Macy's, William Sonoma, and Crate and Barrel and got a little overwhelmed.  So I searched on Chowhound for blender recommendations and got even more overwhelmed.  I think I took less time to find a new dryer than I wasted on the new blender.

Then today, while exercising I listened to the Spilled Milk podcast about malts.  I have 3/4 a container of malt powder left over from the Malt Cake that no one really liked.  So I needed to get a blender today.

Bed Bath and Beyond, Kohl's and Sears later, I came home with an Oster.  I will report back after dessert.  ***Updated to add, "it takes just like malted milk balls!" 

Cookies

Monica: Wow, I haven't made this many cookies since the 8th grade!

Phoebe: What was that, for a bake sale or something?

Monica: No, just a Friday night

A few years ago I decided that I wanted to have some signature cookie recipes.  You know, like be the mom with the best cookies at her house.  First I perfected the Chocolate Toffee cookie recipe from Bon Appetit.  Recently I added Blonde Designs Snickerdoodle recipe as well.  Then I saw a recipe on Amateur Gourmet referencing a recipe from Smitten Kitchen for a white chocolate oatmeal cookie with salt.  I heart salt! 

Look.  They are so pretty.  Not very popular. 

Then I made the chocolate peanut butter cookies in the same article from Amateur Gourmet.  Better, but still no love.  Next I am trying the Momofuku Compost Cookies.  I might not call them that right away.

Recent dinners

I confess, I spend at least an hour a day on food and style blogs.  Totally a luxury, I know.  This week we have been very happy with:

Thomas Keller's Roast Chicken.  I listened to an older Splendid Table Podcast with him on it, while working out.  That's right, I listen to people talking about food while I excercise.  And the recipe was referenced on a local food show last Saturday.  I found the recipe here.

Amanda Hesser's Oven Baked Chicken taken from an All Things Considered interview from 2003.  The dad has a huge crush on Amanda Hesser.  Served with the Broccoli Slaw from Smitten Kitchen.  I love such things.  The big one says "slaw" in one of the grossest words ever.

Tonight we are having Spicy Roast Chicken thighs from Wednesday Chef with either this chickpea dish from Smitten Kitchen or this potato dish from Splendid Table.  Raghavan Iyer lives in our suburb, so I slightly loyal to him, however Deb from Smitten Kitchen has rarely let me down.

I also made three chocolate cakes.  Number one from the Tiny Kitchen.  Number two from Chowhound, mentioned earlier in the week.  Number three was from the All Things Considered Amanda Hesser interview.  I made groundhog cupcakes with number three, as show here.  These were the winner.

As you may have noted, there was a 4 for $19.99 deal on chicken at Cub and I made a trip to Costco for the largest bag of broccoli ever.

Treats

 
After I really great string of baking successes including Blonde Designs Snickerdoodles, I have hit a wall.  The last three or four thing's I've made were average at best.  My tried and true Smitten Kitchen's Blondies failed, twice.  I made a malt chocolate cake from Chowhound and ruined the frosting three times.  I cooked the caramel for the Old Dutch caramel corn too long (in my defense, the big one and I were watching the DMB performance from the Grammy's on YouTube).  The girls will eat any muffin as long as it also contains chocolate chips , but the dad says their unadventurous palates were making him weary.  

Holiday reading

 
I wasted two days of my precious holiday book time on We will always have Paris by Walter and Patricia Wells.  I really love her cookbooks.  I am hoping to make my time less of a waste by cooking some of the recipes in the memoir, because otherwise I will really have to hate those people.  I made roasted chicken with tomatoes and feta (page 132), which was very good and paired surprisingly well with the sticky rice from one of his favorite cookbooks, that the dad inexplicably made to go with it.

Autumn vegetables

I bought sweet potatoes to make this recipe from Bon Appetit for autumn hash.  But the review that it took hours to chop all the vegetables kind of worried me, so I went looking for other similar recipes.  Surely someone is thinking the same way, right?  Smitten Kitchen to the rescue, with Swiss chard and sweet potato gratin.  Gratins are even better than hash.  Plus the dad came home from Costco with a giant block of gruyere yesterday.

Ina Garten's spinach gratin has become a Thanksgiving tradition.  The recipe seems to come and go from the Food Network website, and I usually spend a good hour or so, digging through all my Barefoot Contessa cookbooks to find it.  (It is in the party book.)