Care Package Knits

Just a quick post today - I mailed a care package off to Fiona this last week containing the multicolored scarf I finished last week, a brown cabbage rose scarf based on this design (and modified to be a little asymmetrical in the points) and a Noro striped scarf based on this. I think she's keeping the sideways striped one so the other one's for her Thanksgiving host, and the cabbage rose scarf is for her roommate.



I had to have cataract surgery this week (!!! Get your eyes checked! I'm not that old!) so I've been taking it easy and getting used to my new bionic eye. I'm still adapting to reading and looking at my computer screen and focusing properly, but knitting and TV are definitely doable so I'm entertained. And I can drive, so hurray for that. I'm more than halfway through a pair of mittens I started yesterday, so stay tuned for more knitting before our thoughts turn to Turkey Day cooking!

Tastes of Fall

Sweet potato biscuits. Need I say more? I need not. But I will: the cake recipe in that link is equally fantastic. And in fact, so far, every Dorie Greenspan recipe I've tried has been amazing. Some day I'll join the Tuesdays with Dorie movement, but for now, I'm just a happy visitor in her land of baked superbity.

A Multicolored Scarf

Last night I bound off a scarf made entirely of leftover scraps of worsted yarn. It's from this formula, which works for any kind of leftovers in any weight - pretty cool.



For mine, I cast on 240 sts of some nice charcoaly Noro Kureyon and then switched colors and yarns (mostly different remnants of Kureyon and Malabrigo worsted - the bright blue is some extremely wonderful Malabrigo silky merino) whenever I felt like it...I kept the ends all on one side and then worked them into the fringe so I wouldn't have to weave them in - let's hear it for not weaving in! I just made a half hitch to keep them in place and the added fringe anchors them well.



The pattern creates a pretty firm fabric, so I was a little afraid it would be sort of misshapen or scrunchy when it was done, but a nice bath in Eucalan relaxed the heck out of it and the finished dimensions are 7' without the fringe and about 6" wide. I considered pinning it out and hitting it with a little steam to make it a bit wider, but decided against it - I like it this way! Off it goes to Vermont, as a thank-you gift to the nice person who invited Fiona home for Thanksgiving!

Tarte

I had to go to the doctor today for my annual check-up, where I was made to step on a physician's scale. Fully clothed. With tennis shoes on. Those Nikes, they say they're light but I'm pretty sure they're a full five pounds.


I then came home and baked a pear tarte tatin, so I can have fruit for dessert like the French women do.

November in Paradise, 2008 Edition

Last year, I posted about November in Paradise, aka Windanseaville. This year we had a perfect Halloween weekend: warm on Friday into the evening, sunny on Saturday, and a little rain on Sunday just to make it cozy.



Mary was Cleopatra, as you can see. She's surely in denial about something. Probably homework. Anna was the grim reaper, but she was out the door so quickly in the morning that I couldn't even get my iphone out fast enough for a photo.

Saturday was lazy (at least, it was for me - Anna had rowing so she and John were up and down at the Bay by 6:00). We had lunch by the pool down at the beach...you can see the aftermath of the Halloween festivities and glut of candy here:



So Mary swam the afternoon away, and then Sunday I knitted and watched reruns of House. I hope to have some FOs pretty soon for your viewing pleasure.

October Sunset

The sky has been so beautiful at my house lately. October tends to be warm here with Santa Ana winds, and in the evenings this week there's been a dense marine layer (fog) just below us at the beach. I drive down from my house and descend into a big cloud bank...it reminds me of the cloud wall in Winter's Tale.


I sent Anna & Mary into the upper part of our yard to take these pictures a few days ago. Isn't the sunset gorgeous behind that palm tree? Don't you wish those phone lines were gone?



I look out at the sky when I'm cooking dinner, which happened to be quiche that day. The camera was out, so here's the quiche portrait as well. The crust is a snap in the food processor, although you could fake it with frozen stuff if you want, and the ingredients are anything you've got handy. In this case: a cup of finely chopped onion, a cup of diced ham, some broccoli florets, about of cup of whatever cheese I've got around shredded up. Beat four eggs in a bowl, add about two cups of milk/half & half/heavy cream or a combination thereof, a little salt, a little pepper, pour it over the filling. Bake at 425 for 15 minutes, then turn the heat down to 300 and bake until done, about 30 minutes more.

Tudora

I just love neckwarmers. They're a great project and they look so polished! I only wish I could wear them here in Windanseaville - I'd knit a bunch for myself, because I like how they hide a questionable neck. I even have several in my Ravelry queue. Luckily, someone in Vermont has a cold neck, although I doubt she's pulled this particular garment out yet.


This little number is Tudora, knit in Malabrigo in the Red Mahogany colorway. It's a beautiful color...deep. And I fastened it with a hammered copper button - gorgeous in person. It takes no time at all to finish, and would make a great holiday gift. Go cast on, you'll love it.

Fall is Knitting Time

Dear readers, it's been almost two months since the last time I posted! In that time, I've been a busy little bee. I've been to Vermont twice - once to deposit Fiona at school, and once to visit over parents' weekend. I've been working. I've been cooking. I've been knitting.


I've also been trying to work on a few graphics projects and pay attention to my family and friends while doing this. See me? That was the day I learned a) not to wear white in photos and b) not to let the skinny broads push me into the middle ever again. But it's okay, my hair was really straight that day.


The project shown here is my version of Dark Victory. It's one fat luscious piece of knitting, so warm I nearly passed out trying it on here in La Jolla. You can see how happy Fiona looks in it, back in August. I think it was about 80 degrees that day, and that sweater was the knitted equivalent of locking yourself in the trunk of your car in the parking lot of Costco (I'm not sure how that would happen, now that I think about it. But I ask you, why is the Costco parking lot always hotter than the sun? Global warming: actually caused by 10-gallon vats of mayo.). It lives in Vermont now, more in its woolly natural habitat. I'm hoping it won't come back looking like a potholder with arms.

Seen at Whole Foods

I wonder if they're organic?

Noro Cinchy

For those of you complaining about my lack of knitting content - this one's for you. Two posts in a row about knitting! But don't get used to it. The subject matter of my blog posts will just have to be one of life's little uncertainties for you. It disappoints me too, my friend. If only I had an extra pair of hands.

Anyway. This is a Cinchy Hat, knit up in a random Noro Kureyon and black yarn of similar weight I had in my stash. I ended up using about 75 - 80 yards of the Kureyon and a little less of the black, and I knitted half the hat at the dermatologist waiting for Fiona, another quarter at the pediatrician waiting for Anna, and the last quarter watching Michael Phelps win another gold medal, no waiting involved.



Weaving in the ends took a long time, because I just hate doing it and for some reason that makes me do it sloooowly instead of racing through the horrible weaving like I should. In fact, I'd intended to knit this hat in only Kureyon to avoid weaving in, but the color was just too bland. The black makes it sing, at least in person.



And, serendipitously, I spent the better of part of the day today cleaning out my office - a heinous task, because unlike cleaning out your closet, during which you can fantasize about all the new clothes and shoes would now fit in there, if only you were rich and thin, cleaning out your office is basically so you can do more work. So that's not the serendipitous part. The serendipitous part was I found some black satin ribbon under a bunch of papers on the little couch on my office (Yes, there's a couch in my office but it might as well be a table.) and so I was able to thread up the back of my Cinchy and scrunch it up for pictures.



Cinchy's going to Vermont with Fiona, but Anna was kind enough to model it for us.

Entrelac is Entertaining

I think Quant might be the most popular entry to entrelac on the internet, at least from what my fellow Ravelers say. This was indeed my first entrelac project, and I loved it. It knitted up quickly and I never lost interest in the process at all.


This version is in Noro Kureyon colorway 213...it was very fun to watch the squares turn color, and the Kureyon will keep Fiona's ears nice and warm in icy Vermont.


Look how well the colors and pattern synchronize with my quilt! An added bonus.

Jewel Ball Madness

Hoo-whee it's been a busy couple of weeks! Last week was completely taken up by prep for the Jewel Ball. This year's theme was Speakeasy, so we recreated the feeling of, no, not a speakeasy exactly, because I believe actual speakeasies were prone to seediness, but that of an elegant Jazz Age supper club. We had fun, but I was wiped out for days. Between constructing the ballroom and all, the party itself, staying up all night to rip it back down again (That's the most amazing part - what took a year to plan, paint and build and then several days to construct on site is gone in time for people to play tennis on the five courts we cover the next day.) and everything else, I felt jetlagged and then finally succumbed to some kind of virus I'd been fighting for a week.

Anyway, things are getting back to normal and I'm madly playing catchup, but there's a little photo of John & me in our gladrags at about 1:00 am the night of the ball.

The Oven is Hot

What is wrong with me? I'm going to be putting on a ball dress in less than 10 days and instead of being on my yearly JBD (Jewel Ball Diet) I've been accompanying Mary on a dizzying journey of recipe discovery. I kid you not, we spent an entire morning last week at a restaurant supply store buying a food mill, which Mary had been coveting since watching Tyler Florence and Ina Garten use theirs ("Mommy! You can grind the tomatoes and most of the seeds stay in the top!" Yeah, she's nine. This week she made chocolate ganache and a lemon cornmeal bundt cake, pretty much alone. Some people are born foodies, and some of us develop later in life.) Anyway, in addition to arroz con pollo, honey glazed salmon, spaghetti both bolognese AND carbonara, ad infinitum, the last two weeks have seen a plethora of baked goods, including three of the jam crostatas you see here. Yes, three.



Here are a few of the things we whipped up, with the reviews of the Windansea 5:

Coffehouse Scones - these were okay.
Lemon Cream Scones - a keeper. We have nut and dried fruit allergies here so I left out those additions, but the plain scones were fantastic.
Lemon Cornmeal Bundt - this has its place; it had an earthy crunch and wasn't too sweet. We used blueberries.
Zucchini Bread - we made about 18 muffins from this recipe, which everyone liked.
Easy Jam Tart - this was my favorite find this week. It's easy and every version came out great. The one you see here is apricot, but we especially liked one made with plum preserves - just plums, no sugar added - that we served with homechurned vanilla gelato. Did I mention I've been making gelato?
Better than Pinkberry - Fiona says it is, and to please make it again. I used a combo of Greek and Bulgarian yogurt, and at least it's for sure yogurt, no lawsuit needed.
Chocolate Cream Tart - from Dorie Greenspan's fantastic book. This went out to my sister's house to be served at a dinner party, so we'll have to wait on the review. I added a tiny bit of espresso and a splash of Bacardi to the chocolate cream.

Did I hear a crumb drop?

In knitting news, there's nothing to report. About a week and a half ago, while chiffonading some basil, I narrowly averted slicing the top of my left index finger off with a dull Wusthof and I've been babying it ever since. It's actually all better now, except for the nail being extremely short at the moment. Very attractive, and just in time for my JBM (Jewel Ball Manicure).



But lest you think I've only been cooking, Fiona, Anna and I did go out to lunch (See? That's eating, not cooking.) last week. I took them to a place they'd never been because I avoid crowds of more than 10 people I don't know personally: what used to be called the Bazaar del Mundo here in Old Town San Diego, but now it's the Plaza del Pasado...I think the restaurant is Casa de Reyes, which used to be Casa de Pico. Amid the tourists, we had a moment of staycation. We were serenaded by the mariachis, and I had a salad.

Biscuits and a Vest

Run, Patty! Mommy said TREAT!

In typical fighting Irish fashion, our dog Patty feels compelled to bark her head off about twice a day in response to the insulting presence of some neighbor dogs way up at our back fence. She's not very food-driven, but we have finally trained her to abandon the barkfest and come back to the house when we call her by giving her a treat when she comes through the door. Snoopy, who's very food-driven, loves it when she goes up and starts barking, because he's learned to anticipate the T-R-E-A-T. (That's what we have to do - spell it out - that and the word D-I-N-N-E-R, both of which set him off in hysterics.)



This morning, I prompted the same response from Anna, propelling her into the kitchen from a dead sleep at 10:00 am (remember, it's summer, and she's a teenager) by saying, "Anna, fresh biscuits!" They're a little craggier than Tyler Florence's biscuits, but they tasted great with fresh strawberries.



I only had about a 1/4 cup of buttermilk so I made some with a cup of milk and a tablespoon of lemon juice; the biscuits had a very faint lemon note that was actually quite pleasant. A word of caution - I only used 1 teaspoon of salt in the recipe, not the tablespoon listed, and it was plenty.



In knitting news, I am done with the ribbing on my Back to School Vest. That was a LOT of ribbing. I'm now ready to start the patterned top portion, which will be a very welcome change from K2P2. I'm knitting the smallest size and I had just a few yards left of my first skein of Cascade 220, in case you were wondering.

Can I PLEASE have a biscuit too?

Madalenas

Every now and then I get a hankering for a food I can't get. Does this ever happen to you? Maybe it's something your grandma made when you were a kid, or maybe it's something from a restaurant that's closed, or maybe it's something that's geographically challenging to acquire. For me, typically, it's something Spanish that you just can't replicate here. My local Whole Foods and Bristol Farms have a lot of Spanish products now, and I love that, but sometimes you want something a little less known or a bit more regional. Even if you find the ingredients, which isn't easy in San Diego, where you can get any Pacific Rim/Indian subcontinent/Mexican ingredient you need (or maybe you can't - what do I know, I don't cook those cuisines!), many Spanish ingredients are hard to come by and they don't taste the same. It's like New York pizza: no matter how ardently a place claims to make the genuine thing it just isn't the same. There's something in the water, as the saying goes.



Anyhow, the other problem with Spanish cooking is the recipes themselves. I have no problem winging stuff in the kitchen, but many Spanish recipes put me off because of their lack of standard measurements, cooking time, or temperature, and when you're trying to duplicate a flavor that can be problematic. For example, a recipe might tell you to use half a tall glass of oil and a big spoon of salt, cook it at a pretty hot but not too hot temperature for a while until it looks right, and then serve. Yeah, see, if I could do that, I wouldn't need the recipe, right?



This week, for one of Mary's marathon cooking sessions, we decided to make Madalenas. They're the Spanish version of Madeleines, but not really - they're made with oil instead of butter...they're more of a muffin, really, and on the days I didn't eat fresh bread and the most heavenly creamy butter you've ever tasted - Plugra is close but still not right - I had these for breakfast at my grandparents' house with my giant cup of cafe con leche. I looked around the internet for a likely starting point, combined a couple of recipes that seemed like they might work, and managed to produce a fairly decent batch of 18. John and the girls really liked them so I only got to eat one (Whose memory are these, I'd like to know?). I'll be tweaking the recipe and making them again soon, but this was how I made this batch:



First Time Out of the Gate Pretty Good Madalenas

Zest of one lemon (about 2 T)
4 large eggs
2/3 c olive oil
1/3 c canola oil
1 cup sugar
3/4 c flour
1 1/2 T baking powder

Preheat the oven to 350 and line 18 muffin tins with papers. You could just jam the papers into a brownie pan to make square Madalenas if that's what you're used to, but I was after the taste more than the shape. And see, no Madeleine pan needed.

Beat the zest and the eggs together until the eggs are light and fluffy, about doubled in volume. Add the oil and beat to incorporate. Add the sugar and beat some more.

Whisk the flour and baking powder together, and add them to the egg mixture. Blend it in thoroughly and then fill the muffin tins about 2/3 full.

Dot each uncooked Madalena with a pinch of sugar, and bake them for about 15 minutes, or until they've puffed up and turned a golden yellow color. You can let them get light brown if you'd like them a little more done. Cool them on a rack - they're better the next day, even.

Make yourself a latte, dip in a Madalena, and enjoy! Stay tuned for further refinements...Like I said, I'm going to tweak those quantities, but these were still pretty good.

Crusty

Did I mention that Anna and I went to San Jose this weekend? It's Fencing Summer Nationals, and Anna qualified for Cadets, Div II, and Div III. She flew up for Cadets, lost in the DEs (a heartbreaking 15-14 to a lefty), we flew back up for Div III (another heartbreaking 15-12 this time - they were tied all the way up to 12-12 with about 30 seconds to go in the third 5-minute round and then the girl from ASU took her) and now Div II is on Thursday but we're going to sit that one out. The schedule had her events just too far apart to make one long trip, and we're busy. Plus, it's damn hot in San Jose. Really hot. Thank goodness the Convention Center is air-conditioned, but that doesn't make up for the hundreds of sweaty fencers all decked out in their padded kevlar.

Anyway, we're back. Mary and I spent most of the morning cooking. We started the day with a batch of no-knead bread that we mixed up yesterday to rise overnight. Isn't it pretty? You should've heard it singing when I took it out of the oven. I love this recipe; today I tweaked the method a little by using a silpat instead of floured cloths for the second rise, and that seemed to work fine. The one funny thing was when I poured the dough into the hot Le Creuset casserole off the silpat, it landed on one half of the bottom of the dish and no amount of shaking would spread it out (okay, given - I didn't try very hard since I was shaking a 500 degree hunk of enameled iron), so it baked off like a loaf instead of a round. No problem - so far this recipe is foolproof.

I also have a batch of dough in the fridge from the Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day book. It's more of a sourdough because I'm into the second cycle of making dough in the same container as my last batch without having washed out the remnants, so it's got a starter. I'd show you a loaf of that but I baked one last night and it's gone, and the raw dough isn't much to look at. It's hard to keep fresh homemade bread around in the best of circumstances, but add ballet classes for Fiona, fencing practice for Anna, and growing like a weed for Mary and it's just impossible.



We also have some chicken breasts in the fridge that we pounded flat and have marinating in a little buttermilk for dinner later, and we made a base for blueberry gelato that we'll churn tomorrow. I bought a couple of packages of frozen organic wild blueberries last week to use in a cobbler and they turned out to be shriveled, miserable-looking little things. More like capers than berries, really. We figured gelato would cure anything. I used 3/8 c of 2% milk and 1/8 c of heavy cream, so we'll see how it all turns out.

Every Heart Beats True...

In case you couldn't guess, the theme for today is red, white and blue. We started the morning with ricotta berry muffins, which we took down to a friend's house. This particular friend lives on the Beaumont Street Parade route and happens to be a genuine VIP - she's one of the parade judges - so all the floats stop right in front of her house. The parade consists of homemade floats and scooters & bikes dressed up in bunting, kids waving flags, dogs in red bandannas, etc. There's a band and food at the end of the route and an awards assembly, but mostly it's an excuse to mill around the street and drink a bloody mary (Hey - it's red, and hence patriotic!) before 10 am.



Next we're taking a chocolate cake and hummus over to my sister's for our patriotic 4th of July feast. People, in my family, it's all about the food. It's a good thing there's a holiday in just about every month so we have an excuse to be more over the top than usual. What can I say? We're Spanish. Food = love. I was going to take pictures of the cake and the hummus, but they're not in theme, so you'll just have to use your imagination. I've made the hummus before so I can assure you that it's terrific and easy - minty fresh with a garlic one-two punch at the end; I haven't tasted the cake yet but I made it with Valrhona cocoa so how could it go wrong? The cake recipe is the Texas Sheet Cake version made by Pioneer Woman, although John says it should really be called Nebraska Sheet Cake. It's a geography joke made all the more amusing by the fact that he thinks Nebraska is shaped like a sheet pan, but that's why he's a physicist.


Instead, you can look at the start of my newest knit, a Back to School Vest from Fitted Knits, in red Cascade 220. Because it's in theme.