Day 23: Culinary customs

My Christmas baking repertoire has narrowed down to mostly two things:

Fruit cake, courtesy of a recipe from an old, dear friend, Norma Green. It is dense, moist, and full of buttery vanilla flavour. And, of course, lots of jeweled glace fruit and pecans.

I love the red cherries best of all.

Here's another one, just in case the first two weren't enough.

I also make a big batch of shortbread every Christmas. I like to press the dough into these molds that I got for 25c each after Christmas a few years ago.

The problem is, I can never remember, from one year to the next, which recipe I used last time. So some years the shortbread has been crispy and buttery, with the sugar almost caramelized as it slowly bakes.

Other years it is merely acceptable.

Like today's batch.

I think it is because the recipe I used tonight used powdered sugar instead of granulated, so tomorrow night I will try another recipe. I think I know which one.

Meanwhile, there is a humongous Tupperware full of small fruitcakes that will be distributed to lucky people.

But only the ones that love it.

And Jeff enjoyed a mug of homemade eggnog with a star-shaped piece of shortbread. 

He breathed in a crumb of the cookie and almost choked to death.

Would you like the recipes?
I thought so.

Norma's Fruit Cake
3 1/2 cubes of butter
2 c sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda dissolved in 1/2 c boiling water
2 oz vanilla
6 eggs
4 c flour
3 lbs dried and glace fruit and nuts of choice

Cream butter and sugar, add soda and water. Beat in vanilla and eggs. Stir in flour and lastly, the fruit mixture. Spray small baking pans with Pam and divide mixture between them. I usually make 6 small loaves with this amount. Bake at 250 degrees for 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours. Cakes are done when the top is firm, but you can poke with a toothpick to make sure.
I usually make double this recipe.

The tubs of glace fruit are prohibitively expensive, so I keep an eye on them in the produce section of Safeway after Christmas. Every two or three years, I find them marked down 75% and stock up.

Classic Shortbread
8 oz unsalted butter
1/2 c sugar
1/4 tsp salt
2 1/4 c flour

Cream butter and sugar. Work in flour and salt, knead lightly if necessary. Press into greased molds or 8" round pans. Prick dough with a fork. Bake at 300 degrees for about 30 minutes for small molds up to an hour for larger pans. Shortbread should be golden brown. Leave in pans until firm before tipping onto cooling rack. For larger rounds, cut into wedges while still hot in the pan.

Eggnog 

1 c milk
1 egg yolk
A few drops of vanilla and rum essences
Sugar to taste
A sprinkle of freshly grated nutmeg

Put half of the milk in a mug or small pan and whisk in egg yolk with immersion blender. Add essences and the rest of the milk. Heat slowly in microwave (or on stove top if using a pan), stirring often. Nog should thicken slightly when done. Add sugar to taste.

Today I am thankful that my fridge and freezer are stocked up with lots of butter.
Happy Christmas baking to you!

Day 22: Sew much to do

A couple of years ago, I determined to make use of the large amounts of fabric scraps that have monopolized the space in our smallest bedroom ever since it was happily vacated by some child or another for the bigger bedroom. Jeff complains once in a while, but not so much since he got his very own man-cave and started filling it with books and tools and all sorts of masculine paraphernalia.

So I started cutting out little squares and triangles of coordinating fabric. I have lots of samples from about thirty years ago, when I sewed for a friend who was in the business. I always knew they would come in handy some day! I pieced this top together and pinned it shortly after making my resolution, then ran out of courage when it came to the machine quilting part. 

I manned up this week and dug the sewing machine out of a heap of stuff.

The quilting isn't very complicated and sewed up pretty fast.

A little Google and a YouTube video got me past my fear of binding.

It is all very imperfect, just like me.

The pin-tucked white fabric in the centre of this square is from a wedding dress that I made almost thirty years ago. It had all sorts of pin-tucked sections and lace inserts and took about forty hours to complete. 

Pardon me if you've heard the story before, but this was when the Portland, Oregon LDS temple was being built and our family had been asked to contribute $200 to the building fund. It seemed like a fortune at the time, because Jeff was earning very little money and it was all we could do to pay the basic bills. I was working at a restaurant as a hostess, doing childcare, and also sewing for my friend. I couldn't think how we were going to come up with the money. Then my friend asked me to sew this wedding dress for some promotional thing she was doing. I charged her $200. Which, in retrospect, was too little money, but it was before I had gained a healthy respect for the value of my time. And it did solve the problem.

The strip of blue heart fabric is from Daisy Kingdom dresses that I made for Bethany and Annie one Easter. I still have the dresses, but apparently they are not stylish enough for today's girls.

They were considered to be very fashionable at the time, is all I'm saying.

So, the quilt is finished, just in time to be put in the mail for a very precious little boy.

And I am thankful for the sewing teachers that taught me, at the grand ago of twelve and thirteen, to use a sewing machine. And the kind lady from church who taught me, on a few Saturday mornings, some handy short-cuts and skills that have stayed with me all these years. 

It changed my life, in a good way.

Day 21: I am an Amazon fan

Try saying that five times fast.

I have become, of late, an online shopper.

Specifically, an Amazon shopper.

I can find everything I need, at a better price, and I don't have to drive around in the weather and traffic. 

Tonight, thanks to my favourite frugal website, I found this Richard Scarry game and a set of books, which was just what I needed to finish up my Christmas shopping for a couple of precious grandchildren.

Total cost: $0.00.

I paid for them with my Discover Card Cashback Bonus.

And shipping was free.

But if I hadn't spent over $25, it would have been free anyway, because of my free month of Amazon Prime that came with the Kindle Fire that I bought on a lightning deal a couple of weeks ago.

And that Kindle is already filled with free books that I found on that same frugal website.

And my house is full of smoke detectors that came in a contractor's six-pack.

And my minimalist shoes (most of which came from my favourite shoe website, 6pm.com)  are all fitted with Pedag metatarsal pads that I bought by the dozen on Amazon for much less than my podiatrist charged.

And the Lego man flashlights that we gave the grandkids for Christmas last year (bought on Amazon, of course) are replenished with lithium batteries that cost mere pennies compared to the local stores.

And Bethany and I will both be drying foods all season next year, thanks to a sale on Nesco dehydrators.

And you know those lovely Silpat baking mats that cost a fortune from Demarle? Found some Made in American ones for $5 a piece that will make some nice gifts for my Kiwi friends.

So yes, you might say that I am thankful for Amazon these days.

You can call me the Amazon Queen.

Or Queen of the Amazon.

Have you made any grand purchases on Amazon lately?

Or do you have any favourite websites that you would like to share with the rest of us?

Day 20: Truth in advertising

Today, after a very trying day (which I will tell you about soon, whether you want me to or not), Sam, my witty piano student, sat industriously scribbling away at something while his little brother was having his piano lesson.

Noah and I were playing lots of duets today, as you can see.

I am thankful that Sam very kindly didn't make my behind as copious as he should have if he were being truthful.

And I am thankful that all five of today's aspiring piano players were as sweet as could be, or we might have had a repeat of the tears that followed my altercation with Western Union customer no-service this morning.

How's that for a teaser?

Do you even care?

Day 19: I heard the bells

Sometimes I just need an excuse to post cool pictures of cool things.

Take these here bells.

Every Christmas season for the last several years, I've had the most fun experience of participating in a bell choir. As a piano player, life can be lonely at times, in a musical way of speaking, which is one of the reasons I sometimes give group lessons to my piano students. 

So ringing bells with a group of music-makers is particularly satisfying to me.

And this year, for the first time, Bethany is ringing too, so it is even better.

The music this year is more challenging than usual and we have thirteen ringers, so practices have been frequent and long. I do love a challenge.

But the hardest thing, as usual, will be not grimacing when I make a mistake.

Because you know I will.

Make a mistake.

So today, I am thankful for friends who have indulgent husbands who buy them very expensive sets of bells.

And who let me play with them.

Day 18: The Milkmaid

A few months ago, I discovered raw milk.

At first, it seemed a little  gross, but I knew it was better for the body than the highly processed product that we find in the grocery store. If you think I am weird, go take a look at the information on this website.
I know that some of you probably think that drinking raw milk is bound to end in disaster some day, but I have researched it thoroughly and am satisfied that the farmer uses good practices and the cows are happy and well-pastured.
See that layer of cream on top?
That, my friends, is real milk.
And do you love the carafe on the left (made in France) that I found at a garage sale this summer and fits one half-gallon of milk exactly?
Sometimes my life is just one long flow of serendipity.

Today, I am thankful for Christine at Cast Iron Farms, a wee dynamo of a girl who gets up early every day of the year to milk her beloved cows so that people like me can drink their lovely creamy milk. She home schools her two children and takes care of pigs and horses and chickens and rabbits and sheep and goats and turkeys and her vegetable garden and somehow manages to be smiling every time I see her.

Christine and her family are living their dream, homesteading on a few acres in McMinnville. 

I am thankful that, for now at least, small farmers in Oregon can still sell their milk to people like me, who are trying to get back to real food.

Day 17: Would it be redundant...

...to be thankful for Thanksgiving?

Because I am. Thankful for Thanksgiving.

I love a crowd on holidays, even though all the cooking and cleanup exhausts me. Bethany and family defected to Utah for the week, so we were expecting a small table, just Sam and Charlie and the missionaries for dinner. I'd adjusted to the idea and embraced it, deciding to cook a ham and a small, boneless turkey breast instead of the usual gigantic bird that would defeat my powers of innovation on the leftovers front. 

Then, a day or so before the Big Day, Jon and Jenny's family, complete with Jenny's niece from Utah, decided that they would come after all. And on Thanksgiving Eve, Charlie told me that he had invited our favourite Samoan to come too.

So our small table turned into two tables and I was happy.

Thanksgiving Day around here was the only gloriously sunny day in the midst of a rainy couple of weeks.

Sam, Charlie, and Wrangler arrived nice and early, so after we got some prep work done in the kitchen we went for a walk.

There is a beauty-berry bush just down the road and I want to know why it is not mine.

We finally ripped mine out because the few berries it produced were never this spectacular.

I missed the lovely dinner photo op. But trust me, it was a sight to behold.

A huge ham from Zaycon Foods that was the best we have ever eaten. A small turkey breast and a herbed panko-encrusted pork roast completed the meat menu. Mashed potatoes, rice pilaf, mashed carrots and parsnips, broccoli, Jenny's Jello, green salad, rolls, and gravy for the first course. Which causes me to realize that I completely forgot the stuffing. And I had designated a box of Stove Top just for the occasion.

Darn!

For dessert we had honey-lime cheesecake, pumpkin pie, apple pie, blackberry cobbler, and butterscotch-pecan pie.

Jeff sat working on his Lego boat while we finished eating dessert.

Don't you just love those chubby cheeks?

Jon had to head to work right after he ate, but he did justice to the pie first.

Jenny and Camilla.

For some reason, Sam liked this photo better than the one I took.

Go figure.

Jon has been working on making ghillie suits for his family for some time, and had to show one off to Charlie before he left.

I could say many things here, but I shall refrain.

Wrangler was sweetly underfoot most of the night, always in the hope of a crumb or two. He decided to help with the dish-washing.

My kitchen floor has never been so clean after a big dinner.

Reason # 52 to own a dog?

After as much food had been stuffed into out bodies as possible, we played a rousing game of SpongeBob Uno.

Naked Homer images will always remind of Thanksgiving from now on.

Who is this strange creature?

When the ruckus had died down and most people had gone home, Sam, Charlie, Jeff, Mo and I all sat down to introduce Mo and Sam to the joys of Labyrinth, the movie.

They both declared it to be "weird", which was a mystery to us Osbornes, because to us it is iconic.

I think we shall have to make Sam watch it twenty more times, until she appreciates it for the genius that it truly is.

Let's hear a shout-out for Labyrinth!