jam and my thoughts

Here I find myself again, staring into a large pan of boiling fruit and sugar. And while I gaze at my raspberry jam, I'm deep in thought about how I can make a living out of baked goods and canned jams and jellies. With bags under my eyes I'm exhausted from the thought of planting a fruit and vegetable garden when I don't even know how to till the ground. Ron and I have dreams of a business. One day we want people to buy our produce while they sip on our home brew and garage wine and lather our bread with homemade jam. And maybe they will walk away with a bag of my homemade cookies and eggs from our chickens that we still need to get. And they will be raving about our bacon and sausages that they will be cooking for breakfast. Recently I checked out The One-Block Feast by Sunset Magazine from the library. "100 recipes made with ingredients from your yard. How to raise chickens, keep bees, brew beer, make wine, and more. Garden plans for 4 seasons." The book is beautiful and everyone looks so happy while they prune vines and dig land to plant seeds. When Ron and I bought our property, it definitely seemed daunting but being newlyweds, we were excited. But we can barely make time to even go on a date, let alone paint a wall or knead bread. Okay, it is starting to sound like I'm whining. What I'm trying to convey is that it's a lot of work but also a lot of fun.

I have become a bit obsessed about checking out books from the library that involve cooking, baking, house projects, and the occasional book about training for a marathon. (Probably won't happen but I pretend I'm training...) I skim through the books and pick the ones I would consider buying to add to our cookbook collection. I did end up buying Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook so that I could master her pastry dough. And I also bought BakeWise by Shirley O. Corriher who is basically a goddess of food science. I wouldn't mind becoming a complete baking geek. I didn't get the Sunset Magazine book though. It was a great book but everyone looked too happy doing their projects so I returned it to the library. Ron and I are happy to have projects but we don't always look that happy while we do them..... Honestly, some really suck.

Speaking of projects Ron has been going gangbusters downstairs. That carpet that made me want to hurl has been ripped up and we had our handy ex-DJ turned contractor who loves to rap, dry wall our soon to be wine cellar. (Yes, he has even "free-rhymed" to me about grout. A post for another time.) Last night Ron painted some of the walls so that we can get our bamboo flooring done. This will be our future entertainment room:

Still working on the color for the party room next to it.

While Ron continued to paint, I mowed about 3/4 of an acre of our property, which took me about 2 hours to do. Lots of hills and I was often attacked by blackberry bushes. I eventually burned out, poured myself a glass of wine and worked on dinner. My brother and sister-in-law gave me Melissa Clark's In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite for Christmas. She writes for the New York Times but I mostly enjoy listening to her be interviewed on The Splendid Table on NPR. Plus she has the most amazing hair color. It's orange red like an heirloom tomato. And kind of the same color as our entertainment room. Anyway, I made her recipe for "Figgy, Piggy Drumsticks and Thighs." Essentially it's chicken browned in a pan of bacon fat, which is then finished in the oven with roasted figs and thyme. I presented it on a platter with wilted lettuce and then you scatter it with bacon and garlic.

I also threw a fresh pizza dough on the grill, spread pesto and Emmentaler cheese on top with corn, shallots and mushrooms.

Finally a dinner I made that I would eat again! Melissa Clark's recipe was super easy and delicious. But anything with bacon is delicious. And the pizza was a perfect accompaniment.

More tales of basement projects to come. I'm sure more wine will be poured to assist.

Danishes and Carpet

I have a deep love for baking. I have been baking since I was a kid and my mom loved to bake too. She and I would bake batches of brownies and cookies whenever there was free time. In the summers when I was out of school, I baked almost daily. I think part of my love for baking stems from the fact that I have loved sugar for as long as I can remember. And having the skill to bake allows me to create most anything I desire. I have cakes that bake in 30 minutes (good for a late night craving for chocolate cake) and cake recipes that take hours to put together to fulfill my need for a challenge. Currently I have been playing around with various Danish pastry doughs with some success and most recently I tried a recipe from Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook. I made Martha's version and started off with using the dough to make cheese Danishes.

And my word, they were rockin' good. I don't even buy them when I go to a bakery, Ron does, but I was inspired because it is his favorite. The pastry dough was delicious and the ripples of butter between each layer were oozing out of each pastry and all over my hands. The dough was not easy to make and I was reminded as to why I like pastries when I started putting the 3 pounds of butter in the dough before folding it and rolling it multiple times.

But it was very rewarding. And the I loved the addition of lemon zest and golden raisins.

But then I made her sticky buns. I used the same dough to make what looked to be a delicious treat from her cookbook. I was so impressed by their appearance that I made Ron come and look at them the moment they came out of the oven. I made two kinds. One with hazelnuts and one with pecans. But pouring corn syrup into each large muffin tin as the base made me a bit wary. After reading multiple articles as to why corn syrup is crap I was slightly embarrassed to have it in my pantry. But I admit, I use it. I use it in ice cream and of course, the Thanksgiving pecan pie. But I was still cringing a bit. I knew the buns were to be sticky but this seemed obscene. I figured my inexperience in making sticky buns was shaking my confidence. It had to be right. Buns were in the oven and out they came looking glorious, glossy, and oh so gooey.

Ron and I shared half of each kind. My first bite was delicious. I was partial to the hazelnut because I love the fragrance and firm crunch of a hazelnut. But then I realized that the crunch moved into the hard goo, stuck to your teeth category. The corn syrup mixture was begging to give me a cavity. Then I noticed Ron stopped eating his. Perhaps he was distracted by a story in the morning paper? I finally asked his opinion. "They're good," he said. "But a bit too.......well, hard to eat."

Damn it, Martha! Failure. An entire batch of pastry turned into hard candy. I forced Ron to take them all to his office. I'm hoping he didn't tell anyone I made them though. I couldn't bare to throw them away after I worked on that dough for days. Folding, chilling, folding, chilling, folding, freezing, defrosting, folding, rolling, chilling.... At least the cheese danishes made me pat myself on the back. After eating the sticky buns that morning, I was so high on sugary corn syrup, I started shaking. Kind of like when I have one too many shots of espresso in the morning. I felt my heart racing, I wanted to faint but instead I obsessively cleaned my kitchen. I dumped the rest of my pastry in the trash. Ugh, what a waste.

But so it goes in testing recipes, I have learned. And I have two great kitchen companions. Bernie often licks the floor until every crumb is gone. He sits at my feet as flour is dusted onto his head. I call him my sous chef even though all he does is stare at the oven.

Roscoe, on the other hand, has issues during cooking time. He is very sensitive to lights flashing about. An example would be the reflection of light onto a watch or a cell phone that is dancing on the floor. The worst is aluminum foil. Just the sound of the foil yanked out of its container and then ripped into a piece makes him bananas. He cries, jumps at the walls and eventually tries to attack Bernie. So my only solution was to feed him treats while I tore sheet after sheet of foil in his face. Now the sound that used to send him into a tizzy sends him running into the kitchen for a treat. The same goes for saran wrap. He will come from the basement to plop down by the treat jar.

Border collies are weird, I have concluded.

Meanwhile Ron has been going gangbusters on the basement. I continue to vacuum, although I did start organizing the garage. At the start of all of his projects, my heart stops for a second because the initial shock of change startles me. But it's okay because what was there before was never good. He has ripped up part of the floor that had carpeting like this:

Yeah, that shag carpet you had when you were young. I used to like running my hands through it as a kid but it wasn't like running your hands through someone's hair. (Clean hair, that is...) Anyway, we have carpet from hell in our basement and Ron is slowly pulling it up. He has also knocked down a few walls to expand the look. Besides inhaling tons of concrete dust and finding a family of dead mice, it's been smooth sailing for him. (I can say it's been smooth sailing because I have done nothing except move items out of the room.) The only problem is I have less carpet to vacuum. Time to poor the drinks then.

The Border Collies

"Oh s$$t!" Ron exclaimed.

"What?" I said.

Ron stood bolt upright to block my view of our window seat in the kitchen. "Nothing!"

At this moment it is midnight and I now notice a small dark object on the seat, hidden in the shadows. "Is it a bird?"

"No."

"Is it a mouse?"

"Nope."

"Dog poop?"

"No."

Long pause. Again I ask,"Is it a bird?"

"Maybe..."

"Huh?!"

"It's not that bad...."

"What's not that bad?"

"It looks like it was peaceful when it happened."

"When what happened?"

"Just don't come over here. Go do something else."

I turn around then stop to consider turning back to look and think better of it. You are probably wondering why I came back to asking about it being a bird. My first thought in my mind is border collie #2 who I recently found with a young bird flapping about in his mouth a few days prior. I was able to get the bird to safety but I'm sure it had a heart attack within the hour. I would too if I were playing "games" with a dog and I weighed less than a pound.

Here I introduce border collie #2.

I say #2 not because he is inferior to border collie #1 but to reference the fact that he was adopted months later after border collie #1. Border collie #2 was once named Cookie, then Mikey, until we rescued him and decided on the name Roscoe. Roscoe is definitely a person reincarnated and I don't even believe in reincarnation. But he thinks (a lot!) about....well I am not sure and that's what worries me. You often find him hovering over mole holes, cocking his head as if to ask, "Mole! Why are you underground? Come see me. I want to meet you and we could play together! Oh okay. I'll dig you out instead. And eat you."

We rescued Roscoe with very little information on his background except records of some food allergies and notes that he was a bit hyper. I still remember day one with Roscoe. So sweet, he looked. His low wagging tail greeting me. Later I heard a crash from him flipping a newly made cake onto the ground with its cake stand. And he wasn't sure of border collie #1.

That's Bernie. Another rescue who was a stray. Bernie is the most blissed out being I know. He is in a constant state of craziness, love of life and joy. When he yawns, he shakes his head simultaneously with a low shriek, barely containing his need for an activity. But we love these dogs. So much so that we have backpacks we never use for them, life jackets, toys galore and 5 acres. Yeah, I'm pretty sure we got 5 acres for two border collies.

I spent the last month outside intrigued by birds that would fly close by me to land only a few yards away. I thought, "Gosh these birds are getting so used to us being around all the time that they don't even care!" Then I noticed Bernie cocking his head left and right above a spot on the porch. Aha! A nest was found with baby birds! How cute! Then Roscoe discovered it.

Based on the position of the nest I thought they would be fine until I noticed Roscoe in the yard "playing" with a young bird I mentioned earlier. I'm not truly sure if Roscoe is to blame for a bird dead on the window seat but I wouldn't put it past him. He has caught a squirrel, moles, rats and been found munching a chipmunk. I have been startled many times by these encounters, spitting out expletives when I catch him in the act.

Bernie and Roscoe. My obsessions. My "kids." Yes, we are one of those annoying couples who talks about their dogs as if we made them ourselves. "You should see Bernie when he plays in his kiddie pool! And Roscoe is such a hoot but kind of nuts. But he is getting better now that he is on meds."

I mention medication because Roscoe has a doggie dermatologist. I know. It's insanity. My regular vet calls him the million dollar dog. He has a heart murmur that needs to be monitored, he's accident prone, his anal glands are always blocked, he has cholesterol deposits in his eyes, and he is allergic to EVERYTHING. Bills. And more bills. But Bernie would be lost without him. WE would be lost without him. The two of them together provide immense joy and an abundance of entertainment. They annoy the crap out of each other and at the same time they LOVE each other. And yet, Ron wants another. He sends me emails with subject lines such as, "Save me. I need help." I open the email to find pictures of border collies up for adoption in states as far as Idaho and Washington. I'll catch Ron at the computer where he confesses he has been looking at border collie rescue sights for an hour. Better that than porn, yes, but I think about the insanity of having three herding dogs that only herd us. I can barely handle walking the two of them and I can not imagine walking three! But then, I look at the pictures in the emails and respond to Ron with, "Please buy this dog immediately. I'll get the car ready."