Berries!

Canning season has been a bust until today. Strawberry season at our favorite PYO place lasted all of three days due to the weather not cooperating. The farm share isn't happening this year. We haven't had time to go out as a family to do any of the PYO things we might have done. I haven't canned a thing since March. Our mulberry tree did well and I did make a mulberry pie but I have plenty of jelly and syrup already so I didn't make any this year.

Finally, today, we went to our favorite wild blueberry spot. The weather has not been kind to these berries, either, and it was hard to find good patches to pick. We did see an Eastern Towhee, which I don't think I've ever seen before. In two hours the four of us had two quarts of berries. We came home overheated, hungry and tired. After cleaning up and having a little food, I got to work and made a batch of blueberry jam (with added pectin). There were enough berries for me to freeze two cups for baking later and I ended up with just shy of seven jars of jam. 

Boozy Birthday

Generally, on my husband's birthday, I make something with chocolate. This year is no exception. It's a time to test out new recipes that I find, and to play around a little with my baking skills. However, I have actually made this particular cake for him before. Sometimes a recipe is just that good. 

This Irish whiskey and Guinness cake is just that good. I made the cake part a couple of days ago and refrigerated the cake until it was time to make the frosting. It's easier to cut the cake layers when they are cold. The recipe says to serve immediately after frosting but that isn't necessary. I made the frosting and frosted the cake several hours ahead of time and put it back in the fridge. The cream cheese and mascarpone in the frosting firm up in the cold and it holds the cake together well.

When I made this cake the last time I did separate the frosting and make part of it with whiskey and part of it with Bailey's. The whiskey was so strong the kids couldn't eat it. This time, I just made all of the frosting with Bailey's. It was still very strong. My husband licked the frosting bowl and felt dizzy for a while afterward. It is a rich, boozy cake that should definitely be eaten in moderation! The Bailey's flavor for the frosting throughout the layers was, in our opinion, a better choice. 

Round Two

Since I still had more chicken bones in the freezer, I made another batch of stock a couple of days ago. Today I canned it, and now have another nine pints in the pantry. I might make a batch of vegetable stock another day but, for now, I have enough stock to last a while. 

Replenishing

Happy New Year, a little late!

Yes, there has been a lot of baking - bread, cakes, cookies. I even tried my hand at popovers recently. I made those lovely cupcakes for my mother's birthday and a celebratory cheesecake for the youngerchild's acceptance to college. So yes, plenty of baking, but not much energy to write about it. 

In other news, I found a dairy near where I go riding that sells raw milk and fresh eggs. Sometimes they have cheese and even raw cream, and they also sell meat but I haven't gotten any of that yet. I buy a half-gallon of raw milk every week and it's helped keep my stomach happy. Several of the cows have had calves in the last month. I met two of them, one was only three days old and so very small and cute. I might sometime get enough milk to make cheese or cream to make cultured butter but, for now, just getting enough to drink is fine for me.

Another update is that the farm is not offering a CSA this year, so I won't be going out to the farm weekly over the summer to gather my share and pick from the fields. I have mixed feelings about this but overall I will miss being out there in the fields picking herbs, berries and flowers. Mocha will likely miss all the kale.

Today I canned seven pints of chicken stock I made a couple of days ago (I chilled it to remove the fat, then heated it back up again before canning). I'd run out of all the stock I'd made last year, and it was time to start getting my supply back up. I have more chicken bones in the freezer and will have to make another batch at some point, but at least I've started canning things again. 

Who knows what this season will bring?

Holiday Recap

December is always a busy month and this year was no exception. I've been baking up a storm. Since it wasn't a good canning year, I made a LOT of cookies to give out as gifts. Gingerbread, Linzers, chocolate chip, Nanaimo bars, meringue rochers, damiers, and toffee. I was baking for DAYS. But I was able to bring 4 dozen cookies to my new workplace, drop off cookies for neighbors and friends, and still have plenty left over for the family.

Then it came time for the actual holiday meals. On Christmas Eve we went to visit my parents and cooked lunch for them. I made fettuccine Alfredo and sautéed chicken and shrimp, so that everyone could add their own protein. For dessert we had...cookies!

For Christmas day, the family was greeted with warm cinnamon rolls, fresh out of the oven. I had made the dough the night before and, after its first rise, put it in the fridge. Rolling it out when it was cold was so much easier. I might even make them more often, considering how much easier it was. 

Dinner was chicken or salmon en croute, depending on if one eats fish or not. With curried mashed sweet potatoes on the side, yum! I made puff pastry from scratch, and wrapped each piece of fish or chicken individually. I did pre-cook the chicken because I was worried the puff pastry needed less time to cook than the chicken. They ended up being much larger than I envisioned, and we have plenty of leftovers. For dessert, I made creme brulée!

Chicken

Now I'm very tired and, other that making bread, I think I'll be taking a break. We have plenty of leftovers to eat.

Salmon

Fried Banana Cake

The elderchild and a friend made banana cake the other day and brought some back to us. Faced with a whole loaf of banana cake (slightly lighter than banana bread), we made it into a terrific breakfast! Each slice was fried in butter about 2-3 minutes per side and then topped with maple syrup and whipped cream with cinnamon. Mmm.

Missed It

We missed apple picking season again. 

That's two years in a row. I guess I keep hoping both the kids will be free on the same weekend and, while technically they were, one had Covid so we couldn't exactly go anywhere. I still have some applesauce from last year and when I run out I can just buy a bunch of apples and make more, but the outing was always part of the fun. Maybe next year we can plan that better.

What I have done recently is make a chocolate cream pie, something I have not made before. I followed the King Arthur recipe and it was fabulous. The pie did not last long! Much more successful than that red velvet cake, I might add. 

Today I am making chocolate chip cookies, using a recipe from the NY Times. Lately my toll house cookies have been very...thin. I'm not sure what has been happening but they come out very flat and yet still chewy. Weird. This recipe is fantastic. At least, they look good. We haven't tasted them yet. My new coworkers have been after me to make cookies, since they know I bake. So I'm bringing some in for them. The cool thing about this recipe is that you make the dough and refrigerate it for at least a day. The longer you let it sit, the better it is, apparently. Seems to work.