Not Sure What Happened

I've had and successfully used a bread making machine for years.  I like home made bread.  So the other day I decided to make a loaf of bread.

So I got out all the ingredients and got started.  

I dumped all the right amounts of the right stuff into the pan.  Then I did all the settings, same as usual, and turned it on.

Three hours later I took the loaf out of the pan.  I'm not sure what happened.  Instead of the usual nicely shaped, golden brown loaf of bread, I got a deformed, misshapen little creature.  Fortunately, it still tasted normal, really yummy.  I dunno - maybe my yeast was old.  Anyway, I'll hope it goes better next time.  But I'll still enjoy the taste of this loaf.  I'll just eat it with my eyes closed.

Another Birthday, Another Cake

A few weeks ago we celebrated the birthday of one of our grandkids.  That was fun.  He happens to have a brother who's birthday was just the other day; they're close to exactly a year apart in age.  He saw the fun his brother had designing his own birthday cake so he wanted to do the same.  And, lucky for him, he has a grandmother who was more than happy to do that. She likes doing things like that for her grandkids.

This cake also began with a concept drawing.  That's half the fun.  Then grandma did the baking.  This time around, the baking was a little frustrating.  Brombeere made all the cakes the day before the birthday boy was to arrive but for some reason, two of the three cakes failed, they fell.  Actually, they didn't cook so as the outer edges were getting over-done, the center was still gooey batter.  Unacceptable.  We never did figure out why that happened but when she redid the cakes, they worked the second time.  So in the end, we had the cake we needed to finish.  Phew!

On the day before the party, when the birthday boy arrived, the day was full so he didn't get to help as much as his brother had.  But he didn't seem to mind.  He did get to make some critical decisions, like the color scheme.  He was happy with that, it was enough for him.  But pretty much all the assembly and decorating happened after he had gone to bed.  HIs dad, Schwarzbeere, again demonstrated his artistry by making the final decorations to be added. 

And then, again late in the night, we had a finished cake.

And all the decorations.  We were ready for a party!

And the birthday boy was happy with the outcome.  A cake he had designed himself.  Pretty snazzy!

In the end, he was pretty happy with his birthday cake and party  A pretty nice way to advance in age.

The Birthday Cake

We recently had a birthday that needed celebrating so we asked the birthday boy what kind of cake he wanted.  That can be an exciting question sometimes.  

In this case, he said he wanted to design his own cake.  Then he drew a picture of it.  He actually put quite a bit of effort into drawing out his vision of what he wanted his cake to look like.  This was a week before the day of celebration so Brombeere had a while to think on how she was going to make his idea turn into reality.

The day before the celebration he also said he wanted to help make it.  So they set about making it happen.

Pretty soon they had the basic shape done and ready to do the finish work.

First there was some instruction and then he got to work on the initial application of frosting.

Then came the detail work.  He got  bit frustrated because it was slow, careful business and slow and careful are not always his strong suit.  But he worked at it and did quite well, getting better as he went along.

Alas, baking and decorating a cake can take a while and pretty soon it was bed time.  Grandma was left to finish it off.

But she kept at it and pretty soon it was looking more and more like his drawing.

His Dad even got involved in making some of the decorations that went on the cake.

After a while it was pronounced "done" and, in comparison, it actually looked quite a bit like his concept drawing.  

Success!!

We put out some decorations and then the grown-ups went to bed.  The next morning, when he saw the finished product, he was very pleased.

We asked him how he wanted to arrange his candles on the cake and he told us where to put them.  That worked to his disadvantage.  First he blew out one side ...

... then he had to go around and do the other side.  Took him two breaths to get them all out, spaced out like that.

Then there was cake, ice cream, and presents.  He was quite happy with how it all turned out.  

And then it was done - nothing left but the after party.  It was a lot of cake, but he was happy with how it all turned out.  Brombeere might even be willing to give it another shot when the next birthday rolls around.

Just Like Old Times

 When I was growing up my parents had a big yard, much of which was in garden and orchard.  There were several peach trees, an apricot tree, as well as an apple, a plum, and a cherry tree. There were grape vines and they grew all kinds of regular garden vegetables; tomatoes, corn, beans, onions, strawberries, and other kinds. All of this got bottled and stored and we got to enjoy it all winter.  But all that yummy goodness didn't come without a whole bunch of work at harvest time.  I have lots of memories of all us kids sitting around the kitchen table, under the careful supervision of my parents, peeling, slicing, chopping, and bottling all the bounty from our garden and orchard. Mom would be at the stove, pressure cooking all these bottles.  We learned to love the sweet sound lids popping as they sealed, ready to go in the storeroom.

Anyway, the other day Blaubeere came into a whole bunch of apples, so much so that she was more than happy to have a little help getting them all into bottles, or at least a whole lot of them into bottles.  So we planned a time and went over to spend some time socializing as well as helping with the apples.

Just like when I was a kid, most of us were gathered around the table, working on the apples in something like an assembly line.

Some of us were peeling, that was where I was assigned, which was perfectly okay with me, it was my preferred station.

Others would take the peeled apples and chop them in to smaller bits.

These were fallen apples, for one reason or another they had fallen off the tree and been picked up from the ground.  That meant that they had bruises and stuff so they weren't the prettiest apples.  But they were still fine for making applesauce after having all the bruises and spots cut off.

After they were all peeled and chopped, they went over into the kitchen to be cooked and put in the bottles.  That was Blaubeere's and Brombeere's job.

Once in the bottles they went into the big pot where they cooked the allotted time.

And lastly, they came out of the cooker and onto the counter to cool.  This is where we were able to listen to the lids pop as they cooled.

In the end, Blaubeere ended up with around 27 bottles of applesauce.  She also ended up with a couple of gallons of chopped apple pieces that she'll use for baking muffins and such.  Some mighty fine stuff comes out of Blaubeere's kitchen. And some got made into apple fruit leather. And that's in addition to all the apples that got munched on and eaten because her family really likes fresh apples.

It was a fun way to spend a few hours with Blaubeere and her family. It was a good illustration of the old adage, "Many hands make light work."  And it was a pleasant reminder of all the good times my own family spent doing the same thing when I was growing up.  All in all it was a good time.

Yummy Onions

Recently, as part of the preparations for Heidelbeere's wedding, we were making tortellini soup.  This was for the wedding luncheon so we needed a lot of soup.  And, as you may know, tortellini soup includes yummy onions.  Heidelbeere was planning on about 55 people for the luncheon; lots of onions. Yep, and somebody had to chop up all those onions.

We have a cute little vegetable chopper at our house, but we hadn't taken it with us when we'd traveled out to the wedding.  Fortunately, Heidelbeere has exactly the same kind of cute little chopper.  They are wonderful for chopping veggies, including onions.  Anything to make chopping onions go quicker is welcome, so we got her chopper out and got to work.

This chopper is exactly the kind of thing that attracts kids, its fun to use.  So Heidelbeere's oldest wanted to use it.  However, she soon discovered that onions have a curious affect on anyone in the room when they're being chopped; they make you cry.  You know, syn-propanethial-S-oxide, the stuff that stimulates the eyes' lachrymal glands so they release tears.  Yeah, that stuff.  Personally, I can make it through about two onions before my eyes start watering.  Not so with most others. We had a whole bag of onions to chop, around ten or 15 of the wonderful little orbs.  And the onions that Heidelbeere was using were particularly potent.  

Undiscouraged, however, the little lady still wanted to use the chopper, even though everyone in the room was crying.  So she put some thought into it and came up with a plan to protect herself from the effects of chopping all those onions.

Alas, she soon discovered the goggles did not do much to protect her from crying.  Still it was fun to watch her try.  And in the end, she got to use the chopper as much as she wanted; she didn't last even two whole onions.  But she was happy, so success, right?  Right!

From Scratch

The other day, Blaubeere came to visit with her kids, that's always a good time.  She brought with her a start of her sourdough, which we know from experience to be really yummy.  The original plan had to been to make something with it, bread or cookies, or something, but we ended up doing other stuff and never got to it.  So when it was time to leave, she left it. 

I've made bread before, using our bread machine. Several times, actually.  But except for one time, I've always used the bread machine. I've come close to trying it without the machine several times but just never gone through with it. So, after Brombeere suggested it would be simple to just add the start to a regular recipe, I decided to give it a try.  After all, we couldn't just waste a perfectly good sourdough start.

I dug out all my bread recipes to see if any of them called for using a start but none did.  So I picked the one that looked simplest and decided to do as Brombeere suggested.  So I got out the yeast and started it in some warm water.

Then I got all all the other ingredients and added them all together, as called for in the recipe.  To that point, the recipes says only add half the flour.

It was at that point I also added the start.  Brombeere was kind enough to add a little personalization, some decoration.  It's a smiley face, in case you can't tell.  This is, after all, supposed to be happy bread.

Then I blended it all together.

At that point, the recipe says to begin adding the rest of the flour.  You keep adding flour until the dough looked like the right consistency.  Then you pour it out onto the counter and knead it for a while.

I really didn't know what "the right consistency" was, I only had my memories to go on, from watching my Mom all the times she used to make bread.  For the longest time, all the bread at our house was home made.  She typically made several loaves at a time, there were six of use and we all loved her bread.  So, anyway, I did the best I could and moved ahead with it.

After kneading it a bunch and then letting it "rest" a while, it was nearly ready to go in the pan.  I put it back on the counter, punch it down a bit, formed it into loaves, and put them in the pans, ready to cook.

Forty-five minutes later they were done and ready to come out.  And out they came.

One of my favorite foods is still homemade bread, fresh and warm, right out of the oven.

I learned a lot from this, about making bread the old fashion way, without a bread machine.  I might have to try this again, it actually wasn't all that hard.  One thing I still need to work on is getting the loaves to be more "pretty".  I just need to pay a little more attention to that when I put them in the pan.  Hey, how hard can that be, right?  But regardless of what they look like, they still taste way better than store bought bread.

Cackleberries

Some friends of ours have a daughter that recently got into the egg business.  So she got some chickens and set them up on the family property and put the word out that she was in business.

Her pricing schedule gives a discount if you gather the eggs yourself rather than her gathering them so that's what we do.  That way the eggs are only just a little more expensive than what you buy at the store. 

Plus you get the joy of interacting with all those chickens.  Not that they're real social creatures, they just like to gather around anyone that might be there to feed them.

So once a week we go out and gather eggs.  We even bought a cute little basket for it. 

We go out and gather about two dozen eggs each time.  Now chickens are not the cleanest creatures with their eggs.  So when we get home we have to wash and clean the eggs up.

This week we came home and had scrambled eggs.  We like to spice them up with peppers, onions, and cheese.  Sometime we put other things in them as well but we didn't have any of that stuff on hand this particular evening.

Farm to table, right?   Farm-fresh eggs.  Pretty nice to my way of thinking.