Year End Project-y Goodness

So I am rapidly approaching the end of the year and I don't think I will make my 52 "things" before that time. It was really exciting and encouraging at the beginning of the year and I might try for the the thing-a-day again in early spring but will need to plan it out a bit.

That is not to say I have not been busy. For Thanksgiving this year I was tasked with making pies. I made 2 apple and 2 pumpkin pies. They turned out okay. They needed to be baked a little longer I think but it was a good experience. I even had enough pumpkin filling to make little pumpkin "custards" so that one of the gluten intolerant guests could enjoy dessert as well.

I also tried a chocolate nut pie. It was a different take on a pecan pie. Essentially using mixed nuts. I only really liked the effect when I got a mouth full of peanuts. I like other kinds of nuts but not many and the flavors of them were significantly enhanced in the pie. If I make it again I will just use peanuts I think. Though it was tasty and rich.

While at Bards N' Cooks I managed to turn the heel on my bulky boot socks but to date I have yet to finish one complete pair of socks. Mostly I have been working on the baby sweater for my co-worker. I have all the individual pieces done so now all I have to do is assemble and make the collar. Wish me luck.

It seems my knitting queue has kind of exploded. I need to make a mobius scarf for A along with some typing gloves. I have another friend who just found out she is having a baby and would like to make something for her. And I have socks to finish and some projects for myself I would like to do. I guess I need to become a faster knitter.

For the holidays I had good intentions of making a bunch of homemade gifts but the month sort of got away from me. I ended up getting a good part of the baking done that I wanted to however. I made extremely tiny snickerdoodles, fruit puffs (dried fruit cookies), lots of ginger cookies, some pecan tortes that I am not sure how I feel about, chewy peanut butter chocolate bars, and some candy cane bars that I am rather disappointed in.

I also made a beaded necklace for my grandmother for the holidays. I wasn't pleased with how it turned out. I couldn't seem to find any inspiration with the beads and so I think that hobby has become one I am no longer interested in. I think I might use up my beads and make a bunch of bracelets, etc for gifts for folks and then back my tools away. It is kind of expensive and I find the knitting far more relaxing though not as sparkly.

So all in all I think I can say I did what...maybe 45 projects this year. Not bad. Sadly not my goal but fairly productive.

A Thing-A-Week Part 40: Rocky Road Bread Pudding

This recipe also came from the same magazine as the Harvest soup. This was a weekend of trying foods I normally don't like but was intrigued by high quality recipes. Again, this is not mine so I will give you the ingredients and my instructions. If you know the source, please let me know as I want to give credit where due.

It turned out really well and was excellent served warm with vanilla ice cream.

Rocky Road Bread Pudding

1 cup salted nuts (I used a blend of cashews, almonds, macadamia nuts)
1 lb. brioche or challah with crusts removed (I could find neither so I used 1lb. croissants) cut/torn into one inch cubes
3 cups whole milk
2 cups heavy cream
¾ cups sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract (or 1 vanilla bean)
8 oz bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate chopped
½ tsp kosher salt
4 large eggs + 2 egg yolks
1 1/3 cups mini marshmallows

(You can toast bread and nuts if you wish. I opted not to.)

*Grease a 13x9 inch baking dish. Seriously...need to grease your dish. This stuff sticks.

*Coarsely chop nuts.

*Bring milk, cream, and sugar to a boil. Add vanilla, chocolate, and salt. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes. Whisk until smooth.

*Whisk eggs and yolks in a large bowl. Gradually (don't curdle your eggs) pour hot chocolate mixture into eggs whisking until blended. Pour over bread cubes in baking dish making sure all are coated. Let stand for a bit (the recipe recommended 45 minutes but I was in a hurry and did about 20. No adverse affects but it would probably be more pudding like if left longer). Heat oven to 350 degrees. Fill a kettle with water and boil.

*Put 1 cup of the marshmallows and 3/4 cup of the nuts into soaked bread and mix in. Place baking dish into a larger roasting pan. Fill with roasting pan with enough hot water to come halfway up the sides of the dish with the bread mixture. Bake 50 minutes.

*Scatter remaining nuts and marshmallows over top and bake another 10 minutes. Cool on a rack and serve warm (with ice cream…okay so that is optional but really really good)

A Thing-A-Week Part 39: Harvest Soup

At my part time job there is usually a ragged collection of magazines for folks to browse through between calls that have been donated by other co-workers. I don't remember where on earth I found this recipe but it looked really good and I don't even like squash. Since it is not mine I am not including the complete recipe just the ingredients and general outline of instructions. If anyone has the source I would love to have it.

I made this for the Greyfeathre gathering last week and it went over fairly well. I really enjoyed it and I think it will be included in my "someday" Thanksgiving menu when I finally am able to host Thanksgiving dinner in my own home. This was not originally a vegetarian recipe but I converted it to one by using a good quality vegetable broth and it worked really well.

4lb. pumpkin or squash of your choice, peeled, seeded, and cut into 2 inch chunks.
3 tbsps olive oil
1 onion, chopped (about 1 cup)
2 small leeks, sliced (about 1 cup)
About 8 oz of russet potato, diced (I added a lot more but I like potatoes which may be why I liked this)
1 stalk celery, diced
2 large garlic cloves, chopped
6 cups of broth (whatever kind you like)
2 tsp kosher salt
½ tsp freshly ground pepper

*Roast the squash or pumpkin at about 425 for 45 minutes. I used acorn squash because I couldn't find any pumpkins. I couldn't get the peel off easy enough to fuss with it ahead of time so I just halved the squash, scooped out seed goo, and put some butter and salt and pepper in the core.

*Saute the diced veggies with a little olive oil until tender. It takes a bit so it is a good way to kill time while the squash is roasting. I added a little season salt as well but that is optional.

*(I put this all in a crock pot and cooked it on low as I didn't have a lot of pots and stove space for the party. You can also make on the stove). I scooped out the roasted squash and added the vegetables to a the crockpot. I added the broth and let cook. When everything was soft, I pureed it with a stick blender and seasoned with salt/pepper to taste.

I didn't get a chance to make this because I ran out of time but it looked like a really nice addition. It is sprinkled on top of each individual serving)

Mushroom Topping
Saute:
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 Tbsp buter
• 1 Tbsp minced shallot
• 3 cups assorted mushrooms (whatever you like)
Toss this together with:
• 2 Tbsp fresh chives
• 1 tsp fresh thyme
• Kosher salt and ground pepper to taste.

A Thing-A-Week Part 38: Cake in a Mug

So I found online the following recipe:

4 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
1 egg
3 tablespoons milk
3 tablespoons oil
3 tablespoons chocolate chips (optional)
a small splash of vanilla extract

Essentially, you mix all those ingredients in that order in a large coffee mug and microwave it for about 3 minutes and you get cake...theoretically. I tried it and what you get is a large brown lump of slightly burnt cocoa with a sort of waxy rubbery texture. It is cake if you squint really really hard. I wasn't really surprised but a little disappointed. There has to be a way to manage the science to get something more cake like. I think chocolate is right out unless it is a white cake with chocolate chips because the temperature is too hot and too fast for cocoa which burns fairly easily.

I didn't take pictures but this website is almost exactly what it looks like. Although their's looks more like cake so perhaps the wattage on my microwave is too high. It could have been that my cocoa was too good as well. I have noticed some recipes only really work with a more generic cocoa.

Although in doing a web search there are all sorts of variations online so perhaps it could just have been a bad example. I am not sure whether or not it warrants further investigation though because at the end of it, I know that mixing all of the same ingredients and just baking it an oven will yield good cake as opposed to sub standard cake. And no one deserves sub standard cake.

A Thing-A-Week Part 37: Stew

It's a very Hobbit dinner Charlie Brown!

So I have never been much for stew. My father always made gallons of it whenever my mom was out of town and my brother and I grew up hating the stuff. But I wanted something hearty and autumn-like that I could cook all day in the crock pot. I thought I would give it a try.

I have learned from my limited cooking experience that it is time and attention to detail that makes simple food so wonderful. So I decided to put a little energy into everything rather than just dumping it all in the pot. I did a little research and looked at a few recipes on line and this is what I came up with:

1. Mix flour, paprika, salt, and pepper. Roll cubed beef in the seasoning mixture and then place in a frying pan with hot olive oil. Sear/fry until brown on the outside. Transfer meat to crockpot.

2. Dice an onion and place in same frying pan to absorb the flavors of the meat drippings and olive oil. Add diced garlic. Saute until slightly brown. Transfer to crockpot. Deglaze the pan with a little port and add to the rest.

3. Dice 4 potatoes and about 2 cups of carrots and add.

4. Add broth (beef would have been better but I had some chicken that I needed to use up) and add Worcestershire sauce and a bay leaf. Let cook for 4 hours on high.

5. Mix 1 tbsp each of flour and cornstarch with about a cup of water. Whisk vigoursly until there are no lumps and add to put. Then I seasoned with some seasoned salt, pepper, nutmeg, and mustard powder. Remove bay leaf.

I served with buttermilk biscuits I had made from scratch (I need to remember not to roll those so thing when I am making them or they don't puff), chedder cheese, and apple cider. It was very hearty and not bad. I thought the base needed more flavor but I think I might try making the thickner on the stove with a little port and using beef broth next time.

A Thing-A-Week Part 36: Soap!

I made soap! I have always really wanted to make soap...ever since I joined the SCA really. All the reading I did said "Oh my god! Soap is so dangerous. We don't even know why we make it!" And not having any chemistry background I sort of gave up hope.

Recently someone in the local group has been experimenting with soap and was gracious enough to allow me to play too! So we made a hot process soap using vegetable ingredients. The bonus of the hot process method is the lye is no longer caustic by the end of the night so it could be used the next day. It is also a more period method (though these ingredients were not). It is kinda ugly as it is hard to mold with the consistency it is at. Cold process soap requires about 6 weeks before it is non-caustic but it takes a mold much better.

This is what I got from the process. I am certainly not the expert and there are far better resources online. Essentially, it was Crisco, canola oil, water and lye. The fasts are softened so that they can interact with the lye. The lye is added to water and then allowed to cool while the fats are warmed until they reach a temperature within about 10 degrees of each other and then they are added together and mixed until they reach trace - a sort of thick pudding like stage. With cold process it is then poured into molds and left to sit for a while. With hot process, it is heated some more and goes through a couple of stages of something I am not quite sure how to describe.

When the lye is all reacted out, it is mixed with scents and then poured in molds and allowed to set. The two lighter colored bars were frozen to get them out of the mold. They were also in smaller molds so they are set up a little more.

I am going to try them tomorrow. I am not sure I added enough scent so hopefully I don't smell like crisco tomorrow.

Stuff I have been up to...

I haven't been terribly productive lately. I am not sure that I will make my 52 things before the end of the year but I have some time. Griffin's Needle ate a lot of my August and I haven't been feeling terribly motivated for getting much else done. I never could get the hang of Augusts but we are well into September and I am starting to feel more antsy to do things.

My kitchen experiments have been full of fail recently so I haven't been sharing those. I had made some Fruity Oaty bars for needle arts but they were a little dry. I had also tried making flour tortillas but couldn't get the temperature regulated so they weren't turning out as well as I would have liked. I like the recipe but I need to get some better equipment.

Upcoming Projects:
*Halloween party planning (need to make my costume and some decorations)
*Finish some scroll banks
*Try making cold process soap
*Make jam
*Do some candle experimentation
*Finish my underdress
*Use up my beads. I haven't been doing much beading so I have a ton that I need to figure out something to do with them. I thought I might try making some ornaments or something. Need to do some research online
*Continue slogging through my knitting projects. I am ready to turn the heal on the second sock of the first pair. I still have the other pair to go, my gigantic technicolor blanket, and I want to start making a felted bag for myself and some baby gifts for a co-worker.
*Re-do my class notes for KWB&C and register for the event
*Do some research on Tudor feasts

And probably a bunch of others I am forgetting

A Thing-A-Week Part 35: Lentil Salad

No pictures of this....It turned out well but lentils are not...photogenic.

Essentially I used the following recipe:
http://www.ummah.net/family/recipes/lentil.html

It smells kinda odd (I think it is the cumin) and it is not visually attractive but it tastes really good. I am someone who never thought they would like lentils until I helped out with making lunch for 35 year and I was corrupted.

I think it is a definite win. I just hope it is a fair vegetarian option. I am not sure about quantity though. According to the bag the amount I made was 14 servings. I didn't measure final volume.

A Thing-A-Week Part 34: Pan Perdy

28. To make the best panperdy
To make the best panperdy, take a dozen eggs, and break them, and beat
them very well, then put unto them cloves, mace, cinnamon and nutmeg, and
good store of sugar, with as much salt as shall season it: then take a
manchet, and cut it into thick slices like toasts; which done, take your
fryin pan, and put into it a good store of sweet butter, and, being
melted, lay in your slices of bread, then pour upon them one half of your
eggs; then when that is fried, with a dish turn your slices of bread
upward, and then pour on them the other half of your eggs, so turn them
till both sides be brown; then dish it up, and serve it with sugar
strewed upon it.

I started with:
6 eggs
2 tbsps sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp each mace, clove, nutmeg.

I ended up with WAAYYY too much spice so I added 2 more eggs and some milk (I was bad I know but I just couldn't see making "french toast" without milk...I am weak!)

I also baked the toast more because I wanted a faster way to make a lot of it and I wanted to see if it would work so I put it in the oven for 15 minutes at 400 degrees flipping half way through.

It was yummy and I got about a dozen slices. I wasn't true to the original recipe but if my next experiment goes well...I have breakfast!!! *fingers crossed*

A Thing-A-Week Part 33: Makshufa

A number of years ago Matthias of Rolling Oaks lent me all of his back issues of Tournaments Illuminated. From there I got a bunch of feast/recipe/cookery type articles that I periodically refer to mostly when I have feast planning questions. They have come in handy a number of times.

There was one from the Winter 92 by Elizabeth Cook on an Islamic Dinner. I wanted to find some thing sweet dessert type thing to serve with my lunch and one of the first recipes I tried might be the winner...Makshufa.

The recipe reads:
"Take equal parts of sugar, almonds (or pistachios), honey, and seasme oil. Grind the surgar and almonds, and mix together. Add saffron to color, mixed with rose-water. Put the sesame oil into a basin and boil until fragrant: then drop in the honey and stir until the scum appears. Add the sugar and almonds, stirring all the time over a slow fire until almost set: then remove"

I don't know about the authenticity of above but it looked interesting. I stuck with the original redactors proportions as they seemed reasonable. It turned out like an almond brittle (the rose water is a bit weird) but the rose water masks the caramel/buttery flavor. While strange at first I have to say it has really grown on me. And I can make it a week ahead of time. The only problem is that it has to stay cold or it is really sticky but that may be a fault on my part. I may have needed to cook it longer. I am thinking of making an almond, a pistachio, and a sesame variety for lunch.

Currently testing my kebab recipe and the lentil salad. More on that later.

A Thing-A-Week Part 32: A New Hat

One of my assignments is to make a hat. This is my first attempt. I couldn't really find any instructions on how to make it so I guessed. It turned out vaguely hat shape so I count that as a win. I am not really into big extravagant hats but I always liked this style and hoped it would help me keep the veil and wimple actually on my head. Despite my best efforts circlets pop off my head and veils fly away. I am not so devoted that I want to staple it down so I am hoping some extra weight will help. I have an oddly shaped head, fine hair, and apparently eyebrow muscles with a purpose so most hats find comical ways to be anywhere but on my head. This has lasted a half hour so we shall see this coming weekend how well it works.

I didn't do that great of a job (this is a prototype for a better hat hopefully someday) as my sewing skills are really not all that functional. Yes, I know I embroider but embroidery and sewing are not the same thing in my universe. If I mess up embroidery I just end up with an ugly thing and some lost time. If I mess up sewing I could potentially end up naked. But I continue to try because better garb makes me feel more comfortable at events. And, I really don't like showing modern hair so starting with a hat seems like a safer step.

I know this sounds like a kind of grumbly post but I really am sort of excited about my little hat... imperfections and all.

A Thing-A-Week Part 31: Cloth bag

I finally finished the bag I wanted to make for carrying things to events. Baskets can be so awkward.

Two Things: Cheese Tarts

Cheese Tarts:

95 Crustless "Sienese" Tart
Sienese tart. Take twenty almonds and blanch them thoroughly, and pound them as fine as possible. Then take half a libra of sugar, twelve eggs, and a fogletta of milk, two quatani of cinnamon, and the proper amount of salt, and half a quarto of fresh probatura cheese, pounded until it need be pounded no more. Then spread a mold with butter, and then flour it, and put the mixture on top. And set the mold or pan far from the fire, covered, with a moderate fire. And note that you can put into the mixture a ladeful of lasagne cooked in good broth. And when it is cooked put sugar and rose water on top. (bu 49v-50)
(recipe can be found here: http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/706842.html)

I didn't like the ratio that the tertiary source used so I went a different route with some of my ratios. I didn't want to use 12 eggs so I also tried to cut everything in half. I am not sure I interpreted the measurements correctly. I found differing sources on the web as to the meaning of some of the measurements so my reasoning on this is simply what sounded good to me. I also used a more coarsely ground almond as I don't have the equipment to do a fine grind on almonds (or anything really). I am curious what this recipe would be like with almond paste as ground almonds and sugar if mixed in a certain way (though recipes I have seen vary on this) make almond paste. I opted not to add the lasagna and broth.

a handful of coarsely chopped almonds
1 cup of sugar
6 eggs
1 cup milk
8 ounces of homemade cheese at room temperature
cinnamon
salt
rosewater and sugar sprinkled over the top after it has baked

I gradually whipped all the ingredients together and poured into a greased/floured springform pan (10 inch I believe) and baked at 325 for 45 minutes. the center was jiggly but maintained it's shape. It was a big custardy omelet. This was a little oily and I really don't know why. It was tasty even if the texture is something I don't usually enjoy. I would love to mold this in something next time I make it but I am concerned as to how it will seperate. The springform was just for ease of use but I wish I had some better kitchen molds for baking. My copper molds I have sort of collected from scattered second hand stores so while they all have neat shapes I don't think they are up for oven use.

94. Torta Bianca: White Tart
White Tart. Take a libra and a half of good fresh cheese and cut it up fine, and pound it very well; take twelve or fifteen egg whites and blend them very well with this cheese, adding half a libra of sugar and half an oncia of the whitest ginger you can find, as well as a half libra of good, white pork lard, or instead of lard, good fresh butter, and some milk as much as needed; this will be a good third of a boccale. Then make the pastry, or crust, into the pan, as thin as it ought to be, and cook it nicely with fire both below and above; and make sure that the top is a little colored from the heat of the fire; and when it seems cooked, remove it from the pan and put fine sugar and good rose water on top. (Ma 158)

For this recipe I actually followed a lot of the measurements that the teritary source I used redacted them as. The egg whites were halved but a lot of the other ingredient ratios also seemed to be halved as well so it worked out. I did make a few changes. I add more cheese then they originally wrote simply because I wanted to use it up and I used poudre douce instead of ginger because there was already ginger in the cheese and I wanted something to offset that a little. This meant that it wasn't going to be a truly white tart because the spices would be a little darker.

For the crust: I used flour, butter, salt, and water. I rolled it out and laid it in a pie pan to bake for about 15 minutes at a higher temperature before adding the filling.

12 ounces homemade cheese at room temperature
6 egg whites
about 2/3 a cup of sugar (I think I used a little more)
9 tablespoons of butter, softened
1 tsp poudre douce
1 cup milk
salt

I beat the cheese and butter together, added the sugar, salt, and spices, the egg whites, and then milk. This was poured into a pie shell and baked at 375 for 1 hour.

The top came out really brown and I was worried I had burnt it but the crust looked fine. When I cut into it, it was snow white. The flavor was actually really good and I don't like cheese cake or custard. It was a little oily and I think I will cut back on the amount of butter and maybe the milk as well as it seemed too runny when I poured it in the shell.

I did forget to put the rose water on this one after it baked. I need to remember to do that next time. I remembered with the first tart but forgot with this one.

x-posted

---
Redon, Odile, Francoise Sabban, and Silvano Serventi. Translated by Edward Schneider. The Medieval Kitchen: Recipes from France and Italy. University of Chicago Press. 1998.

A Thing-A-Week Part 28: Cheese!

I finally got around to trying the Cook-A-Long recipe for May...a soft cheese. I don't understand enough of the chemistry that goes into making cheese so I tried the original author's recipe as I wasn't brave enough to test a new cooking method and one that didn't have the safety net of portions. It actually isn't really difficult overall it is just somewhat time consuming and you have to really pay attention. I didn't understand what the instructions meant by how much of a curd needed to form before I stopped adding vinegar and I didn't find anything on the internet. I got a pretty soft crumb to my cheese so it doesn't hold together real well. I mashed it up into molds because my patties weren't holding together and I thought I remember reading somewhere that cheeses and butters were sometimes molded in period.

I didn't really like the ginger/honey combination for flavoring. In looking at some of the period recipes I have found I am surprised they didn't mix savory ingredients with their cheeses. Ginger, Cinnamon, Honey, Mace, and Pepper seem to be the common additives. I am also somewhat curious as to how it would work with the ale I see in a lot of recipes but I am not sure I am brave enough to mess with a formula that I know works until I have tried it a few times.

I believe I am going to take Merouda's suggestion of making the cheese into a tart because I think it would work really well. I plan on trying that this weekend. Actually, I spread some of the cheese on a piece of bread and covered it in the conserve I also made and it was mighty tasty.

All in all it wasn't nearly as terrifying of an experience as I thought it would be. I am very boring in my personal tastes I guess because for me my favorite cheese is a smoked mozzarella--salty, smoky, and yet simple and creamy. This wasn't quite to my tastes but I am definitely excited about experimenting.

I also wonder how this cheese would work in place of the goat cheese in a recipe I have for herb encrusted goat cheese.

I am thinking of hosting a cooks day at my place again after WW and having people make cheese and cheese based recipes.

A Thing-A-Week Part 27: Conserve of Strawberries

From "Delights for Ladies"

50. To make conserve of Prunes of Damsons

Take ripe Damsons: put them into scalding water: Let them stand a while: then boile them over the fire till they break: then strain out the water thorow a colander and let them stand therein to coole: then strain the Damsons thorough the colander, taking away the stones and skinnes: then set the pulp over the fire againe, and put thereto a good quantity of red wine, and boil them well to a stiffenesse, ever stirring them up and down; and when they bee almost sufficiently boyled, put in a convenient proportion of sugar: stirre all well together and after put it in your gally-pots.

51. To make conserve of Strawberries.

First, seethe them in water, and then cast away the water and strain them: then boile them in white wine, and work as before in damson; or else strain them being ripe: then boile them in wine and sugar until they be stiffe.

---
Redaction:

One of my favorite foods from the modern world are gummi style candies. While I know that it is unlikely that I will be able to ever document gummi bears as we know them today, I decided that it would be interesting to explore all the different way fruit was preserved in period from candying to conserves and gelatins.

I decided to make the conserve of strawberries mostly because it required few ingredients and they were all things I could find easily. I started by boiling the strawberries. I like to use frozen strawberries (I have found a high quality brand that delivers far better results then I am able to get in the produce section) but because the freezing process already weakens the berries cell structure the boiling step sort of became unnecessary. I realized I was loosing color by doing this so I strained them and mashed the fruit up instead so I would essentially have the desired fruit pulp from the conserve of damsons. To make up for the color lost I added a small amount of red wine with the white (I estimate that there was between 1.5 to 2 cups total wine added). I have seen this done in other fruit compotes from period to enhance color and thus felt it was an okay decision. I then boiled the fruit in white wine until it was completely broken down and
added 4 cups of sugar. The 4 cups I used was based on a modern jam recipe that didn't use pectin. My hope was to get something that was somewhat thick and I wanted to avoid too much trial and error. I brought it up to a rolling boil to thicken it and then removed it from the heat to cool. I poured it into a pan (thought it could easily be jarred) and also a small mold more to see how it held up. It didn't but I wasn't surprised. The flavor was excellent. Really amazing. The wine brought a flavor somewhat different from modern jams but it was still nice and rich. The color is beautifully dark so I may keep the red wine in for sheer aesthetic purposes.

A lot of jams I have made in the past have used lemon juice and it is amazing how differently the fruit tastes without this ingredient. I like lemon juice because I personally feel it enhances a fruits natural taste. This may have been why there was variation in using the wine.

Adventures in Knitting

Yesterday I had a lovely day spent with a good friend hanging out and knitting. She took me to Lakeside Fibers in Madison which was my first non-chain knitting store experience. It was absolutely beautiful. The store was huge, with a varied selection and wonderful layout. A lot of thought went into that store. There were all sorts of lovely things I would have loved but I am waiting to expand my collection until I have more experience.

We then stopped at Hilldale Mall and picked up some chocolates at David Bacco Chocolates. They were wonderful. I especially liked the Exotic Caramel and the Cardamom Ganache Cube. After that we browsed the mall a little bit and went to dinner at Imperial Garden.

When we got back to her place we watched Creature Comforts (yay talking amoebas!) and did some knitting. She attempted to help me make a small sock in order to show me how they work but the pattern I found for free was a little difficult to understand and it didn't work very well at all. I sort of understood how it worked though and I am going to try again with a different pattern. I really enjoy knitting in the round and there is a wealth of wonderful yarns out there that I would like to play with beyond just making lumpy squares so I am willing to try making socks. I am still rather intimidated by it.

A Thing-A-Week Part 26: Sushi

Saturday I went to get groceries and also stopped at Brennan's and got a bunch of produce. I was feeling adventurous and wanted to try making sushi. They aren't very pretty but it was a first attempt. These are avocado and cucumber.

Also with my produce selection I chopped up and roasted some veggies and made some baked chicken for lunches this week. And, on my health kick, I packaged up some snacks for myself to help with portion control which is one of my biggest problems.

One of the things I like about Brennan's is that they have samples. I had what I thought was a mango while at the store. I thought I didn't like mangoes but this was wonderful. It was sort of creamy like coconut and fruity like peaches and pineapple. So I bought one. I wasn't really sure I picked up the right one as there seemed to be two different fruits labeled the same thing and I think I grabbed the wrong one. *sigh* It was not yummy. I didn't get yummy fruit.

Um....A thing...

So I finally decided my desire for socks out weighed my fear of actually making them. So I cast off my practice tube and ended up with a wrist band of sorts.

A Thing-A-Week Part 25: Happy Muffins

Cherry Muffins
Since my class ended up not doing the redaction, I had some leftover cherries to use up. I didn't want to make the cherry pudding again as it is really more than the 2 of us can eat. I had limited supply of a lot of the usual baking ingredients. Muffins seemed like a good solution. I hunted online for a fruit muffin recipe that would maximize the amount of cherries I could use up while not stretching my ingredients on hand.

These turned out really well. Not too sweet. I added some vanilla and some of the dried fruit zest I had and I ended up using almost all the cherries.

A Thing-A-Week Part 24: Layer Cake

I had a ton of the chireseye left. It was good but not really that good. So I was curious if it might work as a filling for a layer cake. It was late when I got the notion so I whipped up a really simple chocolate cake. This turned out to be an adventure in and of itself. I only had half the amount of cocoa powder that I needed. So I need to add more of something but something that would add flavor. So I grabbed some instant pudding powder from the pantry. Sadly only vanilla but I was feeling adventurous. It turned out to be a sort of good idea as it made the cake denser/chewier and therefore able to stand up to the moisture from the cherry pudding without turning into a soggy mess. This might be the way to go again only perhaps with chocolate pudding instead. It turned out kind of yummy actually and might be worth doing again.

I sliced the two cakes in half horizontally so that I could end up with three layers of cherry goo and use more of it up.

A Thing-A-Week Part 23: Rice Pudding

Aaron had made me rice for my lunches for work but I ended up being sick and not eating it so we had a bunch of leftover rice. I didn't want it to go to waste and Aaron really likes rice pudding so I thought I would give it a try. I found a recipe on line for making rice pudding from leftover rice. It turned out pretty good. It was a little runny and I added to much cinnamon (I thought it tasted fine but it turned brown). And the boy was happy. It seems my Thing-A-Week has been mostly food stuff but at least some of those things are taking out of my normal kitchen comfort zone.

A Thing-A-Week Part 22: Knitted Shawl

So I attempted to knit this: http://tinyurl.com/4g5cha

It is made with all sorts of interesting fluffy yarns that are knitted in with a soft base yarn on these GIGANTIC needles. They were 1 inch thick and Aaron stayed as far away from me as possible while I was working on it. They are designed to knit large items quickly (they are called speed stix) but I essentially ended up with a big piece of netting that stretched in weird ways and is definitely the lumpiest thing I have knitted to date. I don't think my knitting skills are really at a level to handle this kind of project and there are some things I am still kind of faking because I am not sure how to do them. The colors are pretty (I am very happy I was able to figure out color-combo on my own because I didn't want to use the intense colors the pattern recommended). It is a little to short to be at a comfortable length for me but I can snuggle up with its softness. I do want to at some point make a lacy shawl I have seen patterns for but I don't think I am really ready for that yet. This also took me a lot longer than 4 hours (as the pattern suggested) but I did manage to get it done this weekend.

A Thing-A-Week Part 21: For to make chireseye

For to make chireseye:

ORIGINAL RECEIPT:

For to make chireseye, tak chiryes at þe feast of Seynt Iohn þe Baptist, & do awey þe stonys. Grynd hem in a morter, & after frot hem wel in a seue so þat the ius be wel comyn owt; & do þan in a pot & do þerein feyre gres or botor & bred of wastel ymyid, & of sugur a god perty, & a porcioun of wyn. & wan it is wel ysodyn & ydessyd in dyschis, stik þerin clowis of gilofre & strew þeron sugur.

- Hieatt, Constance B. and Sharon Butler. Curye on Inglish: English Culinary Manuscripts of the Fourteenth-Century (Including the Forme of Cury). New York: for The Early English Text Society by the Oxford University Press, 1985.

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GODE COOKERY TRANSLATION: http://www.godecookery.com/mtrans/mtrans06.htm

For to make Cherries, take cherries at the feast of Saint John the Baptist, & do away the stones. Grind them in a mortar, and after rub them well in a sieve so that the juice be well coming out; & do then in a pot and do there-in fair grease or butter & bread of wastel minced, & of sugar a good part, & a portion of wine. And when it is well cooked & dressed in dishes, stick there-in clove flowers & strew there-on sugar.

I only had one big issue with this recipe and that was the translation of clowis of gilofre to clove flowers. It is a minor thing but clove-gillyflower in looking at the OED was used to reference both the spice or the gillyflower (an ancestor of the carnation) in period text and they are obviously very different things. Again this is a minor detail but it reinforces the point that it is good to look up unfamiliar terms.

I was redacting this recipe to see if it could be made in a crock pot. This meant I had to use some larger quantities then I normally would and I ended up making quite a lot of the chireseye.
I started with:

2.5 lbs frozen dark sweet cherries (cherries are not at their peak at this time of year and where they can be found they are a little expensive. I have generally found that frozen fruit that doesn't contain any additives or a "sauce" are of good quality and these were some of the sweetest cherries I have ever had).

1/2 cup butter (I am guessing this to turn out something like a pudding and many puddings are creamy. I thought adding a little more butter would help balance out the acidity of the fruit. And I had a lot of fruit so in comparison it wasn't really all that much)

2 cups unseasoned bread crumbs

1/2-3/4 cup sugar

1 cup of port wine

I began by mashing the fruit until it was almost a puree. I have neither a food processor nor a mortar and pestle large enough to really work this much fruit so I used a potato masher. It actually worked rather well overall. I opted not to sieve the fruit not because I didn't think it was important but more because I was testing the recipe more for viability for my class. I wasn't looking for a perfect redaction. I plan to bring cheese cloth to class and allow students to make their own choices as to what they want to do. I also wanted to leave the juice in as much as possible as I didn't want it to burn in the crockpot.

I then added a stick of melted butter, the wine, some sugar (this seemed like plenty at this point as the fruit was very sweet), and the bread crumbs. 16 ounces of bread is about how much I have seen for modern bread pudding recipes and it seemed like a good starting point. I personally don't like the texture of sauces thickened with bread crumbs so I tend to lean to the side of less rather than more. I also didn't know how much the bread would absorb and I needed to make sure that the recipe was thick but still moist so that it didn't burn.

This all went into a crock pot on low for a little over an hour. I stirred it frequently to make sure it didn't burn. It also thickened a lot as the bread absorbed the juice from the fruit and I ended up adding some more cherry juice to balance a bit. I also noticed that it became more tart as it cooked so I ended up adding a little more sugar (about 1/2 to 1 cup). It still tasted rather grainy/starchy but I found that this improved with a night spent in the fridge. I warmed some up this morning with a little cinnamon/sugar sprinkled on it (as it really needs a little spicy zing) and had it for breakfast.

For my class I am going to bring in whole cloves and try to find some candied flowers.

A Thing-A-Week Part XX: Peach Cobbler

...okay so Genius Photographer I am not. This is yet another recipe inspired by the murder mystery series I am reading. In the book it was called "Minnesota Peach Cobbler" and was an answer to the main characters business competition who supposedly made a famous Georgia Peach Cobbler. It was described as having a cookie like layer for the crust and so I was curious.

You start with frozen peaches (it is the Midwest afterall and it is hard to find fresh peaches out of season). They are covered in a spiced flour sugar mixture and baked in the oven for about 40 minutes to thicken the syrup and "thaw" the peaches. I ended up stirring it up a bit when I took it out of the oven so that the sugar that settled wouldn't burn. Then you dab this paste-like cookie dough on top(I actually changed this a bit by adding some vanilla and a little lemon juice as it didn't seem like it would have much flavor to me). There doesn't seem like there is enough dough to cover the cobbler and it doesn't look very pretty because it is really hard to work with but I put it back in the oven and hoped for the best.

I couldn't believe it when I took it out of the oven. The crust had puffed up and spread to cover the entire cobbler. And it was really good. I think this would also work well with frozen berries.

A Thing-A-Week Part XIX: Snickerdoodles

So my craving for cinnamon lately lead to my decision to try to make snickerdoodles. I never used to like them until recently, but somewhere in the last year I developed a fondness for the crisp, buttery, melt-in-your-mouth cookie that explodes with cinnamon sugar goodness.

I went to the old standby Joy of Cooking for my recipe. It came together really well--incredibly simple if somewhat sticky. They exploded in the oven to sort of gigantic proportions. But, they were all nice and puffy in the oven. They fell into flat little pan cakes once they left the oven. I thought perhaps my pan rotation thing was causing them to fall (my mom always rotated her cookie pans--cookies baked for half the time on the bottom rack and were then moved to the top rack and another tray was added to the bottom. I don't know why she did it and no cookbook has ever described it that way. I just do it because she does it and a lot of what I know about cooking is copied from watching my mom and other folks in the kitchen). So, I decided to leave the pan in the oven the entire time to see if that helped. Nope. The baking was more even but they still turned into flat little pancakes.

They taste fantastic. Exactly what I wanted but I am not sure why on earth they are doing this cycle of explosion/implosion.

A Thing-A-Week Part XVIII: A Pie of Parsnips

As part of this month's Cook-A-Long I also tried to make the Pie of Parsnips.

To make a pie of fresh Parsnips. Take the parsnips well washed, & put them to boil until they are cooked, then take two or three chopped onions & fry in butter, a salted lemon in pieces, nutmeg, & pepper, a little chopped mint, & put all together in the pie, & butter enough.

Note it is necessary to cut the parsnips into pieces, when the pie is half cooked put therein a little Spanish wine.

I was somewhat skeptical about this recipe only because it didn't seem like something that would appeal to my own particular taste preferences but part of this experience is trying new things.

I started by peeling and dicing the parsnips and putting them into water to boil. I decided to season them as they were boiling so that the flavor would be more incorporated so I added some salt, pepper, and about a 1/4 tsp of nutmeg. While that boiled, I zested a lemon and brined the peel in salt water and lemon juice. I had forgotten to salt my own lemons ahead of time and hadn't located any commercially. This may have overall impacted the final product. Once the parsnips were cooked I removed them from the heat and drained them before mixing in onions fried in butter, the brined lemon zest, and the mint. I baked this in a crust made of butter, flour, salt, and water for about 45-60 minutes at 375 degrees F. I didn't have any wine on hand either so there again I missed a step which may have impacted the overall product.

Having tasted the pie I am still not particularly crazy about it. There are definitely a lot of flavors going on...the onions and nutmeg added some sweetness, the parsnips seemed sweet and woodsy at the same time but had an interesting bite to them. The lemon and mint kept hitting me at different points throughout. Part of my opinion may have been changed by the ingredients I didn't have access to while I was making this. I also wonder if this would work better as pasties rather than a whole pie so that all the flavors sort of come together at once in a more concentrated way rather than in a larger pie. I am also thinking that pairing this with a creamier dish or a spicy meat might complement it. Overall it was an interesting experience and I am glad I gave it a try.

A Thing-A-Week Part XVII: Chicken Cordon Bleu

Eliane lent me a copy of "The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry" by Kathleen Flinn. It is essentially the story of the author's experiences while studying at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. I am actually really enjoying the story and it is definitely the type of book I love reading. I think the only thing I don't like about it is that I am not in the mood to read it so I am probably rushing through it faster than I normally would. I really love food memoirs though (well food books in general I think).

There are also recipes scattered throughout the book at the end of each chapter. While Chicken Cordon Bleu has nothing to do with the school itself, the author choose to include a recipe for it and I was inspired to give it a try. And not only give it a try, but really take my time and think through each step. I tend to be impatient and rush things and that is when disasters happen.

One of the problems with this recipe though was one of the ingredients...bread crumbs. I wasn't really in the mood to make my own bread crumbs but all the bread crumbs they sell in the store have high fructose corn syrup or MSG. Both of which my boy won't eat. I checked the organic/specialty diet foods aisle (I really hate that word "organic" but that is another rant) and all I found were gluten free bread crumbs. I have never worked with gluten free products and I wasn't sure of the differences so I went another route. Crisped Rice cereal. I have used this before as "breading" for chicken and have had some really good experiences with it. I grabbed a box of the organic variety though as the original name brand stuff has HFCS too and hoped this wouldn't alter things too much.

The other issue was the cheese. I really really don't like Swiss. I love mozarella and decided to use that instead. Aaron wanted to try it with the Gruyere which was recommended in the original and I agreed to make some for him using that and even agreed to try it. I also got prosciutto for the ham (another recommendation). I have never had it before though I know a lot of foodie's rave about it so I thought I would give it a try.

So the assembly...I layed out everything to start with. The fillings, the ingredients, the dips, etc so that I wouldn't have to try to hunt for things with gooey meat on my hands. The recipe recommended to cut open the chicken breast so that he breast would lie flat like a book. I am not very handy with a knife so I took a meat tenderizer to mine so that the chicken was relatively uniform in thickness and not cause any weird cooking problems. Then it is sprinkled with salt and pepper, a thin layer of Dijon mustard is spread across it, a layer of prosciutto and cheese is then added and it is rolled into little bundles. I don't have any cooking twine so I secured the bundles with tooth picks. I then rolled it in flour, egg, and the crushed cereal (seasoned with sage, parmesean, and season salt to make up for it not being seasoned bread crumbs) and placed into a foil lined pan. Into the oven it went where it got nice and happy.

I tried the prosciutto straight before baking and thought it was awful. Foodie with a refined since of taste I am not. I couldn't wait to get the taste out of my mouth. In fact I made some instant coffee (I didn't feel like making a whole pot) in an attempt to clear the taste but that was just as bad so I added some Kahlua (both ingredients I keep on hand because they occasionally come up in baking recipes I have). Perhaps I got some bad stuff but I couldn't figure out why anyone would find a perfectly tender piece of melon drapped in the stuff such a delicacy. But to each their own. I think saltines and butter is one of life's simple pleasures. Anyway, I was somewhat worried what this would do to my chicken, but it turns out that the cheese really mellowed the prosciutto and made it taste like a rich very salty ham.

In fact, overall it wasn't too bad. I don't think the cereal negatively impacted the flavor. It was a little salty but it is hard to season raw meat to taste and I haven't gotten the knack for it yet. I agree with the author that a smoky/salty cheese or ham would very quickly overpower this dish and I am glad I didn't choose a smoked cheese. I think that the Dijon mustard was really the key element in the overall finished product. I thought the mozzarella was excellent. I am indifferent to the Gruyere but Aaron really liked it and did a happy dance.

Voila

A Thing-A-Week Part XVI: Knitting Stuff

This week I made yet another lumpy dishrag (see below) started my fifth. Eliane also taught me how to knit in the round while I was at Eithni's yesterday. I ripped it out when I got home and started over hoping to have things look somewhat more uniform now that I sort of understood the theory but I am still having problems with the tension that falls on the gap between needles. Maybe this will be something that corrects itself as I go along but it is somewhat irksome now. Yes I know I am not going to be perfect right away but I get frustrated with knitting because I seem to keep making the same mistakes with it and I really don't understand why. I am not sure I ever want to do socks (too much counting and other weird stitch things) but I want to try to make some little purses. I was inspired by the one Eliane made off the TI cover.

In other crafty goodness there was much geeky hanging out fun at Gulf Wars North. I got to make lamb patties with Arnora and Iohanna. It was....an interesting experience all things considered :)

A Thing-A-Week Part XV: Chocolate Cherry Delight

Chocolate Cherry Delights is another recipe I got from one of the Joanne Fluke "Hannah Swenson" mystery novels. The disembodied hand is Aaron attempting to snatch a cookie as I was taking a picture. Basically they are a chocolate cookie topped with a cherry and an interesting fudgy concoction before being baked. They are a little bit fussy and the cookie base is somewhat dry but otherwise they are really addicting despite being exceedingly sweet. I am not sure how to improve upon the dryness of the base as it needs to serve several functions. It needs to be stable. It can't rise/spread too much or the sauce will hit the pan and burn. And, it has to be able to stand up to the moisture of the cherries. I made these for Gulf Wars North and they were fairly well received. I am thinking though I am not going to make these too frequently again due to the fussy level of the recipe.

And, I guess Joanne Fluke has found the perfect gimic for enticing new readers. The recipes inspire me to get into the kitchen so I keep reading her novels so that I get more recipes. I am taking a break for a little bit and am going to read a book that Eliane lent me called "The Sharper Your Knife the Less You Cry" by Kathleen Flinn.

A Thing-A-Week Part XIV: Cinnamon Rolls

My mom's comfort food is cinnamon rolls so she tended to make them a lot. I was never really a big fan. But when I moved out I found myself missing mom's cinnamon rolls. I have tried these a couple of times and they are never as good as my mom's. I just can't seem to get the ooey gooey cinnamon thing to happen. I never seem to get enough goo.

I prefer these frosted but Aaron does not so I didn't frost them.

A Thing-A-Week Part XIII: Lumpy Dishrag the Third

I think this one is my favorite thus far.

A Thing-A-Week Part XII: Mock Apple Pie

So, This is the experimental pie (see previous post). The book I am reading (also in a previous post) has the main character judging a baking contest. This pie was entered as a novelty Apple Pie. The book describes it as delicious with the only downer being the texture of the apples. And then you find out what it is....Saltine Crackers. Yup. The only fruit in this pie is lemon juice. I was skeptical so I decided I had to try this, and unveil it around others so that people wouldn't think I was making it up.

I brought it over to the Rockband group. The comments I heard were "this is really good" and "I like the cake but the pie is better." I was even floored that it tasted so good. One person guessed what it was but a lot of people couldn't believe it was saltines. The texture is indeed not quite right but it is yummy none the less and wasn't that difficult to make. Mine was rather soupy which is somewhat problematic. And, while I love the pie crust I use I don't think it is really meant to be used as a multi-purpose crust. I should give another friend's pie crust a try.

A Thing-A-Week Part XI: Apology Cake

So, I was going to take a pie over to the group playing Rockband for afternoon snackies. It was a new experimental pie and I wanted some opinions. A post will follow. However, because it was new and experimental I thought I should bring snacks that were less likely to suck. Since I had already made pie and popovers and was starting to get sleepy for some reason, I used a box mix and frosted it and made a Red Velvet Apology Cake. It was yummy.

A Thing-A-Week Part X: Popovers

Popovers!

So I, on a whim, purchased a book called "Key Lime Pie Murder" by Joanne Fluke. I like mysteries and I like books where food plays a part. I am often disappointed by both genres so I did not expect much in terms of quality of the work. And, thus far I have not been surprised--tepid writing that keeps me involved only because I want to find out what happens. This makes it an excellent book for bus-riding and I am always in search of those.

Anyway, the reason I eventually bought this book is because there were recipes inside. I am always won over by the opportunity to play. The main character of the story owns a cookie/coffee shop and generally shares some of the recipes she makes in her day-to-day life or in her cookie shop. Popovers happened to be one of them. I have never had a popover and I got the impression that they are extremely unforgiving so I have never tried them. But, this recipe seemed really simple (many of the recipes are) and so I gave it a try. And it was for the most part. I don't think I fully incorporated the flour which may have affected the results and I think that my oven didn't get hot enough so I may have to do some more experimentation. However, for a first go I was pleased that I got at least half of them to go boom! out of the sides of the pan. I put some one a plate with some jam and ate them on the floor picnic style with Aaron. It felt very decadent. They weren't too bad. They were sort of a biscuit-y french toast. I would be interested in trying different flavor varieties once I manage to make it work.

EDIT: So what are popovers supposed to taste like anyway?

Thing-A-Week Part IX: Tapioca Pudding

I suppose you can't possibly imagine who in the house is somewhat partial to tapioca pudding? I actually sort of enjoy making this (as long as it is in small batches) and knowing how much he loves it, I am periodically talked into doing so. I made this from scratch just using the box directions. I am not much of a pudding person but I do admit this does taste pretty good until I remember how much I hate the texture. I also really think the homemade vanilla really makes a difference with this. I might try using an actual bean next time and see how I like that.

I think one of my next period cooking projects is to adapt a rice pudding of some sort. I already have a guinea pig to test it and it might be a potential feast option whenever I do one of those again.

A Thing-A-Week Part VIII: Pepper Steak

I got this recipe from a cook my mom had by Paula Dean. It is a fantastic recipe and one that delights my boy. Sorry folks...I am not going to share the specifics on this one :)

EDIT: I almost forgot. This was a combined effort. Rice made by the boy.

A Thing-A-Week Part VII: Fine Cakes

Fine Cakes
"To make fine cakes; take a pottle of fine flour, and a pound of butter, a pound of sugar, a little mace and a good store of water to mingle the flour into a stiff paste, and a good season of salt and so knead it, and roll out the cake thin and bake them on papers."

Sometimes the recipe redactions one finds on Gode Cookery are fantastic and sometimes they are really off the mark. This one wasn't too bad but I went a different direction with it.

A pottle equals about 2 quarts (8 cups) and that is an awful lot of cake to be stuck with if the recipe doesn't work out so well so I halved it and then halved the recipe again and ended up with this:

1/2 cup of butter (1 stick)
4 oz of sugar
2 cups of flour
less then a tsp of mace (I am guessing I used about a half teaspoon)
pinch of salt
enough water to make it all come together.

I mixed all of the dry ingredients together and cut the butter into it with a fork or pastry blender. I then slowly added water to it (I am guessing about a cup but this will vary so go slow) so that it came together. I think I may have added too much water to it as it was rather sticky. I decided to press it into a stoneware pan I have for making shortbread. Bake at 350 F for about an hour. I had to watch it.

I think next time I am going to roll it out as directed. It didn't really bake evenly and didn't pick up the pretty design from the shortbread mold. It might be kind of nice cut into circles with a biscuit cutter and served with a fruit compote. And, the mace was certainly an interesting flavor. I am glad I didn't add any more (I thought I was being a little skimpy) because the flavor really enhances when it bakes and permeates the whole dish. This is something I need to play with a little more. I think I might try a little poudre douce next time. I have seen some similar cake style dishes in Markham that used cinnamon and ginger for flavor and that is something I might enjoy a little more.


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Markham, Gervase. Best, Michael R (ed). The English Housewife. McGill-Queen's University Press. London: 2003. (page 117)

Thing-A-Week Part VI: Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies

I am counting these as a project just due to shear volume. See we got a new oven because our old oven always picked the temperature it wanted not the temperature I chose. Usually varying between 25-50 degrees. This played some serious havoc with my baking. So we finally convinced the complex that we needed an oven.

Only my brain is still geared towards the old oven. See with the old oven I had to make gigantic cookies or they would burn. The adorable little cinnamon chip cookies Ciara makes would have been heartily laughed at by the old oven and quickly turned to charcoal. So, with cookies I had to think big.

I was making these for someone at work who is having a birthday this week. And, because they are peanut butter chocolate chip I also wanted some for Aaron. And, because the enormous cookie rule means you only get a dozen or so cookies out of a batch I doubled the recipe. Bad idea. The stupid things wouldn't bake. It took forever and I ended up with about 70 some cookies. So, in the end it became a project and I have lots to share. They are tasty. They are Reeses' peanut butter chips and Ghiradelli cocoa powder (the only product of theirs that I love!). Recipe is on the back of the bag. Not complicated at all, just tiresome when you are making ridiculous quantities of them.

Thing-A-Week Part V: Another Lumpy Dishrag

Yet another lumpy dishrag. This one was truly lumpy because I tried something stupid that didn't work very well. But know I know why it doesn't work for future reference. This was made with more of the Sugar n Cream cotton yarn my mom gave me. Cast on 36 stitches I think on size 8 metal needles.

I am now up 5 projects. I am just one short to be caught up with my goal of 52 for the year if I actually plan to do 1 thing a week. There will probably lots of catch up weekends and I am not sure if it is cheating to do 3 recipes in a weekend and count them each as separate thing but I did produce "things" so who knows.

Thing-A-Week Part IV: Fake Fish

Fake Fish:
I don't have a mortar and pestle large enough to crust the apples so I had to be creative using a bowl and a meat tenderizer I don't actually use for tenderizing meat. It worked fairly well actually. I was not ambitious enough to try this with gingerbread as I didn't want to make gingerbread ahead of time and couldn't find an acceptable substitute at the grocery store. I just used the crushed almonds instead. In fact, I used the strained almonds left from an almond milk experiment earlier this week so as not to be wasteful. I mixed all this with a little sugar, cinnamon, and ginger and baked it in a happy fish shaped shell. (It is supposed to be a catfish for the local SCA group's heraldry.) About 10 minutes before I took it out of the oven I brushed on an egg wash with some crushed saffron for a nice golden color. The flavor was very scrumptious and I certainly will be making this again.

Thing-A-Week Part III: Flownys in Lente

Flownys in Lente:

“For to make flownys in lente, take good flour and make a good paste; take good almond milk and rice flour or other starch[i] and boyle them together that they be well chariand. When it is boiled thick, take it up and lay it on a fair board so that it be cold, and when the coffins (pastry crusts) have been made, take a part[ii] and do upon the crusts, and carve them in slices[iii] and do in them good almond milk and figs and dates and carve it in four parts and do it to bake and serve it forth.”

I think my problem with doing redactions is that I am far too literal when I try to translate things. The “ands” in this recipe kept throwing me off. I started by making a flour roux and then adding this to a pot with the unstrained almond milk and a couple tablespoons of rice flour. I cooked this over medium low heat stirring fairly constantly. I ended up with a thick almond porridge. The redaction found at the same source as the original text had taken this mixture and spread it in a thin layer and when it cooled breaking it up into pieces. I can kind of see where they got this interpretation out of the original recipe and as this was the part that was a little muddy for me I tried it this way. I super-cooled this in the freezer to save me some time.

Iohanna had come over to experiment with me and she thought that perhaps the “take good flour and make a good paste” referred to the pie crust itself and so she tried a batch of strained almond milk (we used commercial to try this first before using the limited quantity of “real” almond milk) to see if getting it to boil would have made it more candy/brittle like. However, the rice flour separated a lot and it didn’t seem to thicken. We strained it after a while and set it on a plate in the freezer to cool. It did thicken a bit but became rather blob like and not something that could be sliced.

When the almond porridge had cooled, I was able to break it into soft pieces and lay this in the bottom of the crust. I covered it in diced figs and dates and poured the ½ cup of strained almond milk we got after pressing the thicker stuff. This I baked in the oven for about 40 minutes at 325 degrees Fahrenheit.

I think the next time I try this I will pour the almond porridge directly into the base of the pie shell as the stuff that I cooled turned back into paste at room temperature. The flavor was interesting. I am not much for custard but I really liked the almond goo. I still am not a big fan of dates or figs but some other dried fruits might be heavenly in this instead.

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[i] “Amydon”. Oxford English Dictionary. Second Edition 1989. Oxford University Press. 9 Sept 2008.

[ii] “Perty” is generally thought to be pretty however later in the same recipe “perty” seems to be used to reference parts as in cutting into “fowre pertys” so I chose this translation.

[iii] “Shive”. Oxford English Dictionary. Second Edition 1989. Oxford University Press. 9 Sept 2008. I could not specifically find references to “schiueris”; however, I found “shiues” and “schyves” both quoted from similar time periods referencing slices or discs and this seemed appropriate to the recipe.

Thing-A-Week Part II: Almond Milk

In preparation for the cooking fun at my place this weekend I made some almond milk. I tried this recipe:
"Take blake sugre, an cold water, an do hem to in a fayre potte, an let hem boyle to-gedere, an salt it an skeme it clene, an let it kele; than tak almaundus, an blawnche hem clene, an stampe hem, an draw hem, with the sugre water thikke y-now, in-to a fayre vessel; an yf the mylke be noght swete y-now, take whyte sugre an caste ther-to.

- Austin, Thomas. Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books. Harleian MS. 279 & Harl. MS. 4016, with extracts from Ashmole MS. 1429, Laud MS. 553, & Douce MS 55. London: for The Early English Text Society by N. Trübner & Co., 1888.

http://www.godecookery.com/nboke/nboke57.htm

I translated it to:

"Take pale sugar and cold water and add them into a fair pot and let them boil together, and salt it and skim it clean, and let it cool. Then take almonds, and blanche them clean, and stamp them, and draw them with the thickened sugar water into a fair vessel; and if the milk be naught sweet enough, take white sugar and caste there-to."

I took about a cup of sugar and 1-1/2 cups of water and an extremely small pinch of kosher salt (I used this ratio from the candied almonds I make. I know it makes a good syrup which, while I did not interpret it as the intent, I wanted to make sure there was enough liquid to dissolve the sugar and have it thicken a bit) I put this on high heat and stirred it until it just came to a full boil. I didn't let it reduce to a syrup but it seemed a little thicker then before. I took this off the heat.

I decided against blanching and grinding the almonds as I don't have the right modern tools and not enough patience to do it the period way. I generally buy pre-ground almonds. It saves me time and hassle and I accept it as a substitute. I added the sugar-water to 10 oz of ground almonds. I added about a cup more cold water to this as I thought it seemed a bit thick though I am not sure of the exact propotions. I ended up with 4 cups of almond "milk". It is really thick and very sweet (I am glad I am using this in a custard as I don't think it would be very good with chicken or anything but who knows). I did not need to add any more sugar. I kept wanting to go back for spoonfuls.

I have also been working on my recipe redactions. I have a good idea what I want to do for the Fake Fish but I am having problems with the Flownys in Lente. I read the other redaction but I really want to decide for myself which direction the recipe is going. I am very much enjoying one of the perks of my job being access to the online OED. I am not finding everything I need though and the last little bit doesn't make sense.

I get that I am making a very thick almond milk--almost a cream or custard. This is going in some sort of pie crust with figs and dates. I can kind of see where the original redaction was going with the cooling the milk (like a 'brittle' I think) and laying it in slices in the pie crust and then pouring more milk over top of it and some fruit but that seems sort of silly to me. I can kind of see that in the recipe but I also don't think that is what it is saying either. I just can't figure out what I think it is saying.

I am probably thinking too hard. Redaction isn't something I do much of. I usually read old texts and compare it to someone else's work and go with the recipes seem the most viable as compared to the old text. It is kind of hard to sit down and really think about things but I suppose that is sort of the point. I am worrying too much and should go to bed now.

EDIT: 2 cups of almond milk when squeezed of all the almond pulp made about 1/2 a cup of actual "milk"