I got my garden planted today!
Can’t say that it looks like much now, but give it a few weeks!
I have several types of tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, onions, carrots, spinach, and zucchini. Oh, and in a communal growing area I planted the Cinderella pumpkin.
What is the weather like in your neck of the woods? Have you gotten your garden in the ground yet?
I have wanted to try this for some time now, and so when I came across a magazine article with well described steps I thought I’d give it a try!
Even though I knew that it was going to consist primarily of eggs and sugar with a little butter thrown in for good measure, I wanted to follow the recipe to the letter since I have never made this type of this before.
This is my typical MO when trying any new recipe, really. I like to get a feel for what each ingredient does before I try to replace that ingredient with something ‘healthier.’
I’m proud of how it turned out. There are a couple things I will know to do differently if I make this in the future. 
It was much more time consuming than I expected it to be, but it was a fun process; first the doubt that the steps would actually work, then happiness when the custard started solidifying and the meringue began to fluff like they were supposed to.
I think I added too much lemon juice to the custard, which ultimately resulted in a less firm center then I would have liked, so next time I will have to watch out for this. And I don’t think I whipped the custard long enough before baking it, longer whipping would result in stiffer peaks, which would in turn look cooler. :) Things to remember for next time.
If you feel inspired to try this out for yourself, I followed the recipe in Fine Cooking Magazine, April/May 2012 edition.
And it was delicious! So delicious. I think I might go have another piece now.
Happy Pi Day!
Pi is an irrational number, going into infinity, and so, it is commonly known simply as 3.14, or π.
Or….
I’ve been experimenting with muffins lately, and I found one in particular, a lemon poppy-seed muffin, that I like a lot.
Technically it’s a cake recipe, but I first made it as regular sized muffins, and they were delicious, light and fluffy, but still kinda too big. So, today I tried them in my mini muffin tins, and they turned out still tasty, but the paper wrappers I used get stuck under the muffin top when you try to peel it off. :/ Very sad, since it detracts from the experience of eating one of these little yummies.
The main thing people seem to like about this recipe though, is how the top gets perfectly crispy while the rest of the muffin stays soft and light. I think the next thing I will try with this recipe is to turn them into cookies, or basically, just the muffin top. So stay tuned!
Well, today I worked all the live -long day. It was a friend and co-worker’s birthday, so we celebrated by eating cake and cookies all day long. :)
This cake was made by yours truly, and though the decoration leaves something to be desired, the cake itself was reported as; “the best cake I’ve ever tasted!” by those in the know.
Now that we live in an apartment that offers more bird-appeal I have been able to put my hummingbird feeder to use. In addition, I bought a regular bird feeder, and they are both hanging happily outside.
Also, recently I have been sprinkling bird seed in the grass just beyond our back patio, much to my dog’s chagrin.
Dog meets Squirrel
He gets all riled up and panicky as though the squirrel is going to be our demise or something. I think they’re kinda cute…
Even a tree needs to be reminded that it’s appreciated
So today I was actually able to crack the sliding door enough to poke my camera lens out. The squirrels were cautious, and ran back to their trees several times, but after I turned my camera’s shutter to ‘quiet’ mode they forgot all about me.
Heeey…whatcha doing??
And while I understand none of these photos are going to be award winners, it was a fun process. I enjoyed figuring out how to get to where they were comfortable with me, and getting close enough to the little buggers. I was using my 55-200mm lens, without a tripod (I was laying on my belly on the living room, pointing my lens out through the slightly opened door), and should this opportunity ever present itself again I may try to utilize my gorillapod for more stabilization.
Thank you for stopping by!
I received a dehydrator for Christmas (Thanks sister!) and have been experimenting since then.
Kiwis turned out really well last time I tried, so I thought I’d give it another go today. Before turning it on I held one of the trays over my light box lamp and snapped a few photos.
Well kids, I tried something new today, something I’ve been meaning to try for a few months.
I made whole wheat tortillas.
I thought it would be hard to do, I was wrong. This is probably the easiest bread-family recipe that I’ve ever made.
Ingredients: whole wheat flour, salt, oil.
I got the recipe from 100 Days of Real Food, a blog about cutting out processed food from your diet.
You can see the whole easy-peasy recipe here: Whole Wheat Tortillas
Hello Lovely
This particular little taco gem contains edamame, black beans, tomato, onion, lettuce, olives, cilantro, and homemade guacamole (yes, I made that little lovely too). Ah, so delicious.
They were good plain too, Isaac and I both were eating them as I took them out of the pan!
And a few more:
Doesn’t look so hard, does it?
Oh, and these are also my WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge: Hands submission:
The enjoyment of a tortilla
High Contrast Tortilla
I couldn’t believe how simple these were. The ingredient list is short, they are SUPER delicious, the prep time is about 30 minutes, and you can freeze what you don’t eat. It’s a win-win, and they don’t contain any weird extra ingredients to assist with preservation. There’s no need, these guys won’t last long enough anyway!
In other news, here are few interesting blogs I’ve been reading lately:
Most are part of the ongoing WordCount Blogathon:
A Discount Ticket to Everywhere
and a couple that aren’t:
Brigitte’s Banter - A Gracious Guide to Benevolent Blogging — Five Tips
Giveaway at Magic Onions – They’re giving away $50 gift certificate to Armadillo Dreams, a shop that makes handmade wooden toys.
…I just realized, I forgot to add lime to my taco. Dang! Guess I’ll have to have another one! ;)
Breakfast of CHAMPIONS you might say.
dark chocolate peanut cluster
Who says being an adult is all bad?
Today’s challenge prompt: Delicious
Delicious is: my dinner.
Mmmmm This is in my belly now!
And a bonus sunset for you too:
