Birthday Macarons, Pt. 1

"So mayest thou live, dear! many years, in all the bliss that life endears." - Thomas Hood

My wonderful mother's birthday is this month. To celebrate, we're branching out into French pastry baking with this cookbook devoted to Macarons.

No, these are not mounds of shredded coconut held together with egg whites. They are much more. SO much more.

image credit: The French Touch

A light, crunchy shell filled with a soft, chewy filling. In as many colors and delicious flavor combinations as you can desire, both sweet and savory. Oh yes, folks, we have a winner.

 So, for mom's birthday, we are making the following two flavors at her request, one sweet and one savory:

• Raspberry-White Chocolate Caramel filling inside Pistachio shells
• Goat Cheese-Rosemary filling inside Parsley shells

But, as may be expected, these delightful concoctions require specialized ingredients. We will need:

Almond Flour

Almond Flour is difficult to make at home - if not carefully done, it can become a paste instead. Unless you're feeling adventurous, I recommend ordering it from Nuts Online, where they also sell...

Pistachio Flour

...Pistachio Flour. We only need this to make the Pistachio shells - the Almond flour is used in all other types of shells that aren't nut flavored.

Dried Egg Whites

Dried egg whites can be found at the King Arthur Flour website.

Piping Bags

Piping bags are needed for piping the shells as well as the filling.

To be continued...

To Dye by Hand

"To die, to sleep - to sleep, perchance to dream." - "Hamlet," Shakespeare

When I was a kid, my mom taught me and a group of homeschool girls how to dye yarn at home using Kool-Aid powder. The bright, fruity-colored yarns looked good enough to eat, and as soon as they dried we were happily making tube socks, bean bags, scarves, etc.

Fast-forward 10-plus years: now that I'm a knitting fanatic, I love hand-dyed yarns, particularly specialty ones that have multiple colors and shades in one skein and beautiful names to correspond (I could browse through the Verdant Gryphon website's yarn section for hours).
But, sadly, I am not a millionaire's wife, and therefore cannot justify spending what little money I make on yarns with price-tags meant for millionaire's wives.

Enter this book:

image credit: Amazon.com

With a spiral binding, easily-understood steps and pictures to correspond, this book takes the ol' Kool-Aid process to the next level. It has instructions for how to make beautiful personalized, variegated yarns in the comfort of your own kitchen, and also helps you figure out which colors and shades work together.

But wait, where does one find un-dyed yarn at reasonable prices, or dye powders that don't look like you snitched them from a preschooler's lunch box?

Enter KnitPicks.

The lovely, brilliant people here have somehow worked out a way to sell beautiful, luxury yarns at affordable prices. And, they have "Bare" yarns in all weights, as well as acid dye powders in a wide array of colors and shades.

Hasta la Vista, Kool-Aid.

To be continued...

A Gathering of Saffron

"An orchard of pomegranates with all choicest fruits, henna with nard, nard with saffron...with all choice spices - a garden fountain, a well of living water, and flowing streams from Lebanon." - Solomon 4:13-15 ESV

Crocus Sativus, the Saffron Crocus

About four years ago, when I traveled through Greece on a summer study abroad trip, I bought a small box of Greek red saffron, which I fully intended to use once back home. Four years later, I've used my little stash maybe once since acquiring it. So, I've started looking up saffron recipes to try this year. Here are a few which I hope to make soon:

• Lemon Chicken with Jerusalem Artichokes. 
• Lancaster Chicken Corn Soup
• Saffron Rice
• Creamy Saffron Farfalle with Crab and Shrimp

Saffron is the stigma of the Crocus Sativus that is gathered, dried, crushed and used in everything from meals to dyes to medicine. Real Saffron gives off a taste like honey. If you can get your hands on the real thing without busting the bank, it's well worth the price.

Enjoy!

Love and Chocolate

"Nobody minds having what is too good for them." - Jane Austen

"The wings of the Ostrich wave proudly, but are they the pinions and plumage of love? For she leaves her eggs to the earth...forgetting that a foot may crush them." - Job 39:13-15 ESV

Valentine's Day seems to have become an occasion for intense joy and intense grief - rarely does anyone view it simply as a "happy" holiday. Those who are in love revel in their mad joy, and those who are not in love hate it because they are alone.
Personally, I am all in favor of celebrating love, regardless of my relationship status - and when I say love, I mean self-sacrificial, enduring love. The kind known by mothers for their children, friends for their dear friends, an old married couple for each other, and especially God for his people.

So, that being said, what better way to celebrate love than with chocolate?

Here are several delicious chocolate recipes to choose from:

• Tuxedo chocolate-dipped strawberries; You can always choose to make regular chocolate-dipped strawberries, but these are just too adorable to miss.
  
• Chocolate-dipped candied orange peel; who doesn't love orange and chocolate together?
• Chocolate Nougat; only attempt this if you have experience in candy cooking, as well as enough time and patience. Otherwise, this could end up being a sticky mess. But if you are brave enough to attempt it, it's one of those recipes that is sure to be memorable.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Knitting progress: Paris, Wine and Roses

"I love Paris every moment, every moment of the year. I love Paris; why, oh why do I love Paris? Because my love is near." - Cole Porter

A brief update on two beautiful, tricky knitting projects I've been working on lately.

First, my version of these Paris mittens. So far I've finished the right-hand, and need to make the left-hand. Due to the stranding, this mitten came out a bit tight, but still wearable.

I'm convinced that taking photos of your right hand while holding the camera steady with your left hand should qualify you for the military or something...

The other project is my "Wine and Roses" shawl, which is coming along nicely:

Both of which to be continued...

Green Tea and Persuasion

"Remember the tea kettle - it is always up to its neck in hot water, yet it still sings." - Anon.
 

I've finished my third and final knitted tea cozy, which I've christened my "Green Tea" cozy, since it is made in Kelly and Pine greens. 

Whether the tea in your pot is green, black, white or gold, this cozy does not discriminate :-)


I've also started work on the "Frederick and Anne" scarf from the Jane Austen Knits magazine. This scarf has a lot of lace work, and as long as one follows the chart accurately, it comes out beautifully. The middle panel is a wave, which represents Frederick, and on either side is a delicate leaf motif, which represents Anne. I'm making this with a yarn that is in a subdued electric blue (yes, I realize that's a bit contradictory) and has silver wisps woven in. I like the added romantic touch the blue and silver give this piece, as well as being an appropriate color for the wave.

As I haven't gotten very far yet, the wave and leaf motifs cannot be seen in the photo above, but the pointed edge came out nicely.

More to come later.

Purple Elephants and Scotch Eggs

"Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim'rous beastie/ O, what panic's in thy breastie!" - "To A Mouse," Robert Burns

On the knitting front, things have slowed down a bit. I made my Christmas deadlines for two projects last month, and have been taking a break from the needles n' yarn of late. However, I did find time to make a stuffed animal for a friend's baby while sitting in a hospital all day:

There's nothing like knitting a stuffed purple elephant while sitting in a hospital to make people smile or to start a conversation.

As for cooking, my family recently discovered Scotch Eggs. There's a reason Scotland is the heart attack capital of the world, and these eggs are part of it. But they're incredibly tasty for lunch in winter. They go very well with strong mustard.

The recipe can be found here.

Enjoy!