Friday, June 30, 2017

...Fruit and Veg Friday...

...this was my fruit haul from the market...a lot of it is just for eating...a big bag of sweet red grapes...those won't last through the night...mangoes, grapefruit, one pear, granny smiths, kiwi...

...and the two ripe plantains...I'm going to try a savoury waffle recipe with those...

...and all those golden delicious apples are destined for a recipe with Julia this weekend...
...I'll juice the lemons with Nanny's juicer and keep it in the fridge for whenever I need lemon juice...

...and then on the Veg side of the counter...
...a bunch of delicious new potatoes...the first we've had this year... all from one of our parishoner's gardens...

...sometimes...I really do think there's some kind of good natured competition going on between our parish's gardeners...
...squash cucumbers and zucchini...
...this is actually the second time this year that our window has been filled with home grown tomatoes...
...and I started working up the green beans while the gardener was still standing in the kitchen talking to the Man...
...and those won't last through the night either...

...how is your garden growing?...ours is doing just fine......wink wink...

~Wishing you a lovely start to your weekend!

Thursday, June 29, 2017

...W.I.A.Y. ...

...Scout wanted hashbrowns...so I chopped up a couple of potatoes...just potatoes and Earth Balance in his...
...but potatoes peppers and onions in mine...YUM!

...and then just baked at 425° F until done...
Breakfast - Foil Packet Hash Browns with Onions and Peppers...Coffee with vegan creamer...

...this is so delicious...and simple...and it vaguely reminds me of camping out as we often make foil packets to cook on the coals...see Scout Hobo Campout...here...
Lunch - Chili Beans, rice, carrots, and lettuce...
...remember last week when we tried the Daiya Mac and Cheese...well...we had leftovers...so I froze them in little individual packets...
...and I just reheated it and mixed it with some some peas and almond milk...
...and it was really better this way...
Dinner - Smoked Tofu, Leftover Daiya Mac and Cheese with peas, Lettuce leaves...and in the little dish is some vinegar and blue agave nectar...the traditional Iranian dish is for lettuce dipped in honey and vinegar (but I don't eat honey) and is served on the 13th day of the new year...I remembered it from the Book Club Dinner a few years ago...

...your turn...what did you eat yesterday?...

~Have a lovely day!

Wednesday, June 28, 2017

...W.I.P. Wednesday...

...way back at Christmas...Scout gave me a couple of balls of a silky bamboo yarn to make some socks with...and it's purple...my favorite colour...

...so I finally got around to starting a little project...some old fashioned bed socks...to keep my trotters toasty under the covers this coming winter...
...I found a neat vintage pattern...Knitted Spiral Bed Socks | No. 4705...and this is a better photo of the colour...it's really soft and pretty so far...

...what's in your workbasket?...

~Have a lovely day!

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

...Tuesdays with Julia...

...we made Vegan Sauté de Boeuf à la Bourguignonne for dinner...and it was so...so...very good...
...and of course all of the particulars are over at The Vegan Version
...I highly recommend this recipe...

~Have a lovely day!

Monday, June 26, 2017

...Bread Making...Over the Weekend...

...we made Pain de Campagne...from the Ultimate Bread book over the weekend...

...but here's the Pain de Campagne version from the Food Network

...you have to start your starter a couple of days before you intend to make the bread...there are instructions for using a mixer...but I kneaded by hand this time...for 10 full minutes...
...and it's supposed to be raised in a basket...but know what I used?...my springform pan...it worked perfectly...
...just slashed the top with a razor...
...and baked...it looks just like the photo in the book...
...what could be better than fresh crispy bread hot from the oven...

...have you made any bread recently?...

~Have a lovely day!

Saturday, June 24, 2017

...Scout's Birthday 2017...

...it's pretty hard (for me anyway) to believe that Scout is 19 years old...
...but I got out all of our decorations and his birthday banner (that I printed 18 years ago for his very first birthday)...it's held up rather well I think...
...and got his cake out of the freezer...
...and I'm not sure what happened with the fudge layer...and I'm so disappointed that it leaked out...
...but otherwise...I was pretty happy with how the cake turned out...
...we added some candles...and the kiddos lit them...
...laughing about how 'hot' they got...well...they get progressively hotter as the years pass...haha...
...Scout blew out his candles and cut his cake...
...opened his cards and presents...
...and we had our cake...
...I'm really pretty happy with how it turned out...
...and it was delicious...and Scout has asked if we can have it again...when it's no one's birthday...
...still kids at heart...

~Have a lovely weekend!

Friday, June 23, 2017

...Vegan N'Ice Cream Cake...

...Scout requested an Ice Cream Cake for his birthday this year...

...and I've never had or made an Ice Cream Cake before...but thought it'd be pretty easy-peasie...

...so...of course I searched the interweb for instructions...

...first I looked at the actual Dairy Queen Ice Cream Cake here...
...so this is the 'look' we're going for...

...and then I searched for a 'recipe'...and found one at the Brown-Eyed Baker...not vegan...but easily veganized with Banana N'Ice Cream...
...so I got started making N'Ice Cream...the chocolate version is the first layer...just bananas, cocoa and enough cashew cream...
...to make a nice soft serve textured ice cream...

...I put that in the bottom of my spring form pan (lined with wax paper) and froze it until it was solid...

...then I layered on fudge and crumbled Oreo Cookies...

...and froze that...

...see there are a lot of (not very difficult) steps to making a N'Ice Cream Cake...
...then I made the vanilla version...just bananas, vanilla, and enough cashew cream to make a nice soft serve textured ice cream...

...and layered that on top of the frozen, fudge and cookies...

...and put it back in the freezer again...
...this is what it looked like when everything was frozen and I removed the spring form pan ring...
...and then I needed something to put it on...as I didn't want to put it on my antique cake plate in the freezer...
...so I just traced a circle onto some cardboard and covered that with freezer paper and slid the 'cake' off onto that...

...and put it back in the freezer again...
...while I made some 'icing'...y'all have seen this before too...it's just the cream from the top of (multiple) cans of full fat coconut milk...mixed with vegan powdered sugar...
...and then I got the cake back out of the freezer and started icing it...
...just a layer of white all over...
...and then I mixed up colours to match the DQ photo above...
...and decorated the cake tyring to match the DQ photo as much as possible...

~Have a lovely day!