Do people say insipid anymore?

Do we even know what it means?

You can judge for yourself and see if you think it qualifies as such because I missed the pictures of our rabbit’s broken toe.

(I can feel the silent wave of gratitude radiating throughout blogdom.)

Are you getting this where you are?  Is it over?  Fall is almost finished here.

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It’s not something that waits for you.  If you see it happening, you can’t say, “I really ought to remember to go outside and take some pictures soon.”

“Soon” almost never happens at my house.

It’s now or never.

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Right, Sawyer?

Some things you just can’t put off.

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Although, I am the Queen of Putting Off.

My laundry has been put off until it’s a mountain.

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My dusting has been put off until it’s changed the color of the furniture.

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My grocery shopping has been put off until the children claim “there’s nothing to eat!” And they’re right.

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And my exercise routine has been put off until I’m fat.

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Children will not be put off.  They require constant care and nourishment.

And occasional leaf picking.

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And sometimes they need to stand behind a chained link fence and look sad while Mom says,

“No, we can’t get pizza for dinner.”

I’m glad God gave me something in my life that can’t be put off.

I want to scoop up every moment and squeeze it.

Except maybe the vomit moments.

Those can go away and never come back.

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                                  Uh oh.              (source)

Double yum.

How do you decide between two dreamy popsicles?

Make both?

Yes!

Then have a taste test.

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We’ll start with strawberries.

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8 ounces. You don’t have to measure.  But it’s fun if you have one of these.

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Toss those chopped strawberries in some sugar and put them in the oven at 350 until they look like…

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…this. Caramelized. I have never roasted a strawberry in my life.

You’re a witness.

Meanwhile–

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Coconut milk, sugar, and cardamom finish the list of ingredients.

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Cardamom seeds.

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Ground cardamom seeds. You can buy them already ground, but if you own a mortar and a pestle, now’s the time to use it.

Hey. That line could apply to so much in life:

“If you own a mortar and a pestle, now’s the time to use it.”

You know, for all those mind-bendingly inane moments when you could grind something to a pulp.

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I was wondering if the cardamom would leave black flecks in the brew, turns out it did.

But in a pleasant way.

Here’s what they looked like all put together with the strawberries, and frozen overnight. Please don’t laugh. My picture looks like a dollar store popsicle compared to the one you saw above from the original source.

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Maybe this is why my blog hasn’t taken off.

But the real question is, how did it taste? Did the strawberries lend their caramelized goodness to the creamy coconut and pair excellently with the hint of cardamom?

Let’s wait until we give the contender a fair shot:

This is all you need to make fudge pops. You probably have these in your kitchen right now:

Butter, cornstarch, vanilla, milk, cocoa powder, sugar and chocolate chips.

If you’re like me, you’re checking off the list in your head thinking, yes, YES. I COULD make these today!

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After you melt the chocolate chips in your microwave, you are supposed to add them to the rest of the ingredients in a pan.

Melted chocolate is difficult to remove from it’s receptacle.  We’ll just set this aside for later when no one’s looking.

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I’ve always found cocoa powder a little resistant to mixing with large quantities of milk, until I found this little miracle tool.

They sell them in Ikea in a two pack. You’ll love them for gravy. I use them exclusively as my stovetop whisker. Ew. That doesn’t sound right. Stovetop whisk-er. Let’s keep the cat out of it.

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There’s only two things you add in at the end: a little butter and vanilla (tiddleywinks!)

After this mixture cools, you can use a glass measuring cup with a spout to carefully fill your popsicle molds.

I was in a quandry while mine was cooling because I had to take the rabbit to the vet.

Warning: if you have to take a rabbit to the vet while your fudge pop mixture is cooling, expect it to grow a skin while you are away. (The mixture will grow the skin, NOT the rabbit. Just so we’re clear.)

No harm is done. You can remove the skin, the fudge pop skin, and your mixture will be good as new.

Pour away.

Freeze.

Wake up to…

Fudge pops for breakfast.

I put some marshmallows in there but they kept floating to the top just like in hot chocolate. Hot or cold, those babies are bobbin’.

Which popsicle tastes better?

What I liked about Roasted Strawberry Coconut Milk Popsicles:

I liked the idea. It just sounded so dreamy. But honestly, the strawberries retained their high fruity note. They didn’t mellow with caramelization.  I liked that coconut milk was healthy and non-dairy, but it wasn’t as smooth as milk and didn’t have enough coconut flavor to make up for it. The cardamom made me want the whole thing to taste like chai so it ended up feeling like something was missing. I might try inventing a chai popsicle instead. Greyson loved the Roasted Strawberry popsicles. So maybe this is an individual taste.

What I liked about the Homemade Fudge Pops:

The fudge pops were my favorite. I like that you could get that classic fudge pop taste with out all of the diglyceride monocellulose gabaldy gook. I would change the unsalted butter to salted because they lacked just that bit of salt that would bring out the flavor. Whole milk made them creamy, but also crystallized just enough for me to miss the dense creaminess of whatever doesn’t crystalize.  I might try messing with added ratios of cream, evaporated milk, or condensed milk and get back to you.

It’s 6:00 am.

The kids have no idea I just had fudge pops for breakfast.

Should I tell them?

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Each of these recipes can be found by clicking on the source picture which will take you directly to the recipe.  Clicking on this badge will take you to party headquarters.

There’s a war being waged in our house. A cookie jar war.

First, it’s full. Then it’s not. When only a few cookies are left the accusations fly–

“What happened to all the cookies!”

“Tristan and Sawyer ate them all!”

“No! I didn’t even have any today!”

“I saw you eating one!”

“I only had two and you had four!”

You can never find out what really happened. But there’s one way to make sure you don’t miss out.

Hide the jar.

Mckenna thought this would prove useful when she had to go to the barn and only a few cookies were left. She thought they’d all be gone by the time she got home so she took the matter into her own room and under her bed.

It took about 20 minutes for the boys to find it.

Then somebody left her a surprise when she reached under her bed for her booty…

This is what she saw when she knelt down to pull out her secret cookie jar stash from beneath her bed.

Bossy big sister lost this battle, but I have a feeling the war has only just begun. 

As soon as I saw this recipe on my friend Trisha’s Pinterest board, I repinned it. That’s because it was on her board called, “Tried It-Loved It!  so it had to be good.  Let’s see if our tastes agree–

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You begin by zesting a lemon, which is fun, but also makes you feel a little sorry for him.

He’s been zested.

This lemon and I had a moment. When I have nothing left to give and somebody asks “How are you?” I’m going to say, “I’ve been zested.”

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Stir the zest into some sugar in your Kitchenaid mixer and let it get all fragrant and lemon-sugary.  Use another bowl to whisk together the other dry ingredients.

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Go back to your lemon sugar and add in the best butter in the world. It really is. But grocery store butter will do.

Cream cheese makes an appearance and I think it might be what makes these cookies so chewy.

You’ll need lemon extract AND lemon juice. Mix the wet ingredients and slowly pour in your dry ingredients.

Then it will look like this–

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The dough will be soft, but don’t worry. It won’t stick to your hands…

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when you roll it into balls…

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and it won’t stick to your hands when you dunk it in it’s sugar bath…

Ignore the disquietude you see in Tristan’s eyes– I pulled him off of his scooter.  Like a reluctant cat, everything in him is yearning to leave.

Remember when that was your worst problem in life? Being pulled off your scooter?

Sigh.

Anyway, as I was saying, I was having each of the boys look at me in the garage…

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To see if it had good light for portraits.  Your own garage might have great portrait light,  just make sure they find the light with their eyes.

That’s when it happened.

I called Greyson over for his turn…

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And I realized he was looking down at me.

This just isn’t going to work. The best light is when the subject is looking up at you.

When did he grow so tall anyway?  His jeans aren’t shorter, or are they? Oh, yes. We bought them bunched around his ankles and now they are straight boards.

Yikes!

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Greyson, tuck your chin in. And crouch a little. Yes, that’s the view I know and love.

Now if you can just keep that up for the next few years or so, we’ll be fine.

Go call your brothers in for lunch and don’t forget your sippy cups out here.

Skadoodle now. If you hurry you can watch a Thomas the Train video with your peanut butter and jelly.

Take these tulips, for instance. What better way to add a pop of color to your kitchen?

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For something really eye catching, pair orange with its near complimentary color on the color wheel–purple.

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Wall sconce torches are one of the most unexpected places to find orange,  but it makes a lot of sense to include it.

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It’s warm and inviting and Romanesque.

Just be sure, if your sconces include a live flame, that they are well fastened to the wall as you see here.

A black iron bar with some scotch tape works well.

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I’m lucky enough to know the designer for these and that makes for a hefty discount.

Mention my name when you order and perhaps he’ll apply it to your account, too.

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He’s known to be a generous man.

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Don’t run.

You’re supposed to salt and paper both sides of your chicken, then lay it in the crockpot. I just dumped it in and threw salt and pepper on it.  I figured it was going to get all mixed up later anyway.

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Next, you measure out sticky stuff. This is my favorite tool for measuring whatever gets stuck in a regular measuring cup: peanut butter, honey, mayonnaise, ketchup.  In this case, it’s ketchup. (Neverfear, peanut butter and mayonnaise shall not make an appearance in this recipe.)  Ingredients slide out of this in one fell swoop.

One fell swoop is a good way to live life.

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This is what the honey, soy sauce, diced onion, ketchup, oil, garlic, and red pepper flakes are going to look like once you get them in the bowl. But first, you have to get them in the bowl using some of my favorite tools…

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I like this garlic press because it has the unclogger bonded right onto it. No more digging around for it in the drawer.

But you can’t use the garlic press until you skin the garlic. Well, you can, but I prefer to peel the garlic first…

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Using this.

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Herd the garlic inside.

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Roll it.

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Dump it.

Poor baby, he’s just been skinned alive.

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Pour all those ingredients over the chicken and smush it down into the sauce if you have to. Do real cooks say “smush”?

Real cooks use these rubber spatulas. They are heavy duty and there’s no way that handle is going to come out  like so many others I’ve tried.

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After 1 1/2 hours on high, with some corn starch thrown in at the end to thicken the sauce, it comes out looking like this.

And tasting like something we’d make again and again.

I wouldn’t consider this a true crockpot meal in the sense that it cooks while you are away. It only took 1 1/2 hours on high, but it was good enough for that not to bother me.  Our family ratings were 9, 9, 8, 8, and 1–(Sawyer said the sauce made him cough. So. Whatever that means.)

I can’t wait for Tuesday. I’m sharing my favorite NEW cookie recipe. It’s better than any cookie I’ve ever tried. And I’ve tried a lot.

Can you tell?

Don’t answer that.

Say it isn’t so!  Fresh bread in 30 minutes from start to finish?

I had to test it.  I used to be a serious bread baker, the kind that has her own wheat mill and bulk kneading machine.

Then toddlers came along and I felt lucky to make it to the store to BUY bread.

That’s why I was surprised at the brainless baking mistake I make later in this post.

Hang around. It should be fun.

I’m going to start right off with confusing you. Pellegrino is not an ingredient. Oil is. I make my own mix of coconut/sesame/ and virgin olive oil and stick it in this Pellegrino bottle.  But any ol’ oil will do. (Try saying “any ol’ oil”, it makes you feel like you’ve had one of those shots at the dentist.) (That alone, was probably worth coming here today.)

Even though I grind my own wheat, I stuck to the recipe which calls for bread flour. King Arthur is my favorite brand.

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Can you guys buy yeast in jars down there? I’m up here in Canada and was really surprised to find this. The recipe called for 2 tablespoons yeast and I thought I was going to have to struggle with yeast packets. I usually buy my yeast in bulk from a grain store, so, yay for finding this at a regular ol’ grocery store!

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Put your warm water, oil, yeast, and sugar in your mixer bowl and let it sit for 15 minutes.

Yeast dies instantly at 140 degrees.  It’s best at 120. If you don’t want to use a thermometer you can use your finger.

120 feels like a nice warm bath. 140 feels like, “ouch!”

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After 15 minutes it bubbles up like this. If it doesn’t, you killed the yeast or have old yeast. Do not proceed!

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Mix in your salt, egg and flour.  Knead with a dough hook until dough is soft and smooth and cleans the sides of the bowl.

OR

Knead until it looks like soup and you wonder, “what the heck happened?” Remember your photographic evidence.

Return to your water picture to see your FAIL.  Realize you DOUBLED the water because you are used to cooking in bulk.

Kick yourself.

Quickly double all the other ingredients and proceed with chagrin and humility.

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Try to regain your footing by showing folks your cool idea for a baking corner.

This saves space and  it’s all within easy access. Warning: these will CLANG every time you open the door and scare you until you put buffering material down. Did you know they sell buffering material?

Amazing.

Oh, I must mention these measuring spoons and cups. I like the spoons because they are elongated enough to fit inside spice jars. I like the oval shaped cups because they fit into flour jars easier and are also hearty enough to put on a stove burner to melt butter.

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Poor, little, raw balls of dough.  Shhh! They’re resting. They just need a 10 minute cat nap.

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This is what they look like after 10 minutes in the oven. One is gone!  Where did he go?

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He went to get dressed in butter. He has an appointment with me later.

Would I make these again?

I was surprised it is possible to make a yeast bread this quickly. My family rated them, 10, 9, 8, and I gave them a 7 because they tasted too yeasty to me.  But, yes.  I would make them again and cut down just a little on the yeast to see if that made a difference.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s some butter waiting for me with a roll wrapped around it…

30 Minute Rolls

Two peas in a pod. Two cups in a diner. One with lipstick.

Can you guess where we went?

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There were lots of people, and lots of tulips. Those are Todd’s legs (clothed in denim, thank goodness).

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There were monuments demanding respectful consideration and a this-is-my-best-side pose.

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There were statues begging to be emulated whether it was your best side or not.

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Can you guess yet?

I’m guessing most of you south of the border don’t know.

Goodness knows, I wouldn’t have!!

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This could be anywhere…

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But could this?

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This could be anywhere…

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But could this?

Hey, I’ve got a good idea–

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Let’s knock and see who answers.

(It seemed like a good idea at the time.)

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Lots of places have flowers galore, but do they have–

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Man eating spiders?

I did not take into consideration that all those people lined up taking pictures, also snapped my tom-foolery. Let me know if I pop up on the web somewhere.

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Okay, just 3 more clues.

It has a bridge.

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It has jazz piano players you’ve never heard of immortalized in bronze.

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It has one red tulip about to bloom,

and it’s called….

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Ottawa!

Ottawa is the equivalent of Washington D.C. with a lot more tulips and a lot less armed security.

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But the best thing about it was being two peas in a pod again.

Notice the death grip I have on Todd’s jacket. I’m holding him up. You can’t tell, but he was sick and being a good sport about it.

He tried to apologize for “ruining” our weekend getaway but I told him–

“I’d rather be with you, sick, then with anybody else in the world, well.”

I think that came out right.

]]> http://www.whats-going-on-here.com/2012/05/07/where-we-went/feed/ 13 http://www.whats-going-on-here.com/2012/05/04/for-all-the-smart-chicks/ http://www.whats-going-on-here.com/2012/05/04/for-all-the-smart-chicks/#comments Fri, 04 May 2012 08:52:01 +0000 Missy Jill http://www.whats-going-on-here.com/?p=10254 There’s been a new addition down at the barn.

This is not our barn.

We wanted one, but alas, we are barnless.

For now.

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We found this barn by turning right.  We’d only turned left at the end of our neighborhood for 7 years or so. Then one day, we turned the other way and–wallah!

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A barn.

But not just a barn, THE barn.  We refer to it now in everyday conversation because Mckenna works there.

She’s one of those girls who dreams of horses. And we are one of those sets of parents who can’t afford a horse.

So this barn was God’s answer to her dream and our dilemma.

I love it when God does things like that after 7 years of turning left.

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We didn’t even know it was on the radar screen, but He did.

And He brought it in His time.

Today I brought my camera along when I dropped off Mckenna because there was something NEW to see…

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Ten little chickies.  Hello Gladys!

The barn owner bought a set of chickens. I wonder why they came as a set of 10? Shouldn’t they sell them as a dozen?

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She told us a story (barn owners are always telling stories) of a lady who called her chickens by name and trained them to behave like a dog. I always thought chickens were dumb so I was skeptical. Until this one looked at me with a knowing eye…

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It saw into my soul!

I guess chickens are more like us than I thought, as evidenced by this next photo…

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Do these make me look fat?