Irises and azaleas starting to bloom

I spent some time this morning pruning a few small shrubs and pulling some weeds.  It took longer than I thought to transplant some seedlings into bigger peat pots and now I'm feeling like it's nap time rather than time for more yard work! Hopefully, I'll perk up soon and  feel like rototilling a new asparagus bed.

Our daughter and son-in-law left this morning for California for the last part of their vacation; and Jim and I are now trying to get the house back in order and catch up with the mail and other chores that have been piling up all week. We had a great visit and had some lovely meals and drives.

I think I can muster up the energy to do some hand watering of seedlings and newly planted annuals. Maybe that will wake me up enough to tackle the rototilling!

Have we got grapefruits!

A couple of weeks ago I gave my 8 foot avocado tree and a loquat tree to Jim's niece Eva and her husband Don, after I decided I was tired of moving them in and out of my studio. I kept the meyer lemon, kumquat and bay but the meyer lemon may be going by fall as well since it doesn't seem to be doing well in the studio.

Initially I thought we'd build a greenhouse, but I nixed that plan that when I realized I already have way too much on my plate already. Yesterday, Don showed up with the large planter that held the avocado tree and it was filled with grapefruit from their Florida house. We will be enjoying the juice from those ruby red beauties for a while.

Yesterday a group of us went to the new "Bama BBQ" place in Spruce Pine. They've only been opened 2 weeks and they're expanding already! The long cooked, wood smoked ribs were huge and very meaty. They're not fall off the bone tender but were delicious. They beans are excellent as are the various barbecue sauces that they serve. We'll definitely be going back.

The only gardening I did yesterday was hand watering, moving all the flats of seedlings in and out with a lot of help, and planting a few sprouted tomato seeds and digging up some more old, plastic 6 packs and washing them good for the transplanting I'll probably be doing after breakfast. Showers are expected early this afternoon, so I probably won't get any planting in today either; but we are having fun visiting with Erin and Sven who are happy to just vegg out and watch re-runs of some of their favorite American TV shows, like Law and Order, that they can't get in Germany.

Before they arrived in NC, they were on a whirlwind vacationing mode from New York on down through Washington, DC, and Virginia.  Now they just want to munch, rest and visit which suits us just fine!

Got some ramps

Our daughter and son--in-law arrived late yesterday afternoon and as soon as they unpacked the car we headed for our friend Jim's "man cave" to join him and his group "Sugar Daddy", for a rock jamming session. Our daughter Erin is a rock singer and she's sung with them during previous visits. It was a treat for all of us to have her join them for several numbers. There's always pizza, beer and sodas for those Sunday evening practice sessions. It's always a fun time and anyone is invited.

We joined Jim and friends for breakfast this morning and after wards drove to Jim and Laura's creek house in search of ramps. Jim and Laura told me where to look, so it was a quick search. I dug up about 7 or 8 - just enough to fry up in some bacon fat with potatoes tomorrow morning so our daughter and son-in-law can have the ramp experience. If you're not familiar with ramps, they're a wild food with leaves that look like lily of  the valley with a burgundy steam, and a tiny, onion like bulb at the base which tastes like a cross between garlic and leek - with the garlic having the stronger percentage. When their young, you can chop up the greens as well.

When we got home, I decided to walk down near our stream to see if we had some on our property. None were to be found; but, I did find a stone wall on our property near the old brick silo. I have never walked down there because that part of our property is very sloped and in late spring and summer it's a pretty dense thicket that is pretty much impassable without a machete in hand. Needles to say the stone wall  was a nice find.

I sat down near the stream for a couple of minutes to rest these achy, old knees and enjoy the air and the meditative feeling of the area and spotted a grapefruit size chunk of milk quartz in the stream. I also discovered some very nice big rocks there. When I catch up with the garden work, I'd like to go down there and clear some of the area to expose those large rocks. It been a lovely morning!

The Never Ending Gardening Saga

The past few days have been spent doing some intensive garden cleanup and planting. Our daughter and son-in-law are arriving late this afternoon and I wanted to at least get some annuals planted and get caught up with my perennial planting and garden cleanup. So, I've been spending 4-5 hours most day with the outdoor gardening and then another hour or so with taking care of the seedlings. Today I planted the last rose - the new white knock out, 4 perennials and a new purple clematis to replace one that died this winter and spent the rest of the time cleaning the flower beds and weeding.

I've given away over 50 tomato plants and other seedlings but still have about 9 or 10 flats to water and move in and out every day during these colder nights. I only leave them out when the nightly low is in the mid 40's or above. It's been grueling; but I am seeing light at the end of this gardening tunnel.  There's still a great deal more to do before I'm caught up but at least now, the prospect isn't as daunting as it was a few weeks ago.

With all that's still left to do,  I'm wondering if I'll ever get in the studio before the end of May! Once I get caught up I'm doing to follow the routine of my late friends Otto and Vivika and spent an hour in the garden in the morning before I head to the studio; but that is only going to be doable once I get everything planted, cleaned up and mulched.

In the meantime I'm going to enjoy our daughter and son-in-laws visit and eat out for the next five days.

The days garden report

The hostas are coming in strong. This one is almost totally open. The snow in summer and some other perennials are blooming as well as a lot of the weeds!

I finished and planted the third trench with Red Pontiac potatoes yesterday and started another trench in another area for asparagus yesterday; but never finished because I was just too tired and had to get started on dinner anyway. There's space in this bed for one more trench and I think I'll plant it half in Kennebecs and half in Yellow Finns and give the extra seeds to friends. There are still trenches to dig for the asparagus, which I intended to do today, but I'm pretty tired from yesterday, so I think I'll start planting some small perennials and annuals and stop early to get started on our roast duck dinner.

It's been a busy morning already - taking these garden photos and doing a bunch of weeding and cleanup  before making breakfast.  The doctor put me on another months worth of antibiotics again and like the last one, I can't go out in the sun, so I'm covering myself head to toe and heading out anyway; but with the temperature is supposed to reach 80F today, I have a feeling I may not last too long out there.

Bread making and potato planting

The first asparagus appeared two days ago and I wound up breaking off a couple while planting the potatoes. My butt is guilty! I didn't realize they were already peeking through on the other bed, and was sitting right on the bed while digging the potato trenches.

Gardening, bread baking and cooking took up the whole day. It was a hard, trench digging day to plant two rows of potatoes - German Butterball and Bintje - both old timey varieties.  I wound up digging up the potatoes I had planted the other day and moving the row, after I realized I could get more rows in that bed than I thought.

The new furrow attachment for the Mantis tiller didn't seem to do the job, so I wound up hand digging the trenches.They rototilled OK but didn't seem to create a trench that was ready to plant.  I need to check you tube and see if there are any videos on how to properly use this attachment.

There's another trench to dig today to plant these Red Pontiac potatoes and I still have Kennebecs and Yellow Finns to plant some time this week.

I also have to plant some peonies and primroses that my good friend Bruce dug up on his property. I lovingly call him "Bruce, the destroyer"; because he doesn't want anything growing near his lawn, so I periodically receive these wonderful little gifts from him. He used to throw them away or just run the mower over them, until I begged him to let me come and dig them up, which I've done periodically. Bruce gives me flowers,  I give him veggie plants and we share veggies from our gardens. He's promised to take me ramp hunting soon, to his special spot up near Roan mountain. It's a remote spot only accessible by foot or on his four runner. If we're lucky we might find some morels as well.

Akar yunomi show

Check out some amazing work at the Akar gallery yunomi show:

http://www.akardesign.com/shows/index.asp

Looks like I'll have a glorious day to be in the garden. I'm still trying to recover from some porch sitting partying with friends last night. There are 10 more bags of mushroom compost to unload, about 8 trays, of seedlings and potted plants  to move back outside for the day, and two beds to rototill. Then I have to see if I can get the new furrow attachment on the tiller and make some furrows for planting more potatoes today or tomorrow.

In assessing the garden, it looks like I have at least another 7-10 days of just getting the beds cleaned up and planted along with the continuing job of seedling care. I'm hoping when the beds are done and the terraces planted that I'll be able to split my day between garden and studio. I'm already thinking of how I can cut back all this planting next year and I think I'm going to turn some of the terraces into permanent herbal beds with a few spaces left for annual herbs like basil, parsley, summer savory, etc.

Michael Cardew once told me, asI was admiring his vegetable garden, that his garden was big enough. Otherwise, he said, there wouldn't be time to make pots. I feel that I've reached that point and need to start seriously thinking about cutting back. This 70 year old well worn, achy body has made me finally come to the realization that I can't do it all anymore, at least at the level I used to. So,  it's time to take stock of how I'm using my time and prioritize, which means expending less energy in a such a big garden, leaving time each day for the studio.

Japanese quince

The Japanese quince is blooming and it's so beautiful! The plum and Japanese cherry blossoms are in their full glory now and the peach trees are also starting to bloom.

I was too sore yesterday to do any rototilling and digging; but I did get more weeding, garden cleanup and seedling transplanting done. The rain stayed away long enough this morning, for me to weed one of the terrace vegetable beds and put down a bag of mulch. Now that the rain has arrived, the rest of my days gardening is going to be indoors. I've already planted another large tray of a mix of veggies and flowers, planted more basil, this morning and got my large, pot bound gardenia, root pruned and repotted.

This afternoon I need to get down to the basement and tend to some sad over wintering plants and do a major cleanup of the area. With temperatures doing down tonight, below 45, I'll be bringing in all the flats of the heat loving tomato and pepper seedlings. I love all this gardening, but it's not leaving any time for much of anything else.

This is spring????

 The plum tree is in blossom and my one and only hyacinth is blooming. The Japanese quince is starting to bloom as is the Japanese maple tree and some shrubs. It's going to be in the high 80's today - crazy weather for this time of year. As soon as I take my vitamins, I'm heading out to to the garden to get the heavy work done before it gets too hot.

I got over 4 hours of gardening time yesterday, not counting seedling care and feeding.  I finished planting the bed I had intended to plant the day before. Sore muscles made me postpone that job for a day and instead, I worked on seedlings - transplanting another big flat and organized my seed packets and wrote out a bunch of new labels and pulled some weeds.

Jim brought home about 20, 40 lb bags of mushroom compost which I had to unload by myself. His back is still not totally healed, so he has to avoid any heavy lifting. It was a hard working day but felt soooo good! After a bit of rest, I managed to get enough of an energy boost to try a new shrimp dish from one of my new Italian cookbooks. It was very tasty; but garlic, tomatoes and hot peppers are always a winning combination in my book! I served it over linguini. The sauce was so good it didn't even need the shrimp!

Yesterday I transplanted more broccoli, leeks and kale, I also planted some beet and shallot seeds. Those two beds are fully planted. Today I'll rototill one or two more beds after I put down a few more bags of compost and a sprinkling of organic fertilizer. The plan is to transplant and plant spinach, onions, scallions carrots and maybe lettuce if time and energy permit. I already have a few collards in one of the beds which don't seem worse for wear over a hard winter. I had never grown them before. Does anyone know if this is a perennial vegetable????? After that there will be more seedlings to transplant in the later afternoon. I do love this time of year!

It's asparagus time

Last night's dinner - fresh asparagus on oatmeal bread toast, saturated with lemon butter and top with chopped hard boiled eggs and bacon. It's one of my own concoctions and one of Jim's favorites.

This body is a bit weary after a hard day in the garden yesterday. I got a bit more rototilling done, transplanted a few more veggies, re-potted 18 tomato seedlings into bigger pots, covered the cabbages with remay, pulled a bunch of weeds, and started digging the first trench for potatoes; but my body quit after planting only four or five German butterball potato seeds. So, I came in and searched the Internet for the best price on a furrow maker attachment for my new Mantis tiller.  It's ordered and should arrive in a week or so. I'll finish planting potatoes then! I ambitiously bought 5 potato varieties and I just don't have the energy to dig that many furrows. Come to think of it, I may not even have the space for all of them unless I want to plant on a hillside or in buckets which I may just try if I don't need those big 5 gallon buckets for tomatoes.

The plan this morning is to drag a few more bags of compost down to one of my lower terraces, dig it in and plant some scallions, carrots, parsnips, beets, some more onions, leeks and the kale I didn't get around to planting yesterday.It's an ambitious list and I probably won't get it all done because I want to take a break to watch the Roddick tennis final at one o'clock.

Terrace 1 planted

Yesterday I finished planting this first terrace. From rototilling to planting took a lot longer because the tiller didn't go very deep but did a great job removing weeds and loosening the first 3inches or so; but then I had to dig to a 6 inch depth with the addition of compost before planting each seedling.

This bed has Early Jersey Wakefield cabbage, Savoy cabbage,broccoli, broccoli rabe, thyme and sage which are supposedly good companion herbs for these veggies. After planting I realized that I have a six pack of DeCicco heirloom broccoli and six pack cauliflower to plant; but haven't planned on it for other beds, but I think I can plant them in the kale, spinach, beet and onion bed which still have to be tilled.

My seedlings are growing up a bit and yesterday I put two large flats of tomatoes, peppers, etc. on the porch. After we got home from dinner with friends at the Empire China buffet in Johnson City, I brought those tender plants in for the night. I don't like to leave them out when the night temperatures might be below 50, so they spent the night on the kitchen table and got moved back out this morning.

By the way, that Empire China buffet on Friday night was the best China buffet we've ever been to! They had raw oysters, clams, mussels,shrimp, frogs legs, crab claws, a good sushi bar and hibachi bar and just about every other Chinese stir fry dishes, fruits and desserts you can imagine and all for less than $11 a person. We ate that much in oysters alone!

It's downright balmy out there this morning, with quite a bit of breeze, so I should be comfortable working out there is the forecasted rain and thunder stay away till later in the afternoon. I think I'll tackle the two largest, bottom, terraced beds and rototill what areas I can, which means rototilling around the asparagus plants in both beds.

I have asparagus growing in 4 different areas, since asparagus and tomatoes do well together - asparagus putting out something that repels nematodes which can attack tomato plants, I usually try to to plant some tomatoes near some of them; but crop rotation isn't permitting that this year, even with me having them in four different places; and that's because I usually grow way too many tomatoes!

Seedlings

Here are some of my seedlings. Two other large flats and six packs of tomatoes, peppers, etc are still living in the house but since it's going to be in the 80's today, I may put some of them out later this morning to harden them off a bit.   In another week or two they'll probably have to get put into bigger peat pots. Yesterday afternoon, I bought the last package of them at Walmart and I'm hoping that they'll have more in a few days because I have a very large amount of seedlings that will soon be outgrowing those little peat pots.

It took me longer to get the rototiller going and till one bed the other day and yesterday I manged to plant all the broccoli and cabbage, prune the climbing roses and do a bit more weeding and cleanup. Today I'll plant the broccoli raab, kale and some onions in that bed. The compost pile has two nice, volunteer kale plants which I'll dig up and transplant. I love those compost volunteers. They are always the healthiest, best looking veggies!

My energy is still  low - wonder if it's because I'm 70 or just out of gardening shape this early in the season! Either way, after a couple of hours of hard planting and working in the sun, I'm wiped. Three years ago 6 hours in the garden was the norm on a good day.

Unless there's a rainy day in the next few days, the studio is just going to have to wait until I finish the current planting and prep more beds for potato planting. This year I'm planting 5 varieties - Red Pontiac, Kennebec,  German butterball, Yellow Finn, and Bintji and this time I'm going to mark the rows so I don't wind up with a couple of bushes on unknown varieties! 

Signs of spring

The first daffodils opened a couple of days ago and the hellebores and pussy willow are in full bloom. Spring has arrived!

Sun is shining and it looks like it's going to be a good day to transplant some of these kale, cabbage, spinach and broccoli seedlings. If I have any energy left, I'll plant some potatoes as well.

We had a light frost overnight which didn't seem to hurt the leaf lettuce starts, so I'm going to take a chance and get them planted as well. The weather for the rest of the week shows night time temperatures in the 40's and if we get a late frost in April, I can always cover them with remay.

It will probably be another "no studio" day. So far this week I've only managed a couple of hours in there; but that's about par for this time of year with all this garden and seedling work added to my usual cooking and animal chores.

The past two days I've been glued to the computer, watching live feeds from NCECA. I don't know if there will be any more today which would be a distraction but a lovely one. Yesterday I got to plant a few perennials when they broke for lunch; but the rest of the time I was thoroughly enjoying the free workshop and discussions.

Dinner's going to be a simple linguini with pesto sauce and a salad. After seeing a news report this morning that eating a small amount of chocolate daily reduces your change of a heart attack by over 40%, I'm adding it to Jim's shopping list today. :-) Between the health benefits of wine, coffee, and chocolate, maybe Woody Allen was right in the movie "Sleeper" - that all the things we thought are bad turn out to actually be very good for you!

Oatmeal bread

Since I was up at 4 am, I decided it was a good morning to get another loaf of oatmeal bread made. This loaf is a bit better looking than the one a few days ago; but I'm still getting uneven raising in that bread machine, on some loaves. 

We decided to drive to Asheville Friday, which is always an all  day trip. Our aim was to buy some fresh seafood, have lunch at the Mexican restaurant and pick up clay at Highwater, which was out of Phoenix. Last time I was in there they were out of clay as well. Why don't they just buy another used mixer, I wonder. If I were younger I'd be mixing my own again; but at 70, I've become wise enough to resist that temptation, so  I wound up getting couple of boxes of a white stoneware which I also use.

We've been eating blue shell crabs, steamed clams and fried shrimp the past 3 days. We have definitely saturated our seafood itch! It was so good to find a source for really fresh fish and seafood. They will be seeing us pretty regularly.

Besides husband and animal care, gardening, indoors and out, cooking, there has been no time for studio other than a stolen hour or so the other day to throw a couple of bowls and mugs. Seedlings are sprouting and need to get planted, others need watering, moving outdoors and back in on very cold nights, feeding and transplanting. I've lost quite a few from damping off which has never happened with this expensive seed starter; and I don't know what has caused it this year. Hopefully enough will make it through OK. All the kale, cabbage and broccoli are doing fine and need to get transplanted in the garden later in the week, along with onions and leeks.

It was a gorgeous day yesterday, and  I finally got some heavy duty outdoor gardening done after a couple of morning hours of indoor seedling care and planting. I dug in some metal supports, mixed up some planting medium and planted a couple of red raspberry bushes, a low, fragrant sumac bush, a couple of climbing roses, then pruned the rest of the other non climbers and did some weeding.  Now there are only 2 old climbers to prune. Saying I was totally wiped when I came in, is an understatement, but I still had to muster enough energy to make steamed clams in a wine, garlic, herb broth, for dinner.

The rain today made this another indoor gardening day again with more seedling care and planting. I also got three of the four varieties of potato seeds I'm planting this year, cut and curing.  That was followed by a short stint in the studio before dinner to trim the couple of pots I threw a few days ago. I should be able to get a bit more studio time in tomorrow. There was too much else to do today, including baking bread. I even found time after lunch to read a couple of pottery magazines that have been sitting here for weeks.

Whole wheat loaf

This light whole wheat bread tasted fine; but you sure do get funny shaped loaves with this bread machine. What the heck is that knob on the top of the loaf! LOL

It's been a busy few days dealing dealing with seeds, planting, weeding, and bread baking and no time for studio yet! A whole bunch of old seeds sprouted two days ago and I had to spend the day planting them, and then I wet down another bunch which may begin to sprout in the next 5 days or so.

Yesterday was a gorgeous warm, sunny day, so instead of the studio, I headed to the garden and put down some organic fertilizer on several planting beds, did a bunch of weeding, and unloaded and stacked 14 bags of mushroom compost and manure. Checking the sun, around noon, I realized I had to change my garden plan so those high sun requirement plants were in the right place, so I measured all the beds and make a graph and started on a new companion planting plan for this year. We joined friends for a Tapas/Spanish wine dinner at the Knife and Fork, which was delightful. My favorite tapas was the little steamed clams with sausage and veggies.

Today was the day I planned to plant a few perennials and transplant some cold weather crops but it looks like the rain is going to be here any minute, so I'll be indoor gardening again.

Yesterday Jim picked me up a bunch of replacement grow lights and I need to get them changed out this morning. I'm planning on a simple pasta dinner tonight, so I may even have time for some studio time after lunch, which will be nice.

A day to rest

Each morning I quickly check the peat pots to see if any new seeds sprouted overnight. This morning there were some Opalka, San Marzano, Campbell's and Italian heirloom, tomatoes and artichokes that peeked through overnight, as well as a couple of cippolini onions and leeks. The Bok choi seedlings were early sprouters and now they need to get separated. I'll probably do that after dinner when it will be less stressful for them.

It's damp, cool and windy - a precursor of the rain that's expected, so it looks like I'm going to have another day or to wear my magnetic belt and rest my strained back and catch up with some paperwork.

We just finished a huge breakfast of corned beef hash and eggs and now it's time to read the Sunday papers. We were hoping to watch the finals of the tennis from Palm Springs this afternoon but Charter cable in our area decided to play a woman's softball game instead. Wonder who does their programming schedule over there! On days like this I wish we still had our old satellite dish! We're big tennis fans and we really looking forward to Andy Roddick's final match. I was hoping that Fox sports might stream the match but after checking their web site it doesn't appear that they do that. :-(

First day of spring brought glorious weather

I'm so grateful that mother nature decided to make this first day of spring sunny and warm. Despite a bad night (up at 1am with headache and not able to get back to sleep till after 4 am), I couldn't resist the call of the garden. So I donned my wide brimmed garden hat to protect my skin from the discolorations that are a side effect of this antibiotic I'm on, and headed out to do some weeding and hand spread a bag of calcium on my vegetable beds.

I was too tired to do much more; but it was a start. Hopefully, after a good night's sleep, I'll be able to give the garden more time tomorrow.

My latest planted seeds are starting to sprout and now I'm trying to figure out where to put them all!

Hellebores and other garden news

Spring is ready to break through. These hellebores look like they will be opening any minute!

Yesterday I got out in the garden to do some pruning and early weeding and decided also,  to tackle the old grape vines which probably had never been pruned - what a mess! I watched some you tube videos on grape pruning before hand, but none that I watched was too helpful with these arbor grown Concord grapes. I did find out a lot about grape pruning and growing. There are two pruning methods used for various types of grapes.Commercial growers thin the grape clusters and snip the bottom of the clusters to get bigger grapes. They also remove some leaf cover before the grapes ripen, etc. But, and it's a big but - these old vines of ours are such a tangled mess I can't figure out what to cut or how! I figured out that the main truck is called the cordon. This morning I'll watch a few more you tube videos (there are a lot), and maybe I can get a clearer picture on how to deal with the tangled mess.

The only video I found on arbor supported Concord grapes said to leave the pencil thin burgundy colored  stems; but the only burgundy colored stems on those vines were parts of wild blackberries!  On top of that, the area under the arbor was another sea of a tangled mess of wild blackberry vines that I had to cut down. The worse part of it all is that this arbor was built for munchkins. It's so short that I can's stand up all the way under it making it doubly difficulty to maneuver or see anything. Needless to say, by the time I got back to the house my back was killing me. Also, one of the vines is either died or is dying. The main trunk is split and rotted, so I may just have to cut it down and plant a new, healthy, seedless variety.

Last year I planted a new, different variety grape; but it's too early to tell how well it fared it's first winter.

I worked on that vine till 4 o'clock and then came in to make a pot of mushroom bisque for dinner.  Soup is a comfort meal for me and one that I needed last night!

On the bright side, it's going to be a beautiful, warm, sunny day today, so after breakfast I'll water indoor plants, tend my seedlings, drive to Johnson City to do some food shopping at Earth Fare and plant shopping at Lowes. I'm looking for a yellow climbing rose and the new yellow knock out rose and fish fertilizer; and I'm sure I'll find some other goodies to add to the cart.  I always do!

My original plan for the day was more pruning and garden clean up; but I'm too weary and sore from yesterday so that will have to wait for another day.

More seeds planted

 Here's the latest group of planted veggie seeds. Later today or tomorrow, I'll try to get some of the perennial flower seeds planted now that I have most of the early veggies started. The less hardy fruits and veggies will be planted in another couple of weeks or more.

We had a great corned beef and cabbage dinner with friends last night, followed by Irish coffee for dessert, in the living room, while we watched the Three Irish Tenors video (that is when we weren't chatting away). It's the same ritual every St Patrick's day -same meal, with either watching "The Quiet Man", or "The Three Tenors" afterwards.

Some of my seedlings sprouted over night so I've moved that flat to a south facing window in my office - one of the only two non obstructed south facing windows in the house that will get late morning and some  afternoon sun. Yesterday I moved the cabbage, broccoli and other hardy veggies to porch to harden off for a few days before planting. I do so love this time of year!

Looks like it will be a good afternoon to do the rose and some other pruning. I still have another couple of weeks to go on the latest antibiotic for this eye/sinus infection, so I need to don my silly, wide brimmed, hand painted floral designs, lavender, gardening hat so I don't get skin discoloration from this medication.

I'm gearing up to get in the studio Sunday or Monday at the latest. I'm soooooo ready!

Seed starting and gnocchi update, change in Gougere recipe

ATTENTION: I forgot to put the amt of water in the mushroom gougere recipe, so for those who said they want to try it, I added the water to the recipe in the original post. It's 3/4 of a cup of cold water.

As I mentioned the other day I was going to make my first batch of gnocchi. It was a lot of work and frankly, not worth the effort. I told Jim for all that trouble I could have made pierogi's which are a much better use of mashed potatoes and flour! I once had gnocchi in a restaurant and wasn't that fond of it, but since I've been on an Italian cooking kick, I thought I'd try home made, hoping they'd be better. The gorgonzola cream sauce was a winner and gave some punch to an another wise boring dish.

Yesterday was an indoor gardening day. I planted the large tray of seeds above - everything from tomatoes to bok choi, made a rough garden plan for this year and got a lot of older seeds wrapped in wet handtowel  paper and baggies to test their viability. Today I'll start some more veggies and put some of my older cabbage and broccoli seedlings outdoors to start hardening them off. The greenhouse window is a bit overcrowded and I need to make room for these latest seedling once they sprout. After it warms up a bit in the afternoon I need to prune my butterfly bush and maybe spent a few minutes on other garden cleanup.

If any of my local, gardening friends want to try some new seeds, I'd love to share. Seeds like lettuce and peppers don't last long and we can only eat so much! So give me a call, come over and sit and have a cup of tea and we can go through my huge seed stash.

This time of year I'm usually splitting my time between studio and getting ready for the spring planting season.  With Jim doing so much better, I think I'll finally be able to get in the studio by next week; and I'll only be about 100 feet away if he needs anything. I'm skipping the spring studio tour so I'll be able to work without the stress of getting a firing in before the beginning of June. There's still a lot more work to make to fill the kiln.

Mushroom gougere

 

Here's last night's mushroom gougere.  Someone requested the recipe a while back, so I'll post it below.

Tonight I'll be making my first potato gnocchi with a gorgonzola cream sauce. After that lovely chicken cacciatore recipe from my latest Italian cookbook, I decided I wanted to try more of her recipes and try some things I've never made. Since it's definitely not gardening weather, other than the care and feeding of houseplants and seedlings, it's been a good time to do more cooking.I've been on an Italian kick - made an escarole, potato, turkey sausage soup the other night which we loved. It's a recipe I created by taking the best of a few other recipes. It's definitely one that is going in the recipe box.

Jim and I went to Asheville the other day and bought a new bed - a Tempurpedic, which we hope will allow him to get out of the recliner and sleep in a bed again! He drove both ways and didn't seem the worse for wear. We even had dinner out Friday night and he made it through all three courses without much more than feeling a bit tight in his back.

Yesterday I got my potato seeds, but it looks like potato planting is going to have to wait till the end of the month when, hopefully, the weather will be more cooperative and that will fit planting during the waning moon, which my local friends and neighbors tell me is the time to plant potatoes. Supposed if you don't plant at the right time you get a lot of leafy tops and only a few potatoes. Who am I to disagree with people who have learned to garden this way, through observing nature, for centuries!

Here's the Mushroom Gougere recipe: Serves 4 with a salad or a side vegetable like steamed asparagus, or broccoli.

 Filling:

1 small onion, peeled, halved and sliced

1 carrot, grated coarsely

8 oz button mushrooms, washed and sliced

1 tsp tikka or mild curry paste (if you can't find either, you can use a mild curry powder to taste; but only add a little at a time till you reach the taste you want)

2T all purpose flour

1 1/4 C milk

2T fine chopped Italian parsley

salt and fresh ground pepper to taste

2T flaked almonds

For the gougere(choux pastry part of the recipe):

3/4 C cold water

1/2C all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

6T butter

3 eggs, beaten

3/4 C diced Gruyere or aged Gouda cheese (I use Gruyere)

Preheat oven 400F. Grease a shallow, round, ovenproof dish, about 9"

Make the choux pastry: First sift the flour and salt onto a large sheet of waxed paper.

Next, in a large saucepan, heat the butter and water until the butter just melts (don't let the water boil!). Then fold the paper holding the flour and dump the whole thing, at once, into the water, melted butter mix. Keep the heat under the mix and beat vigorously with a wooden spoon until the mix is no longer lumpy, and starts to pull away from the sides of the saucepan. Once it reaches that stage, set it aside to cool for about 10 minutes.

In the meantime make the filling: Sautee the prepared carrot, onion and mushrooms in the butter for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Then stir in the curry paste or tikka, then the flour. Stir well, then add the milk, mix and stir and cook until it thickens. Lastly, add the chopped parsley.

While the filling is cooking, when the choux is cooled enough, beat the eggs and little by little, add to the choux pastry mix, beating well to incorporated. You may not need to use all the beaten egg. You want the mixture to pretty stiff. Then fold the cubed cheese into this choux mix  and then pour the mix into the baking dish, forming what will look like a wide, donut ring on the inside of the dish. Then pour the filling in the center; and bake 35 -45 minutes until it has risen and is golden brown. About 5 minutes before it looks done, sprinkle the almond slices and bake another 5 minutes.

This is a delicious and very rich dish. A tossed salad goes well with it. Enjoy!

Oatmeal bread

Here's the new  oatmeal bread I just took out of the bread machine. It's definitely not a pretty loaf, but it tastes really good; and the house smells incredible! I think it's going to make a nice toast. I need to check out the instruction booklet again and find out why the color is uneven.

While the bread was baking I headed for the garden and planted those two thornless blackberry vines that I've been meaning to plant. I'll have to replant them when I get more compost because the soil has a lot of clay in it. After that I decided to check out the cold frame and found a bag of compost I didn't know I had, so I cleaned out the cold frame and dug the compost in and now I have to figure out if I want to plant something in it or just use it to harden off some of my seedlings. Maybe it's time to google "cold frame planting" and find some useful tips.

I did it!

It took a while but I finally got it together. I only have one wrench of the right size, so I had to struggle with it and a pair of pliers to do the job! Now all I have to do is get some high octane gasoline and add the oil and I'll be ready to go!

Jim got a great report from the osteopath yesterday. Only 7 weeks after fracturing 9 vertebrae and his sacrum, he's healed enough for her to do a full osteo treatment. He has another 7 weeks to go with limited activity; but he's doing great; and the best  part  is that he doesn't have to have surgery!

A couple of blackberry plants arrived in the mail, but I think I'm going to wait till tomorrow or Monday when it's expected to be a bit warmer, to get them planted.

It's time for lunch and then I think I'll look for a new bread recipe to try in the bread machine and then give myself a break with my new Mother Earth News and a pottery magazine that's been sitting her a couple of days.

Mantis tiller - my new toy/tool

The ad said I'd just have to attach the handle. Yeah, right!  I'll try to tackle assembling it later this afternoon.

We finally have  a sunny day with no snow in the forecast and we're expecting temperatures in the high 50's over the weekend, so I'm going to try and tackle pruning the ancient grape vines up the hill Sunday or Monday. I don't think the previous owners ever pruned them.

Last night the possum was back feeding on Tommy, the feral/abandoned cat's food. What was so funny to us was that Tommy was sitting very comfortably about two feet away while the possum ate his dinner. He didn't seem threatened by the possum, but seemed to just be waiting patiently till the possum finished. When I opened the door to scoot the possum away, who by the way, looked at me as if to say "Can't you see that I'm eating here!", timid Tommy ran away. Fortunately he came back this morning for breakfast. Hopefully he's learned not to wait till dark to come back for dinner, because once dark descends, I'm taking the food back in to the house!

Got a bunch of my veggie seedlings separated and transplanted this morning and finally got around to planting some penstemon seeds. The hummingbirds love them!

Chicken Cacciatore

Lidia Matticchio Bastianich's Chicken cacciatore recipe was a winner. Even Jim, who said he never had a chicken cacciatore he liked gave it a ten.  Thank you Lidia! This was my first time cooking chicken cacciatore and it wasn't until it was almost finished cooking, that Jim made the "I don't like chicken cacciatore" proclamation. It's a good thing he didn't say anything earlier in the day or we would have missed a lovely recipe! I served it on a bed of spaghetti - so good! I can't wait to try more recipes from that book.

Yesterday I got all my new recipe cards sorted and most filed. I just need to get one more double recipe box just for my Indian and Italian recipes.

I ordered a Mantis tiller the other day, to help with my gardening. Hopefully, having the machine do a lot of the soil prep will keep  my damaged neck and back from acting up. I got the model with the Honda motor (Ebay was the cheapest place I found). That model is a bit more powerful than their standard model; and the other benefit is that I won't have to mix the fuel. It's lightweight enough that I'll be able to lug it around the garden myself.

We're doing takeout from our local seafood restaurant for dinner tonight, so I'll be able to use my afternoon time going through more of my paper piles and continue searching ebay for a vintage, double recipe box.  And maybe there will be time to tend my veggies seedlings a bit, which I think are getting ready for their first feeding. First I have to check if I have any fish fertilizer left over from last season.

Nice textured teal glaze

Here's a new glaze of mine #8486V# B. It has a very intriguing teal color and texture. The dark strip on the right is from the 2% iron lip under the glaze. I often put this slip on my white stoneware or porcelain tiles. On darker stoneware, I'll often put a strip of white porcelain slip on the tile. This test is on Loafer's Glory, a porcelainous type stoneware, fired to cone 10 in my soda kiln. Here's the recipe if anyone would like to try it. The color is a bit more on the teal side than is showing on my monitor.

#8486V# B Cone 10

18.3 Kona F4 Soda spar
10.5 Whiting
11.0 Ferro Frit 3195
 8.3 Talc
12.2 Neph Sy
21.7 Silica
  1.8 Fluorspar
13.5 Tennessee SGP#1 Ball Clay
  2.7 EPK

B color: Add 0.5% Chrome oxide, 0./5% Cobalt carb

Domesticated and wild critters have all been fed, we've had our oatmeal breakfast (snowy, cold mornings definitely calls for oatmeal), and I've made tonight's dinner decision - Chicken cacciatore from Lidia Matticchio Bastianich's cookbook, "Lidia's Italian-American Kitchen".

I also took all my spices off of one shelf and cleaned, organized and rearranged everything in alphabetical order. I have more of these shelves to do but first need to get more staggered, wired shelves. I keep the most used spices in the cupboard next to the stove and the more International spices, i.e. Indian, Mexican, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, etc. in a different cupboard. The next job of this morning is to file a whole bunch of new recipes followed by catching up with some snail mail and other paper work.

We're still getting some snow flurries, so it doesn't look like we'll head to town to pick up the mail today. It's a good day for sitting near the fire and working on the paper piles till dinner time.

My quiet green, Hamada clone, test tile

Here's another green glaze test from my last soda firing. This is my take on Hamada's green. I can see where this would be a nice glaze to use over my flashing slip with some wax resisted areas. The contrast between the glaze and flashed areas should be nice and I can probably use the resisted area as a backdrop for some of my black decorating slip brushwork.

Now that Jim is getting around a bit, I'm getting ready to spend some time in the studio as soon as this cut on my finger heals completely. Those loppers cut deep!

Yesterday was food shopping day. We were out for over 5 hours just making a couple grocery store stops, a quick lunch and another stop to pick up our mail. Where did all that time go! Fortunately with such a big lunch, neither of us wanted a regular dinner so I just make some buttered, parmesan, popcorn with a sprinkling of cayenne.

Trish, here's a link where you can find a no knead bread recipe as well as 2 nice videos about it: http://www.breadtopia.com/basic-no-knead-method. I haven't forgotten about your request for the curried mushroom gougere - will try to get to it soon!

There are also videos on yout ube with the originator of this method, Jim Lahey. He only uses white flour, whereas the fellow on the video link from Breadtopia, uses some whole wheat along with the white.

We're expecting snow again - looks like it's going to start any minute. Glad I took the chicken/shrimp gumbo out of the freezer yesterday for tonight's dinner.

Baking day yesterday, seed planting today

Here are the 2 loaves of no knead bread I baked yesterday. It seems that most of my day was spent in the kitchen. I made a couple of pizzas for our Friday night, porch sitting with our friends Jim and Laura. It's the first Friday in about 6 weeks that we've been able to do it.

Jim fared well with the visit but this morning he's a bit achy from the fractured sacrum.

The robins have arrived, so spring is in the air even though the weather is still hanging on to winter. Even in this cold, some perennials and bulbs are starting to peek through.

I've been planting seeds this morning - Genovese basil, Italian parsley, 2 types of spinach,  artichokes (which have to be in the fridge for 2 weeks), and a bit more Early Jersey Wakefield cabbage. After lunch I'll plant another savoy cabbage variety "Chieftain". My kitchen greenhouse window is almost filled to the brim and same for the grow lights in the basement. I wish I had more south facing windows in the house. I may have to clear my studio desk and put seedling on it once I've used up all the house space.

Today or tomorrow I'll need to transplant some of my Broccoli Raab and cabbage seedlings. The first crop of mixed lettuce seedlings are doing well, so far, in the basement. One of my over wintering geraniums is actually flowering under the grow lights!

Pottery in Seagrove NC video

Here's a link to a short video on pottery in Seagrove, NC.

Seagrove Pottery


Between caring and cooking for Jim and taking on his chores as well as my own, there still isn't time for the studio. I have managed to get in an hour or so of garden time two days ago and have gotten some seeds started in the house. I now have broccoli, spinach, cabbage and lettuce sprouted and started some onion seeds and Red Russian kale today.

These days my time is centered on husband, house, animal and plant care and cooking. Jim is healing, but it's a slow process. The past couple of days he's been able to do some local driving to pick up the mail and today he drove to Spruce Pine to get his hair cut; but that's pretty much the extent of what he can do. He's still sleeping in the recliner because of the pain from all those spinal fractures, so it may be another month or so for those fractures to completely heal.

Latest Cinnamon Raisin bread

After a big breakfast thing morning -  fried, leftover mashed potatoes, some nice thick, hickory smoked bacon and this cinnamon raisin toast, I headed for the garden. Thanks Bonnie for tip on soaking the raisins. The bread was much lighter; but I did have to hand knead it a bit to get better distribution of the raisins.

We were blessed with two glorious spring like days that allowed me to do a bit of cleanup, severe pruning of one of the peach trees, weed a bit, dig in some mushroom compost and  plant a short row of peas today. I cut my finger on my jammed pruner which made it all take longer that I planned. It's amazing how one cut on one finger, especially one that won't stop bleeding, will interfere with planned chores!

Now I'm going to sip my wine, watch the Olympics and peruse an old Dom DeLuise cookbook, "Eat This It'll Make Your Feel Better", that I just received. I did a quick scan of it this morning and I think it's going to be a fun read.  Some of his childhood memories of growing up in the Italian neighborhood in Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn are the same memories I have of a similar neighborhood of my childhood in South Brooklyn in a mainly Italian, and Polish neighborhood.

I can still remember all those exotic smells of the Italian and Polish bakeries,  Italian and Danish delis and even the live poultry market where my mother sent me every Saturday to buy a chicken. The Italian neighbors bought the more exotic things like pigeon and rabbit. The same was true for the fresh fish store. Dad loved to go deep sea fishing, so we never bought fish. In fact, dad didn't like fish. He only loved to fish! The way he would tell people the best way to cook his catch, would give the impression that he was a real gourmand; but he would rarely eat the fish. So most of his catch was given away to the nuns at school or neighbors. Dad loved seafood  though, so almost every Friday he sent me down to buy either a dozen crabs and on rare occasions, a lobster at the fresh fish market down the street. There were baskets of snails at that fish store and I always figured that the Italian neighbors bought those, although I never did see anyone buying them.

In the summer we would take the Staten Island Ferry and go crabbing. I remember one time when the entire bath tub was filled with the crab we caught. Our other trip to Staten Island was in the fall, to pick mushrooms. Dad only picked two varieties that he knew from his childhood and mom would can them to be sauteed with onions and served on top of pan fried steaks in the winter.

In the 40's and early 50's there were no supermarkets in our neighborhood other than a small A&P; but that wasn't where you went to buy meat, fruits or vegetables.  It was all those wonderful, little specialty food stores where most of our food was purchased. Walking home in winter, with a freshly, baked loaf of Italian bread that was baked in a wood burning oven, holding it close to my body to keep me warm, was one of those wonderful memories. Often the bread arrived with a few bites out of one end; but Mom never complained. :-)

Somebrite test tile

Here's one of the tiles from the last soda firing. It's called Somebrite and  is a well known glaze which is often used only as an accent on soda/salt pots. It contrasts very nicely with flashing slips. I won't bother to post the recipe as it can be easily found by googling the name.This tile was fired to cone 12 at 2 o'clock; but it works just as well at cone 10 and may work at cone 9 as well. This glaze has to be applied quite thin to get this color, otherwise it will comes out a deep green. My test had a hydrometer reading of 51.

Since copper carb is toxic and this one has too much copper in it to be a safe glaze for food, it should only be used on the exterior or any pots that anyone might be included to use for food.

It was snowing lightly again, this morning and at the moment it doesn't look like I'll be venturing to town. The roads look OK but our driveway is too snowy and icy, so I'll wait another day.

I've been feeding a tom cat on the front porch every day for about a week and even left food out overnight since he was making several visits a day. But two nights ago, a possum was on the porch feasting on his food, so now I'm taking it in for the night.

This morning he and Bonnie seemed to be enjoying each others company until he saw us at the window ooing and aaing on how sweet it was that they were becoming friends. I don't know if he's a feral cat or a pet who was dumped (that happens a lot around here); but in any case, he's very wary of us.

After breakfast I got another big seed and garden order written up this morning and have just three more catalogs to peruse; but I think I've ordered all that I need. This afternoon we'll be watching the Olympics while I get my veggies prepped for our roast chicken dinner.

I roast the chicken on a bed of cut up carrots, celery, onion,  apple and orange wedges (I squeeze the juice into the pan and some over the chicken), with some parsley and a small bay leaf added to the mix. I loosely fill the cavity of the seasoned bird with some of the cut up apple, a wedge of the orange which I squeeze as I put it in, a couple of cloves of garlic and a wedge of onion and a sprig of fresh thyme if I have some. Then I pour some pale dry sherry over the chicken and roast it, basting it a couple of times as it roasts. All the fruit, veggies, herbs and sherry make a lovely, simple sauce. While the finished chicken is resting, I put the pan on top of the stove and boil down the juices to thicken a bit and then strain and serve over the cut up chicken. It makes a lovely, light, tasty sauce.

Another loaf of cinnamon raisin bread

Here's the loaf of cinnamon raisin bread I made again, last night, in the new bread machine. I don't know why the raisins aren't getting evenly distributed even though I'm pristinely folowing the directions! I even hand kneaded the heavy dough a bit while it was in the machine and still wound up with way too many raisins at the bottom of the loaf. 

This new snowfall is certainly bringing even more birds to our feeding station. This morning we had 8 pairs of cardinals. That's 3 more pairs than we've ever seen at one time. I think the word has gotten out! The red bellied woodpecker was also here as well as all our regulars. I'm probably going to give them several feedings again today. It must be so hard on these little guys to maintain body temperature in this crazy weather; and I'm hoping all the extra rations and suet are helping a bit.

After feeding our domestic and wild critters, we enjoyed the cinnamon raisin toast for breakfast. After breakfast I perused a sour dough bread machine cookbook that I got through inter library loan and decided it was worth buying. I found a copy for around four dollars on ebay. That was ten dollars less than the cheapest one on Amazon.com. It does pay to shop around.

We're still working on our leftovers, so tonight I think I'll make some potatoes au gratin to go with the leftover meatloaf. The rest of the afternoon will be spent going through more seed catalogs and watching the winter Olympics and a few more outings with Bodhi before dinner.

Jim's healing is going slowly, but he is making progress. He's completely off the pain killers now and is sleeping well in the recliner now that he can move the recliner back a bit more. He's getting up and around more but I'm acting a bit like a tough  staff sergeant when he attempts to do too much. 

Alkaline green glaze test

Here's an non barium, alkaline copper green test tile from my last firing, on Phoenix, a light stoneware from Highwater, . I designed it for cone 8- 10 but this was in a section that had cone 12 starting. The expansion is pretty high which accounts for the crazing, which probably was increased due to it overfiring.

I love the color, so I'll be interested in seeing what this will do at Cone 10. I was hoping that it would be more of a turquoise; but when you have to add enough silica for cone 10, it tends to shift the alkaline to a more acidic environment which makes you lose that brighter, turquoise color.  I need to try lowering the expansion without losing the color - more testing to come!

It was an eventful morning with the sound of fire trucks coming down the road, only to realize they were at a neighbors house across the road. Unfortunately, it looks like the house was gutted. No one was home. If they were, the house might have been saved. The information I got from a friend is that it looks like it was a chimney fire; and it was only when the roof seemed to be on fire that another neighbor noticed it and called 911. I can't imagine having to deal with the devastation of coming home to fine your home and everything gone - too sad to even contemplate.

Our long driveway is covered with a new layer of snow, so we're going to stay put for a few days until these snows stop, which should be Thursday or Friday. In the mean time I'm pretending it's spring and ordering seeds, starting some seeds of cold tolerant vegetables, cooking and enjoying the Olympic events.

Dinner is already prepped, other than making a salad later, so I think I'll get another loaf of cinnamon raisin bread started. Somewhere in this huge pile of papers is the bread machine manual and recipes!                                  




 

My new copper blue glaze on a Loafers Glory test tile

Since I don't have any studio news at the moment, I thought I'd at least put some ceramic information on the blog once in a while. Here's a Cone 10 reduction copper barium test from my last soda/salt firing. The clay is Loafers Glory, a white, porcelainous type stoneware from Highwater.

I was looking for a buttery surface and this looks very promising. I'll probably use this  on small bud and ikebana vases with a white or shino liner. I got the idea of the copper and rutile percentages from an old Ruth Gowdy McKinley glaze.

Here's the formula is anyone is interested in trying it (of course be mindful that this is not a glaze for pots used for food. Barium carbonate and copper carb are toxic, so make sure you use safe studio practices when mixing, applying, etc.

June's Cone 10, Buttery BaO Copper blue #9785V2

38 Neph Sy
32 Barium Carb
17.3 OM #4 Ball clay
12.7 Silica
Add: 3% Copper carb, 6% rutile  

After lunch I started going through some of my old seeds and got a few cold weather veggies started (Cauliflower, Broccoli Raab, Cabbage, Parsley, etc.). After going through several seeds catalogs, I realize that I probably won't need to buy many more seeds, since I have plenty of just about everything.

I've got leftover turkey meatloaf for dinner, so I might use some of that kitchen time to start another loaf of cinnamon raisin bread to bake overnight if I can figure out that setting on the new bread machine!

Fettucine Alfredo ala Perry

Here's the fettuccine with Alfredo sauce, and sauteed ham, onion and mushrooms that I made for dinner.  It's one of our favorites. This is my serving. Jim's was twice as much! :-) This is definitely a heart attack special, which I don't make often; but Jim opened a nice bottle of wine to counteract all that cholesterol. We're firm believers in the French paradox. :-)

It was  a cold but gorgeous day, sunny day. Bodhi got lots of walks and Bonnie kitty spent half the day outside.  I was able to get down the snow covered driveway and into town to pick up the mail after lunch; neither store got any bird seed deliveries so I'm going to have to watch my last bag so I don't run out before I can get out again in a few days.

We're expecting another 2-4 inches of snow tonight and more snow every day for the next 3-4 days, so we'll just snuggle in for the duration with hot chocolate and lots of good leftovers, and time to continue with my spring seed buying. There are too many selections in too many catalogs and it's taking me a long time to make my choices.

Cold, but happy birds.

The local bird population at our feeding spot  has increased since I tripled their feedings. I've had my National Audobon Society bird book out, trying to identify some of them. We finally figured out that the pretty black, rust and white bird is a Rufous-sided Towhee. Who knew!

The birds have had a big breakfast and so did we. Now we're all curling up in our safe places till the next meal. Jim is napping and I'm catching up with computer work before I start searching for my turkey meatloaf recipe.

With another inch of snow overnight, cold temperatures, and slippery roads, I figured that this is a good night for a comfort meal of turkey meatloaf and mashed potatoes, and watching some of the winter Olympics events.

Yesterday I was able to get to the village and pick up a few necessary groceries. I was hoping to get another large bag of bird feed but everyone was out. Fortunately I have a back up bag which should last till I can get to town again. It was nice to see that our neighbors are also giving extra rations to the the birds during this cold, snowy spell.

My other chore of the day is to continue going through these garden catalogs and get the rest of my spring seeds ordered.

Latest no knead sourdough

It snowed all day yesterday. Fortunately it was never very heavy so we only wound up with about 3 or 4 inches. It was a good day to bake a loaf of my no knead sourdough and drink hot chocolate for lunch.

The neurosurgeon has to perform emergency surgery, so Jim's appointment was canceled, which is just as well with this weather. Jim's doing much  better. In fact, he's now able to lower his recliner chair a bit more. I'm amazed that he's been able to sleep as well as he has while almost, sitting up!

It's going to take another 4 -5 weeks of healing; but at this point I think he's leaning to not even going to the neuro surgeon. The surgeon saw the MRI's and wasn't in a great rush to see him, so we're assuming that he probably agrees with our doctor and the radiologist that since the fractured vertebrae are not compressed, 8 weeks of rest should heal the fractures without invasive surgery.

 So much is on hold right now, including studio time. Hopefully by next week I'll get through the piles of mail and seed catalogs and order the rest of my spring seeds.

Cinnamon raisin bread

Here's the cinnamon raisin bread from my new bread machine. It rises a bit more on the left, so I'll have to manually re-arrange the dough at the first rise next time; but pretty is as pretty does and the bread was great!

Today was a running around, doing chores day - post office, drive to Burnesville for my osteo treatment, then a shopping stop for groceries and  to pick up another prescription for  this sinusitis that's been plaguing me for almost 2 months.. I may be allergic to Bonnie Kitty; but I sure hope that isn't the case!

By the time I got home, unloaded and put away another huge load of groceries, walked Bodhi, fed kitty as well as giving the birds as second feeding, it was time to get dinner started. Fortunately tonight's dinner was leftover gumbo and hot fudge sundaes (a mini one for me!). Now I'll finish emails, take care of my Facebook farm, go through a couple of the newly arrived seed catalogues, watch some TV at the same time, give Bodhi and Bonnie some play time and finish the evening with yoga and meditation.

I was so happy that the bad weather held off till I got home. We've snuggled in with a full fridge and freezer, so let the snow and sleet come if it wants!

Experimenting with a new cookbook

I just came in from feeding the birds. Right now it's sleeting on top fo the couple of inches of snows that we got overnight. It's fierce out there! It's going to be a dismal  day with this sleet  followed by freezing rain, turning to ice. I'll be happy to stay warm and cozy in front of the fireplace the rest of the day, working on my laptop or in the warm kitchen, cooking..

Last night I decided to make one of the pasta recipes from my new cookbook ""Great Women Chefs". It was a rigatoni with sausage, mushrooms, peas and onion and a sauce made from tomatoes, 1/2 and 1/2, ricotta and parmesan. It was tasty but a little bland even though I added some pepperonici. If I make it again I'll use a small ziti, because I think the rigatoni is a bit heavy for such a light sauce, and I'll also add a bit of garlic and cut back on the amount of pasta so there's a hair more sauce.

After breakfast I have to spend a lot of time cleaning up my Verizon software. Overnight, they  mixed up all my emails and put everything in my "deleted" folder. What a mess! So now I have to go through hundreds of emails and determine which ones are truly deleted and not part of current or saved emails. Aren't computers fun!

Another no knead bread

Here's a no knead bread from a couple of days ago. I've been doing a longer rise (15 hr proofing, plus 2 more hours for the second rise). This is Jim's favorite so far, so it's the one I bake regularly. Hopefully I'll find some more good recipes in my new Bread Machine cookbook. It has 300 recipes so there have to be some treasures in there!

Today is my shopping day. I'll wait till this afternoon to make sure the roads aren't icy since I have a 25 minute drive to get to a large grocery store.

We've got a few days of bad weather coming in two days, so I'm going to do some stocking up on some groceries and other things. Jim suggested I should just bring home some take out Chinese food - good idea! After a big shopping day, by the time I get home, put away groceries, feed kitty, etc. I don't think I'd feel like cooking.

I didn't make the cinnamon raisin bread last night  because the bread machine recipe I have calls for powdered milk, which I don't have and neither does out small, in town, grocery store.. That's one more thing to add to my already very long,  grocery list.

Brioche

Here's the brioche I made in my new, Kojirushi bread machine. With Jim recuperating and my being housebound for the next several weeks, I'm using this time to expand my bread making repertoire. I think I'll make a cinnamon raisin bread after dinner. Yesterday I got my bread machine cookbook. It has 300 recipes. That will keep me busy for a while!

I've also used this time to get all my sourdough starters re-vitalized. For a while there I thought I'd have to buy a couple of new starters because I hadn't used two of them for a few months; but after a day or two I was able to revive them. Now I just have to remember to keep feeding them  regularly!

It's a rainy, slush, dreary day out there. If I didn't have studio plants to water or a dog to walk, I'd be spending all day indoors with the fireplace on. Kitty Bonnie stuck her nose out the door and decided this was not a day to play outdoors. Smart kitty!

This has been a good day for some paper work.. I completed my first seed order of the season and still have a lot more catalogs to go through. I was happy to find annual artichoke seeds that will fruit the same season. It's too cold here to winter them over (I've tried before and it hasn't worked). This year I piled a  lot of straw around the plant; but I'm not holding my breath. Next month I'll start the annual seeds and hopefully we'll get a crop of artichokes this summer.  Italian style, stuffed artichokes are one of my favorite dishes.