Yum!

I made a recipe I found on Pinterest and it looked like its picture! And tasted great! Cheated with a premade crust, though.

inspiration

short version

A la Pintester, I present this pink lemonade bar from a recipe I found on Pinterest. The original photo made it seem like it would be way thicker! Also, my powdered sugar keeps sinking in. Now that I look again, I see it's a super close-up shot. There's a spoon in my picture for a bit of scale. The crust is very crumbly, but that may well be because I threw on all the ingredients at once, rather than creaming butter and sugar together first. I'm on the fence: crumbly crust, too sticky to eat with fingers, but maybe those flaws are my fault and I need to try again before declaring it a bust?

Won't Post to Pinterest!

Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.

Spring Still Life

A bouquet of current-bloomers, some macaroon-type cookies off of Pinterest that I wanted to make look like those nest confections, and the slightly absurd bunny (a housewarming gift from the teachers' society next door).

An Old Family Recipe

(Which is odd, because we're not a very old family)

Cookie Cutter Cookies

½ cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
½ teaspoon vanilla
½ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 cups flour

Cream the butter and sugar. Blend in the egg and vanilla. Sift the dry ingredients together and stir into butter-sugar-egg mixture with a wooden spoon.

Chill dough.

Using about ⅓ of the dough at a time, roll on a lightly floured surface ⅛ inch thick (can be thinner if using plain cookie cutters). Flour solid cookie cutters before using. Re-chill scraps.

Bake on lightly greased cookie sheet in (preheated) 400 degree oven for 8 - 10 minutes.

50/52

Triple Threat

Skull Appreciation and submission for Cake Wrecks party and a little gel icing heart. (Does Cake Mate see a jump in sales in each town Jen visits on book tour? After a failed attempt at a tiny homemade bit of frosting, I had to rush out an buy different colors than the lone green I found in the pantry.)

Idea 174: Work only with kitchen tools. A Found heart, rather than a created one, to be sure.

Burger Time!

Processed foods + home grown cukes, dill, tomato.

After taking the picture for Phil's Picassostache, I played with my food for my weekly creativity. I think food is the medium for many of my hearts.

A bit of a curly heart (am I pushing it if I call it art nouveau?) out of the mixer cord. Also, a birthday cake for Phil.

Happy Valentine's Day!




Shortbread hearts, dipped in chocolate.

Buttermilk Biscuits

I Am a Packrat

Sheree e-mailed in response to my comment on her blog to ask if I had a book from my childhood. Here's the proof! I recommend the Tutti-Frutti-ice Sparkle, Perfect French toast, and Raisin-oatmeal cookies.

As for jello salads and presenting food on lettuce, I refer you all to Mr. Lileks and the Gallery of Regrettable Food (I own the book; it was Dan who threw a party based on it). For a delightful popular history work that has lots to say about the role of iceberg lettuce and molded salads in American foodways, I recommend Fashionable Food (now, that's a volume that I own but can't seem to find).

In other news, despite my lingering cold, we did slip out for just an hour to participate in the Great Backyard Bird Count. We saw 15 different species in and near Fountain Lake. In our own yard, in a period of an hour and a half, we had:

• carolina wren 1
• house sparrow 7
• junco 12
• mourning dove 2
• white-throated sparrow 1

The count continues tomorrow.

Reading: The Parable of the Sower, Octavia Butler
On the Muzak at Target: actually, it may have been coming from something on display in electronics -- "Blister in the Sun."

Cubicle Makeovers! Cookery!

Hints for cube makeovers in this cool-looking book. I like my library cubicle since I am by a window and since the walls are . . . . hunh. Not the usual beige or gray -- I think in the blue-green family. My GS office cubicle was quite terrible (except for cool cube-mates).

I am such a library nerd that I named my MSWord folder for recipes "cookery." Yet, when I go looking for tasty dishes I've typed up, I can never find it. Anyway. Here's a nice online exhibit of cookbooks, 1541 - 1931 (Kansas State U.).


Capital City weather: rainy, windy, 30s

Fruit Spritz Cookies

Bake at 375 for 10 minutes
Makes about 10 dozen cookies

4 ½ cups sifted regular flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
dash of salt
1 ½ cups butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
2 tablespoons thawed frozen orange juice concentrate

Sift flour, baking powder and salt.

In another (large) bowl, cream butter with sugar until fluffy light; beat in egg and juice concentrate.

Stir in flour mixture, a quarter at a time, blending to make a stiff dough [my stand mixer isn’t big enough to cope with this much dough; I blend the last quarter or so by hand].

Use cookie press to make cookies; space about an inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Decorate with colored sugar, nonpareils, etc. Bake at 375 until firm but not brown, about 10 minutes. Remove from cookie sheet to wire racks to cool.