Spring break projects

A week at the farm and man, we made a lot of stuff. Messes, mostly, but some edibles, some drinkables, some flammables and stinkables (I'm looking at you, Phrodaux's kimchi).

How can people eat something that smells like a dead body???

Also, discoveries were made. Exhibit A: Mo discovers DEER. Exhibit B: Phrodaux & FQ discover that unlike the late great Odin and the currently great Anubis, Mo cares not one bit about pleasing us, and not much about food. The call of "Treat" would send Nubie sprinting a mile over hot coals. Mo just keeps pursuing creatures he will never ever catch, while all the humans in range run after him, yelling, calling, occasionally falling. Good times, in a low-rent circus kind of way. We may need the military school equivalent of puppy class.

Another discovery, a much more pleasant one. The cookbook Jerusalem by Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi is mind-blowingly amazing. The recipes seem complex but are completely manageable, even in my packed to the brim/no counter space farm kitchen. The seafood stew even looked like the picture (go get the book & compare!). Oops, we forgot the Pernod at home and had to use Absinthe. So, great stew AND green fairy dreams.

Fennel + clams, mussels, halibut, shrimp, mmmmm.

The spice cookies were a breeze, and contained all possible good flavors: spices, chocolate, currants, lemon, crystallized ginger.

Best of all, though, was the chocolate krantz cake. Yes, it takes two days and the recipe covers four pages (2 of them photographs of the whole assembly procedure). No, I have no photos - too caught up in the epic process of this thing. But go to Google and search for images of jerusalem cookbook chocolate krantz cake. Yes yes yes it looks like that and it is the best thing I've baked in a long time.

I'm sure there were non-food projects, hmm. Oh, how about this one:

Ugly pink light fixture that makes everything look drab OUT, new schmancy one from Schoolhouse Electric in. We love that place for a thousand reasons: products, aesthetics, nice people, gorgeous old building, fantastic coffee stand. But most of all, we know a secret that they apparently do not yet know. They sometimes put items out on the floor marked Not For Sale. Pish posh, Phrodaux & the Fairy Queen know that eventually they will sell these items, to us. First case in point: Perfect cabinet for our gorgeous bathroom (the after post).

Second case in point: Phrodaux's speed bag, which I keep calling the boxing thing. The guest bedroom is getting a weird vibe, but whatever. You can still come stay with us. And if you feel aggressive, well, there you go. The thing about those boxing gloves...I gave those to Phrodaux for xmas, because I KNEW (he knew, we all knew, but Schoolhouse Electric didn't yet know) that the speed bag would soon be for sale. Oh, when will they listen to us? That bright red mid-century modern credenza thing? MINE. I see your NOT FOR SALE tag and say to you: Read the blog, silly. I know how this turns out.

Ahem. This is way too long and I haven't gotten to the gin yet, or the precarious transport of a 30' pine log through brushy terrain via one ancient riding mower, two trailers, two humans, and sheer cussedness. Or the Buena Vista ferry or the daffodil festival or the new raised beds or the brontosaurus. We pack it in, people. AND nap everyday.

Back to "work" tomorrow, sigh. But more plans are afoot. Check back for news of a pinball machine, a steel bottle tree, and what we eventually put in those new raised beds. Thoughts? Nominations? How patient do you feel, because I am thinking asparagus.