I'm improving, very slightly

"Riveríní, my bread is exploding." The last words out of my mouth. And I'm not kidding. I made ciabatta and it's expanded about 4 times the size it was. I have enough bread for about 12 people or something. It covers a 30cm x 60cm baking tray and is about 5 cm high. And it's still getting bigger. I don't know what I did wrong. Oh well. Hopefully it tastes nice anyway.

I don't have much other news. I made nice butternut squash last night. And I think I've realised that my digestive system isn't the fondest of eggs. I also made some oat croquette type things, but they turned out quite dry. It didn't help that I forgot to make the sauce that went with them - and I had the ingredients and everything.

The ciabatta's out of the oven now. It got a little toasty on top. I think my oven runs hot. I should get an oven thermometer thing so I can check it. Right so. Here's some foody pictures from over the holidays.




calzone - looking at it makes me want to make another


m+s style cookies - so moreish


last night's dinner


ciabatta monster

International Date Line Funnies

My dress is on the way :) (not sure if I mentioned this already...) It's coming from Hong Kong and went through Korea. It left Korea at midnight tonight (this dress is from the future - how cool is that) and it arrived in Alaska at midday today. Somewhere out there in the swirls and spirals of time is my dress - stuck between now and yet to come. It's all very cool, and all because of the date line.

Christmas dinner is a go today. At last. I think it's going to be wonderful... maybe even worth the wait. I browned the chicken in a pot first, then browned the veggies in the same pot after, then put them all in a lidded dish and put the lid on tight. The smell from the pot after doing the veggies in the chicken juice was so good. I can't smell anything more with the mad seal on the dish in the oven right now, but I'm pretty excited.

I made breadsticks last night. They turned out quite like Italian breadsticks, which I wasn't expecting. They are a little too salty, though. I keep forgetting the salt I use (traditionally dried sea salt) is much saltier than normal salt. Making the dough was a bit mad. It starts out really sticky and you're meant to knead it like a mad thing until it's not sticky anymore. I kneaded it for 20 minutes and it was still sticky. So I just put it to rise and while it was kinda hard to work with (form into little lines) I don't think there was much else I could have done.

I don't have any other news, really.

I have no clue what the world is trying to tell me

As you know, if you've been reading over the last week or two, I've been mad cooking lately. I was really excited about making Christmas dinner - nothing fancy... mini chicken with spuds and carrots and gravy made from the juices of the bird. Simple and yummy. Roll around christmas afternoon when I go to start dinner and I find, to my great disgust, that the bird isn't defrosted yet. It was 24 hours in the fridge and it looked as if it just came out of the freezer. Obviously, I had no other plans. Who plans for a contingency dinner on Christmas day (I will in future, that's for certain). Fearing the worst, but slightly hopeful, we left River and headed out into the great metropolis, looking for somewhere that would feed us. And did we find anything... of course not. lordkilljoy ended up having a fast food burger and I waited until we got home and heated up some leftover calzone (which was yummy, but that's beside the point).

Christmas dinner was put off until today, but you know what... the chicken still isn't defrosted. Oh my god, like. What is this? Antarctic bird or something. Come on. It's about 1/3 the size of a normal chicken. It should have been defrosted yesterday. So again, we are left with nothing to eat. At least today places will be open. Sigh. Christmas dinner take 3 will be happening tomorrow. Tune in then.

Decadent, Delicious, Divine

I'm making chocolate chip cookies for christmas - Marks and Spencer style ones (based on Alton Brown's recipe "The Chewy"). And they seem absolutely amazing. There is half a bowl of sugar in there, three big bars of artisan chocolate, flour, vanilla, and a bunch of other lovely stuff. The dough is chilling right now.

Also chilling in the frige right now is pizza dough. It's been in there for a day, rising away to itself. I made the yeast yesterday - put it in a bowl with warm water. For a while it wasn't doing anything, then I added sugar and immediately it started to blossom. It was amazing. I jumped up in excitement - I'd made something come to life. Brilliant stuff.

I'm making little brownie type things too. And we have ice cream. This christmas is going to be brilliant :)

Ready for Christmas

Length of Day: 9h 56m
Tomorrow will be 7s longer.

:)

No dinner post today. We went out last night. To The Cheesecake Factory. It was amazing. We had brownie cheesecake. It was yummy.

We did it in aid of me not getting a dough mixing device. I was so excited. I'd found one in a shop nearby that was way cheaper than you could get them even on amazon. So we rushed over when lordkilljoy came home from work and I was all excited handing the till person the product code. And then they came back saying they had already sold the last one. And I was a sad, sad kitten. So we got yummy dinner and amazing desert to cheer me up. And it worked. It still means I have to mix the Marks and Spencer (hopefully) style cookies I'm making by hand, which means sore arms after a few minutes, but whatever. The biscuits should turn out nice anyway.

Right so. Will try to update over Christmas, but I might not get time. Dinner highlights will include homemade calzone and (possibly) grilled cornish hen. I'm feeling a bit of trepidation about the recipe I've chosen, simply because grilling a chicken (even a tiny one) seems like an odd idea to me. I might just use the essence of the recipe (how to make gravy from jus, etc) and just roast the chicken anyway. I've no plans for stuffing :( but we'll see what happens.

Anyone bored of dinner posts yet?

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate cutting onions? They really affect me for some reason. The gas gets right into my eyes and stings and dries in equal proportions until tears are streaming down my face. So I read that lighting a candle can burn away the gas, and decided to try it last night. I was chopping shallots, which seem to be worse than normal onions, and at one stage I had all the onions gathered around the candle and lordkilljoy comes over and proclaims "hobo onions." The did resemble that - and they looked kind of cute too - two were resting against each other like lovers cuddling.



Anyway - cute an all as it was. Having a candle burning does not help with burning off gases. All it does is make a fire hazard in the kitchen (as later demonstrated by me when I set some kitchen towel on fire by accident). So yea. That was misadventure in cooking #1 last night. Misadventure #2 occurred soon after when I opened the pack of grape tomatoes (like cherry tomatoes, only more oblong). A happy little tomato looked up at me, covered in mould. Now, a lot of cooking following a recipe means that the times are set out exactly and you don't have time to run to the shop, or else at least one part (if not more) of the dish will be slightly (if not more) ruined. So I grabbed the tomatoes and picked out all the mouldy ones, while putting all the good ones aside to be thoroughly washed. Armed with hot water and an inkling that I'd read somewhere that food mould won't make you sick, I powered ahead with the dish and it turned out lovely in the end. And neither of us got sick. Yeay.


Pasta, grape tomatoes, courgette, shallots, capers and goats cheese. You would not believe how excited I was to be able to grate cheese onto my pasta. You can't go wrong with cheese and pasta.

Winter Sosltice

Happy shortest day of the year, everyone!

It's River's birthday today - she's 2. How cute.

Last night's dinner was a bit of a flop. It seems that I can't, for the life of me, add an egg to soup. It just turns to some kind of dense, opaque lumpiness. lordkilljoy didn't even finish it last night. Ah well. I'll keep trying.


(I hid the soup under the noodles, which is why the photo doesn't look too bad)

We're having pasta with some kind of nice sauce tonight. I'm also thinking of making little tarts for christmas. Not like mince pies, but maybe some kind of pretty apple tarty type things. Not sure. I went out for lunch with some of the girls today and they were all talking about making nice things. So I felt like making nice things too.

So, I'd heard of this street that goes mad every christmas with lights and music and stuff. We visited it last night and it is just a little crazy. Every building was covered with lights - most very gaudy, but some actually a little nice. The houses around us are way more tastefully done. The houses around us are actually quite lovely - I wandered around one evening just looking at them all.

I don't have much other news. River's just locked herself in the bathroom like a silly head.

More dinners

I'm quite proud of the dinners I've made over the past week. There were one or two I wouldn't be bothered making again - not that they were bad, just that they were a little too far from my palate's comfort zone. Friday night was a light chili made with pork and tomatillos (with are tomatoes that taste more like apples. not bad, but a little odd. i had to get them in the shop and i didn't even know what section to get them in or even what they looked like). It was one of the dishes that was only okay.

Yesterday we went out for dinner (Thai - it was lovely). And today I made Chicken Pot Pie (2 individual ones). It was delicious, even if I did totally miss that the receipe called for cream and I didn't have any, and that I didn't reduce the sauce enough. And making the pie topping was so much fun. I've never made pie dough before and it turned out really well. There was a tiny bit left over and I ate it warm with some jam - so delicious.

I was cooking for 3 and a half hours (even if the best part of one hour was chilling the pie dough). It was worth it though - it turned out so lovely.

We went out last night (as I already mentioned) with two of Liam's work friends. Niall came back to the house for a while and River went mental. She barked and growled and was altogether a very unpleasant dog. She did settled down eventually, giving a little grown each time Niall moved around, but then, at one stage she was lying under Naill's legs and when he moved he hit her (being totally unaware that she was there). She turned on him and nipped his leg. I'm so disappointed in her and last night before bed all I could think was that we'll have to put her down. That led to awful dreams of her and me being in a accident and she was covered in cuts and broken bones.
But I really don't know what to do with her. She does have a fear-based vicious streak in her, and now I'm extra scared of having her around strangers. I wonder now is this why her old family gave her up and what did they do to make her this way.

Anyway.

Healthy Sloppy Joes

Tonight's dinner was Sloppy Joe-matoes. It came from the healthy meals cook book and involved quorn and heirloom tomatoes. It was yummy. Here's a photo :)

Dinners

Ooh god, it's miserable again today. Half one in the afternoon and I need a light on to see my keyboard. Dinner last night was a success, even though the egg went a bit weird. I made Wagamama's Chicken Tama Rice. It was so delicious - lordkilljoy ate all of his, then finished off my rice. So it was yummy out, but it looked weird. You're meant to add a beaten egg to the sauce right at the end (the sauce is clear up to this point) and when I threw in the egg it went all thick and opaque. Anyway - tonight is poached tilapia with Spanish rice. It should be yummy too. I hope lordkilljoy doesn't mind rice two nights in a row. It's my favourite staple - I could eat rice for dinner every day (though I do get a tiny bit bored of it after 2 months, as I found out in Asia).

Tomorrow is possible break from cooking night (because we are going to the cinema with a bunch of people, and not at all sure what's happening about dinner). Thursday will be healthy night and Friday is crockpot night. It's so exciting. I figure Saturday will be going out night and Sunday might be roast, depending on how much energy I have / how much of a mess I feel like cleaning up. Though the mini chicken (technically cornish hen) we had thanksgiving was yummy.

I don't have much else news, I think. I really need a new food icon.

Weather + Food = Routine

Yesterday I wore jeans, a light t-shirt and sandals. Today I'm wearing three layers and socks. The weather here is a bit mixed up. I think phoenix people (phoenicians?) don't like the rain. Usually of a morning walking river, we'd meet loads of people out walking with, or without, their dogs. Today we met one person. I think all the people who stayed at home were right. River got saturated and dirty and I had to give her a bath when we got home. I carried her across the carpet into the bath, because I'm paranoid about this mad deep-pile carpet getting dirty.

The walk was nice, in a very Irish way. The day was pretty soft - overcast and drizzly. So picture any typical rainy day in autumn or spring or summer and there you go. Not winter, because it wasn't cold enough. It was just the kind of miserable that you need a coat to keep the rain off, but it's so humid and just warm enough that you end up feeling rotten 5 minutes into the walk. Anyway - it was lovely for a change, but I hope it's sunny again tomorrow. Ooh, the weather is giving thunder for tomorrow - how exciting. River and I might have to find some indoor activity...

I don't think I have much other news. I'm going to try making weekly menus from now on - make something from a different cookbook each day. I was thinking of starting with Wagamama today. I got out some chicken, but I haven't decided what to do with it yet. I think each Sunday afternoon will be put aside for perusing the growing number of cookbooks I have and selecting dishes for the week and making out a shopping list. Sure we'll see how it goes. I'm just sick of Liam coming home and we deliberating for ages about what we'll have. Begin operation: let's get some routine going.

Right so. I'm off, then.

Today

River and I went out for a cycle this morning. It was fun, but she doesn't pull her weight, so it's like going uphill the whole way. I was somewhat tired after 15 minutes. It took me ages to get my bike ready this morning, though. The mover guys had turned the handlebars sideways and it was a little hard to get them back right again (especially because I had the wheel backwards the first time and had to do it again).

River's barking has gotten really out of control since we moved. A lot of trucks and cars go by on the road outside (it's the main way into the estate - thank god we aren't facing the main road) and she barks at every one. She barks at dogs walking outside the window and dogs barking in other apartments. She's even taken to barking for attention. It had to stop. So yesterday I resorted to negative reinforcement. And it's working really well. Every time she barks I say no and tap her on the nose. Not only does she stop barking right away, but the amount of barking has lessened in the one day I've been trying it. So I' happy for that, but sad that it had to come to this. I tried all the positive reinforcement (treats for being quiet, etc) I could think of, but that just seemed to make her worse. I also don't think she's getting enough sleep. She's not relaxing at all. She's been getting about 8 hours sleep in the night time and not napping during the day as she usually does. I was making dinner this morning (stew) and her head was nodding as she sat beside me. The poor thing is wrecked. So I think the sleep deprivation is making her anxious too.

I don't have much else news. We ordered my dress last night. There's no way we could afford one in a shop so I ordered it online from a company in China who tailor the dress to your measurements. I'm really excited about it, but I really hope the company isn't bogus and that the dress makes it here. Well, it has until the end of January to arrive, so we'll see then.

I think that's all my news. Did I mention I got a new keyboard? It's a microsoft Arc and I really like it. It's small and fits my hands perfectly. The only problem is that I keep hitting enter instead of apostrophe. That will take a little getting used to, but I will eventually.

Right. I have to finish tidying away the last of our stuff. The things left are the things I haven't a clue where to put (that sentence was badly worded, but you get the idea surely). Here goes... I might have a little biscuit before I start for motivation. Oooh - actually. I saw these dog biscuits in Costco and they look delicious. The ingredients are like oats, honey eggs, and other stuff that I'd actually use to bake biscuits. But I couldn't just bring myself to eat something that was labelled for dogs. That would be a step over the line from being eccentric to being downright weird. So we didn't buy them. Even though, clearly, I'm still thinking about them :(

Anyway. later.

Things of small note

All our stuff arrived today. The apartment is an absolute mess and it's only now, with all our stuff here, that I realise this apartment is smaller than our last one - and that one was full to the brim with stuff, so I have no idea where we are going to put things. Our little tree arrived in the shipment too, so I put the baubles on it and plugged it in. It's so cute, but it needs some more colour. I might buy some tinsel for it.

Ooh, I put up fairy lights in the kitchen. It looks wonderful now, and I don't have to deal with the awful buzz of a fluorescent light. I also cooked here for the first time last night. It went well enough. I'll have to remember never to turn the coils up higher than half way, because they seem to cook just fine at that heat. Anything higher just makes for burn and mess.

I don't really have much other news. Wedding stuff is coming along. With 5 months to go I'm so glad we managed to get anything at all.

I don't really have any other news. right so. bye.

Arizona

So we made it to Phoenix in one piece (or three pieces). The drive was quite amazing. There was a mad cold front forecast for the day of our road trip and we were a bit anxious about getting out of the mountains in time. The only sign of things to come in New Mexico was extreme winds. But just a little while after we crossed into Arizona it started snowing. It was nothing major - a little flurry that lasted about 10 minutes. For the next hour or so, though, it looked like we were driving through winter. I mean, it kind of is winter by now, but snow doesn't usually happen until January or something. Anyway. So we drove through snowy roads for about an hour after than, and then we started to come down from the high desert. Arizona low desert is hilarious. Saguaro cactus is the funniest thing ever. It's like the plant doesn't know when to stop growing. There are arms jutting from the trunk and main branches all over the place.
Yea. So, the drive was about 8 hours. It went by really fast, though. We played a game of licence spotting. And we got 28 or something. The farthest away were maine, ontario and new york. The countryside is amazing, and we went the scenic route to make the most of it. It got a bit warmer as we came down from the high country, but not by much. There's a mad cold spell hitting this part of the country this weekend and temps have really fallen - from 20-something down to 14ish. Anyway; it's still a lot warmer than Albuquerque (which was set to get to -17 this weekend).

We went to Ikea today :) That was so much fun. I tried to curtail myself, and I only got about half the stuff I wanted. We still managed to spend over $150, though. Most of that was on new bedsheets. Oooh, our new apartment is quite nice. It's way nicer than the old place, but the kitchen is even darker than the old one (or well - there's less light getting to it, but the decor is way lighter, so in the end it probably works out about the same amount of light happening). The place is much more tastefully furnished (I had furnitured written. sigh). What's really weird, though, is carpet in the bathroom. What sort of mental person puts carpet in a bathroom? Apart from being kind of disgusting, it's highly impractical.
And. oh god, we don't have a gas cooker. We don't even have a ceramic hob. We have an ancient metal coil stove thing. It's appalling. I tried to cook porridge this morning and it just boiled all over the place. I was almost in tears. I love cooking, but working with something as torturous as this cooker thing just makes it a hassle.

We went exploring a bit today. Phoenix is totally a proper American city. There is so much here. It reminds me of Texas with how many shops and restaurants there are. We went to Famous Dave's today (we first heard of him from a tv show - best in smoke) which is a barbecue place and I'm still stuffed.

I don't really know what else to say. I know there's been loads happening, but I think I got the main parts anyway.

Right so. Byeeeeee.