Projects

There's always some sort of project going on here! The weekend was pretty darn productive ... yard saling, plant swapping, beer bottling, beer brewing and of course beer drinking to round all that out :)

The mead is still bubbling during fermentation, it will be ready to rack pretty soon (transfer to smaller fermenter before bottling). I did make a Belgian Tripel this weekend, tweaking the recipe a little bit to use local honey - should be delicious! Except it is supposed to sit in bottles for 6-12 months to be at it's tastiest (we'll just see how long I can wait :) No pics of any of that, so sharing some pics from our Monday.
It was muggy and overcast today, nice for being in the garden to love on the plants. Salad greens are making their way
Peanuts I'm finding are pretty fun to grow, they sure sprout up quick!
The Playmobil castle from a yard sale this weekend - we've got to put this together so I can get it up on ebay. It's just about a zillion teensy pieces, though, so not exactly motivating! I did have it about 1/2 way built, but the kids came and reaked havoc (hence the police helicopter and ambulance arriving on the scene):
Reed and his friend deconstructed a toy cell phone and are now making some pretty funky art projects with it
My sweet friend Shonna came over and was convinced (twisted her arm only slightly) to stay for ginger-pear upside-down cake!

It was super delish! If anyone wants to make this special treat, here's my version of the recipe from Jeanne Lemlin's "Simple Vegetarian Pleasures" book (one of my FAVE cookbooks):
CARAMELIZED PEAR AND GINGER UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
3-4 Tablespoons finely diced candied (crystallized) ginger
3 firm but ripe Boc pears, peeled, cored and thickly sliced
The cake:
4 Tbs. unsalted buter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
1-1/4 cups flour (I mix whole wheat flour with a little white)
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup milk

1. Heat oven to 350. Put 4 Tbs butter in a round 9-in cake pan and put it in the heating oven to melt (but watch so it doesn't brown). Once melted, swirl it around, so it can get up on the sides of the pan. Stir in the brown sugar and spread around bottom of cake pan.
2. Sprinkly candied ginger evenly in pan, and arrange the pear slices on top of those to fill the bottom of the pan.
3. Mix all cake ingredients one by one in your mixer until very smooth.
4. Scrape batter over pears and smooth the top out.
5. Bake for 45-55 minutes until knife comes out clean from cake part. This may overflow with juices, so best to have a baking sheet on the next oven rack below the baking cake.
6. When good and deep golden brown, remove from oven and loosen edges with a knife. Place serving plate over cake, and carefully invert (tapping the bottom of the cake pan helps it come out nicely). Serve with whipped cream if you like!

I have no pics of Clay today, he did the last day of homeschool co-op this morning. He's been on the computer alot this afternoon, listening to AC/DC as well as not so classic music like this (i have no idea if this is from a tv show or something, but all the kids around here freakin love it!):


haha! that link's not really for the grown-ups, more for your kids to enjoy and for you to have stuck in your head the rest of the day (you're welcome.)