A Skylight, A Recipe for Rice Pudding, Carol's Thoughts on Knitting

Husband disapproves of blog posts that have more than one topical area as he thinks writing should be "on topic." When he reads this post, it will be understood that he again thinks I've gone a ramblin'.

Getting on with it, here is a picture snapped yesterday of one of the Tile Meister maestros performing his job of setting in a skylight in our relatively dark kitchen area; he had to go up twelve feet from the top of the ceiling through an attic area and onto the roof to get the job done.  Yay for him and great that we now have God's own natural light coming into our work area. 

Today's work in this new sunlight should be completed by 10 AM at the latest, to include this recipe (rice pudding with oranges) and this recipe (pumpkin snack cake).  I must return containers once filled with tasty, very much appreciated foods supplied by friends (apple and pumpkin pie and homemade chicken soup), so why not go ahead and make some foods that my tummy can handle as well? Brilliant. (oh, and no sleep last night because of steroids and I forgot about that insomnia issue until it was too late to take a sleeping pill). Not Brilliant. Latest bone scan this week showed progression of lesions on ribs and spine, uptake of dye inside the skull.

Treat yourself to some Trick or Treat Candy; I'll turn on the coffee!

Thoughts on Knitting (Guest writer is Carol Weber from New York). Carol wrote this a few weeks ago, and it has such a fall flair, an autumnal air, that I wanted to share it.  Carol went to the now Very Famous Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival in September.  At this event, many knitters spend more time and probably even more angst creating just the "right" sweater to wear to this weekend event.  (I would love to just go there and take pictures of the knitters showing their creations.) But I digress, and on with Carol's notes:

Hi Nancy, I wish I could have packaged up today to send it to you, to cheer you through these dark hours. My two knitting friends and I were at the sheep and wool festival. A heavy duty day of yarn shopping, punctuated by some muffins and cider, with a bright blue October sky above. The best part was meeting so many fiber folk, most of them dressed in their beautiful Rhinebeck sweaters that have been months in the making. 

...I was so excited to read that Mary Lou was going to be there at Rhinebeck that I went straight to her table when we arrived. And right next to her were Ann and Kay from Mason Dixon Knitting! I felt like a complete groupie. I got to tell them in person that it was their first book that got me back into knitting after a long dry spell. Blog land is certainly an amazing place!

And in a prior email... 

The best part of the day for me was meeting Mary Lou Egan of Yarnerinas. She's the only person I know who's actually met Jean Miles,; we had a nice chat. She is delightful. Mary Lou and her friends have a new book out, Drop Dead Easy Knits. I bought us each a copy.

Carol, please know I have looked through the book many times, and like I told you, the striped socks on size 5 needles are in the queue!

This is my newest screen saver, and I wish I had the nerve to pull it out when someone starts whining about ANYTHING.  Maybe I just will do that.  A few manor staff and residents will like this, Julie and Louise and April and Cindy for sure.  I'll record their reactions when I go in this morning.  I have missed being at the manor more than a few days this week due to health issues due to radiation of the pelvis. Enough said.

Chin up, dahlings!  

What Happened this Week

Best new recipe tried this week: Lemon Ice Box Cake  by 12Tomatoes to be served at RCIA tonight

source



Finished Projects: A Line Vintage Dress (modified pattern) and Yard Clean Up ( trees, boxes, rose bush limbs) in time for city-wide trash pick up, likely today

source is our front sidewalk



Frustrations: Julie has been in bed two weeks; sewing machine tension is off, making sewing almost unacceptable; Julie does not keep her new phone charged

Successes: Julie was in wheelchair and playing cards in the manor activity room with only minor headaches Sunday and yesterday; Pfaff sewing machine taken to be fixed at the repair shop; went fishing today and we caught our limit of trout! Geese were present

Happiness Derived from Material Goods: New Merlot Leather Lazy Boy Recliner delivered yesterday so Gene and I now have Edith and Archie Bunker chairs

source

 

Blooming:  Iris in front

144 seeds planted on April : progress of sprouting as of April 14. half are up:

Electronic Update: The Fire was knocked off Julie's bedside table on Sunday night and is broken beyond repair; new phone for Julie is working (but hardly ever charged when I need to call her)

Trying to learn how to use Jack's Camera (macro lens):

actual size: a 50 cent piece

 

Ollie the Owl: still here, seen most often at dawn and then again about 10 AM daily

Reading: Almost finished another Rosamund Pilcher's Winter Solstice, and Pain in the Tuchis

So what is up in your neck of the woods?

April Begins

Feeling better this week, thank you very much.  And thank you for comments and prayers.  Sandra, I empathize and sympathize with you for not allowing yourself to be caught up in time consuming efforts at the expense of not getting done what you need to accomplish. Thank you for your email.

Favorite recipe last week from Lee Drummond, Pioneer Woman, for Sunshine Muffins.  Pretty good, a happy yellow muffin with marmalade. Recipe here.  My old stand by recipe is quicker, but not quite as tasty. Gene made beans with ham and a tasty casserole last week, good for taking to the manor.

On April 1, I planted 144 seeds in plastic seed starters for yellow and red cosmos to go into our newly expanding Flower Bed, seen here two years ago when the Delancey Cardigan was knit up.  It will be increased in size by 100 %, to about 10 feet by 4 feet.

Received a dozen 5"x7" gessoed panels to paint from saved pins on Pinterest.  Amazon also provided a like number of mattes in white for pop in pictures.  Yesterday they all received a coating of acrylic peach paint, readying them for images.

On Saturday I saw "Hello, It's Me, Doris" with Sally Field.  It was a time to get out and see how the world and its occupants viewed our first day of warmer weather.  Gave the movie a B+; hard to see Gidget get older, but she kept her charm in tact.



Julie starts her eighth day in bed with a new wound care regime to help heal.  The director of nursing at the manor (DON) and I will be having a serious discussion about getting Julie out of bed and into her wheel chair for at least two hours a day.  It is not good to have her just lie in bed in her room for days at a time, no matter what the DON says.  

We shall see how that idea fares today.

Recipes from Deliciously Ella and Karen Ehman

For ease of reference, so I can easily locate them and cook from iPad instead of printing them out:

From Deliciously Ella

Chickpea, Quinoa and Turmeric Curry: 

• 500g new potatoes, halved
 
• 3 garlic cloves, crushed
 
• 3 teaspoons ground turmeric
• 1 teaspoon ground coriander
 
• 1 teaspoon chilli flakes or powder
 
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 400g can of coconut milk
 
• 1 tbsp tomato purée
 
• 180g quinoa
• 400g can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
 
• 150g spinach
 
• 400g can of chopped tomatoes
• salt and pepper

Place the potatoes in a pan of cold water and bring to the boil, then let them cook for about 25 minutes, until you can easily stick a knife through them. Drain them well.

Place the potatoes in a large pan and add the garlic, turmeric, coriander, chilli, ginger, coconut milk, tomato purée and tomatoes. Bring to the boil, season with salt and pepper, then add the quinoa with a mug of just-boiled water (300ml).

Reduce the heat to a simmer, place the lid on and allow to cook. Over the next 30 minutes, stir every 5 minutes or so to make sure nothing sticks to the bottom. (This is quite a long cooking time, but this is how long quinoa takes to cook in all these ingredients, rather than just in water.) Halfway through cooking, add the chickpeas. When there are just 5 minutes left, add the spinach and stir it in until it wilts. Once the quinoa has cooked and is fluffy, not crunchy, it’s ready.

Thank you, Betty the Woodfairy, for posting that you made this, because I shamelessly copied it and will make it this week!  Or Maybe Gene will, except he cannot have greens because it messes with his rat poison, and he does not care for chickpeas.  Never mind, I will make it.

5 MINUTE TOMATO SOUP by Karen Ehman

1 (15 oz) can Crushed tomatoes

1 (15 oz) can Diced tomatoes

1 (15 oz) can Tomato sauce

1/4 cup Grated parmesan cheese

3/4 cup Plain low fat Greek yogurt

1/2 tsp Garlic powder

1/2-1 tsp Salt (to taste)

1/4-1/2 tsp Pepper (to taste)

Optional: pinch of sweetener of choice or honey (to taste)

Put all of the ingredients for the soup into a blender and blend until smooth and creamy. Pour into individual bowls and microwave until it reaches the temperature you desire (or put soup in a small saucepan and heat over medium heat until it is warmed through).   Yields: 4 Servings

Julie Update:

Still in hospital, grumpy about it, discouraged because daily wound care takes a long time for nurses to attend wounds.  The 3 x/week "team"(wound care team consists of two specialized nurses and often the doctor observes progress) will see her this morning for assessment. 

Infection is decreasing according to the numbers in the blood, but she is still on IV antibiotics but needs to be on oral medication before being released back to the manor.  She was placed in a recliner twice over the weekend.  That could be called progress.

Huge snow day today, and schools are closed; town is on accident alert as it continues to come down.  Using Jack's camera while it is still dark in the early hours of Feb. 1:

Dog Biscuits

Julie suggested that The Manor House give dog biscuits to our local no-kill animal shelter for a Christmas gift.

Here is the recipe I forwarded to the activity director where today some of the residents will make these treats.  I found my old dog bone cookie cutter we will use, tucked away in a plastic bag that has housed cutters since time began; the plastic looks a bit worse for wear but the old cutter is still sharp. My thick notebook of recipes is kept mostly for nostalgic purposes, but it came in handy on this occasion.

 Cindy, Activity Director at the Manor, in Christmas attire!

Charley rolling dough

Nancy and Connie tasting the dough

 Julie's Big Idea to make dog biscuits!

Can you believe these herbs are still alive in mid December?  They are watered faithfully, and they keep on giving.

Last evening I finished 2/3 of the knitting required to make up the Promenade Shawl.  It was begun in July, so I have been fairly slow in the needle process. Each row must have a thousand stitches, and there are too many rows to count.  Add those stitches to changing colors, and it is mind boggling for knitting.

On another note, here is a present for Julie I have saved up for Christmas: another When In Scotland shawl.

Hoping your weekend is a good one!

Who? Me? Cook?

"What is your favorite holiday recipe?" asked a columnist who writes for the Grand Junction Senior Beacon.  She asked, also saying that she would like to take my picture and have my favorite recipe in the upcoming November issue, along with several other contributors.  We had just come out of an evening meeting at church last week when she caught me, and I was actually thinking of how quickly I could jump into my pj's and then into a warm bed.  Food was not on my radar when the clock was nearing 9 pm.

Taken a little off-guard by her question, my first thought was of the shockingly pink cranberry relish that Susan Stamberg shared several years ago on the radio.  I had made that, and it was a bit different from what others might share.  Then I gave the old brain a minute more to think and said, "well, it is not my recipe, and err...actually, I don't cook it, because my husband is outstanding in the culinary category, but I can tell you what it is and give you an internet link to the recipe."  By this time, Writer Lady could hardly back out of her offer to feature my favorite holiday recipe. So she went ahead and took my mug shot and wrote down the information.

Here, let me just do a cut and paste job and reveal the Gene Amole Recipe for Thanksgiving Stuffing that my husband makes semi-annually (we like it with chicken in the summer, too.)

from Living The Grand Life: 

I first started posting this recipe in 2007. Folks seem to like it. We still make it every year. Here it is again so that you can get your shopping list finished. 

Gene Amole was a columnist for the Rocky Mountain News. He was a hometown writer who knew the city well and wrote on a variety of topics.

In 1982, he was looking for a Thanksgiving topic. In desperation he published his recipe for stuffing.

In 1998 he wrote about this about his recipe column: "It was a smash. I had more favorable comments about that column than anything I had written previously. Since then, I have reprinted it twice, the last time eight years ago, but I still get a flood of requests each year to send people copies because they had lost theirs."

 And so he printed the recipe one final time in November of 1998.

My wife is from the south and always had cornbread stuffing. I grew up in Denver and was used to a rather plain white bread stuffing. We adopted this recipe as a new family tradition and have enjoyed it for many years. It is a recipe that responds well to variations. I like to use a whole pound of Italian sausage and Texas pecans.

Gene Amole’s Thanksgiving Turkey Stuffing

20 slices of white bread (or use a package of dried bread cubes)
6 slices of dark, Jewish pumpernickel (don't leave this out)
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon sage
½ pound breakfast sausage
½ pound Italian sausage
1 cup chopped celery
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup chopped walnuts, pecans or macadamia nuts
3 to 4 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1 to 2 Granny Smith or Jonathan apples
Handful of cranberries
2 cups thick-sliced mushrooms
¼ lb. butter
2 cans chicken broth
2 tablespoons Harvey's Bristol Cream or jug sherry

Gene Amole’s directions:
Now, relax. It is impossible to screw up turkey stuffing. First, let's assume you are roasting a 15-20 pound bird. You'll need about 20 slices of white bread and a half-dozen slices of dark, Jewish pumpernickel. Lightly toast and cut each slice into crouton-size cubes and put into a large bowl.

It's a good idea to mix spices separately in a small bowl. Combine a tablespoon of Salt with a teaspoon of Pepper and a tablespoon of Sage. Be careful not to use too much salt because there is salt in some of the ingredients. Next, mix the spices and sprinkle them over the bread cubes.

Now, you are ready to go to the stove. Crumble and brown in a skillet a half-pound each of breakfast sausage and Italian sausage. Drain off the grease and remove sausage with a slotted spoon and add to the bowl with the bread crumbs and spices.

Add a cup each of chopped celery, chopped onion and chopped walnuts. If you are a big spender, use macadamia nuts instead of walnuts. Add three or four tablespoons of chopped, fresh parsley. Peel, core, chop and add one or two Granny Smith or Jonathan apples. I like to mix in a handful or so of fresh cranberries for color. To all of this, add a couple of cups of mushrooms, sliced thick.

The last thing to add is the liquid. Melt a quarter-pound of butter in two cups of canned chicken broth. After it is blended, add two tablespoons of either Harvey's Bristol Creme or jug sherry. Take a little nip for yourself.

You are almost there. Drizzle the liquid over the ingredients in the large bowl. I like a reasonably fluffy stuffing. You can add more liquid if you like. Toss the bread cubes and spices with the liquid until evenly mixed.

Food science no longer recommends stuffing the bird. We make up the recipe and bake it in a ceramic casserole dish. I guess that makes it dressing as opposed to stuffing - whatever you call it, it's good.

One Stitch at a Time

It just occurred to me that I have not yet shown knitting progress on a kit I purchased soon after Julie and I returned to Colorado in May.

That month of May in South Carolina was a complete wash in terms of knitting. Even if there had been time to sit down and knit, there was not a whit of concentration left in my frazzled mind.  So just as well that my hands had a break from the needles.

During June, I finished one of The Yarn Harlot books.  A story she wrote stuck with me when she talked about a woman in her circle of friends who took on the daunting task of beginning to knit a blanket, a huge one.  The woman in the story decided to begin this project while in the midst of several personal crises, including severe depression and the break up of her marriage.  McFee, aka The Yarn Harlot, went on to write that this woman, stitch by stitch, finished one row and then another, day by day, week by week. Lo and behold, after a year, the blanket was completed.  Somehow, the working of the project, the clearing of the mind, that entire process of making a blanket required a different sort of concentration of efforts.  And it resulted in more than just a finished blanket. With the ending of that enormous knitting effort, her depression had lifted and she had made important decisions, including one to end her marriage.  What determination she had.

Back to my tie-in and identification with the woman who undertook that blanket project.  No, I am not leaving my husband. But I did decide to order from a Norwegian designer who had put together kits for the most determined of knitters.  Those who had knit up this daunting project took months to complete it, according to their notes on Ravelry.  So I took the mental plunge back in June and bought the kit, knowing I would eventually complete it because I must finish what I start... a compulsion.  It may take a while to complete, but each completed stitch will work toward good mental health.

So this is the Promenade Shawl now on the needles, started in June:

But then I got distracted with other projects, like knitting up Julie's acrylic shawl just in time for cool weather.

She wore it yesterday on her Wednesday visit to our house.  Her aide helped to choose the dress from her closet to match the shawl, and got her ready.  Julie was all smiles when Dennis delivered her to our curb.  Gene made guacamole and tacos at her request.



Joining in with Ginny and her Yarn Along!

Julie and I took a leisurely wheel over to the hospice restaurant again this week. After thinking about the Ezra book and praying about the situation, it went much better than our first outing there. Thank you all for your kind comments about the Very Busy woman, by the way.  (And no, I have not heard from Her again.)

Here we are in the sun before our lunch.  A kind gentleman snagged from a nearby bench was the photographer.

Recipes tried this week: Beer Bread, and Rosemary Bread, thanks to Stephanie who blogs here.  Ya'll have a good weekend!

Sharing Goodness

Indulge me in the sharing of the goodness I found and re-found today in searching the web.  Here are web sites, readily accessed in the future for perhaps Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus (NPH) or recipes or music or books (if I remember this particular post).

• Quick link to NPH is here.
• I Know that My Redeemer Lives, great text and music are here.
• Life Adjustment Program at Hilltop are here and here.
• Breakfast drink here (thanks, Kepanie)
• the Magnacarta in stitches
• a crochet fly curtain, who knew?  Mrs. T did.
• Soup that the grand husband concocted, again please?
• free: complete Works of William Shakespeare
• jogless two row knitting tip: Craftsy
• liturgical mysteries (have read three, will read more)...will have you rolling in the (church) aisles
• Rijksmuseum for art
• modern church music for an old, old hymn sung in the Shetland Islands when I was there that wonderful season
• Chicken Tikka Masal recipe (forget the skewers)
• Etsy for handmade gift goodness
• recent article about the new Scrabble words

Julie is at Colorado Canyons Hospital, back from South Carolina last week, and is faring well.  Thank you for all your prayers and good wishes.  We hope for a Grand Junction placement soon.

Spring Luck

As I have previously said, Jeans Knitting is one of the first reads of the morning when sitting in my chair, or actually my husband's chair, after I get up and turn on the fire and have coffee in hand.  She blogs daily and wakes me up with her perspective on her coming day.  Jean makes lists of things that she needs to accomplish that day. And updates me, for of course she is writing to me from Edinburgh, telling in her quaint ways of what on her yesterday's list was accomplished and what yet needs to be finished from her uncompleted list.  Most days she gives herself  a 100 percent rating, but a few times she laments that she was just too tired to finish one or two of her self assigned tasks.

Seems I follow Jean closely because I think of her as my one-generation-older friend who is keeping it together in her own way.  So maybe a list is the thing to keep in the forefront of my mind as I try to age with grace and wisdom.

So back to Jean's list, or my list, for the day.  Half of her day seems to involve taking care that her octogenarian, somewhat cranky husband, as she gets his lunch and keeps his writing files in order. That part of my day, compared with hers, does not exist, since my husband is in a reverse role with his own mother and ensuring she is fed and watered,  Although she still lives independently, except for not driving and having severe macular degeneration and not being able to read much or change the time on the clock or figure out how to order on Amazon.  But he needs no care whatsoever, other than being listened to, and occasional affectionate words and kisses.

Then Jean's list goes on to her knitting.  My, what a knitter she is, even to the point of designing her own laces and looking into software to aid in her motif designs.

My knitting, sorely neglected as of late, consists of this pair of socks on the needles, using picture yarn.  Google it and you will see clever yarns that have been mathematically designed to create pictures within the pattern, no matter the gauge you are using.  Here is a picture of my watermelon socks.  Notice those little black dots of color that play into the reds for the seeds within.

these are The Perfect Fit Socks, Abi Grasso Etsy Shop yarn


On the cooking front, two recipes I made this weekend are absolutely the best: carrot cake and hush puppies.

No pictures, but the carrot cake was found here, originally published by Southern Living. It has the usual suspects in the batter of grated carrots, crushed pineapple, with a little surprise of coconut.  We liked it, the neighbors liked it and I am serving it to friends today at coffee and tomorrow (frozen, but thawed) to the pinocle card group.

I was looking for an old fashioned sweet hush puppy like my grandmother used to make, but times have changed and what I found was from Paul Prudhomme, found here. We had fried trout with the couture hush puppies. Those puppies have onion, green onion tops, red pepper and only one egg, but after setting for a couple of hours in the fridge, the juices from the vegetables incorporate themselves into the flour and cornmeal and give an excellent texture. Beware these pups are fried, and I used only a film of grease, but they soaked up every bit of that canola oil. Not low calorie, but delicious. (And I did not find one recipe that called for just cornmeal, flour, egg and sugar, like Mom used to make.)

Saturday, I thought I was buying plain ol' johnny jump-ups for a splash of blue color on the patio while waiting for anything to rear its pretty head from the cold soil.  When I got home, I looked at the label more clearly after planting it and was happily surprised to learn I had purchased Rock Cress Axcent Lilac plants, a perennial.  What luck!  I needed new perennials.

The husband reminded me of what Garrison Keillor said:

“Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you have, which once you have it you may be smart enough to see is what you would have wanted had you known. ” 
― Garrison Keillor, Lake Wobegon U.S.A.

If you are following Angela in A Pause in Lent, I have written a piece on Path to Writing concerning what I heard yesterday in church since we are just two weeks away from Easter.  (It is under revision, in case you click on it and do not see it.)

Have a great week, and haste ye back in a few days to see the laundry line bowls in progress, thanks to the tip from Elizabeth, seen here when she writes about Washing-Tale Lines.

Lenten Season and New Starts

Joining in with Angela and the Henri Nouwen discussion groups, I have responded to this third Sunday in Lent, writing on this blog some thoughts about the Prodigal Son and how the elder son might have perceived being left at home.

Our church as been having soup lunches and dinners during the Lenten season, and we all pitch in and bring soup and bread after noon services on Wednesday.  Here is a recipe I have made several times, and it is a pretty darned tasty crock pot recipe:

On the painting front, I am in the throes of creating four panels, 10"x 30" each.  The term, according to Wikipedia is a "tetraptych."  It will be of a tree, in four colors.  Here is the first panel:

then again on the wall in the living room to see how the greens look against the peach colored paint on the walls...

 

Have a great week and make some delicious soup!

New Year's Eve

As seen here:

Detail of people drinking, from a treatise on the Seven Vices, Add MS 27695, f. 14r

A picture above of revelers from the past making merry in their own way.  For us, champagne at home and asleep way before that ball descends in Times Square.

Three loads of fabric including linens and clothing in the trunk of the car for a Good Will run, house cleaned, and soup about to be cooked.  That is my New Year's Eve, in a nutshell.

This is a five star recipe from Alton Brown from Food Network.  I am hungry already.  Lunch soon.

What are your evening plans, if I may ask?

A Beanie for Alonzo & Zucchini Cake

Babies need hats.  Purl Bee has a cute pattern for a heirloom hat that made up in just a day or two.

Originally, the thought was to make a pair of booties, but after making the first one and realizing it looked too large, I checked the pattern and saw I had cast on too many stitches.  The second one looked lots better, meaning I have to rip out that first stay on bootie and start all over.  Can I get it done in time for Sunday when the hand off is to occur?

And, in the meantime, this is on the needles: Norwegian Shawl or Scarf.

For your culinary pleasure, I was directed toward a  recipe that is excellent; a fairly heavy zucchini cake with lots of cream cheese frosting with zested orange.  Have a look here.  My notes here.

Our neighbor keeps supplying us with his zucchini, and we keep trying new things with them.  Not a single zucchini has been harmed or wasted in the process of experimentation.  We took over a portion of this cake to them as a "thank you", and they upped us by bringing over zucchini brownies.  Not a bad deal.

Leaving you with this bumblebee on a cosmos.  They are busy little things.

Rolled Dumplings for Peach Cobbler

Ripe, lucious peaches are everywhere in western Colorado this time of year. Sweet, juicy fruit picked straight from the tree was used to make our latest peach cobbler.  Freshly grated nutmeg and cardamom make those juices zing.

The best recipe for peach cobbler can be found at Cook.Com, in my humble opinion. Here it is:

OLD FASHIONED PEACH COBBLER

8 or 9 peaches, peeled and sliced
1/2 c. water
1 1/2 c. sugar
2 tbsp. self-rising flour
Pinch of salt
1/2 c. butter, melted
*add cardamon and nutmeg, optional*

Cook peaches in water until tender. Mix flour, salt and sugar. Add to peaches. Mix. Add melted butter.

PASTRY FOR COBBLER:
1 c. self-rising flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/3 c. shortening
4 tbsp. sweet milk, or enough to make a stiff dough

Blend flour, salt, and shortening to coarse meal texture. Add milk. Roll on floured surface. Pour half of peaches in 9x13 inch pan. Cut some dumplings and push dumplings down into the peach juice. Pour remaining peaches in and top with lattice strips. Bake in a 350 degree oven 35 to 40 minutes, or until top is golden brown. I like to sprinkle a little sugar on top before baking. This should be juicy cobbler, not dry.

The rolled texture of the dumpling and the self-created thickened sauce is similar to that of an apple dumpling.

A little vanilla ice cream doesn't hurt the taste!

What They Said, What They Shared

Without other people in our lives pointing us to new things to read, new things to cook, new reasons for "why things happen", new things to view on tv, and  new knitting techniques and patterns, our lives would not be near as diverse.  So here are a few of my new favorite things that have lateley been pointed out to me.

...as relating to online games, this article is well worth a read about Granny Chichi who lives in Belize and is whupping her journalistic grandson in the most charming of wordy ways  (Severo Avila said it)

...as relating to cooking, here are a few absolutely delicious recipes my friends and husband have made over the past few months. I was a lucky recipient of their good eats. (Gene, Natalie, and Dottie said it)

• cold cucumber soup
• banana crepes with orange cognac sauce from Michael Richardson of Cottey College in his excellent cookbook
• gelato with moscato wine, divine!
• trout cakes
• easy flourless chocolate cake ... a true winner
• eggplant dip with yogurt *great as a dip for artichokes last night*

...as related to why it rains in the fall, this is what Simon said

...as related to streaming movies, this summer I have watched and enjoyed the following older movies, new to me (Pam mostly said it)

• The Chorus
• Haute Cuisine
• Found Memories
• Stories They Tell
• Midsomer Murders with new episodes just released

...as relating to knitting, (Esther Budd  said it) the Her Royal Highness Shawl, which I am knitting for the second time because I am a glutton for punishment, tells me I am currently knitting, in the round, several thousand stitches just on one round for the ruffle on this shawl.

(source)

Above is Kate the Duchess of Cambridge in 2011 in a knitted green shawl that caused a stir in the fiber world. If you click on the source link, you will see where it could have been purchased back then.  Esther Budd came up with a pattern for the knit shawl that you can purchase here.  So now you can make your own shawl similar to that of the Duchess.  You can see why Budd calls it the "suicide ruffle" in her pattern if you have ever knit this many stitches in just one pattern repeat

(started on the suicide ruffle a day ago, apologies for poor quality of that green color)

this is the yarn for the HRH shawl I'm working on:  numma numma in wintermint and a truer color shown, referred by The Knit Girllls

source

What have YOU been pointed to lately?  What have you learned?  What can you recommend?  Tell, tell!

Linking as usual with Tami at Works in Progress Wednesday and Yarn Along and Fiber Arts Friday.

and Natural Suburbia.