Blue Jeans and Cotton Tees

I adore bread – especially fresh bread right from oven.

I’m so thankful that God blessed me with a daughter who’s goal for the year is to learn to bake beautiful hard crusted artisan breads. (Are you jealous yet? You should be you know!)

For our Valentine’s party – she worked all afternoon to make these out-of-this-world French Baguettes.

She was so thrilled to pull them out of the oven and thump that hard crust and hear the crunch when she cut into it.

We were thrilled with the soft pillow-like inside and the wonderful yeasty flavor!

They did take some time to make – but weren’t difficult. We just had to do a little planning ahead to get them done in time.

Trust me – they were worth the effort!

French Baguettes

5  cups white bread flour (we used only all-purpose flour and it was fine)
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 ounce fresh yeast
2-1/4 cups lukewarm water

Sift the flours and salt into a bowl. Add the yeast to the water in another bowl and stir to dissolve. Gradually beat in half the flour mixture to form a batter. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature for about 3 hours or until nearly tripled in size and starting to collapse.

Add the remaining flour a little at a time, beating with your hand. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 8-10 minutes to form a moist dough. Place in an oiled bowl, cover with oiled plastic wrap and let rise, in a warm place, for 1 hour.

When the dough has almost doubled in bulk, punch it down, turn out onto a floured surface and divide into 3. Shape each into a rectangle measuring about 6 X 3 inches.

Fold the bottom third up lengthwise and the top third down, and press down to make sure the pieces of dough are in contact. Seal the edges. Repeat two or three more times until each loaf in an oblong. Let rest in between folding for a few minutes, if necessary, to avoid tearing the dough.

Gently stretch each piece of dough lengthwise into a 13-14 inch long loaf. Pleat a floured dish towel on a baking sheet to make 3 molds for the loaves. Place the breads between the pleats of the towel to help hold their shape while they are rising. Cover with lightly oiled plastic wrap and let rise, in a warm place, for about 45-60 minutes.

Preheat the oven to the maximum, at least 450 degrees. Roll the loaves onto a baking sheet, spaced well apart. Using a sharp knife slash the top of each loaf several times with long diagonal slits. Bake at the top of the oven for 20-25 minutes or until golden.

Spray inside the oven with water 2-3 times during the first 5 minutes of baking, or place a pan with water on the bottom rack of the oven beneath the bread. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Makes 3 wonderfully crusty loaves.

I’ve linked this post up over at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam’s Tasty Tuesday.

You must know by now that I love traditions – especially holiday traditions!

Valentine’s Day just happens to be one of my favorites!

Somewhere around baby number three we realized that finding a sitter and heading out to eat on Valentine’s Day was more expensive and stressful then it was worth.

So I made a special meal for the entire family – and served it by candlelight.

A tradition was born.

This year was no exception! But since we had a church activity on Valentine’s day – we celebrated early.  Dagmar was our chef for the evening and decorated the table with candles and napkins.

It is amazing how beautiful 25 cent silk flowers from the thrift store look in candlelight! It’s also amazing how candlelight covers up the baskets of unfolded laundry, the piles of toys, and the school books that never got put away!

Notice the napkins? Over twelve years ago I bought some nice red cotton material, cut it into napkins and hemmed them up. We’ve used them for Christmas and Valentine’s Day ever since!

The menu varies somewhat from year to year – but always includes red jello with Cool Whip. This year Dagmar got fancy with a heart mold and conversation hearts!

An Italian dish – like cavatini or lasagna is almost always our main dish. This year it was a yummy sausage lasagna! She added a lettuce salad and freshly baked baguettes. We filled our garage sale stemmed glasses with pink lemonade to drink.

Dessert is always cream puffs – always!

They are filled with French vanilla cream and topped with chocolate ganache.  Yummy! This year we fancied up the plates a little with Smucker’s raspberry plate-scapers.

There is usually a card or two to open, maybe a small gift or chocolate treat.

It’s a simple, but very special way to celebrate with my Valentine’s.

What better way to say “I Love You” then with food!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

I am an Olympic junkie!

For two weeks every two years, I live, eat, sleep and breath the Olympic games – and I’ve taught my kids to do the same!

For us the fun begins on opening night when we have an Olympic party and watch the ceremony together.

We try to make a meal that reflects the host country – Chinese sweet and sour chicken for the Beijing games, fresh pasta and bread sticks for the Torino games, etc..

But we were a little stumped about Canada.

We ended up making Canadian bacon pizza (now stopped laughing Pat and my other Canadian friends – I know that it’s NOT authentic! Sure tasted good though!)

For dessert we made chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting and decorated with Olympic rings made out of M & M’s.

Then we all snuggled in and watched the Opening Ceremony from the very beginning all the way to the torch ceremony!

I love the geography and history and even political lessons the kids get as the different countries march in. (Why won’t Iran march in beside Iraq?)

Now for the next several days, we’ll soak in the drama, the victories, the defeats,and all the  stories that will make Olympic history!

All the while we’re spending time together as a family – and creating more memories that will bind us together!

Okay – I fully realize that I have already shared more than you probably want to know about my freezer and it’s contents. But please – just one more!

You have to understand that it’s snowing again and I’m house bound and I need help.

Serious help.

You see…I found something in my freezer.

Something that I buried deep down and tried to forget was there.

But I unearthed it – and now I know I have to deal with it.

It’s a package of rabbits.

Yes, cute little bunnies. Think Thumper.

Over a year ago a friend’s son shot them and butchered them and asked me if I wanted them. I was quite busy at the time and a little distracted and I said sure.

He brought them over in a large ziplock bag. I told him to just put them in the big chest freezer. He did and I forgot all about them (that’s the beauty of a big chest freezer!)

Until now.

I found them.

And they still have the legs attached.

And the legs have fur on them.

Yes, for over a year I had rabbit fur in my freezer.

I hope the innards are out. I’ve been too scared to look – and besides they are frozen shut.

I thought for a moment that I would just wait for Mom to come down – she would know how to cook rabbit meat. Mom knows everything.

Then I realized that if she cooked it – I would have to eat it.

Now I’ve heard that it’s supposed to taste like chicken, but I’m not sure I am brave enough to try it.

Now lest you think I’m a wimp – I will proudly admit that I help with butchering around here. I’ve dealt with innards and fur and feathers. But those parts are always outside.

It’s a process and by the time the meat arrives in the house it looks like – well – meat. All traces of it’s “bambi-ness” are gone.

The fur and feathers don’t make it to my freezer.

That don’t stare at my from the counter as I prepare to cook them.

I’m trying to work up the courage to thaw them and chop those offensive legs off and actually cook them.

Or…then again – maybe not.

Do you think if I just ignore them long enough they will just vaporize?

Photo by Masteruk

My refrigerator was stuffed.

I’m not sure how it happened, but somehow the left-over’s got out of control. I had lots of  little containers full of little bits of stuff.

It was time to be creative.

Buddy was my “sous chef” for supper – and he loves thinking outside the box! Normally he comes up with all sorts of wild ideas and I remind him to stick to the recipe.

But not tonight!

He grabbed different things from the fridge and together we figured out somewhere to use it!

He used up some of the extra milk we got on sale to make his favorite pudding. We put that in parfait glasses. Then he did a layer using the dibby-dab of cream cheese mixed with the chocolate ganache that I had hidden in the back of the fridge. He topped it with the last of the whipped cream from the dessert the other night.

Then he found two graham crackers in the cupboard and crushed them on to sprinkle on top. I grabbed the last two tablespoons of crushed walnuts that were in the freezer and added them to the crumbs.

Dessert was done, now it was time for the main dish.

We started with the left-over chicken and cream sauce.

I dug out the chicken and cut in up. Meanwhile, Buddy found some left-over turkey, some gravy, part of a container of mozzarella cheese, a bit of left-over onion dip, and some cold buttered noodles.

Perfect!

We cooked up the two odd packages of pasta that were open in the pantry. Mixed the whole thing together with the left-over cream sauce and added enough milk to coat everything.

I was just pouring into a casserole dish when buddy discovered a small container of crushed saltines.

We tossed them with a little Parmesan cheese and sprinkled the whole works on top.

It baked for about 40 minutes at 350 degrees and we had a one-of-a-kind delicious casserole – almost entirely of left-overs!

Don’t you just love an (almost) free meal!

Picture by Luigi Chiesa