Orange Fig Jam

I've been mostly letting the squirrels have the figs my tree produces.  In years past, it was nothing to write home about. But for some reason (probably all of the rain we've had) she decided to make a lot of fruit this summer.

She's hiding waaay back there in the corner.  She has been very nearly dead two or three times due to ice storms or drought, but always manages to claw her way back!

 

Lately I've been finding a couple fat figs per day.

And since one of my favorite things is fig jam, I made some!

This is about 1 1/2 c. quartered figs placed in a small pot with the juice and peel of one small orange, about 1/2 c. or so of sugar, and a couple tablespoons water.

I brought it to a boil, then simmered it nice and slow until it was the thickness I wanted.

I also sliced the orange rind very thin and stirred it in. When It was cool, I ladled it into a pint jar for the fridge. I'm having a friend over for wine and charcuterie this week and I think this will pair nicely with some cheeses! 

But it will also be wonderful on my oatmeal, a bagel, or PBJ!

Gina

Jeannette's Easy Apple Cake

 I had some wrinkly apples to take care of and thought of this snack cake recipe.  Seeing these well-loved handwritten recipe cards is very nostalgic for me.

Easy Apple Cake

2 c. diced apples (I didn't even peel mine)

1 c. sugar

1/3 c. oil

1/2 t. vanilla

1 egg

1 1/2 c. unsifted flour

1 t. EACH baking powder, baking soda, and cinnamon

1/2 c. raisins (optional)

dash of milk if batter seems too stiff

The sugar needs to sit on the apples for about 10 minutes to draw out the juice.  But you can get your wet and dry ingredients ready while that happens. (I didn't have raisins to use, so I added in the rest of the chopped dates I buy for my Sunday oatmeal.)

Stir in the wet ingredients first, then add the dry and mix well.  Add a splash of milk if you think the batter is too stiff.  I just happened to have this finishing sugar I wanted to try - so I sprinkled the top of the cake after I poured it into my dish.

If you spray your glass dish with oil, the cake will easily release.

Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes.

It doesn't need frosting because its delicious by itself, but I won't come at you for serving it warm with Bluebell vanilla ice cream.  Wish Mom were here to share it with me...

Happy Memorial Day.  I will be at work.  Maybe enjoying a slice of this cake with my lunch!

Gina

Jeannette's Peach Cobbler

 One of the things I wanted to rescue from Mom's house was her recipes.  I gathered up as many cookbooks as I could fit in my arms, and most of her recipe cards, many handwritten.  An oldie but goodie is this cobbler recipe, which she made fairly often, especially in the summer.  (If you use fresh, peeled peach slices, be sure to add about 1/2 c. water and 1/4 c. sugar to the syrup you make to pour over the peaches. This will sub in nicely for the syrup in the canned peaches)

Jeannette's Peach Cobbler

29 oz. can peach slices

3/4 c. brown sugar

1 T butter

2 T cornstarch

all of the syrup from the can of peaches

1/2 t. each ground nutmeg, cinnamon, ground ginger

dash salt

Biscuit topping: 1 c. flour, 1 1/2 t. baking powder, 1/4 t. salt, 1/2 stick butter, 2 T sugar, 1/4 c. milk, 1 beaten egg.

Preheat oven to 425. Drain the syrup from the peaches into a small saucepan.  Place peaches in a buttered 8x8 baking dish. (I like to cut mine up a little so its easier to take normal sized bites!)  Bring the brown sugar, butter, cornstarch, salt, spices, and reserved peach syrup to a boil.  Let boil one minute.  Pour over peaches.  Combine the dry biscuit ingredients.  Cut in small pieces of butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs.  Add milk and egg. Stir just until moistened.  Drop by spoonfuls over peaches.  Bake about 20 minutes.

Serve warm with your choice of ice cream!  Mom always had Blue Bell in her freezer and loved the old fashioned vanilla.  Every time I make this I will think of her and wish she were here to enjoy a bowl of it with me.

Gina

5 thing Friday - weatherstripping, cobbler, El Rancho, KFire Winery, mornings

 I finally got around to changing out the weatherstripping on the attic door in the hall ceiling.  Took me an hour or so.

One package of this stuff was just enough - about $3.

I also used these small detail sanders to help smoothe out the wood so the adhesive sticks better.

It was painstaking work - someone before had not only used adhesive weatherstripping, but bolstered it with a power stapler.  I scraped and sanded and made a huge mess on the carpet.

But I think I did a good job.

There are a couple of spots that I may add staples to - we'll see.

I made a peach cobbler from an old recipe card of Mom's - I will post it on Monday.  It was so good and really hit the spot!  I enjoyed it with butter pecan ice cream and man, was it good.

On my "empty day" I took myself to Burnet and Bertram - just a short drive from Austin.

I ate at a restaurant that Mark and I visited often, and had an amazing $10 breakfast of barbacoa, beans, eggs, potatoes, and corn tortillas.  It held me throughout the day.

Then in the afternoon I visited a winery in nearby Bertram and joined their wine club!  It has been years since I have visited this particular one.  The wine is good, priced reasonably,  and the owners are very friendly.

It being in the middle of nowhere is a PLUS.  Its time to reclaim things I once enjoyed doing.

I have been heading out to my deck each morning to catch the sunrise.  I get there just after it breaks, and I light a candle and enjoy my coffee, sans creamer.  Its been a very pleasant 5 days off and now I am recharged for the weekend!

Gina

Chocolate Chip cookie dough to keep on hand

I had forgotten about this particular recipe card for cookies until I had a sweet tooth attack lately.  Its a hybrid recipe - created by me from a couple of other recipes.  It might be my favorite cookie - crisp chewie and so buttery. They should be famous!  This time I was out of my favorite dark chocolate chips, so I used a mix of white chips and semi-sweet chunks.

Gina's Famous Chocolate Chippers (ha!)

1 1/2 sticks butter - melted, slightly browned, and cooled

3/4 c. each white sugar and brown sugar

1 1/2 t. vanilla extract

1 egg

Mix all of that together and add:

2 c. flour

1 t. baking soda

1/2 t. salt

then

1 c. chocolate chips of your choice

(the beauty of this recipe is no mixer is involved, you can mix these up by hand, and the dough isn't sticky so it releases from your scooper easily)

Pre-heat oven to 350. Chill the dough for 20 minutes, NOT LONGER. Drop by spoonfuls onto cookie sheet (I use a Silpat) and bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes.

I use a 1/8 c. measuring cup and make dough balls to freeze on a plate.  When they are frozen I pop them into a gallon size ziploc and store in the freezer.  From frozen, they take a couple minutes longer to cook.  When you take them from the oven, slam the cookie sheet down a couple of times gently and the cookies will settle and look perfect. (see above!)

I took some over to The Girl, warm from the oven, and told her they were from a new place called G's Treats.  Located in the suburbs, the woman only has one oven.  They were a hit!

Gina

5 thing Friday - Spencer, pin cushion doll, photos, art, Fudge Pie

Happy Birthday to Son #1 who made me a mom 36 years ago!  He is a hardworking man, loves his family, has a wicked sense of humor.  A good guy.

I am blown away by the fact that I have a child this old.  When we started our family, Mark and I surely did not envision all that would pass. I don't know how to parent adults, so I have moved into an advisory role for the best job I ever had. 

A blog post about pin cushions reminded me that this beauty was in a box somewhere with a broken head.  A little E6000 glue surgery later and she was mended.

I would like to make her another skirt.  I don't know why I took the original one off, and the cushion of her body is not great for pins, but she was sewn by my mother and it has great sentimental value.

I set her on a shelf near a recently discovered picture of Mom.

She is pictured here in Morocco, 1990.  Newly married and so happy.  This photo makes me smile, and I do miss her crafty self so much.

I've been moving things around on my walls, making things a little simpler, easier to look at.  I took the kids' teenaged portraits off the wall in my bedroom, and stored them in the family album.  To the empty space above my dresser I put the nude line drawing.  Seemed appropriate for a bedroom more than an office.  I ordered a beautiful Japanese chrysanthemum print from Etsy to add to my collage wall in its place.  I also patched and painted over the holes left by my failed attempt to hang a TV wall mount.  Then I returned the mount to Best Buy, as suggested by a blog reader!

The upcoming ice storm has me all kinds of stressed out.  Time to bake.  I found an oldie but goodie recipe in my files for Fudge Pie.  Crust is optional.

I made two glass dishes of it, wishing I had ice cream to top it off.  It has a very moist brownie-pie feel to it - perfect to scoop with a spoon.

Fudge Pie

*Pre-heat oven to 350.*

1 c. sugar

1 stick butter, melted 

1/2 c. flour

2 eggs, beaten

1 t. vanilla extract (I also added a half teaspoon of instant coffee)

2 oz dark chocolate, melted with the butter

chopped nuts - optional, but about 3/4 c.

Mix all.  Pour into glass dish or pie shell.  Bake for 25 minutes.

Stay warm everybody!

Gina

5 thing Friday - step stool feet, chair seat, big decisions, tub drain cover, snack mix

About a year ago I replaced the rubber feet on the step stool I use often.  At the time, it was a tight fit and they were hard to put on.  Over time, the edge of the step stool foot cut into the rubber feet.  Time to replace them yet again.  Don't you hate it when you have to re-visit a project you thought was done?!

You can see how one is misshapen.

I ordered a different set of feet that were slightly larger.  Turns out, they were too large.  What to do? Returning a $6 pack of rubber chair feet to Amazon is also a pain in the rear.  And they automatically tried to send another set out, to which I said NO, I will figure out a way to make this work.

In the garage toolbox I found exactly enough 3M mounting tape (whatever that is) and wrapped it around the end of the leg like so.  It provided just enough extra width to make the rubber feet fit snug. Perfect.

Mission accomplished.  I use this stool all the time.  I bought it years and years ago for our first house.

I got to looking at that fabric I bought last week and it is so pretty I knew I had to use some of it to recover my antique sewing table chair.  So vintage-y and beautiful!  It took me a power stapler and all of 30 minutes and was a good creative project.

On Wednesday, Scout came over to help me move the leather sectional to the garage.  I am patiently awaiting the new one. I'm a little nervous - I think I picked the right style, right color couch for me.  But big purchases always do a number on me.  I do trust myself, its just that for years I had another person to bounce all of these things off of.  One day, these decisions will feel more natural to me.

I pulled off the caulk around the guest tub overflow drain cover and wanted to shriek.  In fact, I might have.  Looks like the plumber was right - I need a new tub insert.

But that's not going to happen right now, so I pulled out this peel and stick caulk I had purchased months ago.  Originally I planned on putting it at the base of the tub, but I never got around to it.

It looks like homemade sin and maybe like its loose, but its not.  I did add a small bead of clear caulk all-around it.  Its a temporary patch job, but it will work until such a time as I replace the tub insert in here.  This bathroom is rarely used.

I made some Fall-themed snack mix, courtesy of an idea on a blog I read often.  It made a LOT, so the extra went into a sealed container in my pantry for whenever I want a treat, which is often.  I found this storage jar at Home Goods and filled it to the brim for Scout - he is my Halloween babe.  If you like salty-sweet snacks*, I highly recommend.

Happy weekend!

Gina

*In mine is: cheese crackers, Cocoa Puffs cereal, honey roast peanuts, Brach's autumn mix and candy corn, raisins, peanut butter filled pretzels, and Reese's Pieces.

5 thing Friday - curtain spiff, Dubai chocolate, a good dinner, stitching, Empty Nest

Projects around the house were very low key this week.

I installed a regular curtain rod in the office and ordered a simple rod pocket panel in a dusty blue: 

The walls in here are a gray called "Train", but it has a hint of blue to it.  And since I decided that it was rather plain, I added a beaded fringe along the top and the hem.  Is it perfectly done? No. If you examine it you will see a messy hem at the bottom, since I seriously underestimated how tricky it is to machine stitch not only that fringe, but the flimsy fabric as well.

The fabric is a crinkly gauzey polyester and slippery as an eel.

It's hard to get a good close-up of the beads, but they are lovely.  Its sort of boho chic and I kind of love it. 

I finally got to try a Dubai-style chocolate bar and it was as delicious as I imagined it to be.  The chocolate was Belgian, which I find a touch sweeter than your usual milk chocolate.  I think that it would be even better made with dark chocolate.  At $8 it was a splurge and not something I will be adding to my usual grocery order.

To balance out the candy, I made a seasoned curry rice and some honey carrots to go with pan fried tilapia and that was also quite good!  I find that I can cook for myself with no great trauma about 3 nights a week.  I'm still working on it.

A work friend is leaving soon, and I bought her some wine she likes and thought I would stitch a quick something to hang on the bottle.

Also not perfect!  But heartfelt.

If you've been reading this blog a bit, you know that this has become an unofficial Cannary motto, and one I try to remember daily.  The rest of the quote states that "optimism is a magnet for good luck".  I am hoping that is true.

We did it, Mark!

I wish you could be here to share this milestone.

I got the last Cannary kid launched into his own apartment, living life on his own.  He took the rest of his things yesterday and whatever he didn't want went into my donate pile and directly over to the Habitat Restore.  As I told him yesterday, "you got this, I love you and am very proud of you, and don't forget: you know where to find me".  For launching four of them into adulthood with strong family support and a mom on their side, I'm proud of me, too.

Gina