Dogwoods and Paint

April 18, 2012 By 6 Comments

Seems like an unlikely combination:  dogwoods and paint.  Add in Eastern Redbud trees, a 100-year-old rustic cabin on the Shenandoah River, osprey diving for fish, a group of happy artists, an art gallery and what have you got?  A watercolor portrait workshop in wonder-full Woodstock.

Do not, however, add in one camera that I forgot to bring with me.  Instead, add in one Blackberry with camera app, less than steady hand and less than crisp photos.

The cabin was over the river and through the hills.  Make that over the mountain and through the forest.  It was a charming old cabin.  And I mean old, cabin.  It was part antique, part fishing cabin.  But it was on the water.  And it wasn’t a chain hotel.  When I booked it, I thought the drive over the mountain to the workshop would also be charming.  It was.  It was beautiful with those trees blossoming white, pink and magenta, their blossoms cascading softly throughout the forest, like falling feathers.

Even the hairpin curves in the road were, eh, adventurous.  Until.  Until three long dump trucks came barreling around one of the tight curves, two feet over the yellow line, squeezing my lane so hard there wasn’t enough room for the road, them and me.  Thankfully, my lane abutted the woods and not one of the frequent steep drop-offs beyond the guard rails.   My reflexes went into Speed Racer mode. I compensated by driving along the thankfully shallow gully, crushing a few twigs in the process, but not crashing.  Then I sat there for a while, my heart pounding, trying to get up the nerve to get back on the road.

Fast forward.  I arrived at the workshop a little late.  A half hour late.  No worse for the wear.  This time, I not only painted, but I finished a portrait:  a significant feat for me.  The local artists in the workshop were lovely and I enjoyed listening to their Virginian accents.  We had a brief field trip to the drugstore on Main Street for a chocolate malt.  That old drugstore had a working soda fountain.  What a delightful surprise!  It was a hot day, too.

It was a wonder-full weekend in Woodstock.

~ – ~

Note:  I’ll be offline for a few weeks starting this weekend.  I’ll be back mid-May.

Filed Under: Art, Outdoors, Play, Travel Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Chocolate, Vanilla or Both?

April 4, 2012 By 6 Comments

This is a test run for dessert for tomorrow night’s dinner with friends.  Test run = my excuse for sampling it!

These are cookie-dough-ball-sized scoops of Häagen-Daz vanilla ice cream and homemade chocolate sorbet.  The sorbet is fantastically easy to make; thank you Ina Garten for this recipe!

It’s shown here in its, er, test bowl in the smallest ramekins, though from the photo it appears much larger than it is.  I plan on serving it in Frangelico glasses for dessert.  I haven’t decided whether to serve it with berries, too.  What do you think?

Filed Under: Baking, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Birds, Sunshine and Breakfast

March 27, 2012 By 6 Comments

How I loved toast.  It was a comfort food.  My favorite way to eat it was a hearty, crusty slice buttered and sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar or spread with lemon curd.  Fast forward to gluten-free.  Gluten-free toast is, eh, o-kaaay, but I find that the rice and other highly processed flours give it an unpleasant texture.

Then I discovered a bread recipe at Elana’s Pantry made with almond flour, which is more like a quick-bread and so delicious toasted.  One piece fills me up.  And that, coming from a lady who could have eaten toast all day before and still felt hungry!  That’s likely because almond flour is high in protein, has minimal carbs and an extremely low glycemic index.

This morning, while the birds were chirping, the sun was shining and the coffee ground and brewed itself, I made breakfast:  lovely thick and creamy Greek yogurt, pansies from the hanging baskets I hung to welcome Spring (the orange ones smell divine), and the solitary, but hearty, piece of gluten-free almond flour toast topped with St. Dalfour’s wild blueberry fruit spread.

I’ve also enjoyed this bread and toast with a smattering of goat cheese and Herbs de Provence with roasted cherry tomatoes on the side.

Speaking of herbs, I’m the proud owner of a bumper sticker that says:  “Love People.  Cook them tasty food.“   I’m not one for putting stickers on my car, but this one made me smile.  What does that have to do with herbs?  The saying is from Penzeys Spices.  Which reminds me:  time to order some not-hot curry powder and sweet cinnamon.  Penzeys’s customer service is terrific.  It’s a pleasure ordering from them and the products are wonderful.

Wishing you a delicious day!

Filed Under: Baking, Gluten Free, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Indulgence

March 18, 2012 By 10 Comments

Once a year I make a three-layer, deep, dark chocolate Guinness Extra Stout cake with ganache frosting.  Paying homage to Guinness, I make it on St. Patrick’s Day and sprinkle a bit of edible gold dust and sparkling green sugar flakes over the top.

Since I’ve learned I’m allergic to wheat, I’ve gone gluten-free.  I’ve adjusted most of my recipes, but this is one recipe I’m leaving as written at Epicurious.  (You might also enjoy reading the comments on the recipe here.)

Regardless I can no longer eat it, I enjoy making it as much as I used to enjoy eating it:  immensely!  This year, I gifted the cake to friends, which is why it’s pictured on a cardboard round set on the base of a cake carrier instead of a crystal serving platter that matches its level of indulgence.

It might be three miles layers high, and ganache might sound complicated, but the cake is simple to make.  Really.

~-~

Tips:  use the best ingredients you can find and afford.  The batter will seem too thick, like chocolate pudding, but it’s supposed to be that way.  You will need the biggest bowl you have to mix it.  Before I had a KitchenAid, I made it with a $10 hand mixer and large plastic bowl.  This year I made it in my KitchenAid and the batter filled the mixing bowl within one inch from the top!

I decrease the sugar to 3 1/2 cups (any more might affect the texture) and use bittersweet chocolate for the ganache.  You can use both semi and bittersweet chocolate – or one or the other — for the frosting, which you can adjust to your sweetness preference.  Sometimes I lightly coat the layers with raspberry jam before I spread the ganache over them, which is tasty and a nice trick if you find you baked it a few minutes too long and it feels dry.  The cake will become more moist once it’s covered in ganache, whether you jam it or not.

Sometimes I serve it with homemade-whipped-cream flavored with a little Bailey’s or cinnamon.  Or with a small scoop of beautiful vanilla ice cream.  Depending on what’s fresh at the market, raspberries, blackberries or currants are lovely with it as well.  I add a tablespoon of unsalted butter to the ganache, which helps it spread easily and gives it a lovely shine.  I suggest increasing the ganache by a quarter to a third more.  If you find you have too much, you can always scoop it and make homemade truffles…or eat it with a spoon until it’s gone as I’ve been wont to do ;)

Quarters or slices of the cake freeze well.

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This is a once a year cake.  We eat healthy as a rule so that we can indulge once in a while — this is the perfect cake for doing so!

*  The stout gives the cake a deep, rich flavor, but the alcohol will bake out.

Filed Under: Baking, Not Gluten Free, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Singing in the Wilderness

February 14, 2012 By 6 Comments

A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread–and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness

from The Rubaiyat ~ Omar Khayyam

This Valentine’s Day, I remembered lines from The Rubaiyat.  They speak to my wilderness-loving heart.  My Valentine knows that one of the most romantic places he can take me is the wilderness.

In the scene above, we’re resting at 12,000 feet, overlooking a wild and mostly uninhabited valley and the next mountain range in a series of successive mountain ranges.  With very slow, careful steps, and my Swiss Gear hiking poles, we made it up the shifting shale to the peak.

Instead of a jug of wine, we had a Thermos of coffee.  Instead of a loaf of bread we had Clif Bars.  And we each had Thou.  We were on top of the world.

A year later, we were married on top of a 14-er towering over old growth aspen forests.  Wild meadows of sweet wildflowers shining through the mists hugged the mountainside as elk silently strolled about.

Our hearts were singing in the wilderness.

Wishing you a Happy Valentine’s Day filled with love to your heart’s content!

Filed Under: Outdoors, Treasures Tagged With: , , , ,

Reflections on Sprague Lake

January 24, 2012 By 10 Comments

What better time to revisit the glittering aspen of Rocky Mountain National Park than a gray January afternoon?  As I sit here writing and sipping dark roast coffee while slushy snowflakes fall, I wrap myself in a warm Rocky Mountain reverie.

Combine one artist-in-residence, his artist wife, several oil painting students and one watercolor student (me) on an en plein air adventure and you have a week of glorious autumn afternoons in Rocky Mountain National Park.  Toss in a couple of bears and elk to top it all off!

The aspen are unpredictable.  They can turn golden any time between late September and mid-October.  The brilliant colors of the aspen of the West delight like the Northeast’s intense red maple trees.   There’s nothing like a few days of Colorado’s bright blue skies, short-sleeve weather, and a group of artists to seal the deal on a perfect Rocky Mountain memory.

     Happy Daydreaming!

Filed Under: Art, Outdoors, Travel, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Voices of Beauty and Courage

December 31, 2011 By 8 Comments

What alchemy:  from darkness, courage speaks through beauty and color!

Years ago, I discovered beautifully vivid folk-art wall hangings, arpilleras, at Le Feria, a Peruvian restaurant in the Shadyside neighborhood of Pittsburgh:  three-dimensional, intricately hand-crafted artwork displaying scenes of life like no quilts or hangings I’d seen before.

Fascinated by them, I inquired and learned the story of their origination was even more fascinating than the picture stories of village life they display.

Under Pinochet‘s dictatorship, political women prisoners began sewing arpilleras (burlaps) with three-dimensional appliqued pictures in which they could hide notes those on the outside could receive safely past the guards.  How ingenious to deliver messages within such beautiful artwork!  How inspiring to have the perseverance and courage to stay strong and pull such beauty forth from one’s weary soul!  Lines from Invictus come to mind…

The arpilleras are still hand-sewn, no longer by Pinochet’s prisoners, but by those who live in conditions of poverty most of us could not fathom.  What a testament to the human condition that from suffering and lack, beauty and sunlight is born.  (For more information:  see The Folk Art Gallery, Lucuma, and Food For Thought Book Collective.)

Our small arpillera (pictured above) is a shining light in our home.  It sings brightly from the wall that no matter how dark some hours might feel, we each have a well of strength, fortitude, courage and Joy from which we can draw and Live!

Filed Under: Art, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , ,

The Quieter Side of the Season

December 13, 2011 By 6 Comments

The holiday season bursts forth with so much joy, music and laughter. There are decked halls and dining rooms, tables overflowing with tasty treats, and choirs filled with cheery choruses. There are parties and festivals. There are house guests and jingle bells. Lots of fun!

There’s a quieter side of the holiday season, too, softly whispering delicate snowflakes, twinkling stars and lights, and the spirit of wonder. There are shining ice-covered ponds, sweet pine needles, and snow angels. There are holy and silent nights.

One of our holiday traditions is a quiet, late-night, winter walk. It’s no surprise that in our family, Jane Yolen’s Owl Moon is as classic a holiday tale as Dylan Thomas’s A Child’s Christmas in Wales or Clement C. Moore’s ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas.

Years ago, a snowy white owl flew swiftly, stealthily beating its powerful wings not ten feet over our heads. Whoo-oo-whoo-oosh.  Whoo-oo-whoo-oosh.  We’d been sitting so quietly outside while the moon rose through the snapping cold air. Just thinking of Owl Moon, I recall the rhythmic sound of that owl’s wings flying through the night.

When you go owling, you have to be very, very quiet. You don’t need anything, anything at all, but hope. What evokes the spirit of the season more than hope?

Wishing you a Hope-Filled, Wonder-Filled, Holiday Season!

Filed Under: Outdoors, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , ,

Windswept

November 11, 2011 By 12 Comments

This evening I was talking with friends from the wind-blown mountains where we met, at the edge of the high plains snug up against a mountain range where 50 mph winds are status quo.  Where from the same spot you can watch the sun set over the mountains in the west and the moon come up over the plains from the east.  No buildings or houses — or anything — to obstruct the view.

How I loved the feeling of freedom the invigorating wind evoked as it rushed through the grasses, projecting tumbleweeds like cannonballs.  The land is semi-arid and for lack of water few folks live there.  It’s so bare.  So elemental.  There’s a purity in wilderness, in wild landscapes.  The wilder, the free-er.

One lazy day, moseying about in a bookstore, I happened upon a copy of Painting Greeting Cards in Watercolor.  Inside, I discovered miniature painting sketch exercises, which I thought were perfect to warm me up for painting something larger.  The exercises are terrific for days when we need immediate, simple, creative gratification.

One of the miniature sketch exercises reminded me of that fantastic landscape where the high plains and the water-less mountains meet.  Talking with my friends tonight reminded me I’d painted it so I dug it out of the corner of a bureau drawer to share here (posted at actual size of the painting sketch).  It’s a crudite.  A little appetizer whetting my desire to paint that windswept land.

Filed Under: Art, Outdoors, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Treat or Treat

October 31, 2011 By 5 Comments

No trick here!  Just treats.  Halloween is a great excuse to bake goodies, you know.  I’ve found a treasure of a recipe for an old-time favorite.

Before going gluten-free, one of my weaknesses was King Dons and Hostess Cupcakes.  Yes, it’s true.  I loved the chocolately goodness and filling.

I was determined to find a gluten-free and healthy recipe.  Then I ordered Elana Amsterdam’s Gluten-Free Cupcakes and what to my wondering eyes did appear but a recipe for those delicious, sumptuous little cakes!  Going a step further I bought a Babycakes cake pop maker and after a few trial runs, I had tasty Gluten-Free Chocolately Cream-Filled Cake Pops.

Tasty, as in if one didn’t know they were gluten-free, one would never know because they taste just like Hostess Cupcakes or King Dons!  They also have a lower glycemic index and higher fiber, which is an added bonus.

I packaged two boxes up for two special people in my life and will be delivering them tomorrow, just in time for Halloween!  Mmm, the chocolatey deliciousness…

Wishing you a fun-filled holiday full of laughter and unexpected treats!

Filed Under: Baking, Gluten Free, Treasures Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
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