Kitchen-ness

always more iced coffee :: acorn squash, already :: elderberries :: 

breakfast for two :: boiling maple syrup :: maple cream

This week has been a bit slow in the kitchen. We had our friends over, two couples and five kids, for dinner Sunday night and it seems like we've been coming down off that high ever since. There have been a few things of note, though. For starters, there are chokeberries.

Have you any experience with chokeberries? They are also called aronia berries and are pretty good for you but there is not much out there (and by out there, I mean on Google) about how to deal with them at home. They are so high in antioxidants that in Russia, they are grown commercially, juiced, then the juice is made into gummie vitamins. I got these from picking them off a bush in my neighbors yard... then I learned more about them... then I dug up the neighbor's bush and moved it to my yard. {Really, I did. But he was getting rid of it and told me if I wanted it, I could do the digging instead of him.}

Also, there was maple cream. This is a new thing for us. Basically, you boil maple syrup and stop just short of candy stage. You stir for, oh, about 19 minutes longer than when you lost the feeling in your arm and it becomes whipped up, like butt-ah.

Linking up with Heather @ Beauty that Moves - join us there!