In my kitchen...

traditional lambie cake, it was awesome :: my first homemade french bread :: 

hoecakes :: Victoria sponge :: sandwich bread

I know it looks like we are carb-a-holic, wheat-binging, fat-so people but we aren't. I can completely justify all of this.

For starters, we had a wonderful weekend yardsale-ing. I added four new vintage Fire King milk glass mixing bowls, a boat-load of Christmas ornaments, a baguette pan, a lambie cake pan, and who knows what else. So... I just had to make the lamb cake. You can't own a lamb cake pan and not make it, come now. Here are links for the cake recipe and the frosting. FYI, the frosting recipe makes just enough for this cake... no real extra for eating off the spoon, so I don't recommend sneaking tastes. Ask me how I know that.

Now, the lambie cake recipe I linked to actually makes two cakes, but if you just put your leftover batter in a loaf pan, you have a perfect base for a Victoria sponge. Slice it down the middle, fill it with raspberry jam, sprinkle the top with powdered sugar and head to your tea party to watch Jane Eyre. We loved the cake, the movie, and the reunion of friends.

The french bread happened much like the lamb cake happened. I haven't managed to find a place to put the pan yet, so I filled it with dough and baked it. Makes sense to me.

Last but not least, I am really into cornmeal lately. Maybe its the chill in the air. Maybe its the yellowing of the powdery, dry leaves. Maybe its the 10lbs of apples I have on my counter. Just take your favorite recipe for cornbread, add an extra egg (and extra milk if you need to) to get it the consistency of pancake batter and fry those puppies up just like {American} flapjacks. Yum.

What happened in your kitchen this week? Show and tell with Heather @ Beauty That Moves.

In the kitchen, deep fried

my male hummer at the kitchen window :: pasta in process :: the pasta maker :: angel hair :: tomatoes from the garden :: wide noodles with shrimp and garlic butter :: swedish rosettes :: plus sugar :: making donuts :: table ornament from the yard

So, I think this was the un-healthiest week on record here in my kitchen. We might has well have gnawed on sticks of butter all week. Thanks to some really productive yardsale-ing, we had a donut batter dropper ($.50), a rosette maker ($1.00) and a pasta maker ($2.00) to try out! What's even more crazy is that they all worked perfectly, once we got the hang of it.

We tried pasta both skinny and wide. When in doubt, add more flour. We ended up with a few trial noodles that didn't pass inspection and we didn't know what to do with them... so we deep fried them, too.

The donut recipe is here. I used both the orange and the old-fashioned. We agreed that the texture of the orange was perfect, but the flavor of the old-fashioned was best, so if you make them, use the orange recipe, add the old-fashioned spices, and sub out milk for the OJ.

For the record, that is the first time I've even come close to getting a hummingbird in a picture this summer. AND I abuse that dahlia every year by tossing it in the garage through winter and only bringing it out when it is fighting for life, and still it rewards me with the most perfect blooms year after year.

What's happening in your kitchen??

This week in my {messy} kitchen

               

tidy spice drawer :: tidy beside-the-stove cupboard :: yardsale finds ::fresh pears :: 

pear salad with goat cheese and roasted sunflower seeds

This week in my kitchen was about leaving it cleaner than it started. It has been months since I've sorted and taken inventory of what's in the pantry. I just keep buying groceries without really knowing what I have. Two sea salt grinders? Three peppercorn grinders? About 12 lbs of pasta!?!

We've also had some good luck yardsale-ing these past few weekends and now I have a few more things to fit into my kitchen cabinets. My vintage glass snack set obsession has gotten me up to 40 matched sets of plates and glasses. What a party that would be! So far as I can tell, antique stores sell them for about $8+ a set and my most recent purchase cost me 80 cents per set!

We must have eaten something this week, though I'm not exactly sure what. I am excited that good fresh pears are in season. They were my very favorite fruit as a child and mom wouldn't often buy them. Perhaps because the second they are ripe, they are prone to bruising badly.

I also tried a "Holy Yum Chicken" recipe from Pinterest. I found the sauce a bit mustard-y and strong, but the chicken was moist and delicious. If you try it, I recommend using half and half mustard to maple syrup instead of 2:1 mustard and syrup.

Join me and some other fine bloggers at Beauty that Moves

We shopped victoriously.

We had a great Saturday. It started with yard sales, where we found a few kitchen things, some swivel casters ($.50/ea), and the #3 knitting needles I had been wanting to pick up at the crafts store ($.75). We added to our pres-cut collection with a salad bowl and an additional banana split boat. We stopped by the farmers' market in between places but it was overwhelmingly crowded and not a fun place to be, which is a shame.  Grabbed a few flower pots and a vintage pink depression flower frog ($4, though I should have haggled) and called it a success.

We finished up the yardsales in Fairmont so we took the opportunity to eat at the Poky Dot. My cousin, Casey, waited tables here through her time in college but we never stopped in. Our server had a sicky-sweet twang that made it hard for us to understand what she was saying. Imagine, if the Avon lady were a bee, and she were buzzing in your ear, that was this girl's voice. I hope she grows out of thinking it is cute. We both got burgers and the fries were late in coming so each of us got about two potatoes worth!

Last but not least, we headed to Miller's Greenhouse at the recommendation of a friend, since I've been on the prowl for scented geraniums. Miller's did not disappoint, and I had five varieties from which to choose; we took a lemon and an apple scented. Both are heavenly and at $8+ a piece, I was inspired to come right home and start cuttings.