Friday, August 17, 2012

What's cooking

I can not tell you where the days go right now. We have been working on so many things, and reading books, that we find the days slip by so quickly.
Mark found someone to mow around the pond and on the driveway and this has added not only to his work load but it is making us look less neglected around here. For the past 4-5 years with all the stuff that was happening here we just did not have time to keep all the green stuff cut back.
 So Mark starting doing some talking and found one of our neighbors works for DOT and things were slow right now for him. Yeah- and Good lord I want one of these for our tractor.
Look at how pretty the driveway is becoming! Really- you need to oh and ah since I know how much time,( and money) this takes.
It is almost as good as getting a new kitten!

I unloaded the tiles this past week and decided that I was sticking with the Red Rock or Red stone. I used a white clay body and besides finding it a bit dull there were two tiles that warped like potato chips.
Ugh- they of course had a ton of work on them and the are rocking and rolling. I am still licking the sting over those two.
There were some good things like this house number.
I had a couple form Pinehurst ask me to make this for them.
This is their house number and they wanted to be sure it could be seen from the street.
I think it will work great.
I hope that they will send me a picture when it is all put up.
I was also glad we broke up that yellow with some weeds and another color.
Bright!
This is one of the tiles out of the last kiln- picture is terrible but I love the colors in this one.
This is where I really enjoy those premixed commercial glazes. Fun with glazes I should call these.
Sometimes they work really well.
Even though they are expensive for tiles you just don't use that much.

I also make some tiles form some of the scraps and loved the way these came out- terrible picture, I think the camera needs some work, it has been doing some strange things....like double exposures.
Anyway these are being shipped to a customer today. They did not get left in the store but 1 day.
They are not real large but will be fun to hang in a place that needs something.

In wrapping up this week there are many pots drying for the next kiln load in the Big Gas kiln, that we have never named, but now I am thinking Henry would be a good name for a kiln that has worked hard all it's life being faithful and just trudging along.
So what's next? More pots, more tiles, more firing, more driveway and more books.
Cheers!
M

PS- and you thought there would be a recipe in here didn't you?

Blueberry and Blackberry Galette with Cornmeal Crust
( disclaimer one- I had no blackberries---)
Crust:
1 ¾ cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup raw organic sugar
¼ cup cornmeal
¼ tsp. salt
½ cold ,cold butter, cut into small pieces
1/3 buttermilk- or in my case milk

lightly spoon flour into measuring cup and level with knife.
Combine flour, sugar, cornmeal into food processor and pulse to mix.
Add:
Butter- pulse 3-4 times or more in my case.
Add milk to just hold together but not wet.
Chill- I did over night.

Filling: Combine in a bowl toss well to coat.
4 cups of blueberries
2 cups of blackberries- I only used the 4 cups of blueberries.
½ cup of sugar- I used 1/4th
3 TBS. flour
2 TBS. lemon juice
2 TBS. milk

I added a TBS of orange liqueur, cinnamon and chopped up orange rind

Preheat oven to 350
Roll crust into a 15 inch prefect circle
(Not really I just threw that in.)
I rolled this on a pastry cloth I have using light flour on top.
Flipped it over onto lightly flour dusted wax paper.
Continued to roll using light flour on the rolling pin.
Then flipped it over on parchment paper to bake and place that on a baking sheet.

Place the filling on crust leaving about 2 inches all the way around the edges.
Fold edges inward to center, pressing gently to seal.

I baked for 30 minutes then brushed the pie crust with 2TBS. Blackberry Jam heated with about 1 TBS. orange liqueur.
I poured the extra on the berries.
Baked another 30 minutes.
Let cool and serve. 


13 comments:

MH said...

To clarify for all you NC taxpayers reading - The mower guy is a DOT contractor who hasn't a contract at the moment. The operator is an ace with that mower. I watched him work over a cedar tree that was taking over a turn in the driveway like a barber evening out a crew cut.

smartcat said...

Wish our mower guys were as adept with tools. They usually leave behind a landscape that that makes you believe in a very angry Bigfoot!
Do you get a thrill when your gardens and landscape are tamed?....enough to look planned, but not tortured.
I'm in love with the house number.
The nights up here are cooling enough to think about firing BigMama.

Shortstuff said...

I <3 the mower guy. Great job and I wish he would come to my house. Looks like 3 turns in the yard and he'd be done. Thanks for taking care of all that upkeep. The tiles are wonderful as usual. Love the house number tile. Hmmmm maybe one of those would look good at OUR place? Do you work in blue?? ;^)

hootowlkarma said...

The recipe sounds wonderful! Do you think it would work okay with frozen (unthawed) blueberries? When they're thawed, they often have texture issues. Thanks for sharing!

Kellie Jensen said...

wonder if the warped ones could have a custom built wood piece to display them on their curve... then it would just be art.

Claudia from Idiot's Kitchen said...

Oooh, I love the house numbers! AND, I have 2 pints of blueberries in the fridge....this sounds like a great recipe.

cookingwithgas said...

thanks Mark for keeping me straight on facts!
S-cat-I like them wild as well but the wild right now is looking pretty brown and sad.
Leslie- I know- love the mower guy, he did in 3 1/2 hours what would have taken weeks by hand.
JR- I use frozen all the time- just do not thaw them out. Then again you could do this with peaches, they are in season right now and so tasty.
Kellie- wavy art....might work.
Claudia -- nothing better! This is really good. I hope you enjoy and I hope you have some ice cream or whipped cream....

Tracey Broome said...

just a little piece of heaven there..... sigh.....

Anna M. Branner said...

Do you ever put your tiles in your Etsy shop? I have seen some tempting ones on your blog over the years....

cookingwithgas said...

TB- I share!
amb- I did once and no takers- i could try it again but if you see something you like speak up.

Linda Starr said...

Oh that recipe sounds so delicious, I might have to try it when the weather cools off a bit, too hot to heat up the oven.

Alex Solla said...

I once considered asking the fella from the local town mowing crew if he could help us with some spots in our ditch where the cattails are super thick. His machine would have gone through it like a hot knife through butter. Never worked up the gumption to ask him. Now... I might just do that. Next, I need to find someone to help us move a few tons of compost from the town pile into our garden. I seldom lament getting rid of our truck... but when it comes to moving manure or compost, nothing could beat our big old beast of a truck.

cookingwithgas said...

Alex- I suggest you do ask. Sometimes there are things they would love to cut just a little more on.
I love a good truck and I don't think we could do without one.
I morn the fact that trucks became "fancy"- what a waste...and don't send me any hate mail if you love your fancy truck. I really love that you love it. It just put us folks that live in the country in a place where the prices went way up there.