Homemade bread

You may recall that I've taken over much of the cooking in my house.  Some of it has been good, some of it just o.k. and some of it has been pretty bad.

A couple of days ago I dragged out our old, hardly ever used bread machine to see what I could do.

My first loaf suffered because I forgot to use warm liquid.  That was pretty much a short little hockey puck.  The second loaf was a potato bread that turned out a lot better.  But my healthy diet conscious wife said "why don't you try something with whole wheat flour."  (I knew that was coming and had already considered it.) 

In the meantime, I had bought a quart of buttermilk because I thought I'd seen a recipe that looked interesting.  I made buttermilk/banana pancakes this morning.  Now neither of us is fond of pancakes but we got through them and I thought they were pretty good.  But I still had quite a bit of buttermilk and was wondering how to use it before it went bad.  (Which brings to mind the old line - How do you tell if your buttermilk has gone bad, anyway?  But that's beside the point here.)

SWMBO to the rescue!  She found a recipe on the Internet for Buttermilk Honey Wheat Bread made in a bread machine.  The recipe said it would only take 55 minutes.  Now, I know how long my bread machine takes just to knead the dough and let it rise and bake it and I seriously doubted that.  But I went ahead, tossed it together and turned on the machine.  It's clock told me it would be all ready in . . . . . 3 hours and 45 minutes!  But hey, I'm retired, I've got nothing but time. 

It finally got done, we tasted it and loved it.  Wonderful!

It's a small loaf but there are only the two of us and we can always make more.

If you're so inclined, you can find the recipe here.  Just don't trust it when it says it only takes 55 minutes.

The new Blackwell

Frequent readers of this blog may remember a scrawny, scarred-up, underfed cat that began hanging around my residence after I began feeding him in the garage.  He had, at that time, been dubbed "Blackie Detroit."

But he kept getting into fights and coming around more and more scarred up.  So we took him to the Humane Society, had him neutered and brought him home to become an "inside cat."  He's gotten out a couple of times and explored a bit but doesn't seem to get into any more fights.  What he does do a lot of is eat!  And eat and eat and eat.  That little kitten has grown into quite a heavyweight cat.

 

And he's my buddy now.  He lets me pet him, scratch his head and back, even his tummy now and then.  And when I'm not using it, he takes up residence on my bed.  Last night I found him acting nearly human, taking a snooze using a pillow to rest his head.

 

As you can see, he's become quite a home cat.  And when we brought him in he acquired a new name.  He is the much more sophisticated "Blackwell" now.

Tumbleweed Junction

Out here in the wild (South)West, spring brings a plethora of nasty plants which go by the name of tumbleweeds.  They're called that because when the plant dies and dries, it breaks off and the large, sort of round top part tumbles across the deserts with the wind.  Where I live, in the high desert, there are thousands of them on pastureland and vacant lots.



Barbed wire (or as it's called down South "bob wire") fences catch a lot of them and I saw some town work crews out gathering them up and hauling them away this morning.

But the fences don't get all of them and frequently they are encountered on streets and highways.  They can get caught under one's car but usually they just kind of explode and scatter when they're hit.


Now if you've ever watched an old Western movie, you've no doubt seen tumbleweeds.  And there's even a great old song about them.



And yes, that fellow who came down the stairs and stopped to listen was the "King of the Cowboys" - Roy Rogers.

A musical interlude

Here's a neat song from those round-the-world musicians at Playing for Change.  In honor of Bob Marley.  I like the work of the two brothers(?) from Italy, Simone and Roberto Luti.



(Thanks to my buddy, Jeff, for tipping me to it.)

Monday update

As I wrote to my friend, Phil, he can wear his "cheesehead" proudly now that the Lombardi trophy has been returned to Green Bay with the Packers' win over the Steelers in yesterday's Super Bowl.

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Progress continues to be made on the Highway 89-A overpass at Viewpoint Road in north Prescott Valley.  The north side now has concrete in place.

The south side looks like it's getting ready to match it.

Traffic is still moving normally through the intersection while heavy equipment continues to roll on the project.

I think the entire project is supposed to be done in the fall of this year.  I'll keep you posted.

Sunday morning . . .

. . . is just right for homemade cranberry muffins.

A chocolate mess

I am constantly finding recipes on television, the Internets, in magazines or newspapers that sound simple and good.  Frequently . . with my limited cooking skills . . they turn into disasters, with a knowing grimace on the face of SWMBO.  Today was such a case.

I discovered a recipe in a local paper for what was termed "Hot Fudge Cake".  Sounded pretty good and fairly simple.  It was loaded with brown sugar, cocoa and chocolate chips.  What could go wrong with that, right?

Well perhaps the first indication that this was a weird recipe was that it was baked or cooked in a crock pot.  You know, a slow cooker.

But I charged ahead into the fray, first making a batter (no eggs though).  Brown sugar, cocoa, flour, baking powder and salt which was then combined with some milk, melted butter and vanilla extract.  Spread that in a crock pot that had been sprayed with cooking spray.  Top it with a cup and a half of chocolate chips.  Then combine some more brown sugar, cocoa and boiling water and pour it over the top.  Put a lid on it, turn it to high and leave it for 4 hours.

The room smelled marvelous until the last 15 minutes or so when SWMBO asked how long that thing was supposed to cook because it was smelling "scorchy".  I said everything was under control.  At exactly 4 hours I lifted the lid, did the toothpick test in the middle of the "cake" and it came out clean.  Done.  Except it was bubbing a bit menacingly around the edges and, yes, it did smell a bit "scorchy".

SWMBO said she'd like to ask the recipe's author why they didn't explain how to get the "creation" out of the pot.  I said we'll just put a plate over it and invert it.  But first maybe I'd check the sides with a spatula.  Hmmmm.  Some parts took some shoving and scraping to get it loose.  Seemed a bit charred.  But nevertheless, I did the inverting process, tapped the bottom of the cooker and picked it up.  Out tumbled a kind of muddled mess of chocolate in several forms.  Some of it was cake.  Quite a bit was liquid chocolate.  Parts of it were burned hard bits.  Definitely not a sight one would want to show off in a photograph or on a nice party plate for guests.

But . . . it tasted delicious!  Chocolate flavor to the max.  Oh we'll eat it and it goes especially good with some vanilla ice cream.

But I doubt if I'll ever make another one.  Certainly not in a slow cooker.

But then . . .