Vanilla Icing

CSA Pickup

I snapped a few pictures with my cell phone the other day when I went to collect our CSA share from our pick up location:

The house is beautiful; I only wish it had been a sunny day!

Dark Chocolate Brownies

Somehow these turn out more impressive when I don't have to substitute half of the chocolate chips with peanut butter chips because I neglected to buy the BIG bag of chocolate chips from Costco when I was there two days ago.

Spicy & Creamy Vodka Sauce

Spicy & Creamy Vodka Sauce over Fresh Gnocchi  -- shaped by my 7 year old daughter

        

In December of 2007, I had a wonderful sausage and gnocchi dish at a restaurant called Mezzanote.  I haven't been back there since but since then I've wanted to eat that dish many times!  Finally, I decided I wasn't likely to get back any time soon and decided to make something similar enough to satisfy my taste buds.  It was spicy and I advise using the greater amount of red pepper if you like spicy things.  If you don't you could omit the red pepper and even substitute the hot sausage with sweet sausage.  Here's what I came up with: 

Fresh Gnocchi
       by Michelle

3 lbs potatoes
2 eggs
2 cups of flour, plus a little more
generous pinch of salt

1.  Pierce the skins of the potatoes with a fork.  Bake in a 350 degree oven for approximately 1 hour or until tender.  Remove from oven and set aside until cool enough to handle but still hot.

2.  Peel potatoes and discard the skins.  Pass potatoes through a food mill or carefully mash them until there are no lumps.  Add the pinch of salt and eggs.  Stir in as much of the flour as you can.

3.  Turn the mixture out onto a floured counter top and knead in the remaining flour.  Add a little extra if necessary, if the dough is too sticky but be careful not to add too much!

4.  Cut the dough into four sections.  Take one section to work with and set aside the rest.  Roll the section into a long rope about 1 inch thick.  Cut the rope into one inch sections.  Take each cut gnocchi and roll each one off the tines of fork onto a floured cookie sheet.   Repeat until all gnocchi have gone across the tines of a fork.  Repeat with remaining sections.  See here for illustration.

5.  Cook gnocchi in boiling salted water for 3-4 minutes.  Depending on how large or small you cut the gnocchi you might need to cook them for a minute less or a minute more.  I like to cook a 'trial gnocchi' to determine how long to cook the batch.      Drain well and toss with sauce or butter and sage.


Creamy & Spicy Vodka Sauce
                    by Michelle

5 links of Italian Hot Sausage
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 cup  finely chopped onion
3 tablespoons butter
Olive oil
1 cup vodka
24.5 ounces tomato sauce
1 cup heavy cream
1/2-1 tsp red pepper flakes
Salt and Pepper
1 cup fresh grated Parmesan
1 recipe Fresh Gnocchi OR Fresh Pasta (or 1lb dried pasta)
additional Parmesan if desired

--This recipe makes more sauce than is needed on purpose.  Place some in a bowl for those who wish extra sauce and/or refrigerate the extra for later in the week.--

1.  Remove casings from sausage and cut or form the sausage into small balls.  In a deep pan, cook sausage until cooked through.  Lift sausage from pan and set aside to drain.  Pour off any excess grease, being careful to leave any brown bits in the pan.

2.  Add the butter and a splash of olive oil to the pan.  Scrape up any brown bits and add the onions to the mixture.  Cook over medium low heat until the onions are nearly tender.  Add the garlic being careful not to burn.  Cook until the onions and garlic are tender.

3.  Carefully, add the vodka.  Allow it to boil for a few minutes and then slowly pour in the tomato sauce and stir to combine.   Put the sausage back into the pan.   Bring to a gentle boil, then turn down the heat and allow it to simmer for five minutes. 

4.  Add the cream and red pepper.  Allow the mixture to return to a gentle boil and cook for another five minutes.   Generously salt and pepper the sauce to taste.

5.  Turn the heat to medium.  Stir it occasionally until it has reduced and thickened a little bit.  This will take another 5-10 minutes and helps concentrate the flavors. 

6. Remove from heat and stir in the fresh grated Parmesan Cheese.   Pour over hot, fresh gnocchi or pasta.  Serve with additional Parmesan Cheese. 

Frustrating

Can you believe just when I announce I'm 'back' now that I have the new stove that I misplace my camera.  I've made quite a few things that I wanted to share with you too:

Cookies, French Bread, Cheese Bread (Cheddar, Parmesan & Piave), Chicken and a Cherry Pie--but now these things are all memories in the bellies of my family and friends.  I am planning a full house search for it today.

Meanwhile....

...here is a picture I took with my cell phone of Maia.  Last Friday, Rick and Tristyn went for an overnight camping trip with our friend Levy and his son.  That meant Maia and I had the evening to ourselves for shopping at the mall and watching dvds in bed.  On Saturday, we met up with our friend Katie (Levy's wife) and her two girls and helped do a service project and had lunch. 

We had a very good time having a dedicated 'girl's time' together and must admit we are sorta hoping the boys go camping again soon.

Saturdays in Summer

....are for trying out new ovens!!   Bake for 12 minutes REALLY IS 12 minutes!

And for those curious as to just what the glass of the old oven door looked like....

It's pretty awful, isn't it?   I had learned how to adapt and still use the oven but it was getting to the point where something requiring 15 minutes to bake needed an extra 10, something needing 30 needed about an extra 20 and so on and so forth. 

It's also pretty disgusting but please don't be too turned off.  With the oven door like that there was no way I was going to use the self clean feature and I was too afraid to manually clean it and knock in more of the glass.

Anyways....June Baking here and now we are on to July and I'm back in business!

A New Oven

A new oven is coming home on Friday.   I am anxiously planning what will be the first thing I cook/bake on/in it.  Any ideas?

Please bear with me and the few posts this week as I await the new oven.  =)

Saturdays In Summer

....are for dancing your little heart out....

....and coming home exhausted!

(I hope I haven't offended any of my dear readers with this slightly racy picture!)

No Seaming Worries

Last night just as I was about to make dinner, Maia asked me if she could use my sewing machine.  My poor-ancient-works-one-third-of-the-time-if-you're-lucky sewing machine.  She's never used a sewing machine before and I started to explain how it didn't work very well.  And stopped as I saw her face fall.  I remembered this post by Treemama and knew that right at this moment letting Maia try her hand at the sewing machine was more important than delaying dinner.

Maia picked it up very easily but we left turning raw edges under for another time.  I wanted her first couple of times sewing to be about learning how the machine works and not how well she's pressed and pinned the raw edges under.  She doesn't seem to notice raw edges yet anyway.

The machine behaved reasonably well.  I guess it likes the zig zag stitch more than the straight, running stitch.

Concentrating intensely.  =)

Hot Cross Buns

                Hot cross buns!
                Hot cross buns!
                One ha' penny, two ha' penny,
                Hot cross buns!
                If you have no daughters,
                Give them to your sons


I think it might be time to cave in and purchase a new oven.  I thought I could hold out a couple of years until we do a kitchen remodel that way I could get a really fantastic oven guilt free because I had used my old one for so long while it's broken but I can't.  The hole in the glass is really starting to effect my baking.  It does no good to put a thermometer inside because the temperature changes so often depending on how fast the heat escapes through the broken glass.  =(
                One ha' penny,
                Two ha' penny,
                Hot Cross Buns!