Month: February 2012

Bread and Soup Season

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I love soup during the winter months.  Lately, I’ve been on an Italian leaning soup kick, having made ‘clean out the freezer/fridge/pantry’ Minestrone Saturday night and Northern Italian Spinach and Cornmeal Soup last night.  Or rather, Arugula and Cornmeal soup, as I have arugula in the garden attempting to bolt because it’s been so warm this winter.  February and the arugula is bolting.  Go figure.
The arugula was a good substitute – the peppery bite gave an otherwise mild soup a nice flavor.  The little food critic that lives in our house that generally finds this soup rather ‘boring’ gave it a two thumbs up.  
What better to go with a big pot of homemade soup than a fresh baked loaf of bread?  For years I have been on the hunt for the perfect bread recipe.  I have read with some fascination about no knead loaves, but I find when I feel like having fresh baked bread, I want it NOW and not in a few days, for fresh baked bread takes time.  A good number of the no knead recipes I’ve seen call for starting the dough at least a day ahead of time, which is well and good, but sometimes I really need immediate satisfaction.  A few months ago, I found this recipe for a no-knead olive bread.  It calls for a two hour first rise, an hour long second rise and it’s no knead.  How could I not try it?
As if that wasn’t enough, it was also an olive bread.  When I worked at a local non-profit, Tuesday was Free bread day courtesy of a grocery store chain that likes to donate their day olds to local ‘charities’ (I’ve actually heard employees of this store say that to customers).  I once grabbed a loaf of what looked to be Rosemary bread, only to find it was Rosemary Olive bread and we fell in love with it.  After that, I grabbed a few loaves every week.  I have since been unable to find this bread at said grocery store and we have missed it.  Pat kept telling me I could make the bread myself, but honestly, I’ve yet to really perfect homemade bread.
Until now. 
That is my finished loaf last night.  I have baked two loaves of this in the last three days and we have eaten them.  Both Pat & I agree, this is the best bread I’ve ever made.  I have stopped searching for the best bread recipe, because this is it.  I started the dough 3:30 Saturday afternoon and we were eating it by 7 pm Saturday evening.  It’s good.

I used what I think are Black Cerignola olives from the grocery store olive bar.  (I’ve been able to find them at both Kroger and Whole Foods.)  They are large, meaty and pitted.  I cut around the stone in a way similar to how I chop mangos.   Edie, who swears up and down she can’t stand olives, eats these without complaint.   For the most part, I followed the recipe as it is on the website, with a few exceptions:
  • Adding fresh chopped rosemary along with the olives. 
  • Sprinkling sea salt on the top before putting it in the oven
  • Omitting the cornstarch wash
  • Doubling the amount of water poured into the broiler pan
  • Making two loaves, rather than four.
I imagine this bread would be good plain as well.  In the past I’ve used leftover Rosemary Olive bread in savory vegetable bread puddings, for grilled cheese and for a different take on French Toast.  I think I’ll have to track down the original cookbook and take a gander at it for sure.

Recent Knitting Projects.

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My friend Kristin got rid of her stash and gave me a big bag of yarn when I saw her last summer.  I wanted to say thank you and so I knit her a scarf out of some of that yarn.  Here it is:
The ends are this are knit out of a fun chenille pom-pom type yarn, with the main body of the scarf being this very soft, almost suede-like yarn.  I got a number of compliments on it while I was knitting it.   It was very  easy to work with and did I mention soft?  A good hunk of it got knit when we were driving to Alabama to visit the in-laws over the holidays.   Nothing like 10 hours in a car, one way, to knock out some knitting projects.   I’ve started another scarf out of her gifted stash as a donation for the upcoming silent auction for The Jedediah Thomas Smith Foundation annual luncheon, which is another way to say Thank You to her.
This is one I knit for Edie for Christmas – also from Kristin’s stash.  It’s a fingerweight yarn.  I’ve knit this pattern several times over, it’s quick and easy and turns out quite cute.  I think I got it out of the Sunday paper a few years back – it’s all knit stitches, where you  increase every stitch every other row to make the ruffles.  I have two HUGE cones of this yarn and this scarf didn’t make a dent.  I’m thinking it might be a lovely shaw at some point.  It’s quite soft and well, purple.  Our favorite color next to orange. 
My friend Bonnie worked on this scarf one night, when our knitting group had gathered after a particularly tense PTO meeting at school.  In her haste to remember the wine, she had forgotten her knitting, so I lent her one of my projects, since you know, I always have a few I’m working on.  She couldn’t stop commenting on my tight little stitches.  Indeed, there are 1600 stitches in the last row of this scarf with a finished length of 32″.  I knit this on size 8 needles and wasn’t sure how the finished product would turn out.  It’s actually just the right length to wrap around a neck.  It’s quite darling on Edie. 
What intrigues me about knitting is how different yarns and needles create such different results.  I have a heck of a time with gauge.  When I knit scarves, I don’t have to worry about the final measurements as much, I just knit until it looks right.  You can’t do that with sweaters.  Speaking of sweaters….

Serious Progress has been made with Pat’s sweater.  Sleeve No. One is done.  (Okay, so it’s an inch short in that shot, but it’s much farther along than it was here.  I’ll be starting Sleeve No. Two this week and at this rate, I might be able to start putting it all together by sometime mid-summer.  Pat’s hinted it would make a fabulous Christmas gift.  It’s definitely taking me longer than I had anticipated – the yarn is on the heavy and stiff side because it still has a good bit of lanolin in it.  Which means it’s perfect for him to wear out on the river on cold days.
I also knit a really fun little scarf for my cousin’s girlfriend, but a certain little someone who likes to play with my camera may have deleted the photos.  Oh well.  It was white on white, mixing up all the white yarn I had on hand, with some pink and green fringe yarn thrown in for fun. I gave it to her without all the ends woven in (I finished it a few hours before her birthday party and realized I hadn’t brought my needle to work the ends in and didn’t feel like running out to get one.).  I threw some cables in here & there for fun and because I like knitting cables.  They seem to make the process go faster for me for some reason.  Hopefully I can get a new shot next time I see her (and work those ends in!).

Here’s the thing.

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I find I write blog posts while I’m doing other things, mostly cooking, although it’s a good time killer when you are waiting on the floor to dry after mopping or babysitting the printer (because no matter what, my printer demands I sit next to it whenever I print ANYTHING or it will somehow screw up, then becoming an hour long study in frustration as to what the heck is going on with that thing and just when I am about to go all Office Space on it, it suddenly starts working again) or to avoid doing things, like cleaning the house or laundry.  The batteries on my camera died last weekend, and I’ve been too lazy to run out to get new ones, so everything I’ve thought about blogging, like uhm, the latest scarves I’ve knitted, or what’s happening in my garden right now, has required me to run out and get camera batteries to either capture the moment or move the pictures from my camera to my computer.  And since I generally have something on the stove at the moment I’m inspired, or, it’s late at night,  I’m waiting for the big yellow angel to swing by and drop miss thing off, there’s always a reason to not drop everything and run right out.

What’s particularly sad about this is that just today, I drove not just right past the K-mart, but cut through the parking lot TWICE on my way elsewhere.  Sadder yet, I have driven by it several times this week, as it’s right next to my current frenimy, Whole Foods, which I go to at least 3 times a week, because you know, they need me to.  (Sort of like how Eloise was needed to oversee so many events at The Plaza.) Also, I have decided it’s the closest grocery store to my house, other than Reid’s, which I consider more a convenience store/butcher shop.   When one has X number of errands to complete in X amount of time, I don’t always feel like adding one. more. stop.  I am lazy like that.   So, I drive through the Kmart parking lot without stopping. 

It’s not like I’ve been that lazy all around – I’ve been cooking up some tasty morsels, sneaking in a little bit of gardening here & there despite the fact that it’s technically still winter and we got a bunch of snow while we were out of town last weekend and yes, mopping floors and doing laundry.  I moved the vacuum cleaner yesterday – AND turned it on.  Here’s a small confession – our vacuum really doesn’t have a good home that’s out of sight.  We are slightly closet challenged here, so I use my mother’s old trick of just leaving it lying out in the middle of a room, so it always appears as if I am in process of cleaning.  Of course, when it sits in that spot for 2 weeks right by the front door, it gets obvious that I’m not actually cleaning, so sometimes I just move it from room to room.  Sometimes, in that process, it actually will get plugged in, turned on and used.  Yesterday was one of those days.  Honestly, no matter how much I vacuum or not, there is always glitter all over my floor.  I think little girls off-gas it.  Seriously.  It is all over my house, even in my car.  My house breeds glitter dust.

I almost made time to grab batteries yesterday so I could take pictures of my Girl Scouts doing a craft project, but then got nervous that if I was prepared to capture moments, they’d be their usually needy selves when it comes to crafts.  Over the years I’ve learned that what the Girl Scouts say are age appropriate crafts turn out to be anything but.  Or, if they are age appropriate, it’s with a one on one adult to child ratio.  We’ve had some epic craft fail and I blame the Girl Scout Handbook for each one. It also taught me the lesson the hard way to run through every project ahead of time, especially the ones that look easy, because they are the ones that get you the most.  Yesterday was different though – I don’t know if it’s because my girls have gotten big enough to do things on their own or if it’s because the project was fairly easy (Paper Beads), but they did an outstanding job yesterday.  I probably have the only Girl Scout troop out there that avoids craft projects – honestly, I hate the kids making stuff to just bring home and clutter up the house more, just for the sake of making something.  I don’t want that stuff in my house, so I’m not going to do it.  We also don’t sell cookies.  We are sort of a slacker Girl Scout troop, but it works for us.   I make all the parents take turns helping, so we are all in agreement on how things go.  If anyone wants to see something done, then they get to be the ones to make it happen.  I feel that’s very democratic, yes?

In the immortal words of Scarlett O’ Hara, Tomorrow is another day.  Maybe tomorrow I’ll find some time to swing by and get me some camera batteries.  You know, in between all my other activities.  ‘Til then…..

Sometimes Life Hands You Mystery Citrus.

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Remember how I said all of our friends brought pretty much everything we needed for Pat’s Birthday Party?
We ended up with quite a bit of leftovers when it was all said and done, from a dozen eggs from the Royston chickens, to a package of sausage from Miss Piggy, to a case of assorted beers as well as some citrus that Eric had brought back from his recent trip to Florida.  He mentioned something about lemons in the mix, but honestly, most of the fruit appeared to be the same size and turned out to be some of the tastiest, if smallest grapefruit we’ve ever had.  There were a few pieces of fruit that had damaged skin and we couldn’t quite tell what it was.  It was the same size as the grapefruit, so we really sort of assumed that they were grapefruit as well.  
The other day, while on Tastespotting (which is my absolute favorite food porn/time suck these days), I saw this link for a grapefruit olive oil cake.  It was described as more of a ‘breakfast cake’ than a dessert cake.  Which actually sounded quite do-able, since I swore up and down I was not baking a cake the entire month of February.  But, my family does need to eat breakfast and while some of us are quite content to eat things like oatmeal and raisin bran and homemade granola with yogurt day after day, others are not.   As this member of our household loves carbs as part of her breakfast, I thought this might be a nice treat.  Reading the recipe, I saw it was made with whole wheat flour, eggs and olive oil, so really, it did look fairly healthy.  I decided to skip the glaze, as that was just added sugar and I do keep an eye on how much sugar we consume, even if I have a wicked sweet tooth and serve things like cake for breakfast.  Everything in moderation, including moderation.
I thought it would be great to try this recipe out while I had such amazing grapefruit.  Certainly this would turn out fabulously and then I would be applauded for such a wonderful breakfast treat.  The recipe called for grating the rind, but as the exterior was so damaged, I sort of skipped that part, which I do realize was probably a crucial step to the flavor and while I do know better, you wouldn’t have wanted that zest either.  I cut them open to juice them and THAT’S when I realized they were a lemon, and not a grapefruit. 
I was undeterred however in my quest for cake.  So I pressed on, thinking it was now a full blown experiment and what was the worst that would happen?  A lemon cake instead of a grapefruit cake?  They’ll still eat it, because they eat just about everything I attempt to cook and if they don’t like it, then we’ll feed it to the squirrels, who love everything we give them. 
I am sad to say the cake was slightly overbaked, despite the fact that it didn’t cook for the full 50 minutes called for in the recipe. You know how you can smell a cake starting to burn? That happened, so I pulled it out early and while it wasn’t burnt, it was definitely starting to crisp on the edges. When we cut into, I found it was indeed, dry, but not too crumbly. Flavorwise, I found it sort of meh at first, but this morning, dipped in coffee, it was just right.  Breakfast cake indeed.  Although clearly, grating the rind and combining it with the sugar is key to more flavor in this cake.
Oh, and my main reason for a baking break, that whole muffin top thing?  I am quite pleased to say that a little over a week without cake combined with some serious workouts made a visible difference in that muffin over the top of my pants.  Yes, I do realize that for a woman past 40 this is an incredible gift of genetics and that noting it here probably just helped to shorten that window of time I have left to pull this sort of thing off.  I am no where near bathing suit ready, but at least I can still fit into my pants without looking unfortunate.  I can only imagine how fantastic I’d look if I would work out like that and forgo cake all the time.  But then, everything in moderation, including moderation.

Valentines.

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That’s Edie’s Valentine this year, made with a few images she found on the internet, some Photoshop skills and Daddy’s iphone.  Personally, I think it turned out sort of brilliant, although I really didn’t know where she was going with it until I saw the finished product.  The greeting on the back was a simple “Happy Valentines Day”, in an Edwardian font.  She was quite specific about using that font.
Edie had a sleepover last weekend, so Pat & I took the opportunity to go to Beer Run for beers & nachos.  We don’t always make Valentines a big deal, but  it is special to us.  And I do love that we still celebrate with nachos and beer.  Although you’d think that after all these years, he wouldn’t be surprised at how I will eat nachos every chance I get.
Mostly what I like about Valentines Day is that it was an excuse for a boy to call a girl. And that girl still thinks that hearing his voice at the end of the day is the best way to end a day.  Every day.

That was a good week.

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Thanks everyone, for all the love for last week’s posts.  Last Monday was most certainly a very good day, for when I had gotten home from that estate sale, in my inbox was the notification that my long awaited piece in Women we Love was going to run on Wednesday.  As if that wasn’t enough, there was also an email saying that Bingo Night that I had put together at school the previous Friday was the biggest Bingo Night our PTO had ever had, with a record breaking fundraising total.  I was feeling pretty darn tooting proud of myself.

This Monday was a little different, as I woke up to discover we were out of coffee.  Oh well.

I got a good number of congrats on the success of my business with the “Women We Love” piece and while I am thankful for the good wishes, to be perfectly honest, the business still has quite a ways to go.  There are certifications and licenses to be had and recipes, packaging and delivery methods to be perfected…..it’s a little overwhelming at times.  And always, that little voice in the back of my head asking,  am I really up to this?  Learning to shut that voice up is a job in itself.  I just keep putting one foot in front of the other and see where the road takes me.  

After months of ignoring invites,  I finally joined Pinterest this morning.  I keep hearing it’s a time suck and I really do not need any more of that, but I’m hoping it will help organize all these recipe links I keep saving in various folders on my computer.   Perhaps a little bit of method to the madness?  One can only hope.

I think I might make these for my Valentines this year.  Last year I made them in full size muffin cups and they were downright decadent.  I’m going to go for mini muffin tins this year, so we can eat them in one pop.   We do celebrate Valentine’s around here, maybe not in a full blown chocolates, flowers & jewelry sort of way, but it is a special day for us. 

In the meantime though, there are bathrooms to be cleaned and floors to be mopped and I swear, laundry breeds while we are sleeping at night. Just when I think it’s caught up, I’m wrong.  Sigh.

Kicking it up a notch.

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I like to bake. 
I bake cakes like that three layer chocolate on chocolate goodness pictured above on regular occasion for family and friend’s birthdays. They all encourage me to sell these creations and while I have here & there, I feel like my presentation skills are slightly lacking.
Remember this from a few weeks ago?  That’s me playing around with piping.
I prefer to think of it as modernist abstract.
So my answer to this small problem was to assist in a baking class at the Charlottesville Cooking School this past weekend.  I figured I might learn a trick or two about baking and I would hopefully learn a little something about how to make my cakes and cupcakes look better.
The baking class in question was taught by Rachel Willis. Click on her name and you will go to her website to see her cakes.  They are amazing.  She is an artist.  She is also a fantastic teacher. 
I can also tell you her cakes taste as good as they look.  Maybe better.
It was a two day class, with Day One being for the making of the cakes, frosting and some of the fillings with Day Two was set aside to put them all together.  While I learned a few new things Day One, what I learned primarily is that I know far more about baking than I realized or give myself credit for.  I have learned by just doing: by reading recipes and following them to the letter.  Even if they don’t always look good, they usually taste good. Because recipes don’t tell you the finer points of how to make icing pretty when you put it on. This is why I signed on for the class, to kick it up a notch, and make my cakes look as good as they taste.
So, Day One, was a bit of a cake walk.  (Slight pun intended.)
Day Two however, was a whole other ball game.

I learned how to slice a cake.
You can use this trick to make a cake’s top surface level and you can use it to turn one layer into two.

I learned how to structurally build a cake so that when I stacked layers, they would stay sturdy.
(Hint: Pipe some buttercream frosting around the edges to keep the filling in place.) 
I learned I held my piping bag the wrong way.  I learned I don’t let the air out when I first fill it, so when I go to decorate the cake in question, it looks like that cupcake up there.  (Like doo-doo.)
I learned so many things I was doing wrong and how easy it is to fix them.
I learned you can practice with the same frosting over and over, on an upside cake pan. 
I see that happening in my future.

I learned how to make my cakes look like that. 
Smooth.
It’s really not much more than a flick of the wrist and how you hold your tools.
I learned what a crumb coat is and why you do it.  I learned that I need to allow myself more time in assembling my cakes, that this is key in making them stay together better, as well as the final appearance. 
Two basic cake recipes, a classic vanilla butter cake and a dark chocolate sour cream cake, were given out, along with a buttercream recipe and two different fillings – a whipped triple cream and a chocolate ganache. We learned variations on those – like a mocha buttercream, a white chocolate ganache and so on. Everyone got to ‘design’ themselves a cake using those basic guidelines.

 

I think they did some fantastic looking cakes, didn’t they?

I learned my favorite chocolate buttercream frosting is actually a Swiss style buttercream.
I learned the differences in all the buttercream frosting styles actually, as well as flour and cocoa types.
Oh yeah, I learned there are different buttercream frosting styles.  Although this, I had a small clue about, having so many different frosting recipes in my little collection of cookbooks.

Everyone took home a four layer masterpiece they had spent the weekend creating.
It was such a fun class, with a great group of ladies.  I enjoyed spending my weekend with them.
  I got to enjoy a slice of Rachel’s that she shared with the class,  but as assistant, I didn’t make a cake and I didn’t take one home, which was more than fine with me.  Given all the cake we’ve been eating around here lately with all the birthdays coming just after the holidays, I’m developing a muffin top.  I am holding fast to my pledge to not bake a cake for at least a month, although I am dying to try out my new skills.  But, until I get serious about working out again, lose that muffin top and fit into my jeans, I’m not baking a cake.  It’s one thing to be my age, quite another to look it.
I just won’t have it. 
I’m proud to say I hit the gym hard today.
Nothing like cake to motivate.
I came home from this class completely jazzed Sunday night.  I had every intention of blogging about it yesterday, but then I stumbled upon that estate sale.  I’m still sort of floating on that little high – I spent last night reading some of my new cookbooks.  That Southern Living Heritage series is a treasure.  Today, in between cooking dinner & laundry & working out & running to the grocery store & doing the after school club pickup & blogging & uploading pictures from the class to the cooking school’s Facebook page, I managed to clear a spot for the series on my dining room hutch, while the rest found a home in my cabinet. Which, by the way, is officially chock full, until I figure out a new home for either the stand mixer or a few of those cookbooks.   Some creative problem solving is most certainly needed, whatever the answer is, because none of them are going anywhere for a while.

Treasures and Kindred Spirits.

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So, I was all set to tell you about the absolutely wonderful baking class I assisted with at the cooking school this weekend, but on my way home this morning, I stumbled upon the most fantastic estate sale I’ve been to in a long time.  So, the baking class recap will just have to wait until tomorrow.

We had borrowed some tables and chairs from the Parks & Rec department for bingo night at school last Friday that needed to be returned this morning, to their storage shed over by CHS.  Along the way, I saw a sign for an estate sale.  On my way home from dropping them off, I popped in, just to see what I could find.  I noticed as I walked in, this was the last day, so everything was half off.

Sweet. 

As I walked into the garage, I couldn’t help but notice all sorts of good kitchen gadgets.  Although picked over, I could tell, there was a cook that lived here.  I hoped that not everything was picked over, that I could find a few useful things for myself.

And then I walked into the kitchen.  I saw a shelf of cookbooks that looked seemingly untouched.  I started rifling through them, then, suddenly became aware that there were at least 4 other bookshelves next to me, all FULL of cookbooks.  I stepped back and realized the breakfast nook off the kitchen had even more.  There were cookbooks EVERYWHERE.  There were complete sets of cookbooks – Bon Appetit, Gourmet, Time Life, Betty Crocker, McCalls, Southern Living, I could go on and on.  There were vintage cookbooks, there were new cookbooks, there were shelves upon shelves of what I call those church cookbooks – you know the ones that churches and ladies groups put together and sell as a fundraiser?  She had a whole collection of them.  I noticed many of her cookbooks were noted as to who had given them to her and when.  She had handwritten notes in them, she had recipes she’s written down, shoved in them, she had cards taped to the inside covers.  I realized I was standing in the kitchen of a woman who’s cookbook ownership style was very similar to my own.  Not only that, I realized that she had some of the same cooking interests and cookbook collecting habits as myself – with a heavy emphasis on southern style cooking as well as those church collections.
The first cookbook I grabbed was a rather beaten up one.

That I realized was an old, beloved copy of The Joy of Cooking.

A 1943 edition as a matter of fact.

Shoved full of recipes and notes and stains.

This newspaper clipping was in the front of the book.
  I like to imagine she cut it out because of the picture it painted.
Isn’t it lovely?

This was glued to the inside front cover. I think she covered the book in a wallpaper scrap and that appears to be a label from a product she wanted to remember.  This is something I do – shove labels I want to remember into cookbooks.  Hers was glued in, on top of the book cover edges.
The inside covers and all blank pages on the inside of her Joy of Cooking were filled with handwritten recipes.  Some are water damaged, but they are a treasure.
I realized as I looked that she had multiple copies of cookbooks – I found two Joy of Cookings, but went with the beat-up copy.  I have a newer version myself and what I really wanted were her notes.
So now I have two Joy of Cookings myself.  Which will fit in splendidly with all my Betty Crockers cookbooks.  (I have two an early 1950’s and a late 1980’s, plus the Cooky cookbook from the mid-sixties).

Amazingly, I held myself to two of the church collection cookbooks.  The one on the right is from First Presbyterian Church, here in Charlottesville, circa 1966.  The other is from a group called the Proud Land Rose Society and it’s the “Bicentennial Issue”, 1976. 
She had shelves upon shelves of these.  She had multiple copies of some of them.  I couldn’t help but notice, we had some of the same, from different areas of the state.  She had them from up and down the east coast.  I collect these as well, but I narrowed it down to these two, because one was from Charlottesville and the other one fascinated me. 
It had pages I had never seen before in these books. Serious menu planning.

Baking hints and food measures.
Gardening charts!

And then I found this.  Good Housekeeping, 1949.  Also full of bookmarks and notes. 

This one being my favorite.  An old Sweet & Low packet to mark the Indian Shrimp Curry recipe, with notes.  Yes, I will be making this and soon.
A canning cookbook.  Always good to have more of those, especially ones with pickles, jams & jelly recipes.

This is a classic.  I first learned about Edna Lewis from my dear friend Leni.  I’m not sure the previous owner used this, as it’s in mint condition, but I’m tickled to now have a copy in my collection. Edna Lewis was the granddaughter of a slave, and this cookbook is considered a classic in Southern Cooking.  Edna Lewis was sometimes referred to as the Julia Child of southern cooking. 

For years, I have collected piecemeal, books from a collection put out in the mid-1980’s from Southern Living, called the “Southern Heritage Collection”. 
Today I discovered the missing books in my collection.
I snatched them all up, as well as the index.
She had two sets of these. TWO!

I have loved the ones I’ve had, so to complete the collection has me beyond tickled.
I got my first one, “Vegetables”, at a yard sale when we still lived in Birmingham.  They are full of old Southern recipes, with illustrations and pictures from the late 19th and early 20th century.  They are gems. And I now have the complete set, which includes, but is not limited to:
Bread
Breakfast and Brunch
Cakes
Celebrations
Just Desserts
Gift Receipts
Pies and Pastry
Socials and Soirees
Soups and Stews
Sporting Scenes
Oh the possibilities in there!

And then I found this, right next to that collection.  
The inside cover.

The note on the inside of the card. More than a few of her cookbooks had similar inscriptions. 
I love that she kept track of her cookbooks this way.  I want to start doing this to my cookbooks.
This particular cookbook was written by Eugene Walter.  The most charming man you probably have never heard of.  I read this review of his oral history, Milking the Moon: A Southerner’s Tale of Life on This Planet and thought it looked interesting.  I wrote it on a running list of books I wanted to remember to read, only to have my dear husband buy it for me one Christmas.  Go read it. 
Allison currently has my copy, otherwise I’d lend it to you. It really is mandatory reading if you are going to know me.  I’m quite sure Eugene and I would have been kindred spirits, had I ever been lucky enough to meet his acquaintance.
I have been looking for my own copy of this cookbook for years now.  I’ve borrowed it from the library, so I’ve read it, but to now own it?  Happy happy.
She actually owned the entire series, but at that point, I felt I’d picked up enough cookbooks.  As it is, I’m not entirely sure where I’m going to store all these.  But this one I had to have. 
As I was walking out, I stumbled upon one last treasure, that they just gave to me, for free.

A binder of recipes, labeled as to the contents on the spine.
I found another binder with meats and casseroles and so on, and decided to leave that one.
This one, with desserts and cakes and breads suited me just fine, thank you very much.

Table of contents.
Menus – she has a spot for menus.  In there, she had menus of Thanksgivings past.  I have thought about organizing my menus of Holiday Dinners past and now I shall.

Inside, she had an assortment of recipes, all taped or glued down to looseleaf paper.

She had little headlines and sayings cut out and glued down too.

These two gems were covered by a sheet protector. Stapled to the Dark Fruitcake recipe is a note signed Mother.  It was written on a Tuesday and her mother wrote she had included some tips in the recipe so it should turn ‘just as well for you as it does for me’.  She closes saying she’s not going to the club party tonight- ‘it’s too bad for me to go out.’ In pencil, just under the ‘Tues. nite’ written in the upper right hand corner is ’66, marking the year.
Anne Thomas gave this recipe to her in 1963. It’s noted by hand in the corner.

This recipe, for green sauce, is written partly in German, with English translation.   
It looks like a Green Goddess recipe.
She had decorated some of the tab pages of the binder with images cut out of magazines and the like.  It reminds me of notebooks I made myself in high school and college, dedicated to fashion clippings.
Pictured above are the dessert and cake cover pages. 

Mother Carter gave her this Cranberry Salad recipe in 1958.
I’m guessing that was her mother-in-law.

And then there was this.  Tomato Aspic.  With multiple exclamation points on either side of EX, which I gathered was her way of saying a recipe was good, as it is on many recipes throughout her cookbooks, especially ones with stained pages and other notes. Stained pages are a dead giveaway a recipe has been tried and probably well liked.  I have never, ever been inclined to try any recipe for tomato aspic, but in going through her cookbooks today, I find myself wanting to try this.  Perhaps I shall.
Flipping through these cookbooks, I found all sorts of notes, both cooking and gardening.  As I walked through the rest of her house, I realized not only did she collect cookbooks, she was an avid knitter as well as a gardener. She was a big reader and must have been well traveled, as there were many travel books and books on other countries.  There was a number of history books too – honestly, I probably could have filled my truck up with all the books I saw in that house that I wanted to bring home. Her record collection was simply amazing.  In so many ways, I felt that I was in the home of a kindred spirit.  I’m sad our paths didn’t cross sooner, but I do feel like I was meant to stumble upon that sale today.  The only other thing I bought was a new watch – the battery in mine died a few months back and the watch is too beat up to put yet another battery into.  My new watch is a Seiko – that I got for a whopping $2.50.  I’ve wanted one of those for a long time, never thinking I could actually score one second hand for such a great price. All in all, I ended up paying about 25% of what everything had originally been marked for, which ended up being less than $25.  That’s right.  23 cookbooks and a watch, for $24. 
I spent a little bit of time looking through the knitting and gardening things, but honestly, I was so jazzed about the cookbooks, I couldn’t quite focus.  And I’m quite content with my current knitting and gardening libraries.  This was the third day of the sale – the knitting supplies had been well picked over and I don’t want to add to the stash.  (That was part of the deal with Pat when I started knitting, that I would NOT have a stash for that, as my sewing stash is uhm, sizable to say the least.).  As for the vinyl records, I know I walked away from some gems, but at that point, I was in line, ready to go and well, as much as we love music, we have been moving away from vinyl.  Most of our library is digital these days and I’m quite okay with that.  I’ve even moved to e-books, having gotten a Kindle for Christmas.  I can’t go to e-cook books though.  I need to be able to spill and to note in my cookbooks.  I need pictures.  I need to flip back and forth between pages.  I need to stack about 3 or 4 of them and cross reference similar recipes while I’m cooking, so that I can write my own recipe when I’m done. Most of all, I like using all random manner of items as bookmarks in my cookbooks and today I learned I’m not the only cook who feels that way.
What an absolute score.

Happy Sights.

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Things in my back yard that are currently making me happy:
My purple Hellebore.
It’s going to be gangbusters this year.
It was really hard to get a shot of all the blooms in a close up.  
I’m just not up to the task.
It took 3 years for it to bloom after I planted it.  I was close to digging it up and moving it.
Which probably would have been the kiss of death.
So glad I found some patience for it.
Patience is one of those over-rated virtues that I don’t really have.

My ‘neighbor’ hellebore is putting out some blooms too.
I got it at a neighborhood plant swap hosted by The Barns down the street.  
I love walking through my garden and seeing all the plants from friends and family.
When they shoot up out of the ground and then bloom, it’s like a little ‘hello’.
Yesterday afternoon, I looked out my back door and saw the empty red recycling bins going up the hill on Rose Hill.  As I walked up the road yesterday, the trend of red recycling bins continued up around the bend.
As we have green ones, I know it’s not a uniform thing, and maybe they are out there every Thursday and I just now noticed.  Either way, something about it made me really happy.  At one point the sun seemed to make them all glow – little spots of glowing color in the otherwise drab winter landscape on a spring like day.