Basic Curry.

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A few months ago, Betty handed me a cookbook she’d bought to give as a gift to someone, but before giving it, she thought I needed to be ‘made aware’ of it.  “I think this would be a good one to have around” she said.  I agreed and so proceeded to get myself a copy.
The book in question is “More with Less“. She had gotten it at the 10,000 Villages store on the downtown mall.  Both the cookbook and the international fair trade organization come from the Mennonite community with a focus on sustainability, using what you have and consuming less.
But I’m not talking about that here today.  You all know how I feel about talking about sustainability – I just prefer to do it and not talk about it. If you want to learn more about 10,000 Villages, click on some of the above links or go check out the store downtown.  And full disclosure, I first learned about their sustainable practice because a dear high school friend is their marketing director.  It was her Facebook posts from her Vietnam trip last year in which she met artisans that taught me about the organization’s mission.  (I also wrote about them previously in The Hook‘s last Green Homes issue.)
No, what I want to talk about here today is this recipe I stumbled upon in “More with Less” that is quickly becoming a favorite.   I first found it when I was looking for something easy and different to do with lamb for Pat’s birthday dinner.  He & Edie are fans of lamb, me, not so much, so I only cook it upon request.  I found a recipe for “Basic Meat Curry” that is truly was basic, with lamb as an option. Also listed as options were chicken, beef, mutton, fish, any leftover cooked meat or meatballs. I made it with lamb for Pat’s birthday and then again recently with tofu.
I love a good recipe that can be varied endlessly.  Not every recipe in this cookbook is so pliable, but it is a very good basic how-to cookbook that you can use for spin-offs.  I have what I call a “Rule of Three” – I use it in buying magazines as well as culling my cookbook collection – where a cookbook must have a minimum of 3 recipes in order to keep it’s spot on my shelf.  This cookbook definitely meets that self imposed standard.  Betty was right when she said we needed this around.
Tofu was on sale at the grocery store last week.  Normally I prefer Twin Oaks Tofu, that locally made goodness, but at 99 cents a block, I thought I’d try the grocery store stuff.  No, it does not touch Twin Oaks, but not everyone has access to Twin Oaks and when friends in other areas ask me about cooking with tofu, I want to be able to tell them how to make it and make it well.  Cooking with tofu is challenging.  I’ve been attempting to cook with it for 20 years and feel like I have just gotten the hang of it.  Most of that I attribute to good tofu, but there has been quite a bit of trial and error I assure you.  Boiling tofu for 10 minutes before you do anything else with it is a good place to start in getting it to stay firm and absorb flavors more readily.
I thought I’d try some of this tofu in the basic curry that was so good with lamb.  As it simmers for several hours, I suspected that would be enough time for the tofu to absorb some of the curry flavor and it did. I also threw some vegetables in there so it would be a well rounded mostly one pot meal served over rice. I do love a one pot meal, probably more than my dishwasher does, for it means I don’t have to bother with the synchronization of things coming off the stove at the same time.  I am a lazy cook.
Basic Fill-in-the-Blank Curry
Heat in skillet:

2 T fat or oil

Saute in oil:
Chopped onion
Minced Garlic
Blend in small bowl:
2 T. lemon juice or vinegar
2-4 T curry powder
Stir curry mixture into onions and fry lightly for 2 minutes.  You can add additional spices (suggested are cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, coriander, turmeric, ginger, cumin, cayenne). 
Add your meat or tofu.  Suggested are:
chicken, cut into small pieces
beef or mutton, cut into 1″ chunks
fish, cut into chunks
Any leftover cooked diced meat
browned meatballs
cubed tofu (try boiling it for 10 minutes before hand)
Stir-fry briefly to coat meat with spices.  Add:
1 cup tomato juice OR 1 cup chopped tomatoes
1 t. salt
1-2 cups broth or water
Bring to a boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 2-3 hours for beef & mutton, 1 1/2 hours for chicken, 20 minutes for fish and cooked meats.  Add more liquid as needed for cooking to thin stew consistency.  (I cooked the tofu for 2 hours, but you could simmer it for just a short while and still have a tasty dish.)  Serve with rice.
Suggested vegetable additions include cubed potatoes (give them at least 20 minutes to cook), cabbage, green beans, peppers, carrots, spinach and peas.

On Chocolate Caramels.

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I was recently asked if I wanted to try some Gearhart’s Chocolates, specifically a Dark Chocolate Caramel. Of all chocolates, Chocolate Caramels are my hands down favorite.  I will go through a box of assorted chocolates and poke the bottoms of every last candy until I find the elusive chocolate caramel one and when you discover that someone went through and poked a hole in the bottom of every last candy in the box, I will lie to your face that it was me.  So how delightful to not only be spared the work of poking out every bottom, there were no mystery nougats to be endured. Phew. 
Enough about me.  Let’s talk Chocolate Caramels.  Here’s the description I was sent of the chocolates:

Gearharts was approached by several of the local wineries around Charlottesville and asked to create a chocolate that would pair well with red wine. The result was the Dark Chocolate Caramel. Using Gearhart‘s Signature Caramel (with cocoa added to the actual caramel), this chocolate also contains a hint of balsamic vinegar and cracked black pepper, is coated in extra bittersweet dark chocolate and finished with Maldon smoked sea salt flakes.

I’d be curious to see what some of the wine pairings are, because none came with the chocolates, nor could I find them on Gearhart’s website.   Not all red wines go well with chocolate – my eloquent friend Megan wrote a wonderful piece last Valentine’s Day for The C-ville Weekly on pairing wine & chocolates in which she explains why that lovely Malbec I had did not pair well with these chocolates. I knew that was going to be the case, but I went ahead and tried it anyway.  Not very good.  A better match would probably have been a Norton (I highly recommend Horton Winery’s Norton) or any of the other wines she mentioned in her piece but as I don’t make it a habit to keep dessert wines on hand, I can’t talk to you about how the wine paired with the chocolates.
I can however, tell you about these caramels. The dark chocolate and caramel were superb. As for the black pepper,  it was only noticeable when nibbling on the salted corner – which is sort of interesting – you don’t think that one flavor, salt, would pull another flavor,  black pepper, through so much, but it did here.  The touch of balsamic vinegar came through on the finish, providing a nice counterpoint to the sweetness of the caramel that lingered on the palate.
The kind folks over at Gearhart’s also included an 8 piece sampler of their other chocolates with the dark chocolate caramels.
The sampler came with a small brochure that lists all their fine chocolates and includes color pictures, so there’s no need to stab the bottom with your fingernail to see what flavor you are holding.  It’s a nice touch if you are inclined to sharing or if you’re like me, only share what you aren’t entirely wild about.  Which doesn’t apply when it comes to Gearhart’s.  I just like certain ones (The Earl Gray, the Taj and now the Dark Chocolate Caramel) better than others.

How she rolls….

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My friend Erin has started a blog, Notty Pea.  You’re sure to love it – just like me, she’s crafty and admittedly not a type A personality.  Go check it out now and follow it. You won’t be sorry.  She’s pretty awesome. I don’t just say that because she could out drink me back in our wild, kid-free days. 

Speaking of introductions, Edie had no school on Monday, so I let her stay up and watch some Downton Abbey with me.  Of course, I crashed out about 10 or so because I cannot stay up past 9:30 without serious caffeine that then keeps me up all night.  It’s early or nothing with me.  Anyway.  She has no such problems.  Who needs the internet for spoilers when you have an 11 year old daughter?  That’s right, the first thing she told me in the morning was everything I’d missed the night before on Downton Abbey.  And she wants to go back and watch the entire show now.  There’s a character named Edith don’t ya know.  Not a whole lot of Ediths out there, at least that she knows of.

So she’s been walking around practicing her British accent, announcing that she wants to live in a manor house.  I think she thinks the show is set in the current British country side. She really won’t hear otherwise.  I hate to ruin a dream world, so I’m letting it go mostly.  Except for the duchess thing. It seems she’d prefer to be called “Duchess” after watching that.

I really need to be more on top of her TV watching habits.

That’s what is currently on my living room coffee table.  Sunday’s NY Times magazine, coasters and a deer jaw she found while going off trail in the woods at the park across the street.

Duchess indeed.

Goodness.

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Did you ever make something so good that not only could you barely believe you made it with your own two hands, but you wanted to shout about from every rooftop and share it with everyone you knew?

I’m having one of those moments.  In fact, I’m sitting here eating it and realized I just could not wait to blog about it.  Which means I also didn’t bother with trying to take pretty pictures. 

But we’ve discussed my photo laziness before.  How I’d be a great food blogger if only I put more effort into my photos.  But I’m an A minus type personality, which means I just fall slightly short of having everything perfect and I’m really okay with that.  The buns looks fabulous, they taste even better and what you need to do is to just make them yourself already.

I stumbled upon this recipe on Pinterest yesterday and couldn’t wait to try it.  Lemon Cheesecake Morning Buns.  If that doesn’t sound like a cure for winter short of flying somewhere tropical, I don’t know what does.  We are certainly ready for winter to be over with here.  I’m itching to dig and feel the dirt between my fingers, Pat’s ready to fish and Edie is just ready to not be in the house with us.

The last time I followed a dough recipe from the internet, it was a fail.  But everything about the recipe for this dough looked like it might work.  And, fingers crossed in the back of my head, if it was a good dough recipe, perhaps it could be my new Christmas morning cinnamon bun dough recipe.  I’m here to tell you, it’s good. And it will be my new Christmas morning cinnamon bun dough recipe.  I can’t tell you how relieved I am that I got that one right on the first try- I love sticky buns as much as the next person, but certain parts of my anatomy were not thrilled to hear we had were going to be sampling recipes for the next year.  The parts that tend to show I’ve been eating sticky buns for breakfast on a regular basis.

A few notes on the recipe – which I mostly followed.  I subbed some spelt flour for white flour and used buttermilk instead of the called for milk with vinegar mix. I also ignored the pan advice, reaching for a cake pan that was not big enough (despite my better half standing there telling me the pan wasn’t big enough) so that I could have that nice round pan of buns.  Not all of them fit in that pan, which meant I baked two pans this morning (there’s a third in the freezer, as I split the batch in half.  I don’t need all those buns lying around and I do love having something I can just pull out of the freezer.) and explains the first picture of the 3 buns in their own pan.  The top of the buns on the upper rack of my oven got a little brown, although they were only there for 25 minutes.  They tasted just fine though (and I’ll see if my dear husband won’t mind recalibrating my oven for me today). 

The dough was absolutely dreamy to roll out.  I can’t remember last time a dough was so easy to work with. The end result is a pastry just as dreamy – light and fluffy with lemony cheesecake filling.  I think these might even be good without the glaze. Something to try with the batch in the freezer for sure.

The time I fell off the roof.

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I like to tell the story of why Valentine’s Day is special to us – how it was the day that prompted Pat to call, leaving me a message even though I was out of town, so we really sort of consider the day the start of us.  We’ve also told the story of how we met when I fell off the roof at a party which leaves some wondering, how did we go from me falling off the roof to him leaving me a message on my answering machine on Valentine’s day?

One of my favorite things about Auburn during my time there in the late 80’s and early 90’s was that were like 3 bars in the entire town.  It wasn’t that there weren’t things to do – there were plenty of things to do – it was just all at someone’s house. Far cozier (and cheaper) than a bar. My second year there, I lived in a great big old house near campus with a yard and a large screened in front porch – perfect for parties no matter the weather.  I think we threw parties there just about every weekend that year.  I was friends with a few guys in bands, so the idea came about that we should have band parties.  Band parties were a great thing in those days – they’d set up a stage in someone’s back yard (or house), access to the yard would be restricted to one entrance, you’d pay a cover, bring your own beer or maybe pitch in for a keg and it was a party. My not quite (there was a house between ours, but it was set far back from the road and ours were quite close to the street, so at first glance, our houses appeared to be adjacent) next door neighbor, Stuart E, had some legendary band parties that year, including the time Green Day played in his kitchen.  I remember seeing them on Behind the Music talking about the time they played in someone’s kitchen and remembering fondly that the keg for that show was at my house. (Stuart & I would plan parties so that if one of us had a band, the other would have a keg.  It was inevitable, if one of us had a party, the other one would end up with a spillover party.  I’ve been blessed with great neighbors throughout my life, but Stuart E was hands down, one of the best. I miss that guy.)  At some point though, the town council instituted an noise ordinance that basically said only frat houses could get away with having outdoor band parties.  By that point, I was living in a different house – a smaller one not quite so conducive to huge parties every weekend.  I also had roommates that were not on board with them – although they still happened occasionally.  You can take the girl out of the party, but you can’t take the party out of the girl….

Anyway, I’m not entirely sure how it happened, but someone noticed one day that my house, with a vacant lot next to it, was a little more than a block in either direction from two different frat houses – and the sounds of their outdoor band parties.  It was suggested that we try throwing an old school back yard band party – I think someone even managed to make sure it was the same evening as a party at one of the houses, with the idea that only our closest neighbors (of which, one was a religious center that no one lived at) would know the difference.  It was a  brilliant idea – although I do remember that we had bail money as part of the deal should it get busted by the authorities.  Turns out, we didn’t need it – the plan worked and it was a good party.  It was the last big band party of my college career, one last free-for-all in a long line of free-for-alls.

The house had a detached garage in the back.  The stage was set up along the side of the garage.  I couldn’t help but notice there were a few folks sitting on the roof peak of the garage and good hostess that I was, I decided I should go up there to mingle and see if those guests were having a good time.  A good hostess always greets all of her guests, yes?

It was pretty easy to hop up on the chain link fence separating my house and the building next door and launch myself onto the roof from there.   I sat up on the ridge, took in some of the band, talked to two gents before deciding I needed to head back down to the rest of the party.  As I sat on the lowest edge of the roof, I grabbed a tree branch from the neighbor’s yard, put one foot on the edge of the fence and as I was placing the other foot on what I thought was the fence, I proceeded to hop down.  Only the other foot missed the fence and I somehow landed tangled up in the tree in the back yard of the building next door.  Thankfully, my dear friend Pat Shaw witnessed this and came to my rescue, fishing me out of the tree and bringing me back to the ground.

A year later, I was hanging out with my Pat and he asked if I remembered falling off the roof.  I did I answered, telling him about the bruise that covered the top half of my left arm for weeks on end as a result and how did he know about that?  Turns out he was one of the boys I was talking to just before I slid down the roof. (He actually tells a great version of what it was like to hear the fall.)

It wasn’t the first conversation we’d had – that one took place a few years before that when he came in to pick up a pie from the pizza shop I worked at and I asked him and his buddy if they knew of any parties that night. But it was the longest conversation we’d had up to that point.  Up on my garage roof at the very last free-for-all band party of my college career.

He really did know what he was getting into.  Nineteen years and counting later, he’s still here and not at all surprised when I do things like fall off roofs or throw a party for our closest 300 friends.

So while some might dismiss Valentine’s day as an excuse to push cards, flowers and candy, what I love about it is that it made a boy think to call a girl who fell off a roof.

Valentine’s treats that are so easy you almost can’t stand it.

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I love Valentine’s Day.  Not that I love the commercialization of  it – I hate the commercialization of everything.  But as I like to blog here every year, Valentine’s Day marks the start of this family and so therefore, it must be noted in some fashion.  Nothing big and splashy of course – just a wee something.  Keeping with my love of handmade gifts, I started making these treats for my valentines a few years ago.   They are quick, easy and yummy – my holy trinity.
The original recipe came from a post on Design*Sponge, but I’ve altered it over the years to be the one I’m about to share with you, so I’m not linking to the original.  If you can melt chocolate, you can make these.  They are that easy.
A few notes – I use good dark chocolate and natural peanut butter.  The original recipe calls for crushed graham crackers and salt to be added to the peanut butter mix, but I find it’s not necessary.  I make them in mini-muffin tins, as I find a full size muffin tin peanut butter cup to be a little too much.
Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups
2 bars (4 oz each) good chocolate 
3/4 cup peanut butter
3/8 cup powdered sugar, sifted
Melt a bar of chocolate in a double boiler (or use the microwave method of melting chocolate which means putting your chocolate in a bowl, letting it go for 30 seconds, stir and if needed, pop back in for another 15-30 seconds.)
Using a spoon, spread melted chocolate on the bottom and sides of paper muffin liners.  Coat them generously – this is the bottom and sides of your candies.  
Chill in fridge for 10-20 minutes or until hardened.
Combine peanut butter with sugar.  Melt remaining chocolate.
Place peanut butter in each muffin cup.  I like to spread it out a bit with the back of a spoon.  Dollop melted chocolate on top of the peanut butter, using a spoon to smooth out the tops.  Refrigerate for about a half hour or until fully hardened.
Sometimes I get jiggy with it and sprinkle sea salt on top.  Today I used bamboo salt. Because it was the first jar I grabbed when I opened the spice cabinet, that’s why. 

This is what is left to clean up.  If you can melt chocolate, you can make these.  And your valentines will thank you for them.
Yield:  24 mini muffin size peanut butter cups

Mama Brag.

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(Consider the title your fair warning of what follows.)
My girl has been on quite a roll lately.  She brought home a stellar report card, making the honor roll again. She made orchestra recitals- a performance that she had to audition for.  She won first place in the paper airplane distance competition in her Saturday morning enrichment class.  She made the cut-off for drama club this semester. And she’s been making some incredible treats in the kitchen on the weekends.
Drama club is due more to timing than it is anything else.  She has looked forward to being in drama club since Betty’s son Ben (now in 8th grade) was in 5th grade and we attended his first play, his first semester at Walker.  Edie decided then and there she was going to join drama club when she got to Walker.  She would tell people when asked if she was looking forward to going to school there, that yes she was because she was going to be in drama club.  When the club sign up list came out last semester, she waited a day to turn it in, pondering her choices for the other days of the week.  As a result, she didn’t get drama club.  She was quite bummed, but eventually she ended up pretty content with her second choice of yoga club.  And when the club sign up sheets came out this time around, she made sure she was at school turning it in bright and early the next morning. Lesson learned.
As for the paper airplane, she’s not really entirely sure how she managed to construct a winning airplane.  Pat signed her up for the Saturday morning class through the Curry School over at UVa. He thought that “Intro to Applied Sciences” sounded the most interesting of all the choices presented.  When I dropped her off for her first class, I was handed a letter and a course description by the instructor and realized it was a kids engineering course.  I also realized that she was one of four girls in the class and definitely the only blonde haired blue eyed child.  When we went to pick her up that first day, she stood in the doorway, glaring.  You have to sign your child in and out, and of course we were behind in the queue.  She stood there, glaring, while other kids had to wiggle past her to leave as their parents signed them out. I actually heard other parents commenting on the glaring girl who was scowling in the doorway.  Ah yes, that would be mine. She’s quite good at math and wants to be a fashion designer – so our attempt at showing her there are any number of careers in design out there in the world utilizing all her skills was not fully appreciated.  However, the second week of class, Edie came home quite proud of herself for constructing the paper airplane that flew the longest AND was the prettiest in the entire class.
Of course it was.
Edie’s orchestra instrument of choice is the stand up bass. She plays this in addition to piano – which was her choice.  She started piano last year, enjoyed it and wanted to continue with it while picking up another instrument.  We talked to her about what playing two instruments meant – mostly having to practice two instruments.  All summer long we talked about it, trying to give her an out.  She stuck to her guns.  School started and the reality of the commitment of playing two instruments hit her.  I was ready and willing to let her give up piano, so when she came to me wanting to quit, I at least thought I’d make it seem like she needed to argue the point.  Only her argument for why learning to play two instruments was hard was that “it makes me have to think”.  Oh kiddo.  You so do not get to quit things because it makes you have to think.  Wrong answer.  You just bought yourself a year’s worth of piano lessons.
And now that she sees other kids she knows playing multiple instruments in jazz band, an ensemble she has stated she is interested in joining, I’m guessing piano lessons aren’t going away anytime soon. 
This cooking thing has got to be hands down, my most favorite trick of hers since becoming potty trained.  I think not having cable has helped nurture this – you see, Saturday mornings when she wants to watch television, there is pretty much nothing on that appeals to her.  She started watching the PBS Create channel and absolutely fell in love with Julia Child.  That lead to her watching Jacques & Julia and discovering Jacques Pepin.  Which in turn, inspired her to walk into the kitchen one morning, pull out a cookbook and make us breakfast before we woke up.  This is fast becoming her new Sunday morning habit, one I can very quickly become accustomed to.
The only downside to this is the mess that she makes.  Oh, and sometimes breakfast isn’t ready until noon.  But that’s okay.  She’s learning mise en place, the importance of reading the recipe and assembling her ingredients before beginning.  So what if that requires the use of every last bowl in the house.  She’s also learning how to clean up after herself, which I love almost as much as I love her making Sunday morning breakfast.  Definitely my favorite trick on the path of independence since potty training.  Now if I could only get her to put her laundry away…..

Following the path.

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I finished removing the quilt top from the rest of the quilt this weekend.  Saturday was a beautiful, bright sunny day and I thought it’d be perfect to shoot a picturesque shot of the quilt from the clothesline in the yard. Only the wind didn’t get the memo.  Oh well.  One of the reasons you love me is my imperfect pictures, yes?

With the back & disintegrating binding removed, you can see where the quilt is shredded.
I thought that taking the back off would be the hardest part.  But now that the quilt is ready to go, I realize that choosing the fabrics will be a challenge.  I don’t want to alter the character of the quilt too much, but considering blue is my least favorite color and blue seems to be the color most used in the quilt, that’s going to be inevitable.  When I was pulling fabric out to make a skirt, there was a sizable piece of red corduroy involved.  Pat asked where it came from.  I answered it probably came from Grandma’s (his other grandmother) stash.  Turns out it was a scrap from a blanket she made him, which makes it a natural to be utilized in the quilt repair project.  After all, what’s better to fix a quilt from his bed than a piece of an old blanket from his bed? 
I have some other pieces of fabric I’ve pulled that I want to use, but as some triangles are one offs, there is opportunity to utilize many little scraps I’ve held onto.  I suppose an assessment of exactly how many triangles I need is next, followed by rifling through my fabrics again.  I think I’ll be able to make new pieces out of the old backing, as parts of it are salvageable, which will also be nice.  I’ve got a lovely linen for the new backing, so that the restored quilt will hopefully have the same light feel as the old quilt.  I don’t know that I’m going to re-quilt it the way it was – if I do, I’m not going to quilt through all the layers, but rather, attach the back separately.  Although I’ve realized my new machine (it’s three years old, you’d think I could stop calling it ‘new’) is capable of quilting it.  
I’m a little overwhelmed at this stage of the project.  I know I just need to take a deep breath and jump in.  I plan on photographing each square before and after.  There are some fabrics that are beyond repair, some that are so sweet, I want to see if I can’t somehow salvage them.  I suspect I’m about to do a good bit of reading on vintage fabrics and quilts.  It’s funny how a project starts out one thing – “Sure I can repair the quilt your grandmother made that you love” and leads you down roads you didn’t imagine when you set out.  I love a good adventure, don’t you?
(If you haven’t noticed, there’s a new link on my sidebar for the new Facebook page for Chicken Wire and Paper Flowers. If you haven’t liked me there yet, you should go do that right now.  It’ll be fun.)

And then there were nine.

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We are down to nine chickens, from a dozen last fall.
 Kramer, of the criss cross beak went first.  We were surprised she lasted as long as she did.  As she grew, her beak got progressively worse and there was really nothing to be done about it.  She was half the size of the others, but definitely had the strongest personality.  She often wandered away from the rest of the flock, just doing her own thing.  She was quite fearless.  Ultimately though, she just wasn’t getting enough food to sustain her.  
 Butters, the large Buff Cochin rooster, was sent to the farm to live after he started turning a little ornery and chasing people.  
 Cuddles, aka, Rosebud aka Ruby aka Diana, the little soft grey chick that struggled along, then turned into a big, beautiful, white fluffy White Cochin, passed away after taking sick during that bitter cold stretch we had in January.  
She was everyone’s favorite, hence all her names.  When Brian came over to tell us, he was a little upset.  Edie was upset too when we finally broke the news to her.  Not as upset as when she learned about Kramer, but still sad. 
I suspect Ozzy misses her too.  I got a whole set of shots of those two snuggled up just a few weeks ago, as they appeared to be chatting under the back porch.
Well, maybe not chatting as much as Ozzy walking over and resting her head on top of Cuddles, appearing to console her.  Looking at these now, I wonder if Cuddles was ill back then and Ozzy knew.
Owlface appears to be our best layer, laying at least one green egg a day for us.
Although Ozzy isn’t too far behind.  Ozzy continues to be our funky chicken, with her lopsided crest that hangs over one eye.  I think she’s a Houdan breed, which is originally from France.  She is hands down, Edie’s favorite chicken of them all and with the loss of Kramer & Butters, she’s now the first chicken to come running out to greet whatever human she sees.
Their house is down at Brian’s, two doors down and yet they wander over to our yard daily.  It’s uncanny how they know who feeds them. 
During a warm spell last week I tried to capture the sights of the front yard – Edie plopped in the front yard, talking on the phone while supposedly doing her homework, meanwhile the chickens wandering about.
Just another day in the neighborhood.