little loomhouse

I visited the Little Loomhouse a couple weeks ago and have been dreaming of it ever since. It's three cabins tucked away in a wooded neighborhood in Louisville's South End where weavers, spinners, and dyers create some of the most beautiful things from yarn and fiber. According to the Little Loomhouse website, Frank Lloyd Wright visited and described the cabins as "three board and batten cabins set in the dignity of nature under the mighty oaks of Kenwood Hill." The cabins have dream catchers in the windows and looms lining the tables, ready to go. Oh, there's so much possibility there!

Have you ever been somewhere and just thought, "I have to find a way to be here more"? Well, that's the way I feel about the Little Loomhouse. It was started as a weaving workshop in 1939 sponsored by Eleanor Roosevelt and continues its goal of textile education today. I felt inspired by the surroundings, both nature and textiles, and I'm excited to learn from the people I met there.

I'm already planning my next visit.

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If you're local, be sure to check out the Little Loomhouse's workshop list. I want to try weaving and dyeing with indigo!

rosas

This past weekend we had such wonderfully cool, sunny days. We spent an entire afternoon outside and didn't break a sweat. We went for a morning walk and I had to wear a shawl! It's what I imagine summer in northern climes must feel like. Now I understand why some people claim summer as their favorite season. My heart still belongs to fall, but I'll take more summer weekends like this past one.

Come fall I'll have a new hat to warm my ears on crisp days because I finished this blue-gray Rosa hat. I loved knitting with handspun yarn! As soon as I cast this Rosa off, I cast on another one, this time in pink with gray stripes for my sister. It will match the fingerless mitts I made her a couple Christmases ago. I showed her the hat in progress, and she got goosebumps because she liked it so much! She's definitely knit-worthy!

I'm joining Andi's KAL/CAL, and it's already motivated me to get my knitting organized. I'm still trying to be resourceful (and frugal!), so I combed through my stash and picked out yarn for a Cable Baby hat, a baby-sized Antler Cardigan, and a Pei hat (my first stranded knitting project! wish me luck!). Are you joining in? I completely failed at the one knit along I joined before, but this one is just about finishing any projects you happen to have on the needles. I can handle that!

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And finally, I'm joining in Ginny's yarn along. I've been in a nonfiction mood for quite some time. I'm currently engrossed in The Cornbread Mafia, a book about a large-scale marijuana-growing operation (and bust) centered in Marion County, Kentucky. I find it fascinating that the author links Prohibition-era attitudes and activities in Marion County with attitudes on illegal drugs a generation or two later. The book can get pretty tangential at times, but overall it's an interesting narrative. I'm also reading Gulp, which makes me queasy. Even so, I can't stop reading it! 

21c

It has been so hard to get back into the work week after the weekend that we had. For K's birthday, I surprised him with an in-the-city getaway. We stayed downtown at the 21c Museum Hotel, which was voted the #1 hotel in the US and #6 in the world (that's right, big things are happening here in Kentucky). The 21c has fabulous 24/7 gallery space with a bevy of art exhibits. Their rooms are full of interior design inspiration, and they serve up delicious meals at their restaurant, Proof.

Downtown Louisville has (surprisingly) a lot going on at night. I curled up on the window seat for a while and watched people walking by. Later K and I had a board game marathon (it was his birthday, after all). K was surprised and loved having a low-key birthday getaway. 

 

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I just had to show you guys my favorite interactive art installation. A camera projects live images onto a wall along with falling letters. You can actually catch the letters as they cascade down. The word nerd in me had a blast!

If you're in need of a getaway, I highly recommend the 21c!

csa day

This week our CSA box came loaded with broccoli, French breakfast radishes (oolala--fancy), carrots, lettuce, kale, and kohlrabi. With the exception of the radishes, we got these same vegetables last week. That's fine--it just means I have to be more creative so it doesn't feel like we're eating the same thing over and over. This is what I've come up with:

Menu

Tuesday/Wednesday: Teriyaki vegetable and tofurky sandwiches

Thursday/Friday: Broccoli Lasagna

Saturday/Sunday: Kale and Feta Pizza

Monday: Hummus, pita bread, whatever raw vegetables we have left

Every day: Salad of lettuce, carrots, radishes, and kohlrabi

Dessert of the week: 25 cent ice cream on Saturday!

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Scenes from my kitchen last week

Chocolate chip pecan cookies 

I baked three dozen for a get together with friends. Then I froze the extra dough--enough for two dozen more cookies!

Eggs ready to be made into cake

I made a yellow cake with chocolate icing for my sister's graduation party. It didn't go as smoothly as I had hoped, but enough icing will cover nearly all flaws, right? The cake baked up tall and pale yellow. I frosted it with an old-fashioned chocolate buttercream. We cut thick slices that reminded me so much of the bazaar scene in Pollyanna. Every time I watched that movie I wanted to eat that cake, and now I have. Next time I'll have to snap some photos.

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What's on your menu this week?

csa day: "lettuce" begin

Lettuce sandwich with tofurkey and cheese

Our first CSA day of the year! It felt like Christmas to open our door and find a box of fresh vegetables there waiting for us.

This is the first year that K and I have a CSA subscription to ourselves because the past two years we've split it with my family. I'm a little nervous about being able to use all of the vegetables each week, but I'm taking this as a good challenge to try to eat more veggies and keep my diet more local. I think I'll be cooking/preparing food more, maybe freezing or pickling things, sharing with friends, and hosting family and friends to help us eat this bounty. I'd really like to cut our grocery bill down to the minimum (local eggs and milk, yogurt, flour, etc.) and eat mainly from our CSA. I'll be documenting the process here, so hopefully I can get some help when I run out of ideas for what to do with all the radishes and greens I get.

Our vegetables from Finger Picking Farms

This week we got four kinds of lettuce--Panisse, Green Towers, Bronze Arrowhead, and Jericho. We also got Red Russian Kale, turnips, garlic chives, radishes, and strawberries. The strawberries were so tiny and sweet that K and I ate them as soon as we had the box in the door, so no photos of those.

Olive Bread + Bean and Olive Soup

The menu for this week

Sunday/Monday: White bean and black olive soup from my favorite cookbook, Olive bread from this book (pre-CSA meals)

Tuesday: Dinner out for Dad's birthday (Happy Birthday!)

Wednesday/Thursday: Big salad with lots of lettuce, garlic chives, radishes, eggs, and parmesan. Garlic oregano vinaigrette. Olive bread. White bean dip.

Friday: Kale and Turnip greens tart, adapted from this recipe.

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What are you eating this week? 

Are any of you getting a CSA subscription this year?

  

csa day: autumn begins

CSA day vegetables from the past two weeks have definitely shown that fall is here. We're getting butternut squash and cold weather greens like chard, though some summer staples like tomatoes and peppers are still hanging on.

Two weeks ago we got: lots of sweet peppers, hot peppers, a variety of squash, chard, and tomatoes.

Last week we got: sweet peppers, a mix of beans, hot peppers, sweet basil and holy (purple) basil, beets, butternut squash, and sweet potatoes.

This year's CSA subscription has felt very different from last year's. Last year we picked up the vegetables at the farmers' market and chatted with one of the guys who worked on the farm. He'd let us know how growing was going and give us tips on how to cook things we weren't familiar with. This year the vegetables are delivered to my dad's front porch in the early morning, so it feels a little like the vegetable fairy has come. Delivery is very convenient for us, but I've missed the interaction with the person who grows our food. 

Recently Nick, the farmer of Finger Picking Farms, emailed some details about how the farming is going. He said that because of the lack of rain and super hot weather, he's gone to overnight watering for the fall crops. The watering has to be rotated fairly often to get to all of the crops, so he's been sleeping in a makeshift bed in the back of his pick-up truck, waking every hour and a half to change the watering over. Knowing all of the work he's put into these vegetables will make them taste even better and will keep me motivated to use them all.

The plan is to freeze a lot of peppers, make a small batch of pesto, and to roast the squash and sweet potatoes. I'm sure we'll find a night to have the green, speckled, and yellow wax beans with dinner, but I don't know what we'll do with the beets yet. With school and work, I don't have the time to whip up beet gnocchi this week. Does anybody have any quick and easy ideas?

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Menu Highlights from the past two weeks:

Indonesian Sweet Potato and Cabbage Soup

Spinach Lasagna

Black Bean Chili (from Lynn's Paradise Cafe)

Breakfast Burritos (Chili leftovers + Eggs + Tortillas)

Peas, Feta, and Fried Egg on Toast (via A Cup of Jo)

Veggie Burgers and Cabbage Casserole (K's mom's recipe)

Yes, I am very behind on sharing our menus, but we've made some really great meals lately that I think you will absolutely love! 

The Sweet Potato and Cabbage soup--Inspired by the Indonesian dish gado-gado, this soup contains sweet potatoes, chopped cabbage, ginger, garlic, onions, and tomatoes in a peanut butter broth, and is excellent when topped with green onions and cilantro. While the name might not sound very appealing at first, let me tell you, once you make this it will quickly become a regular in your meal-making. It's got peanut butter in it after all!  And with so many healthy vegetables, it's great for warding off colds.

The Black Bean Chili--This is a very thick and hearty chili (what a certain TV chef might refer to as a--gag--stoup). The recipe comes from a nationally famous local restaurant that specializes in good food, expensive drinks, and gaudy decor. What I love about this chili is how versatile it is. Not only did we eat it as plain ol' chili, we also used it to make breakfast burritos and as a topping for baked sweet potatoes (my new favorite lunch). The only major change we made is using only half as many beans as the recipe calls for. Believe me, even when halved, it's still plenty of beans.

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What have you been cooking lately? I'm always looking for fast meals and make-ahead dinners.

csa day: time to get creative with squash

Finger Pickin' Farms CSA for the week of June 29, 2010.

Left to right, top to bottom.

1) Zucchini, golden zucchini, zephyr bicolor squash, purple carrots

2) Zinnias, sweet basil, green cucumbers, white cucumbers, pattypan squash

3) Beets, candy apple red onions

We got a lot of good food this week, but I'm most excited about these sweet onions. The color is such a brilliant ruby and they taste amazingly sweet. I'm trying to come up with ideas to use up some of the squash and zucchini we've amassed, and I can't decide what to do with all of those cucumbers. Maybe a salad or perhaps some pickles.

Weekly Menu:

*Veggie Burgers and oven fries

*Cold soba with dipping sauce

*Egg Fu Yung with Cabbage, Carrots, and Candy Apple Onions, Rice

*Pizza with Tomato, Basil, Garlic, Feta and Parmesan

*Beet Gnocchi (wish me luck!) from Apples for Jam, a cookbook that is on my Christmas wishlist already even though it's only July. I start my wishlists early.

*Pasta and Squash Casserole. I'm making this one up as I go. I'm picturing a layer of cooked pasta, topped with sauteed squash and zucchini, garlic, and tomatoes, bechamel or marinara sauce, a sprinkling of parmesan and bread crumbs. Baked until golden and bubbly.

Maybe the best pizza I've ever made

Blackberry Buttermilk Cake from Apples for Jam

I also made a breakfast cake this past weekend because I hosted a little breakfast party for my uncle who was in from out of town. I just love having breakfast parties these days! The food is easy--I usually do fresh fruit, eggs, a baked good, and maybe some bacon if K wants to cook it. Pour everyone a cup of coffee, put on some records, and start the day off right. 

I'm having a friend over for tea tomorrow before we go thrifting, so I get to bake a little something for that, too. I've been reading Anne of Green Gables for the first time and it makes me want to bake lots of cakes, have teas, and go play in the woods. Thanks to Amy for recommending it!

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What's on your plate this week? And what's on your mind?

csa day: green and yellow edition

What's in the CSA box this week? (6/15/2010)

From left to right, top to bottom.

Column 1: Fennel

Column 2: Kale, squash, lettuce

Column 3: Cucumbers, arrowhead cabbage, green beans, squash and a golden zucchini

This week is the start of something a little different with our CSA. Our CSA is going to home delivery, so instead of picking up our vegetables at the farmers' market, our box now shows up on my dad's front porch. Nick, who owns Finger Pickin' Farms, explained that home delivery will allow him more time in the fields picking, and hopefully more produce for us. We did get something unexpected in our box this week--flowers! It's the first time for flowers from our CSA, but I hope not the last because I love fresh flowers. 

My half of the CSA flowers

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Weekly Menu:

--Leek and Potato soup. Just the thing you want on a hot, humid day: a steaming bowl of soup. We had all the ingredients on hand, so I made it despite the weather. I'm glad I did because it tastes wonderful. Plus, I just got Mastering the Art of French Cooking from the library and discovered that if I stir some cream into my soup and eat it chilled, it's vichyssoise. What fancy leftovers I have.

--Blue cheese and Squash Pizza. I used this pizza dough recipe, but it was too salty for my tastes. I'll probably try it again with less salt, but if you've got any pizza dough recipes you love, send them my way.

--Cook out at Mom's. Meat and vegetables on the grill (and veggie meats for me), Mom's famous potato salad, and peaches

--Skillet Nachos with Black Beans and Squash. A one pot meal. Saute about 2 cups of vegetables--in my case squash--in a skillet until crisp-tender. Add 2 cups of beans and 1/2 cup of salsa. Cook until warmed through. Remove the mixture and wipe the skillet clean. Toss in tortillas chips and top with the vegetable/bean mixture. Add some shredded cheese. Cover and cook over medium heat for about 5 minutes or until cheese is melted. Top with your choice of: olives, sour cream, salsa, guacamole, jalapenos, etc. (Adapted from Betty Crocker's Quick and Easy Cookbook)

--CSA hodgepodge. Green beans, cabbage casserole, and baked beans.

--Dinner out. Maybe the Swan Dive. 

--Kale chips for a snack. I have to try them after so many of you highly recommended them.

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What are you eating this week?

Sweet Cherries from Pitting to Pie

How do you know if your cherries are sweet? 

See if they all huddle into a heart shape on your cutting board. 

Then you know they are. Or you can just taste them. 

K's parents gave us some cherries they picked, knowing we love fresh local foods. My first question when I heard they had cherries was: are there enough to make a pie? And the answer was: yes, plenty. *squeal* I've never made a cherry pie and actually haven't eaten many either. I've certainly never had a cherry pie made with fresh cherries, so I was pretty excited to try it out. 

I do remember making cherry turnovers as a kid at day camp. We folded white bread in half, spooned in some canned cherry pie filling, and mushed the edges together to keep the molten red goo from oozing out.* Then some of the counselors cooked the turnovers in butter and sprinkled them with sugar before putting them in our eager little camper hands. I always signed up for the cooking and craft activities and never for the sports ones at day camp. Not much has changed since then except maybe that I've grown in my culinary endeavors, which brings us back to the sweet cherry pie I made this week with nary a can of pie filling to be found. 

I started pitting the cherries by slicing them in half and yanking out the pit, but soon discovered it was easier to put the knife aside and just split the cherries with my fingers. So that's what I did. It took hours. Ok, maybe an hour, but it felt like a long time. I got six cups of these tiny cherries and still have another bag in the fridge, but I was finished pitting for the day. 

I made this all-butter pie crust, even though I was worried about the crust melting down into a lumpy blob, which has happened to me with other butter-only crusts. I love rolling out pie crusts, getting to use my mom's old rolling pin and the zigzag cutter for making pretty edges. I also love weaving the dough into lattice a top and snitching the extra little bits.

I took this picture of the pie straight out of the oven. I was terribly afraid it might collapse on me and I wanted some documentation that it had once been a pretty, if rustic, pie. I love how old-fashioned pies are. You could have seen a pie just like this cooling on a windowsill 100 years ago. 

I moved the pie to the dining room to cool and couldn't resist how it looked with the white hydrangeas and bottle of wine. Somehow the combination of pie, fresh flowers and wine makes me forget all the little frustrations of life. Of course it could just be the wine...

After waiting and waiting for the pie to cool, I finally got to try a piece. It's so good! The flavor of the cherries really shines, and it's sweet without being cloyingly sweet. Did you notice that it didn't collapse at all? Score one for me and all-butter crust. Plus, it tastes way better than canned cherries and white bread.

I used this sweet cherry pie recipe if you want to try it for yourself.

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So what about you? Do you have any pie memories?

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*We never got to eat white bread at home (thanks Mom!), which made it such a treat to eat when I was at other people's houses. My cousins had all the luck because they had pitchers of kool-aid in their fridge and white bread to snack on. My cousin Sara and I used to smash slices of white bread as thin as we could get them, then cut out circles using small drinking glasses. We'd heap the bread rounds onto a single plate next to a glass of kool-aid and play "communion" until our stomachs couldn't take any more.

csa day: first one of the year (to me)

(Actually the first CSA day was last week, but I missed it because I was in Minnesota, so this is the first one for me!)

Our CSA produce from Finger Pickin' Farms for the week of June 1, 2010

From 12 o'clock and on around clockwise: bok choy, beet greens, radishes, 3 lettuces, kale. Strawberries are in the middle, but you figured that out already, didn't you? The strawberries are so small and sweet. I could eat them right out of the carton, but I must maintain some sense of discipline so that I can make some of the strawberry recipes on my list. An update on my list: muffins and ice cream have been made! Strawberry rhubarb pie and strawberry jam have been added to the to-make list.

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CSA days are amongst my favorite days of the year and I love that in summer (and it does seem like summer here, so I'm going with it) I get to experience such great days every single week. Last year we split our CSA with my mom, but this year she's decided to grow more of her own vegetables. She's got lettuce, broccoli, onions, tomatoes, sorrel, and a whole host of herbs growing. So we are sharing our CSA with my dad, and I'm very excited to see what he does with his half of the produce. He's a great cook, famous in my family for his soups and roasts, but he's very much a meat-and-potatoes guy, so I want to see what he'll do with all of these greens and lettuces.

I really enjoy planning meals around what we get from the market. Here's the dinner plan:

*Pasta Alfredo with sauteed garlic, beet greens and peas. Yes, we did just have this a couple of weeks ago, but it's so good! Plus, my sister was over for dinner, and I knew she'd love it.

*Tofu and bok choy stir-fry with garlic-mirin sauce over rice.

*Black bean quesadillas, kale sauteed with garlic, lemon and soy sauce, and oven-roasted potatoes. A real mish-mash of flavors, but it works for us.

*Dinner out by the river to celebrate my Grandma Alice's 82nd birthday. Fingers crossed that it doesn't rain.

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I would love to hear what you're eating this week, so please share in the comments. I find myself endlessly curious about what other people are cooking and eating, plus it gives me ideas for what to make.