Category Archives: Food

The post that wasn't(and the one in its place)

I could bore you with the sordid tale of my laptop falling in the hole(TWICE!) and my camera pretending to be broken and me almost FedEx-ing it to BFE for nothing, but I won’t. Let’s just cut to the chase, shall we?

Between getting my system fixed and the camera working again, I bring you this!
All together now

The solid burgundy was done first.
Crochet Tam

I’d been wanting a nice, simple slouchy hat for the winter. I didn’t seem to find what I wanted in knitting, so I browsed crochet patterns and found one that worked well. Just wish I could remember where I found it. But here’s a similar one.

I had to rip the multi-colored one a few times because I forgot how many increase rounds I did before continuing on even and it kept getting too big. Way to record-keep Bean! Anyway, I got it finished and I’d like to make more of them. I had one going in the second pattern out of some handspun wool/silk from my stash but no matter how big a hook I use I’m not getting the drape I’m looking for. Methinks I need to use a different yarn. I’m also seriously considering making this next one a knit. I like the looks of this hat. Sigh, so many patterns, so little time.

I’ve been in the kitchen again too.

scratch biscuits
I got wind of these awesome biscuits from Yarngeek and had to try them out. The process was really quick and simple. That’s always a plus with me. As good as they are, though, I’m thinking I prefer buttermilk. So that’s next on the list one of these days.

That’s pretty much it for now, til next time!

TTFN

Experimenting

That’s what I’ve been doing with my crafting lately. I wanted to get more practice with double knitting, especially in terms of remembering what color to work with at a given time. So I figured I’d try to do stripes. At first I did single row stripes but it started to make me dizzy so I switched up to double row. A few triple rows slipped in there but I was having too much fun to stop.

Hotpads in action

Double knitting allows me to spend more time using both my hands without it being traditional colorwork. What’s funny is, when I first started knitting, I couldn’t purl with my left hand like I can now; I had to switch the yarn to my right hand to purl. Now, I can’t purl with my right hand to save my life! If I do, the stitch is facing the ‘wrong’ way and I have to work into the back of it to get it to lay right on the next go-round. I find that a bit too fiddly for my taste. I did a few more hot pads and got to use them today.

I decided to experiment some more with my baking too. I wanted to know if I could incorporate ham and cheese into the sweet rolls. So far, it worked!

YAY
I simply divided the dough in half and layered ham and cheese on the dough, then rolled it right up. I think next time though, I’ll roll the dough a tad thinner. I have a feeling the middle didn’t bake well on one of them, but reheating for breakfast should solve that.

The weekend is not over yet, and I’m hoping I get to experiment with some fabric too. Lil Beanlet needs belts like no tomorrow. I think it’s time I got my sewing machine in gear and get ‘er done! ;)

That’s all for now. See ya soon! Happy Crafting!

Friday Goodness

Twins.. sort of

Let me start with a little story: Once upon a time, I had a blender/food processor. I never, ever used the processor part. When we moved house, my BIL helped us unpack the kitchen and proceeded to drop and break the glass blender jar. After a while I got another unit, but just the blender part. I kept the processor part thinking it would work on my new blender bottom. And still never used it. Fast forward to today…

I found a recipe on Instructables.com for 1-ingredient ice cream and it calls for a food processor. Actually it does say you can use a blender but the processor is probably the better gadget for this. I decided to try it, only to find out the processor part DOESN’T really fit on the blender bottom. (It did but I didn’t realize I absolutely NEEDED the feed-top for the blade to spin and I thought it didn’t spin because the base wasn’t the one that came with the processor attachment)

I dug through the cabinets and found the base to the old unit. Yay! I was finally ready to begin.

Gonna do the chop!

I followed the instructions and was on my way after a false start or two. The purple spatula wasn’t really the best thing to use to get the chunks to the bottom of the bowl. And that cleaver really needs sharpening, so I switched it out for a serated knife.

After about 3 minutes:

Voila! Banana 'Ice cream'

There you have it! It’s creamy and good. Now, it doesn’t taste exactly like ice cream. It doesn’t have dairy or added sugar(though I did spritz a little vanilla extract in there to get the mixture ‘moving’. But, the consistency is very close to ice cream, or more like frozen yogurt. If you love banana smoothies, you’ll love this. As per the website, I’m sure you can add other frozen fruits and flavorings for variety, and I’ll probably do that in the future. For now, I’m plotting a big banana purchase in the near future. ;)

TTFN.