Saturday, August 25, 2007

A couple of flops

Wide awake at 5 a.m. again. I went to bed about 9:15 last night after I put Nell down. She slept until 4:55. Sam gets up incredibly early and offered to take care of her so I could sleep in. But, no go.
The Multi Grain Struan was a flop. It didn't rise well in the first place and then I was careless when putting the loaf pan in the oven, which caused what little rise I had to fall. So, I baked a Multi Grain Brick. Sam was sweet and sliced a piece and said it still tasted good. So, into the trash it went. Too bad you can't frog a loaf of bread and salvage something. I'll still try to make it again in the future. The picture looks wonderful.
I had trouble concentrating yesterday. I was waiting to hear from Caitlin. I guess she was one of the few that received a cot to sleep on at O'Hare Airport. Her 8 a.m. flight was canceled too. She made the 10:30 flight and arrived at KCI about an hour later. Since she didn't have a cell phone I had to wait for her to call me until 12:30 or so. So, most of the morning I was distracted and puttered around the house.
I decided to make Chicken Enchiladas and Guacamole for dinner last night. I was inspired to make my own corn tortillas like Barbara does over at Tigers & Strawberries. So, I took off for a Latin American grocery store not too far from here for Masa and a tortilla press. What a huge surprise! It had been some time since I had been there and the whole store has been remodeled. Plus, the front of the store was a Farmer's Market loaded with local produce. I've never seen so much produce in a grocery store. They even had hatch chilies for a fraction of the cost of what they sell them at Whole Foods. They had tons of chilies, every kind of fresh Mexican produce, greens, eggplants, etc. It was wonderful. And they are all labeled with the local farm from which they came. I'm switching grocery stores!
Sam and I were eager to make the fresh tortillas. But, they were only about four inches in diameter. Certainly not big enough to use for enchiladas. Since everything I've made from Barbara's recipes have been a huge success, the error must have been on my part. I think it's probably the cheapo tortilla press. I've sent Barbara an email, and maybe she'll respond with some advice. The tortillas tasted good, but a little thick in my opinion. So after making a few tortillas, that dough was trashed as well.
Today, I am making a bread recipe from Beard on Bread. It calls for rye, whole wheat, and all purpose flours, plus soaked whole wheat berries. It makes two large loaves of bread, so I'll finally have some extra to give away to my friends that I've promised to give any bread overflow.
Nell is coming dangerously close to discovering the cat door to the basement. She's small enough to fit through, too. On the other side of the cat door are the stairs to the basement, which poses a huge danger, considering that it takes her about three attempts to make it up the one step from the patio to the sliding patio door. It wasn't much of a consideration before because she never went too far and seemed to be afraid of the slickness of the Pergo flooring in the kitchen. But, now she's all over the place and seems to find the one thing she should not. Just like a regular baby. I think I'll head over to Target today and get a baby gate.
All Hell is going to break loose over here when she gets big enough to get off the big chair or the couch. At this point, we can put her on the couch or chair with some toys and she'll settle down for a nap. When she wakes up, she whimpers to get down. Once she is big enough to get down, we'll have to come up with something new. Any thoughts?

1 comment:

supertee said...

I have an old baby gate you can borrow if you need to.