To #4977
An Ode of Gratefulness

So this is awkward. I will admit that I am partly (mostly) to blame for your death. While you were munching away on mountain grass and doing other bovinely things, we were plotting your demise and trying to calculate how many steaks we could make out of you.

But we are thankful for you. And we chose you for a reason. We've seen the pasture you spent your life on. We can rest easy knowing that you were treated with kindness, fed with food that won't make you sick, and allowed to roam freely outside where you belong. We know that you spent your whole life from birth to our freezer within a 40 mile radius and used less gasoline to get there than I use in a few days of my life.

So we are thankful for you and the health you will provide for us, and for the community you create by bringing 8 friends together to share your bounty. Since you're inanimate now, you probably don't care, but if it helps, we promise to make you as tasty as possible and share you with friends 'round our table.

Sometimes being local means eating with hippies.

We found ourselves walking into a local eatery this evening for dinner and had some tasty sandwiches - a roast beef sandwich for Doug and a turkey sandwich with almond and sun-dried tomato pesto for me. The best part of the evening, however, was the company. We appeared to be the only functional adults in the restaurant. This entire place was run by hippies. Should we have taken a clue from the stale marijuana smell, the walls painted like a psychedelic dream, or the macrame curtains? It took forever to order our food, though we watched on, entertained, while two employees tried to make sense of the orders they'd just taken. They got most of them correct, but every 4th order or so came with a voice over the loud speaker saying "Umm...the person with the veggie sandwich with no pickles? your order is ready." "Ummm... if you ordered a chocolate milkshake, your order is ready." "Ummm...if you ordered chicken wings with your order and didn't get them, we have them up here." We waited patiently while others came to get the onion rings they ordered instead of their french fries. We got an order of chicken wings with our dinner that actually belonged to someone else who had been waiting for quite a while. I was hoping to get a knife but couldn't seem to get anyone's attention as they searched for someone's milkshake that had gotten lost. All in 30 minutes. It was quite comical. There seems to be a latent part of my identity that looks kindly upon the hippy lifestyle. I like being barefoot. My favorite t shirt for 2 years was a thrift store find with the words "Don't Bungle the Jungle" on it. I could do a great twirly dance at Dar Williams concerts. And I believe there is still archeological evidence of my macrame projects. But somehow I grew out of that phase. I've become a square. And yet, I'm okay with that.

Fall is here. School is in full swing. Our weekends are full of football games and outdoorsy pursuits with a mandatory Sunday nap. Someday I may launch a long political rant, but suffice to say my mood on the political climate is bordering on anxiety. And it never ceases to amaze me the American public's distaste for actually researching actual facts about the presidential candidates (Imagine someone's surprise if they did: "Huh, I looked up 'community organizer' on wikipedia and it turns out it's actually a good thing." "Huh, I checked the dictionary and it turns out the phrase Team of Mavericks is an oxymoron."). I'll stop here. Just do me a favor and think really hard before you vote. Really hard.

Latest food projects: a mozzerella cheese making experiment that did not turn out as I had hoped. Finding new uses for cabbage and beets. Tricking Doug into eating kale. Finding that dipping all other unwanted veggies in a beer batter and deep frying them is always a good solution. And I can't wait for apple cider and pumpkin products.

Also, as I write this, it is 10:15 p.m. and Doug is waddling around me with his snow pants and ski jacket on. Nevermind that it was in the 80s today. It's time to start thinking of skiing.

Hillman Sibling Vacation Video 2k8

I am mentally working on some posts about my adventures as of late, but for now a few recipes that make me happy.

The last few weeks, our CSA box has brought us lots of herbs, sweet onions, carrots, kale, beets, lots of lettuce, and today...summer squash and zucchini!

This is a recipe I watched Jamie Oliver do with zucchini. Penne pasta with bacon, zucchini, and a rich carbonara sauce. I really like watching him cook--measuring by handfuls and pinches not cups and teaspoons. We ate it too quickly to take a photo, but here is the foodnetwork version which is, admittedly, much prettier. Click on the picture for the link to the recipe.



And here is another recipe from the week. I have never had beets in any version but pickled (which I remember from my childhood being yucky), so I have a list of different recipes to try with this newfound veggie. This is a delicious cake, a little like carrot cake. If I made it again, I think I'd add some walnuts to the batter before baking. And don't forget the cream cheese frosting. Yum! I've posted the recipe below - click on the title for the original. I wish I had snapped a picture, because the batter goes in the oven bright red and comes out a speckled caramel color.

BEETNIK CAKE
INGREDIENTS:

1 cup vegetable oil 2 cups white sugar 4 eggs 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 cups shredded beets 1 (8 ounce) can crushed pineapple, with juice

3 cups all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice 1 teaspoon salt

DIRECTIONS:

1.	Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9x13 inch baking pan.
2.	In a large bowl, mix together the vegetable oil and sugar until well blended. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then stir in the shredded beets and pineapple with juice. Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, allspice and salt; stir into the beet mixture until just incorporated. Spread the batter evenly into the prepared pan.
3.	Bake for about 45 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a wooden pick inserted into the center comes out clean. When cool, frost as desired, or eat plain.

My Favorite Kitchen Gadget, and Other Epicurean Musings

My favorite kitchen gadget. Oh, but there are so many to choose from, you say. The tea press is indispensable, and what about the fine grater that zests lemons and limes in seconds, and please don’t forget the food processor! These are all wonderful things, my friends, but for the summer at least, I have to go with practicality over finesse. As long as our CSA keeps delivering large boxes full of leafy greens, the revered kitchen gadget of the summer will be the salad spinner. It is unglamorous for sure, but when you hate washing lettuce as much as I do, it makes life a little simpler.

CSA pick up day every Thursday has become both like a culinary Christmas and a solemn challenge: How much lettuce can you eat in one week? No kidding. We currently have 5 bags of lettuce and 2 bags of spinach in our fridge. As the season continues, we are seeing more diversity in our produce, but salads of all kinds will likely be a staple of every meal for weeks to come. I have been trying to make some different dishes highlighting the organic local produce we get each week. Unfortunately, I am a better cook than food photographer, so you will have to live with descriptions and second rate photographs.

Grilled chicken salad with warm bacon dressing and crispy polenta cakes. I tricked Doug into eating radishes with this dish by grating it into the dressing.

Herbed spinach dip with crudites. Just add some yogurt, lemon, and lemon zest to a handful of spinach and fresh herbs (I used basil, parsley, and garlic scapes).

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie. One of my best (and more attractive) pies to date. Mark Bittman has a great recipe for an all butter crust for those who don’t like to use shortening, and I think substituting a fruit liqueur like Grand Marnier for some of the water in the crust makes it delicious. I used fresh CSA rhubarb, but used grocery store strawberries, since it wasn’t quite strawberry season here.

Crunchy herbed chicken, lemony risotto with peas, and a garden salad. One of my favorite things about cooking is the chance to put together meals with friends and make dinner a community event. Anne provided from her garden tomatoes for the salad, and the thyme and oregano, which flavored both the risotto and the batter for the pan-fried chicken. The CSA provided the onions and peas for the risotto and the lettuce and radishes for the salad. I don't think I've ever had peas that weren't frozen, and these were delicious. Which leads to your fun food fact for the week: Peas, a legume, have been cultivated for about 9,000 years. Legumes were so well regarded in the ancient world that the four major legumes known to the Romans became names for prominent Roman families: Fabius from fava beans, Lentulus from lentils, Piso from the pea, and Cicero from the chick pea. Now don’t you feel smart?

Ever wonder what my kitchen looks like in the aftermath of these experiments? I absolved Doug of his dishwashing duty this night:

Should we as Americans (and especially those of us responsible for educating today's youth) be concerned that it requires multiple signs and fences to keep people from stepping into an active steaming geyser?

Well, we've done it. 3 National Parks, 13 Days. 2,400 Miles. 5 Showers. After a few days of unpacking, doing laundry and dishes, airing out tents and sleeping bags, etc. it feels like we are home. Doug is doing a fantastic job chronicling our trip here, so take a look if you are interested. I still feel very fortunate that we had time (and the benefit of a relatively fuel efficient car) to explore some of the most beautiful parts of our country. While planning, we were a little disappointed that we planned the trip so early in a year with such heavy snowfall, as we weren't able to access all the places we wanted to see. But we were thoroughly rewarded with some early season perks, such as pleasant weather, an astounding display of wildflowers, and waterfalls that would knock your socks off. Doug compares my awe of waterfalls like a child's love of unicorns or rainbows. And it's probably a fair comparison. I will add a video from one of my favorite hikes, to Osprey Falls in Yellowstone. For a comparable effect of the power of this waterfall, place your computer on the bathroom counter plugged into some large speakers, and aim your shower head (cold water of course) on your face as you watch this.

I've been trying pretty hard to avoid blogging, but I couldn't resist on such a momentous occasion such as this:

I'm pretty sure I can say that it's the only being I've spent more time with in the last 4 years than my husband. And while it doesn't possess his good looks, wit, or dishwashing abilities, it can boast in its sleek appearance, and virus immunity. That's right. My little G4 IBook. And today it begins its 3rd life of sorts. We replaced the hard drive in October, and after watching its battery life deplete and the final death blow that severed its power adapter last week, it now has a shiny new battery and adapter. So it's truly a laptop again. I can work in the office, on the couch, outside on the patio for the next 5 hours and 20 minutes without reaching for the power cord. Wahoo!

Of course there are other summer accomplishments and activities that I am proud of as well. School is out and I am enjoying my make-up free, cooking, napping, and book devouring existence. A few things of note (with illustrations for you visual learners):

The first week of June brought me to Boston and other old New England haunts for the nuptials of my good friends from Bloomington, Brandon and Rachel. It was a gorgeous wedding and a good chance to see some IU friends. The trip also gave me a chance to see some other friends living in New England, though I am notoriously bad at photo documenting these visits.

The IU Girls

Jackie and I, post kayaking, enjoying the Portsmouth Chowder Festival!

Doug has done a much better job at documenting our outdoor adventures on his blog and flickr site. Most recently we had a pleasant day hike around The Loch and Mills Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park. We are getting ready and excited for our upcoming trip to Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks. Seriously, who wouldn't want to spend their 2nd wedding anniversary with a moose???

I've been an unambitious chef as of late, but am working up to greatness. I finally got some herbs and tomatoes planted this week, and this afternoon we go to pick up our first share of CSA veggies! Last year my culinary project was a dessert of the week throughout the summer which yielded some tasty results. This year my challenge will be to cook a meal each week highlighting some of the fresh, locally grown, ingredients that come to us from Grant Family Farms (or from our back patio as the case may be). I probably won't get into full swing until after our vacation. In the meantime I'll post a pic of my most recent carrot cake with cream cheese frosting (courtesy of me and my wonderful kitchenaid appliances).

Funny 'cause it's true. Hope you relate (otherwise we may not be able to be friends. unless you like snacks as much as i do too).




And these are just because I saw them at a conference last Friday and they made me chuckle (very appropriate for working with educators who have an intense fear of technology):

Because I Love You. All of You.

Caucus (not to be confused with couscous): A Little Old Fashion Democracy

Do you ever feel that we are a little too removed from the political process? Ever feel the disconnect between walking into a polling center, pushing a button, and magically that somehow someday translates into the new leader of the free world? Well, friends, come to Colorado where choosing a presidential primary candidate is a little like playing Oregon Trail - Presidential Election Edition.

So unlike other states were a voter shows up to a polling place and casts a ballot then swings by Starbucks on their way back to work, this evening I found myself jammed into an elementary school gymnasium with several hundred other people navigating the confusion of finding our precinct, signing in, remembering our voter id number, and finding a place to sit or stand. We got there 30 minutes early and still had to wait in a long line. After calling the caucus to order, we found our different precincts and huddled together. Then we literally chose a presidential nominee by a show of hands. Our group then chose volunteers to be our delegates for the particular candidates, people who agree to go to the county delegation meeting to vote for that candidate. I sat there thinking about the way that people have gathered together over the last few hundred years to choose a president, not in isolated little voting booths, but crammed into a building with kids playing on the floor while the adults shared their ideas with each other. At the end of the procedure, our group had I think 79 people who voted and ended up sending 7 delegates for Barack Obama and 3 for Hillary Clinton. Obama appeared to be the clear favorite at our polling location and I'm curious to see how he did throughout the rest of the state. We were just one of dozens of polling places in our county alone.

Now here's the point at which I betray the fact that I managed to pass civics, U.S. history, and U.S. government in high school without ever really understanding things like the electoral college or a lot of other things about the presidential nomination and election process. But this whole experience actually felt like democracy. On the basis of sheer efficiency the whole idea of a caucus seems very antiquated when you have a machine that will tell each party how many delegates to send for one candidate or another. But something about looking my neighbors in the eye and raising my hand for a candidate made me feel more engaged in and more responsible for the election of a new leader. There were people of all ages there and no matter who people were voting for, everyone was excited that we filled an entire gymnasium full of people who are aching to see change happen in our country. It was pretty cool to see.

For more on caucus fever in Colorado, my friend Sean has written a few really great blog posts on his perceptions of the presidential caucus (as well as further proof why Barack Obama should be the next president, if you are still unconvinced).

Everything mildly interesting in my life comes from NPR or Neatorama.

That's not entirely true, but the other interesting things that tend to happen to me are all protected under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. So, here are a few of the more interesting things I've seen lately:

10 Awful Words and the People They’re Named For. Ever wonder where the words dunce, boycott, and chauvinism came from? Makes me wonder what the word Hillman could one day be used for. Most likely some sort of intestinal disorder.

Boot camp for teens addicted to the internet. That's right, I'm blogging about it. On the internet.

Anti-advertising advertisements. This is an irony I can get behind.

Geography trivia game. The most fun you can have realizing how geographically illiterate you are.

A study that shows that not making our beds could be keeping us healthy. Score 1 for cluttered people everywhere!

The best Christmas present ever (on etsy.com, which is a super cool website by the way).

Happy Thanksgiving, Ya'll!

It Lives! It Lives!

After a month of mourning over what I thought was the end of my electronic companion, it has seen a resurrection of sorts. My super rad husband, in a stroke of technological brilliance, dissected the computer into a dozen pieces and a million screws, installed a new hard drive, and put it all together again. Well, more or less. There were still 5 or 6 screws left over at the end that are [hopefully] not functionally necessary. Though I wanted to take a picture of the bare bones spread out all over the table, you'll have to settle for the finished product.

This weekend in Fort Collins brought the first warning signs of winter, cold and rainy. We commemorated by taking extra naps. I officially perfected the art of high altitude cookie baking. And I made Doug breakfast in bed this morning purely out of the goodness of my heart (that and because of the Hoosiers' sad defeat by MSU. Sigh).

Oh, NPR, how you inform and enlighten us all!

I got a few chuckles out of this driving home this afternoon. It brings some light heartedness to the ridiculousness of the presidential primary race and its self-imposed urgency.

If you laugh too, then we can be friends.

Masquerading as Suburban Homesteaders

We are now the proud partial owners of a cow so lovingly named #9633, who is somewhere in transit between a Colorado pasture and a beef processing facility. We've been talking for over a year now about buying grass-fed, hormone- & antibiotic-free beef from a happy local farm, and were glad to find some friends who felt the same. The six of us are splitting a half cow, which will be enough beef to feed us all for quite a while. Which means that we are not only the proud owners of 1/6 of a cow, but the proud new owners of the freezer now in our garage.

As we wait for our meat to arrive, we have decided to try some other freezing experiments. So Sunday at the farmers market, we bought 40-some tomatoes and a few pounds of green beens and carrots. After many hours of cutting, blanching, packing, and garbage disposal repairs (still in progress), here's what we came out with (in can equivalents):

11 cans of tomatoes

4 jars of spaghetti sauce

6 cans of green beans

3 cans of carrots

1 qt of tomato juice

It's been exhausting, but very enlightening as well . Wendell Berry would be proud. And so will we once we get to sit down and enjoy the fruits (and vegetables) of our labor:)

"She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain." (Louis May Alcott)

I've been using GoodReads to document my literary adventures and misadventures and it is WAY easier than putting things up on this site. So you should all join (or at least visit and make witty comments here). However, since I won't be putting many desserts or books on this site, my blog is essentially defunct. Therefore, I shall commit to either a) having a more interested blog-worthy life, or b) posting strange pictures of cats to distract you all from the absence of a).

Case in point:

Dessert of the Week (Peach Pie) and the Institution of the 10:00 Bedtime...

The cruel world of gainful employment requires me to seasonally postpone my work as a domestic goddess, hence the lack of posts as of late. So my apologies for no new interesting posts. It has been a strange summer for me, one in which I tried to recapture the art of rest. Some days were great--reflections made, projects completed, books read, relationships strengthened. And some days I descended into a kind of restless slothfulness.

This summer Doug and I got to explore more of this incredible state that we live in. We got to know some new friends. We had the priviledge of filling our guest bed multiple times over the summer, and for that I am grateful that people love us enough to make the trip to visit.

The school year for educators seems to begin the same way every year. While kids are out finalizing their school supply list, teachers are holed up in auditoriums and board rooms psyching themselves up for a new year. This tends to include guest speakers and other events that remind us of the pride we should take in our profession, in the difference we make in the lives of children (presumably to distract us from realizing how little we actually get paid for all this life-changing).

Yet for some reason, this year, I believe it.

Final Harry Potter Book Blasted For Containing Spoilers

NEW YORK—Harry Potter fans throughout the world were shocked, disappointed, and outraged to learn last week that J.K. Rowling's 750-page...

Harry Potter and the Deus Ex Machina

From Wikipedia: The phrase deus ex machina ['de.ʊs eks 'maːkʰi.naː] (literally "god out of a machine") describes an unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot.

I just finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows today. It was a very entertaining read--suspenseful, with enough holes leftover for fankids to stay glued to their message boards-- though I will say that I'm glad the series is over. I don't think I could have endured any more books in which Harry and his friends repeatedly find themselves moments from their demise only to be saved by the most ridiculous and improbable thing you could ever imagine. That being said, it was a fun series, the final book no exception, and now of course I'll have to call my sister-in-law later to gab about the story's resolution.

Dessert, Er, Breakfast of the Week: German Pancake

This is an awesome recipe. Rather than standing over a stove for 20 minutes flipping pancakes, you pour this mix into a hot pan, stick it in the oven, and it bakes and contorts itself into a crazy shape while you sip your tea and listen to NPR (at least that's how I do it).


3 large eggs
1/2 c all-purpose flour
1/2 milk (I used a mix of 2% and half and half)
1/4 salt (can omit if using salted butter)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 Tbsp butter
confectioners' sugar and fresh fruit


Set oven to 400. In a large bowl, whisk eggs. Add flour and whisk until smooth. Add milk, salt, and vanilla and mix until incorporated. Once oven is hot, add the butter to a large cast-iron skillet (I don't have one, so I use a 10 in glass pie plate) and transfer to oven until the butter melts. Remove from the oven and quickly pour the batter into the hot pant. Return to oven and bake until the pancake is puffy and golden brown (about 15 min). Top with fruit and sugar.

While in Denver last week, Joanna took her first trip to Jamba Juice, and while only one of the employees was that peppy, she did get a similar dumfounded response when she was asked what kind of boost she wanted and answered, "A what?"

Dessert of the Week: Strawberry Mousse

This was a good choice for this week, as strawberries are Jo's favorite food and it allowed me to make a dessert without turning on the oven.

Perhaps feeling inspired, Joanna created her own dessert of the week and only melted one plastic dish in the process :)

In other news, we did see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix last week and I enjoyed it without debating the various bones of contention as to how closely it parallels the book (for those who enjoy that debate, I did read an interesting interview with the screenwriter who actually made me appreciate the film adaptation a little better). I am not ashamed to say that I enjoy the Harry Potter books and movies, though neither are enough to keep me up until midnight on their release dates (I really enjoy sleep, you see).

Back to the mitten state this weekend for the nuptials of Dad and Pam and a cousin council meeting to be held at a secret location known only as "The Meadow." Cheers!