Step away from the Baklava!

All I can say is that this stuff is dangerous. Holy cow, I literally have no control when around these sweet pieces of bliss! I served these for dessert at my Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Years a.k.a another reason to eat yummy food) dinner, and they sure didn’t last long. I adapted this recipe I pulled off of AllRecipes.com, and here’s how I did it:

For the nuts, I used a combination of pistachios and walnuts. I love the green color of the pistachios, don’t you? Make sure they’re chopped pretty finely so you don’t have any super large chunks.

I made the sauce before assembling the baklava so that it had adequate time to cool, and I scaled it to 1.5 times the suggested amount. Just combine 1.5 cups of water and 1.5 cups of sugar in a sauce pan and bring it to a boil. When the sugar is melted, add 3/4 cup of honey and 1.5 teaspoons of vanilla extract. Let the mixture simmer for around 20 minutes and then remove it from the heat so it can cool.

Assembly was much easier than expected, especially if you use melted butter and a basting brush to spread it over the delicate phyllo dough. Just be careful not to put too much butter, as that will make it soggy. I also didn’t cut it all the way to the bottom as suggested by the recipe, since several people claimed it would be too soggy when you pour the sauce over it.

This would make a perfect treat to bring to a potluck. You can store it in an airtight container for 1 to 2 weeks, if it even lasts that long!

My all-time favorite salad

One of my friends calls this the “Awesome Salad,” and I have to agree with her.  I probably make this salad several times a week, and it never fails! The ridiculously delicious dressing is courtesy of my cousin, and it works in just about any salad. I even use it as a marinade from time to time.

Salad assembly: Combine into a large bowl

• A large amount of spinach or other leafy greens of your choice (perhaps arugula or a spring mix?); these form the bulk of the salad, so don’t skimp!
• You can add a handful of crisp romaine for an added crunch.
• 1 small, crisp apple. I always use granny smiths, as their sour taste plays nicely with the sweetness of the other ingredients.
• A handful of dried cranberries
• A handful of chopped candied pecans (YUM!)
• 1-2 heaping teaspoons of goat cheese or gorgonzola

For the dressing, combine and whisk in a small bowl (approximately):

• 1 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
• 1 teaspoon of honey
• 1/2 teaspoon of dijon mustard

The dressing measurements are approximate, as I usually just eyeball it. You can adjust the ingredient amounts to get the taste you prefer. If you want it sweeter, add more honey. If you want it spicier or with more kick, add more dijon. It’s totally up to you; just have fun with it!

Thanksgiving Very Berry (Yummy) Pie

Oh man. I LOVE berry pie. I can’t stress enough how much I love it. Especially with a giant scoop of vanilla bean ice cream. Up until now I’ve only made apple pie, but Thanksgiving calls for something special. Fortunately, Berkeley Bowl had a delicious selection of berries this week, including (of all things) huckleberries! I don’t believe they’re in season now, but this is the first time I’ve seen fresh ones for sale in California. Here’s the breakdown of my berry mixture:

4 ounces of huckleberries, 12 ounces of raspberries, 12 ounces of blueberries, and 6 ounces of blackberries (all fresh).

Another first was my all-butter crust, using the French Pastry Pie Crust recipe on All Recipes. I usually make it with half shortening and half butter, but I always felt a little weird about it. The good news is that the crust came out beautiful, and I’ll definitely be making it this way from now on.

See those chunks of butter? That = flakiness and pure yumminess. For the filling, I mixed the berries with a half cup of sugar, a quarter cup of corn starch, and 2 or 3 teaspoons of lemon juice. I let it sit for a while (in the fridge), and the sugar extracted some of the juice from the berries. Since I wanted to avoid a runny pie, before I added the berries I drained out the juice.

 

I find that lattice tops are much easier than a solid top pie. I always have difficulty transferring (elegantly) the entire rolled out crust to the top of the pie. With lattice top, I can work with each small strip individually, and it’s also a bit more interesting to look at. Last but not least, the lattice top allows some of the juices to evaporate while cooking, which is great if you don’t want pie soup for dessert. Here’s the final result, and let me tell you that it’s even more delicious than it looks:

Birdie Apron

Ok I know it’s been forever since I last posted. The good news is that I’ve still been productive, so over the next few days I’ll be sharing what I’ve been up to, starting with this apron I made over the summer:

The fabric is from Alexander Henry, and I used the pattern from Amy Butler’s In Stitches book. I found that the first apron I made was a bit too long, so I trimmed down the original apron panel to 18 inches. The towel loop is also quite small, so I cut a 9 inch long piece instead of the recommended 6.5.

I love the fabric and have been getting a ton of use out of the apron. Who would have thought that I would make something useful?!

no knead bread

So my sister called me a few days ago to brag about some awesome bread that she made and I was totally bummed to find out that you need some sort of dutch oven to bake it in. It turns out that she was so smug because a bright shiny turquoise one was already in the mail!

Here it is in all its glory! I actually got my act together and cleaned the stove so that I could post a picture of it.

Anyway, onto the good stuff – the bread! You can find the recipe here. Apparently it already made the rounds on all the food blogs when it came out 1.5 years ago, so I’m a little late to the game. Nevertheless, the recipe is ridiculously simple and tasty to boot! I used half white flour and half whole wheat.

Here it is right out of the oven. The crust is so crispy that it crackles! Of course I had no patience and had to cut right into it.

Perfectly moist on the inside and great with a slice of cheese. Next time I’ll suck it up and use all white flour and maybe even some fresh rosemary. I love this bread because it’s everything bread should be — flour, yeast, and water. No chemicals or preservatives or even oil like the ones you buy from the store.

a-line skirt

Well I finally got the courage to try my first piece of clothing: an a-line skirt. I drafted the pattern using the sew what! skirts book. Since the fabric is so light, I had to sew in a lining as well. This proved to be quite tricky, but it was manageable. The hardest part was getting the zipper in, until I realized that I was using the wrong side of the zipper foot (doh!).

I love love love the skirt, and it’s surprisingly stretchy and feels great against my skin. I think I’ll have to take the waist in just a little, probably with tiny darts. I’m wondering if it’s bad form to sew in the darts after the facing is already in place … but I guess I don’t really care as long as the skirt fits well and looks great on the outside.

Frenchy Bags

Two weeks ago my sister calls me at — gasp — 7:30 in the morning complaining that she’s not feeling well. Three hours later she’s over at my place and we’re eating boiled potatoes and sewing cute frenchy bags. I love the Alexander Henry fabric she used, especially paired with red and white polka dots.

I would say it took us a solid 8 hours to cut out all of the fabric and sew it together. The next time I use this pattern I’ll probably try it with fusible interfacing as opposed to the sew-in kind. I found the interfacing to be incredibly tedious, and I could never baste the fabric perfectly flat onto it; the fabric kept bunching up in random places. Thankfully, most of those bunches were hidden in the seam allowances, but it was annoying nonetheless.

The next morning I put together another bag, which I intend to give to my other cousin. After cutting it only took me about four and a half hours, which isn’t bad at all!

** Edit: I completely forgot to mention my chief problem with this bag. The lining for both came out shorter than the bag, and so when you put something in it that’s heavier than a piece of paper, the top panel collapses in a weird way. We were able to get around this with the black and white bag by folding over the top panel, but it doesn’t work so well on the second due to sloppy sewing.

Also, I noticed that some of the stitching is coming loose on one of the side seems, and I’m thinking of reinforcing it with sewing glue or whatever it’s called — is this a bad idea? I can’t think of another way to sew it back together without either taking the lining out (eek!) or having the stitching be visible for a small portion on the outside.

made an apron

I actually finished this a few weeks ago but was too busy enjoying the inevitable end-of-the-semester laziness to post about it. I used the pleated apron pattern in Amy Butler’s In Stitches book. I found the pattern very straight forward and easy to follow, except for attaching the ties. The directions for this step didn’t seem to make much sense, but I figured Amy’s folks probably know a thing or two more about sewing than I do and decided to try it anyway. There was definitely some hocus pocus going on because it actually worked! I still can’t figure out how, so I’ll just have to chalk it up to the sewing fairies and leave it at that.

I used fabric from Michael Miller’s line, which I got at The Cotton Patch in Lafayette. I was actually hunting down some Joel Dewberry fabric, but as it happened they were sold out. Fortunately, the women working there were extremely helpful and encouraging, and I’ll definitely be back!

Here’s a dramatic picture of sewing in the pocket, probably some time in the middle of the night. In retrospect, I probably should have picked a more fun/vibrant fabric, but I think it’s still cute.

By the way, I read that if you pin the fabric horizontally, you can sew right over the pins without breaking the needle. Is there any truth to this?

And here’s a not-so-great photo of my quite-great apron! I love the pleats and the trim, and I can’t wait to give it to my cousin when I visit in a few weeks. Shhh don’t tell!

amy butler gum drop pillow!

My first official sewing project EVER is now complete! I spent the day following Amy Butler’s pattern for gum drop pillows. In retrospect I probably should have chosen a fabric that would be easier to line up panels with, but who cares?! It adds some much-needed color to the apartment and is fun to sit on and/or rest my feet on. I can’t complain with that!

first bout with painting

I’m pretty sure the last time I picked up a paintbrush to paint a picture was in kindergarten, and I haven’t given it much thought until recently. A few weeks ago I decided to pick up a few tubes of acrylic paint from the local crafts store and give it a shot. I must say I’m unexpectedly pleased with the result!

The painting is a knock-off of Lynnette May‘s Robot Love. I had a blast playing with the paint and watching  the picture slowly come together. I hope to make more paintings to decorate my apartment with this summer, so I’m currently on the lookout for colorful, easy designs …