More snow.

We're supposed to be on a plane to Florida as we speak, yet we are not. The Portland airport is closed, and we received a call at 4:15 this morning telling us that our flight was cancelled. I'm trying not to feel depressed that we can't leave until Wednesday, but being snowbound is getting old.

Florida

Marco Island at sunset, old GQ cover, Jena Ardell, Jonathan Quinn

It looks like we may get another few inches of snow today. I'm very much looking forward to some warmer weather for Christmas.

Le Mode

I am in love with polyvore.com. I liken it to playing with Barbies for adults. My husband can't figure out why I would want to do this, but I love coming up with ridiculous outfits based on fantasy trips. I think I spent two hours making outfits last night. 

Clockwise from top left: 

Parisian cafe date

Airplane travel outfit

Art museum date

Miami shopping

Carry On

My visual packing list. 

We leave on Sunday for our great Floridian Christmas adventure. I'm looking forward to getting away from the snow, rain, and freezing temperatures here and spending some time in 78 degree weather. However, I hate flying. I'm sure it's mostly psychological, but I get sick on almost every flight. This time, based on recommendations, I've invested $3 in Sea-Bands. I think they might just be voodoo, but after years of suffering, I'm willing to try anything. My fingers are crossed.

This is my essential carry-on packing list: good reading material, lots of water to drink (I bring an empty bottle and fill it after security), music, moisturizers, and a toothbrush (nothing like giving hugs when you get off a plane 7 hours later and smell like eww). I also pack my own snacks and meals because airplane food is usually unpleasant. 

Biscotti Extravaganza

Biscotti are cookies baked multiple times. From wikipedia:

Biscotti originates from medieval Latin word biscoctus, meaning "twice-baked": it defines biscuits baked twice in the oven, so they could be stored for long periods of time, which was particularly useful during journeys and wars. Through Middle French, the word was imported into the English language as "biscuit".

I like to make mine slightly less sweet than a cookie (I've decreased the sugar from the original recipe by about a third) with slightly savory flavors (thus, anise), but these are a sweet treat best served with tea or coffee. The original recipe calls for white chocolate, but I find white chocolate kind of weird - it's not even really chocolate. Dark chocolate and cranberries are a decadent, sweet-tart combination.

Dark Chocolate Dried Cranberry Biscotti
Modified from Bon Appetit recipe

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups dried cranberries (about 6 ounces)
8 oz dark chocolate (again, I used Callebaut)

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line baking sheet with parchment paper. Combine flour, baking powder and salt in medium bowl; whisk to blend. In a large bowl, beat sugar, butter, eggs, vanilla extract and almond extract extract until well blended. Mix in flour mixture, then dried cranberries. Divide dough in half. Using floured hands, shape each piece into 2 1/2-inch-wide, 9 1/2-inch-long, 1-inch-high log. Transfer both logs to prepared baking sheet, spacing evenly.

Bake logs until golden brown, about 30 minutes. Cool completely on sheet on rack. Maintain oven temperature. Using serrated knife, cut logs on diagonal into 1/2-inch-wide slices. Arrange slices, cut side down, on same sheet. Bake 10 minutes; turn biscotti over. Bake until just beginning to color, about 5 minutes. Transfer biscotti to rack.

Stir chocolate in top of double boiler until smooth. (I don't own a double boiler, so I just melt the chocolate in a small heavy ceramic bowl on the element of my stove, which works just fine). Using fork, drizzle chocolate over biscotti. When drizzling, it's best to move the fork in wide strokes over multiple biscotti at once, as it looks better than dripping it directly over individual biscotti. Let stand until chocolate sets, about 30 minutes.

Biscotti

These have a subtle licorice flavor. Serve with a glass of port, or a cup of coffee. Yum. 

This is what I spent my snow-day doing. 

Anise Almond Biscotti

(recipe originally from Bon Appetit)

3 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/3 teaspoon salt

1 cup sugar

1 1/4 stick (10 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon anise-seed

1 cup sliced almonds

Preheat oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. Mix sugar, melted butter, eggs, vanilla extract and anise-seed in a large bowl. Add flour mixture to egg mixture and stir with a wooden spoon until well blended. Mix in almonds. 

Divide dough in half. Using floured hands, shape each dough half into 13 inch by 2 1/2 inch wide log. Transfer both logs onto prepared baking sheet, spacing a few inches apart. 

Bake logs until golden brown (logs will spread), about 30 minutes. Cool logs on baking sheet. Maintain oven temperature. 

Using a serrated knife, cut logs on diagonal into 1/2 to 1 inch wide slices. Arrange slices, cut side down, on baking sheet. Bake 12 minutes. Turn biscotti over, bake until golden brown, about 8 minutes. Transfer to cooling rack, and allow to cool completely. 

I like candy.

With the snowy, frigid weather, I was inspired to make some treats. These are a wonderful combination of sweet and tart, and somehow Christmas-ey (and in my opinion, much tastier than these). I suggest using organic oranges because conventionally grown oranges are sprayed with pesticides, although the organic oranges at our grocery store looked like they'd been rolled all the way here from Florida. I also suggest using a high quality chocolate (I used Callebaut) because your finished product is only as good as the ingredients you start with. This makes quite a few candies, four oranges resulted in about 4 cups of candy. 

Candied Orange Peel

(Recipe originally from Use Real Butter)

Peels of 4 Oranges 

3 Cups sugar

1 Cup water

1 Cup sugar for rolling peels

8 oz+ chocolate

Slice off navel and stem ends of oranges, then cut into quarters. Peel the orange, being careful not to tear the quarters. (I kept the orange wedges for a snack, but it'd be a great addition to a fruit salad, if you're so inclined.) Some recipes suggest scraping out some of the white pith with a spoon, but I don't think it's necessary.

Cut the peels into 1/4 inch slices. Place the peels into a large pot and cover with cold water. Heat the water on high, and once it boils pour off water. Repeat boiling process twice more - this helps remove some of the bitterness from the peel. 

Combine sugar and water in a saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat until the temperature reaches 230F (a candy thermometer would be a great help here). The sugar will be boiling rapidly and have a slightly golden tinge. Add orange peel and reduce the heat to a simmer. Simmer until peels are translucent, about 30 minutes.  Remove peels from syrup with a fork or tongs, and set on a rack to dry for several hours.*

Once the peel is dry, roll each in sugar; this will remove any residual stickiness. They're delicious as is, or you can enrobe them in chocolate. Melt chocolate in a double boiler. Dip each peel in dark chocolate, and place on a sheet of parchment or wax paper to dry (roughly 15-30 minutes). Enjoy.

*I tried eating one of the orange sticks just after it had been boiled and was cool enough to eat. The flavor was still VERY intense.  After they dried overnight, the flavor was mellower, so don't despair if they start out too strong. 

Il neige.

The weather outside is frightful, but let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Sparkling Snowflakes

It's snowing this morning! 

paper snowflakes, card, bottle & necklace. Card & necklace via ohjoy!.

Est-ce qu'il neige?

It may snow in Portland this weekend! It's time for a big wool blanket, cozy slippers, and a cup of tea. Lovely scarf, gloves & ornament available here.

Cuisant

I love to cook.

The Joy of Cooking is a great cookbook for basic recipes. When I need to know how long to cook squash, how to make basic pancakes, or just to determine what a souffle involves, this is where I look. We have a mini-paper back copy that's throuroughly stained and dog-eared from tons of use.

Gourmet is great inspiration for flashy dishes, and just how to embellish a basic dish. I love that epicurious.com offers a searchable database of Gourmet's recipes with reviews. I generally like to know whether something is good before I spend time making it, and the reviews often offer great additions and tweaks that make dishes even better.

Cooking by Hand is my most recent cookbook obsession. This book makes you want to brine your own olives (insane), and create your own balsamic vinegar which you store in your attic for 20 years. The closest I've come to either of these is making my own yogurt. There is a huge section on meats, butchering, etc, which I just pretend isn't there (because we're vegetarian and the idea of making sausage kills my appetite). But, it's a great read, and makes me even more determined to put in a huge vegetable garden next spring.

Back Steps

Our most recent project was re-tiling the back steps going down to the back door from the kitchen. The new tiles match the kitchen tile. It looks a lot fresher, and I don't see every single dog hair and footprint anymore. Hooray.

Stockings

When I'm in a sour mood, I challenge myself to think of 5 (or more) good things that have happened during the day. Sometimes the best things I can think of are pretty simple, like "I still have air to breathe".
Since I mentioned that in general I don't like Christmas or winter, I've been thinking of all the things that I do like about the season. I like Christmas stockings. My mom embroidered stockings for my brothers and I when we were kids. One of my favorite parts of Christmas morning was waking up at 4 AM, dumping out our stockings, which were mostly filled with mandarin oranges and chocolate coins, and binging on citrus & chocolate before my parents got out of bed.
I don't have a Christmas stocking now (nor do I have a mantel to hang one on), but I like the idea of a stocking made of non-traditional fabrics. Charming, no?

Salle de bain

Our bathroom is puny and ugly. The photo on the left is when we first moved in. The blue paint was probably the dirtiest paint I've ever seen. Gross. We re-painted a warm gold/ yellow color, and I painted the vanity a creamy white, and replaced the heinous plastic handles with silver. It made a HUGE difference.

My husband calls it the Manhattan style bathroom because the two of us can barely squeeze in at once. It is small, but really, I think it's just a matter of the space being used inefficiently. If we had a pedestal sink, you could probably get out of the shower from either side of the shower doors.

Anyhow, remodeling the bathroom is one of our top priorities (once we win the lottery), especially since you must go through our bedroom in order to use the bathroom (it's the only one).

These images are inspiration for an eventual remodel. Pedestal sinks, colored glass tile, marble. . . lovely.

Holiday Madness

Amsterdam advent calendar on right available from NouveauDesigns here.

Christmas is easily my least favorite holiday. There are so many things I dislike about winter and the holidays, so this year I'm trying to remind myself of all the great things about it. When I was a kid my parents had a little cardboard advent calendar with doors and windows which you opened to reveal pictures of Christmas-ness (candles, trees, ornaments, teddy-bears). I loved the surprise of discovering what was behind each door, and the idea that each day you were one day closer to THE DAY, which at the time meant presents, and tons of chocolate.

Red & Gold Christmas

Warm Christmas inspiration.

Dining Room

This is the dining room when we moved in. Note the gorgeous ceiling fan. I'm pretty sure that it came down the second day we lived here. 

I love these windows, although they are in really bad shape, and the view of our neighbor's house is nothing special. Our current dining room set-up obscures them, because it's the only window where our houseplants can get enough light and warmth during the winter. Someday, I'd love to install a little window seat under the windows and make the dining room into a library/ dining room.

The dining room today. I have grand ideas of what it could be, and this isn't it (yet). 

\

My little reading nook. 

The light in the dining room that replaced the horrendous ceiling fan. 

Pain Perdue

Recently, French toast, or pain perdue (lost bread) as we like to call it, has been our favorite meal. I've made it three times in the last month, and in general, there are few things that we eat this frequently. Usually the meal starts as a use for old stale bread. I often buy ciabatta from our local bakery and don't get around to using it, thus, pain perdue! The most recent time I made it, I didn't have stale bread (which makes it tastier, I think), so I used fresh whole wheat bread.

It was still pretty lovely slathered in dark maple syrup, even though it looks kind of terrible.

Pain Perdue
modified recipe from the Joy of Cooking
Serves two (roughly three slices each)

3 large eggs (I can be pretty snobby about eggs, and only buy organic, free range, foofie eggs)
1 cup milk (I often use a combination of whipping cream and soymilk, because these are other items that are often leftover in the fridge)
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
6 or more slices slightly stale bread - I use as many as will soak up all the liquid
1 tablespoon butter

In a large bowl beat eggs until mixed. Stir in milk and vanilla. Add two slices of bread and let soak for a few minutes. Meanwhile, melt 1 tablespoon butter in large skillet. Add soaked slices of bread to skillet. Let cook on each side until brown. Flip, and brown second side. Repeat with each slice of soaked bread. I usually put the oven on low, and put a plate in the oven to store the slices until they're all done.

Serve with cinnamon, powdered sugar, butter, or just plain grade b maple syrup.

Living Room Before & After

This is the living room before we moved in. My husband really wanted to keep the lime/ neon green wall. I was less than thrilled with the color. I couldn't really work lime green into my vision for the room. So, instead I picked a color from our local paint shop called "grilled cheese" (I kid you not). Somehow this seemed fitting for our house, and I like the color better than lime.

Warm and cozy, right?

The inspiration for the dining room/ living room color was this image from Domino magazine. It's so cheerful and bright, I thought that when the weather outside was grey and miserably rainy, we could enjoy some virtual sunshine inside. We'll see how that works out this winter.

Image from here.

Finally, I like the use of a little bit of the same color used as an accent color surrounded by white. It still looks happy and warm even in small doses. I think the color works best with a restrained palette everywhere else, but I'm not sure a house with two dark-haired pets would do very well with too much white.

Kitchen Before & After

The kitchen was one of my least favorite rooms when we moved in to the house. It took a while, but we did a little makeover with paint, and installed some ikea shelves & workbench to make a breakfast nook. Eventually I hope to remodel the kitchen, but in the meantime, I enjoy it in all it's orange glory.

this is my favorite corner of the kitchen.

Chez Moi.

Notre maison. Prior to moving in. May 2008.

potting shed & garage.