Carrot Wine!!!
July 13th, 2009After our recent wine adventures I got a little more inspired to create my own batch of wine. I have been reading up on the process for several years now, but have kept it on the back burner. Here in Seatte, there are a lot of home brew supply stores so it’s easy to obtain the obscure ingredients necessary for the project. I quickly settled on carrot wine as my first attempt since carrots are cheap and you need a lot of whatever fruit or vegetable you are using for your base. I have also I have tasted carrot wine once before and it was delicious! I have no idea of my recipe is similar or it will even turn out at all, but here’s my attempt!
Step 1: Get 10lbs of carrots, wash, scrub and chop them!
Step 2: Boil the carrots till soft and drain the water into the primary fermenter.
Step 3: Add all the other stuff and let it sit loosely covered over night
Step 4: Check the specific gravity of the mix so that we know the sugar content and can later estimate if the fermentation is complete.
Step 5: Add the yeast!
Now we let it sit in the bucket for 3-5 days while the yeast have a party with the sugar. When the fermentation slows we will test the specific gravity again and put it in a glass container with an airtight plug to continue fermenting. In the secondary fermentation in the glass container it should ferment much more slowly and the wine will become clear as sediments precipitate out of solution. Every 3-4 weeks, we shift the wine from one container to a second, to separate the wine from the sediment. This process of shifting the wine is done for about 6-12 months then we bottle it and enjoy! There isn’t a definitive answer as to how long the process should take some websites say just 3 months others say nothing less than a year! I figure I’ll play it by ear. I’m quite excited about my experiment, I hope it turns out well 
Leavenworth!
July 13th, 2009On the Fourth of July weekend, Patrick, Sara and I decided to go on a biking camping trip near Leavenworth WA. It was an excellent trip! We drove out on the Thursday evening and we had our choice of campsites, apparently everyone was waiting till Friday to take their holiday. This unfortunately meant that all the mosquitoes could focus their attention on us! After choosing our campsite and getting out of the car to set up our tents we were assaulted! Patrick got 12 bites just on one hand! Since it was already late we just made a fast retreat to our tents!
In the morning we made pancakes on the camp stove! I brought the cast iron since we didn’t need to hike it anywhere and it’s MUCH better for distributing the intense heat of an MSR camp stove that has two settings, burning inferno, and off. Pancakes were a HUGE success! The last time I tried to make them on a camp stove we ended up just cooking the whole bowl of batter until it thickened into something edible, because they would just burn and stick too much. It was pretty grosse!
Action photo of Sara fending off the mosquitoes!
YUM! Pancakes!
We made several retreats to the car while we were organizing to depart on our bikes since the mosquitoes were still being vicious. We followed this bike route . We camped at Tumwater campground, marked on the map and headed clockwise around the loop. The mile directly north and south of the campground are the least good road as the shoulder is not particularly wide and there was some gravel but the other 38 miles were great! We saw several other cyclists. There was only one hill that was of any significance, and the scenery was great! We stopped at Napeequa vineyard for their tasting. They hanging the open sign as we passed, so we couldn’t pass them by. They had excellent wine! We particularly liked their rose and desert wine but alas with a full day of biking in the sun we couldn’t take any wine with us. We continued on our way to the little town of Leavenworth. This town reinvented themselves as little Bavaria at some point in their history. It’s a cute little town, they get it just right. With the mountains in the background and a lot of genuinely interesting things going on around town its a nice place to visit.
We arrived about 2pm and really hungry! We first gorged on the pound of fresh cherries we had with us then found a restaurant for lunch. The waiters were all in Bavarian costumes, and the food quite good! We tried a few more wine places, including Maison de Padgett, Ryan Patrick, and Kestrel Vinters. Each place had a different style of wine, and in between tastings we napped in the park, wandered through the art market, went to the chocolate stores, the cheese stores etc. There was also a public park behind the downtown were many people were rafting and swimming! It was very hot that day and we were quite tempted to jump in ourselves but the banks were quite muddy, we didn’t have a good way to dry of and there were still 10 miles between us and our campsite!
The last 10 miles were quite beautiful but we at that point were also very tired! When we got to camp we were quickly attacked by the mosquitoes again. Nothing really worked except the campfire smoke. Which wasn’t too bad considering it was a beautiful evening for s’mores, and chocolate stuffed roasted bananas! In the morning we decided to just pack up as fast as we could and head to town for breakfast. We went to a nice cafe and had awesome hot chocolate and belgian waffles with strawberries and whipped cream! There were a few bottles of wine that we wanted to get after the tastings the day before but none of the stores opened untill 11am, so drove a few miles down the road to a nice pull off by the river. We lazed around and did a little fishing!!! We could see a few TINY fish, but nothing big and certainly nothing biting.
After a few hours we went back to town for our wine and then headed home to seattle for a BBQ with friends and fireworks over Lake Union. We had a wonderful evening playing board games on the porch then strolled down the street for a good view of the fireworks. Happy Fourth!
Fremont Solstice, a hike, and some garden pests
July 10th, 2009Recently we have been going on several mini adventures. We decided to check out the Fremont Solstice parade this year, I have never been before and it has a reputation. Our timing was perfect and we got there just as the parade was arriving, and there was quite an assortment of costumes, dancers and themes.
There were several people in these costumes made of paper and cardboard boxes.
There were a lot of homemade floats with environmental ish themes, though some were just silly for the heck of it. For example this Scorpion bicycle and the green monster below:
The parade was an interesting diversion for the afternoon!
The next day we went on a day hike to Lake Annette. It was a great day hike, quite close to Seattle. Unfortunately it started to rain as we drove to the trail head but we kept going anyway. As we started the tree cover protected us enough and it was pretty nice. We got a little cold if we stopped too long but we made it to the lake in good time, and we had a nice lunch by the lake. We huddled under some pine trees and enjoyed the view.
I had brought my fishing pole, as I’ve been recently fascinated with trying to learn to fish. Not that I want to catch any, I just want to learn how. Unfortunately it was too cold and rainy to really hang around waiting to not catch anything. A few hundred meters after we started hiking back, it got sunny and nice! There was a particularly beautiful section of river right at the start of the trail, I could have been content to sit and watch the river for hours.
All in all it was an enjoyable afternoon.
Lastly, I figured out what has been attacking my rainbow chard in the garden! I thought it was something to do with too much sun or too little water since parts of the leaves were turning brown and shriveling. It turns out I have leave miners! They lay their eggs on the back of the leaf and the critters emerge into the middle of the leaf and eat out the middle leaving the top and bottom.
They spread through the whole leaf and kill it entirely. Eventually the turn into a worm that drops into the soil for next year! I have a few pictures below. Apparently all you can do is cut off any leaves as soon as you spot the damage and next year they suggest planting in a different section of the garden, since they only attack the greens of spinach, chard and beets.
Here are a few pictures of the other plants, Most excitingly is my artichoke, and the tomatoes I grew from seed from last year’s crop! The tomatoes are a heirloom purple tomato that are soo delicious! I’m looking forward to this year’s harvest!
I’m on VA-CA-TION, at least for one more day
June 15th, 2009Patrick and I have been having a great time hanging out with friends and family the last week, sadly we will be taking a plane back to reality tomorrow evening. I have already been getting emails of things to take care of and trying not to think of the mound of work tasks that have been pushed a side. While we were here we were able to go on a brief trip to Yosemite NP, which was quite beautiful.
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Me pointing to half dome.
Patrick enjoying a waterfall near camp.
Embers from the camp fire.
A trail-side lunch spot.
There was also a somewhat spontaneous reunion of high school friends.
Some yummy burritos (devoured).
Someone we did not know from school, who made a guest appearance on our hiking trip to the coast.
OMG Flavor cake
June 4th, 2009Recently I decided to try this recipe I had been eyeing for a ricotta pie. It’s from a book called “the spice cook book” It’s one of those books that was written in the day when people actually cooked instead of re heating boxes of stuff and opening cans. I’ve tried only a few recipes from the book thus far but it has excellent flavor ideas. Spices make the world go around as far as I’m concerned
I made this pie Monday night and brought it to school on Tuesday for our group meeting. It was a HUGE hit, my advisor very seriously wanted the recipe and two people independently said it was the best cheesecake they had ever tasted! I thought it was pretty good, I would like to try making it again though with some changes and see if I can make it better
Here is the original recipe for the cheesecake:
Torta Di Rocotta
3C (1.5lbs) Ricotta cheese
1/4 c sifted all purpose flour
2 T. orange zest
2T lemon zest
1T vanilla extract
1tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp salt
1T chopped citron
————————————————————–
1c sugar
Mix first 8 ingredients, In separate bowl beat eggs until foamy, add sugar and continue beating the mixture 2 min.
Fold into cheese mixture.
Ricotta Pie Pastry:
2C sifted all purpose flour
3T sugar
1/2 tsp salt
———————
3/4 C butter
2 large egg yolks
1-2 T water
Mix dry ingredients. Cut in butter to crumb consistency. Add yolks and just enough water to form a dough.
Roll half the pastry dough to 1/8″ thick and in a circle 1″ larger than a 9″ layer cake pan. Fit into the pan leaving 1/2 inch of pastry around the rim. Fill with cheese mixture. Use remaining dough to roll and cut 1/2″ wide strips. Criss cross on top of the pie. trim turn under and flute the edges.
Bake at 350F oven for 1.5 hrs or until filling is firm and crust is browned.
MY MODIFICATIONS:
I used 2 C ricotta, it’s all I had.
I use only 1/2 tsp cinnamon, I didn’t want to overpower everything.
Left out the citron, I didn’t have any
I added the yolks directly to the cheese mix, then whipped the whites to soft peaks. Added sugar to the whites and again whipped, then folded it all together.
Because of separating the eggs, volume was definitely more than your average 9″ layer cake pan so I used a spring form pan. I needed about 2/3 of dough to make the crust and omitted the crisscross top.
Definitely make the specific crust recipe above. It’s not your average pie crust and the taste/texture is phenomenal with the filling, they compliemnt eachother really well. When I make it next I might skip the step of separating the eggs to compare the difference in texture. The flavor was just right but cutting it etc it is a little crumbly. I wonder if all the egg separating made it too fluffy for the structure, OR my other idea is to add a small bit of plain cream cheese to give it a bit more glue between the ricotta. (not too much though because the ricotta flavor is mild and its the subtle difference from cream cheese that helps make this recipe stand out)
Yet another fast forward….
April 28th, 2009I will start with January since things can always start anew in January. Nothing really happened in January though as I was too busy preparing for February. In February, I went to Mexico for a week to attend a wedding and catch up with some old friends. It was a fantastic trip, and really enjoyed the food, friends and culture. My first international trip since returning from England! The rest of Feb and March was spent catching up from being gone
April I was out on a research boat doing field work. Again awesome!
Then Mom came to visit for a while and we went to the tulip festival! Quite beautiful.
There were two small hiking trips somewhere along in that mess, and also some new gardeing though no photos of the new garden yet…
That brings us to the present! I would have inserted photos to the post but wordpress/gallery seem to be unhappy tonight. Photos are uploaded and in the Seattle2009 album.
Fall is here
October 8th, 2008And I think summer happened somewhere in between…. I should probably be doing my homework now but I happened to have my computer on and I happened to have some photos from my recent pumpkin adventures. In the last few weeks we’ve been feeling a bit fidgety that Seattle doesn’t have all the New England Fall activities like pick your own apples. This fact is also despite being the apple capitol of the US! To be honest though, that is probably the reason, not as many small family farmers, and more industrial sized apple farms. Anyway we found this great “King County produce finder”! It helped us to find a pick your own apple orchard! We had great fun, they had lots of other “pick your own” produce including green beans, tomatoes, chard, and potatoes! They made you work for your vegetables, the potatoes really had a pitch fork next to a field and you dug them up! This particular farm also had fresh cider donuts, very yummy! Still no unpasteurized apple cider though… I wish folks would realize that “cider” is really just apple juice in comparison to the flavor in unpasteurized cider….
We also recently went to a pumpkin farm! We picked up LOTS of pumpkins, one of which has already turned into a pie!
Pumpkin Man! Carrying our pumpkins, I’ve actually got one more in my hand as I take the picture.
Lauren’s found her pumpkin!
Hurray for pumpkins! It was actually kind of cheating. The “pick your own-ness” of the farm was an over statement. All the pumpkins that were ripe had already been cut from the vine, All you needed to do was pick it up out of the mud. It really should be choose your own pumpkin, but isn’t that what you do when they are in a big pile? Anyway, syntax aside, it was great fun!!
There has been some boat progress, the hull is nearing completion. School is otherwise good, and I really should get back to doing my homework!!!
NPR show on Mortgage crisis
May 10th, 2008This morning on NPR I heard a fantastic show discussing how the Mortgage crisis all got started, as told by the investment bankers who started it. Very interesting and very well done! The link to the program is here, though currently the free full download is not available, it should be tomorrow ish.
I’m working on a take home midterm for now so I’m gonna disappear again, unless of course I need a distraction!
Tomatoes in my bananas?
May 8th, 2008So we have a little banana plan in the office and I tend to throw out the washed out remains of my lunch bowl on to the plant. It’s either the remains of some tea, or water with a bit of potato starch etc all vegetable stuff nothing crazy, I noticed this week that we have 4 mysterious sprouts coming up in the banana plant pot! I think they are tomatoes?? It’s the only thing I could think would be in the wash water of my lunch to create a sprout! I’m pretty excited to see them grow! I’ve also read that it’s best to water tomato seeds with warm water, which I’ve in inadvertently been doing because I boil water and pour it into the lunch bowl to help get the sticky bits off! Anyway, I’m hoping the seeds survive and we have some tomato plants in the office
Also, listening to NPR I came across this very interesting blog. It’s written by a woman in Cuba, about life in Cuba. Here is an article discussing what her blog is about, and about a recent journalism award she won. It sounds very insightful and I’m interested to read her posts.
I’m also excited about the upcoming Folk Festival here in Seattle! I’ve been pretty busy with work the last few weeks and hoping things will be a little more calm by then and I can go enjoy a fun weekend! Anyway, that work-crazyness isn’t over yet! Later!
Boat Un-Progress
April 8th, 2008So my boat is far from complete, but still have hopes of getting more done, especially now the weather is starting to get better! Shivering in the cold to work on the boat was not so great! I’ll post more pictures as progress comes, but this was an interesting link passed to me….