'S' Cookies taste like christmas to me!

Mina on Soumalinen!

I am now a finn citizen and although my attempts to learn language are in fits and starts there are things that i feel i do truly connect with in the mother culture.
I love 'S' Cookies.

My mummu used to make them for me when i was little, and then my mom and i attempted several versions before we finally came to a version that satisfied and was measured in cups and not grams, including one batch of 'z' cookies which were a memorable accident.

I thought i'd share the memory and the recipie here. I took this last batch to work and its the second year in a row, becoming a tradition?!

I think i'll be making a second helping of these for my christmas day feast!

You will need:

150 g butter 1/3 lb...

125 ml sugar 1/2 cup

3 eggs

175 ml sugar (yes, more!) 3/4 cup

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp of baking powder

650 ml flour or 2.5 cups

Cinnamon Coating:

3 tbsp. sugar per 1 tbsp. of cinnamon=cinnamon sugar coating

Whip eggs and sugar. Whip sugar and soft butter. Blend the two. Mix flour, cinnamon and baking powder. Add it to the butter/egg/sugar mixture. Roll some of the dough at a time into half inch thick rod and cut into 4 inch long pieces. Dip pieces into sugar/cinnamon mixture and form them into letter S. Bake at 350 F for 10 to 15 minutes.

Note: Kneading the dough with your hand is encouraged.

are you CRACKERS?! why yes sir, i beleive i will!

I spent today slaving salivating over a hot stove.

On the menu:
Bison Meatballs with Corsican Mint, Miniquiche Muffins,

and most impressively: Whole wheat Crackers!

I made them from the bicycle ground whole wheat flour i bought at the market back in june from the flour peddler at the vancouver wednesday farmers market. Its chunky and too coarse for cakes or cookies and i hardly ever make breads… so i chose it for some seriously nubbley crackers.
Used some flat beer from my refrigerator as the binder in the mix rather than water to give it a little punch.

I’m pretty happy with these although i know that the next time i’m making them with more ‘toppings on them. these are a little plat.

Also, today was the day that i learned to really appreciate the need for twist top wine bottles. How else can you simultaneously drink a bottle of red AND use it as a rolling pin!?

Last night was so GREAT!

I worked the cash at bar B1 at the stadium last night and had THE BEST time!

I was remembering faces, drink orders and helping people out left right and centre, making chitchat and garnering some tips on top of it all.

We shared our tips out so it didn’t turn out to be that much after it was split 6 ways, but heck, last night gave me confidence that i could more than do that at a real bar and be successful.

Mixed drinks be damned. I’ll learn as i go and skip bartending school. maybe i’d barback for a while to get my feet wet, but it would be super cool to do more work in this industry.
I had 5 hours of FUN!

'plotting' continues

i spent much of today (the part i didn’t spend sorting worms from my fresh compost mulch) re-arranging yet again as things have bloomed and spread at their own paces.

I am not sure why somethings are just killing and others are sort of stopped, but i’m trying to pay attention to the rythms of the plants as we go. My cherry Tomatoes are absolutely rocking house. So many flowers, soon i know i will be flush with little balls of sunshine!

Found a new planter on my way home today and i had built one the other day so i was able to spread my pepper plants into the bigger of the two to keep them out of the way of slugs.

I have resolved my slug issues at least with the bigger stemmed plants like squash by cutting the bottoms out of plastic containers and putting them around the stems and a little into the soil. I think because the plastic is a little jaggedy they don’t go up and over, or at least they haven’t yet and its been a few weeks.

I’ve seen some flowers on my biggest squash plant and am hoping the trend continues on the other four!

strawberries are getting busy and i’ve moved them up into the windowboxgarden where they get more consistent sun and they have more area to droop… go everbearing!

my beets now take up a whole 2ft section of the garden and should get lots of sun. its too bad i waited to figure that out until now, but at least i’ll have them in the fall… same with the chard, looking forward to some winter greens!

Pepper plants look well and are shiny green.

The big topsy turvy planter is surprising me by growing up along the outside edge of the ‘planter’ bag.. but it too is flowering now.

i put in a section of carrots today and popped a couple radish seeds in between the cucumber plants to take up the room around those roots as they grow. I don’t love radishes but i can appreciate them for their practicality.

scarlet runners are all flowery so soon there will be beans.
sor of wish i had grown sweet peas instead of wax beans. next year or maybe even edamame?

i replanted my cilantro and dill because they got weird and stringy and never filled in. i have them in a planter where the roots will be more concentrated and where i can keep a better eye on them so they don’t flower out.

i also razed and replanted salad mixes in the box and reclaimed the old strawberry pot for spinach. i would eat spinach all the time i don’t know why i have let that tarry. soon i will.

anyway, i’m content that i am done mucking about for the next few weeks. hopefully my next garden task will be to pick!

-love kiki!

A month later: Happy worms, happy kitchen, happy garden! Happier Kiki!

We are doing so well me and my little wigglers!

I am happy to say that my first compost harvest shows some GREAT signs!

The yield is very woody because there were lots of yardwaste-scraps in there to begin with.
There were lots of flakes of what i suspect were yam skins that had been picked completely clean.I found an avacado pit picked clean too… i would like to imagine that one day a worm will just eat right through it, but those suckers are tough, so i’m going to leave that one out and heck, maybe plant it!
There were some rather big chunks of Carrot that my roommate tossed in, and which i pulled out and chopped so they get broken down a bit more easily by the worms and their helpers

.

My worm bag is home to:

-Millipedes
-Centipedes
-Pill Bugs
-A few ants
-All sizes of wigglers including some new almost translucent baby wigglers (ISNT THAT COOL!!!) and some yellowey young wigglers too.-lots of mites that i can’t see but i know they

are there
-very little moldiness mostly in the mushier fruits and only if you start mucking around in there.. that’s part of the breaking down process!
-almost NO SMELL other than a kind of earthiness. Because of the bedding that covers the scraps, unless you turn it over (which you shouldn’t probably be doing anyway).

Things i have learned so far:

-Worms are my favourite pet! (sorry manny)-I don’t have that many scraps in my kitchen but it smells way better in here anyway because there isn’t much left in the trash that could rot.
-those suckers work FAST!
-The bag tends to dry out even in our humid climate so i water it whenever i need to water the yarden and its been okay.

This is what my wormbag looks like, its on drawer rollers and slides in an out. the bottom is tied and when i harvest it i let it fall out the bottom and then pick out the wormcitas!

Soon i will insulate and put a front on this bin so for the fall/winter, to keep out the cold and rain. Hooray!

There is also room enough that i can add a second bag if we outgrow the size in the fall when i start restocking the soup library and have more than our approximate 1lb of scraps per week.

I’m so glad i finally did this!

Woot Woot Vermiculture!

I received my worms in the mail last week, and made a worm bag a la: Instructables using my friend kims old Polar Fleece sweater. The worms live in a wooden frame with roof that lives just outside my front door, and they are in a pull out drawer so i can easily toss in my scraps once in a while.

I saved some yard waste, leaves, sand and added to that some of my ‘sea soil’ from gardening and topped that off with shredded newspaper bedding.

Its been 3 days since the worms moved in and things seem to be going along swimmingly. They are cool, calm, and collected and next week i’m going to start adding scraps for them once they are used to their house.

This is exciting times and i feel its the beginning of a beautiful friendship!

COMPOST WORMS:
http://compostworms.ca

WORM BAG PLANS:
http://www.instructables.com/id/Worm-bin-bag-for-indoor-vermicomposting-and-easy-s/

Soon i’ll post some pictures, i promise!

May 6th dream

Okay this ones a doozie.

Dream part A:

There is a body.

I beleive its my 'boss' and i'm sure he's just about dead... been hit by a truck in the road and mostly demolished but we (my 'cousin' and I) managed to get him into the van and onto he road.

The safest place to take him is the nearby church but i'm having issues going in there.

He's not making any noises which is more troubling than if he were for absolute certain.

So we go in. (Wow, that's the shortest sentence i've ever written. I'm sure of it.) Priest tries to help us but just moving him into the triage is enough to kill him. Dead.

Dream part B:

Investigation.

My 'father' is called in. And the 'wife' comes too, along with my 'brother'.

Somehow, all of this, the body, the 'boss', the death, the driving a van (for the church) and the priest are all central in my own secret psycho-drama and the priest thinks it necessary to unravel my issues to get down to the core of the crime. (its all about me.. surprise! Its my dream afterall).

My 'family' all go into the rectory and my 'father', priest and I are in the chapel, where it is suitably dark and foreboding (#8?). I end up divulging a secret ring of high calibre pornographic filmmaking taking place within the walls of the church that revolves around the sale of drugs and other black market shenanigans. I of course (being my actual self for a moment of subconsciousness) have nothing to do with the drugs but have a serious shopping addiction which has me in serious debt. the key phrase i recall is 'Buck a Part', which i must only assume means per scene...? (momma needs some new red shoes!)

In any case the 'boss' is an undesirable fellow and it seems the psycho-anlaysis of my explicit part-time work in front of my distraught 'father' in the chapel is punishment enough for (possibly?) running dude down like a distracted deer and turning his insides into stew.

Okay, but here's where it gets weird;

'Father' is super unhooked over the whole thing, and convinced that I too am involved in drugs. 'Cousin' is most certainly implicated and likely with cause, but doesn't especially care unless the police become involved (tough madonna from suddenly susan type) and my 'brother' (who i assume is younger than my 'cousin' and I) has a life threatening "air pressure" problem which entails him carrying around a big squeeze bottle (like anesthesiologists use) that is connected to a direct line to his lungs... and mostly he lets it drag on the ground behind him like a little kids blanket. Sometimes he nearly passes out because his lungs start collapsing. Things in dreams don't have to make sense.

So yeah. 'Father' is pissed, 'Wife' is distraught and confused, 'cousin' is defiant and quiet and brother is mostly untroubled but perhaps less than a top notch student. We're all sitting on the roof of the church listening to our thoughts. Next thing you know a Witch swoops in all broom-like and knocks 'father' out of dispair and into a three story fall. His head is bleeding. We all go down to rescue him but one after the other fall victim to minor injuries in the process... (giant spiral staircase made of computer breadboards) When confirming that 'priest' is on his way and 'father' will be alright i start to notice that fathers blood tastes somewhat delicious. Like gravy. It is gravy!

It seems the witch for whatever reason has seen fit to turn us into a walking buffet, while 'wife' fusses over 'brother's' air pump her hair becomes mashed potatoes, etcetera and well all end up eating big handfulls of one another for dinner. I think I had corn abs.

Please let this dream be my subconscious livin' it up and not a sign of things to come.

People turning into food scares me more than zombies. But not as much as clowns.

Fin.

April 28 dream

Hi there.

so i just woke up from dreaming that i was a member of a team that was orbiting a foreign inhabited planet for observation before first contact.

It was the end of our 3 year shift and i was flying back in our little pod to earth. there was a dog on the station and his owner was super cool and thought about letting him go back with us but he didn't come through the door when it pressure locked.

most of us were sort of ragtag.

we understand the basic science and everyone has a specialty but in general we are just regular folk with a sincere interest in people and most of us were super positive which perhaps was our skill.

there were two other girls around my age on the pod with me back and it seemed like our little crew was pretty tight, we even lived together on earth in a common apartment and part of our pod talk involved who might have condoms left since we had sublet to the other rotation.

I like the visual aspect of this dream it was REALLY involved and i especially like that there were these pad sized 'post cards' (lol spellcheckker just deleted the i infront of pad) that were supposedly technology gleaned from the colony we were observing and they allowed us to make contact to our earthbased families while in faster than light travel… pretty rad no?

Also, have you seen 'moon'. best movie of 2009… in my opinion.

Also Also, don't bother watching Leviathan. Lame-i-thon.

100 things that make me happy Spring 2010:

1. Peanut Butter

2. Sitting on my new Zafu

3. Freshly trimmed ends

4. Tuba Dents that i can actually reach (until i get magnets and then i'm dents unlimited)

5. North American Long Distance Calling

6. Sun Breaks!

7. Coffee, even the gross work kind.

8. The Tyee's arts section

9. Text message invitations

10. People who 'pop by' my work and brighten my day!

11. Wednesday Chats with my coworker

12. My GARDEN!!!

13. Zee, the best roadbike i've ever loved. Free, and she shifts even though the cables nearly cut right through!

14. Mclaughlin group and smoothie sundays

15. Walk/Talks with mom in the afternoon.

16. Bumping into people I know in Vancouver!

17. Pop Radio Thursdays

18. my wallet sized photo of the Harasewich Family.

19. The Brittania Centre & Pool!

20. The Pogues

21. Cheap wine from south of the border.

22. Magazines. Still, yes, i know...

23. Spray Tanner, i think dyeing my skin is still better than dying of skin cancer.

24. Legumes. I hardly eat meat anymore at all... and i'm down with that. Lentils are my fave.

25. Okay, Mole Salami from Salumi in Seattle.. MOST AWESOMENESS

26. Grandville Island Winter Ale.

27. Skype

28. Being friends with my childhood friends parents.

29. Helping people with their bags, holding doors, being kind.

30. High Fives with the print music kids.

31. The mountains! They are my neighbors.

32. Roadtrips to Seattle and Environs to visit my favourite americans!

33. Lardizabol.

34. Cookie Day!

35. When the rain chases me home on my bike and I win!

36. Thinking up new ways to use all my free time

37. Making lists

38. Nesting in my new home city

39. Checking out local bands and co-workers shows.

40. A good americano.

41. Kissin'

42. Football... you know what i mean! And the american kind, mostly the superbowl.

43. My fur earmuffs

44. Bert my workplant

45. Yamaha chrome plated conical dent roller

46. Scifi reads

47. Facebook, and the people it has brought into my life unexpectedly!

48. The luck i have finding just what i need and what i didn't know i needed.

49. my long hair!

50. being an independent woman, with lots of support.

51. Jam it, Pickle it, Cure it! and my project

52. Lapping the old folks in the swim lanes!

53. Playing my brass' (tbone/euphonium/trumpet)

54. Grey's Anatomy nights with girlfriends.

55. Dance Parties with the Maddams Family Gang

56. Seattle! I love that city.

57. Evrott HiJinks!

58. Renting a car for the weekend.

59. Sarah Brett and Jimmy!

60. Getting letters/postcards and emails from loved ones.

61. Popcorn and SoyaSauce

62. Wintersoup Library.

63. The library's selection of dvd's

64. Power Yoga once in a while

65. Blackberry Season

66. Mountain Snowboarding

67. Wes Anderson Movies.

68. Cereal Anarchy

69. My L A B E L M A K E R

70. Red Shoes

71. High Thread count Sheets

72. My rock collection

73. Starfishes! Orange, Gold, Red and Purple!

74. Ballet and modern Dance.

75. My theatre, the cultch!

76. RTC Bakery, You Complete me.

77. Orange Hand Cleaner with Pumice

78. Sleeping in!

79. Biking downhill to work.

80. Camping in the rainforest

81. Moss on EVERYTHING

82. Flip Flops.

83. My fish Manny

84. Singing to myself.

85. Freezing things.

86. RUST

87. Cephelopods, as always. (except humboldt squid, they're bitches)

88. My family. Coolest EVER.

89. Partying during the 2010 olympics, i will NEVER forget it!

90. My Crazy and Crazier Dreamscapes.

91. Babies. They're cool. Because they're people.

92. The Canucks! Inspiring me to actually enjoy hockey.

93. Barack Freaking Obama and the new left realism.

94. My soon-to-be-city bike! (Blight! Short for Blue-Lightning)

95. Slippers.

96. Accents, and boys who have them.

97. Menswear. Good Tailoring. Bowties, Neckties, Cumberbunds, Suit Jackets, Suspenders, Hats, Moustaches and snappy shoes.

98. Romance.

99. The beach, tide pools, tide flats and old men tanning.

100. Sunshine, Glorious, Beautiful Uninhibited Sunshine!

Toaster Tarts are good enough for Jazz!

I like pastries… maybe too much, and i like making them too.. enough that i could happily keep this recipie in circulation and never buy a bakery version again! I know what’s in these at least. :)

They are intended to bear similarity to pop tarts or frozen strudels, and i would say that they are more like the latter.

I used the fruit compote we had left over from a dinner party as the filling but it was a little runny even after i thickened it and simmered it down for an hour or so.. so the goo was leaking out the sides as i was assembling the two halves of pastry, but once they were baked they held tight. I reccomend using your absolutely favouritist jam… My next batch will be filled with apricot&brandy jam.

Indulgence!
Oh yeah, and they keep really well in the freezer and are ready in the minute or two they take to toast, but are crispy and delicious!

SO MANY LEMONS!

My roommate half-arsed the master cleanse.

I love her, but somehow she wasn’t able to sell all 30 on craigslist even for the bargain basement price of 6.75, and she wasn’t willing to cut back on her level of physical activity while cleansing. I totally get it. But its been driving me nuts to see all these lemons sitting on the table getting old. Its sort of heartbreaking.

I had an idea that what i could do is use them to make yellow snow cones to distribute during the downtown spring olympics madness here in vancouver, alas, my plans were much more complicated by the details such as lacking a snow machine.

Anyhoo, there are rather a few recipies in the JPC and i opted to make enough lemonzestvodka to make a double batch of both Limoncello liquor and Limoncrema.

I juiced all the lemons after zesting them and wound up making a lemonade sirop that i’ve frozen for the summer, I froze 6 icecubes worth in the icetray and will try making individual lemonades by adding a cube to a glass of water. its about 4TBSP of sugar to 1.5 cups of lemonjuice and seems to be about the right amount to add to a pitcher of water. :) Hooray for useful.

I will update on the progress of the liquers as they progress, pretty good work for a sunny sunday!

Yogurt Cheese is my new staple food!

So easy and wonderfully rich and light at the same time.

All you gotta do is hang up some yogurt in a piece of clean jersey or a teatowel overnight and you end up with this amazing spreadable wonder. Its better for you and tangier than cream cheese on a bagel.
My current favourite is adding rosemary to it… mmm… rosemary yogurt cheese on a raisin muffin! :)

Jammin' in Vancouver!!!

Kiki:
Hey blog: How do you feel about being re-directed for a while towards my newest obsession?

Blahg:
Sure! I'm game, write all over me!

K:
Cool! Well I finally bought my very own copy of 'Jam it, Pickle it Cure it!' By Karen Solomon and in so doing broke my debt repayment rule of 'NO book's until the debt's gone'... but it was a conditional rule break.

I broke the rule because: I have a plan.

B: -Oh no, not another plan!

K:
Oh yeah, I'm gonna work my way through every recipie in this book, not unlike the whole julie/julia thing... but well... cooler because this book is cooler. To me. Seriously, Curing my own bacon... SO THERE!

B:
Is that sanitary?!

K:
Well wether or not it is, i'm darn well going to do that, and the rest of the recipies/projects in this book and expand my repetoire of things even further because in life, i am the jill of all trades and master of none.. and darn proud of it!

B:
That certainly is true.

K:
Great, so you're on board! Its up to you to record my wins and losses in this particular trail of kitchen related escapades and even when its feeling tough, and as though there isn't any point in making yet another batch of homemade toaster tarts, (less salty this time) there is a magical outcome that doesn't involve a movie deal or a hug from meryl streep... although you know how much i like hugging famous people and discretely clipping a lock of their hair for DNA analysis and later genetic mapping.

B:
Ok, GO! Whats the magical culmination of this forlorn and somewhat pre-emptively self-depricating goal?

K:
I'm going to San Francisco!
Not only has Ms. Solomon Written an awesome book that is so well photographed and typeset i want to lick the pages, she's tucked away her personal secrets and scores in 'The Cheapskates Guide to San Francisco'. Wouldn't you know it, i've never been there as an adult... and i'm broke.

B:
Sounds formidable.. but surprisingly well considered.

K:
Thanks self-talking encouragement voice that i have so far called 'blog' (or Blahg in this printing)!!! Lets Get Cracking!

B:
Indeed!


Note to self:
The next few posts will be backdated to relfect their original entry on the interweb.

GO ME!

My new and deeper dreamscape

It has been a few months now since the change in my body chemistry and i'm now a victim/winner of fantastically vivid dreams.
I have yet to decide how i feel about them, but i'm going to use this blog since i hardly use it for anything anymore as a dreamblog, I will record as i remember these events.

Oh, yes.
I woke up just now 3:48 or so after a dream about being a school mistress (a la jane ayre) and our funding decreased drastically, which meant closure until further notice. At this point many of the teachers i oversaw mostly young women all went out to the playground of my childhood and tried to enjoy each other (non-sexually) for the last time before going home. The atmosphere was of desperation and I apparently also dealing pot on the side took full advantage. I found myself commiserating with two young cooks at same school... brothers and hiding out in back of the cafeteria kitchen hot boxing the storage room. Unfortunately, there was a vent down into an alley and the smoke wafted out and then up into the quarters of two very young south american dudes who were acutely offended and made haste, gun in the hand of the younger one, somehow holstered so as too be kept a distance from the body. I watched horrified half way to escape out of a side door as he panicked, gun against the throat of my comrade, whose brother swept back in after evading the other south american and the two of them pulled the trigger in a struggle. Next the body of my friend although well-stoned slumped further into the box he sat on blood trickling from his fatal wound and the tables turned. His brother managed to wrestle the gun out of its strange forcefield, turn it on the south american who was no more than 16 and use it to push him out the door away from the corpse. I pleaded with him: 'They're brother's too.,Don't be hasty!'

That's pretty much the end.
Woke up shaken, not stirred with a trickle of tears and the feeling of clenched jaw.