Monday, February 22, 2010
Crusade nr 37 - Love letters
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Kitchen woes
Last week, there were many. In fact, everything turned out wrong.
First, the bread. I made the Anadama bread from Reinhart's book and it was un-eatable. I don't know what went wrong. This is a bread with quite a lot of molasses added to the dough and maybe this was the problem. I am not too fond of breads with molasses, so Anadama and Limpa are off my list. That's ok, plenty of other recipes left.
Then, I made a red been stew with tofu. Failure. I modified the recipe, replacing tempeh with tofu, and half of it ended up in the garbage.
So, this week I was on a mission because I did not want a repeat of last week failures. I decided to buy a pizza stone and proceeded to test it.
First test, apple pizza. Bingo! The crust came out very thin and crispy, the sugar caramelized on top, and the apricot jam brushed on top added just enough sweetness to complement the cheese. This recipe is definetely a keeper. I was so hungry that I forgot to take a picture before supper...
Then, I made a lentil soup with dried apricots. For the bread of the week, I made pumpernikel and baked it on the pizza stone. Warning! This bread is not for the faint of heart. I never tasted a rye bread with such a strong taste. So this one too is another keeper.
Then, lentil-walnut burgers. And last but not least, muffin/scones/cookies. When I took them out of the oven, melted chocolate oozed from those "muffcones". I baked them directly on the pizza stone because the dough came out a bit too stiff, that is why I call them muffcones (otherwise known as "genetically engineered" muffins!). They might be ugly, but they are good! I modified the recipe by eliminating the butter and reducing the sugar. I also added more spices, but next time I will add even more cayenne and cardamom.
And to top it off, I found a recipe for a cinamon mocha drink in an old O Magazine...My name is Mona and I am a chocoholic!
First, the bread. I made the Anadama bread from Reinhart's book and it was un-eatable. I don't know what went wrong. This is a bread with quite a lot of molasses added to the dough and maybe this was the problem. I am not too fond of breads with molasses, so Anadama and Limpa are off my list. That's ok, plenty of other recipes left.
Then, I made a red been stew with tofu. Failure. I modified the recipe, replacing tempeh with tofu, and half of it ended up in the garbage.
So, this week I was on a mission because I did not want a repeat of last week failures. I decided to buy a pizza stone and proceeded to test it.
First test, apple pizza. Bingo! The crust came out very thin and crispy, the sugar caramelized on top, and the apricot jam brushed on top added just enough sweetness to complement the cheese. This recipe is definetely a keeper. I was so hungry that I forgot to take a picture before supper...
Then, I made a lentil soup with dried apricots. For the bread of the week, I made pumpernikel and baked it on the pizza stone. Warning! This bread is not for the faint of heart. I never tasted a rye bread with such a strong taste. So this one too is another keeper.
Then, lentil-walnut burgers. And last but not least, muffin/scones/cookies. When I took them out of the oven, melted chocolate oozed from those "muffcones". I baked them directly on the pizza stone because the dough came out a bit too stiff, that is why I call them muffcones (otherwise known as "genetically engineered" muffins!). They might be ugly, but they are good! I modified the recipe by eliminating the butter and reducing the sugar. I also added more spices, but next time I will add even more cayenne and cardamom.
And to top it off, I found a recipe for a cinamon mocha drink in an old O Magazine...My name is Mona and I am a chocoholic!
Monday, February 15, 2010
The state of English language
No, this is not about the deplorable state of language in general, I am afraid that would not be fun. Not for me in any case. Fun are the articles that appear in The Gazette about the quirky things that happen to English language in Montreal.
Here, we close off the lights and rent books from the library. We also have autoroute instead of highway and depanneur instead of convenience store. I live in a four-and-a-half and not a two bedroom condo. No idea where this is coming from and in case you wonder, the half is the bathroom... I think. Kids go to the garderie. People have chalets and not cottages. I wear running shoes and not sneakers or runners.
We like our pizza all-dressed. Some of us at least. This one was news to me a couple of years back. I do not usually ordere all-dressed pizza anyway. I make my own. I lived in Italy, and they do not have all-dressed pizzas. At least, they did not have them then, maybe they do now. They are not fond of the "kitchen sink" approach to topping their pizzas and stick to one or two main toppings besides tomato sauce and cheese. But I digress... Turns out that in other parts of Canada, people order pizza with the works. South of the border, it is pizza with everything on it.
Years back, I worked for few months in Nova Scotia. My team mates were from Toronto. They kept talking about pop, especially at lunch time. Turns out, our fellow Canadians drink pop while we drink soft drinks. South of the border, they drink soda. Funny things indeed ...don't you think?
Here, we close off the lights and rent books from the library. We also have autoroute instead of highway and depanneur instead of convenience store. I live in a four-and-a-half and not a two bedroom condo. No idea where this is coming from and in case you wonder, the half is the bathroom... I think. Kids go to the garderie. People have chalets and not cottages. I wear running shoes and not sneakers or runners.
We like our pizza all-dressed. Some of us at least. This one was news to me a couple of years back. I do not usually ordere all-dressed pizza anyway. I make my own. I lived in Italy, and they do not have all-dressed pizzas. At least, they did not have them then, maybe they do now. They are not fond of the "kitchen sink" approach to topping their pizzas and stick to one or two main toppings besides tomato sauce and cheese. But I digress... Turns out that in other parts of Canada, people order pizza with the works. South of the border, it is pizza with everything on it.
Years back, I worked for few months in Nova Scotia. My team mates were from Toronto. They kept talking about pop, especially at lunch time. Turns out, our fellow Canadians drink pop while we drink soft drinks. South of the border, they drink soda. Funny things indeed ...don't you think?
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Adding color
The second week with Misty - adding color. I discovered the Stabilo pencil. A mighty one if I say so myself! |i used the water soluble graphite pencils before, but the Stabilo has much more pigment. I painted over one of the drawings from the previous week and I decided to try again the underpainting technique that I learned from Jane, with better results this time.
Stabilo and titanium white:
Stabilo and titanium white:
The underpainting:
I seem to be having a problem with the shadows, they are not dark enough. Like I avoid making them too dark becasue then the composition will be off, instead of darkening the shadows and adjusting the middle tones accordingly. Maybe I will work a bit more on this one.
The face of insomnia - I could not sleep once and I decided to draw...
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
New journal page
I also stopped at Camelia Sinensis.I think this is the first tea house that opened in Montreal 12 years ago. I tried to go for oh....eight years maybe. Yeah, that long ...but i am planning to catch up as soon as the weather gets better.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Pencil drawings
After long hesitations, I signed up for a portrait class with Misty. Thas was way back in...January! I decided to be more careful with my money so that I can pay off the mortgage faster and eventually be able to retire and spend more doing things I like. This means that discretionary spendings, such as artsy stuff, were the first casualties. Hmmm ....this plan lasted a whole two weeks!!! In the end I succumbed to the temptation to learn more about face painting. I am not sure why I am so obsessed with portraits but here I am. I've been checking Misty's blog regularly for a while and I like her art. So in the end I figured life is short, nice things are few and far between ...and I signed up.
The first week was about pencil drawing. I did few sketches on found papers - reclaimed postcard envelopes. It worked well, except the blending is not as smooth as it should be. I did not get a chance to make my own tortillons; blending with tortillon instead of blending stick helps achieve a smooth finish. So I am told. I will try ...one of these days.
First week's production:
This is an older sketch that I reworked, I corrected the nose and the mouth and added more shading.
Profiles are definetely the most difficult. I went back and corrected this one, I made the eye a teeny bit bigger and corrected the upper lip under the nose so she does not look so strange anymore. I definetely need to do more profiles. And I used to think that 3/4 faces are difficult ...
The first week was about pencil drawing. I did few sketches on found papers - reclaimed postcard envelopes. It worked well, except the blending is not as smooth as it should be. I did not get a chance to make my own tortillons; blending with tortillon instead of blending stick helps achieve a smooth finish. So I am told. I will try ...one of these days.
First week's production:
This is an older sketch that I reworked, I corrected the nose and the mouth and added more shading.
I used this sketch in week 2 to paint over it with acrylics.
Friday, February 5, 2010
In praise of idleness
Do you believe in coincidences? I am not sure what I believe in these days, but at least I notice when something happens three, four times in a row. I keep bumping into this idea o idleness it seems.
Of course, I grew up with the belief that being idle is bad. I had to "do" something all the time, something productive, usefull like homeworks, study, reading. I am not even sure I know how to be idle, assuming that I could find the time for it. It does not mater what I am doing, part of my brain is doing something else. Discussions are going on non stop in my head and no, I do not have ADHD. I simply do not have enough time to deal with everything that needs to be dealt with. I am sure I am not the only dealing with this predicament.
I recently read Jean d'Ormesson's Qu'ai-je dons fait?. In this nostalginc memoir, he also talks about idleness and creativity. Idleness is letting the dust settle, taking time to observe, think, reflect. Masterpieces came to be because their authors took time to be idle. Proust comes to mind, his idleness forced on him by his asthma. He spent years secluded in a cork-lined bedroom, writing A la recherche du temps perdu. For Thoreau, it was a different kind of idleness, the one made possible by a life in close communion with nature. Leonardo filled his notebooks with the results of his observations because he took the time to observer. The list could go on. Of course this is not to say that one has to be sick or live a secluded life to be creative. It merely means that the creative act cannot occur when one cannot take time to notice. Nowadays, only the lucky ones seem to have this luxury.
Then, I found this post talking about ... idleness and Bertrand Russell's essay In praise of idleness. And this makes it two.
In an article in Harper's Magazine, the author talked about how America outsourced thinking. How true. Thinking is in short supply these days indeed. No time, we are too busy dancing our fingers on remote controls, ipods, ipads, cellphones, kepboards ...not to mention that nobody tought us how to think. Those who do not think are easier to control because they will think whatever the few want them to think.
And finally the fourth praise of idleness came from another issue of Harper's, from an article about Warren Buffett. The richest man in the world has an office on the 14th floor of a grey building in Omaha where every day he reads reports and thinks. The office is not an example of state-of-the-art-technology, au contraire. But its server the purpose of allowing its owner to do what he does best and that is produce ideas.
How could it be otherwise? How can one think when beig subjected to constant noise, voices, bips, flashes, rings, images, numbers ...The answer is simple: one does not.
I see this chain of events as a concidence; some would argue that it is the Universe trying to tell me something, except that I am not strong in the faith department. And in any case, there is not much I can do about it until I retire or, if I am lucky, until I can leave the rat race behind ...for now, I just notice it. Going back to my long list of non-thought provoking activities.
Of course, I grew up with the belief that being idle is bad. I had to "do" something all the time, something productive, usefull like homeworks, study, reading. I am not even sure I know how to be idle, assuming that I could find the time for it. It does not mater what I am doing, part of my brain is doing something else. Discussions are going on non stop in my head and no, I do not have ADHD. I simply do not have enough time to deal with everything that needs to be dealt with. I am sure I am not the only dealing with this predicament.
I recently read Jean d'Ormesson's Qu'ai-je dons fait?. In this nostalginc memoir, he also talks about idleness and creativity. Idleness is letting the dust settle, taking time to observe, think, reflect. Masterpieces came to be because their authors took time to be idle. Proust comes to mind, his idleness forced on him by his asthma. He spent years secluded in a cork-lined bedroom, writing A la recherche du temps perdu. For Thoreau, it was a different kind of idleness, the one made possible by a life in close communion with nature. Leonardo filled his notebooks with the results of his observations because he took the time to observer. The list could go on. Of course this is not to say that one has to be sick or live a secluded life to be creative. It merely means that the creative act cannot occur when one cannot take time to notice. Nowadays, only the lucky ones seem to have this luxury.
Then, I found this post talking about ... idleness and Bertrand Russell's essay In praise of idleness. And this makes it two.
In an article in Harper's Magazine, the author talked about how America outsourced thinking. How true. Thinking is in short supply these days indeed. No time, we are too busy dancing our fingers on remote controls, ipods, ipads, cellphones, kepboards ...not to mention that nobody tought us how to think. Those who do not think are easier to control because they will think whatever the few want them to think.
And finally the fourth praise of idleness came from another issue of Harper's, from an article about Warren Buffett. The richest man in the world has an office on the 14th floor of a grey building in Omaha where every day he reads reports and thinks. The office is not an example of state-of-the-art-technology, au contraire. But its server the purpose of allowing its owner to do what he does best and that is produce ideas.
How could it be otherwise? How can one think when beig subjected to constant noise, voices, bips, flashes, rings, images, numbers ...The answer is simple: one does not.
I see this chain of events as a concidence; some would argue that it is the Universe trying to tell me something, except that I am not strong in the faith department. And in any case, there is not much I can do about it until I retire or, if I am lucky, until I can leave the rat race behind ...for now, I just notice it. Going back to my long list of non-thought provoking activities.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Flavor of the week
This time around, I baked Vienna Bread with Dutch topping.
The icing is in fact a paste made of rice flour, yeast, a bit of sugar, salt and oil. This bread is supposed to be very good toasted. I tried it fresh from the oven and it was excellent. I am not sure about the toast as I do not have a toaster. I find it amazing that we can come up with so many different using only flour, water and yeast. And a bit of patience, since these breads require long, slow fermentations. I do not mind, all I have to do is put the dough in the fridge overnight and take it out the next morning. Almost always when I make bread, a commercial comes to mind. It is for some kind of frozen bread (frozen bread ... yuccc) and it shows bakers busy in the kitchen making the dough and baking the bread in the wood burning stove. And then a woman comes up in a storm complaining that she cannot spend three hours baking bread because she has yoga and this and that. She looks like she overdosed on caffeine. Of course, the conclusion is "thank goodness for frozen bread". Yeah, sure ....I wish I knew what kind of bread is she making that takes three hours, but that is a whole other story. Me, I am sold. I have my own home bakery now :)
Monday, February 1, 2010
Where did January go ...
... no idea, I am afraid. I only have 2 journal spreads for this month.
When I started this spread, I had something else in mind, but it took me so long to finish that I forgot. On the left page I glued this quote by Oswald Spengler:
This is our purpose: to make as meaningful as possible this life that has been bestowed upon us; to live in such a way that we may be proud of ourselves; to act in such a way that some part of us lives on.
Up until few years back, I was so much into all this purpose gibberish that I ended up investing lots of time and effort in things that turned out to be nuisances at best. Instead, I should have invested my energies to simplify my life and organize my finances so that I can take early retirement. I don't think a day goes by when I do not regret it.
Here I used all the candy wrappers from the Celebration bottle. It does not even look like a lot of chocolate, does it?After all, I did not even have enough to cover both pages. That is a photo from when I was maybe 3 years old. I was allergic to chocolate and strawberries back then. Maybe this is why I eat so much chocolate now, to make up for those years when I could not?!?!
Now, full speed ahead in February. Only -25 today and a gorgeous, sunny day.
This is our purpose: to make as meaningful as possible this life that has been bestowed upon us; to live in such a way that we may be proud of ourselves; to act in such a way that some part of us lives on.
Up until few years back, I was so much into all this purpose gibberish that I ended up investing lots of time and effort in things that turned out to be nuisances at best. Instead, I should have invested my energies to simplify my life and organize my finances so that I can take early retirement. I don't think a day goes by when I do not regret it.
Here I used all the candy wrappers from the Celebration bottle. It does not even look like a lot of chocolate, does it?After all, I did not even have enough to cover both pages. That is a photo from when I was maybe 3 years old. I was allergic to chocolate and strawberries back then. Maybe this is why I eat so much chocolate now, to make up for those years when I could not?!?!
Now, full speed ahead in February. Only -25 today and a gorgeous, sunny day.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)