Needlefelting Class

I taught another needle felting class. The yarn shop, Recycled Lamb, the class is at has moved to a beautiful new building with an actual class room with great views and shoppers can come and see what we're doing and get inspired. A great atmosphere! I'm liking doing just a full day rather than the typical 4 evenings once a week. I took some pictures of some of the finished works.

Tomato Aspic ... Grandma's?

I'm researching ways to use gelatin. When first married I made some jellos using gelatin and fruit juices. I even did a coffee one. But now I'm looking for veggie ideas ... and others ... Anyone got ideas?

Tomato Aspic

I had a quart of V-8 style tomato juice from the health food store and wanted to use that. I'm using a quality gelatin. Many recipe I found used lemon jello. I don't want to use jello - totally unnatural and full of sugar. Here's what I settled on ... a good thing!

TOMATO ASPIC

2 envelopes unflavored gelatin (my container says 1 Tb to gel 1 C liquid, so I used 4 Tb, I'm wondering if I can use a bit less)
4 C V-8 Juice
1/2 C lemon juice
1 Tb parsley (fresh or dried)
1 tsp sugar (I used sucanat)
pinch of dill weed
1/2 tsp celery seed
dash of cayenne pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 tsp worcestershire sauce (Annie's from health food store since I've not made my own yet. And since hers does not have anchovies in it, which is a must for worcestershire sauce, I added 1/2 tsp fish sauce.)

Dissolve the gelatine in 1 cup of the juice. Heat the rest and simmer about 10 minutes. Add the gelatin mixture and stir well. You can pour this into a greased mold, and chill about 8 hours. But you can also add veggies to the mold too.

This time I cut up fine -
about 1 C celery
1 poblano chili
a bunch of chives from my garden (1/4-1/2 C)
1 mashed avocado

Other options could be adding in olives, or artichoke hearts, or shrimp ...

We had dinner guests and they liked it. One man said (for two dishes I served - the other being roasted brussel sprouts) that he's not had this since his Grandma made it!



This post has been linked to Simple Lives Thursday, Food Renegade, The Healthy Home Economist, The Prairie Homestead, Real Food Wednesday, Little Farm in the Big City, Friday Food Flicks, Beyond the Peel.

Soft-Boiled-Eggs, Rosemaling, and Chicks

Rosemaled Egg Cup

Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Where do I start this post? From chicks to eggs to rosemaling? I'll start with "I love eggs".

My 10 girls

We had chickens for almost thirty years. When Heather married we got rid of our chickens, as she was my one child who loved chicken chores. I have missed the chickens. I miss fresh eggs. We are building a new coop closer to the house. I will be the one doing chicken chores. I currently have 10 chicks in my dining room. Every morning I sing my "Good morning, good morning ..." song to them and say, "Good morning girls". I want them to get to know me, get to know my voice.

Danish boiled egg holders - egg top snipper

Years ago a Danish friend gave me egg cups for soft boiled eggs and taught me how to prepare them and eat them. I love a 'sunny-side-up' egg with great toast, but I'm cutting down on my bread consumption, so have returned to regularly eating a soft boiled egg.



I have an egg piercer. I pierce the large end, cover the eggs with
tap water, sprinkle in some salt, and bring to a gentle boil. In my
Hearth & Home I tell you there is a science to cooking eggs. Call it
the culinary alchemy of eggs. I always like to know the whys and know
my ingredients. In heating eggs in shells, a race begins between the
buildup of pressure within the egg and its release of air oozing out the
end. If the air pocket is heated faster than the air can escape, the
shell cracks. Some eggs have larger pores, some have harder shells, so
not all crack. Thus the hole poke. I could go on and on with the science, like why the salt too ...

Egg timer

I also have an egg 'timer' that works for me, in that I know when the dark purple line is at the half-way mark to 'soft' I remove my egg and crimp off the top. If it looks a little underdone, I'll set the top back on and let it sit a bit, otherwise I eat it immediately, with some fresh ground sea salt and pepper, with my little spoon.

I looked in Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions book for a time - she suggests 3 1/2 minutes, but does not say whether the egg should be room temp or from the fridge. Since I don't have my own eggs yet, but buying pastured eggs (otherwise you should use organic), mine are coming from the fridge to soft-cook.

Why look in Sally's book? My daughter-in-love was just here and little S's first food is an almost raw egg yolk. I cooked her egg like I do mine with my timer and Sarah said it was just perfect. Little S was quite colicky until Sarah started making the raw milk baby formula in Sally Fallon's book - like night to day difference!

Monte's mom used to do Rosemaling like the egg cup I started the post with. Since she no longer can do it, I treasure the pieces we have of hers. I'll end this post with pictures of her rosemaling.

Rosemal over Keeping Room couch

Rosemal over our bed

Rosemal hanging in our entry's stairway

Posted at The Homestead Barn Hop, Little Farm in the Big City, Simple Lives Thursday, Food Renegade, Frugally Sustainable, Real Food Wednesday,

Marilyn Monroe's Take on Staying in Shape

I couldn't pass on sharing this - look at what she eats!