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Tonight we had a veggie lasagna with white sauce and a green salad.

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For dinner tonight I tried a "sheet-pan" meal of sliced Kielbasa with bite sized chunks of potatoes, onions, and peppers, with a green salad. It was excellent. My kitchen is a mess -- the sink is clogged, which happens once every 4 years due to the design of the pipes in the basement going to the septic system. Of course, I had every baking pan and cookie sheet and most of the cooking utensils in the house dirty about the time I discovered it. I'm doing a lot of holiday baking for a family gathering on Sunday. I can use the bathroom sink, but only as much as absolutely needed. Looking at the rosy side of things, with no baking/cooking to be done, I'll have plenty of time to do the other household chores that I avoid!

[chocomouse]

Dinner was venison steaks, leftover mushroom risotto, and butternut squash.

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Today I made the traditional rum cake for my husband's group Christmas party tomorrow night. It's a simple recipe -- using a yellow cake mix, a package of instant vanilla pudding, eggs, oil, and a lot of rum! Plus a glaze made of rum, sugar, and butter that is delicious.

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We are Ellen's Halfpint Farm, in the Main Exhibition Hall. We just got a letter yesterday saying our booth space has changed (for the better!) next year. We will be in A12, which is about across the aisle from B13 which we have had for years. My sister Ellen hand paints fibers and yarns. I look forward to meeting you next spring!

[chocomouse]

Yes we do go to the Maryland Sheep and Wool, the first full weekend in May. We've been doing that show for years, maybe 30 years. It's huge, so festive with people, animals, music, food, and a farmers' market as well as everything related for sheep and fibers. We love it! Do you go to it, and are you a knitter?

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Corn chowder and dinner rolls, both from the freezer.

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The Artisan Fair was fun, educational, and interesting! It was very small, and I was just one of three food vendors (on sold jams and jellies, and another sold just cookies) so my baked goods sold pretty well, for a market that was mostly Christmas gift items, with some gorgeous pottery, jewelry, cutting boards and other woodcrafts, wooden bowls, photography - some very expensive items, and in a wealthy town. My husband's maple syrup, especially the bourbon barrel aged syrup sold really well, and was a great conversation starter. But preparing for the event was a ton of work (and I am well aware of the work of the show itself, as I do sheep and wool festivals, knitting/crochet conventions, etc. all year round all over the US, with my sister who hand-paints wool fibers, cloth, and yarn). I plan to do the same event again next year, and it will be easier - I will have my packaging issues worked out, and have recipes to hand out ready, ingredient labels, etc. The process is more difficult because it is the holiday season with lots of prep, and I made the huge mistake of going away the previous week for some fun time, but that required some recovery! I had thought about doing a local weekly farmers' market when I retired, just to give me something to do, but now know that I will not do that. I love to bake, but not "production" baking. I do miss the baking I used to do for my co-workers and am looking for events to share my goodies with once in a while. I've located a community elder coffee klatch that I now plan to bring goodies to. But I think once a month or so will be enough! Does anyone else here do this type of thing on a regular basis?

[chocomouse]

That's going to be interesting to work in a different kitchen Baker Aunt. Is it a better space than the kitchen to be renovated? I sure hope everything goes smoothly for you.

I baked two loaves of rye bread today, and I sliced some of the frozen cookie dough logs into cookies that baked while the rye dough was rising. The cookies were an orange, made with plain vanilla dough with chopped candied orange peel that I made a while back, and the other was the same but with chopped dark chocolate added to it. Both are delicious. These are two of the doughs I will use for my Christmas cookie platters.

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Dinner here was salmon on the grill (with the outdoor temp at 17* and going down), with mushroom risotto and broccoli from the freezer.

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We had salads tonight - a simple pasta salad with orechiette, celery, onions, bell peppers; a seafood salad, and a chicken - grape salad, with fresh garlic knots. An interesting menu change-up when the temp is 26* and going down.

[chocomouse]

I've spent quite a bit of time baking today. Saturday I'm vending at an Artisan Fair, for a local charity group. My husband is going to sell his maple syrup, so I decided to sell maple baked goods. It's my first time vending my foods, so there is a lot of work in addition to the baking. I've made Vermont Maple Oatmeal Bread (a KAF recipe) which is the only yeasted product I'll have. I also made Maple Coconut Cookies, Maple Pecan Scones, Maple Oatmeal Cranberry mini loaves and muffins, Maple Walnut and Fig Bread (from Sift magazine). Tomorrow I'll make Maple Bacon Shortbread and Maple Cornbread mini loaves. I'm also giving out copies of some of my recipes. Next year, assuming I choose to do this again, I'll add things such as Maple Vinaigrette, Maple Cinnamon Buns, cheesecake, etc. I'm enjoying the challenge of doing something different. Of course, my husband is hoping none of my goodies will sell, and therefore will go straight into the freezer!

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Tonight we had chicken thighs with Penzey's Greek seasoning, bite-size chunks of butternut squash and potato roasted in the oven, and a green salad.

Baker Aunt, we love that Greek seasoning too, and I should try it on salmon. We usually have our salmon plain, but sometimes drizzle it with maple syrup.

[chocomouse]

I'm back from a long weekend in Maine for a girls' getaway! We shopped and took a class at Stonewall Kitchen's cooking school. It was a seafood dinner: three appetizers, shrimp, salmon, and lobster; pan-seared scallops and mushroom risotto and asparagus; and a chocolate tart. The food was excellent, although the guest instructor lacked teaching skills so it was difficult to follow. I'm doing a Bake for Good class at KAF on the 19th, which is a free class. They give you the ingredients, tools and instruction for making a pie; you make the crust, with their supervision and help, and then they fill and bake it and give it to a local non-profit that helps the homeless, runs a food shelf, etc. They have similar classes for cinnamon buns and sugar cookies. And, I'm enrolled in their English muffin class in January - my muffins taste good, but look awful and are not holey enough. I'm eager to be back in my kitchen!

[chocomouse]

I've used salt and a scrubber-type sponge, but I've never had a badly rusted pan to clean. I rarely re-oil my pans, either, and I have one I got new over 50 years ago. I do have a funny looking pan, never seen another one like it, that has some kind of a thick, gooey substance on it that I have not been able to get rid of, although I did manage to clean off a couple small spots of rust. There's a "new cast iron cooking" group on Facebook that you might look at; they have lots of suggestions for cleaning and also for cooking (though not the healthiest food to eat!!). My favorite cast iron pieces are the bread pans and the huge round pizza pan - I use them all the time.

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