Snow to Beach in 1.5 hrs

In hopes of keeping you up-to-date with Lily (not just food!), some of our latest endeavors encompass water (or as Lily says "agua") in its various forms. Yes, Santa Barbara has had some good amount of rain this year. Apparently it has been all over the news, but for a NW gal, it feels pretty normal :) Lily and I have been enjoying playing in the rain, especially checking out the creek that is only 4 blocks from our house at the nearby park. She loves to poke sticks at the rushing water, throw in an unsuspecting leaf, and climb on the nearby rocks. We both just put on our hoods and enjoy the rain and the rushing water, 2 natural resources not usually touted by Southern California.

Due to all of this rain, our backcountry has been receiving a good dusting of snow. Thanks to a suggestion by Jason, we capitalized on this one day, so Lily could see and touch her first snow! We tried to teach her to throw snowballs, and it seems that she only wanted to do so at our friends' dog:

We also enjoyed a visit from my (Heather's) mom for her birthday in February, as well as her sister, Nicole, and niece, Grace. Lily adored Grace and wanted to copy her with most things. Here the girls are on the beach together:

Here we are with Nicole and Grace in front of a our favorite beach pancake spot.

Happy Spring!

A delicious breakfast treat

One of our guilty (or not-so-guilty) pleasures is a stroll to our favorite French patisserie, 1/2 mile from our house, to snatch up one of the buttery, flaky treasures. Yes, we are talking melt-in-your-mouth almond croissants (the best ever, maybe even in Paris!), pain au chocolate, plain 'ol butter croissants with homemade jam, and various brioche rolls. The pastry chef also creates the most beautiful little confections that look almost too perfect too eat. However, it is easy to quickly change one's mind after taking a bite of these little treats. Even Lily has started a sophisticated croissant palate at such a young age :) Let's suffice it to say that Renaud is an absolute French genius! Croissants and other complicated French treats are just one of those food delicacies that I am willing to not try to make, but rather enjoy the fruits of another's labor!

When I came upon this month's Daring Baker's challenge, I was pleasantly surprised to enjoy this breakfast bread, as if I was sitting on the patio of Renaud's Patisserie. This, I decided, is the closest I get to such French pastry deliciousness. For surprisingly much less work than that of a typical french pastry, this treat tasted much like a lightly sweetened brioche filled with yummy things :)

The March 2011 Daring Baker's Challenge was hosted by Ria of Ria's Collection and Jamie of Life's a Feast. Ria and Jamie challenged The Daring Bakers to bake a yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake.

After making the "brioche" dough and allowing it to rise, the dough is rolled out into a rectangle and spread with a vanilla meringue. I chose to top it with an orange sugar I made using orange zest and organic sugar, dark chocolate, and toasted slivered almonds.

Then, you gently roll the dough up and shape it into a wreath, snipping around the wreath to expose the hidden treasures.

After a 2nd rise, the dough gets brushed with an egg wash and placed in the oven. The inside yumminess peeks out through the slits in the dough and the whole round becomes beautifully golden.

Finally, the bread gets a nice dusting of powdered sugar.

And, voila! A light, buttery dough hugging melted chocolate, scented with orange and crunchy almonds awaits!

Oh, and this recipe is both adult and kid-tested and approved!

Sweet and Creamy for Valentines

This Valentine's Day we were treated to an evening with friends, celebrating marriage, and being reminded of who we fell in love with when we married each other in the first place! It is such a special evening every year that we would never want to miss out.

The past couple of years, I have had the privilege of preparing a simple, but elegant meal for the group to enjoy. This year we enjoyed fresh farmer's market produce, including the salad that starred (my favorite) Shepherd's Farms mixed greens, as well as Root's Farms beets, avocados and (store-bought) goat cheese, all tossed with a balsamic vinaigrette. For the entree, we had a light, but filling manicotti with homemade pasta and a homemade ricotta filling with fresh farmer's market asparagus and garlic scallions. Finally, for dessert...we had a large group, so I served up Ina Garten's Mocha Icebox cake that layers a mocha whipped cream/mascarpone with chocolate chip cookies. The second dessert was my Daring Baker's challenge:

The February 2011 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Mallory from A Sofa in the Kitchen. She chose to challenge everyone to make Panna Cotta from a Giada De Laurentiis recipe and Nestle Florentine Cookies.

For Valentine's Day, I decided to do the classic paring of chocolate and raspberries...how can you go wrong? The panna cotta was delicately layered with raspberry puree and topped with chocolate ganache and fresh raspberries. Instead of using the Nestle recipe, I decided to go with another Giada inspired recipe for the florentines that features slivered almonds with orange zest and was then dipped in chocolate.

It was fairly simple and highly recommended. Panna cotta is delicious on its own without layering the flavors, as I did. It could be enjoyed with a simple topping of fruit and a drizzle of honey or a berry coulis or whatever sounds delicious to you! Here is the recipe if you are interested.

Frohe Weihnachten...Merry Christmas!

The 2010 December Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Penny of Sweet Sadie's Baking. She chose to challenge Daring Bakers to make Stollen. She adapted a friend's family recipe and combined it with information from friends, techniques from Peter Reinhart's book...and Martha Stewart's demonstration.

I have to admit that over Christmas even a sweet lover may be overwhelmed by the overdose of sugary goodness. While Stollen is a sweet bread and even dusted with a generous amount of powdered sugar, it is pleasantly not overly sweet. The enjoyable bits of homemade candied zest of meyer lemons and backyard oranges, along with slightly plumped dried cranberries and

lightly toasted almonds added the right balance of sweetness and saltiness.

After several hours of rising/proofing, the fragrant dough is rolled out and rolled up...

With inspiration from Martha Stewart, it is then curled into a circle to make a festive wreath. After baking, the Stollen gets a basting of butter and a generous sifting of powdered sugar. It then looks something like this.

If you can hold yourself back from digging right in, it can then rest on the counter overnight to dry out a little and concentrate the flavors, just like the Germans do. Then on the next morning, cut yourself a little slice and have it with a cup of tea or coffee for a nice treat :)

If you have enough for leftovers the next morning, then you can toast it and spread a little butter for another delicious treat.

Surprisingly this recipe was not too difficult, but simply requires a little planning in advance, as it does take some overnight rising as well as another day of waiting after it is baked. However, take note that it does also freeze well, so you can make it when you have time and then take it out of the freezer when you need it! Here is the recipe for you to enjoy.

Merry Christmas!

It's all about the crust

The 2010 November Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Simona of briciole. She chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ to make pasta frolla for a crostata. She used her own experience as a source, as well as information from Pellegrino Artusi’s Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well.

I made a simple rustic tart with blueberry preserves and persimmons. But because of my love for tarts, I also made a lemon curd tart, using a recipe from Julia Childs for the curd (that was delicious). Just the right balance of tartness to sweetness.

Comfort Food

Come on, admit it...no matter how health conscious you may be, isn't it hard to pass up a good donut? I'm not necessarily talking about Dunkin' Donuts here, however some may be fans of that establishment. I'm talking about those mom 'n pop shops with the homemade-tasting deliciousness...that crisp outside with a light and airy inside, with just the right amount of sugary glaze on the outside. Mmm...

Well, lucky for us, the October 2010 Daring Bakers challenge was hosted by Lori of Butter Me Up. Lori chose to challenge DBers to make doughnuts. She used several sources for her recipes including Alton Brown, Nancy Silverton, Kate Newmann and Epicurious.

I have always (secretly) wanted to make donuts, but never had an excuse to do so...until now! The DB challenge allowed me to choose from 4 different types of donuts: yeast donuts, buttermilk cake donuts, pumpkin cake donuts, and bombolini (Italian-style, jam-filled donuts). And, since I was breaking out the industrial-size container of canola oil, I figured I might as well make as many different varieties as I could. Alas, the only one I did not make was the bombolini. Guess that will have to be another day...

Making donuts is actually not too difficult, as it may seem. First off, make your dough, roll it out, and cut out your shapes, just like making biscuits - with a hole in the middle:

Next, throw it in the fryer at about 365F:

Then, drain them on paper towls, and either roll in cinnamon-sugar...

or top with a delicious glaze, such as this blueberry glaze:

The above donuts were the buttermilk cake donuts that were quite tasty. The blueberry glaze was the clear favorite. However, Lily didn't seem to mind the cinnamon-sugar donut holes :)

For the next experiment, I made yeast donuts that I glazed with a bowl-licking chocolate glaze and pumpkin cake donuts with a simple sugar glaze (the donut holes got the cinnamon-sugar treatment):

I also made some blueberry-glazed yeast donuts and some sugar-glazed donut holes.

All in all, I had a very happy husband and some happy friends, who gladly helped me to eat up this little DB challenge. The favorites of the lot were the chocolate-glazed donuts, the blueberry-glazed buttermilk cake donuts, and my favorite was the pumpkin cake donut. Ahh...choices!

If you feel up for a little homemade treat, I recommend the recipes we used for the donuts. Check it out at: http://thedaringkitchen.com/sites/default/files/u11/48_Doughnuts_-_DB_Oct_2010.pdf.

As for the glazes:

1. The blueberry glaze consisted of confectioner's sugar, organic blueberry preserves, and enough heavy cream to make a thick glaze.

2. The chocolate glaze came from Alton Brown: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/chocolate-doughnut-glaze-recipe/index.html

Work (and play) around the house

Recently, in a small group we joined, our "ice breaker" was to have everyone go around and tell the group the details of their day. It ended up being really interesting to understand how each person spends their day and what it is that they do in a given day at work.

Well, I figured it might be interesting to take a look at how our dear Lily spends her time! You see, Lily at the ripe age of (almost) 16 months old, is running, climbing, operating electronics, and loves spending time outdoors digging in the dirt and "gardening." We feel that the activity level has amped up significantly in the past couple of months. As Jason has said, it's a good thing she loves books, because that is the most sedentary thing that she does - Lily goes to the bookshelf, pulls off a book, plops down in her bean bag and flips through a good picture book!

So, back to Lily's day! Lily usually wakes up and hollers down the hallway, "da da...ma ma...da da...ma ma" until one of us goes to get her from her crib. After she has some milk, we (try to) snuggle in bed before heading to the kitchen for breakfast...usually consisting of banana, plain yogurt, toast, and maybe some scrambled egg. When she is finished, she says "da done" and signs "all done" simultaneously. After that, she is off and running. I have included some pictures of some of the things that she enjoys doing with her free time:

Lately, she can't get enough of playing the piano.

It's hard to keep her seated, as she much prefers to stand up and tickle the ivories:

She also loves to play with a toy drum that plays music. Here she has set up shop on a console table, where she has scooted a stereo speaker back just enough to fit her little bottom:

Next, is not what we see in a typical day, but this is a good example of what happens when mommy is not watching Lily and the gate was not up to block off the office...Lily has confiscated the computer and is opening all kinds of windows I wouldn't begin to know how to open. However, I like to think she is just advanced for her age and sending out emails :)

Lastly, a day wouldn't be complete without hours of time in the backyard, kicking balls, digging in the dirt, and watering the plants. I can't tell you how much this girl loves to be outside. Here she is watering the mint (repeatedly) and then signs "more" while saying "ma" so that I will refill her tiny watering can.

Lily eats lunch around noon and then heads off for a 2 hour nap at 1p.m. When she wakes up, it's off to play "hide the monkey" (her monkey is one of her favorite stuffed animals), or chase Lily around with the threat of a tickle. At around 6, Lily has dinner and is off to bed by 7:30 (after a bath and a story, of course!).

As I am sure you guessed, there are many variations on her day, including out of the house activities :) However, this gives you a little snapshot into a day in the life of Liliana Grace! Hope you enjoyed a glimpse of our little active girl!