What I Really Think

No videos so far though.

Maria, requested and we aim to please here at the home of the robins. First off, they're getting very big, and soon will be forced from the nest, to live on the ground, where they will practice using their wings and learning to fly. Their father will stay with them there while their mother will lay the next set of eggs in the nest. We're a little nervous about this stage as we have lawn care, so are keeping a close eye, so we can put up some sort of temporary fence/warning signs to keep the lawn service from mowing the lawn in that area.

Here's a shot of them, hanging in the nest - can you see the wings? How about the open eyes?

Here's a shot of mom feeding the "teenagers." Sometimes she gives them entire worms. They're big enough now so we can actually watch from our family room window which is just a few feet from the tree. She doesn't seem to mind.

One more quick shot of those fecal sacks. The mother and father (yes, he's an active participant), pick up the sacks and drop them around the neighborhood. The father seems to prefer my neighbor's driveway. :)

Okay, okay - I know I'm two weeks behind. I still haven't even done the bread sticks from week three but today, I finally got to the Grappa Soaked Sponge Cakes from week 4. Now, like so many of my fellow Sunday Slow Bakers, I did not have mini-bundt pans and though my intention all week had been to hit Bed Bath and Beyond to see if I could get some there, I never did. So like others, I improvised using a small bundt pan for half the batter and my large muffin tin (6) for the other half. Also, I don't have grappa, and at this point in my life, I don't feel like buying any. I'm not a grappa drinker. Normally, when a recipe calls for grappa, I sub brandy but after reading Palma's blog, I decided to go with limoncello instead (it was a toss up between limoncello and Disarono but more members of my family prefer lemon flavor, so the limoncello won).

The cake is pretty easy to put together though with a few distinct steps (e.g., making the glaze, dry ingredients, wet ingredients, separate eggs - oh and I always wonder, should I have sifted the cake flour and then measured or measured then sifted?). Also I feared I may have deflated my egg whites some when I incorporated them into the batter but everything seemed to rise just fine. Baking time was exactly 25 minutes, and while I enjoyed brushing the limoncello glaze on at the end, I realized I need new pastry brushes, as little bristles got left behind here and there.

Here are some shots, sorry no decoration with them and my results weren't nearly as pretty as my fellow bakers. Oh and I didn't do such a hot job of greasing the bundt pan (all those nooks and crannies), so the cake came out in two pieces leaving a bit behind in the pan.

I've been following along with the PhotoHunters for a few weeks now but hesitated jumping in. Though Maria thought I should this week. I feel a little bit like cheating since I had posted this picture earlier, but it is a good shot, and since this week's theme is our choice, I wanted to highlight this photo by my daughter of a robin's nest in the weeping cherry in front of our house.

Yesterday, we did the tour of New Jersey's nursing homes. Starting in West Orange to visit my 95 year-old grandmother, and unfortunately (unfortunately because she's in a home), ending in Piscataway to visit Chris's way too young mom.

On the bright side though, we celebrated grandma's birthday (a few weeks late), with an ice cream cake. So I thought it would be good to post a picture of all of us, four generations of Lapiroff women (Lapiroff is grandma's maiden name).

Jerry picked Biscotti di Limone e Semolino for this week's challenge Sunday Slow Baker's Challenge, initiated by Krista. I'm cheating this week, since I made them before, when I first got the book, Dolce Italiano, you can check out my previous entry: Lemony Semolina Cookies.

Well, yesterday, our little friends were busy standing in the nest, testing their wings, hopping just outside the nest on nearby branches.

Yesterday's Shots

Then last night, while Becky was upstairs and I was out, one of our little babies flew the coop (or nest in this case).

So, here we were yesterday, me at home, Becky and Sammi at school, feeling sad all day. I kept checking the nest, only to remember, our little babies were gone. Then we went for a walk, and got really upset when we saw a dead baby bird on the ground. There was a nest above us, and it didn't have its feathers yet; it must have been blown from the nest during Monday's storm.

Afterwards we came home, Beck and I were chillin' on the couch, watching TV when she let out a scream. The father and one of the babies were back! They were prancing around on our front lawn, the father, looking for worms, and the baby following close behind. Sometimes the father would feed the baby, and sometimes it looked like she was trying to find the worms herself. Becky grabbed her camera and took another couple dozen shots.

So this week I got to choose what our Sunday Slow Bakers made. I wanted something slightly challenging, different, and with produce I knew I could easily find this time of year. I would have chosen the zucchini cake but I was hoping to do it this summer (with the glut of zucchini I get from the farm - though now I think it's what we're making next week, but I need to check). Gelato was another definite possibility, but we're supposed to be baking, so I ignored those too. There was also an apple tart - but again, to me, a fall dish, which is how I ended up with grapes (nine weeks out of ten I can find decent grapes at the market).

First off, I got these big, sweet black grapes from Whole Foods, so that part was easy. I had some left over hazelnuts from when I made the chocolate hazelnut cookies, no grappa (for soaking the grapes), so I substituted some Frangelico and the rest of the ingredients were pretty straightforward (e.g., butter, flour, cream, eggs, sugar).

I had already made two tarts using the Sweet Pastry Crust, a Fresh Fig Tart and the cover recipe, Pine Nut Tart, so I didn't have any nerves about assembling it this third time. I still love this crust recipe. It comes together easily, isn't delicate, so if it breaks while I'm rolling, or moving to the tart shell, it's easily repairable, and this time, if someone doesn't forget to close the freezer drawer and defrost my freezer, I should hopefully have some crust left for another tart real soon.

Likewise, the filling was pretty easy too - though it did require three different bowls, one on the food processor for chopping the nuts, one for the egg yolks and one for the egg whites. The recipe suggests using the same bowl for the yolks and whites, and just cleaning between, but since I needed a bowl to mix the hazelnuts and egg yolks together in, I didn't do that. I just used my hand mixer for the egg yolks, added the hazelnuts, and my stand mixer to beat the egg whites.

Leave plenty of time for this recipe though, both active and inactive. Inactive because the tart dough requires an hour or two of chilling before rolling, and then another hour once it's rolled out and in the shell. Active because slicing and then placing those grapes could be a bit time consuming.

It baked up fine in the specified time and looked pretty puffy when it first came out of the oven but then settled nicely. The grapes did spread some, so don't be afraid to place them close together.

See that? That's the chart of the hills we climbed when we rode our bikes into the Sourlands of NJ on Saturday. Oh, yeah, a nice 50 mile ride up and down some flippin' big hills! Who knew we had such hills in New Jersey? Well, most of us who live here and ever traveled to the western or north western sections of the state.

I'm very proud of me on that ride. I didn't rest on any of those hills, or get off the bike once! Though I did travel pretty slowly on them, I kept chugging along. I only wish I brought a camera because some of the views were amazing and we traveled along rodes that sometimes contained more bike riders than cars.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending upon how you look at it), we're doing it again this Saturday, only going farther! Oh, and for those who like numbers, it was a 50.5 mile ride with a 3050 foot elevation (i.e., total amount of climbing across all hills, which also means, we had descents of 3050 feet). In Vermont, the highest elevation we had was 2800 feet (or so) and that came going over one long slow climb over a mountain.

I made this cake on Sunday afternoon since we were having friends over for dinner Sunday evening. Some comments from memory, it said to grate the zucchini but I've always shredded it in the past when making zucchini cakes (using my Cuisinart), so I wasn't sure how to approach this. I did end up using my box grater, and used the second to smallest hole to grate the zucchini which came out a bit pulpy and watery but I'm happy to say I actually liked it that way in the cake. You didn't have "strings" of zucchini as you ate the cake - it just sort of blended into the background.

The other think I loved about this recipe (and from the Grappa cakes), is the suggestion/direction to brush the glaze on. In the past, whenever using this type of glaze, the recipes I've used have always said to drizzle the glaze on - which usually ends up with a mess on my counter (if it's still on the cooking rack), or puddles on my plate (if I've plated it). Plus, you don't get "complete coverage" of the icing around the cake. By brushing this on, it really does create a crunchy coating all around the inside and outside of the cake.

My last observation, the use of the spice combination of cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg, made the flavor of this cake more reminiscent of fall desserts to us - so while I won't make it again during July or August - I absolutely know what I'll be doing with the September, and October bumper crop of zucchini we always get at the end of the harvest.

Chris loved this cake and definitely proclaimed it a make again. Becky too - Sammi, not so much, but I think if she didn't know there was zucchini in it, she would have loved it too.

Anyway, we're so pathetic, and this went so quickly that here's my picture!

Oh - I still need to figure out the WW points but will report back shortly with that information.

I don't like "travel mugs." They leak (my car console is evident to that) and they don't keep the liquids hot enough for me. I do like styrofoam to go cups though. While they do still leak, at least the coffee/tea stays hot. However, they're not so friendly to the environment, and as a family, we were going through about 12 - 14 a week.

So, a few weeks ago, I ran into a fellow Weight Watcher member at Dunkin Donuts before our meeting and she was getting a refill of her travel mug. I asked her what they charge her for that, it's 12 ounces, so apparently a small. Then I asked her if it keeps the coffee hot, and she said for a long time. Then, she proceeded to turn the cup over, and lo and behold, it didn't leak!

Okay - I'm bad, since my debut, I missed two weeks but I'm back.

So first shot, me, while my mother still had control of my hair and clothes.

Me, after I started to gain control (she still had a little - notice the lilac pants):