March 20, 2009
· Filed under cooking/baking, gardening
Just like the TV show on Food Network. I had the garden tour committee meeting here this week and decided to serve food from my garden. I had white bean spread with sage pesto, lemon balm bars, fruit and veggies and a chocolate pound cake with rosemary. Everything turned out great except the chocolate pound cake. My DH took one look at it and said “Throw it away! You are so chopped!”
Here is a picture:
When I picked it up from the cooling rack the middle literally fell out. I told my DH that there was no way I was going to throw this away – too many expensive ingredients.
So here is what I did – the edges were done so I cut them and drizzled them with a chocolate ganache – still wasn’t the tastiest pound cake I have ever had but at least it didn’t end up in the garbage…
Here are my lemon balm bars. The lemon balm is just barely peeking through but I was able to gather just enough to bake this great treat. I have made this many times and it is always good!
Speaking of gardens, here are some things that are in bloom right now – yellow columbine, blue verbena, peach tree and my knockout rose. I LOVE 
spring!
March 9, 2009
· Filed under art/craft, cooking/baking, gardening
It has been absolutely beautiful here and I can’t stay OUT of the garden! I say I am going to only work for a couple of hours and then three or four hours have passed. All my veggies are coming up – chard, beets and peas so far. Also planted some new oregano, marjoram and thyme. Because our growing season is so long in Texas some of our perennial plants just wear themselves out. So they need to be replanted every few years. In a few weeks I will plant basil and tomatoes.
My friend Judi told me that the squirrels weren’t eating my Japanese maples – they were just sharpening their teeth! Could they not find a trash tree to sharpen their teeth and NOT my maple that is probably worth at least a thousand dollars…. Please!
Anyhow my art in the garden today is this pathway I am creating. I saw this idea on the garden tour last year so it is not original but I love it. We have a great slope in our yard – good for drainage but not so good for keeping decomposed granite from washing away. Here is what I did yesterday!
And here is some swiss chard that overwintered from last year and a blossom from our ornamental peach. The peaches from this tree are not edible but the squirrels like them and plant them all over the place – so I now have five peach trees growing in my backyard and I have given a few away. Yesterday I found two new japanese maple seedlings while clearing some leaves . I will transplant them once they get a little bigger . I already have 18 little trees in four inch pots that I rescued last year - they are ready to move up to one quart pots.
And finally my DH is a great and in the Spring when I am so busy in the garden he cooks for me. Here is a dish he made last week – pan seared scallops, mashed sweet potatoes flavored with ginger and a wilted spinach salad.
March 4, 2009
· Filed under art/craft
are now finished. First is the handpainted malabrigo – yarn leftover from my circumnavigate sweater. It is long and wonderfully soft and warm. Only have a couple of weeks left to use it – but I will pull it out next year and enjoy it a lot I am sure. Here it is!
And on Saturday I took a nunofelting workshop at Whiterock Weaving Center (whiterockweaving.com). My instructors were Rhonda Douglas (petuniafiberart.com) and Suzanne Morgan (suzannemorgan.com).
They were both very patient and supportive. I really enjoyed the process and now know what I was doing wrong when I tried it on my own. I also want to experiment with dyeing fabric and yarn. I bought several silk scarves from Dharma Trading Company and have lots of roving. So I will be making more scarves. Gardening is foremost in my mind right now but come June I will be wanting something that will keep me in the air conditioning. Here is my pretty springlike scarf!
It is light as a feather but warm at the same time.
