Cross-post: December KTC Event: Annual Cookie Bake!
January 10, 2012
Read about our cooking group’s December event: Our annual cookie bake at Joyce and Jessica’s home! Click through to our Kiss the Cooks blog!
Cross-post: November KTC Event: Annual Dinner at William’s
December 12, 2011
Read about our cooking group’s November event: Our annual business meeting and dinner at William’s home! Click through to our Kiss the Cooks blog!
Cross-post: October KTC Event: Cuban food on Lopez Island
October 31, 2011
Read about our cooking group’s October event: Ropa vieja and other Cuban delights, courtesy of Fernando! Click through to our Kiss the Cooks blog!
William’s Effing Good Cinnamon Rolls
October 30, 2011
These were amazing! William shared all his secrets, and reiterated his offer to coach us through it in person. Click through for the recipe…You’re welcome!
I knew it would be one of those days when…
October 10, 2011
Nearly stepping on a dead rat should have been my first clue. Nevertheless, I blithely soldiered on to the office and another day at work. Wonder what messaging method the universe will use tomorrow?
Cross Post: September Cooking Group: Canning with Anne and Frank
October 8, 2011
Read about our cooking group’s September event: Capturing summer in a jar via canning with Frank and Anne. Click through to our Kiss the Cooks blog!
via Kiss the Cooks
Organic matters: A little girl’s potato experiment
September 5, 2011
Besides being as cute as a button, I found the content of this little girl’s video to be important. Elise decides to do an experiment to see how long it takes a sweet potato placed in a glass of water to grow vines.
Time needed to grow vines for conventionally-grown sweet potatoes, sprayed with “Bud-Nip:” Forever. No vines will grow.
Time needed to grow vines for organic sweet potatoes from the supermarket: After a full month, the potatoes yielded a few “wimpy little vines.”
Time needed to grow about a bajillion hearty vines from organic sweet potatoes from a local certified-organic market: Less than a week, and the vines that have grown are close to taking over the kitchen!
Young Elise goes on to explain that Bud-Nip is the commercial name for common herbicide Chlorpropham, and that it works systemically within the plant, so washing produce treated with Bud-Nip has very little effect on reducing the amount of this chemical that one would presumably consume. Bud-Nip is commonly used on conventionally-grown blueberries, carrots, onions, spinach, tomatoes, beets, and cranberries.
I think young Elise says it the best: “Which potato would YOU rather eat?”
Cross post: August Cooking Group: Easy, Breezy, Redux: Summer Pasta with Meg and Shawn!
September 5, 2011
Read about our cooking group’s August event: Easy, breezy summer pasta dinner with Meg and Shawn. Click through to our Kiss the Cooks blog!
Read about our cooking group’s July event: Easy, breezy, beautiful summer fare with Damian and Joyce. Click through to our KTC blog!
Descanse en paz, Joe Arroyo
July 27, 2011
Qué tristeza me da… Realmente es una gran pérdida. El único comentario que me sacó una sonrisa fue el man que sugirió que el viejo Joe sacara a Amy Winehouse a bailar salsa… Al menos ninguno de los dos sufre ya de nada.
Sad face. 
“Te fuiste a encontrar con TANIA, a formar tu REBELION a otra parte, te fuiste como EL CAMINANTE, ahora eres tú EL AUSENTE, viviste NOCHES DE ARREBOLES, te llevaste tu CARA DE PAYASO, AY PAPÁ .. PAPA… aunque LA NOCHE esté triste, serás siempre el CENTURIÓN DE LA NOCHE, porque FUE TU MIRADA la que se apagó, pero es ese recuerdo el que hace saber que TU VOLVERAS, volverás porque aquí se queda tu JoeSón…”
Su última entrevista, a través de RCN.
Cats re-enact Harry Potter in 1 minute
July 17, 2011
This find seemed quite timely, and really funny to boot!
via Cheezburger
Read about our cooking group’s May event: Chocolate adventures with Jessica and Rick. Click through to our KTC blog!
Read about our cooking group’s April event: Homemade Thai food at Frank and Damian’s place. Click through to our KTC blog!
Verano
May 11, 2011
Saw this on someone’s FB page today, and it sounds like an excellent plan to me! The guys never cry about this stuff, do they?
“VERANO. Expirado el plazo de la “operación bikini” arrancamos con la “operación burkini”, mucho más asequible.”
Watch it wiggle
May 1, 2011
Remember those Jello commercials from way back in the day, with that memorable little song: “Watch it wiggle, see it jiggle, cool and fruity, Jello brand gelatin…?”
Today is Seattle’s second spring-like sunny day this year. As such, it required poking around to see what less-than-winter-weight clothing choices I could find in my closet. I doggedly tried on dozens of items which had been in our “summer closet” for the last 18 months or so. Afterwards, suffice it to say that my thoughts were filled with Jello.
My outlook brightened considerably, however, when I ran across this video of Jello cubes bouncing in slow motion (Thanks, @Foodista!). After all, if my jiggly belly could somehow manage to look half as graceful and mesmerizing as it bounces around as these shimmering Jello cubes do, I have no reason to view it with such disappointment, do I? I wonder if painting it a rich shade of burgundy would help…
via Foodista
Gratitude
April 29, 2011
Take 90 seconds and consider how your words shape your world. We can all use a reminder to be compassionate and to cultivate gratitude.
Reverse psychology, Bugs Bunny-style
April 21, 2011
“Bueno, no. Vamos.” I loved this! And I think the kid really thinks he won!
via Urlesque
Cross post: March cooking group: Pastry dough!
April 12, 2011
Read about our cooking group’s March event: Pastry dough with Frank and Fernando! Click through to our KTC blog!
William’s Pie Crust
April 12, 2011
Pie Crust (enough dough for one double crust pie)
- 2 cups flour
- 6 oz. frozen butter, grated, and then re-frozen
- 2 Tbsp sugar
- 1 tsp salt
- Juice of one lemon
- 1/2 pint heavy cream
In a large bowl, add flour, sugar, and salt.
Cut in frozen butter (use a pastry blender).
Combine lemon juice and heavy cream.
Add lemon-cream combination by the tablespoon and mix by hand only just until the dough is the right wetness.
Make two discs, wrap and refrigerate about 30 minutes.
Roll out dough, place in pie pan, add filling, cover with top crust, brush with milk and sprinkle sugar on top.
Place in preheated oven at 450 degrees F for 10 minutes. Reduce temperature of oven to about 375 and bake about 45 minutes.
You might want to place the pie/pies on a pan to stop the “juicing over” from messing up your oven.
~William Keegan, March, 2011
It’s mountain beaver time!
April 4, 2011
Yes, folks, it’s that time of year again! As reported last year and the year before, the return of spring in Seattle brings the return of my furry, football-shaped friend: the mountain beaver. Ain’t he sweet?
He’s out a little earlier than usual this year, and seems to have taken up residence farther up the hill behind our house. Unless that’s some other mountain beaver, of course. I didn’t catch his name.
