Musical Soup Eaters

Wild Things

Posted on May 18, 2013 by Tara

Thing 1: Bones

Do you have bones in your yard? Like a collection? We do. This is currently on our back porch.

I’m not sure what it is, but it was given to my kids. They think it’s great. My three year-old once came to the back door, his arms full of bones, yelling for me to open it. I did not. Bones stay outside. I’m all for scientific discovery, but I don’t know about these things. My dad once gave my oldest son a goat’s skull he found on a hike. My son promptly traded it in for a cool crystal at the Nature Center. I prefer the crystal; my dad misses the goat skull.

Thing 2: Crazy taco of decadence

So, I bought this taco a while back. I can’t remember what they called it, but it was Torchy’s taco of the month a few months ago. It involved fried chicken, a fried egg and bacon, wrapped in a waffle, wrapped in a tortilla. Served with maple syrup, obviously.

How was it, you ask? It was sublime pleasure, quickly followed by nausea. Such is the price of decadence. Should you get the urge to make this at home, I would suggest leaving off the tortilla. The tortilla, of course, is what makes it a taco. But it just doesn’t belong. The waffle is the natural outer layer here (if such a thing were to occur in nature).

Thing 3: Wild Child

The three year-old has been waking very early lately and making mischief. This is how I found his room one morning.

You see, the previous day, he “cleaned” his room by shoving all this stuff into his closet. The next day, he inexplicably piled it all outside his closet. He takes his work seriously. The problem is, no one understands what his work is.

Yesterday morning, he helped himself to some breakfast sausage. As his dad and I were showering and dressing, he took the sausage out of the freezer, stood on a chair to reach a bowl, then microwaved the sausage into charcoal. The house still smells. I’ve been seeing more and more of his big brother’s independent streak in this one. It’s a little concerning. Good thing he’s cute.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Rød Grød Med Fløde

Posted on May 5, 2013 by Tara

Last week my kindergartener’s school had a staff work day, so we spent the morning berry picking at the farm we visited last fall. It was an unusually cold and windy day for this time of year. On top of that, the strawberry crop had suffered from a late frost and hail storm.

As a result, the farm was practically empty and we had row after row of strawberries to ourselves. While there were far fewer berries than usual, there were still plenty to be found.

However, as it turned out my children had very little interest in picking berries. The girl picked for about 10 minutes before she lost interest. I don’t think the little guy picked a single one. He ran up and down the rows than asked me to hold him. Most of these berries were picked by me

What did my children want to do instead? Feed goats, of course. The toddler liked to feed the “baby goat with no teeth.”

We ended up bringing home two baskets of strawberries. I spent a fair amount of time this weekend making things from strawberries. I have to say how much better fresh-picked strawberries are compared to the ones from the grocery store. Most of the ones at the supermarket are grown to be sturdy, to travel well and to last. Not for flavor. The ones from the berry farm are smaller, more delicate, and sweeter.

So, the title of this post. Many years ago, I spent a couple months in Denmark. Danes love asking American to say fød grød med fløde. It’s very difficult for us to say, so we mispronounce it and they laugh at you. It’s great. Helpful hint: If this happens to you ask them to say refrigerator. I’ve been practicing, so if I ever go back to Denmark I plan to introduce it into conversation as much as possible. (And with that I sense all future invitations to Denmark evaporating.)

As it turns out, rød grød med fløde is not what I thought it was. I thought it was simply strawberries with cream. From a quick Internet search, it looks like the strawberries are usually cooked with sugar and thickened, cooled, and served with cream. I loosely followed this recipe.

As with anything this simple, you want to use the best possible ingredients, so our freshly-picked strawberries were perfect. But truthfully, I don’t feel like the cooking process really added much. These berries would have been equally delightful sliced and raw.

Posted in Fruit, Healthy | 1 Comment

Life Is a Highway

Posted on May 3, 2013 by Tara

Dear Blog,

I know things haven’t been quite the same between us lately. I still like you and think you’re fun, but I know I haven’t been around as much. It’s not you, it’s me. Okay, it’s a little bit you. To tell you the truth, sometimes you feel like work and I don’t appreciate that. Let’s keep things casual, okay?

Lately the days have been like a highway without a shoulder. I have to go fast, or we crash. I can’t pull to the side of the road, or we crash. Do you see where I’m going with this? There’s a lot of potential crashing. But I’m always on the look-out for a nice rest-stop. A nice clean one, with bathrooms and no vagrants. Preferably with a picnic table and a patch of wildflowers nearby. Maybe I’m more of a Sunday driver and we can see each other a little more on weekends. In fact, I think I have just the thing for us to talk about this weekend…

Fondly,

Tara

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Siren Song

Posted on April 22, 2013 by Tara

Oh, why couldn’t she be the other kind of mermaid, with the fish part on the top and the lady part on the bottom? -Futurama

I bought this wooden mermaid on a whim the other day. I thought she had a quirky charm about her, and might add a beachy vibe to our mantle.

Once she was home, I changed my mind and decided that she didn’t fit and I should return her. However, my nine-year-old son freaked out about this. It was very odd how much he wanted to keep this thing. He begged me not to return her. If I didn’t want to put her in the living room, perhaps I could put her in his room? His little sister tried to tease him about this, but his casual responses made her quickly lose steam. I have to admit that I love it when this happens. He often tries to taunt her about her love for the little boy down the street and it ends quickly when she nonchalantly responds, “Yes, I do love him.” Teasing is just not much fun when nobody gets upset.

Anyway, we ended up hanging her on the wall along the stairs. It’s a loss prominent location than the mantle, but apparently she’s here to stay.

Singing a siren song of a different sort, is this banana bread. (And, hello, clunky transition!) A few weeks ago I received an email from my aunt Diana with a link to this banana bread with the simple message of “I think this is the best banana bread I have ever eaten.”

Her timing was perfect, as there was a cluster of bananas ripening on my counter. Of, course it took several days after that for me to actually make the bread. By that time, the bananas were beginning to ooze onto my counter. The resulting bread was quite good. The recipe uses half white flour and half whole wheat, so you get some of the benefits of the whole grain, but the bread is not at all heavy. Definitely a keeper.

Posted in Bread, Breakfast | 1 Comment

Peter Rabbit Birthday Party

Posted on April 13, 2013 by Tara

A couple weeks ago, my sister threw a Peter Rabbit-themed birthday party for her son’s first birthday party. It feels a little like cheating to share it here, since I did none of the work. But she had so many cute ideas–more than I really captured here. I think it’s a great idea for a small child’s Spring birthday party, and would also make a great baby shower theme or Easter party. The party was in her backyard and had a very garden feel to it. In addition to tables, she set out picnic blankets on the grass. Check out the carrots hanging from the fence. Also not pictured are the little pots and seeds planting activity and jelly bean “carrot” party favors, which were cone-shaped pastry bags filled with orange jelly beans and tied with green ribbons.

Ears were supplied for those who chose to wear them, such as Bunny Grandmommy.

Each table had a radish centerpiece.

Cupcakes were decorated with carrots, radishes, and what I think were cabbages.

How cute are these little potted food labels? And how else would the people know that they are eating fruit and cheese? (By the way, I’m pretty sure I’m a delightful big sister and never sarcastic. And if my three siblings think otherwise, they can tell it to their own blogs. Just kidding!)

In all seriousness, the party was adorable. My sister is an amazing mom to one of the cutest little boys I’ve ever seen. You’re just going to have to trust me that this kid is incredibly adorable by any standards. Happy first year, little guy!

You might also like this recap of our Little Monster baby shower.

Posted in Dessert, Family, Holiday, Party | 4 Comments

Turning Six

Posted on April 8, 2013 by Tara

Yesterday, my little girl turned six years-old. We celebrated by eating cake and breaking out her new Snoopy snow cone maker. The birthday girl designed the cake–two layers of yellow cake with lemon curd filling and sliced marshmallow flower petals. I’m not much of a cake decorator, but I think it turned out pretty well. Perhaps a bit rustic.

She was beyond thrilled about the snow cone maker. We gave one to a friend recently and she has been dying to get one of her own.

I tried to add gravitas to the situation by telling her that this is the ONLY time she will turn six in her ENTIRE life. Although, perhaps that’s the kind of thing that just builds anxiety.

It’s funny looking through old pictures. Although funny isn’t the right word. It’s a little surreal sometimes the way time has a way of marching along, leaving a trail behind us of moments that become increasingly difficult to remember.

Although, based on this interaction with her brother, perhaps things haven’t changed much after all.

Posted in Cake, Family | 2 Comments

Making Stuff, Real and Imagined

Posted on April 1, 2013 by Tara

I once saw a bag that said “I’m so crafty I make people.” By that definition, you could probably say I’m an accomplished crafts person. By any other definition that does not involve the manufacturing of humans? Not so much. However, this week was a bit of an anomaly and I made something other than food.

The lovely Catherine hosted a get together at her house and I made this bracelet. I’m pleased to say that it looks reasonably like an actual bracelet.

Musical Soup Girl does not share my crafting aversion and she makes stuff all the time. Usually with massive amounts of scotch tape. She’s also taking an art class after school. This toothy masterpiece is currently gracing our refrigerator.

And, of course, there was egg dyeing for Easter. This post is obviously a little behind the times since Easter is already over. But egg dyeing is serious business.

This girl was not satisfied with the number of hard boiled eggs I supplied and insisted on dyeing a raw egg. Naturally, a few minutes later a large gust of wind picked it up and smashed it on the ground.

Who needs those little wire egg dipper things? That’s what hands are for.

This egg was declared “the best egg” by my nine year-old. Behold The Best Egg.

I believe he’s a cousin of my Balls of Despair. But for Springtime.

There was one thing we talked about making but never did. My daughter has the book A Time to Keep: The Tasha Tudor Book of Holidays. This book features magical holiday scenes inspired by Tasha Tudor’s childhood. For Easter, it shows a wonderful egg tree decorated with eggs of different sizes from different birds.

My daughter said she wished she could do this, and I have to admit I think it would be pretty cool too. I made a half-hearted effort to find eggs from different birds, but all I found were duck eggs at a local grocery store. Duck eggs are quite similar in size to chicken eggs, so that didn’t really help much.

Maybe some day we will try to make this, but not this year. We did clean and dye a couple chicken eggshells, but they also blew away and smashed on the deck. It was pretty windy. In the meantime, if anyone in the Austin area comes across a vendor of exotic bird eggs, please let me know. I would probably have to display it with my hypothetical chimera cake. So while we’re at it, I’m also in the market for some sheep’s milk.

Happy Day After Easter!

Posted in Family, Holiday | Tagged Easter | 1 Comment

Zucchini Carrot Bread

Posted on March 24, 2013 by Tara

I believe that my appetite is pretty open to suggestion. On Friday, I engaged in small talk with another mom about the spiciness of various foods, which included a discussion of Indian food. Now I feel sure that I’ll need some Indian food within the next week or so. Earlier this week, I was in a meeting with someone who brought in and ate a slice of zucchini bread. It looked good. Hence, I made zucchini bread.

To be precise, I made zucchini carrot bread bright and early this morning. I based the recipe on this one, but made some modifications such as adding some whole wheat flour, brown sugar and milk, and replacing the walnuts with pecans.

I took it out of the oven to cool then left for an exercise class. When I returned I noticed something peculiar. There was a trench carved out of the top of the loaf. At first I thought this was a naturally occurring event and that the top had sunk. However, it was too deep for that and it was obvious that someone had sampled the bread by gauging it out with a few fingers.

The culprit turned out to be my nine-year-old son. I was not bothered by his unconventional sampling technique. What bothered me was his questionable hygiene. He has his fingers in his mouth ALL THE TIME, nibbling away at his fingernails. And as far as I can tell, he seems to consider soap to be an optional step in the hand washing process. In short, I’m a little grossed out by the idea of his germy fingers emerged in the bread that, yes, we all ended up eating. So, if the whole family contracts, say, the common cold followed up with worms and the bubonic plague, there won’t be much question about the identity of patient zero.

Germs aside, it’s a good recipe. All the kids love it, despite the presence of vegetables. That’s got to count for something, right?

Zucchini Carrot Bread

Author: Adapted from Food.com

Ingredients

1.5 cups all-purpose flour
1.5 cups whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon grated nutmeg
¾ cup sugar
¾ cup brown sugar
3 eggs, beaten
1 cup vegetable oil
¾ cup whole milk
1 cup grated zucchini
1 cup grated carrot
1 cup chopped pecans

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Sift together flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg in a large mixing bowl.
Add the sugars and blend.
Mix the eggs with the oil and milk and add that to the flour mixture, mix again.
Mix the zucchini, carrots and pecans, add and mix.
Put this in a large greased loaf pan and bake for approx 1 hour 10 minutes or until done in the center.

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New York, New York

Posted on March 18, 2013 by Tara

We spent five days last week in New York City. All five of us, plus my parents. I have to admit, the thought of wrangling my three children through the streets of Manhattan made me a little twitchy. It seemed like a great idea months ago when we first hatched this plan, but as it got closer I wasn’t so sure. I think this was why I had such a hard time planning this trip. I am happy to tell you that the trip was a wonderful success. Sadly, my camera stopped working at the beginning of the trip, so all my photos are of the cruddy iPhone variety.

I have been to New York City several times before as a tourist. I also spent a winter there for an internship right after college, which was, in retrospect, the loneliest time of my life. Visiting the city again, this time with a child’s perspective in mind, gave everything a fresh tint. The kids had a great time. Even the most mundane experiences–a walk down a busy street, a trip on a subway, a taxi ride–were adventures.

The highlights for the kids were the American Museum of Natural History for the nine year-old, a boat trip to see the Statue of Liberty for the five year-old, and the Central Park Zoo for the three year-old.

I loved two of the special exhibits at the American Museum of Natural History–Our Global Kitchen: Food, Nature, Culture (I learned how to make a virtual poached egg with hollandaise sauce. You’d better believe I’m going to be attempting a museum-quality egg at home) and The Butterfly Conservatory. The Butterfly Conservatory was a magical place, full of live butterflies that occasionally landed on us.

On our last day, the kids rode on a gorgeous, old fashioned carrousel in Bryant Park, while giant snowflakes fell around us. Magical.

Sticking with the food-focus of this blog, I’ll tell you a couple of the culinary highlights. We went to Trattoria Dell’Arte for my birthday dinner. I had a spaghetti carbonara that was insanely rich and cheesy and topped with a fried egg, for crying out loud. I have it on good authority that artery clogging does not occur on birthdays.

Based on the recommendation of a friend of a friend, we had Dim Sum at Jing Fong in Chinatown. It was tasty, fast, inexpensive, and a really unique dining experience. The little guy did not appreciate it, however. He enjoyed a hot dog instead. He ate that thing with gusto.

We also ate at a charming little Alice in Wonderland-themed place on the Upper West Side called Alice’s Tea Cup. We had soups, sandwiches and that sort of thing, and the kids had hot chocolate topped with shamrock sprinkles.

This should make them happy, right? Unfortunately, this was after a long day and two of our three children (the older two) ended up crying through the meal.

Alice’s Tea Cup was conveniently located near the Levain Bakery, which I have been dreaming about since seeing their chocolate chip cookies on an episode of Throwdown with Bobby Flay. The cookies were massive and also quite good. I have already attempted my own knock-off version. While they didn’t end up bearing much of a resemblance to the originals, they were quite good too. Also much smaller. I just can’t bring myself to form baseball-sized balls of dough.

Finally, I noticed that this is my 100th post here on Musical Soup Eaters. I think it’s fitting that it happened to be about a special time for us. This quiet little corner of the Internet has been a happy place for me. Thank you for reading.

Posted in Family, Non-food | 3 Comments

Time to Drink the Vodka

Posted on March 9, 2013 by Tara

So, you may recall that back in the early days of 2013, I started infusing a bottle of vodka with cacao nibs. The recipe is from a book I got for Christmas, Paul A. Young’s Adventures with Chocolate. It is simply a combination of vodka and cacao nibs allowed to soak for a long period of time. Or in the words of Paul A. Young, it took a month to “nurture the vodka.” Well, this vodka is all loved-up and nurtured, and it’s time to drink this baby.

It turns out there wasn’t as much vodka left as you might expect. The cacao nibs drank a lot of it. Rather, they soaked up about half the bottle. You can see how bloated they look below. I used a coffee filter in a funnel, and poured the vodka into a jar to strain out the nibs. Then, I washed out the vodka bottle, and strained it again to remove any left over grit.

I did try sipping it straight, and it just didn’t work for me. For my last Food Lush post, I asked readers for suggestions about what I should do with cacao-infused vodka. Suggestions included:

Something with Kahlua and/or Baileys
Maybe a white Russian but with cacao infused vodka instead of regular
Chocolate martini
Chocolate martinis with Frangelico
Mixed with coke

For my first drink, I made a version of a white Russian. However, I used the cacao-infused vodka instead of regular vodka and skim milk instead of cream. So a skinny brown Russian, maybe? Whatever it’s called, it was pretty good.

For further indulgence, we made this lemon poppy seed cake and it didn’t last long. Nine times out of ten, I would be perfectly happy indulging my sweet tooth with a good chocolate chip cookie, but I have to admit this lemon poppy seed cake was pretty good too. Also, fruit + seed= completely acceptable breakfast. It’s simple math, people. And am I the only one who thinks that citrus desserts are just a little classier than other desserts? I’m not sure why.

In other news, we traveled through space and time to the land of the dinosaurs. (I guess maybe I should have started with that, instead of the vodka, huh?)