Monday, August 7, 2017

I’ve been in the kitchen almost all day testing my recipes. First up were my Cranberry Almond cookies. They were quick to make and I got almost three dozen from the batter. I played around a bit with the cooking time and temperature. The recipe called for the cookies to bake at 350° for 10-12 minutes. Since I know I always have to cook things a bit longer in our oven I baked them for the full 12 minutes. They were good but seemed a bit undone in the centre. For the next sheet I added a couple more minutes to the baking time, and for the third sheet I upped the temperature to 375° and baked them for 14 minutes. The batch at 350° for 14 minutes were the winner. My cookie sheets are relatively large so I can only fit one in the oven at a time; with the quantity I’m making it would take forever so Pat went out this afternoon and bought a couple more sheets. I’ll be able to fit three sheets in the oven at a time now so that will speed things up, although I’ll still have to stop in between batches to fill the sheets.

When the cookies were done I headed out to do a bit of shopping. There were still a few things that we needed for the celebration that didn’t involve the concession but that I said I would pick up. After that was done I headed to the grocery store for my baking supplies.

Next on the test board were my Cranberry Tarts. The frozen cranberries were to be cooked, put through a colander and then cooked again. This was a lot of work for about 15 tarts; the colour wasn’t that great (it reminded me of play dough as it was cooking) but they taste quite good. But I thought there should be an easier way. Pat didn’t think putting the cranberries through the blender would work so I tried changing the lemon juice in my lemon curd  recipe to cranberry juice – the rest of the ingredients and quantities were the same as the recipe I was using. The colour is even worse (brownish, and not even a golden brown) and I don’t think it is going set the way the lemon curd did; I guess the cranberry juice doesn’t have as much pectin as the lemon juice does.

I refuse to give up though as the tarts have gone into some of the promotional material, so I’ve found another recipe that uses canned cranberry sauce and marshmallows – that sounds like my kind of recipe. So I’ll go out to the store and buy a can of cranberry sauce (hopefully I can find some) and give it another go.

Sunday, August 6, 2017

It took me most of the morning to finish yesterday’s tasks. The show we are watching on Netflix is subtitled so I can’t stitch and watch at the same time. I intended to only watch one, maybe two, shows but the story was nearing its conclusion and it left you hanging after each show so we ended up finishing off the series. I read a bit before turning the light out but my book still wasn’t finished.

So this morning I got up and finished the hand stitching for the binding, the sleeve and the label on my O Canada project. I was on my way upstairs but decided to sit out on the back deck and finish my book first. When that was done I came upstairs with the intention of working on a card before my trip to the library.

But when I saw the mess my desk was in I decided I needed to do some computer and office work. Cranberry Hall papers are sorted, filed and/or shredded. I have a deposit ready for the bank on Tuesday and a pile started for things I will need on the weekend. Then I did some pre-posts for my website and documented my latest project in my project book. It was past lunchtime by the time I finished so we sat on the deck and had lunch.

By the time I came back in after lunch, I had decided that getting another card done was more important than the trip to the Library. But first there were just a few e-mails that needed my attention. I’ve just now left an impromptu Cranberry Hall meeting to discuss volunteers and programming for the two event sights; I was only needed to get in my request for volunteers to help with the concession.

Pat has had ribs cooking in the oven since noon and there is no chance of starting any of my baking today so I’m finally going to start that sewing. I think we are off to the movies tonight.

Saturday, August 5, 2017

I’m working again today, but it feels more like fun. I’m busy quilting my O Canada project. In fact, the quilting is done and I’m going to start cutting the binding. I’m hoping for a finish tonight, regardless of how late I need to stay up. I have other things to do tomorrow and I want this one off my list (and off my mind).

I also hoped for another finished today but I don’t know if I’ll get there. I have a hundred or so pages left in my book and, if I get it done, I plan to return it to the library tomorrow afternoon and sit and enjoy the space a bit more.

But for now, it’s back to O Canada.

Friday, August 4, 2017

Although the motion wasn’t passed unanimously it was carried so we were off on the first ferry yesterday morning – destination Costco – to pick up some new lights for Cranberry Hall. Of course that wasn’t all we purchased; I got several jugs of Cranberry Juice for our celebration as well as some Ginger Ale to add to it. A big box of envelopes for the office, some coffee beans, some olive oil and some cooking sauces also went into our cart. It was a quick trip but I had time to go up and down pretty much every aisle in the store.

Today I was out all morning putting up posters for the Cranberry celebration – I went as far south of town as I could go (the ferry terminal) and made stops at several places along the way out and back. I also put up posters at several places in town and, while I was out, looked for some glasses and some nice donation jars. I was successful with all the posters, but didn’t have as much luck with the glasses or donation jars. I’ll check out another thrift shop tomorrow and then I might have to break down and spend some decent money to get what I want.

The afternoon was spent getting the Cranberry Hall minutes written and circulated, along with a notice to our regular renters about the upcoming celebration. It seems it never ends, but it will once we get past next weekend.

Tomorrow will be a quilting day and all next week I’ll be baking – both in the heat of the day and with the heat of the oven!