myrnamay

In Jars.

In which I frantically attempt to get things out of the garden & into jars.

 

The world's most low-key zucchini pickles, a combination of the Zucchini Pickles, Cafe Zuni Style from Poppytalk and Smitten Kitchen's Pickled Vegetable Sandwich Slaw. I didn't have any turmeric, I did not take the time to crush the mustard seeds, I did not use a mandoline, I added black peppercorns and garden jalapeños, I reduced the sugar....and they worked out perfectly. Freestyle.

 

A certain member of the household hates the word "chutney", so Slate's You're Doing It Wrong: Apple Chutney becomes Apple Voldemort: The Condiment Which Shall Not Be Named. The apples we gathered were a little sub-par, but this stuff was fantastic on Madhur Jaffrey's Shrimp & Onion Pakoras (with zucchini & corn taking the place of shrimp).

 

I'm currently thousands of miles from my beloved Bar Tartine, so when I needed to dispatch some beets as well as feel a tiny twinge of that ol' marble bar bliss, I made Bar Tartine's Pickled Dilly Beets from HonestlyYUM (except our garden dill had already gone to seed, so these aren't so dilly). Bleeding Heart Martinis are imminent. 

 

How did I ever wake up in the morning before I discovered jalapeño jelly? Toast or a bagel spread with peanut butter, jalapeño jelly, and a sprinkle of sea salt just might be the perfect breakfast. Complex carbohydrates, protein, and enough of a kick to open your eyes and make you excited to be alive. Sadly, I have no idea where I found the recipe. I was intimidated by the inclusion of pectin, but making it was as easy as jalapeño pie.

 

Finally, for now, we have Mark Bittman's Tomato Jam. I skipped the cinnamon and cloves and used less than 2/3 of the called-for sugar, and judging from tablespoon that I slathered on toast because it didn't happen to fit in the jars, this stuff, as the New York TImes said, exceeds expectations.

 

Ants On A Log, Reimagined

Celery, hummus, almond butter, currants, pomegranate seeds, chickpeas, and peas. 

For a dreamy stoop picnic with Leah & Heidi.

 

 

Margarita Cupcakes Baked Into Margarita Glasses: This Is No Time For Restraint

 

My friend Mike and I go out for burritos & margaritas ('ritos & 'ritas) about once a month, so when his birthday arrived, I wanted to make a cake that related, somehow. (Actually, I think I promised him a cake-filled burrito baked into a cake...) A burrito cake seemed out of my skill/patience level, so margarita cake it was! Is such a thing possible? Of course, and of course the PPK girls have mastered it in Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World. But, even though I love Mike, and cake, and margaritas, I was only feeling ho-hum about this endeavor: I guess I'll bake some cake.. But a birthday and a recipe this good deserve something special, over-the-top, and a little bit trashy! And so..

 

I baked the cake into margarita glasses. Safety Alert: I had no idea if this would work, and no idea if it would work for anyone else. I picked out sturdy looking glasses at the thrift store, so maybe they were sturdy or maybe I just got lucky. This might be really dangerous! But it worked perfectly. I stuck a cookie sheet in the oven, filled each glass and set it carefully on the sheet, and baked them for a bit longer than the recipe said (because they were each about the size of 2 or 3 cupcakes).

These are truly margarita cupcakes- there's tequila in the cake and the frosting (the cake is obviously cooked but the frosting is not), and the zest & juice of a million limes. I just bought 2 tiny bottles of tequila from the corner store, using the darker tequila in the cake and the lighter in the frosting. Why? Whim. When I use my darling but far-from-industrial-strength mixer, buttercream never comes together perfectly. It was a bit more wet than fluffy, but it tasted sooooo good. I spread a thin layer on the top of each cake, mixed together lime zest, sugar, and kosher salt, and made a "salted rim" on the outer edge of the frosting.

 
Since I was taking these to a surprise party, I wrapped each in cellophane and tied on uber-cheap green ribbon from the dollar store.

 

 
And then put each one in a sparkly hologram clashing green gift bag from the dollar store, threw in some crinkle-cut paper "easter grass", and tied on a compostable fork (just in case). Still, something's missing...

 

 

Of course, glitter tattoos and skull stickers for all, from the quarter-machines at the corner of Valencia & 16th. Possibly the most wholesome tequila-&-tattoos birthday celebration ever.

You Can Take The Girl Out Of The Mission...

 
...But you're going to want to get her back there as soon as possible.

If you can swing it, I highly recommend living at one end of the Mission while one of your favorite people in the world lives at the other end. Over the years, Crystal & I had coffee, whiskey, and burritos at every possible spot between our two apartments (well, all the spots we liked), hit every garage sale and dollar store, analyzed the openings & closings of businesses, and had a damn good time. When she decided to move away last autumn, I was bravely excited for her, but so! sad! for myself. Her birthday was a'comin', so I wanted to make her a little piece of the Mission to take on her journey. We'd heard a rumor that there were no burritos in Seattle, so I was concerned.

But what?

 
A lowrider, of course. Before I started terrorizing the Mission with Crystal, I was completely oblivious to the existence of lowriders (and cars in general, really). But she loves them and would point out her favorites. One sunny day we were sitting in a dark bar, and she pointed out the door: "Look.." There, waiting at the light, was a burgundy lowrider with an orange...roof, would you call it? and a cool orange painted squiggle. It was niiiiiiiiiice. Once I'd decided to embroider a lowrider for her, I knew that color combination was the one. But, I couldn't remember quite what a lowrider, you know, looked like, so I did an image search. Nothing useful, nothing inspiring. Pouting. Then, I searched for "sweet lowrider" and learned, once again, to ask for what I really want. The image I based my drawing/stitching on was titled, "Sweet lowriders need gas too". Indeed. I printed the image in black & white, loosely traced it onto the linen to get the proportions right, and sewed it up! That orange squiggle was the hardest part. Embroidering a cool-as-hell squiggle is not ideal, perhaps, and it didn't turn out cool-as-hell as I would have liked. The next one- to celebrate Crystal's recent homecoming, perhaps?- will be sweeter.

 

 

 

 

 

Did you know the French word for acorn is "gland"? We totally won this one, French!

 

As you might be able to tell from the light in these photos, I made some little autumn thank-you cards very, very early this morning. Well, not very very early, but early for a project to have been completed by me. I passed out with a fever last night at 8pm, which meant I was awake this morning...before 5! Took a few naps, daydreamed, watched the sky brighten, made tea, made cards.

Note to my boss, an adorably loyal reader: I did not stay home sick to make acorn cards. There are just only so many naps one girl can take.

 

I carved the acorn stamp, and made a few cards with the "thank you" written with various pens, but decided a darling acorn wouldn't talk in my gangly handwriting. Right? Totally. But then!- not only was I able to find my old letter-stamp kit from Sue, I found all the necessary letters, which are teeeeeeeny, and scattered throughout my craft supplies.

 

And here are my acorn-people sketches. And a mermaid. And the words "damnit" and "come on", I believe provoked by the fact that I couldn't seem to draw a stick. But those are good eyelashes, right?

Overall, a good morning for a feverish girl, made even better by this tribute to acorns. I take back my previous statements: I'd love to have White Stripes matryoshkas.

Homeward Bound

I made this stamp for my parents months ago, very early on in my stamp infatuation. I gift-wrapped it, packed it carefully, and mailed it off, only to have it returned weeks later through some mysterious postal service portal. I've just held onto it ever since, feeling superstitiously that it shouldn't be mailed. All very dramatic, I know. But soon I'll be able to give it to them in person, hoping that my humble rendition of their lovely home can somehow thank them for saving me again, and again, and again.

Maybe they'll even like their stamp so much they'll take me to The Chicago Diner, Bleeding Heart Bakery, and Wishbone while I'm in town. Ooh, and Handlebar- Bell's beer, vegan samosas, and cuties on bikes... Chicago, you know I love you.

Let's just get all the cakes out of the way right now.

Another little embroidered cake from the archives, made a few years ago for a friend who makes cakes based on her paintings, & vice versa. The original cake can be seen here- don't you just love that magical little city (mountain range?) on top? I picked this cake partly for the amazing combination of white-red-yellow-pink-brown, and partly/mostly because I will sew anything if I get to do French knots. What's cuter than a perky little dinner-roll-like bundle of thread?

I got hooked on French knots after seeing the nutty amounts of them being cranked out over at Posie gets Cozy, like on this pillowcase, or this pillow. I still aspire to do some project requiring thousands of French knots, but haven't come up with anything yet. Any ideas? Please help! French knots are my anti-drug!

There's a nice tutorial from the Purl Bee, if you'd like to be as nerdy as I am...

Hold the phone. I was already to hit "Publish", when I remembered What I Hate About French Knots! They're like... remember how Christmas lights used to be wired in series, so if one burnt out all the rest went out, too, and the magic was over? Well, that's how French knots work. There you are, just knottin' along, gettin' cozy with some Austen- Keira! Gwyneth! Aishwarya! Alicia!- and you couldn't be happier. But then, one of your knots is wonky, or too loose, or the thread gets stuck, and you can't just cut it off because they're freakin' sewn in series! What are you supposed to do? Start from scratch?

Hmmm... As always, there's a good chance I'm doing this all wrong. Though I directed you to a tutorial, I didn't actually read it. Everything I know about sewing I learned from a little free-with-embroidery-floss pamphlet from 1939. I love it, and I'm stickin' with it.

Cakes of Grey

You know you have the perfect job (pastry assistant) when you read pastry books on your lunch break (current reads: the not-as-naughty-as-you-think-it-will-be-if you're-not-paying-attention-to-spelling Dessert Fourplay, and the deliciously wholesome Good to the Grain) and draw pastries when you get home.

I love the honeymoon phase of a new job! Comin' in early, stayin' late, being a super-nerd.... And the nice part is that the love affair with a good job doesn't crash & burn after the honeymoon- it matures, and deepens. And maybe, eventually, you even get good at the job and don't spill so much or make the wrong cake recipe!

 

One day we were talking about a dessert based on Luc Tuyman's St. Valentine, and the challenges involved in avoiding ending up with a grey cake. But I think I'm pro-grey cake! I'm not sure, since I've never had the chance to eat one, but a delicate cloudy gray cake might be lovely.

Or super-gross. Probably gross. I'm new at this.

So I started drawing grey cakes, realizing once again that I don't have a lot of bright ideas about how cakes should be decorated. Dots & flowers & swags: that's pretty much all I've got. 

Cakes are happening around here.

I've been so busy at my new-la-la job, there's been no time to think of a project to do, let alone, like, do it. And take pictures of it, & write about it, and maybe even come up with a zippy title.

Hmmm...maybe it's not the lack of time that's the issue, but the fact that my brain is all used up learning all new thrilling things! Today was my second day, and when I got home I showered, ate a family-size salad, and watched approximately 14 episodes of Arrested Development, 30 Rock, & NewsRadio. That's it. 

So, here's a little cake-in-the-meantime. Last year I had a great plan to embroider cakes for all my little baby cousins' birthdays. Such a sweet idea, I know. Of course, this is the only one that was ever finished, for Megan, daintiest of fairy queens.

And these were the sketches I started with, which are really making me want to draw some more cakes. I think I stopped making birthday-embroideries because I couldn't think of cool enough ways to doll up cakes. That seems inexcusably lame. I'm on it!

Not just Rory's teacher/Lorelai's former fiance

I have never ever been the type to call people by their last names, but for some reason the magical Ms. Medina is simply "Medina" to me, about 60% of the time. Yesterday was her birthday, and I thought perhaps she needed a signature stamp, a sort of calling card, a feminine, poppy-red version of Zorro's "Z". Watch out, San Francisco!

The shavings you see here are only from the final detailing. A much bigger mess was made.

Medina is one of those rare women who can wear a bright red flower in her hair and have it look almost understated, and just exactly right. Gorgeous. I love Medina, I love poppies, poppies are magic: there you have it, the entire creative process. I was especially inspired by this amazing poppy wallpaper from Plants and Their Application to Ornament. This is a recognizable poppy, right? I saw so many poppy illustrations that were just roses with seed pods stuck on- sacrilege!

I also brought the birthday girl the ingredients for her brand-new signature cocktail...

La Medina!

-1 part Columbia Gorge Organic Cranberry Raspberry Juice

-2 or 3 parts Champagne (you know, sparkling white wine)

-Pretty glasses

Um, that's it!

Happy Birthday, Medina! You get mas picante every year.