Starry Sky Ranch

Gluten/Grain Free Christmas

I had three different women close to me enter this past holiday season unable to indulge in the treats they normally would have made this time of year. One newly diagnosed celiac.  If you find yourself in a similar situation you might able to try a few of the recipes we enjoyed. 

Coconut macaroons are a standby here. Made without condensed milk or flour they are crunchy/chewy and keep well.  I melted some compliant chocolate chips and drizzled over the tops. 

Next up was a childhood fave, jello meringue cookies.  Now listen. I am not even going to try to pass these off as health food.  I'm just saying they are grain, starch, and dairy free and brought back childhood memories.  They are a standard meringue cookie made with whatever flavor jello you like and we add mini chocolate chips.  For my newly gluten free friends - you can eat 'em.  

It isn't Christmas here without some peanut butter/chocolate cookie.  Sugar Free Mom has a great Reese's cup knock off. You can also make a chocolate kiss type cookie using the Three ingredient peanut butter cookie recipe all over online.  I use a different nut butter and Swerve or similar for the sweetener.

Snowballs are a family tradition here that are easily adapted.  

No flour? No sugar? No problem.  There are work arounds.  (I used sugar substitutes for all these fwiw) They are still treats and meant for special occasions, but it is encouraging how many people have experimented and perfected alternative options. Sugar Free Mom linked above is a new absolute favorite resource. 

disclaimer - we ate every dang one and I didn't do pics so will send you along to the original websites

Rubber Chicken, a penny pincher

photo: foodnetwork.com

The food budget gets away from me if I am not vigilant about it.  I have making an effort to be more proactive once more.  Recipes abound in fall/winter for all the holiday meals that happen this time of year.  You know what else appears?  Cheap turkey.  You can often find it less than a dollar a pound. If you have the space, grab an extra or two.  If you have not read the Rubber Chicken story, hit that too.  

The idea of the rubber chicken is a multi day process that begins with a roast chicken dinner on day one.  The next day you clean the leftover chicken off the bone and add beans/rice/cheese or whatever else makes for a great burrito dinner.  Day three you put the carcass in the crockpot with veggies and a spoonful of vinegar to pull the minerals out of the bones.  You are rewarded with a collagen rich broth to freeze or you can add noodles and make a hearty soup.  For larger families, the Rubber Turkey works in the same way.  

For my next party trick I am considering investing in a pressure canner. (All American seems to be the front runner with friends.)  The freezer has a finite amount of space and is not terribly user friendly.  We will continue to make good use of it for sure but the idea of having prepared meat and beans is super appealing.  You can then take great advantage of these seasonal deals and stock your shelves for weeks or months to come.  2020 just reminded us why this is still a good idea in our modern age. 

 

June Daybook

Outside:

The rain has begun to fall regularly once more.  The bloom times are quite delayed at this altitude so we are just beginning to see the first spring flowers. The yard is our escape right now.  We have cut down dead trees, uncovered a retaining wall, sanded and stained our wood patio set, and hung more lights over the deck.  I use 'we' loosely.  I have been mostly applauding and advising and enjoying the fruits of their labor.  

From the kitchen:

Pizza Stuffed Pepper casserole from Cleanfoodcrush was a hit.  It was even better for breakfast the next day with eggs.  She has a tuna stuffed pepper recipe that may be on the menu for Ember Days this week. 

Liturgical living:

Yesterday was the Feast of the Pentecost. I love how things come together when we really immerse ourselves in a lit based lifestyle.  Today we had this passage in The Courtship of Miles Standish where the recently spurned Captain insists the only tongue that will be understood is "the tongue of fire that speaks from the mouth of the cannon!" The elder of the community, "the one voice of peace," responds:

"Not so thought Saint Paul, nor yet the other Apostles;
Not from the cannon's mouth were the tongues of fire they spake with!"

Ember Days as mentioned above are this Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday. They are a time to acknowledge the changing of the seasons, to fast and pray for the one that is beginning.  It seems a particularly good idea right now. 

From the learning room:

Along with working through the last epic poem in our Longfellow volume, we have reached the Punic Wars in our history reading.  We covered The Big Three in Greece.  

and Alexander the Great

and his struggle with The Gordian knot also summed up by Phineas and Ferb.

Reading: 

The library is now open for curbside pickup.  Given our current crisis we are working through many books on civil rights, diversity in general, and the history of nonviolent protest. We have pulled from lists from my Pinterest board. We just try to keep listening to each other's stories and consider new perspectives.

Creating:

Tess finished the last skirt and now we need to order more fabric.  

 

Thinking about:

So often the saints' words are a sign of contradiction.  They fly in the face of our first instincts. They make me pause and consider.  I am pausing and considering these words of St Therese and how often I lack that peace that she insists comes from letting of my need to defend.  It's pride, really. What if someone has a completely faulty impression of me?  What if?  

It's ok.

 It needs to ultimately just be ok. It is inevitable after all.  Of course, the flip side is remembering we are just as wrong about other people more often than we suspect.  

"Why should we defend ourselves when we are misunderstood and misjudged? Let us leave that aside. Let us not say anything. It us so sweet to let others judge us any way they like. O Blessed silence which gives so much peace to the soul."  - St Therese of Lisieux

Dutch Baby

Our phones were upgraded last week.  I was expecting this to be a non-event for me, other than taking the plunge to the larger screen.  I long ago gave up taking photos on my old phone.  They were bad from the day I got it.  My pleasant surprise this past week has been the phone camera. It works!  It works well!  Such a blessing for documenting on the go.  And that's just what I did when this young man wanted to try a new recipe today - Apple Dutch Baby Pancakes

He did a great job and actually caught my recipe reading errors before they became recipe making errors.  (And yes those are repurposed protein powder tubs up there.) 

Food Prep

While my guys were tackling a deck repair the other day I ended up getting some work done ahead in the kitchen.  Big project of the day was getting some dressing and ghee made.  Aidan had mentioned In and Out sauce a few days earlier so I made up a copycat batch.   We also knocked out some Paleo ranch which I feel I cannot live without from this day forward.  Disclosure - husband liked it better as a dip than a dressing due to the dill. Say that three times fast.  And finally - the ghee.  Big new here is that it WORKED.  I couldn't seem to get all the milk solids out last time around.  Will say it took a lot longer than any of the recipes suggested but look at that.  Liquid gold.  

We made a double batch of Buffalo Chicken Stuffed Spaghetti Squash.  Oh my word.  With the ranch?  So good.  Daughter and husband crumbled bleu cheese over theirs.  Truly a hit.  It did make a LOT though so plan accordingly.  For the record, it's even better the second day for leftovers. 

I made broccoli soup to go with.  It was also even better as a leftover.  Everyone liked it.  Almost everyone.  Not this one....

There's one in every crowd.  Note to self: have cheddar handy next time.  

Star Spangled Summer Studies

That sounded catchy. It's actually far more impromptu and serendipitous than thoroughly preplanned, however it has come together so nicely.  First, it's hot.  Just blasted hot. Second, September is starting to fill up with fun travel plans.  So we jointly decided to do some projects now while we are otherwise melting and will have a head start on the autumn semester which is always full to the brim.  

True to form this idea occured to me AFTER the 4th.  Since the unit study police don't actually exist we are making a whole patriotic month of it over here.  This is part of our stack this week:

top

King George

Which led me to read up on George III and Charlotte and their fifteen fine children.  And porphyria and whether or not he had it.  

To pull all the separate 'real' books together I have my new favorite ever notebook book.  I may have been so gaga over this series I bought them all.  They are something like ten bucks at Amazon right now and I am kicking myself for getting mine at B&N but I couldn't stop myself.  Years ago - TEN years ago now when I was in perptual motion all day with tiny people - I wrote about guerilla homeschooling.  This series makes it super feasible to do that.  They give you a broad overview of the topics and general skills your students should have mastered when they leave middle school.  The pages are laid out exactly like a bullet journal type of notebook you might have put together yourself.  I'm in lesson planning heaven.  

 

The middle schoolers are making this interactive notebook (pssst its free) and sort of crazy over the whole thing.  They balked at writing essays about the era, but then complained they were running out of room to put aaaaaaall the cool information they had in their notebooks.  That second one is an awesome problem to have as a teacher though.  It is helping them learn to distill all that fabulous information to the main points.

They are adding their own maps and things. This was inspired by a page in their book. (linked above) 

An art project "in the spirit of" from here.  More American symbol art lessons and more American Revolution projects here. 

Abbie is working on some latin and English notebook pages: 

There has been a LOT of cooking happening - which involves a whole bunch of math and direction following.  Here is a July dessert that has no redeeming virtues other than it's color coordination and fun factor.  Pioneer Woman's Holiday book as a variation on this recipe which we used.  

So that's how July has been shaping up.  Summer school this year - which I usually only recommend if you are getting nice restful breaks throughout the main part of the year which we do have.  
 

So.  Much.  Fun!

 

The Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie?

 

That's what my family says so far.  We unloaded another load of landscaping dirt tonight.  The girls thought that called for dessert and knew exactly which one would be best.  "The Cook's Illustrated recipe?" I asked.  "No! Alannah's are the best, Mom," they replied.  So we asked Alannah for her recipe.  She says, "Oh, it's in the Cook's Illustrated cookbook." 

Boom. 

I helped brown the butter and confirm the doubled measurements and they did all the rest, which is my favorite.  Turned out as perfectly crunch-chewy as they hoped.  The boys are probably downstairs snooping through freezer and pantry for the extras we hid as we speak.  

 

anticipation

"The next day, the second day of December, we all, even John, even Daddy when he got home from the office, made Christmas cookies."

- The Twenty-four Days Before Christmas

My favorite line comes a few pages later, however.  "After school Mother discovered we'd eaten up all the first batch of Christmas cookies, so we made more."  

Because that happens too, we will be having several such days between now and Christmas.  #readingthroughadvent

Best-tasting cookie icing here

 

Almost December Daybook

Outside:  The rich autumn reds and oranges we were blessed to enjoy so long have been blanketed with beautiful snow cover all week. We need the moisture and I just plain love the snow.  Then again I loved the leaves.  It's a beautiful world, period.

 Around the house: We moved all the furniture and dozens of books from the family room/school room. (hundreds? thousands? millions?  probably not, it just felt that way.)  When we pulled up the carpet we noticed some concrete irregularities and panicked a little.  Ok I panicked a lot.  We have had enough disaster in our residential history to warrant panic.  However the contracter who came out assured us all was well and to carry on.  That we did.  We are now nearly halfway to a new floor.  It is transforming an 80's basement to a clean open farmhouse space.  That might be more in my big picture vision than in actuality at this moment but the promise is there.  The boys are learning so much working on this project. They have painted and cut out vents and trimmed edging.  Real life work.

Note to self: get the leaves and pumpkins rounded up today.  

Wearing: Snow gear per above.  I need to buy some more waterproof gloves soon.  The first snow always surprises us.  In other wardrobe news we have ordered the girls' dresses for the wedding. I am probably late on the game but working on mine.  An unrelated note - Elizabeth Broadbent wrote this essay about dressing your kids in secondhand clothes which resonated with me.   I heart thrift shops.  

In the kitchen: lots of veggies.  Someone here, who isn't me, had a 'midcentury' physical and is motivated to jump on the veggie train with me. This one was good.  Roasted brussels sprouts and butternut squash and onion.  Toss in pomegranate seeds or craisins afterwards.  

Listening to:  Christmas music on the piano.  All day.  Every day.  Carols.  It's a wonderful thing though to have a houseful of piano students again.  Their instructor gave them a new Christmas music fun book and Tess especially has been all over it. 

On an unrelated random note,  driving home home last night I was listening to Simon and Garfunkel's America.  In the dark, as the music was playing, I was 16 again, right back in an apartment in Italy listening to that album playing on a turntable and soooo terribly homesick.  Missing a boy with all my heart.  (dear reader, I married him)  So funny how music can transport you not just to a place but to the very emotions that enveloped you at that moment.   Another random note - the song was written in '68.  So basically it's almost as old as I am, which doesn't feel as old as it sounds when I say it.  Not at all. 

Creating: We are busy making Christmas gifts.  Trying to aim low and finish a few.  The guys packed up the sewing machine and many of the craft supplies so we are working with a limited cache of tools at the moment.  Abbie was given a bracelet making kit for her birthday.  Her big sister helped the girls make a ton of them over the weekend.  

Abbie's bells and whistles party didn't materialize.  Because, life.  We decided to make a gingerbread house together instead.  

Reading:  My time has not been my own lately.  Every time it seemed as though moments were going to open up to grab my book they have been taken up with other work.  However we finished a huge chunk of our fall reading list and are happily diving into advent and Christmas books. (see right sidebar)  Today we will at least begin 24 Days Before Christmas.  This was our first introduction to Madeleine L'Engle and the Austin family.  In this slim volume we follow the family's gentle approach to holiday preparation.  Each day Mrs. Austin puts up a little bit of cheer, usually homemade.  Some foil ornaments.  A door wreath.  A batch of cookies.  Without even realizing it you fall into step with her as the days draw nearer.  I am so looking forward to sharing it with the youngest of our family and hope this will help to set the pace for our own advent.  

Coincidentally, a friend shared this short essay on L'Engle this week.  She captures the purpose and role that art plays so well, 

"To try to talk about art and about Christianity is for me one and the same thing, and it means attempting to share the meaning of my life, what gives it, for me, its tragedy and its glory."

 

of cakes and company during election week

It has been a full week, even removing the election from the mix.  Saturday was a work day in house and yard, at least after one midday soccer game.  LOTS of weeding and leaf bagging and cleaning.  We had overnight guests on Sunday which was wonderful.  So good to visit even for a short time and I love a full house.  The kids helped set up bedrooms and we made a big vat of chili to serve with baked potatoes after church. 

Monday and Tuesday were challenging from start to finish.  My husband was hosting his work unit at our place for their fall morale day on Wednesday. This is our second year so I had a good idea of what we needed to do though our basement remodel has kept things a bit off kilter around the house.  We planned our part of the menu and cleaned as usual.  In the middle of it Monday it seemed to me a good time to empty our clown car pantry and closet and deep clean them.  Why I don't know but they are super tidy now.  

On Tuesday the girls and I headed to the library to vote and return books. Afterwards we went to the thrift store and found some finishing touches for our party tables  - baskets and tablecloths in rich fall plaids.  With what seemed like mounting momentum we headed to Walmart to make a return and buy the rest of the party supplies and ingredients.  

I was feeling ON TOP of my game at that point.  Like, oozing good citizenship and hospitality prep.  However right there in the craft aisle getting some raffia to tie onto a vase I noticed my vision going.  As in away.  Migraine aura was starting.  Not good not good not good.  Not at Walmart where there is no escape from flourescent lighting and no one with a drivers license with me.  I've had enough of these to know how long we had before the aura passed and the pain hit.  Probably a half hour for the one and up to an hour for the other.  So I soldiered on.  Tess read my list and we managed to load the cart between us.  Fortunately most of mankind was out voting so we at least had a near empty store.  When all was clear we headed home and the boys unloaded.  I went to bed.  

Fortunately the pain was not debilitating and prep could resume a few hours later.  By then election anticipation was reaching a fevered pitch.  The rest of the house was glued to the set. (Do we still say 'set?' That's TV anyway.)  I was rather detached from the whole thing, probably due to the sorta surreal post-migraine haze.  I hit the kitchen to begin the first of the two cakes we intended to make, which was the original point of the post.

 Oh how I do ramble. It's worse in person where you can't click away. 

So cake one was a Pumpkin cream cheese bundt.  I was very pleased with this one though it did take a while. And we misplaced the pastry bag when we cleaned the pantry so the topping is.... like it is.   My election guys shuffled back and forth updating me.  When the cake and cleanup was done it was after 11pm and still no verdict.  Knowing the day we had ahead of us it didn't seem as though agonizing all night would be a good idea so I went to bed.  Even shut the door.  Done. 

I must have been pretty darn done because I woke up having slept straight through and reached for the phone in the morning to see what had happened.  And then?  I got dressed, tied on an apron and made another cake because my job description was not one of those that had changed overnight.  In times of upheaval some of the most constructive things a person can do are the everyday familiar things we always do - plunge our hands into soapy water, mix up batter, run a mop, set a timer, arrange a vase of flowers, light some candles. Those are the things I did.

And made a Cider Cake with Butterscotch Bourbon Glaze, which I realized too late was not the pinned recipe I intended to make, but was already committed.   Not that it wasn't good.  By all accounts it was.  Either it was post migraine haze or the recipe was really confusing.  There were measures of sugar divided, but then only one direction for sugar usage.  Or mention of 'add remaining' such and such but we hadn't used any of that item prior.  Being NOT the world's most gifted baker I read and reread to catch my error and couldn't tell you now where it lies - recipe or me.  (odds are on me)  Someone make the darned cake and either set me straight or validate my confusion if you will. Long story shorter, it was an intellectual challenge of sorts which I enjoyed.  Employed some new skills and techniques and would likely have been perfect if I had set my oven properly and not to convection.  Because I do things like this.  

Just want to pause to add here that when my ballot was filled out I was, in fact, completely coherent lol.  I vote better than I bake.  

Anyway, the world continues to spin loudly and sometimes precariously outside these walls. Over here we have baked and scoured the junk shop and read books and opened our doors to over three dozen people of all different walks of life this week.  It's been wonderful.  As my friend MacBeth says, "Humans are very nice close up." Our home has been one of the best places for us to love and serve them. I feel very fortunate to have been able to spread a little warm and happy in what has sometimes been a very not that season.