Columbus Weekend & Chocolatey Vegan Goodies

crazy mural on the side of our building

Our wonderful, wonderful friends drove all the way from Toronto to visit D and I this past weekend (it was great to see you guys!) The weather was absolutely perfect for lots of walking, and we had a fun-filled few days of packed Columbus action. Maybe I can convince them to move here to keep me company. Almost all the photos in this post are courtesy of my uberawesome friend M, who, in addition to being a talented graphic designer/artist/painter, has got some maddeningly great photography skills.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies (made with tofu, soymilk and applesauce!!)

Friday I spent the day baking some vegan goodies to keep people well-energized (well-sugared) throughout the weekend. What I love about reading other peoples blogs is not only do you share common interests but you are also introduced to things you may not have tried yourself. And there are many talented knitters/bakers out there. I saw the cookies on the brown sheep's blog and from there, I was able to link to a whole other world of vegan delights. Cookie recipe is linked above - I subbed all-purpose flour because I couldn't find any whole wheat pastry flour, and I also found that it yielded about 70 or so large heaping teaspoon-sizes cookies, not 50 like it claimed. The more the better I guess. We ate them for breakfast, snacks, lunch, and dinner.

I also found this recipe for yummy chocolate cupcakes made with soymilk that produced moist, chocolatey dense cupcakes. I might start using this recipe even for non-vegans, that's how good they were. Unfortunately I didn't have enough icing sugar to make frosting, so they were not as pretty, but everyone agreed they tasted good plain. My friends are easy to please.

i have holes because jenny used a toothpick to get me out of the pan

We started Saturday at the North Market where T chatted it up with one of the Amish farmers.

walking to the North Market

mozart's bakery

(He had some kooky stories about chickens and frogs in his bed after a flood)

After a quick lunch (where we were serenaded by members of the Columbus Opera), we strolled through Goodale Park...

what's that in the pond?

Then we headed north through Victorian Village and walked all the way to OSU campus.

pretty ducks in the pond by D's office building

While on campus, we went to the William Wegman exhibit at the Wexner Center which was really good - definitely something we will take D's parents to when they visit next weekend. It's free admission and on until early December, so go while you can.

In the evening, we had a dinner at Dragonfly NeoV (delicious vegan cuisine) and went to the Gallery Hop in the Short North. A long but very productive day of tourism.

Sunday started with brunch buffet at Union Cafe, then a trip to the Columbus Zoo and a quick visit to Trader Joe's. The zoo was awesome. My favourites included the discovery aquarium with some of the biggest tropical fish I'd ever seen, including a unicorn fish. This tank was massive, probably about 10 feet tall. We were lucky to see feeding time, where a zookeeper in scuba gear got in the tank and walked around to feed the fish. The tiger and gorilla exhibits were great too, especially the indoor portions with plexiglass walls that let the animals come right up to you. Who knew Columbus had so many places to see? Having visitors is a great way to experience things you may not otherwise try.

i am a magical unicorn fish

N and T made us all a delicious dinner at home...maybe because I whinged about missing Mrs. T's homecooking they had on Friday evening. D.e.l.i.c.i.o.u.s. You guys are the best cooks ever!

aren't the hosts supposed to cook the dinner? instead they drink purple moon and pumpkin beer

And to leave you with a little knitting, here is Mr. Bear with his finished features, and Mr. Mini Bear too. The yarn is sportweight Misti Alpaca held doubled throughout - I bought two skeins and had enough leftover to make this tiny guy. This is for a friend's birthday, who will receive the little guys in a couple weeks.

i am mr. bear, this is my mini-me

And one last crazy cat picture.

gatsby looking like the devil

The Perfect Baguette: Part II

The baguette-making continues. Yesterday I tried out another recipe for authentic French baguette from the book French Women Don't Get Fat. The author began making her own baguettes after moving to the US from Paris and being unable to find a decent baguette. I guess this is a more common problem than one thinks. She goes on to write how dead easy it is to make a good baguette, and that people have this mislead belief that bread-making is incredibly difficult hard work. Sounds good to me. I was hopeful that another French recipe would yield a tasty, crusty, chewy stick (and no, this was not a diet recipe).

The ingrediants were all purpose flour, active dry yeast, warm water, salt, and egg wash. I mixed the yeast with water this time (according to the recipe) and let it sit 10 minutes. Then it went into a bowl with the flour, salt and more warm water and yielded a gooey dough. My only complaint about the recipe at this point was that it called for "4-5 cups of all purpose flour" without any further explanation for how to decide the final quantity. I went with 4.5 cups.

I kneaded for about 20 minutes even though her recipe said 6-10 minutes (but by machine) and passed the windowpane test. Now, this is where I think I'm having some bread problems. After about an hour of rising, my dough was only slightly risen, definitely not doubled. I think I'm doing something wrong with the yeast, but then again, I was trying to follow the recipe.

Then I shaped the dough into baguette-like loaves and was pleased to see them cooperate somewhat on the second rising (remember last time they failed to rise whatsoever). I skipped the egg wash and just brushed with water, and used scissors for slashing - not so pretty, but at least they had slash marks. The actual baking was done at a lower temperature (450 F) than the first recipe I used and called for a pan of hot water to be placed next to the bread.


Overall, not a bad bread! It was lacking a bit in the golden colour and chewiness department, but was quite tasty and crusty even though it didn't look as nice as the first batch. This time I remembered to double my cookie sheets and grease them (thanks Hazel) so I wouldn't have burnt and stuck bottoms. I think next time I will put a little sugar in the yeast (4 people have now suggested this to me, who knew that this was common knowledge), bake it at a higher temperature, and use more spraying in the first few minutes in the oven.

Now if we can just hurry up and eat this batch so I can do batch #3! The good news is that we have lots of visitors coming in the next while, so they can help eat through all the trials (I am excited about their visit for other reasons too, but those are not relevant to this blog). I have been eating nutella baguettewiches for the past two days...yummy!

Happy Hallowe'en!

Amish Weekend

Back from our first road trip! The weather was fantastic and made for a beautiful autumny experience. On Saturday we visited the towns of Sugarcreek, Walnut Creek, and Bolivar and met some lovely people along the way. First we stopped by the Sugarcreek Artisan's Mercantile (and town gym) and received some suggestions for how to spend our day. We went to the Alpine Hills Museum and had an authentic Amish meal at Beachy's Restaurant. After, we took a tour of an old working Amish home and ate some delicious fry-pies..mmm. There was a newborn baby horse - apparently no one knew she had been pregnant! There were some cute donkeys, sheep, Shetland ponies and piggies too.

Some fabric from an Amish quilt shop:

Yesterday I stopped in Joann's to pick up a couple of supplies, and an hour later, walked out with some mini alphabet stamps, textile paint, 2 yds of muslin, a walking foot for my sewing machine, and some quilt batting. That store is so overwhelming. I wandered aimlessly around the quilting section thinking I'd like to buy some quilting cotton, but had to give up because I didn't know how much and what colours I wanted to buy. Even after one settles on a colour theme, there are endless prints and patterns to select from. My anxiety dissipated as soon as I left the area.

The stamps were inspired by Whispering Pine's wonderful crafts - her attention to detail is incredible and her projects are so professional and classic. Although I don't know what I'll be stamping just yet, having these stamps make me feel like I too, can create similar wonderfully detailed crafts. What's silly is that I already owned some alphabet stamps but sold them at my yard sale thinking I would never use them again. I was wrong. Every crafter needs a set of alphabet stamps.

As if I don't already have enough hobbies, I am going to give quilting (basic basic quilting, it may not even involve joining two different fabrics together) a whirl. The foot and quilt materials are for the coaster project from Joelle Hoverson's new Last Minute Patchwork & Quilted Gifts book.

Not sure when I'll get to start this though, as I'd like to finish a few more projects I started earlier (second apron, jacket, monkey socks. . . the list is embarassingly long). Happy crafting!

Crafty Update

Finally, the weekend! This weekend will be especially fun because it happens to be Road Trip #1. A while ago I purchased Neil Zurcher's Ohio Road Trips and have been wanting to do a little exploring. Starting with central-ish (I think) Ohio, we will be visiting the Tuscarawas region and stopping in Sugarcreek, Dover, Bolivar, and whereever else catches our eye. This entire area is also home to Ohio's largest Amish population, and producer of a ton of Swiss cheese. Should be very interesting.

Onto knitticraftiness: It has been a crafty few days so I've got a few photos to share. First off, I made yet another bear from LMKG - they are just so cute. You can never make too many of these. It still needs facial details, but it's almost done. I love its pudgy arms and legs. Gatsby was suspicious at first, but soon converted to a bear-cuddler:


What a helpful photography assistant. I think he's giving me a dirty look.


The jacket is slowly coming along. It has been abandoned many times for smaller, quicker knits, but I managed to start a sleeve...

I also baked a cake on Thursday, but was rather uninspired, and ended up just using the flower candies I had made last time. Actually, this cake went through several disasters including having to remove some ugly hot pink roses from the centre. That's why there is a large mound of purple in the middle - to hide the ugly mistake. The cake was unfortunately a bit of a mess on the inside (I broke both layers) too, so hopefully the taste makes up for the interior ugliness. It's a nice bright lemony cake inside...yum!

And I finished the crown of the Koolhaus Hat:

Have a good weekend!

Koolhaas Hat

This is a common thing that happens - I get sidetracked and start casting on for new projects, and soon end up with all these half-knitted objects lying everywhere around the house. But when I saw this cool hat designed by the talented Mr. Brooklyn Tweed, I couldn't resist making it. So last Friday I stopped by the Yarn Shop on Kenny Road and picked up a couple balls of worsted weight wool for this little side project (it's not quite done, but close enough):

Pattern: Koolhaas Hat
Source: Interweave Knits, Holiday Gifts 2007
Yarn: Reynolds Kids Play Time, a little more than 1 skein
Needles: US 7 and 8

Aside from knitting, I had dinner at Bluefish on Friday night, did a little shopping and stopped by Whole Foods on Saturday, and then checked out a punk band at Skully's - a loud and interesting night. This started us on the topic of making more of an effort to experience more arts and culture - including some day trips to explore Ohio's nearby towns!

The Perfect Baguette: Part I

Since we arrived in Columbus, D and I have been unable to find ourselves a decent baguette. Who knew it would be so difficult? They were everywhere in Toronto and we took them for granted. I would say my favourite baguette was from Ace Bakery - delicious golden crusty chewy goodness on the outside, chewy and bubbly on the inside, so good that you have to tear off a hunk and eat it before you get home. Yum.

I'm not a bread expert in any way (although I am sounding like a baguette snob, oh well) but there is a specific texture and taste that a good baguette is supposed to have. If you like reading about food, you should read Jeffrey Steingarten - he has a fun chapter about baguettes in one of his books (I can't remember which one, but his writing makes my mouth water for foods I have never even heard of. That's how good it is).

I've sampled several Columbus baguettes now and am getting the impression that the mid-west is not somewhere that likes anything other than soft, fluffy bread. Supermarkets sell something they like to call a 'french baguette' which is more like a long, glorified dinner roll (pale and undercooked, sad sad bread). Then we tried one from the North Market, which was better, but still not Ace. It was flavourful but too crusty and too fluffy. Then last week, I bought one from Whole Foods Market thinking it would be close to the real thing, but it was just a bit better than the first supermarket one. Maybe there is a delicious baguette in Columbus that we haven't found yet, and if you know of one please tell me. In the meantime, I got tired of searching and decided to taken it upon myself to learn how to make one. D's sister always raves about homemade bread, and last winter D's mom started making her own bread too. Obviously it is going to take many attempts to become good at baguette-making, so here is my little tribute to food journalism, in the manner of Steingarten, my food writing hero.

For my first attempt, I decide to follow a simple recipe from a little book by Peter Mayle and Gerard Auzet because I am convinced that a French baker's recipe is the way to go, and am sold by the secret little 'inside tips' they offer throughout (like spraying your oven with water to promote good crust). I gather all my ingrediants and supplies:

Already I have a problem. He claims they use half all-purpose and half bread flour in the book, but then the recipe only refers to all-purpose flour. Maybe he means that the APF is really a mix of APF/BF. But when I check another recipe it actually lists both flours. What to do? I end up going with the 50/50 mix because of all the talk about this in the first half of the book.

Then I add yeast to the flour and salt and slowly add warm water, all of which I mix by hand. My arms are already aching. This already seems suspicious since most instant yeasts are supposed to be added to water to 'proof' before being combined with the dry ingrediants, but I overlook this fact because a) surely a French baker knows what he's doing and b) I am trying to follow a recipe correctly for once (D accuses me of not following the recipe when it actually matters). I am scared my bread won't rise.

The doughy mess sits for 10 minutes on the counter and now requires me to knead it for 15-20 minutes until it passes the 'windowpane' test, which is when the dough has developed enough glutens that when stretched, it doesn't break and allows light to pass through. I am learning that making bread by hand is really tiring. But a good workout for the shoulders. Thirty minutes later, I still haven't passed the windowpane test and I'm ready to lie down. I knead for 5 more minutes and just barely get my windowpane. Phew. Now we wait for the dough to rise:

Does it look doubled in volume to you? I don't think it will get any bigger, but at least I know the yeast is doing something.

At this time, D calls and needs a ride home from school. This gives me just enough time to cut the dough into four and shape them into batards. Once I return from picking up D, they should be about doubled in size:

Uh oh. They didn't move, so I guess the yeast stopped working. Does bread get bigger in the oven? These are going to be very baby sized baguettes. I carry on with the next step in the instructions, which involves creasing and rolling the dough into 15" long sticks:

I let them sit for another 35 minutes for the last rise, during which time my baguettes sadly remain the same size. At least I am following the recipe. The next part is to brush them with water and slash them 4-5 times across the top - trickier than it sounds. My knife drags through the dough and cannot seem to make a gash. I try again and the dough is looking more mangled every time, so I leave it. Now for the fun part. I drip water into the oven to create a nice steam room for my baguette:

And here they are! They don't get any bigger in the oven and look much more like thick breadsticks, however they do taste quite authentically baguetty. And there is a nice crust (I think the water trick worked). Two stuck to the pan completely and only their tops could be saved, but the recipe didn't say to flour or oil the pans so I don't see that as being my fault.

See the nice big holes? D thought they tasted better than any baguette we'd bought in Columbus so far, so this is a promising start (he later admitted that when he saw the four uncooked batards he was worried they would come out like rocks). Other than the abnormally small size, lack of slash marks and sticking to the pan, this wasn't a bad first try. At least the texture and flavour were good, which is what this whole venture was about. Next time, I'm going to mix the yeast and water first to see what happens.

Recycled Baby Onesies

All summer I'd been spotting cute and cool baby onesies popping up all over craft land, including one shop that was selling onesies made of recycled vintage T-shirts. They had some awesome ones made from old band shirts like the Ramones and Smiths. Unfortunately I was never much of a band-shirt wearer, so my selection for fabric was a bit more limited. I tried to raid D's closet but didn't get any good haul.

Here's a recycled tee onesie I made for baby M, who is a super cutie pie (her parents are ex-McGillites). I bought a basic baby clothes pattern and modified the closure, and used ready-made bias tape for the trim. The most challenging part, actually, was putting in the snaps - I didn't realize I needed to reinforce them with interfacing since their sharp metal teeth would weaken the fabric, so hopefully it will survive a few wearings. Babies grow so fast anyhow, so I'm sure she won't be wearing it for long.

And here are two more I made in a fit of enthusiasm:

I really need to find some more awesome t-shirts.

Knitting is sloowwwwly progressing. I've had to stop because I developed some rather uncomfortable neck and jaw aches (I seem to have trouble relaxing when I knit), but the front panels of the jacket are done, the shoulders are seamed, collar is done and now I am knitting a sleeve. I have been having increasing bouts of uncertainty as to my yarn choice for this jacket, and have been very tempted to rip out the whole thing a few times already because it's too drapey and the yarn would have been better suited for something like the Hourglass Sweater pattern. Oh well, I'm so far along now, I might as well finish and then judge how it looks.

D gave a big talk at school today and it went well, so we are off to have a quick drink to celebrate!