hopeful

We take St. Patrick's Day pretty seriously around here. In the old days, that meant a lot of loud Irish punk and some serious pub carousing. Now we settle for excessive amounts of green clothing, nothing but traditional Irish music on the iPod, and cold beverages in a can poured perfectly into pint glasses (see here) enjoyed from the comfort of our own couch. For the last few years, we've attended our church's St. Patrick's Day program, and this year we somehow landed ourselves on the planning committee. It was a blast - Irish stepdancing, snake hunts, cake walks, an appearance by St. Patrick. With all that on the agenda, we managed to talk my parents into coming down for the day...and they brought along my aunt, my eleven-year-old niece, and my eight-year-old nephew. My boys were completely surprised, and the day was subsequently even more fun than anticipated. There is nothing quite as exciting as a group of surprise visitors at the door, especially when the group includes cousins.

We started the day with St. Patrick's Day brunch. This recipe was soooo yummy, and really easy to throw together. I made the biscuits the night before so all I had to do when everyone arrived was warm the biscuits, fry up some eggs, and stack it all together. Yum. As written, the recipe makes 8 to 10 biscuits, but because you only use half a biscuit for each serving, you end up with a lot of extra biscuits. If you are serving a bigger crowd, just make more eggs. The ham is totally optional; use it if you like it, skip it if you don't. I opted to double the recipe and freeze lots of leftover biscuits; we had them for dinner tonight with baked potato soup and enjoyed them all over again.

In addition to tasting good, the biscuits are really pretty to look at. I did not manage to take a decent picture, but the one on the Betty Crocker website gives you a good idea.

It wouldn't be a holiday without a little custom applique...

Happy March!

St. Patrick's Day Biscuits
Adapted from Betty Crocker

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Makes 8-10 biscuits / 8 servings + leftover biscuits

1 package frozen creamed spinach, thawed
2 3/4 cups Bisquick mix
3/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp. ground mustard
2 Tbsp. butter
8 eggs
2 Tbsp. butter, softened
1/4 lb. sliced deli ham (optional)

1. Heat oven to 425 degrees.

2. In medium bowl, mix spinach, Bisquick, cheese, and ground mustard just until dry ingredients are moistened. It seems like you need to add liquid, but you really don't - there is enough in the spinach.

3. On a lightly floured work surface, knead dough eight to ten times. Pat to 3/4 inch thickness; cut with 3 inch round cutter. You should get 8-10 biscuits.

4. Place rounds one inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 13 to 16 minutes or until golden brown (can be done in advance).

5. In a nonstick skillet, fry eggs to desired consistency in butter. Season with salt and pepper.

6. Split 4 biscuits and spread cut sides with softened butter. Reserve extra biscuits for a later use.

7. Top each biscuit half with a slice of ham and one fried egg.

My husband Sean is not a fan of recipes; he is far too casual a cook to follow someone else's instructions. His favorite day to make dinner is the day when I look at the crossed-out list of meal options on the fridge and swear there is nothing to eat. He then opens the fridge, roots around, and comes up with something delicious and surprising.

While not a recipe guy, he is very much a technique guy. Most recently, he caught a video on chow.com about how to make the perfect chocolate chip cookie and decided he had to give it a try.

I concur. They were the best chocolate chip cookies I've ever had -- chewy and chocolatey and sweet and moist. They tasted best -- of course -- right out of the oven, but we had no trouble eating the rest after the boys went to bed. Don't judge; I know you do it too.



The recipe came from The Bon Appetit Cookbook, but Sean swears it is not the recipe but the techniques that made them so crazy good. Here are his specific tips:

• The eggs and the butter should be room temperature. You can speed the eggs along by putting them in a cup of warm water for about ten minutes.
• Use the whisk attachment on your stand mixer to beat the butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla. Beat it really well. Switch the whisk for the paddle attachment before adding the flour.
• Mix the flour in as minimally as possible - just until incorporated.
• The better the chocolate, the better the cookie. A no-brainer, but worth mentioning before you head to the store. Sean recommends using an equal amount of flour and chocolate chips. This makes really, really chocolatey cookies.
• Sean made our cookies extra big and thus adjusted the time accordingly. As a general rule, remove the cookies from the oven before they look completely done. You'll be glad you did.

Enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted from The Bon Appetit Cookbook
Makes about 30

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Nonstick vegetable oil spray
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup white sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
2 tsp. vanilla
3 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Spray a large rimmed baking sheet with spray.

Whisk flour, baking soda, and salt in medium bowl to blend. Set aside.

Using a stand mixer with the whisk attachment, beat butter until light and fluffy.  Add sugar and brown sugar; beat until well blended. Add eggs and vanilla; beat until creamy and well blended.

Switch whisk attachment for paddle attachment. Gradually add flour mixture, beating just until incorporated. Stir in chocolate chips.

Working in batches, drop dough by heaping tablespoonfuls onto prepared baking sheet, spacing three inches apart. Bake cookies until pale brown, about 15 minutes.  Cool 15 minutes on sheet. Transfer to racks to cool completely.

I taught myself to knit in the fall of 1997. I was in India on study abroad and, after three months spent with a large group of American students at a monastery in Bodh Gaya, found myself alone and very cold in the mountain town of Darjeeling for the independent study portion of the semester. After months of intense communal living, the solitude was somewhat comforting, and when I came across a shop that sold yarn and needles, I picked up a few supplies. A college friend had shown me the basics prior to this, so I was easily able to get started. I knit a scarf for my mother, who I was missing, and another for my then boyfriend, who I was missing as well. When it came time to cast off, I toted my project down to the front desk of the Tibetan guest house where I was staying and, without a common language, asked the Tibetan woman there who was often knitting to show me how. I can see her smile so clearly in my mind.


When I decided to join the Peace Corps a year and a half later, I once again found myself alone and very, very, very, very cold (I was assigned to northern Mongolia). I knit a lot. I mean like a crazy lot - I made my friends sweaters and scarves, mittens and hats. I constantly wrote home asking for more yarn, and I collected yarn on countryside visits (which is why I still have six skeins of scratchy camel wool under my bed waiting for a project). I mastered the art of knitting while reading at the same time, so I'd sit by my wood stove with needles in hand and a book balanced on my knees while outside temperatures hovered around -40 degrees. I spent months and months like this.

When I reflect retrospectively on my fifteen year relationship with yarn and needles, there's a theme that runs throughout; I seldom knit for myself. For me, knitting has always been a meditative act; there is something about the rhythm of moving two sticks and a length of yarn together that breeds a reflective quiet in my mind. I like to think of each stitch as a thought for the recipient, be it a distant friend or a soon-to-be-born baby. Okay, that is a bit overstated: there are plenty of times when I am on a timeline and just want the darn thing to be finished...but I'd like to think that the majority of my gifted projects are knit up with tiny little wishes worked into the stitches.

This long-winded introduction is to bring you up to date with my thoughts as of late. My wonderful and amazing mother had gastric bypass surgery last week, and I knew months ago that I wanted to make her an afghan to have around the house during her recovery. That does not mean that I had the wits about me to get started on a afghan months ago, however, so when it suddenly got to be January, I found myself frantically looking for a quick pattern online. Two words. Big needles. Really stinking big needles. This Lion Brand pattern claims to be a six hour project. I don't know if I finished it in six hours since I don't think I've had six consecutive hours to knit since I got home from Mongolia. But I can decisively report that it was really fast, really easy, and super cozy. I particularly like the heft of the blanket - the four strands of yarn held together lend a lot of weight to it. As a bonus, it kept my knees warm while I worked on it.

My mom is recovering beautifully, and it was an absolute joy to present her with this blanket last weekend. I like to think of her covered in my stitch thoughts as her body figures out its many changes..and I am glad, on these cold winter days, that she is warm.