Posts (page 2)

INGREDIENTS:

• 3/4 cup shortening
• 1/4 cup butter
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 4 egg yolks
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon lemon extract ( I usually use all vanilla)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

PREPARATION:

Cream shortening and butter with sugar. Add egg yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Pour milk into a large measuring cup; add extract(s) and baking soda. Into a separate bowl sift flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg.

Add dry ingredients to the creamed mixture alternately with the milk mixture. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto ungreased baking sheets then sprinkle with a cinnamon-sugar mixture. Bake for 12 to 13 minutes at 375°.

Warning: this makes a bazillion cookies.

Got a movie you'll watch over and over again?  For me, it's The Shadow.

Yeah, the one with Alec Baldwin.  It's not a great movie, it's not fine cinema.  It's full of scenery chewing actors, but God help me I can watch it over and over again.  I can't even say the same for The Rocketeer.

It's got Tim Curry, Jonathon Winters, Peter Boyle, and of course Penelope Ann Miller, although she's a little skinny for me.

Anyways, it is on tonight, and it just made me realize that I am perfectly content with watching it yet again.

Nice to get one in the "completed" category:

smallhouse7

Friday I had company come visit in several forms.  The first was a good friend who came to hang out for a bit and watch the kids play baseball.  Then my sister and her son came down to spend the weekend.  My sister took my Dad to the Braves/Reds game on Saturday (Braves lost in OT) while I took my nephew, my kids, my mom and my brother to see Speed Racer.  I have to say, I was a little shocked to discover that the "matinee" in Huber Heights is $7.50 (it's 3:50 in Piqua) and frankly I think I was overcharged.  The movie was set pretty solidly at the grade-school age boy level, and that's about it.  They overused the "pan the face across the screen while the background changes into a flashback" way too much--like every four minutes.  And no, I'm not kidding.
Moreover, a lot of people spent a lot of time looking like other people.  Roger Allam spent most of the movie channeling Tim Curry.  Christina Ricci spent a lot of the movie looking like Rose McGowan, and Emile Hirsch spent most of the time not looking like Leonard DiCapprio, which is his usual modus operandi.
Plot?  Paper thin.  Mostly a lot of CGR cars banging around with Spritle and ChimChim providing the "comic relief" up to and including throwing poo (thankfully the chimp's, who seemed to have the most expressive face of the cast as well).
Afterwards, I took the crew out for ice cream, which definitely helped me put a good spin on it.  When we got home, it was nothing but Hot Wheels track, which is the real payoff.

I think of Memorial Day weekend as being a "2-0-1" weekend, meaning I have two days off (Friday and Saturday), work Sunday, and then have Monday off.
I've got some plans.  Friday I want to get some casting of Hirst Arts molds done.  I've started building another small house--nothing fancy, just something I can build with the molds I already own.  Saturday is Castles & Crusades, and on Monday I've having some friends and my parents over for a barbecue.
At least, that's the plan...

Today my family and I went to the Dayton International Festival, which is essentially a bunch of local ethnic clubs and student groups hosting booths touting their various countries' culture, especially food.  It was a lot of fun, and of course educational.  They even had a program for the kids: each child got a "passport" with pages of each of the countries represented, and on each page was a trivia question that the kids had to ask or answer themselves.

The best moment was when my son, a serious Sinophile even at the age of eight, went to the booth for China.  "Can you name a major landmark located in China?" the woman asked.

"The Yellow River," said my son with a straight face.

The woman was visibly startled and said, "yes, the Yellow River is a major landmark." One whose flooding ended a lot more dynasties than the mongols climbing over the Great Wall, I thought to myself.  Then the woman stamped my son's passport.  "Shien shien," said my son, as the lady's jaw hit the floor.

My daughter had a great time looking at the costumes, and dancing with the Irish dancing group.  I wish there was a group closeby, instead of the cheesy "practice for working a pole at the local gentlemans' club" dancing school here in my area.

From Southernfood.about.com

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 cup cake flour
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons cream of tartar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 stick (4 ounces) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
• 3/4 cup half and half

PREPARATION:

Roll the dough to about 3/4-inch thickness on a floured surface. Cut out biscuits with a 3-inch round cutter. Gather up dough scraps, reroll, and repeat the procedure until dough is used up. Place biscuits on an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake biscuits in center of a 400° oven until golden brown, 12 to 15 minutes. Serve biscuits hot, with butter.
Makes about 12 biscuits.

Notes: I found the dough particularly sticky, no doubt as a result of the amount of cake flour vs. regular flour.  You may want to adjust the proportions.

Got the second unit finished.

orcwarband2

They're on the right (the first is on the left.  Now that they are done, I'm working on my Arrer Boyz next.  I'm going to take a quick break to read my new book--it has got me thinking about some things that I may mull around here.