Updated Ice Cream List

• Cinnamon ice cream*
  
• Vietnamese coffee ice cream
• Lemon ice cream
• Hazelnut Mango ice cream (not from a recipe, but thrown together to use up some cream)
  
• Lemon buttermilk sherbet
• Banana blueberry sorbet
• Cherry sorbet

Next? I dunno. I was kind of considering trying the Tin Roof recipe, since that's the sort of crazy, mix-in, swirled with fudge craziness I've never before attempted.

Or I could just settle down with the tub of Vietnamese coffee and luxuriate.


* Let's just take a moment to note that this ice cream is courtesy of Clare and her generous gift. Because, if you recall, the box came packed in nutmegs and cinnamon sticks and bay leaves. So what to do with those cinnamon sticks? Well DL's recipe calls for 10 4-inch sticks. The box came with? You know already, doncha? 10 sticks. They're 4 inches long. Clearly (CLEARLY!) I was meant to make this ice cream. And I did. Thanks, Clare. You're pretty fly for a person less than 6 months old.

Prezzies!

Holy Turmeric, Batman! Yesterday Iain received an entirely unanticipated gift from Miss Clare. She sent him the 4-jar curry box from Penzey's.

So I made banana bread, of course.

What? You say. Be careful, dear, you're showing your ignorance.

Penzey's packs their gift boxes so that the glass jars won't wiggle. What do they use as packing? Styrofoam? Paper? Fairy kisses? NOPE!

They use cinnamon sticks, whole nutmegs, and dried Turkish bay leaves.

Is everything becoming clear now? No?

I did not have on hand all the ingredients I might need for curry (next stop: the store), but what was sitting in my fruit bowl? 3 half-rotten bananas. And what's in the fridge, leftover from making lemon-buttermilk sherbet? Buttermilk, obvy. And what's on the back of the enclosed recipe card sent by Penzey's? Grandma's recipe for banana bread. And where is Penzey's located? Wisconsin! Mid-westerners know baked goods, y'all.

So I used my new nutmegs to make banana bread (and banana bread muffins because mid-westerners bake in quantity, y'all). It's really quite good.


Wait...

Does that mean...

YES! I baked something here (at 4500 feet) and it did not suck. YAY! I am no longer a total failure.

Thanks, Clare. You've restored my mojo. I'd stay to chat but I've got tandoori spice to rub into chicken breasts.

Dialogue

The New Dad: "We are having our first full day at home with just Clare and her Daddy today. Susan should be back in about six hours."

Me: "This is probably a good time to start talking about boys. She'll need to know how to identify the good ones, and how to know when one is a rotten egg. That's your job, Dad."

The New Dad: "Why bother? None of them are good enough for her."

Red Potato and Asparagus Salad

I think we can all agree on one thing: if you have a baby under 4 weeks and/or under 6 lbs, you should not have to cook your own Easter supper.

A committee of Very Serious Intellectuals agreed on that principle last week, so today I needed to make a side dish. You can see how that happened. Although Easter suppers are not exactly my specialty, Miriam came to the rescue with a potato salad chock full of veggies, herbs, and spring flavor. Naturally, I messed with it.

Ingredients for the salad:

• 24 small new red potatoes (this was one bag of the organic ones at the store), about 2-3lbs.
  
• about 2 Tablespoons of olive oil
• 2 lb. fresh asparagus
• 1/2 cup sliced or slivered almonds, toasted (I used sliced, toasted them in my toaster oven, which took 4 minutes exactly) (after I burned the first batch)
  
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh mint or basil (I used mint, and it was all the contents of one of those plastic boxes)
  
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced

Directions:

• Preheat the oven to 400.
• Put the potatoes into a baking dish (I used a 13" Pyrex lasagna pan) with the olive oil. Salt and pepper the potatoes.
  
• Roast between 25 and 35 minutes, so they are tender when pierced with a knife. Try to avoid over-cooking, because they'll squish in the salad if they're too soft.
• Prep the asparagus: cut off the tough ends, then bring about 2 inches of water to the boil in a big frying pan. Cook the asparagus 3-4 minutes. DO NOT OVERCOOK BECAUSE THAT WILL BE NASTY. Shock them (plunge into ice water), then drain and let them dry off on a kitchen towel. Cut them into 2-inch lengths.
• Mince the garlic, chop the herbs, get the nuts ready. Mix all the ingredients together in a big bowl.
  

OK, here's where I messed with the recipe. Originally, as printed in the Williams Sonoma Entertaining Cookbook, it called for making a warm sauce of chicken stock (1 cup) and 1/4 cup of olive oil. You'd heat the potatoes, add the asparagus and everything else, then serve warm.

That's no good for me. I need a cold dish that can stay crunchy and delish tomorrow for my peeps. So... I improvised.

Make a vinaigrette. I got out my Mark Bittman, but then realized I had a bag of Penzey's Greek seasoning. I whipped up a batch of that (2T seasoning, 1/2 cup oil, 1/3 cup red wine vinegar, 1T sugar, stirstirstir), and used about 2/3 of it in the salad. Add salt and pepper to taste. Eh voila! Delish. It's tart, it can be eaten cold or at room temp (technically you could warm it up, too), it's pretty and seasonal and healthy. I used the rest of the dressing as a marinade/baking sauce for some chicken breasts and let me tell you: yum.

Thanks, Miriam.

Clare Noshes (and learns about college)

Little Clare was a teensy thing at birth, but apparently she lost a bit of weight during week one. So her mom and dad (and Grandma) are trying to encourage plenty of eating to help her grow. Check her out above - so tiny!

But she seems to be enjoying herself, snug as a bug in a rug:


And check out the proud Dad:

Of course, he's encouraging a sound college choice with that sweatshirt. I can see already that Miss Clare will have a lot of options for her loyalties - JHU, MSU, EKU, and many other 3-letter schools.

Clare!

Welcome to Clare Catharine, who arrived yesterday at a whopping 5lbs, 14 oz. Just a wee thing, and so blonde. You can all but hear the collective gasp of delight and congratulations going out to Brad and Susan.

Personally, I can hardly wait to see whether she embraces her mom's love of cows or her dad's love of the Revolution. Or perhaps both?