Category Archives: photography
Peanut Butter and Chocolate Are Perfect Any Time of Year
Or, peanut butter m&m cookies can be Christmassy if I say they are, so there. At last year’s holiday lunch, my good pal Pookie brought some to-die-for peanut butter cookies with m&ms in them. She told me the recipe came from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home To Yours, which I immediately borrowed from the library in order to copy down the recipe. I know that I have claimed before that the Joy of Cooking peanut butter cookies are perfect, but the last time I made them, I really found them to be way too dry and crunchy. I guess it’s a week for trying things out I’ve been meaning to for a while, because when I realized I had Christmas Eve off and nothing to do until the evening, I figured it’d be as good a time as any to make these cookies. I mean, what’s more Christmas Evey than baking cookies? (Well, probably a lot of things, but who’s counting?)
Anyway, these cookies turned out gigantic and they were plentiful. The recipe calls for chopped peanuts and/or crunchy peanut butter, but I went with the IPB standard and stuck with creamy peanut butter and added in just less than a cup of plain m&ms. And I just now tasted one, and they turned out pretty awesome, if a little less chewy than I remembered.
Peanut Butter Crisscrosses
from Baking From My Home To Yours by Dorie Greenspan
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup peanut butter (I used smooth, but you can also use crunchy)
1 cup (packed) light brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups chopped salted peanuts (I used 1 cup plain m&ms instead)
About 1/2 cup sugar, for rolling
Position the racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line to baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats. (NOTE: I just kept the rack in the middle, and since I only have one silicone mat, the other cookie sheet went bare. It seemed fine.)
Whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and nutmeg.
Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter on medium speed for a minute or two, until smooth and creamy. (NOTE: I don’t have a stand mixer OR a hand mixer, so I used good ol’ elbow grease.) Add the peanut butter and beat for another minute. Add the sugars and beat for 3 minutes more. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each addition. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl and, on low speed, add the dry ingredients, mixing only until they just disappear. Mix in the chopped peanuts. You’ll have soft, pliable (mushable, actually) dough.
Pour the 1/2 cup of sugar into a small bowl. Working with a level tablespoonful of dough for each cookie, roll the dough between your palms into balls and drop the balls, a couple at a time, into the sugar. Roll the balls around in the sugar to coat them, then place on the baking sheets, leaving 2 inches between them. Dip the tines of a fork in the sugar and press the tines against each ball first in one direciton and then in a perpendicular direction – you should have a flattened round of dough with crisscross indentations.
Bake for about 12 minutes, rotating the sheets from top to bottom and front to back at the midway point. When done,the cookies will be lightly colored and still a little soft. Let the cookies sit on the sheets for a minute before transferring them to cooling racks with a wide metal spatula. Cool to room temperature.
Repeat with the remaining dough. making sure to cool the baking sheets between batches.
A Labor of Love (of Beer)
I can’t remember when I first saw and favorited this photo of a bottle cap wreath, posted by Elise Blaha. But ever since I saw it I’ve been wanting to try it. This past year has been a bit more of a crafting year than previous ones, so sometime around Thanksgiving, I sent out a bulletin to my family to start saving bottle caps. And then I embraced yet another excuse to buy ribbon at the craft store.
I knew my dad would know the best tricks to flattening the bottle caps, but I didn’t really envision it being a task that required as much nitpicky work as it did. I’d collected the 50 or so bottle caps I needed, and hammered them all on Tuesday night in the chilly garage at my parents’ house. Dad referred to it then as a labor of love, and boy howdy was he right. My thumb is still feeling a little funny a day later.
But dudes! Look how cool it turned out!
I cut a wreath shape out of an empty case of beer, using a bowl and a smaller bowl as the models. I also cut a smaller circle to test out, because I wasn’t positive that the hot glue would stick the bottle caps to each other and to the cardboard. It took a lot of willpower – A LOT OF IT – to arrange the bottlecaps haphazardly, as opposed to in an orderly and color-coordinated fashion. I really wanted to count them out when I sorted them into colored piles so I could evenly distribute them. But I didn’t. I swear.
To adhere the ribbon, I cut two holes in the wreath template and threaded the ribbon through before gluing on the bottlecaps. I felt like that would keep it more sturdy in the longterm. We’ll see. Either way, I’m psyched to report that this craft was totally worth the effort.
Now if only I could decide whether to ever make one of these again, knowing that my sister’s boyfriend and his family apparently have a gigantic jug of bottle caps they’ve been saving. For me.
Christmas favorites, a list in photos
Christmas lights, everywhere. Christmas light bokeh.
Stockings, handmade by my grandmother as we three were born. I have to learn how to knit so I can make them for our future children.
The growing nutcracker collection in the window, arranged by size.
Wrapping presents. Using real ribbon instead of that crappy curling kind. Even if it’s a bit indulgent.
Making shortbread with Dad. Eating shortbread.
The advent calendar my mom made when we were kids, still kickin’.
Big, fat Christmas trees. The icicles we hang once the tree’s decorated. Towering piles of presents.
Starting my own Christmas collections and traditions.
#2: Visit Local Breweries
It’s really no secret that I’m kind of in love with beer. (I’m thisclose to finishing my 52 Beers project, in fact.) So adding an item about visiting local breweries when I wrote my 28 to do list seemed a bit obvious. But for all of my love of beer, there are several really good breweries in the general area, and I have never been to ANY of them. I don’t know why. It’s silly. So! This past weekend, when Pete said he wanted to celebrate his birthday at Defiant Brewing Company in Pearl River, New York, you better believe I was in. (Okay fine, I would have been in to celebrate Pete’s birthday, brewery or not, but the brewery was like an added bonus. Especially given how much I like to check things off of lists!)
Anyway! My friends have been frequenting this brewery for a while, because the beer is good, the prices make your jaw drop, and the atmosphere is awesome. It was pretty crowded when we showed up around 10pm on a Friday night, but after an hour or two, it calmed down to the perfect type of bar vibe: there’s a place to sit, the beer is awesome, and you can hear each other talk. (I never claimed to be one of the cool kids!)
I’ve been to breweries before, but Defiant had way more beers to choose from than I expected. I tried the Prohibition Pilsner (light for your non-dark-beer-loving pals, but not so light that a real beer lover won’t be happy) and one of the lagers, the Muddy Creek Lager, which I really enjoyed. The beer was really good. And for every three you drink, the fourth is free. Free! And they’re only $3.25 to start with! Honestly. It’s probably good that I don’t live closer.
It was a lot of fun, and not just because of the beer. I can’t wait to go back. Even if my clothes reeked of hops and yeast and barley something AWFUL after we left. (But don’t consider this item checked off! Triumph, I’m looking at you!)
Hello, October
Hello, new photo project. Hello, another attempt at writing more. Not that the two are necessarily connected, but… here we are. I don’t take photos very often when I don’t have a Project to make me do it. I suppose I should feel bad about that, but I’ve admitted that I have a tendency to be very, very lazy. And so if I want to get better at photography, or at writing, or even just get to a point where I’m not a little sad that I don’t do either more often, I have to force myself to do so. And that’s okay.
In other news, I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich last night that was made with blackberry jam, and it took me back in time to gourmet toast breakfasts with my grandparents. I’ll have to tell you about it someday.
Post-Move
I’ve been living in my new apartment for three days now, and I’m hesitant to write about it, because I’m pretty sure this whole post will come off as obnoxiously gushy. But oh! I can barely contain myself because my new apartment is so much more awesome than my old one and I’m so excited about it.
Before I write any more, though, I have to say that my Very First Apartment was a good one. I learned to love it, and even though the astronomical cost of heating it was a big part of what made me leave, I feel a need to remind myself that my first apartment was not a dump, it was a perfectly wonderful place to live, and it was noteworthy if only because it was just that – my first place. But! Despite the fact that I only moved across the parking lot, into another apartment in the very same building, Apartment the Second is kind of shockingly nicer than the first one. It’s the little things like the lack of water damage, or the missing funny smell in the kitchen, or the fact that the doors shut properly, or the fake-swanky “marble” countertop in the bathroom, or the not-completely-ugly linoleum floors in the kitchen and bathroom, or the simple notion that the doorknobs have been replaced in the last ten years. Being on the second floor is infinitely better than the first floor, and the balcony doesn’t even face a whole bunch of other balconies. I might even use it!
But it’s more than all of that – (and I promise that I know how zen/new-agey this sounds) the feeling in this apartment, the vibe, it’s just more. There’s more light, and air, and I don’t know how to describe it, because the layout is almost entirely the same, but it feels different, better, prettier, homier.
On Saturday I had more people helping me than I could have ever asked for, and I’m BEYOND grateful to each of them for every single thing they carried, put away, every curtain rod they hung up. It was amazing. The next day I just couldn’t believe (a) how much was done in literally less than TWO HOURS, (b) how many things made it from one apartment across the parking lot and up the stairs into the second apartment without touching my hands once, and (c) how much – dare I say it? – FUN it was. Despite the whole drenched-in-sweat part. And the fact that someone moved into the apartment above my old one the same afternoon as I moved out. It just meant a lot to me that so many of the people I care about were able to just be there.
Ugh, it’s too gushy even for me. But it’s all TRUE. Dan kept telling me after it was all over that I just looked HAPPY. And he’s right. I made the right call.
#24: Go on interesting photo-taking excursions
This item on my 28 To Do List was meant to be an ongoing one. This one was meant to inspire me to go on as MANY photo-taking excursions as possible. A week and a half into my 28th year, I think I’m doing pretty darn well. (I’ve also finished rolls on both of my film cameras. While that’s not strictly an excursion, it goes along with the whole spirit of #24, I think.)
Last Friday, Pete, Sheryl and I went out to western NJ to take photos at the 27th Annual New Jersey Festival of Ballooning. We stood at the edge of the farm where she keeps her horses and took pictures through the haze as the balloons inflated and gently rose up and floated away in groups of two and three, until there were well more than 20 visible at once. Hot air balloons are surprisingly soothing, the way they move about so gracefully. It was also almost nostalgic, because my grandmother lives in that general part of New Jersey, and there were times visiting her as a kid that we’d see hot air balloons flying over her house. So that part was cool, too.
Then on Saturday, I met up with a bunch of my flickr friends at Coney Island in Brooklyn, a place I’ve never been, despite hearing about it during Mets games (“The Cyclones are Brooklyn!”). We ate hot dogs at the original Nathan’s, and then walked up and down the boardwalk, taking in the sights, and thousands and thousands of scantily clad people. Then the skies opened up; we heard a wave of screams as the folks on the beach ran toward the boardwalk, and we were all drenched within seconds. (No camera equipment was harmed, thank goodness.) We took cover under a cheery white and red striped tent, splashing in puddles, and once the rain stopped, we recommenced our walking on the boardwalk. We took pictures in a photobooth, we took photos of and with each other, we couldn’t quite understand the wacky weather, and mostly we just enjoyed each other’s company. The weather sucked, yes. My shoes and socks and jeans were still quite damp when I got back. But it was worth it.
And then this past Wednesday, Pete had an extra ticket to see the Daily Show, so we decided to make a photo-taking day of it. Did we realize it was going to rain again? Well, maybe. But we couldn’t let the tickets go to waste, so we brought an umbrella (okay, Pete brought an umbrella; I didn’t want to carry one around so I stuck with my superpowered gor-tex raincoat) and figured we’d suck it up. We went to the Intrepid and managed to take a whole lot of hurried shots as the rain began, trying desperately not to slip on the wet deck of the aircraft carrier. We then headed down to the hangar deck, where the main museumy parts are located. I didn’t bother reading any of the descriptions, but just took pictures of things that looked cool. I also couldn’t help thinking that a visit to the Intrepid would have been just as much fun with my dad, who could have explained all of the planes and helicopters for me. It was an amazing place, even if we did get totally soaked walking over to the Daily Show studio.
So all in all, my first few photo-taking excursions were fantastic. Let’s just hope future ones don’t all involve weird weather and waterlogged sneakers. Seriously.
#1. Take pictures in a photobooth
The first item on my list of 28 Things To Do While I’m 28 was accomplished on Saturday at Coney Island, thanks to some sleuthing by the lovely Jodi, who saw my list and then looked up where the photobooths were at Coney Island! How cool is that? Very. Of course, I messed it up by (a) not being ready for the first shot, (b) making the same face in the second and third shots, and (c) not thinking that duh it needed to dry before putting it safely in between the pages of my book. But still! Awesome!
Completed: 27 Things Minibook
So back on my 27th birthday, I wrote a list of 27 Things to Do While I Was 27. Yesterday, I finished the minibook I’ve been working on for a few months documenting my progress through the list. Having a list of goals for the year, some silly, others more serious, has been a lot of fun. I didn’t finish everything on the list, and that’s okay. I’m really proud of this little book, and I’m sure I’ll love having it when I’m older as a time capsule chronicling my 27th year.
Because it’s more fun to see the book in person, I’m only posting photos of my very favorite pages here. I blogged about the minibook a few months ago, though, and you can see a few more pages over there. These minibooks are quite possibly the most fun thing to make ever.
she likes stripes 