Chocolate Chip Cookies Cockaigne - An Adaptation

The Joy of Cooking is my "food bible". I would say I use this at least 5 times a week and it shows! The pages are covered in flower and butter and chocolate smudges. Until recently, I thought the word "Cockaigne" after some of the recipe names was some type of French cooking technique of which I had never heard. So, after a little research, I learned that this is not the case at all.

Apparently (according to Wikipedia), Cockaigne is a "medieval mythical land of plenty, an imaginary place of extreme luxury and ease where physical comforts and pleasures are always immediately at hand and where the harshness of medieval peasant life does not exist." Cockaigne is also the name of a family estate of Irma Rombauer designed by her architect husband, John Becker. Recipes in the Joy of Cooking that are designated with a "Cockaigne" ending are a family favorite of the Beckers!

And this Chocolate Chip cookie deserves to be a family favorite. Since I am grinding my own flour now, I needed an adaptation of this cookie that would work with only whole grains. I also threw in a little coconut flour for the extra sweetness and fiber.

This is a double recipe  I included volume and weights on the flour for those of you who weigh your flour for baking.  I always like to freeze half of this for "cookies on demand".

Ingredients

• 2 cups White Whole Wheat Flour (10 oz.)
• 2/3 c. finely milled Oat Flour (4 oz.)
• 1 c. coarsely milled Oat Flour (5 oz.)
• 1/2 c. Coconut Flour (4 oz.)
• 2 1/2 tsp. Baking Soda
• 1 1/2 tsp. Baking Powder
• 1 tsp. Salt
• 1 pound butter (soft)
• 1 1/2 c. sugar
• 1 1/3 c. brown sugar
• 2 large eggs (room temp)
• 1/2 c. milk
• 5 tsp. vanilla
• 1-2 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips (depending on your preference)
• 6 oz. milk chocolate grated or chopped

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees
2. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together Wheat flour, Coconut flour, finely-milled Oat flour (retain the coarsely milled), Baking soda, Baking powder, and salt until evenly distributed.
3. In your electric mixer bowl (or a large bowl for hand mixing), beat butter with medium speed until it is creamy and light.  Add sugars and beat until fully combined.  Beat in eggs one at a time; scraping the bowl in between.  Beat in milk and vanilla.
4. Stir in the flour mixture gradually until everything is well blended.
5. Stir in the coarsely milled oat flour, chocolate chips, and grated milk chocolate until evenly distributed.
6. Prepare your baking sheet by greasing, laying parchment paper, or a silicone baking sheet
7. Use a small disher or your hands to drop 1.5" balls of dough about 2 inches apart on the baking sheet.
8. Using two fingers, slightly flatten out each ball of dough.
9. Bake for 8-12 minutes until lightly browned.
10. Cool and Enjoy!

Cookies-On-Demand
You never know when you are going to NEED a chocolate chip cookie.  I take about half the dough and form it into a log.  I then roll up the log in parchment paper and twist the ends like a giant tootsie roll and put it in the freezer.  When you want to make cookies, just use a steak knife to slice off about 1/2" discs and cook at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes.

Let me know if you try this one out! What are your FAVORITE Joy of Cooking Recipes?

The Garden My Husband Built

I often come up with lots of great ideas that create a good deal of work for my husband. Over these 16 years of togetherness, we seem to fall into these roles as a couple. I come up with some crazy plan and he makes it happen.

After a successful summer with a container herb garden on my deck, I thought we definitely needed a garden. The problem was, I am a very inconsistent "maintainer" (is that a word). I tend to have a ton of enthusiasm at the beginning of a project and then fizzle out as I get bored or discouraged. So, if this garden was going to work, it had to be pretty self-sustaining.

After a lot of research (thanks, Internet!) I decided we would need a raised bed garden with a drip irrigation system on a timer. Following much of the advice in Mel Bartholomew's book, Square Foot Gardening, we found a sunny spot in the yard and made a plan.

Cedar really would have been the best option for the beds, but it was out of our price range. We didn't want to use plain lumber because of the toxins it would leak into the ground. Although it is less than ideal, we settled on painted lumber (I LOVE the paint color - husband? not so much).



We put river rocks around the beds to keep weeds down and some flagstone for a walkway through the garden area. We put chicken wire underneath each of the beds to try to keep out digging varmits from beneath.




The drip irrigation on a timer has really been a life saver. If I go on vacation, the garden still gets watered. If I forget, the garden still gets watered. This is the number one thing that has turned my black thumb at least military green.




So, after two years of gardening, we have had some great successes (such as an abundant strawberry harvest, beautiful herbs, and lots of broccoli) and we have had many failures (2 years of failed eggplant, spinach destroyed by aphids, and deer eating all our tomato plants). But each year we learn a great deal. It brings me so much joy to tend to the plants with my children and to "pick" our dinner at night.

The Garden My Husband Built is a Finer Thing

This post is a contribution to Finer Things Friday at Amy's The Finer Things in Life.

ReCre8 Old T-Shirts

T-Shirts.

I have WAY too many T-Shirts. I rarely wear them, but I love the memories of special events and times in my life that the T-shirts represent. Being the beginning of the New Year, it is time to clean out some of these unused items from my closet. Rather than just trashing them, here are a bunch of projects to ReCre8 these t-shirts.

1. T-Shirts as Rags. (Instructions: Just cut them up - any shape or size)
   
2. T-Shirt Handkerchiefs/Wipes (Instructions)
   
3. T-Shirts as Reusable Napkins. (Instructions)
   
4. T-Shirt Pillowcase: (Instructions)
   
5. The T-Shirt Quilt. (Instructions)
6. T-Shit Laundry Bag/Tote Bag (Instructions)
7. T-Shirt Memory Scarf (Instructions)
   

I plan to try several of these. What about you? Do you have any ideas to add?

Cre8-ing New Years Resolutions

It's that time of year. The end of another year that has past by more quickly than the last. I just looked at my last blog post and it was dated 2009! I think that the trouble is, I want to be posting about new projects every day, but it is just too much as a full-time working mom of 3 young boys. So, my first New Years Resolution is about blogging:

• Resolution 1: Blog Sometimes, and Only When I Have Something Useful to Say

As I sit and think about my goals for the upcoming year, gardening is one of the first things that comes to mind. I have had an active vegetable garden for two years now with many delightful success and many failures along the way. I am terrible at regular maintenance, so my goal is to have a gardening system in place that I cannot mess up! I feel that I am going into this year with so many lessons learned and a whole lot of inspiration to grow food in the spring, summer, and fall.

• Resolution 2: Maintain a 3 Season Garden (Spring, Summer, Fall)

I am no seamstress, but I love to "hack" together some clothes, costumes, and other sewing projects. Re-purposing a useless piece of clothing into a useful one is my favorite way to sew. Which brings me to my third resolution...

• Resolution 3: Document at Least One Re-Purposing Sewing Project

Whole foods cooking and baking has been an ongoing journey for all of us in my home. What works? What doesn't work? There are a lot of projects here I would like to get documented.

• Resolution 4: Document More Cooking and Baking Projects

I have not been successful at ridding my life of all things plastic. However, for so many reasons (see My Plastic-Free Life), I want to minimize plastic usage in my life, especially those things that are disposables. It's always a challenge to find good, reusable alternatives and it takes some Cre8-tivity to make it happen.

• Resolution 5: Use Even Less Plastic

So, I will try to keep these resolutions this year, but I will not stress myself about it. To me, it is more important to that is to keep my balance and have all priorities in place.

Pass the Weeds, Please (Episode II)

A Foraging Recipe - Weed Pesto

Here is a great pesto I like to make with some of my weeds...

Ingredients

• ¼ cup Dandelion Greens
• ¼ cup Purslane
• ¼ cup Field Garlic (grass)
• 4 bulbs Field Garlic (bulb)
• ¼ cup Olive Oil
• ¼ cup Pine Nuts
• ¼ cup Basil leaves
• ¼ cup Grated Parmesan Cheese
  

Directions
Mince and lightly saute the garlic bulbs in some Olive Oil to take the edge off. In a food processor: chop up the nuts and garlic bulbs. Add all of the greens and continue to process until everything is finely chopped. Add in cheese and slowly add the olive oil slowly while processing until you reach the desired texture. Leave in the fridge for a few hours before eating. Serve as a dressing for penne pasta, use as a sandwich spread, or serve with crackers or toast.

So, what weeds do you like to eat?

Pass the Weeds, Please (Episode I)

I’ve been intrigued by foraging for food in my backyard my whole life. My neighbors and I searched for wild strawberries, ate “onion grass”, and came up with a recipe for “lemon grass” cheese sauce. At the time, it did not concern me whether or not these things were toxic. Lucky for me, they weren’t!

Now I am a suburbanite who does not want to use fertilizer or weed killer to have a lush, green bed of grass in my lawn. Instead, I like to arm my children with baskets to go collect dinner from the lawn. Backyard foraging has become a fun family activity. Here are some of the things we can find in our mid-atlantic yard:

Purslane (Portulaca oleracea) – This is my absolute favorite weed. I like to just pluck off some of the succulent leave and eat them plain because they are tasty. They have a little bit of a lemony flavor to them. A sprig of purslane makes a great addition to a toss salad, an addition to a tomato sauce, or as a component of a pesto. What is unique about purslane is that the leaves are naturally high in Omega-3 fatty acids, which is rare for green vegetables. The stems are high in Vitamin C. I like to put purslane in a container garden – it doesn’t need too much tending. Most often purslane is considered a weed and people are trying to eradicate it, but if I see some growing in a friends yard, I just say “May I have your weeds?”

How to Identify Purslane

Nutrition Information for Raw Purslane


Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) – This is my second-favorite weed. Besides the fact that it is a beautiful flower and makes great bouquets, necklaces, rings, and hair accessories, it is extremely useful food and herbal remedy. Have you ever eaten that Whole Foods “Spring Greens” in a bag salad mix? You are probably eating Dandelion greens. The leaves are great in the spring for salads, pesto, or sandwich toppings. Dandelion greens are a great source of Vitamin A and C as well as fiber. The roots are great in the fall for a bitter tea or as a nutritional supplement. Dandelion roots harvested in the fall are high in inulin (soluble fiber). The flowers can be eaten raw, cooked, or dried and ground into flour.

How to Identify Dandelions

Nutrition Data for Dandelion: Greens

Wild Blackberries (Rubus allegheniensis) – We have these growing all along our fenceline as well as on our bike-riding route. What could be better than free blackberries? The brambles can be prickly, so take care when picking these. Make sure to wait until they are dark purple before picking – otherwise, they won’t taste very good. Use them just as you would blackberries: Freeze them, make a jam, add to a fruit smoothie, or best – just eat them as you pick!

How to identify Wild Blackberries

Some words of caution…

1. Don’t eat any foraged food that is from an area that may be exposed to insecticides, road salt (from snow), or any foreign chemical substances that you don’t know about.
2. Make sure to clean anything that you pluck from your yard thoroughly.
3. Make sure you can absolutely, positively identify something before you eat it. Many plants in your yard are poisonous.
4. Don’t encourage non-native invasive species to grow. Check with your state or local invasive species organization.

Resources
Properly identifying anything you forage is very important. Here are some great resources to help with that. I am a big fan of naturalist “Wildman” Steve Brill who has written a book on the subject and has a wealth of information on his website: http://www.wildmanstevebrill.com/. He includes tons of information on identifying plants that are edible and is working on a book for foraging with kids.

An organization called Plants for a Future (http://www.pfaf.org/index.php) has a searchable database of edible plants with all kinds of information on uses of the plants and any hazards or warnings about their usage. It is an excellent free resource.

Frugal and Fun: Backyard Foraging is a Finer Thing. (See more Finer Things at Amy’s Finer Things Fridays).

This is a series and I plan to share more foraging tips, resources, and recipes to try.

Cre8 Your Own Energy: Documenting our Solar Project

Okay, so I am not building my own solar panels or anything, but the stars aligned for us this year and we are able to get solar panels on our home. I hope to document that process here a little bit.

Step 1 - Reduce Energy Usage
Of course the process started over a year ago for us. It started with an awareness of how much energy we were using and wasting. We only have electric available in our neighborhood - and boy, were we using more than our share! In the winter, our bills $400-$500+. So, being the geeky engineer-types that we are in my household, we immediately started tracking our usage and started an aggressive campaign to reduce our electric usage. We turned down our heat, turned up our AC, got rid of our "vampires", switched to CFLs, turned the lights off, among many other little energy saving changes. The results were dramatic! I would say we save about $1700/yr over if we had not changed our behavior. This graph is what we've been using to track our usage over time.



Step 2 - Cost/Benefit Analysis
So once we reduced our usage, we looked at the costs and benefits of installing the solar panels on our home. The up-front costs are very high, approximately $60K for the size system we are getting. Luckily, this year there are many state and federal grants and rebates that end up cutting the cost in half to about $30K. We are using a local company called Standard Solar that will take care of all the paperwork and permits for us. Now, we will expect $1200 cost savings every year on our energy bill. In addition, the energy company will pay us a credit for producing clean energy (like a carbon offset price). This system should (theoretically) also increase the value of our home by about $30K. The financial Return on Investment for us (minus the increase in home value) is about 11 years assuming energy costs stay the same. Now, if energy costs rise, our ROI will come much sooner.

That is just the financial benefit. There are also benefits that are not financial. One is knowing that we are not burning through as much natural resources to create our energy. Another is emergency preparedness. If our electric service became rationed or more unreliable, we have a good solid backup. Also, it is a great learning experience for us and the kids. So, overall, it was a go for me and my husband.

Step 3 - Evaluation, Planning, Permits, and Design
Now, this was the easy part for us because the Solar Company does all this work for us. Our solar rep came out and took a bunch of measurements and pictures of the house. They tested the sun exposure and determined that we would have 89% efficiency with the panels. The panels will be mounted on the east-facing back of our roof, so you won't even see them from the street. An engineer at the company then made up a bunch of technical design drawings for us to review and approve.


Now that the design is complete and the permits are pulled and the paperwork is filed, we are ready for our installation. That is yet to happen. I'll let you know how it goes...