Oh Easter Bunny!

Yesterday, when my mother and I walked into the barn, it was pretty obvious that the Easter Bunny had been there.

What! The Easter Bunny is bringing grills now!

What is that, Easter Bunny!

Holy crap, that grill is bigger than my last apartment.

We made hot dogs for lunch, and then my mama and I went to the garden and weeded the shit out of that thing. We have so much asparagus this year; I am so excited for the asparagus. We also moved the mint to its own home so it stops killing my much more tender herbs– it was strangling the tarragon, which is not okay. A load of herbs made it through the winter, which made me excited– the horehound, the sorrel, two kinds of sage, the tarragon, lavender, mint and oregano. I’ve decided mint is like the insidious evil mastermind of the herbal kingdom. It smells and tastes delicious, so we don’t dig it out like the weed it is, and instead we let it come perilously close to murdering our tarragon. Evil!

Then I picked like a bajillion violets to try to make creme de violette, but after macerating the shit out of them, I think I need to pick a bajillion more tomorrow. The base for this stuff doesn’t taste even remotely violet-y enough. We will see how this goes. I may split a bottle of good vodka in threes and do a batch with fresh violets, a batch with violets macerated in syrup, and one with dried violets, and see if one is better than the other. If I have enough violets! Seriously, I picked like a hundred and fifty of them.

Then we decided to play with the Easter Bunny some more and made these:

That’s got blue cheese, mozzarella and bresaola with fresh arugula.

That one is smoked gouda, beer-steamed clams, and bacon. Yum!

Oh, the Easter Bunny also brings things for my father:

That is bright pink Burnett’s pink lemonade vodka. It smells and looks like nail polish remover. It tastes like nailpolish remover mixed with Crystal Light. I feel like I should make a post about the drinks I make for my father sometime. In case any of you want to drink like a fifteen year old girl.

Okay, time to check on my violets and then sleeping!

Mirrored from Antagonia.net.

Oh Easter Bunny!

Yesterday, when my mother and I walked into the barn, it was pretty obvious that the Easter Bunny had been there.

What! The Easter Bunny is bringing grills now!

What is that, Easter Bunny!

Holy crap, that grill is bigger than my last apartment.

We made hot dogs for lunch, and then my mama and I went to the garden and weeded the shit out of that thing. We have so much asparagus this year; I am so excited for the asparagus. We also moved the mint to its own home so it stops killing my much more tender herbs– it was strangling the tarragon, which is not okay. A load of herbs made it through the winter, which made me excited– the horehound, the sorrel, two kinds of sage, the tarragon, lavender, mint and oregano. I’ve decided mint is like the insidious evil mastermind of the herbal kingdom. It smells and tastes delicious, so we don’t dig it out like the weed it is, and instead we let it come perilously close to murdering our tarragon. Evil!

Then I picked like a bajillion violets to try to make creme de violette, but after macerating the shit out of them, I think I need to pick a bajillion more tomorrow. The base for this stuff doesn’t taste even remotely violet-y enough. We will see how this goes. I may split a bottle of good vodka in threes and do a batch with fresh violets, a batch with violets macerated in syrup, and one with dried violets, and see if one is better than the other. If I have enough violets! Seriously, I picked like a hundred and fifty of them.

Then we decided to play with the Easter Bunny some more and made these:

That’s got blue cheese, mozzarella and bresaola with fresh arugula.

That one is smoked gouda, beer-steamed clams, and bacon. Yum!

Oh, the Easter Bunny also brings things for my father:

That is bright pink Burnett’s pink lemonade vodka. It smells and looks like nail polish remover. It tastes like nailpolish remover mixed with Crystal Light. I feel like I should make a post about the drinks I make for my father sometime. In case any of you want to drink like a fifteen year old girl.

Okay, time to check on my violets and then sleeping!

Please check my post about Helping victims of the tornadoes in Alabama if you haven't seen it yet.

Mirrored from Antagonia.net.

Two Cocktails!

I am waiting for the Presidential speech to start, but I wrote this up on the train and figured I’d go ahead and post it.

I was so pleased with the violet cocktail on Friday that I decided to try another violet cocktail on Saturday.

Wretched Groom

Ingredients:
1/2 large Bosc Pear
3 oz Greylock gin
13 fresh violets
1 1/2 tsp evaporated cane juice
splash of Cognac
splash of Mathilde Poire liqueur

Instructions:
–Cut two very thin slices of pear, dice remaining pear into 1/2″ cubes
–Reserve three violets, add violets, pear, cane juice and gin to shaker
–Muddle well, until violets and pear are completely macerated
–Add cognac and liqueur
–Shake
–Pour into chilled cocktail glass, garnish with violets and pear slice

I also decided that what with all the violets, I might as well pick as many as possible before they wilt and/or get mowed and try to make my own creme de violette. Yesterday, I picked somewhere in the vicinity of 100-200 violets and cooked them with sugar, but that didn’t taste nearly violet-y enough, so today I picked about a thousand violets and I’m going to try just infusing the fresh violets and see how that works.

So, yes, I spent three hours picking violets. I’m not proud. Or tired.

I also picked slighty-smaller-craploads of dandelions, because I decided I’m going to try making my own bitters. I’m excited because I think I’m going to try using asparagus blossoms in the bitters. I figure if I infuse a bunch of different things separately, then I can try mixing and matching them until I get the right concoction. Bitters often use dandelion greens, but I picked some flowers, too. I’m secretly excited for when the asparagus goes to seed, because asparagus fronds have the most awesome flavor and I can infuse some of those. And sorrel.

Then I used the flowers to make this, partly because supertailz requested a drink using Magellan yesterday, but I’d already gone with Greylock as the iris flavor in Magellan would completely overpower the violets, which are really, really subtle. You know, subtle enough that a hundred of them don’t appear to leave much of a flavor in simple syrup.

Bradbury

Ingredients:
3 oz Magellan gin
6 dandelion blossoms
Splash of Ramazzotti amaro
Splash of Cardamaro
A few droplets of walnut oil

Instructions:
–Reserve one dandelion
–Add dandelions and gin to shaker, muddle until dandelions are completely macerated (they will look like small yellow ribbons)
–Add Ramazzotti and Cardamaro
–Shake and pour
–Garnish with remaining dandelion blossom and walnut oil to taste

In other news, we picked some of the first asparagus of the season. Let’s talk about this asparagus. You know how there’s all that talk about how organic vegetables are necessarily smaller and wimpier than the factory farmed kind?

Yeah? Well MY ASPARAGUS AND I CHALLENGE YOU.

LOOK AT THE SIZE OF THAT ASPARAGUS.

It was also shockingly sweet and tender for the size. I was mightily impressed with our asparagus-growing prowess.

Oh, also, I lied. About the not being tired part.

Mirrored from Antagonia.net.

Two Cocktails!

I am waiting for the Presidential speech to start, but I wrote this up on the train and figured I’d go ahead and post it.

I was so pleased with the violet cocktail on Friday that I decided to try another violet cocktail on Saturday.

Wretched Groom

Ingredients:
1/2 large Bosc Pear
3 oz Greylock gin
13 fresh violets
1 1/2 tsp evaporated cane juice
splash of Cognac
splash of Mathilde Poire liqueur

Instructions:
–Cut two very thin slices of pear, dice remaining pear into 1/2″ cubes
–Reserve three violets, add violets, pear, cane juice and gin to shaker
–Muddle well, until violets and pear are completely macerated
–Add cognac and liqueur
–Shake
–Pour into chilled cocktail glass, garnish with violets and pear slice

I also decided that what with all the violets, I might as well pick as many as possible before they wilt and/or get mowed and try to make my own creme de violette. Yesterday, I picked somewhere in the vicinity of 100-200 violets and cooked them with sugar, but that didn’t taste nearly violet-y enough, so today I picked about a thousand violets and I’m going to try just infusing the fresh violets and see how that works.

So, yes, I spent three hours picking violets. I’m not proud. Or tired.

I also picked slighty-smaller-craploads of dandelions, because I decided I’m going to try making my own bitters. I’m excited because I think I’m going to try using asparagus blossoms in the bitters. I figure if I infuse a bunch of different things separately, then I can try mixing and matching them until I get the right concoction. Bitters often use dandelion greens, but I picked some flowers, too. I’m secretly excited for when the asparagus goes to seed, because asparagus fronds have the most awesome flavor and I can infuse some of those. And sorrel.

Then I used the flowers to make this, partly because supertailz requested a drink using Magellan yesterday, but I’d already gone with Greylock as the iris flavor in Magellan would completely overpower the violets, which are really, really subtle. You know, subtle enough that a hundred of them don’t appear to leave much of a flavor in simple syrup.

Bradbury

Ingredients:
3 oz Magellan gin
6 dandelion blossoms
Splash of Ramazzotti amaro
Splash of Cardamaro
A few droplets of walnut oil

Instructions:
–Reserve one dandelion
–Add dandelions and gin to shaker, muddle until dandelions are completely macerated (they will look like small yellow ribbons)
–Add Ramazzotti and Cardamaro
–Shake and pour
–Garnish with remaining dandelion blossom and walnut oil to taste

In other news, we picked some of the first asparagus of the season. Let’s talk about this asparagus. You know how there’s all that talk about how organic vegetables are necessarily smaller and wimpier than the factory farmed kind?

Yeah? Well MY ASPARAGUS AND I CHALLENGE YOU.

LOOK AT THE SIZE OF THAT ASPARAGUS.

It was also shockingly sweet and tender for the size. I was mightily impressed with our asparagus-growing prowess.

Oh, also, I lied. About the not being tired part.

Mirrored from Antagonia.net.