Date-Grape Bars

Posted in Recipes on 09/11/2010 02:16 pm by Orthoclase

Hard to say without snickering, but tasty — almost like a chichi poptart…

(Adapted from Betty Crocker Cooky Book, ©1963.)

Filling:
3-4 cups concord grapes, washed & stemmed
1T (or less) oil
Dash salt
1+ cup medjool dates, pitted & chopped
1/4 cup sugar
2T lemon juice

Separate the grape pulp from the skins. Put the pulp into a saucepan and heat over medium heat until they start to burst open. In the meantime, lightly coat the skins with the oil (I used melted bacon fat, olive or vegetable will do), place on a baking tray, very lightly salt and roast in a 400°F oven for a few minutes.

When the grape pulp is cooked, put it through a sieve. Get as much of the pulp as possible. Discard the seeds. Mix the pulp with the roasted grape skins, and put the grape mixture back into the saucepan with the dates, sugar and lemon juice. Cook this for a few minutes over medium-low heat until thickened. Let cool.

Crumb:
3/4 cup shortening (part butter — I used 1/2c shortening, 1/4c butter)
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 3/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp soda
1/2 tsp salt (orignal called for 1t, which was too salty)
1 1/2 cups rolled oats (I used the thick-cut ones)

Heat oven to 400°F. Grease a 13x9x2 pan. Mix sugar & shortening together. Stir together flour, soda & salt, and then mix with shortening/sugar mixture. Stir in rolled oats.

Press half of the crumb mixture in the bottom of the pan. Spread the grape-date mixture evenly over the bottom layer. Distribute the rest of the crumbs over the top. Press them down a bit, or it’ll just be crumbs and fall off.

Bake for 25-30 minutes. While warm, cut into bars and remove from the pan.

 

My how time … drags on

Posted in Mundanity on 07/17/2010 05:05 pm by Orthoclase

Here it is, the middle of July 2010, and I am finally getting to the point of doing something with the stuff we’ve accumulated in the house and the storage bin. The piles have been growing since we moved here (1997) — it’s the largest house we’ve owned — then they really took off when Plagioclase’s mother moved in (2004) and we became just completely crammed in as I cleaned out my mother’s house (2007). But until now, I wasn’t really seeing the stuff — it was just like a painted wall to me. Ok a 3D wall in a series of really small rooms, but the point is it became background.

Of course now the problem is figuring out what to do with it all. Some of it is just trash or recyclables (funny how cans of paint seem to accumulate). However, most of it is stuff that was already slated to be sold somehow. But how? eBay is too slow and too annoying. A local auction would be unlikely to generate much. A garage sale is an awful lot of work, requiring much advance planning and pricing and cleaning of the garage (part of the problem). Plagioclase suggested we set up a single table every week, and say “Come back next week, we’ll have new stuff!”

Then there’s the possibility of actually using some of this stuff, especially the vintage items, for movies. Well, stock videos, at least, since a friend of mine makes them. NO! STOP IT! I am really going to get rid of it… eventually.

*sigh*

 

Lime-flavored syrup

Posted in Recipes on 07/09/2010 09:01 pm by Orthoclase

Before I forget (based on a recipe in a comment thread at Chowhound)

Purée together (food processor):

* 2 limes (about golf-ball sized) — I just put ‘em in whole.
* 1 (ish) cup water

I didn’t make it smooth, there were some pretty big chunks left

Put into a sauce pan and add in 1 (ish) cup sugar. Heat to a boil until the liquid foams (this is what I did anyway — there are lots of internet recipes for making simple syrup).

Let cool. Strain into a glass cup/jar/bottle for keeping.

As of this posting, I haven’t tasted the final version. I could see maybe changing to brown sugar (would likely be really good in rum drinks), and possibly modifying the proportions.

I like the idea of making my own cocktail mixers. Does that make me a hipster now?

Update: It is not as sweet at the stuff you can buy, but it is certainly the right limey-bitter :) I call this a win!

 

July 4th WESP

Posted in Pretensions on 07/04/2010 03:13 pm by Orthoclase

Today’s (unheard, since I’m off of NPR lately) Sunday Puzzle:

Next Week’s Challenge

From Eric Berlin of the National Puzzlers League: Take an eight-letter term that’s often used to mean “a good child.” Remove the first two and last two letters, and reverse what remains to get a four-letter word meaning “a bad child.”

Very easy, really.

Read the rest of this entry »

 

Have I offended you?

Posted in Uncategorized on 04/17/2010 09:36 pm by Orthoclase

No really, Patience. Weren’t we friends once, or at least on speaking terms?

 
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