Smoothie time

O and I love to share smoothies.  He calls them "soothies"- with much gusto and excited anticipation- which I think is the cutest thing ever.  Well, besides his sweet little kisses, or when he rubs my arm while we cuddle, or when he makes jokes... I guess you could say I think everything he does is the cutest thing ever.  As it should be, I suppose.

Anyway, on this particular day I decided to make a real treat of a "soothie".  I had prepped the day before by throwing a handful of marionberries (leftover from making marionberry scones) into the freezer- in a bag, of course.  When we were ready for our smoothie I combined some soy yogurt, hemp milk, greens powder (spirulina, chlorella, etc.) cocoa powder, and the berries into the blender.  O danced around by my side as I blended it all together (oh, do I ever love my Magic Bullet.)

It was delicious.  Berry cocoa smoothies for the win.

This is his "grumpy face".  He's such a ham!

This is his "happy face".  Very appropriate for smoothie time.

More brews!

So far, Kraig is keeping up wiht his goal to always have a homebrew in the works.  He even has his brewing schedule mapped out for the rest of the year.  What a fun hobby for him to have! 

I must say though, I am a baker and baking is precise with just a little teensy-eensy bit of room for error or experimentation.  But baking doesn't intimidate me like it does for some folks.  Brewing?  THAT is intimidating.  I feel like my husband is a mad scientist when he's brewing.

Check out these photos from the first day of pale ale brewing (there are two rounds of fermentation before racking (bottling) followed by bottle conditioning.  This brew will be ready to drink in about 2 weeks or so (4 weeks from original brew date)).

 Carboy and funnel, sanitized and ready!

 Owen gets excited about making beer.  

 Yeast from Hopworks brewing co., and Kraig's notes and recipe.

 Apparently one needs to drink beer in order to make beer!

 Whole grain crystal malt

 Everything is boiled...

 and precisely measured.

 Hops!

 boiling malt

 Calculating original gravity, IBUs, and he can also figure out the estimated alcohol content

Primary fermentation!  That's some happy yeast!

Summer foods

Oregon is certainly the mecca when it comes to delicious foods.  We've got locally-grown, harvested, and processed grains available from Bob's Red Mill just a mile or two from our house.  Strawberries- and berries in general- here are unlike any I've had before.  Deliciously red all the way through- no white interior with super-tart flavor.  Marionberries are named after Marion county in Oregon, so you know you only get the best from here in the state.  Same for cherries- Oregon is well known for its plump, juicy Hood-grown cherries.  True confession: I had never eaten a raw cherry, nor baked with cherries, until we moved to Oregon.  What. A. Shame.  Anyway- Oregon has a wonderfully long growing season and super fertile soil, so that is just the tip of the iceberg.  Mushrooms (chanterelles especially), hazelnuts, and ohmygoodness the wines.  

We're in paradise, for sure.

It's been a great summer so far with our CSA, but we've also tried to get out and explore the other avenues of acquiring some of the fresh produce from the area.  We have perused farmers markets but we like to go straight to the source.  Thus, we made a little trek to Hood River to pick up ten pounds of cherries.  

I had plans for these cherries.  Oh yes.  Big plans.

 Sweet cherry crisp

 I'm getting a little ahead of myself- here are some pictures from our trip to the Hood River Cherry Fest.

 CAN YOU EVEN BELIEVE THIS VIEW?!  This is Mt. Hood.  Well, it's the base of Mt. Hood.  She is covered with clouds but it was such a warm, beautiful summer day.  In my humble and slightly biased opinion, Oregon has some of the most majestic views.  But that's not what this post is about....

Cherries!

 We picked up dark sweets, rainiers, and lapins (I think lapins are my favorite, but it really depends on my mood.)

 Rainiers.  Y-U-M.

 Cherry Cobbler

I've also made a cherry pudding cake, and we froze a few different pie and crumble variations.  Thankfully, though, cherry season is just getting started here, so there will be many more cherries to enjoy!

I think having our CSA has helped pull me out of my first-trimester anti-cooking binge.  I was so repulsed by so many foods and so exhausted by pregnancy in general that for months it was hard to motivate myself to get in the kitchen let alone pull together a meal.

Having a variety of super-fresh produce brought to my house each week certainly helps cure that.  Fresh garlic!  Fresh carrots!  Fresh herbs!  Oh, it's been fun.

It's also been a little chilly for July (usually right around 70 degrees) so a hearty soup seemed appropriate.  I really don't need much of an excuse to make soup, to be honest.  There's really nothing like homemade soup, but adding a side of crusty bread with fresh homemade pesto certainly makes it that much better.

Fresh fruit smoothies!  We usually don't get enough fruit in our CSA to bake anything, so we either eat the fruit plain or I blend it up into a smoothie for me and Owen.

I'm looking forward to when harvest season really picks up.  It's not been hot here yet, so I think it will be an interesting- and late- harvest this year.  No complaints here!  We're enjoying everything as it slowly comes in.

Adventures in homebrewing

Homebrewing equipment is terrible exciting for toddlers.  Don't worry- we sanitize everything before use. 

 Performing.  Maybe playing a sax?

Spring in Portland

Now that it's summer I should update on what spring was like in PDX.

We've been neglecting our camera lately.  Shame!

I played a little catch-up to get some proof...

It took quite a while for it to warm up here in Portland.  We didn't mind, and hardly noticed to be honest with you.  Coming from Ohio we're used to a huge jump in temps around the beginning of May (like, 40s to 80s), so we really enjoyed the temperate spring.  It had been in the 50s and 60s for the duration of May (and April, and March) and we were loving it- though the locals say this has been the chilliest and rainiest spring that they can remember.  We had no complaints, but it's nice that this was perhaps the "worst" of it.  June was sporadically cloudy but mostly sunny and hovering around 70 degrees.  Fantastic!

We've taken advantage with lots of family walks, gardening and other outdoor projects, cooking up some spring produce, and doing a bit of spring cleaning indoors.

Our potted peppers are doing great.

And the basil is doing well rooming in with the parsley.

We put up some decor on the outside of the house.  (no photos yet...)

Our CSA started.  Oh my.  I love this particular farm- gorgeous, organic produce, lots of variety from week to week, and low prices.  Hooray!

Kraig's been picking up a few sustainable hobbies around the house.  He's been roasting more coffee, as well as homebrewing some beer!  His first try was a mango-raspberry summer ale.  It is delicious from what I have heard so far.  He's going to try to keep a beer going in the carboys so that he always has plenty on hand as well as to give away :)


There are also some new neighbors that we welcomed to the 'hood.  They are great friends from Cleveland so we were thrilled that they found a home just 3.5 blocks away from us!  Owen has been enjoying playdates and meetups with our newest neighbors :)  Kraig and I certainly love having them nearby as well!

New Year's Dinner

For a lot of different reasons, we had our New Year's Dinner a week late.  Kraig was taking out the compost and snapped a photo of me working in our super small kitchen.  See me?

We had the traditional German/Polish New Year's feast of potatoes, sauerkraut, and "sausage".  I also made green beans and vegan gravy.  Yum!  For the sausage?   Tofurkey brand kielbasa, which is a pretty good stand-in for the real thing.

Licking the gravy spoon.  He is his father's son.

A Vegan Christmas Feast

Is it gratuitous to post photos of our Christmas meal?  Oh, it is?  Shucks.

This was our first all-Vegan Christmas and I was darn proud of it!  IT WAS SO DELICIOUS!  

Cornbread. nom nom nom.

Obligatory mashed potatoes.  Surprisingly delicious for being vegan.  I'd dare say they were the best MP's ever.  

I was not part of the meal.  Well, except that I cooked all of it.  Kraig just likes to capture me in my element.  Ha!

Garlicky greens.  Come to mama.  

Boy Eating Cornbread

The Best Mushroom Gravy in the World.  Seriously, I think I drank some of it straight (not really, but I really, really wanted to.  True story.)

 Green bean casserole with homemade fried onions.  (For inquiring minds, the "cream of mushroom sauce" in the green beans was my mushroom gravy.  YUM.)

 The Christmas Roast Beast!   Haha!  Braised veggies with Field Roast Celebration roast.  It was really, really good.

 Check this out, Owen is trying to steal more cornbread.  Thief!

First of all, that looks so amazing.  Secondly, our new camera captures STEAM.  How crazy is that?!