Posting

also, I know I've been really bad about this. I really hate this set up & am looking at migrating this over to wordpress. I want to set up so I can include my walking/running posts every day & now that I'll have super kitchen, hopefully much more cooking notes.

yeah!! be on the lookout.

CUPCAKES!!!

Ok. As promised,  here's the recipes.

Apologies as the blog I saw this on is someone who prattles on & on. You can ignore all that & just look at the instructions.

Chocolate Stout Cupcakes
 - I didn't tweak too much. There's some good advice - have eggs at room temperature.
 - For yogurt in baking I always use the 'french style'. it's consistency is similar to cream & works well. I did not have vanilla in the house but the yogurt was vanilla so instead I put in a tsp of whiskey.
 - And I used a pinch of allspice instead of the cinnamon & unsweetened cocoa powder instead of the Dutch.
 - if you don't have a sifter, whisking dry ingredients will work.
 - I did not use Guinness, but trader joe's chocolate stout. Some of them are tricky - they're flavoured with artificial vanilla & can be really strong. but this one tastes like beer & not like it's been stirred with a bad candy bar.

They turned out great. Really moist but also light & fluffy.  I used frosting & caramel from a different recipe though, which you'll see here:

Buttercream Frosting & Salted Caramel

for the caramel, again I used the vanilla yogurt instead of heavy cream. It actually gives it a great flavor, creamy but not too sweet. & I used a little extra whiskey as I didn't have vanilla extract on hand.
the same with the buttercream.
No one who tasted has commented on lack of vanilla & the whiskey combined with vanilla in yogurt covered just fine.
Also no mixer so I stirred it all by hand. Yes. Really.

I also made these, which turned out good. Maybe not as impressive as the beer ones.

Chocolate Orange Cupcakes

 - The ingredients are metric but there's a ton of online conversion if you need that.
 - This was the big adjustment. I did not have self rising flour so I looked at subs online & whisked some baking soda & powder in before adding the dry ingredients to wet. For additional help I also added about a 1/3 cup of sparkling water to the orange juice. There's tons of recipes that use orange soda (full of sugar) & the fresh juice/sparkling water combo is the perfect substitute.
I didn't measure too exact on the water. when it was all mixed I put in a bit more to get the consistency I wanted. It's still a pretty thick mixture for cake but cooked up really well.
 - I used the same buttercream icing as the others partly because there was a lot of it. & because I didn't want to go super orangey. i mixed in a cream cheese one but it used caster sugar & i was not happy with how it dissolved. or did not. I'd go all powdered if I did that again.

& There we go. Happy to answer any questions.

The Nature of Resolve

I hate this new layout. But I am determined to write more. Starting now. well, starting during this week.
So be on the lookout.
I'm going to play with this to get the hang on having it punctuate correctly (what are they? Facebook?).
then I'll fix that argo nonsense & move on.

two blogs. two twitters. that's a lot of clever for little old me. but i'm up to the challenge. lot of news & changes in January. you'll see them here.

Argo F*&K Yourself It'll make sense when you see it. I promise. Instead of writing a long wrought out review, i'm just posting my notes as is. For fun. - Laemmle NoHo7, 1:30 show 12 October. - Phone Off/Notebook out. - Popcorn is a good lunch right? - BYOW - Arclight ticket would've been $13. paid $11.50 here for tix & popcorn - My good deed for the day was holding the door for the guy in the walker. and then not sitting in the ADA seats in case he needed one. hilariously, the coffee sipping hipster with worse manners wound up with the older slightly deaf couple who showed up 15 minutes in sitting by him. ha. ha. - I think the woman in front of me might be here to binge eat in the dark. that's a huge bucket of popcorn. & she's got food in wrappers too - "Deep Dark Canyon" preview. could be quite cool. Abraham Benrubi had a couple great moments in the preview (that's Jerry the desk clerk to those of you playing the home game) - JohnHawkesJohnHawkesJohnHawkes. - Can you tell they showed "the Sessions" preview? Bawdy is the word for sure. - Who is that beautiful girl? David Oyelowo!!!!! ok. the beautiful girl is Emayatzy Corinealdi & this is not her first film but she is being billed as 'introducing' for this film, "Middle of Nowhere". i have a feeling we'll be hearing about her. I already knew this was Oyelowo's year. ***I got to the theatre 10 minutes before listed show time & there was 5 previews. no commercials. & a very funny clip of Anthony Hopkins as Hitch telling people to turn off their cell phones. - WB - used old school 70's logo. cool - who is narrating? (i think Clea Duvall now) - genuinely can't tell if they mixed in real news footage. if they shot that all themselves, its impressive. - took me forever to figure out that was Tate Donavon. like until they got to the Canadian ambassadors house. even longer with Clea. seriously. - Bring Kleenex. - Kyle! (chandler, that is) - wonder why they used Peter Jennings name? because he's passed? they showed clips of a bunch of other folk like Koppel & Conkrite. just curious. - fucking sh??d??? (i'll let you know if i figure out what that word is) - wouldn't it look suspicious to have dinner plates for 8 people & have 6 of them be missing? - Ernie!!! (Barry Livingston. Ernie from My Three Sons. I don't know why. - Ben is getting a lot of revenge shots in at Hollywood here. it's awesome - its a wonder they didn't use Hef (for the producer?) - City of 6 Films (hilarious name for the production company) - Tacos on either real or fake Rodeo Drive - God music was bad in the late 70's. - With the election on, Argo could maybe be the most important film this year. i'm surprised we're not hearing more. - Argo Fuck Yourself! geez - I hope they all got a shirt with that on. - "It's like talking to those 2 old fucks on the Muppets" - Ben Affleck should hire John Goodman all the time. - really smart casting all through. - who needs to bring an effing drink to Argo? at 1:30 on a Friday? the guys behind me apparently - smart violence. not bloody. not too much. well timed for tension. - pneumatic tubes! - "When the Levee Breaks". on vinyl. at the Canadian ambassadors house. - Cranston. Oscar. Now. effing hell can he build a character & then just tear the arse out of a piece when it's time. - kinds of sounds that will maybe resonate more with younger people who don't remember things like stampers. - that damn whiner killed it when it counted. jaysus. i thought he was gonna sink them. well done. Ok, so all in all, so needs to be watched. so amazing. If you're old enough to remember when this happened it will break your heart a bit. it's strange to me to tell people about it & realize how little it's remembered or what is known. it was such a huge part of our lives. It's extremely well done. not perfect but damned well executed. particularly as he's really making several small films & smooshing them together. hte hollywood part & the CIA parts & the 'Houseguests". I love it when something lives up to my expectations.

happy music!!

Fail on posting this on Monday but here's the brand spanking new video for "Rhyme O'Clock" by Wordburglar featuring Bram (as in Sharon, Lois &....)

This might be a rerun

but I haven't used it as a happy Monday tune. It may seem a bit dark for that but sometimes just rockin' out makes a gal happy. Well, this gal at least. Here we go with "Mr. Hurricane" from Beast

happy Monday!!!

More power pop (or poppy rock if you prefer) from the always terrific Yukon Blonde. *love* hope you enjoy! "Stairways"