Croquembouche, Part Two

For the dessert, today: fill the poufs, make caramel, and assemble. How hard can it be?

Filling poufs with custards. Fun watching some of them expand.

Mega-Ultra* Cookie

I did it! Attempted macarons for the third time and they came out with the perfect texture!

Mega Ultra Cookie - the most perfect one of the bunch

Added matcha powder to the cookie batter and the filling is strawberry jam mixed with cream cheese (it's all i had). YUM!

*Mega Ultra Chicken from Aqua Teen Hunger Force. 

Staycation Day 1

So for my first day of the staycation...

Spent an hour or so in the print shop today, making blind-punched thank you notes.

They are listed on etsy now.

Watched a meh movie (Duets) on netflix and knitted some of a scarf- pink organic cotton yarn- chunky and textured.

Aiming for a somewhat narrow long fun scarf. Looking forward to fall...

Went to the Domain to The Steeping Room for tea and scones with Mom, then wandered through a few shops

Yummy scone with jam and clotted cream!
When the weather cools down, will definitely go back for a pot of hot tea and scones.

Put on Clueless for background giggles (sadly it made me feel old; dumb high school kids, man...) and marinated some chicken for dinner and tried some zucchini cakes- yum!! Serve that with some plain organic yogurt with a 3-finger pinch of curry powder...

Also saw the carrots in the fridge (blech, carrots. Really. Especially baby carrots- i can only eat 5 and then I feel the gag coming...) and decided Carrot Cake! I don't think I've ever made it from scratch before so... Found a recipe from a pretty reliable source.

Not the prettiest, but you know what? I don't care!
It's a cake from scratch, and it tastes like carrot cake, so there!

Had dinner with T (chicken, basmati rice, steamed brocolli, and a zucchini cake

Wouldn't tell T what was in the veggie mound until after he tasted it.
He does not like zucchini, but thought these were okay. Didn't care for the yogurt dipping sauce.

And went to Central Market in hopes of finding those citrus slices.

Success!

Someone who features letterpress studios, who I've been in contact with, has asked to feature us. Eeek! I'm not ready! But no time like the present, right? In the morning I'll do a few reprints, get them online, and *then* say "sure!"

No more candy?

To treat myself for my birthday-week I went with T to Big Top on South Congress yesterday and did not have a good time this visit:
A) it was a jungle of whiny kids. terrible.
B and most importantly) they aren't carrying my little citrus slices! The horror! I really wanted them and can't exactly scoot to the mall's candy shop while I'm on vacation (not getting on 360 and Bee Cave is such a windy road; the candy isn't worth it).

These are what I was craving: Since I was robbed of my craving I got the regular citrus candies (some looked like tangerine segments and were very good!) and tried a few chocolates, which I never do; I usually stick to the fruits flavors. Grabbed a few chocolate covered gummy bears, choco covered banana chips (yum!), large whopper-type balls but the outer layer was mint-chocolate, a couple choco covered oreos, and yogurt covered raisins, which I have always liked but never buy and I can't think of why. They're so good! Everything I got was good actually, but i *really* wanted the citrus slices.

When I got up this morning, my baggie of jelly candies was empty. I'm blaming the cats, but I think we know who really ate them all last night.