Quick Lemonade

When it comes to lemonade I prefer to go the simple route - water, sugar and lemon juice stirred together.  None of this making cooking up a concentrate, chilling it, and then adding the water.  It also works well for making limeade, just substitute lime juice for the lemon juice(obvious, no?).


Lemonade
13 cups water

2 cups granulated sugar(or more or less to taste)
2 cups lemon juice
Combine all ingredients in a 1 gallon pitcher, stir until the sugar dissolves.
Makes ~1 gallon.


Kickin' Arnold
1 cup lemonade
1 cup iced tea
1 tbsp ginger syrup(I'll add the links as I get to the recipes)
Stir together and serve over ice.
Makes 1 large serving, or 2 normal ones.


Lemon Granita
4 cups lemonade
1/2 cup sugar(again, to taste)
1/2 cup lemon juice
Stir together and pour into a 9x13 pan.  Freeze for 1 hour, scrape with with a fork to break up any ice that's formed, continue to freeze and scrape every hour or so until it's frozen through.  Scoop into a bowl and enjoy!
Makes 4-ish servings. 


Raspberry Lime Slushies
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen 
5 cups limeade, divided
1/2 cup lime juice
1 cup raspberries
1 cup soda water
Purée raspberries and press through a sieve, stir together with 4 cups of limeade.  Pour into ice cube trays and freeze.  Toss the ice cubes into a blender and blend with lime juice and 1 cup limeade until slushy.  Pour into 4 glasses and top each with 1/4 cup soda water.
Makes 4 servings.   

Summertime Staples

Now that the weather is getting warmer it's time for me to put away the cocoa mix and put my coffee pot away and break out the cold drinks instead.  In an effort to actually keep hydrated and keep our drink options interesting(I don't like plain water much).  So I've assembled a selection of staples that keep well in the fridge, are cheap, and can be mixed and matched with each other and other basic ingredients that you likely have around in the summer.

I'll be sharing these recipes throughout next week, so today I'll lay out the necessary ingredients and my small list of equipment that really makes it easy for me keep the fridge stocked and me away from Dunkin's iced drinks.

First the necessary ingredients:
Coffee(I just use Folgers that I can buy in a big cheap-ish can)
Sugar
Lemon juice
Tea bags
Fresh ginger root

My equipment of choice:
2 - 1 gallon pitchers(I have these)
1 - 2 quart pitcher(this is my favorite)
Colander or sieve
Small kettle or large saucepan

Optional but handy equipment:

Sealable glass bottles

I have a 1 liter bottle that I use for ginger syrup and a couple of smaller ones that I use for small batches of berry purées and for the husband to take drinks to work in.  I found mine at HomeGoods for $3-5 each, which is way cheaper than I was able to find them online.

A soda siphon

Now this is a really optional item - if you have one or you find a good one at a tag sale(that's where ours came from) or if you can borrow one from a relative that doesn't use it anyway, great!  If not, bottled seltzer is still relatively cheap if you can get it on sale.  You can get the soda chargers for about $0.40 each if you buy them in bulk from a bar supplier, they're actually more expensive to buy from Amazon than from a smaller dealer.

And lastly get yourself some good cute glasses for sipping these tasty concoctions from.

See you Monday!

Over There, Over There!

I'm guest blogging about bread over at City Wife, Country Life today.

Too Sore to Knit Tonight

 So I'll blog instead.

We spent our weekend enjoying the gorgeous weather(high 60's!) and working on the new dining room.  We installed four new windows by ourselves and it really couldn't have been much easier.  Aside from the very last window, they slid in easily and, thanks to my Dad's expert framing job, were perfectly level both vertically and horizontally and required no shimming.

The first window went in on Saturday evening, the second had to wait until the next morning due to noise regulations.

 One side all done!  The big hole in the middle should be filled later this week by. . .

 This beauty that we picked up this afternoon, the glass is about 2/3 the height of the door.  The outside is going to be painted a gorgeous red, and the trim around the window will be the same tan as the siding.

The handsome husband nailing in the very last window, which was only trouble because the sheathing was cut badly and dipped down into the window opening.

All done with the windows!  This next week's challenge is going to be hanging the front door and a hanging the patio door on the back side of the dining room.  It's so nice to see this coming all together and starting to look like an actual room instead of just a weird porch.

Grey Monday

It's a lovely grey Monday here, not really the cheeriest way to start the week, and even more gloomy when the 10 day forecast expects rain for 8 out of the next 10 days.  But rainy days are also good for lots of coffee and knitting and soup.  Mind you my current knitting projects are at least as grey as the weather.

 My latest purchases at WEBS.

The Webs Anniversary Sale started this weekend and I headed up on Saturday to make sure I got the Cascade 220 I wanted before they ran out.  So the above is two sweater vests and some pima/silk for my sister - all greys.

Thankfully I also thought to get some color for myself.  A nice skein of clearance Sockin' Socks, which means I now just need to learn how to knit socks - just a small detail.  I'm waiting on a book on how to knit socks from the toe up, it looks like it will be more difficult initially, but I think it will be worth it to be able to just keep knitting the sock until I run out of yarn rather than ending up with leftovers once the foot is long enough.  If I can figure this out everyone may be getting socks for Christmas this year!

Carrot Cupcakes with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

Carrot Cupcakes:

4 cups all-purpose flour

3 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

3 teaspoons ground cinnamon

8 large eggs

2 cups granulated white sugar

2 cups canola or vegetable oil

4 cups finely grated raw carrots

1 cup grated apple(approximately 2 large)

1 cup crushed pineapple, drained

1/2 cup pecans or walnuts, coarsely chopped

1 cup raisins or currants(optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Combine wet ingredients in one bowl and dry ingredients in another, fold gently together until just combined.  Fill muffin cups 3/4 full, bake for 20 minutes.

Adapted from Joy of Baking.  Theirs was sadly lacking pineapple.

For frosting:

Two (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
1 tsp maple flavoring

In a mixer beat all the ingredients on medium until fluffy.

Note: If you don't have maple syrup you could use milk instead and just add extra maple flavoring.

What I've Been Up To This Past Week

I'm trying to wrap up my big sewing projects before it gets to be too warm around here.  I'd also like to move along to the 2 skirts and 3 dresses that I already have all the supplies for.

So without further introduction, here are the three quilts I've been working on.

The Bean's Quilt, made from Freebird by Moda, bordered with some brown swirl fabric from Joann's and backed with blue flannel.  This was (rather obviously) taken before I'd finished it, it was just pinned together at this point.  This one is all the completed and winging its way to the sunny Midwest!

This is for a friend who is due right around Easter.  It's made from Fandango by Moda, with a swirly teal border and a teal flannel backing.  I have the top completed and the backing together, now all I have to do is make a nice quilt sandwich and it will be all set!

Lastly there's this lovely latte colored lap quilt that I made for my MIL as a birthday present last week.  From start to finish I only spent 2.5 days on it; it helps that it was just simple squares and no difficult piecing.