5 gallon beer

This weekend we bottled our first (of hopefully many) 5 gallon batches of beer with Peter and Claudia. It should be something close to a chocolate maple brown ale. The bottles are now carbonating at Peter's house- it looks to be a success and we'll know for sure in 2 weeks.

This time around we had a bottle capper- we made about 50 bottles.

Roast Duck with Sausage and Apple Stuffing a la Julia Child: Caneton Roti a l'Alsacienne

We roasted 3 ducks from the Meat Hook for Christmas, using a recipe from Julia Child. It helped to watch her episode on how to roast a chicken (the chicken sisters!).

The ducks were amazing, and the stuffing was possibly even better.

Pâté de Campagne

This recipe only took us a couple hours and it came out really great. We did about a third of the Ruhlman/Polcyn recipe, used chicken liver rather than pork (we'll try pork next time- its supposed to have more flavor), and just used the basic onion/parsley/garlic/spices seasoning. A "pâté de campagne" is characterized by a more coarsely ground meat and 'rustic' texture.

Step 1: Grind pork shoulder butt, chicken liver, spices.

Mix with flour, eggs, cream and brandy.

Step 2: Pour mixture into a lined terrine mold.

Bake in hot water bath.

Step 3: Remove from oven and let cool overnight.

its too hot to cook in the summer...

Grandma Cyclops

Brats!!

Stiring the ground pork/spices

Me and the hog casing

Red Shed Community Garden

We did our open hours at the community garden this morning and came home with a nice salad (not pictured), a bouquet and some fresh mint. It was a really pleasant morning, we weeded and mowed the lawn. We really should have taken some photos of the garden itself, maybe next time.