silly and fun and altogether delicious...

if i were to assess (say, on a scale of one-to-ten) how much of an emotional wreck i have been of late, it would probably average out somewhere near seventeen. life is like that these days. however, there was one wholly-absurd and thoroughly-enjoyable bright spot we got to share. 

a certain animator had a birthday recently, and we used that event as an excuse to indulge in a multi-day festival of foods delivered from some restaurants in the area. we are selflessly doing our part to keep the local economy alive. that's my story, and i'm sticking to it!

some were places that were already known to us, but we discovered a few new gems along the way... like Wienstein & Gavino's (he loved their lasagna), and the indescribable desserts from Bon Et Petit (they are so awesome, they don't need no stinkin' website!). 

then there was that other dish. this one requires a bit of explaining. 

if you have never heard of a thing called poutine, be glad. the dish—and i use that term very loosely—consists of fries topped with gravy and something the locals refer to as cheese curds. oh, and i should probably mention that the curds are supposed to squeak when you chew them, earning them the nickname of squeaky cheese. 

but wait... it gets worse!

the curds lose that disturbing auditory quality when refrigerated, so cheese curds are usually kept at room temperature. the absolute worst part is that they sell them everywhere! no exaggeration, you can find plastic bags of fresh cheese curds on the cashier counter of almost every gas station... right next to the breath mints and the cigarette lighters. that is how much they love their poutine in Quebec, and that is probably the main reason why i have been avoiding the stuff since my very first visit to Montreal (some eighteen-ish years ago, if you need all the details). 

what does any of this have to do with his birthday, you ask? patience. i was just getting to that bit.

birthdays around here are often used to guilt the other person into doing stuff to which they might otherwise object. some call this "love". i had absolutely refused to eat the rabbit he cooked for New Year's (a story for some other day), which meant that i already owed him one.  

so, there we were, with his birthday happening at the end of something called La Poutine Week, where restaurants all over Quebec (and beyond) come up with outrageous combos of poutine toppers to reflect their cuisine. the animator kept reading me the descriptions of some of the local offerings in the misguided hope that he would tempt me to give it a try, so i knew that it was only a matter of time.

him: ooh... there's butter chicken poutine. you love butter chicken.
me: i do. it's one of my favorite foods. i just don't want it on soggy chips with gas station cheese.
him: or, what about this one? lobster poutine! you love lobster.
me: exactly. i love lobster far too much to do it the disservice of ending up atop poutine. 

now, i should point out that he had never even tasted poutine—despite living in Canada his whole life—which made his attempt at a guilt-trip all the more ridiculous. 

me: i am not stopping you from eating poutine. get it. eat whatever you want. 

him: i know, but i want to share this experience with you.
me: why do i have to be tortured so you can satisfy your curiosity?

him: that's how the love works. 

me: good luck with that. 

then he made some comment about me being no fun, which i reminded him was part of my charm. still, it was his special day multi-day celebration, so i gave in. and, after going through the whole list of local offerings, we narrowed it down to the Baby Back Black Velvet Poutine from McCarold, a new-to-us pub a short drive from our place...

or the Philly Cheesesteak Poutine from an old favorite, Notre Boeuf de Grâce.  

[random aside: the restaurant's name is a play on Notre Dame de Grâce (NDG), our neighborhood here in Montreal. i had mixed feeling when they first opened (about a block away from our old place) in the location previously occupied by D.A.D.'s Bagel, a business that was much-loved by the locals. D.A.D.'s was open around the clock, and we would often pop in there during one of our late night walks. i liked going there in wee hours when they were making the mountains of bagels that would be sold at cafes and other such places around town. it was mesmerizing to watch them being moved in and out of the large wood-burning oven. i vowed to hate whatever business took its place... which lasted all of a few months.] 

where was i, again? oh, yes... poutine. 

so, after way more debate than most sane people would find necessary, we settled on the Black Velvet Poutine. it showed up looking just as i expected, like so many servings of poutine i had seen being consumed by other human beings: soggy fries and scattered lumps of gas station cheese. this was not going to end well. 

i took one look, and made the face that he knew from experience meant he would probably be eating it all alone. still, it was his birthday, and i had promised to give it a try, so i stabbed my fork into a chip, and gave it a taste. 

it was a-maz-ing!

i went in for a second bite in silence, stabbing a chunk of the meat this time. this was the point when i started regretting that we had not gotten two orders, because i was definitely not feeling inclined to share. we paused briefly to exchange our mutual (wholly-unexpected) enjoyment of the combination of saucy meat and fries, and we instantly made plans to check out some of the pub's regular offerings in the future. 

but there was still that other thing. 

me: i'm kinda afraid to try the cheese curds.
him: yeh. me too.
me: i'll be freaked out if i bite into something and it squeaks

him: but it would be false advertising if it doesn't squeak. 
me: i know. that's why i'm scared. 

him: me too. let's try it at the same time.

so we did. and it does. and we both laughed because it was silly and fun and altogether delicious. so now we are looking forward to Poutine Week 2022. meanwhile, i have to find something even more absurd delectable for us to try when my birthday rolls around. 

i only "eh" in jest...

i climbed out of bed unapologetically late today to find that it had rained while i was asleep. this was a most welcome sight, as Eastern Canada is in the grips of a sweltering heat-wave. the rain brought a brief respite, prompting the appearance of some much-needed pollinators who have been mostly laying low over the past week.

the animator caught a shot of a butterfly resting on a rain-drenched squash leaf in this year's balcony garden project... which he promptly turned into a jigsaw puzzle.

there was some dispute regarding the use of said image.

me: i'm gonna put that picture in my blog post.
him: did you ask for my permission to use it?
me: did you ask for my permission to use my camera?
him: [silence]
me: exactly! my camera. my photo. 
him: but i took it.
me: good luck proving that.

there has also been a spike in the number of wildfires across Quebec, which makes sense with all this heat. however, forestry experts have identified an additional, wholly-unexpected factor that is contributing to there being twice as many forest fires as usual at this time of the year.

you guessed it...it's the covid!

people are stuck at home, with little by way of distraction/entertainment, so the great outdoors presents itself as an attractive destination for anyone seeking to escape the confinement (while maintaining the common sense avoidance of other human beings). as a result, a lot more of them than usual are coming to the same dangerous conclusion.

"let's go camping, eh?"

now, i feel a need to pause here for a moment to address anyone who may have read that last sentence, and are now concerned that i may have gone native. i assure you that no such thing has occurred. i could not stop sounding like i spent most of my life in New York City, no matter how hard i might try. that quintessentially Canadian noise only ever escapes my face when i am joking about the place. trust me... i only "eh" in jest.

where was i again?

oh, yes... more people going camping, which means more irresponsible campfires, which means more forest fires. so now there is one more thing to worry about in what is already shaping up to be the most stress-inducing year in recorded history.

speaking of stress...

'twould seem i am doing a particularly bad job at keeping mine in check of late. i actually found myself on the receiving end of a bit of (wholly professional) medical advice that is unlike any i have encountered before. "you need to calm the hell down," he said. so now i can add that the list of things to (try not to) stress about. good grief!

i began my quest for calm by harassing a farmer about some sheep, and eventually purchasing a couple fleeces from the good people over at Kinnaird Farm. yes, i did recently get two fleeces (from a different farm). however, i really wanted some naturally-colored grey/black wool, so i convinced myself that this purchase was totally justified.

the only disappointment was that i could not go pick them up in person, as a visit to a sheep farm would definitely have knocked my stress levels down a few notches. the animator was prepared to turn the drive into a fun day trip. however, i am taking the whole 'common sense avoidance of other human beings' thing most seriously, so i ended up having the fleeces shipped to me... and the box sat unopened in a corner for several days.

him: you're not gonna open your package?
me: nope!
him: i thought you were so excited to get your fleece.
me: i am.
him: so why don't you open it?
me: the covid. 
him: i see.

it was like every gift-giving holiday rolled into one when i finally broke the seal on that box.

then i broke the vacuum seal on the biggest ziploc bag i have ever seen, and stood there in awe as the fiber expanded. everyone is entitled to their brand of crazy, and i totally embrace mine.

first there was Frosty, a North Country Cheviot/Blue-faced Leicester/Romney/Rideau Arcott cross. i have never worked with purebred Romney or Rideau Arcott wool, but i can see the definite influence in the cross. Frosty is a "hogget", which means a sheep that is in its second year. the term can also apply to the wool and the meat from the animal. yes, i do take my hobby very seriously.

i laid Frosty's fleece out (tip-side up) on a painting tarp that i commandeered for this very purpose. ten points if you spot the ridiculous cat. that is Cordy. she will show up again... and again.

i grabbed a few locks from different parts of the fleece. this one should have been called "Jacob", on account of the coat of many colors. it is insane that all of this came from the same sheep.

next came Blackie. this one is a NCC-BFL cross, and the fleece is finer and more springy than Frosty's. as with most naturally "black" sheep, the color of the wool is actually a super-dark, greyish brown.

i was trying to get a shot with my dark-grey kitty Philly for comparison, but she was more interested in running around like a lunatic.

i forgot to get a photo of Blackie's fleece opened out on the tarp, so i had to pause composing this post to do so (cut-side up this time) .

i took fewer samples from this one, as there was less variation across the whole thing. it is a mostly-uniform dark color with a tweedy patch that left me wondering if this sheep might be related to Don King. [disclaimer for legal purposes: i am in no way suggesting that Don King has engaged in any activity that might have resulted in his DNA being part of a sheep's lineage.]

as per usual, i grabbed some hot, soapy water...

and gave the sample fibers a wash, keeping them covered to maintain the heat in the water. the yogurt containers from last time have already gone into the recycling, so i am using takeout containers this time around... if you need all the details.

those greyscale colors really come alive after a wash. Frosty is on the top row, and Blackie is on the bottom. i really love those silvery-grey sections of Frosty's fleece. it would be nice to find a whole fleece that color.

i decided to wash Frosty's fleece first. i want to keep the locks intact, so i have been carefully laying them out in plastic mesh baskets that i keep for this very purpose, and washing them one basket at a time.

yes, it does take longer than if i divided the fleece in a couple-few batches and washed it like that, but there is something indescribably calming about sitting cross-legged on the floor, carefully organizing chunks of dirty wool into neat rows. that calm was, after all, the point of this whole thing.

unfortunately, Cordy (the Little One of our furry trio) keeps hanging around, trying to eat bits of the wool, and keeping her out of trouble is definitely cutting into the relaxing part of this exercise. try explaining to a cat that the doctor says you need to "calm the hell down". she is as troublesome as she is adorable.

i tied pieces of bird netting to a collapsible laundry rack to make a two-tiered wool-drying rack.

i would have added a third layer of netting to the bottom of the rack, but this setup doubles as a cat trap, so that would have been a very most terribly bad idea. she is seriously my favorite cat.

i want to fill the bathtub with this stuff, and dive in head-first. it is so lovely!

you can see the difference between the tips (left) and the cut-end (right) of the fiber. i wonder if this was the first time Frosty got a haircut. [addendum: the farmer said Frosty also had a haircut last year.]

i am about halfway done with this fleece, then i will move on to washing Blackie's. hopefully my poor cat will survive the over-stimulation.

there has also been quite a bit of spinning in between playing with dirty wool. i mentioned back in April that i had started spinning up the fiber i bought at last Summer's Twist Fibre Festival. [naturally, said festival is cancelled this year... which was another excuse for buying two more fleeces.] that got pushed to the side for a while, but i want to free up the wheel to start spinning all the fleece i have been accumulating of late.

i have two full jumbo bobbins so far, with about half a bobbin's worth of that fiber left to go, which should (hopefully) be enough for a simple sweater of some sort for self.

oh, and there was also a calendar at the bottom of the box of fleeces, and it is filled (naturally) with photos of happy sheep. one of those days was my birthday. it was total rubbish. perhaps i will get around to celebrating it some other day when life is slightly less insane.

it seems to be raining again. i am going to resume sitting cross-legged on the floor, playing with dirty fleece, with at least one cat close at hand to keep me company. i would not have it any other way.

executive bad-girl decision...

someone had a birthday. i made a German apple cake to mark the occasion.

it was not my birthday, i should add, as my parents had sense enough to see that the celebration of my arrival in the world would not fall in the dead of Winter. and, before i forget... let us just chat a bit here about the dead of Winter.

you know all those groundhogs everyone tends to make a fuss about at this time of year? well, according to the majority of said creatures, Spring is supposed to come early this year. meanwhile, we are expecting something in the range of fifty centimeters of snow... FIFTY CENTIMETERS... (TWENTY INCHES, to us Yanks)... before the day is through.

so, basically... groundhogs lie!

where was i again? oh, yes... a birthday has been celebrated.

he has been super-busy of late, so the festivities consisted of the aforementioned cake... and leftovers from the day before. and, before you go thinking that it sucks to be eating leftovers, i should point out that we made a huge batch of sarma (the subject of my first ever post).

while most people's Wednesday meal probably consisted of bits left over from the meals they ate on Tuesday, Monday... and probably Sunday too... we were whipping up a fresh batch of mid-week Croatian cabbage rolls. so that is what we had for his birthday meal the following day.

i had one with a bit of smoked meat...

and he had two with half a kielbasa... because he excels at being absurd.

we made quite a few adjustments to his father's basic recipe, which will probably result in my favorite animator being kicked out of the family when his dad finds out. the four biggest changes were 1) using a combo of ground  pork and lamb (his dad uses pork and veal), 2) the addition of some barley to the rice and ground meat filling, 3) ditto for a grated zucchini, and 4) copious amounts of gochujang (Korean chili paste) mixed into the simmering broth. the first bite was indescribable.

him: i may get disowned... but it will be totally worth it. 

i cannot begin to explain how delicious this was. i love the taste of lamb, and gochujang makes everything better—we put it in most things we cook around here—but the inclusion of the barley turned out to be the best decision of all. not only does it bring a slightly nutty taste, but the chewy cooked-barley texture is fantastic in the filling. there was no discernible taste from the zucchini, as it has very little to offer on that front, but i like knowing that it was there.

we were practically pausing after every bite to comment about how good it was. my empty bowl speaks for itself.

then there was that cake.

this was my second time using this recipe from a food magazine (which i will talk about next time around, as this is already too long), and it is far less complex than it looks. the secret is the use of frangipane (almond paste) in an otherwise basic butter cake batter. that goes into a springform pan, and is topped with fanned out slices of Granny Smith apple.

i made a some minor changes to the recipe (added some ginger, cinnamon, and nutmeg to the mix) and a few less-minor ones. we tend to like our baked goods on the less-sweet side, so i used about two-thirds the recommended amount of sugar (especially as there would be powdered sugar sprinkled over the top, plus a bit more sugar sprinkled on the apples).

if you squint a bit, you can see the sugar crystals on the fruit before the cake went into the oven for about an hour.

the biggest change of all was to reduce the oven to 350°F, instead of the suggested 375°F. i was skeptical about so small a cake being in so hot an oven for so long a time, but i decided to be a good-girl and do as i was told the first time i used this recipe. i will not be making that mistake twice, as the batter expanded so rapidly that first time, the apple slices were mostly covered up.

had i not made the executive bad-girl decision to reduce the heat halfway through, the cake would probably have been burnt long before the cooking time was up.

so, i used the lower oven temperature this time around, and it was perfect... if i do say so myself. i left it cooling while we ate sarma and watched the newest episode of Death in Paradise.

[random aside: i am rather fond of Ralf Little, so i may have done a bit of fan-girl swooning over him being added to the cast.]

it should be noted that my favorite animator is like a small child where cooling baked goods are concerned, so we had the same conversation several times.

him: how long do we have to wait to eat cake?
me: until it's done cooling. 

and, eventually it was. he insisted that it had to go on one of the plates he... uhm... "borrowed" from his parents place when he first moved out... like twenty years ago. those plates are older than him. this one has a chip on the edge, which i cleverly positioned just out of the frame.

the last step was to add a bit of powdered sugar. he did that part.

i skipped this step the first time i tried this recipe, because i did not want the extra sweetness, but we were celebrating this time around, so the powdered sugar is a nice final touch. i was afraid the apple slices would be covered up, but they were still visible.

it was still his day, so he did the slicing.

now, if it was my birthday, i would be eating cake with some sort of adult beverage. however, he absolutely despises the taste of most forms of alcohol (he makes an exception for boozy eggnog during the holiday season), so we opted instead for geriatric-adult hot beverages.

that last bit reminded me that i also added a healthy splash of vodka infused with juniper berries to the cake batter. he may hate drinking alcohol, but he has no problem with it as an ingredient in cooked items.

the most important thing i should note about this cake is that it was entirely wheat-free, so i did not have to resort to taking antihistamines at any point.

i used a combination of roughly three parts oat flour to one part Bob's Mill Gluten-Free baking flour. i used straight oat flour the first time i made this cake, but the GF flour was a surprisingly excellent addition this time around, especially as i only included it because i wanted to get rid of the stuff. i usually hate the grainy texture of those GF flours, but this one was absolutely undetectable when combined with the oat flour, so i will most likely use this combination in other wheat-free baked goods from now on.

a great time was had by all.

everything is upcoming...

two random observations before i begin.

1) kimchi-flavored Korean ramen topped with slices of Jamaican jerk pork is the cultural collaboration that will bring about world peace.

and...

2) this does not look like a cat who is guarding my strawberries from squirrels.

i pointed out said fact to her, so she yawned and did this. useless!

i had a birthday recently, which we decided to celebrate by turning it into a three-day weekend of random stuff. seriously... if you had a choice between going to work on Friday, or driving around Montreal doing random stuff, which would you choose??? exactly!

so, off we went, and stuff we did, including a stop at a little shop on the other side of town that sells... well... random stuff. you can see why i had to go there, right? exactly!

we purchased a large bag of soy-wax pellets, and several bottles of scented oils, which will be featured in an upcoming crafty adventure... for TWO. [i emphasized that last bit in case he thought that his involvement with said project ended with sniffing bottles of essential oil in a shop that looks like a slice of Hippie Heaven.]

we were a few blocks away from Marché Jean-Talon, so we absolutely had to spend some time there. to call this place a "farmer's market" is an understatement of epic proportions. it is a MASSIVE wonderland of random stuff (mostly) of the culinary variety. there are stalls and specialty shops selling just about any food ingredient you could imagine. best of all are the delicious smells of things being cooked all around you.

there is a little house across the street from the market that i want to live in one day, mainly because it has a large arbor of grapes growing in the front yard (take THAT, people with your pointless front lawns), but also because it is so close to what is possibly my favorite spot in all of Montreal... possibly.

we managed to forego the temptation of having lunch at the market, but we did enjoy a few samples of things as we wandered around, filling our bag with fruits and veggies as we went.

we spent quite a bit of time daydreaming among the sprawling assortment of transplants and other gardeny things, but as the balcony garden project is already at past capacity, we had to walk away empty-handed. we did, however, stumble upon someone selling tiny potted indoor plants, which has been at the top of my must-find list.

we got a small assortment of tropical stuff for another upcoming crafty adventure.

i need to start working on this particular project soon today for two reasons. having made the mistake of letting his dad in on the plant-related plans, we are now receiving almost-daily inquiries into its progress. we tend to procrastinate overthink things before getting them started, which is driving his dad bonkers, as he is the type who has the thing made/built before the idea is done forming in his head.

then there is my crazy cat Cordy (the useless littlest one of the three) who refuses to take my word for it that miniature palm trees are not an exotic kitty snack.

so now i have to hurry up and get the thing done, if only to 1) put his dad out of the stress of waiting, and 2) save me from strangling an adorable little cat.

we decided to take the super-scenic route and drive through downtown on our way back home. we had to settle instead for crawling  past downtown (for reasons which will become clear in a moment). we eventually got home, where we grilled some amazing things, and i i was introduced to what may become my new favorite beer. the sun was shining, and i was in my happy place. best birthday ever!

my three-day-weekend birthday happened to coincide with the Montreal Grand Prix, which usually involves the entire downtown area being blocked off from vehicular traffic. as a result, the city of Montreal—which is already renowned for being a "party town"—turns into a veritable carnival with locals and all of the folks who roll into town just for the race doing their best to delight all of the senses.

so where did we head for Saturday's adventure? that is correct! we went to the opposite end of town, and spent some time at one of the large (quiet) parks along the canals. [fun fact: Montreal is an island in the middle of a large river, so there are lots of canals and other waterfront sites to be enjoyed literally all around the city... cause... you know... it is a small island... in a river... literally...!]

and what did we do at the quiet park, you ask? we wandered around, collecting bits of stuff that used to be attached to the trees. this too will feature in an upcoming project. everything is upcoming it seems.

this little twig chose me, but i cannot seem to figure out how to make it do magic stuff. there i was, walking around  the park, twig in hand, practicing my swish and flick wholly unapologetically. i hear what you are thinking... and i really do not care.

we went over to the other side of the park, where i was mesmerized by people fishing, but that did not last long, as evening was slowly creeping in, and the bugs (and my allergies) were telling me that it was time to flee. so we came home... and grilled some other delicious things.

then we decided to relax on Sunday. so we stayed in... and grilled even more delicious things. we also watched a lot of random stuff during the course of the three-day-weekend, (mostly) of my own choosing, as it was my own personal national holiday. [i will be apologizing for years for subjecting him to the terror that was the Michael Bay Transformers films, which will (likely) be the subject of an upcoming post/rant about frustrating things.]

with so much stuff upcoming, i better get started with all the necessary procrastinating planning.