LiggiLand

New Blog

2010-05-27T21:04:00.000-05:00

I'll be posting my first entry on my new blog, Pardon My Dust, in the coming days. Keep your eyes peeled!

A Peaceful Dissolution

2010-04-30T13:13:00.000-05:00

In some ways, this post has been a long time coming, although it will probably come as a shock to many of you. You've probably noticed that there hasn't been a post around here in a while - 10 weeks, actually. And you also probably noticed that I never did finish blogging about our trip to Italy. So really, if you think about it, it shouldn't be too much of a surprise that this will be the last real post in Liggiland.

Why? Because Liggiland is dissolving. Just like when Czechoslovakia divided into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, Liggiland is splitting up as well (yes, really, it's just like that). The Liggi- and the -land are going separate ways.

Never fear, you won't have to go on living your internet life without my wit and sarcasm. In the next few weeks I'm going to start a new blog. I'm not quite sure what its angle will be, but I'll link to it from here when it's up and running.

In the meantime, thanks for being my constant readers, despite my sporadic posting and eclectic subject matter. I promise you (and myself) that more laughs, good food and stories of the beautiful Juliette's antics are coming soon.

With love from Liggiland,

Erin

Maybe I should just call this a pseudo blog and be done with it.

2010-02-16T15:10:00.000-06:00

For the second time this month, I appear (with a photograph this time!) in a post over on Not-A-Fortune. We celebrated Chinese New Year in high style, and all our antics were documented for posterity. Not to be missed!

A Pseudo Post

2010-02-10T08:25:00.000-06:00

I know, I know, I've been slacking off lately, not posting like I should (I haven't even finished blogging Italy yet!). But maybe I can make up for it with a pseudo post? Go check out my friend's most recent post on her blog, Not-a-Fortune, where she features a (not-a-)fortune I recently received in a cookie at PF Chang's. I promise, it's worth your while.

Pilfering Prickly Pears

2010-01-23T15:10:00.000-06:00

So, first things first:

1) If you haven't had a prickly pear margarita, you've only been half-living life.

2) I'm prone to impulsive little "adventures" that often aren't well thought out - which is what makes them fun, but also sometimes disastrous.

There's a prickly pear cactus at the entrance to my office park. It looks like it's on an easement so it probably doesn't really belong to anyone - or it belongs to everyone. I don't know. I drive past it every day, and for the past few weeks the fruits have been ripening, and I've been thinking, "I really ought to pick those and figure out how to make some prickly pear syrup and then have some margaritas." But it's always on my way into the office at 8am, and I always forget about it five minutes later. I left work early Friday afternoon to run a quick errand, and on my way back in I saw the cactus again and decided to finally get those fruits. There's no shoulder, so I just pulled up on the curb (bad idea #1), put the hazard lights on, and hopped out of the car. I scrambled up a little embankment (another sign this was doomed) and got to the cactus. Now, I was totally expecting spines on the cactus pads. I was prepared to avoid those. I was artfully bending around 2-inch long spines and I grabbed one of the fruits, and it hurt. And I thought, "Dammit, I thought I avoided those spines, I need to be more careful." I picked the fruit and tossed it in my little bag and grabbed another. And another. And another. And every time, it hurt. So, I looked down at my hand and there are these little, tiny, hair-like things (which I now know are called glochids) sticking out of my skin, like splinters. So I touched one with my finger tip, and it HURT. And I tried to pull it out, and it hurt even more. I looked more carefully at the fruits and realized they're completely covered in these sharp little things. I paused for a moment, considering my options: I could quit with my meager harvest of four prickly pears and and have nothing to show for it, or I could forge ahead and at least make the pain I've endured thus far worthwhile. Being absolutely brilliant, I went with the latter. A couple dozen pilfered prickly pears and a whole lot of cursing later, my right hand was so covered in these things I could barely grip the steering wheel with that hand anymore, and I'd managed to stick myself in about four different places with the bigger cactus spines as well. But, I had my prickly pears, and I will have a margarita by the end of the weekend, dammit.

In other news, I need a pair of tweezers.

Good Food and Bad Omens

2010-01-02T14:03:00.000-06:00

Happy 2010 everyone!

I hope you all enjoyed ringing in the New Year. Mr. L and I are notorious homebodies, so we decided to stay in and have our own low-key celebration, which revolved around food (of course). Mr. L experimented by making some lowfat jalapeno poppers, while I made Cioppino. If you're not familiar with this soup, it's an Italian-American tomato-based seafood stew that originated in San Francisco. A Bay Area classic. And The Gourmet Cookbook has a great recipe for it, but it calls for a full 5 1/4 pounds of seafood! As you can imagine, this gets expensive pretty quickly, especially if you're going with sea scallops and halibut and crab, not to mention that not everything they call for is always available. So my general rule of thumb is to get whatever is freshest and looks best that day. Below is the version I fixed for New Year's Eve, but you should definitely feel free to change it up based on your own tastes and your fish market's offerings.

Cioppino (San Francisco-Style Seafood Stew), adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook
Serves 6-8 (I'm willing to bet you love it so much, you only get 6 servings out of it)

1/4 cup olive oil
2 medium yellow onions, finely chopped
4 large garlic cloves, minced
1 Turkish bay leaf or 1/2 California bay leaf
2 teaspoons fresh oregano, minced, or 1 teaspoon dried oregano, crumbled
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 green bell pepper, cored, seeded, and cut into 1/4-inch dice
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 1/2 cups dry red wine
1 (28-ounce) can whole plum tomatoes, drained (juice reserved) and chopped
1 cup bottled clam juice
1 cup chicken stock
1 pound littleneck clams (about 2 inches wide), well scrubbed
1 pound mussels, scrubbed and debearded
1 pound red snapper fillet (or other firm white fish), cut into 1 1/2-inch pieces
1 pound bay scallops
1 1/2 pounds Fruta de Mer (a medley of various seafoods, including calamari rings, scallops, clams, and shrimp - often cheaper and an easy way to get a mix of a lot of different seafood)
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh basil, plus additional for garnish
A loaf of good, crusty San Francisco-style sourdough

Note: Some people will tell you that cioppino is not complete without crab. Gourmet calls for 1 (1-pound) king crab leg, but most San Franciscans would probably go with Dungeness if it's available. Good Pacific crab costs an arm and a leg here in Texas, so I went without.

Heat oil in an 8-quart heavy pot over medium heat. Add onions, garlic, bay leaf, oregano, red pepper flakes, salt, and pepper and cook, stirring, until onions are softened, about 5 minutes. Add bell pepper and tomato paste and cook, stirring, for 1 minute. Add wine and boil until reduced by about half, 5 to 6 minutes. Add tomatoes, with their juice, clam juice, and stock and simmer, covered, for 30 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Add clams and mussels to stew and simmer, covered, until they just open, 5 to 10 minutes, transferring them as they open to a bowl with tongs or a slotted spoon; discard any unopened clams or mussels (if they don't open, they've gone bad and you shouldn't eat them!). Lightly season fish fillets, scallops, and Fruta de Mer with salt, add to stew, and simmer, covered, until just cooked through, about 5 minutes. Discard bay leaf.

Return clams and mussels to pot along with any accumulated juices and gently stir in parsley and chopped basil. Serve cioppino in large soup bowls, garnished with additional basil, and accompanied by good, crusty sourdough bread.

And after all that work, you get this:

Look at all that yumminess in a bowl!

You might wonder why, if the soup has tomatoes and red wine in it, the broth isn't redder. In all honesty, I don't know. I can tell you that it was much redder until I added the clams and mussels. Perhaps they released some of their own juices and diluted the tomato-wine base? At any rate, it still tasted excellent.

For dessert, I finally made a recipe I've been dying to try for years now: Giada's Chocolate-Hazelnut Ravioli. Think about it for a moment: raviolis, filled with Nutella and deep fried to golden brown deliciousness. Yeah, it's about as incredible as you think it is.

I didn't make any major modifications to Giada's recipe, although I will say that I didn't think the sugared mint leaves added anything to the taste, and 45 seconds per side is a little long on the frying time - I'd recommend closer to 20 seconds per side.

All in all, a pretty solid end to 2009. And then, 2010 came along and mucked it all up.

It's early afternoon on New Year's Day and I decide to carve myself a slice of that nice crusty sourdough I picked up to go with the cioppino. Except it's a day old and extra crusty now. And my knife slips and goes straight into the tip of my left index finger. Like, nearly through it. At first I don't realize how bad it is, just that it hurts, so I grab a paper towel and apply pressure (those years of Girl Scout training really stuck with me). And Mr. L comes running, because of course I screamed like a girl, and then he goes and gets the band-aids, and I immediately know those aren't going to cut it. So I call my mom and ask, "Mom, how do you know when you need stitches?" (the call every mother just loves to receive, I'm sure), and she advises I go to the emergency room post haste. So we drive to the ER, with Mr. L speeding the whole way ("it's just a flesh wound!" I remind him), where we proceed to sit for a few hours, and I start to feel like a clumsy moron.

Trust me, it looked much worse in focus.

And then a much clumsier moron arrived in the ER - he had cut the tip of his finger clean off and was carrying it in a plastic bag with ice. For reals. How's that for a well-timed ego boost?

At first the nurse practitioner seemed unimpressed with my wound, and I found myself trying to impress upon her how bad it was ("It's kinda sealed itself back up, but if you pick at it you'll see it's deep and it'll start bleeding again. See?"). But once she started cleaning it and opening it up to inject the local anesthetic (which was the most painful part of the whole thing, I might add - I made Mr. L hold my other hand and grimaced the whole time), she seemed much more impressed with my handiwork ("It's deep, like you said." "Told you."). The best part of the ordeal was that I'm pretty sure I heard her tell Mr. L that I'm not allowed to do any housework whatsoever for at least 3 months, or until I feel up to it, whichever comes second.

Mr. L says I look like I have one of those foam fingers you see at football games.

I say I look pitiful.

Souvenirs! I'm pretty sure "NKDA" stands for "this one's in pretty bad shape and we might have to amputate."

After four hours and four stitches (an astounding average of one stitch per hour), we headed home. On the bright side, Mr. L will be doing all the bread slicing for a while, as well as dishes and laundry (I convinced him we still launder by hand and since I can't get my hand wet I'm just not able to help out!).

While the start of my 2010 was definitely inauspicious, I hope you all started the year out on a much more positive note!

Green Your Hanukkah!

2009-12-13T15:06:00.001-06:00

Being half Jewish (and not a very good half Jew at that), I'm prone to forgetting significant Jewish holidays. This year, Hanukkah really crept up on me. I honestly didn't even think to look at the calendar until I was unpacking the Christmas decorations on Thursday (yes, ironic, I know), saw the menorah, and thought, "Oh, hey, when does that thing start?" The answer: Friday night.

Friday was a busy day for me, and I was out and about until after sundown anyway, so I blew the first night. As the second night approached, a half-joking thought crossed my mind: "I wonder if there's an app for that?" And I'll be damned if there isn't.

Image snagged from http://imenorah.mikejutan.com/.

iMenorah, for the Jew on the go (their real slogan is "For the Jew far from home!" but I like my version better). I downloaded it and was able to light the menorah while Mr. L and I were out to dinner on Saturday night. It was great! You tap to light the shamash, then light the other candles from left to right. After you light them, some random voice recites the prayer aloud, and the candles slowly burn down over the next few minutes. Genius!

This image also snagged from http://imenorah.mikejutan.com/.

But being half Jewish, I still have some guilt about not actually lighting the menorah at home. So I'm going to rationalize it in a couple ways. First, they donate 10% of the proceeds to a San Francisco charity (the app costs $2.99). Second, it's more sustainable, right? Conventional candles are often made with petroleum products, and more petroleum products are used to transport them to the store and then back home to my house. Plus, when you burn them they emit all sorts of nasties, I'm sure. But this app is the totally green alternative! Minimal inputs, no transportation costs, no indoor air pollution from the burning. It's great!

Now, I won't get too smug about how charitable and green my new Hanukkah ritual is. But I will tell you this: while iMenorah does make Hanukkah a bit more fun for me (using it made me giddy) and might actually be greener and all that, it just didn't feel quite the same. Next year, I might try sourcing some locally produced soy Hanukkah candles and see how that feels in comparison - perhaps it will make me even more smug?

Awash in a Sea of Produce

2009-12-12T12:12:00.001-06:00

Keeping up with a CSA is hard! We really struggled to find ways to use all the yummies we got before they went bad, and we still weren't entirely successful. Not big fans of eggplant, those went to the break room at work for someone else to put to good use. We had so many peppers we couldn't possibly use them all, and some of them have become shriveled and sad looking. The rest, however, went into some tasty meals.

We used many of the peppers in a fresh salsa. I roasted one of the poblanos, then minced and added it to the salsa, along with a few serranos and jalapenos. Some of the other peppers went into a chili Mr. L made later in the week, although even then, we still couldn't use them all up.

Lettuces and some of the carrots went into yummy salads for dinner and lunch. And I triumped over the kohlrabi! Thanks to Wendy over at I Love Baby Quilts! for sending me to a link explaining all the great ways to eat kohlrabi. I went with the simplest - peeled and shaved raw over a green salad. Delicious! It really does taste like a raw broccoli stem - sweet and a little earthy.

I tossed the fennel and remaining carrots with some olive oil, salt, pepper, and fresh thyme and roasted them according to the instructions posted at TheKitchn last week. Super yummy!

The butternut squash went to very good use in an amazing Butternut Squash Risotto with Shrimp from Bon Appetit's November 2009 magazine. The risotto is infused with the sweet, earthy butternut squash flavor. Because you saute the pancetta and shrimp separately and then stir them into the risotto at the end, they retain their individual flavors and as you're eating you discover pleasant pops of smoky pancetta and sweet-salty shrimp. Divine!

The risotto looks a little monochromatic in this photo, but I assure you the orange squash,

pink shrimp, and reddish-brown pancetta all pop on the plate.

The beets were fabulous in a Roasted Beet Salad with Walnuts and Goat Cheese from Vegetables Every Day by Jack Bishop (thanks to SBITC and fortunecookiejunkie for reminding me of this awesome recipe!) My favorite thing about this recipe is that it features the beet greens as well, so you really use the entire food. And it has goat cheese, which is also always a plus.

Lastly, the Swiss Chard went into a delicious recipe for Skillet Gnocchi with Chard & White Beans from Eating Well's January/February 2009 issue. This one just didn't photograph so beautifully, but trust me when I say it tasted great!

We picked up this week's CSA delivery, and it contains much of the same as last week, including lettuces, carrots, beets, peppers, and two small butternut squash. We received a few new items as well, including fresh dill, new potatoes, and bok choy.

I'm still a little stumped by what to do with all the peppers we're getting, though. We just can't use that many serranos and jalapenos in a single week. Do any of you have a solid way for preserving these? Smoking and canning? Pickling and canning? Help!

I'm also having trouble identifying these peppers this week. They're the size and shape of a poblano, but much closer to an anaheim in color. Anybody have any idea what they are? Can I stuff & bake them?

The largest of these guys is about 6 inches long, much closer to a poblano in size and shape.

A Bushel and a Peck

2009-12-05T09:57:00.005-06:00

Our kitchen is literally busting at the seams with produce right now! We joined a local CSA recently, Johnson's Backyard Garden, and yesterday we took our first delivery. For those of you unfamiliar with CSAs, the gist of it is this - you buy a share in a local farm, and in exchange you get a portion of the harvest each week. For about $30 a week, we're getting roughly half a bushel of farm fresh, organic, local, seasonal produce. Look at all the beautiful stuff we got yesterday!

Here's the breakdown:

Red and green leaf lettuce (1 head each)
Chard (1 bunch)
Eggplant (2)
Japanese eggplant (1)
Kohlrabi (3)
Beets (4)
Fennel (1)
Carrots (1 bunch - about 13)
Assorted peppers (including seranos, jalapenos, possibly some Anaheims, and some others I haven't yet identified).

Vibrant purple eggplants.

I truly doubt I could have picked up all this organic food for just $30 at the local farmer's markets, or even at Central Market. And I love the idea of supporting a small local farmer who's doing something they love. My only problem now is - what do I do with it all???

Gorgeous beets. I haven't managed to get any of the beet seeds I planted in my backyard garden to grow like this.

So, at the suggestion of my good friend Sarah over at Pretty Bird Press, I'm challenging myself to use everything I receive from my CSA each week. I'll post my efforts here, as well as any recipes I use. My hope is that this will not only help Mr. L and I eat more healthy foods, but also to expand our horizons and introduce us to some ingredients we haven't tried before.

Working all these peppers into our diet will definitely keep us warm on the cold fall evenings Austin's been having lately.

I need a little bit of help from you, though. Do you have any ideas for what I should do with all this deliciousness? I'm especially curious about the kohlrabi - I've never cooked with this before, so I need all the suggestions I can get!

The daunting kohlrabi - I won't let you stump me!

Dennis & Erin's Excellent (Italian) Adventure - Part 4

2009-12-04T09:30:00.002-06:00

Day 8 (Tuesday , October 20)

Today we departed Florence and made our way to Rome. Before leaving town that morning, I decided to make one last trip to the leather markets, where I picked up what I now affectionately call "my lovely."

Soft black leather, chocolate brown suede lining, pockets for my phone and iPod, and it even smells like leather - all for the low, low price of €50 (or about $75). sigh. I think I'm in love...

We caught our train to Rome, and during our 3 hour trip I took another series of really blurry photos from the train. The windows on this train were even dirtier, so the photos look extra bad. But, it was still nice to see some more of the Italian countryside. A few of my favorites.

After arriving in Rome, we walked the few short blocks from the main train station to our hotel, Roman Residence. This was, by far, the nicest and most comfortable hotel we stayed in - modern decor, complimentary bottled water, a flat screen TV, a shower with plenty of hot water, and a reasonable nightly rate. The hotel is small - only 4 rooms - and the owner, Massimo, is very helpful.

After dropping our bags and settling in, Dennis and I decided to explore Rome on foot. The hotel isn't located in any "prime" tourist areas, but it was in walking distance to everything and very close to the train station. We stopped in at a pizzeria for lunch and had what might have been the most disappointing meal of our trip. They confused our order and brought us a seafood pizza that was absolutely terrible. On the bright side, we did pick up a couple very valuable pieces of information for future reference: squid ink on pizza is not tasty, and putting pre-cooked shrimp on pizza before putting it in the oven results in shrimp with about the same texture as a super bouncing ball.

With a thoroughly unsatisfying meal in our bellies we continued our stroll north, eventually winding up at the top of the Spanish Steps. Looking past the faux Egyptia n obe lisk at the top of the steps, we had a lovely view of the streets of Rome.

Descending the Spanish Steps.

The view from the bottom of the Steps looking back up wasn't quite as lovely, in part because the Steps were cast in late afternoon shadows and crowded with teenagers. We lingered on Piazza di Spagna for a while, watching the crowds and absorbing the atmosphere.

A chestnut vendor.

This poor horse can't possible know how funny he looks.

We left Piazza di Spagna and headed west, finally arriving at the Trevi Fountain. The amount of detail in the carving is astounding, and it transitions from semi-natural formations to formal sculptures seamlessly.

Next we headed to the Pantheon, where I got a little bit obsessed with photographing the domed ceiling.

The Pantheon ceiling. It's awesome.

Then it was on Piazza Navona, where we found another faux Egyptian obelisk and a vibrant artists' market. We also got to enjoy a serenade from this guy:

Not Pavarotti.

Finally, Dennis insisted we head to Campo de' Fiori. So we trekked on, and once we got there we spent a whole whopping minute looking at a statue of Giordano Bruno. And then we left.

We walked a lot further than we realized because the walk back to the hotel was a long one. Along the way we passed Trajan's Column, but we were too tired and focused on getting back to the hotel to be impressed. Exhausted from our long day of walking, we skipped dinner and collapsed into bed.

Next Time: We explore the peculiar specifics of the Vatican's dress code.

Dennis & Erin's Excellent (Italian) Adventure - Part 3

2009-11-29T16:36:00.015-06:00

Day 6 (Sunday, October 18)
Our first full day in Florence! Today was a day devoted mostly to wandering, which we excel at.

The streets of Florence.

After breakfast at the hotel, we made our way toward the heart of downtown Florence. Our first stop was at a little house museum devoted to Dante, author of The Divine Comedy and a resident of Florence. This was a thoroughly strange place. What we didn't realize at the time was that this building didn't actually exist until after the turn of the 20th century - the local government demolished the pre-existing building in order to build one to stand in as Dante's home. On top of that, it had this....

...a mime. A mime who appeared to be voguing for us beneath a bust of Dante. It reminded me of the mime-statues you see at Caesar's Palace or The Venetian. It was just such a strange sight.

We moved on to wander the streets of downtown Florence, which are lined with clothing stores. We spotted all sorts of American intrusions, like Foot Locker, H&M, and, of course, The Disney Store. I'm always amazed at how The Disney Store manages to work its iconography into everything. Take the border around this tray ceiling, for example.

You might have to squint to see it. No? Okay, try looking closer.

Mouse ears! Even when they try to reproduce classic "Italian" architectural motifs, the mouse ears creep in.

Next we made our way to the Piazza della Signoria, where we saw the Palazzo Vecchio. A replica of the Statue of David is located in front of the Palazzo, as well as a few other statues. Then we headed over to the Uffizi Gallery. This contained quite a few famous works of art, including Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus". Not being an art person, I wasn't very engaged. However, there were some really pretty views of the Ponte Vecchio.

After we finished up at the Uffizi, we headed down to see the Ponte Vecchio up close.

Looking across the Ponte Vecchio, lined with gold and jewelry shops.

After several hours of wandering, we slowly made our way along Florence's cobblestone streets and back toward the hotel, stopping in the leather markets and perusing vendors' stalls along the way.

We took a short nap, had a thoroughly unremarkable dinner at a nearby restaurant, and purchased a HUGE dish of gelato for dessert that we both shared before returning to the hotel for the night.

Day 7 (Monday, October 19)
We decided to make the most of our last full day in Florence. After purchasing our train tickets to Rome for the next day, we headed to the Duomo with the (foolish?) intention of climbing the 463 steps to the top. This was a thoroughly exhausting idea.

Going up...

...and up...

...until you finally reach the breathtaking view.

The view in every direction is absolutely beautiful, as are the building's architectural details.

After taking in the view and catching our breath, we descended the 463 steep, narrow steps very, very slowly.

Back on the ground, we headed back toward the Ponte Vecchio and crossed over the bridge to the Oltrarno neighborhood. We wandered the area's narrow streets, poking our heads into shops along the way.

An Oltrarno street.

A small corner grocery.

A head of Romanesco, or Roman cauliflower at the corner grocery in Oltrarno.

Mopeds and motorcycles line all the streets.

After our stroll, we headed toward the hotel, perusing leather markets (again) where Dennis kissed the Porcellino. We also encountered the most glorious thing ever: the waffle cart. Here, you can buy two small Belgian waffles, and sandwiched between them is your choice of fillings: powdered sugar, Nutella, chocolate spread, etc. It was, in a word, divine.

Yum!

We finally made our way up to Via Cavour and the Galleria Michelangiolo, a small private museum with working scale models of many of Leonardo da Vinci's machines and inventions (no photos allowed, of course). Then, off to the San Lorenzo market, which had the pushiest vendors we encountered in Florence.

For our final meal in Florence, we headed back to I' Daviddino, or Little David, where we ate dinner our first night in town. It didn't disappoint the second time either. We had a caprese salad and bruschetta to start. I had tortelloni for my main course, and Dennis practically cleaned his plate before I could snap a picture of his gnocchi. For dessert, Dennis ordered the amazing ice cream truffles...

...while I was disappointed to learn they were out of tiramisu. The waitress suggested the torta nonna instead, which she described as an almond cream cake. Topped with a liberal dusting of powdered sugar, it was absolutely, positively to die for. And it didn't have an ounce of chocolate!

We wrapped up our last evening in Florence with a leisurely stroll back to the hotel, where we rested up for our rail trip to Rome the next day.

Up Next: Dennis & Erin Take Rome by Storm!

Happy Turkey Day

2009-11-26T17:49:00.002-06:00

At my parents' house in California this holiday, I'm thankful for a dad who's willing to brave the air quality police to build a Thanksgiving fire ("no burn ban is going to keep me from having a fire in my own fireplace on Thanksgiving!"), a mom who insists on making both pumpkin pie and pumpkin cheesecake even though there are only four of us eating, and a husband who quietly puts up with the unique brand of crazy swirling around him at his in-laws' house.

Happy Turkey Day, Y'All!

Dennis & Erin's Excellent (Italian) Adventure - Part 2

2009-11-21T22:23:00.011-06:00

Day 4 (Friday, October 16)
Dennis and I both slept poorly last night, but we still managed to get up at a reasonable hour. After a quick hotel breakfast, we headed down to the nearby waterbus stop and caught the line to Murano. The bus ride was long - about an hour - because of all the stops the bus makes, but we got a nice view of the city and San Michele, the cemetery island where Venetians are buried.

Following Rick Steves' Venice Lagoon Tour in our guide book, we hopped off the bus at Murano. Murano is known for its glass-blowing, so we fully expected to see glass workshops at every turn. Not so much. In fact, we didn't see a single one. We decided to make our way to the Glass Museum, and along the way we took in some lovely views of the island. And then there was this weirdness:

Huh?

Maybe if it wasn't surrounded by crowd barricades. Or in shadow. Or had some sort of explanatory label. Maybe then I'd get it. But instead, all I could think was, "This is no Chihuly."

After touring the glass museum, which had some lovely glass and ceramic artifacts excavated from the island (no photography allowed, but you can see some of the collection here), we made our way to the stop to catch the bus to the next island, Burano (yes, they rhyme). Along the way, we found this little piece of awesomeness, attached to the exterior of a building:

Double huh?

I'm going to take a stab in the dark and guess this has to do with the island's tradition of glass blowing. But something is just not quite right here...

After a lengthy wait (Burano is a less popular destination so there are fewer buses) and a 40-minute ride, we arrived in Burano. Burano is known for its lace-making, so we were hoping to see little old ladies lining the streets, tatting to their hearts' content. Instead, we found what we came to call l'isola dei gatti - the island of cats. They were everywhere.

"That's right, this is my boat. You got a problem with that?"

"Why yes, I do make all the lace sold here myself. Why do you ask?"

We found Burano to be much more picturesque than Murano. It had a much more "lived-in" feeling - like real people make their lives there.

Houses painted in pastels and laundry hanging out to dry. Sigh.

So lovely.

Since the island's Lace Museum was closed for renovation, we strolled the island, had lunch, and then made our way back to the bus stop. We waited a while for our bus, then sailed back to Venice. The ride took about an hour and parts of it were decidedly unpicturesque, and we were pretty tired and windblown by the time we got back to Venice.

After a short nap, we headed out to dinner at a restaurant near the hotel that the staff recommended to us, Ristorante Antica Sacrestia. This place was down a dark alley and around a corner, but it seemed to be drawing plenty of diners. We were lucky to be seated immediately; folks arriving just a few minutes after us were lined up out the door. The ceilings were low, the lights were dim, and the tables were packed in like sardines. But the owner greeted us and the servers were attentive (though clearly busy). And the food was mostly tasty. Appetizers were good, wine was tasty, and Dennis's fish was excellent. I ordered the cuttlefish "alla veneziana" with polenta. Turns out that in this case, "alla veneziana" means "cooked in its own ink." Also turns out that I don't care for the taste of cuttlefish ink or food that looks like a solid black mass. I can't hold this against the restaurant, though, and since everything else was great, I'm guessing it's more an issue of my taste than the restaurant's preparation. On our way out, the owner stopped us and gave us a complimentary bag of house coffee (perhaps because I ordered yet another caffelatte after dinner? I'm so enamored with these now). A perfect ending to our last night in Venice.

Day 5 (Saturday, October 17)
We got up early this morning and took the #1 water bus line to the train station. The nice thing about this bus is that it travels the length of the Grand Canal. The major drawback is that it's a little slow (about 45 minutes from San Zaccaria to the train station) and it's seriously crowded - especially during the morning "commute," which is when we were aboard. Still, since we didn't take a gondola ride on the Grand Canal while we were there, it was nice to see the full length of the Canal before we left.

After arriving at the station much earlier than necessary, we eventually boarded our Eurostar train to Florence. Since we're wimpy Americans, we booked first class tickets and wouldn't have it any other way. We sat next to a nice Australian family with two adorable kids who weren't at all annoying (so rare for other people's kids!), and I shot a series of really blurry photos from the train during the 3 hour train ride.

The closest thing to a good shot from the train.

Dennis was very patient with all my photo snapping.

After we arrived in Florence, we made our way to our hotel, Hotel Casci. We got a little lost along the way, and it was made all the more nerve-wracking by the fact that this was the first Italian city we'd encountered that had cars. Cars with drivers who seem not to value pedestrians' lives at all. But, we finally arrived at our hotel, checked in, and collapsed in our room. This one was about as well-equipped as the last, but lacked the picturesque Venetian view. It also had the world's most awkwardly placed toilet paper dispenser and a combination sink/fold-out bidet that released the most disgusting rotten egg smell every time one of us took a shower. Not cool.

After a brief rest, we got a snack at a cafe and then we made our way to the Accademia delle Belle Arti di Firenze. We reserved tickets in advance, which was a good thing, since it allowed us to bypass the line and the super-aggressive street vendors who hassled waiting tourists. The highlight was, of course, Michelangelo's Statue of David (no photography allowed, although this didn't seem to stop most visitors). I was really struck by how large the statue was. For some reason, I always thought it was much closer to life size, but it's actually much larger. There was also a special exhibition of Robert Mapplethorpe's photographs located throughout the galleries, which made for a really interesting juxtaposition of nudes in the arts over time. Kinda cool.

After David, we headed back to the hotel for a quick nap (which, of course, went too long thanks to me), and then headed out for a late (by American standards) dinner at a cafe down the block. This turned out to be an awesome find. Named I' Daviddino, or Little David, the food was excellent and reasonably priced. I had tortelloni filled with spinach and ricotta in a cream sauce with ham and zucchini. I really regret not taking some photos of it, because it was sublime. We wrapped up our day with a stroll back to the hotel and much-needed night's rest.

Coming Up Next: Dennis & Erin do Florence!

Please pass the martini and diet pills now....

2009-11-19T22:46:00.004-06:00

...because I feel like I'm in the 1950s.

Some of you may remember the origin of this blog's name, "Liggiland." It came about when I announced to my then husband-to-be that I wouldn't be taking his last name, but that I was more than happy to meld our last names into one and then we could both change ours. After some initial strife, he doesn't seem to mind anymore. No one in my family minds it. But my mother-in-law insists on referring to me as "Mrs. Liggio." At first it was "Mrs. Erin Liggio." I asked Mr. L to talk to her about it, but mostly I bit my tongue and sucked it up. And then this arrived in the mail today.

The offending article.

Mrs. Dennis. Liggio.

Apparently, I don't even get to have my own first name anymore. Now, I know that in the past, and probably still in some parts of the world today, married women considered it a privilege to be able to call themselves "Mrs. Huffington P. Nobgobbler." I'm not one of them. I love Mr. L, and most of the time I'm perfectly happy to be his wife. But I didn't change my name when I got married for a reason - I'm still the same person I was before I said "I do." My fundamental personality didn't change. One of my core relationships did, but who I am didn't. And so I didn't change my name.

The replacement of my first name honestly feels like a smack in the face. It feels like to my mother-in-law, I have no first name or last name (or identity) of my own - I'm just "his wife." I find it maddening. I know there are women who don't mind this, who embrace it even, and I'm fine with that because it was (presumably) their choice. What's infuriating to me is that my mother-in-law insists on continuing this even though she's been told repeatedly that it doesn't just bother me, it offends me. I worked hard in school, in my career, and in my personal life to build a personality and identity I'm more or less proud of. I don't want that erased or replaced at someone else's whim.

Okay, that's enough venting on that. Lighter notes in the days to come, I promise.

Signing off,

Not Mrs. Dennis Liggio

Dennis & Erin's Excellent (Italian) Adventure - Part 1

2009-11-15T15:45:00.005-06:00

I know, I know, I've been slacking. It took me a full week to get back into my normal routine, then a couple more to post pics to Facebook and Flickr. But I'm finally back to normal and all the photos are posted, and now it's time to make you jealous with all the little details.

Day 1 (Tuesday, October 13)
We flew Delta (which I refuse to hyperlink to), which I wouldn't recommend to anyone. Our original flight departed Austin around 1pm, connected in Atlanta, and then continued on to Venice and arrived at about 10:30 the next morning. Two weeks before our departure, Delta canceled our original flight. Our new itinerary departed about 6 hours earlier, at 6:45am, but only arrived in Venice 1 hour earlier. And we had stops in Atlanta and JFK. Delta FAIL. The only redeeming qualities were the unlimited free wine and beer on the transatlantic flight and the free Bejeweled I played the entire flight on the screen embedded on the seat in front of me. Oh, and I watched "Night at the Museum 2", also for free. Awesome.

Day 2 (Wednesday, October 14)
We arrive in Venice, and I am totally excited! Why? Well, first, I'm in Venice. But also because Mr. Liggiland had a 50/50 shot at getting arrested at immigration. You see, one of his brothers signed him up for Italian citizenship when he was just a teenager (their grandfather immigrated from Italy, so they were eligible), and Italy has compulsory military servi ce. Not knowing this, Mr. L didn't know to file the requisite waivers until after the fact, which is when the Italian consulate promptly lost them. Maybe. We don't know. It seems that Italy has yet to enter the 21st century, because they still do everything on paper and don't digitize any of their records. Suffice to say, I spent months telling Mr. L he better be on his best behavior or else I might turn his AWOL butt in at immigration. My threats turned out to be completely empty though because Italian immigration consists of one guy who takes your passport, gives the photo a cursory glance, stamps it and sends you on your merry way. That's it. Thoroughly disappointing for me, but a big relief for Mr. L.

We got to skip baggage claim because we managed to fit everything into 2 carry-ons, thanks to the magic of Space Bag Travel Bags, which may be the best invention ever. Using these a wesome instructions, we purchased our tickets for the water bus from the airport to old Venice and found the bus stop (which is a long, chilly walk from the airport terminal). I was a little nervous about trying to communicate, but it turned out pretty much everyone could understand my broken Italian (and the guys on the bus were more than happy to correct my pronunciation of the stop we needed) or, more often, spoke enough English to get by. The bus ride was a long one, over an hour, but it gave us an opportunity to take in some nice views of the lagoon and Venice from a distance.

We got off at the San Zaccaria stop, named for a little church nearby that's dedicated to John the Baptist's father. After getting slightly lost, we finally found our hotel, Hotel Fontana, which turned out to be right around the corner from the church. Lesson number one in Venice: what they call "streets" we call "alleyways," so take that into account when trying to navigate.

Our hotel, Hotel Fontana, seen from the street.

Even though we arrived a little early, our room was ready so they let us check in. While the room's decor wasn't luxurious, it made up for it with the most picturesque view of the Venetian street below.

See? Picturesque.

After a much-needed nap, we headed out to wander Piazza San Marco.

Piazza San Marco, with the Campanile (Bell Tower) on the right and St. Mark's Basilica in the background.

Detail of St. Mark's Basilica.

Detail on one of the buildings lining Piazza San Marco.

After a bit more wandering around the Piazza area, we headed to dinner at a restaurant near our hotel, Trattoria da Roberto. We each had pizza - I had pizza capricciosa, which had all the usual yummies as well as artichoke hearts, and Dennis had the "house special," which had pepperoni, olives, mushrooms, and "wurtzel," which looked like a sliced up hot dog. All tasty enough, though, to satisfy us at the end of an exhausting first day.

Day 3 (Thursday, October 15)
While I slept well our first night in Venice, Dennis did not. After a quick breakfast at the hotel, we headed out see the interior of St. Mark's Basilica (no photographs allowed) and the P ala zzo Ducale (aka Doge's Palace, also no photographs allowed). While neither of us was terribly impressed with the Basilica (we're just not church people, I guess), we did like the Doge's Palace. My favorite part was crossing the Bridge of Sighs and touring the prison.

Exterior of the Doge's Palace, sometimes called "the wedding cake" because of all the ornamentation on the building.

Detail of the Doge's Palace.

The Bridge of Sighs is undergoing some restoration work, hence all the sky-and-cloud-covered scaffolding surrounding it. Dennis commented that it looks like the windows of the new store going in at the mall.

Next up was a wander through the streets of Venice, courtesy of our fabulous Rick Steves guidebook. We got to see the former Nazi Party headquarters in Venice (which is as ugly a building as you might expect) and the La Fenice Opera House before finally making our way to the Rialto Bridge. We had a quick lunch in a cafe (where I first experienced an involtini - a rolled up, toasted warm pizza), then went to see the bridge. While the bridge itself was lovely, the view from it was much, much better.

We wandered the area surrounding the Rialto Bridge, which is known for its fish and produce market, and saw some gorgeous things, including this amazing spice shop.

After our mini-adventure, we headed back to the hotel (stopping for gelato along the way, of course!) and took the a short afternoon nap. Afterwards, we got up and headed back to th e Campanile di San Marco for some gorgeous sunset views of Venice.

A rainbow over Venice at sunset.

To finish the day, we headed out to dinner. Dennis had what he called the second best calamari of his life, whileI had some very tasty spaghetti alla carbonara. We finished it off with what I would eventually decide is the perfect Italian dessert: tiramisu and caffelatte.

Coming Up Next: Murano & Burano, then on to Florence!

Italy Sneak Preview

2009-11-12T09:30:00.001-06:00

I've been meaning to blog about our trip to Italy, but I've been working hard to get all our photos up on Flickr first. I promise to get you all the play-by-plays soon. In the meantime, check out our photos from Venice, Florence, and Rome.

The Arch of Constantine, viewed through one of the Colosseum's arches.

Ciao!

Happy Birthday Dennis!

2009-10-25T05:39:00.003-05:00

Today, Mr. Liggiland turns 33.

The Birthday Boy chows some pizza in Venice.

I think it's going to be a quiet birthday, seeing as we're both still exhausted from our trip to Italy, I seem to have picked up a touch of food poisoning on our last day in Rome, and last year we pulled out all the stops with the Firework-Erin-Mistook-for-a-Candle-and-Almost-Set-the-House-on-Fire Incident.

On the menu: Black Bottom Peanut Butter Mousse Pie from Bon Appetit's Fast Easy Fresh cookbook and dinner of some sort. We'd previously discussed going out, but we also talked about frozen pizza (we might cook it, we might not - we're wild and crazy like that). There will also be presents and plenty of time to snuggle with the Julie. And probably a trip to HEB and some laundry too. Fun times.

Happy Birthday Dennis!

And the Geek of the Day Award goes to....

2009-09-20T11:10:00.004-05:00

Check out the awesome feat of bakery geekery my friend Katherine of Not by Chamomile Alone shared today. A Han Solo Frozen in Carbonite Birthday Cake!

Click on over to her blog to learn more about the day-long team effort that went into making this cake. And Katherine, mad props on your baking and decorating skills!

Hats Aren't for Every Day...

2009-09-18T09:35:00.002-05:00

Sweet baby kitty Juliette learned this lesson the other day when I bought my very first bottle of gin (more on that coming soon). I was standing in the liquor store on Saturday, staring at an entire wall of gin and completely confused, when a liquor store guy took pity on me and offered to help with my selection. He rattled off a few different brands, but when he mentioned that the bottle of Broker's came with a freebie, this Jewish girl knew it was for her. And just what was this free gift, you ask?

A plastic hat!

Doesn't Juliette look posh with her wee plastic bowler hat? Now, I won't name names, but one of us wants Juliette to wear the hat all the time, and one of us thinks her mommy is insane and doesn't want to wear the hat at all. So, we've come to a compromise: hats aren't for every day, just for special occasions.

And whenever her mommy wants her to wear one.

Bites: Chocolate Chip Scones with Ginger Glaze

2009-09-13T20:03:00.007-05:00

A couple months ago, I wrote about my favorite scone recipe for Blueberry Scones with Lemon Glaze. I mentioned I was pondering other flavor combinations, and I gave one a try on Sunday afternoon. I replaced the blueberries with mini chocolate chips, and lemon with crystallized ginger in the glaze. They turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself. The chocolate flavor doesn't overpower the buttery richness of the scone dough, and the ginger gives the glaze a subtle spice.

Chocolate Chip Scones with Ginger Glaze (adapted from Tyler Florence's Blueberry Scones with Lemon Glaze)
Makes 8 scones

For the scones:
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold, cut into chunks
1 cup heavy cream, plus extra for brushing the scones
1 cup mini chocolate chips

For the glaze:
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
1/3 cup finely chopped crystallized ginger
1 tablespoon unsalted butter

The raw materials.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

Sift together the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, salt, sugar). Using 2 forks or a pastry blender, cut in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Make a well in the center and pour in the heavy cream. Fold everything together just until incorporated; do not overwork the dough. Fold the mini chocolate chips into the batter.

Light as a cloud and studded with mini chocolate chips.

Press the dough out onto a lightly floured surface into a rectangle about 12" long x 3" wide x 1 1/4" tall. Cut the rectangle in half (so that it forms 2 rectangles, each 6" long), then in half again, so that you have 4 (3-inch) squares. Cut the squares in half on the diagonal to give you 8 triangles.

Cut like so.

Place the scones on an ungreased cookie sheet and brush the tops with a little heavy cream. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes (this batch took me about 19 1/2 minutes) until lightly browned. Transfer to a rack to cool slightly.

While the scones are cooling, make the glaze. I've found that this recipe makes about twice as much glaze as I need, and I apply it pretty liberally. While I usually make a half recipe of the lemon glaze when I make the blueberry scones, this time I needed about 2/3 of the full glaze recipe.

Combine the cream and powdered sugar in a microwave-safe bowl, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Stir in the crystallized ginger and butter. Microwave on high for 30 seconds. Remove from the microwave and whisk the glaze until the butter is melted and glaze is smooth. Spoon the glaze over the scones. Let sit a minute before serving (if you can).

Can I resist the awesome power of crystallized ginger?

No, no I can't resist.

Bon appetit!

I'm a Winner!

2009-08-28T10:19:00.003-05:00

My apologies for not posting in so long. It's been a busy season in the office, and I really haven't done too much that's blog-worthy. Until today.

I'm a winner! Last week, one of the blogs I read most often and get some great tips from, Addicted to Costco, hosted a contest. In exchange for listing the top five items I buy at Costco, I was entered into a drawing for a $100, $50, or $25 Costco Cash Card. Today, I got the fabulous news - I won the grand prize! A $100 Costco Cash Card, all for me! I'm literally giddy like a little kid on Christmas morning (or the last night of Hanukkah). I've never been especially lucky, although I did win $1 in a box of Cheerios as a kid (my mom let me choose the box, and I got to keep the dollar if it was a winner), and I won $50 at the slots in Las Vegas last May (we were playing on a resort slot credit, so it was completely free money). But this is a new record for me! 100 whole dollars!

Now, if you're worried that I just won't know what to do with my newfound fortune, or that I might actually spend it on something useful like groceries or household goods, don't you fret. I already have a plan. I've been desperately pining for a new digital camera to take on my upcoming trip to Italy, but funding issues have been holding me back. Not a problem anymore!

If you haven't checked out Addicted to Costco before, I recommend it. Each week Kim writes about the deals she scored during her most recent Costco trip, and reviews the quality of the items she purchased. She also reviews Costco's most recent coupon books and highlights other warehouse news and deals. Check it out!

Patio Spruce-Up

2009-07-29T08:30:00.003-05:00

A couple months ago, I mentioned that a recent hail storm had busted the crate I store my BBQ supplies in and I was looking for a new, possibly greener, solution. I asked you for ideas, and got a whopping... zero. Zip, zilch, nada. Left to my own devices, I waited for divine inspiration.

Awaiting inspiration from the DIY gods.

And then, one day, I saw this. Smith and Hawken was closing its doors for good, and yours truly just happened to have $75 worth of gift cards from her last birthday that needed spending pronto. The next day I headed over to my local S&H, which was absolutely mobbed with like-minded deal seekers. Hidden in the Clearance section, underneath a few layers of orphaned garden gloves and chipped pots, was a small potting bench. It was perfect (especially for the low price of $99, minus my gift cards - $33 including tax)! Turns out it's from S&H's children's furniture line, Sprouts, which is why it's the perfect height for a little side table. Made of sustainably-harvested eucalyptus wood (certified by the Forest Stew ardship Council), it's weather-resistant and green. Bonus!

Add in a few hanging plant pots (also from S&H), some succulents from my favorite local nursery, a watering can and a storage bin, and a hanging utensil rack for th e BBQ tools, and...

Voila!

Plenty of work space on top and storage space underneath, and pretty plants to look at while I grill. I had considered putting casters on the bottoms of the legs, to raise it up a couple more inches and make it more portable, but it didn't turn out to be necessary. Long term, I would like to replace the little plastic basin with a deeper, stainless steel one that we could fill with ice and use to chill drinks when we (finally) have friends over for a cookout, and also replace the doormat with something a bit more stylish. But until then, it's pretty darn cute the way it is, if I do say so myself. Grand total: $157. Not too shabby.

And not to worry, the old storage bin won't be tossed in the trash. I'll use it for storage in the garage, where the golf ball-sized hole in the lid won't matter quite so much.

Bites: Blueberry Scones with Lemon Glaze

2009-07-20T08:45:00.001-05:00

Lately, it seems like the only blog-worthy things I do involve food. I swear, sometime soon I'll change it up. But until then...

Last week I made a batch of Blueberry Scones with Lemon Glaze , a Tyler Florence recipe from the Food Network website. These are super-easy to make and even tastier to eat. I highly recommend these the next time you have some extra blueberries on hand.

Blueberry Scones with Lemon Glaze
Makes 8 scones

For the scones:
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold, cut into chunks
1 cup heavy cream, plus extra for brushing the scones
1 cup fresh blueberries

For the glaze:
1/2 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
zest of 1 lemon, finely grated
1 tablespoon unsalted butter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

Sift together the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, salt, sugar). Using 2 forks or a pastry blender, cut in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Make a well in the center and pour in the heavy cream. Fold everything together just until incorporated; do not overwork the dough. Fold the blueberries into the batter. Take care not to mash or bruise the blueberries because their strong color will bleed into the dough.

Even when the photo is blurry, it still looks good.

I interpret the words "a little heavy cream" liberally.

Bake for 15 to 20 minutes (it took me about 22 minutes) until lightly browned. Transfer to a rack to cool slightly.

While the scones are cooling, make the glaze. I've found that this recipe makes about twice as much glaze as I need, and I apply it pretty liberally. I usually make a half recipe, but the directions are the same whether you make the full recipe or just half.

Combine the lemon juice and powdered sugar in a microwave-safe bowl, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Stir in the lemon zest and butter. Microwave on high for 30 seconds. Remove from the microwave and whisk the glaze until the butter is melted and glaze is smooth. Drizzle the glaze over the scones. Let sit a minute before serving (if you can).

See those flecks of lemon zest? Those give this glaze what I call "punch you in the face" lemon flavor, which is the only kind of lemon flavor I like. The glaze really makes the scones - honestly, they taste a little bland without it. If you're not a fan of blueberries and/or lemon (what's wrong with you?!?), I imagine you'd be pretty successful substituting cranberries for the blueberries and orange for the lemon. I've also heard tell (from Sarah over at Pretty Bird Press) that substituting mini chocolate chips for the blueberries and topping the scones with a vanilla glaze is quite delicious as well. This got me thinking that mini chocolate chip scones with a ginger glaze (or ginger-vanilla glaze?) might be good too.

Do any combinations come to mind for you? Do you have any recipes that spark your creativity (and that you'd care to share)?

Bites: Grilled Pizza Fail

2009-07-12T12:05:00.001-05:00

When I first created Bites, I promised it would include both my suc cess es and *my failures* in the kitchen. Today, I make good on that promise by showcasing my spectacular failure at grilled pizza.

Right before the long Fourth of July weekend, I solicited your best pizza dough recipes. I received a whopping... one. One! And so, I resorted to the Google, which is rife with pizza dough recipes. After much weighing of pros and cons, I settled on this one from Simply Recipes:

Simply Recipes' Homemade Pizza Dough
(Makes enough for two 10 to 12-inch pizzas)

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups warm water (105 - 115 degrees Fahrenheit)
1 package (2 1/4 teaspoons) of active dry yeast (I used Fleischmann's)
3 1/2 cups bread flour or all-purpose flour (I used all-purpose flour)
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon sugar

In the large bowl of a heavy duty electric mixer (I used my Kitchen Aid), add the warm water. I used a candy thermometer to make sure it was the right temperature, so I wouldn't kill the yeast. Sprinkle the yeast over the water and let sit for 5 minutes, until the yeast is dissolved. Stir to dissolve completely if needed at end of 5 minutes.

This is how it looked after 5 minutes. The yeast had dissolved and "bloomed."

I gave it a little stir to make sure it was all evenly distributed.

Attach the mixing paddle to the mixer. Mix in the olive oil, flour, salt and sugar on low speed for about a minute. Mine looked like this:

Remove the mixing paddle and replace with a dough hook. Knead using the mixer and dough hook, on low to medium speed, until the dough is smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. If you don't have a mixer, you can mix and knead by hand.

Now, this is where I should have known I was getting in over my head. Because it took 25 minutes of kneading with the mixer and an "extra" 1/2 cup flour to get the dough to come together. I say "extra" because there was a moment when I was measuring out the flour that I thought to myself, "Hmm, was that 2 1/2 cups, or 3 cups? Probably 3..." So there's a definitely possibility I was short 1/2 cup of flour when I started kneading, explaining the need for extra. At any rate, the dough did indeed become "smooth and elastic" and formed a ball (which I forgot to take a picture of, of course).

Place the ball of dough in a bowl that has been coated lightly with olive oil. Turn the dough around in the bowl so that it gets coated with the oil.

It was in a ball before this, I swear...

Cover with plastic wrap, like this:

See how the plastic wrap is touching the dough? That's what the photos
accompanying the instructions looked like, so that's what I did.

Let sit in a warm place (between 75 and 85 degrees Fahrenheit) until the dough doubles in size, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours. If you don't have a warm spot in the house you can heat the oven to 150 degrees, and then turn the oven off. Place the bowl of dough in the warmed oven to rise.

After about 1 1/2 hours, my dough had more than doubled in size.

This is the point where you punch the dough down. Once again, I hit the Google to find out what exactly this entailed. Then I felt silly, because it's exactly what it sounds like. You punch your fist in the middle of it to knock out all the air...

One swift punch later.

And then fold the sides down into the center...

Turn the dough out onto a floured surface, divide into two equal pieces, and set aside to rest for about 10 minutes.

They kind of look like lungs, don't they?

Now, this is where things took a turn. I used my fingers to spread the dough, resulting in some spots that were too thick, and others that were so thin they tore. Next time, I'll use a rolling pin for better uniformity.

I referred to several different websites and blogs for advice on grilling pizza, and cobbled together my method from all of them.

I have a charcoal grill, so I started the coals in a chimney and built a fire for indirect heat. The grill seems to have gotten pretty hot - around 525 degrees Fahrenheit.

I brushed the grill grate with olive oil, and brushed the top of the dough with olive oil. Lacking a fancy-schmancy pizza peel, I improvised and dusted my unrimmed baking sheet with flour, then put the pizza dough on. I headed out to the grill, went to slide the dough onto the grill and found that it.... stuck. Like glue. After scraping with a spatula and prying with my fingers, I finally got the dough onto the grill. I tore a few holes in the dough in the process. After patching, it looked like this:

Not pretty.

Most sites recommended that I let the dough cook for a few minutes, until it was golden brown on the side closest to the coals, then rotate 180 degrees. I went to do this, and discovered that the side furthest from the coals was completely uncooked. Rotating the dough was a nightmare that resulted in more tearing and patching. Now it looked like this:

Even less pretty.

After the bottom had finished cooking, I pulled the dough off the grill (not easy). I brushed the top (uncooked) side with olive oil, the flipped the dough over so the cooked side was facing up. I topped the cooked side with fresh mozzarella, fresh tomato, and basil, then returned the dough to the grill, clamped the lid on, and repeated the cooking process: cook, rotate, cook. The pizza broke into several pieces this time, and came out looking like this (apologies for the blurriness):

Final product tasted better than it looked.

The second pizza came out much the same. In both cases, the thickest spots in the dough never cooked through. I loaded the second pizza up with too many toppings, which actually made that one a little bit soggy.

I think this method has potential, but I'll do a few things differently next time.
1. I'll make 4 smaller pizzas, instead of 2 larger ones.
2. I'll roll the dough with a rolling pin for more uniformity.
3. I'll dust my makeshift peel with cornmeal instead of flour, since that supposedly helps the dough slide off more easily ("it's like little ball bearings" one person said).
4. I'll build the fire differently. I'll try scattering a layer of coals all across the bottom of the grill and cook the dough with the lid on from the beginning, in the hopes that it will cook more uniformly.
5. I'll top the pizzas sparingly.

Have any of you ever tried grilled pizza? Got any tips for next time?

Cats on Wheels

2009-07-11T10:41:00.004-05:00

Midway through a small DIY project this morning (that I promise to blog about later), I hit the Google in search of casters. You know, those things you attach to the bottom of table legs so you can roll the table around? Yes, those things. And on one of the major home improvement store's websites, I came across this:

Go ahead and click on that photo folks, so you can see it in all its glory. No really, go ahead. I'll wait. And while you're there, pay special attention to the part I circled.

Yes, that's right, this store is suggesting that you attach these casters to each of your furry kitty's paws for what I can only imagine is some bizarre version of feline roller derby. I've heard of cats behind the wheel, but never cats on wheels. I briefly considered the idea, then thought better of it. But still - I want to know who wrote this. Do you hear me Big Box Home Improvement Store??? I want answers!

Please Mom, can I get one? Pleeeeeeeeeeease?????

2009-07-09T17:02:00.003-05:00

New under the "Fake Stuff I Want for Real" heading is the amazingly awesome Tauntaun sleeping bag that ThinkGeek debuted as an April Fool's prank earlier this year.

After overwhelming fan response, they promised they'd make it for real. Now, it looks like it might be a reality.

Who's got two thumbs and can't wait to sleep inside a tauntaun? This girl!!!

Bites: Calling All Pizza Dough Recipes

2009-07-01T08:03:00.004-05:00

http://www.flickr.com/photos/slice/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

I'm looking for the perfect pizza dough recipe: bakes up slightly crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside, and makes a great canvas for a variety of toppings. I'll admit to resorting to Boboli in the past, but with a long weekend coming up I thought I'd try my hand at a homemade pie.

Do you have a favorite pizza dough recipe you'd care to share?

Bites: Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

2009-06-28T14:30:00.004-05:00

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies, adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook. Makes approximately 5 1/2 dozen (54) cookies.

Mr. Liggiland's favorite dessert combination is chocolate and peanut butter, so I'm always looking for new ways to combine the two. He and his team had a long week at work recently, so I wanted to make a batch of cookies for him to take to the office. I searched high and low, but couldn't find a Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe I liked. So, I went to my trusty Gourmet Cookbook and decided to adapt its Peanut Butter Cookies recipe to my needs. The results were mixed (haha, get it, mixed? nevermind...). I think I added too many chocolate chips, because the dough broke apart at the end and turned into a crumbly mess. After rolling each ball of dough by hand, they baked up fine, but I thought there had to be a better way.

Mr. Liggiland invited some friends over to play board games Saturday, so I decided to use them as my guinea pigs and took a second stab at the cookies.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups chunky peanut butter (not "all-natural"; I used Jif reduced fat chunky peanut butter, and it was fine)
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips, divided

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

(Gourmet recommends that you butter your baking sheets. I did the first time, but it felt unneccessary. These cookies have so much fat, I really don't think you'll have a problem with them sticking. But, butter your baking sheets if you like. It can't hurt.)

Beat together butter, peanut butter, and brown sugar until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes.

Before beating.

After beating.

Beat in egg, then add flour, baking powder, and salt, beating just until dough forms.

The dough after it comes together. Apologies for the blurriness.

Remove bowl from mixer and fold in 3/4 c. chocolate chips.

Mmm, mmm, good.

(I think this is where I went wrong the first time - I beat in 1 1/2 c. chocolate chips on low speed, and the dough dissintegrated into a crumbly mess. In this particular recipe, less is more, and folding by hand seems to be more effective. Even so, the dough still broke apart a little bit this time. Perhaps mini-chocolate chips would work better next time?)

Roll dough into balls approximately 1 1/4 inches in diameter and place on cookie sheet approximately 2 1/2 inches apart.

Why, yes, I am Type A. How did you know?

Gently flatten balls with fork, creating a crosshatch pattern. This is important because the cookies don't spread much on their own while baking.

Pretty little cookies, ready for the oven.

Bake in middle of oven until golden and slightly puffed, approximately 10 to 11 minutes (10 1/2 minutes was perfect for me). Cool on cookie sheet for a couple minutes, then transfer to a baking rack to cool.

Ah, yeah...

After sampling enough cookies to constitute a scientific sample, I thought this batch was pretty darn good. Maybe still missing a certain something, but definitely better than the first attempt. So I left my cookies to cool and went about my normal Saturday morning routine, reading my usual blogs. And then I came across the most recent post over at Addicted to Costco, featuring these delicious-looking lovelies:

Chocolate-dipped, chocolate-drizzled chocolate chip cookies. Photo from Addicted to Costco.

Now, I am not the kind of girl who can say "no" to anything that incorporates a chocolate drizzle. And then I realized: that's what my cookies were missing! A luxurious, gooey, chocolatey drizzle.

I still had half a bag of chocolate chips, so I put 1/4 cup in a microwave-safe bowl and microwaved them on 50% power for 2 1/2 minutes (try them at 2 minutes first, stir to melt, and then continue heating in 30 second intervals after that). I tried drizzling gently with a fork at first, but just got lumpy, second-rate Keebler Elf-looking stripes.

Not so much.

Then I opted for a spoon and more of a spatter paint approach, and got much better results.

Now these look almost as good as they taste.

Mr. Liggiland and I agree: these cookies are much, much better with a chocolate drizzle. The geeky hordes seemed to enjoy them as well (the cookies at least kept them at bay for the evening). I think I might attempt these again sometime down the road, incorporating mini chocolate chips instead of regular ones, or perhaps eliminating them all together and just using the chocolate drizzle. Give the recipe a try yourself, feel free to experiment a little, and tell me what you come up with!

When It Rains...

2009-06-12T18:24:00.006-05:00

Last night, Austin experienced a little late season "severe weather" (read: thunder, lightning, wind, rain, hail). We got a fair amount of rain and some hail, but thought we escaped unscathed. We found out differently tonight. With predictions for more strong weather and a possible tornado watch for this evening, I went outside to cover the plants and protect the BBQ again. And that's when I found this:

Hail damage.

That's a golf ball-sized hole punched through the plastic Rubbermaid container we use to store our BBQ equipment. Apparently, we're not so unscathed after all. Still, we fared better than some, so we shall count ourselves lucky.

Now for the fun part: shopping! I'm going to need to replace that storage bin, preferably with something sturdier and weatherproof. Does anyone know if they make those galvanized metal stock tanks with lids? I've always wanted to use one as a planter in the garden, but maybe it could make a good storage container too.

Any suggestions? Extra points if it's aesthetically pleasing and/or green.

Bites: Chocolate Chip Pound Cake

2009-06-08T21:04:00.015-05:00

"Bites" will be a recurring feature on this blog and will feature my successes and failures in the kitchen.

Chocolate Chip Pound Cake, from Giada's Kitchen: New Italian Favorites by Giada de Laurentiis

This was absolutely delicious, even if the title was a little misleading. It really doesn't have a traditional pound cake texture - it's closer to a cakey brownie, but in loaf form. I also didn't bother with the dipping sauce. The cakes are plenty moist (thanks to the 1/3 cup mascarpone and 1 cup vegetable oil) without the sauce, although I'm sure the extra chocolate certainly wouldn't hurt.

Makes 2 pound cakes

For pound cakes:
5 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1/3 cup mascarpone cheese, at room temperature
2 1/4 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
3 large eggs
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

For Homemade Chocolate Sauce:
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2/3 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Place a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease and flour two 9 x 5-inch loaf pans.

In a small saucepan, combine the unsweetened chocolate and 1 cup water.

It's just unsweetened chocolate and water, but I already want some!

Place over medium-low heat and stir constantly until the chocolate is melted, about 2 minutes. Set aside to cool for 2 minutes, then whisk in the mascarpone until the mixture is smooth.

Note: No matter how delicious this looks, don't make the mistake of licking the whisk like I did. Not good (yet)!

Beat the sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla in a large bowl for 30 seconds. Stir in the chocolate-mascarpone mixture. Whisk the flour, baking soda, salt, baking powder, and chocolate chips in a medium bowl. Add the dry ingredients and stir just until blended.

Divide the batter among the prepared pans and bake for 55 to 60 minutes or until a tester inserted into the center of each loaf comes out with no crumbs attached. Cool in the pans for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely. (If you plan to freeze the cakes, wrap them well in aluminum foil once they are completely cool).

Warm, chocolate pound cakey goodness.

If you want to make the chocolate sauce (which can't possibly hurt):
To make the sauce, place the chocolate chips in a small heat-proof bowl. Combine the heavy cream and vanilla extract in a small saucepan and heat over medium-low heat until small bubbles appear at the edges of the pan. Pour the hot cream mixture over the chocolate chips. Stir with a fork until the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth.

Drizzle the chocolate sauce over the pound cakes and refrigerate for 15 to 20 minutes to set the chocolate sauce. Return to room temperature before serving.

She's Ready for Her Close-Up Now

2009-05-27T12:30:00.004-05:00

As Sarah over at Pretty Bird Press so kindly pointed out, I omitted one resident of LiggiLand in my previous post: my sweet baby kitty Juliette. Since this simply won't do, I've decided to correct the error with a Julie-centric post. This is sure to be the first of several (many?).

Juliette is 11 years old and very small, just around 6 1/2 pounds. She is full of spunk and sass and energy, and still plays like a kitten.

Like any good cat, she's also a bit of a diva, and loves her some shoes.

She also loves to sleep, which is when I get some of my favorite pictures of her.

As you might have guessed by now, Juliette is a pretty big part of our lives. We love her like a furry child. And since we don't have any human children, that's as much as we can imagine loving something right now.

Coming soon: building a fountain in the front garden. Stay tuned!

Origin Story

2009-05-25T18:28:00.000-05:00

Hello, and welcome to LiggiLand! I plan to use this space to post about my life - it's a way to keep up with family and friends, and hopefully connect with others who share my interests.

I suppose I should start by explaining the title of this blog. On April 20, 2008, I married my wonderful husband, Dennis, whose last name is Liggio. My last name is McClelland. A few months before the wedding, I mentioned to Dennis that I wouldn't be changing my name after we got married. This came as a bit of a surprise to him. During the inevitable discussion that followed, I suggested that we combine our last names. McCleggio had a nice ring to it. Vetoed. Then how about.... Liggiland? After several hours of my extolling the many virtues of such a name (people will think we're our own nation! maybe we could even join the UN!) and of Dennis shaking his head and rolling his eyes (I choose to think he was doing it playfully), Dennis finally agreed that if we ever owned a theme park, we could name it LiggiLand. I reluctantly agreed.

And then a blog was born. Since there were no restrictions on what I named my very own blog (you're not the boss of me, Dennis!), I went with the name I fell in love with a year and a half ago: LiggiLand.

The residents of LiggiLand.

So there you have it. Not just a story about the name of this blog, but a peek into our slightly wacky lives. I like it. I hope you do too.