Strawberry Strudel

My sister left for Oxford a few days ago, and I wanted to make her a little treat for the morning before she left. It was really nice-- we were able to have a last minute get together and have some quality: "sister time." I brewed some nice coffee, and made this yummy strudel. It wasn't hard at all to make-- try it out!

What you will need:

Puff Pastry Sheet

Pastry Cream

Fresh Strawberries (I used about one package)

Egg Wash

Apricot Glaze

Directions: 

• Thaw your puff pastry sheet from the freezer
• Prepare your pastry cream. (It's the same recipe from the pomme du tarte, so click on the link for the directions).

•  Flour your work space so that you can roll out your puff pastry sheet.

•  Now, spread out your pastry cream in the middle of the rolled out puff pastry.

•  Make 1 inch slits on both sides of the puff pastry and brush it with your egg wash.

•  Dump your strawberries on top of your pastry cream.

•  Fold up the top and bottom of your puff pastry to: "tuck" your pastry cream and strawberries in.

•  Taking each of the one inch pieces, fold them from one side of the strudel to the other. The egg wash acts as a glue, and will keep the pieces in place.

•  Transfer your strudle to a baking pan (If you don't flour your surface enough, your puff pastry will get stuck to the parchment paper-- like mine did!)

•  Brush egg wash on the top of your strudle and bake at 350 degrees for about 40 minutes, or until your strudle is a golden brown.

•  Pour your apricot glaze on your strudel while it's still hot.

Enjoy!

Beef Stew

I'm stuck at home during a Nor'Easter and I really have been craving a home-made beef stew. I found a really great recipe here, but I made a few tweaks to it because it didn't roast in my oven too well. In my pictures, you can see I started off cooking in an oven roasting pan, but just ignore that! It was taking way too long to cook, so put it on the stove in a stockpot instead of in the oven. 

Oregano and Red Wine Beef Stew
Serves 4

1 bag of cut and peeled baby carrots (16 ounces)
7 stalks of celery
1 pound fresh green beans (or one 14.5 ounce can of green beans)
1 whole onion (medium size)
2 large cloves garlic
1 jalapeno
1 can cut tomatoes (14.5 ounces)
3 whole potatoes (red or russet)
32 ounces of beef broth
1 cup of red wine
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 ½ pounds beef stew meat
2 teaspoons dried oregano
2 teaspoons ground pepper
2 teaspoons dried parsley
4 bay leaves
1 teaspoon salt (or salt to taste)

Directions:

Remember, although I put all of my ingredients into a roasting pan, you should put yours on the stovetop. I don't know how the original recipe was able to be cooked in the oven with a roasting pan...I used a cover on my roasting pan just like the original recipe, but the ingredients just weren't cooking for some weird reason. Oh well! Just cook it on the stove and you should be fine!

First, dump out your can of tomatoes into the pot and turn on the stove to medium-high heat.

Chop up all of your vegetables and add them to the pot.

Add everything else except for the olive oil and beef.

Let your stew cook on the stovetop (not oven--haha) while you prepare the beef.

In a separate pan, add your olive oil and beef, then cook throughly.

When the beef is browned, add all of the pan's contents (beef and liquid) to the large stock pot.

Let cook 2-4 hours, or until the vegetables and beef are soft enough to cut with a spoon.

This stew is SO good! Plus, it makes the house smell delicious! I think the red wine gives it some amazing flavor, and the jalapeno just gives it the right amount of heat! This is definitely a great stew for a cold day. Enjoy!

Green Onions: Day Ten

Look how these green onions have grown in ten days!

Very impressed with myself! Especially since I've been realizing how expensive produce is up here! I'm so glad mom and dad pay for my groceries, because with my tastes, I'd be broke if I had to buy my own food. I think I'll be eating lots of green onions when I'm out on my own to save money on the grocery bill! haha

Pathetic?

I just had a thought... it is sad I'm 22 years old and blogging about produce growing on my windowsill! Today I will make an effort to get out more and be interesting! haha

Green Onions: Day Two

At first, I thought these green onions grew about a half an inch overnight. After looking at the pictures from yesterday however, it doesn't look like they are growing as fast as I thought... that dark green growth is misleading!  

New Years Cards

I like making my own cards for the holidays, but this year I was just so busy I never got around to it!! :( So, I decided to make some cards for the new year rather than belated-holiday cards...thought it would be more thoughtful/less forgetful!

These are the cards I made-- they're really simple, but they kind of reminded me of champagne (which is probably why I like them... I love champagne!)

You'll need:
Plain Card-Stock 
Colorful Paper
1 inch circle craft punch
3/4 inch circle craft punch
Glue
Glitter



Here are the craft punches I used:

They are like big hole-punches-- you just squeeze the handle on them, and they punch out different shapes! I love them. Until I get myself a Cricut, these will have to do! :) (I'm not supposed to use my Cricut Cake for cutting paper because the chemicals in card-stock are not good for you.)

Punch out all different colors with both punches

After I punched out my circles, I put them in a jar and shook them up so I would be able to grab a random assortment each time I needed my circles

Glue on your circles in a random pattern. After they dry, add a little dollop of glue and some glitter so when the glue dries, there will only be the glitter showing.

Shake off your excess glitter and your cards are ready once the glue dries!

Seriously, I should be getting reimbursed for all of this product placement!! Haha. I need to learn how to make money on this blog so I don't have to get a real job!

Green Onions: Day One

I read somewhere that you can keep green onions indefinitely if you just keep the roots in water. Always up for the domestic challenge, I kept these green onions rather than throwing them out. I just put them in some water on a windowsill. The green stalk supposedly grows back. Hmm...I'll keep you all updated to see if this really works. It would be nice not to have to buy these things anymore! Fresh produce is just so expensive in Maine during the winter--plus it would be nice to: "reduce my carbon footprint" if this works out!