a big step!

I've done it. I've switched over to wordpress and i'm never looking back!
Come follow me here: http://www.strangerthanbaking.wordpress.com

I will be making all of my new posts there.
Someday I will figure out how to redirect this site to the new one.

And don't forget to follow me on twitter! @STBaking

love STB

The arrival of autumn....

brings cozy times reading on the couch until it gets dark, your favorite sweaters, cute jackets, fall colors outside and in, and warm food that makes you feel good. I love fall food. Savory soups made with hearty vegetables that melt in your mouth and dense broth that restores health to your bones. The aromas of baking pastries with cinnamon lathered fruits in the middle. Cookies that have ginger and shortbread and marzipan! Breads that have fruit and cinnamon and sugar. Those sister spices of fall make their welcome appearance to the front of your spice rack, ready for the daily grind with a grin on their face and a mischievous gleam in their eye... allspice, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, and of course... more cinnamon!!
Although I always love baking more, I think cooking is the most fun in fall. There's a cozy feel of being in the warm kitchen with the stove bubbling, your long sleeves rolled up around your elbows and cutting root vegetables that can be casually tossed into a large dutch oven to ruminate and get cozy with their neighbor veggies in a savory broth bath. One of my favorite, easy to make comfort foods is Moroccan Chicken. I adapted this recipe from Martha Stewart's Great Food Fast cookbook. It is easy to prepare, low maintenance to cook, and makes tons of food for yummy leftovers! Side note: I also love that the prep needed for this recipe involves chopping things in large chunks. Plus, I enjoy cutting zucchini! I just like the texture of  cutting through ripe zucs... call me weird. I have a thing with textures and tactile sensations. I hope I just enlightened you to a new appreciation for zucs!

Come on in fall! I open the door whole heartedly. But hurry up and don't let the cold in!

Moroccan Chicken
Ingredients:
~ 2lb of your favorite parts of chicken (thighs or breasts?) cut into chunks
3 carrots, chopped in large chunks
3 onions, thinly sliced
1 14.5 oz (or larger) can of cut, peeled tomatoes. I will settle for nothing less that San Marzano tomatoes! Do yourself a favor and treat yourself to them ASAP. I even save a handful to toast on bread and drizzle olive oil on top as a pre-dinner snack with a spirited bev ;)
1 15 oz can chickpeas, drained
1 3/4 C chicken broth
1/2 t ground ginger
1/4 t ground tumeric
1/4 t ground cinnamon
1/4 t chili powder
2 zucchini chopped in large chunks (savor the chopping ;)
2 C dry couscous (2 cups chicken broth and 2 T butter for making the couscous)

Directions:
-Combine all the ingredients from the chicken to the chili powder in a large pot or dutch oven (make sure you add the juice along with the tomatoes!). You can accidentally toss in the zucchini if you forget to separate everything like i did. Smile at how easy this recipe is already. Add a large dash of salt and pepper.
- Simmer covered for 20 minutes or until the veggies are tender and the chicken is cooked. Add zucchinis in after 10 min if you didn't add them already.
-Meanwhile, bring chicken broth and butter to a boil. Once butter is all melted, add couscous and stir well. remove from heat and leave covered to cook for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork before serving.
-Pour a heaping mound of couscous into a bowl and top with the chicken dish. Enjoy!

Psalm for a dark night

murky aura of dissatisfaction

where do you reside?

if I knew, would i try

to ripe you out

from the inside?

who is the illusion

me or you?

not lean enough

not strong enough

not the right clothes

not the right shoes

not the right bag

or

not the truth

not the light

not the cure

not the end

not the fight

a twisted comfort

in the doldrums

why do i let this

sadness linger

exercise, diet, money

nothing i can buy

can satisfy

when i get this way

i know the cure

but i don't have

the mind the heart the might

i fail

and i choose

a dark night

until He chooses me

to pull into the light

once again and

not for the last time

Upcoming Travel

I am so excited! I have three big trips coming up that are going to be amazing!

First: Buddy and I are chartering a 30ft catamaran and sailing around the San Juan Islands and Gulf Islands with 4 of our friends for a week

Next: I am going to my to my hometown to be my best friend's doula. This is going to be incredible. It will be one of those moments that mark a time of change that was inevitable, but you are never ready for. She has been my soul mate since middle school and I can't believe we are childbearing age! I am so glad that my calling can serve her through the first time she gives birth and also help her for a week or so post partum. I can't wait to see the little thing!

Finally: I am traveling to Monaco via Paris to spend some time with 3 dear girl friends. We all love food and adventure. Last time we did this we went to New Zealand and it was one the best trips of my life. I intend to use some of my Paris dining knowledge from "A Homemade Life" to eat well.

One of the above mentioned 3 ladies shared this video with me and definitely got me pumped up for the trip. Three friends travelled around the world and made one minute videos of their experiences. This one is about the food they ate. The creators also made two similiar videos called "Move" and "Learn"

EAT from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

i keep coming back to the good stuff

You know how you go through phases of enjoying something so much that you listen to it/eat it/ watch it over and over until you get sick of it? (i write this as i am popping down my fourth fruit roll up in 10 minutes) Well, I must say that I have never gotten sick of My Morning Jacket! A roommate in college introduced me to them and we used to listen to the "Z" album over and over and belt out "Wordless Chorus" without shame. A few years later I moved out to Seattle and watched "I'm Not There" with a friend. There's a scene in the movie where there is a funeral and a man singing "Going to Acapulco" and I thought it sounded like the lead singer from MMJ and it turned out it was! While researching this I realized they have put out more cds and I promptly bought them. The albums "Dawn" and "Evil Urges" are great with their own distinct feel. Something about Jim James' voice just makes me want to toss my hair from side to side and belt out the lyrics. They were on my list of "Bands I Must See Live", and then they came to town a couple of weeks ago just in time for my 3rd honeymoon! Buddy and I snagged tickets and got blasted by their live set. Awesome energy, but I think Buddy and I are getting a little too old for the stand up and get shoved around by sweaty teenagers and drunken 30 year old crowd. We had a good time anyway and I loved the show! So glad I went.

The song my roommate and I used to belt out in our dorm room:

Here's a taste of their new stuff with an intro by Conan. He even mentions the show we attended!

My favorite song from "Evil Urges"

I miss this

I just finished hosting a baby shower. I don't miss that. But I do miss quiet saturday evenings, when the temp is still warm at 8pm and the sun is just beginning its hour long yawn before bedtime around 9pm. I made my second baby sling for a client. This one turned out better than the last. I have posted pics of it on the Projects page. I plan to continue making baby slings for clients as gifts. And I keep getting clients. I hope business is this easy when I am a midwife!

I am in the midst of creating a curriculum for christian childbirth classes. I have learned so much while doing it. I am basing it off of Jennifer Vanderlaan's curriculum.

Buddy and I celebrated our third honeymoon (2nd anniversary) over 4th of July weekend by doing a 5 day backpacking trip in Olympic National Park. It was amazing. Very beautiful! We saw 7 black bears. One of which we had a very close encounter with and quickly realized the difference between mace and bear spray. Don't worry, we didn't end up needing it.

Over this backpacking trip Buddy and I reflected on two major struggles in my life. I am not at peace. I know I will always have things on my To Do list and I can't ever get everything done, I will never be satisfied, and I will alway make myself self insanely busy. Where's the peace in that? If I believe God is in control of everything and His plan is better than mine, then why I am so upset about not completing my To Do list? Or not spending my time the way I want. It's because I don't believe those things. I am constantly trying to make my life better, get things done, and do what I think is best. I don't actually trust in God's plan, I only trust my own. How do I trust God's plan?

The second lesson is that I have still been struggling with a birth I attended last fall. I was the doula for a close friend and she wanted a natural childbirth that turned into a C-section. She was very afraid of that happening and wanted me to help her prevent that. I know she doesn't hold me responsible for what happened, and there's not really anything that I could have done to change the circumstances, but I still felt terrible about it and every time I see her I want to ask her to forgive me. As I was telling Buddy this he helped me realize that I had been feeling like it was up to me to give women the perfect birth. I was making it my responsibility to make sure nothing bad happened to the women I was serving. If I just worked hard enough or knew enough or did the right thing at the right time, maybe I can save all women from having a bad birth. All of this is a lie I honestly believed. No matter what I do, God has a plan for every women's birth. It's not up to me to change that plan. But I can still help them get through it, and to trust God all the while.

This weight will only get heavier as I become a midwife. I can not rely on myself, I must trust God and know that His plan is best. Even if it does not look like a "perfect birth" according to my standards. Each woman has their own experience for a reason.

How I feel

I kept my promise after all!

Ok so I realized the best thing I can do is write a blog about all the amazing things I am learning about as a doula-midwife and hot topics the girls and I discuss.

I am totally pumped! It's still in the works, but here's the beginning: MISSeducation. www.misseducation.blogspot.com was taken already by someone who made ONE post back in 2007 about britney spears!! Ugh! Anyway, it looks like blogger is going to toss blogs that haven't been updated since 2007 in June, so if this blog goes off well then I might be able to nab the blog address without a hyphen. Cross your fingers! What should our first topic be?

I'm gonna forget everything I wrote two days ago

So, already I am trying to bite off more than I can chew. I am a slave to my creativity and insane drive to do EVERYTHING. T$ and I were laughing about Hyperbole and a Half today and then we casually started talking about how the blogor (thats hip lingo I made up for a "blog author" quick! someone write a wiki article about it so people who don't use a dictionary will think it's a real word) quite her job and makes enough money from her blog to get by. Since i am quitting my job in a year anyway, I thought "I can do that! If I get enough followers now, then I can start making money off of the blog by next year to provide a pretty sweet cushion." Forget everything I said two days ago about just following my calling and not filling my time with a bunch of distractions. This doesn't count... So as I biked home and stopped by the grocery store to pick up my dinner this evening, I realized 2 things:

1. How quickly you resort back to bachelorette behavior when your husband is gone

2. I need a gimmick for my blog

Let's start with #1. So I needed to pick up milk because we ran out this morning. As I was picking up milk I realized I had no plans for dinner so I went down the frozen food isle to see what was what. I picked out a bag of frozen food that had a delicious looking picture on the package, included meat AND vegetables, and said it made 2 servings. I thought "oh great, i'll eat a serving tonight and have left overs for lunch tomorrow. totally worth $6, right?" This is how my bachelorette dinner turned out.

Classy, no?

After having a 2 minute argument with myself about whether to save the last little bits for lunch tomorrow, I ended up eating it all. 2 servings my butt!

#2. So what should be my gimmick? Should I even do this? T$ helped me brainstorm some ideas, which include:

• write about food. is that too done? I kinda already do that.
• have a goal like in Julie and Julia, where I try to accomplish something in a year. For example; I could try to see all of the curiosities in the Pacific Northwest in one year.
• OR I could try to tie this blog into my calling by blogging about women's needs, resources for education, tips, tools, hot topics, things you should know, etc.

To top off my bachelorette evening I am going to bring my laptop to Starbucks, have a chai latte, and try to do some homework because I feel smarter there (and less lonely).

rain rain go away, bring back my man instead

Another business trip for my buddy. He'll be gone until Thurs. I always lack motivation to come home from work when he's gone. I had to bike to work in the rain this morning to top it all off.

I'm actually blogging to stall doing homework right now. I have to complete a lab, a crossword (my fav part), and read 3 chapters before taking my mid term all hopefully before Sat. It's gonna be a busy weekend. Is there anything wrong with doing homework at work?

Last night buddy and I snuck out for some dinner at a vietnamese place down the street that was recommended to us. it was awesome! huge steaming bowls of Pho with duck salad for $7! Jealous!? and to top it all off, there was a large group of vietnamese men gathered around a table near us having rounds and rounds of beers and a good old time. They would make jokes that we could only recognize by the resounding laughter at their table and buddy would turn to me and shake his head, "i just don't get vietnamese jokes"... mostly because he doesn't speak vietnamese. Then one of the older men breaks out into this amazing vietnamese sonnet and sings to his friends. some of them join in singing a phrase or two and at a couple of apparently key phrases they would all raise their heinies and take a swig. It was like something from a movie. I felt like I should be dressed like Ayn Rand and we were in some hole in the wall restaurant near Vietnam in the 50's. I was waiting for the waitress to join in and sing a tune and the old man to get up and dance with her across the restaurant like Fred Astaire. Instead, buddy and I finished our romantic meal, paid the tab, and as we got up to leave, the old man looked at us "sorry for ruining your meal!" we laughed and shook our heads "not at all!" and then he looked at me and sang "you're so beautiful" as we exited. I probably blushed.

Off I go to study neurons and eat green curry from a jar.

Happy Easter!

I am constantly amazed by our church. Pastor Mark Driscoll announced just a few months ago that we would hold Easter at Qwest stadium this year and it was hard to comprehend. Flash forward: i am on stage in a gold robe singing "Christ is Risen" in front of over 17,500 people while over 500 people got baptized. One of the most amazing experiences ever. I have never been a part of something so moving.

This is the video of the sermon. Every once in a while you can see me in the front row of the choir just to the left of the cross.

When Pastor Mark walked on stage in front of me and I saw his timer start ticking away 20 minutes, I thought to myself, "how can he possibly preach the Gospel to thousands of unbelievers in 20 minutes?" Well, he did it. And he did it well. Check it out.

When the music is posted you know I will post it here.

It was a blast. I wish all of you could have been there.

My tear jerking moment: I was walking around afterwards as people were still getting baptized. I saw a young woman get baptized, walk down from the tub and hug a young man who I assume was her brother. I recognized the brother as a church goer. She looked at him and hugged him. Initially he kept a stoic faced and hugged back, and then I saw his face change as the emotions overwhelmed him. His stoic look turned into tears of relief and joy and he embraced her tightly, his shoulders beginning to shrug up and down as the tears began to flow. The amount of happiness he must of felt knowing that when either of their lives end on this earth, he knows he will see her again in Heaven. I pray that I would know that about all of you!

I love you all!

Happy Easter!

a new leaf

So I started this blog to figure out those handful of things that make me happy. I think I have found the ticket. I am really excited. I have been struggling for the past year with being overwhelmed in so many ways and constantly not feeling like myself. I've felt edgy and it's been so hard to feel happy. I feel like there is so much to say about what I learned over the past month, but in summation:

-God is GOOD!

-I need to focus on my calling: to serve women

-I need to focus on those things that are part of my calling and stop overloading my time with everything else

-I am so blessed, and I should be (and can be!) happy

So, I went to San Diego for a Women's Leadership Symposium with a bunch (not all!) of my favorite ladies from college and we had some really interesting conversations. One of which was about birth control. Being someone who concerned with empowering women and ensuring they are educated and well informed I want t make a shout out. Everyone (not just women) should understand how their bodies work. And women, especially, should understand their fertility cycle and how their body works, because 1. its amazing, and 2. it could save your life, you future, and the future of your children and so on.

I'm currently reading "Taking Charge of Your Fertility" its a great book on how our bodies work and how to avoid getting pregnant naturally without the need for pills, barrier methods, or devices. Or, if you are in that phase of your life (which I am not) it also tells you how to get pregnant.

Anyway, that's my soap box for today.

New Year! New Post!? New cupcake recipe!

I know it's hard to believe I've finally made a new post. I have been so busy and so stressed out with everything that I haven't been myself, and haven't had time to blog. My schedule is significantly less busy this quarter, at least, and hopefully I will have more time and motivation to blog. We'll see. All of my blogging promises have come up empty thus far, so don't hold me to it.

A few months ago a dear friend, dare I say mentor, lent me a book called "A Homemade Life" by Molly Wizenberg. I have been slowly going through it like a large, delicious, intensely sweet truffle. Every little bite has been great and I have been taking my time savoring it. Each chapter talks a little about her life or her family and the end of every chapter has a recipe relating to the story. There have been many great recipes that I have been aching to try. This chocolate cupcake recipe was my first so far and I've made it three times this year already. The first time was for New Years Eve and they were quickly devoured. Then I made them again for a friend's birthday. And just recently I used the same recipe for my husband's birthday cake and made chocolate ganache and raspberry sauce as the topping. Decadent and amazing!
An easy must-try recipe. Instead of a sickeningly sweet butter frosting these cupcakes are topped with melted bittersweet chocolate that gently cracks in your mouth with each bite and then slowly melts with the rest of the chocolaty goodness.

Also, if there are left overs do not be offended; somehow these cupcakes are even better the second day!

2011's Bittersweet Cupcakes
'Gredients:
1 oz semisweet chocolate (chips or finely chopped)
1/2 c hot brewed coffee
1 c sugar
3/4 c + 1 tbspn whole wheat flour (or unbleached all-purpose flour if you're a ninny)
1/2 c unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tspn baking soda
1/4 tspn baking powder
1/4 tspn salt
1 large egg
1/4 c canola oil
1/2 c well stirred plain whole milk yogurt (not the fat free junk)
1/4 tspn vanilla extract

For cupcake topping: 8 oz bittersweet chocolate (chips or finely chopped)

For ganache topping on cake: 1/2 heavy cream, 4 oz bittersweet chocolate (chips or finely chopped)
For raspberry sauce: 1-2 c fresh raspberries, 1/3 c sugar, 2 tbspn lemon juice

Preheat oven to 300 F and line your muffin tin with little cupcake cups.
(If making a cake grease a 8-9" cake pan, place parchment paper in the bottom AND grease the parchment paper. You can also double the recipe to make a double layer cake.)

Pour the semisweet choc into a bowl with the hot coffee and let it melt, stirring occasionally.

In another bowl whisk together all the dry ingredients (sugar-salt).

In your mixer beat the egg on medium for about a minute until it is a bold solid yellow. Beat in oil, yogurt, and vanilla. Beat in melted choc mix until well combined. On low speed, beat in all of the dry ingredients. Scrape down the sides and mix briefly until everything is combined.

Using a 1/4 c measure, spoon batter into the muffin tin (or pour all of it into the cake pan). Bake cupcakes for 20-25 min until a toothpick comes out clean when you poke their little muffin tummies. Let them cool completely before doing the topping. (For the cake, bake ~50 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool.)

Boil water in a small-medium saucepan (keep on a low boil or simmer). Place a glass or metal bowl on top of the saucepan (should fit somewhat inside the pan, but not touch the bottom) and melt the bittersweet chocolate in the bowl until its smooth and inviting. This method helps prevent burning. Pour a heaping spoonful (regular spoon, not soup spoon) on top of each cooled cupcake. Rotate the cupcake to roll the melted chocolate to a smooth cap over the top. Let the melted chocolate cool until it has a matte (dull, not shiny) finish. Enjoy!

For the cake topping:
Heat 1/2 cup heavy cream in a saucepan until steaming NOT boiling. Pour hot cream into a bowl with bittersweet chocolate. Stir occasionally as it melts, shoe away tempted fingers. In a few minutes the choc will melt and only a little bit of cream will be left that can then be stirred vigorously into the chocolate to form a smooth ganache frosting.

While waiting for the choc to melt, put raspberries, sugar and lemon juice into a saucepan and stir over medium heat until the mixture begins to bubble occasionally. The raspberries should be soft, moist, and an intense color. The juice will accumulate and thicken slightly. Careful not to let it burn! Remove from heat.

How you distribute the ganache and raspberry sauce is completely up to you and your guests. Have fun!
This is how I did it:
Pour most of the ganache topping near the middle of the cake. Use the back of a spoon to make an artistic design while spreading the ganache over the top of the cake. (The key is to avoid lifting the spoon until the very end!). Drizzle remaining ganache onto each plate in a zigzag. Place cut cake pieces onto the drizzle design and top with heaping spoonfuls of raspberry sauce.

Yum!!!