FOOD AND MORE FOOD

February is Love Your Library month, and our local library, with a new addition, had a fun event on Wednesday night.  It was called Edible Books, and patrons were to select a book that had some kind of food in its title and make a display, along with food.  I choose a children's book called Bagels from Bennie, as well as a book called Pete's a Pizza.  

 

 As I love making bagels (eating them, too) this was a fun endeavor for me.

 

 

 

...bagel dough resting...

 

 

 



...after resting, formed into balls, and let rest again, then form into bagels, drop them into boiling water...

 

 



...sprinkle on whatever toppings you want...

 

bake in hot oven







...finished bagels! 

For this event I made tiny bagels.



Here is the display that I made.  I offered two schemers with the bagels, a sweet cinnamon, cream cheese, and a savory garlic, feta and cream cheese.

 







This is the display/food for Pete's A Pizza.  When school let out after 3:15 the pizza did not last long.

 

 

 

I have also been making pasta lately, especially wanting parpardelle pasta, shown below.

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Sauté fresh mushrooms, fresh spinach and lots of garlic... 



...serve on cooked parpardelle tossed with home made pesto, topped with the mushroom spinach mixture...grate fresh Romano cheese on top...

 

delicious!!

 

 

 



It seems that I can't drag myself out of the kitchen these days, except of course to get out on my skis.  Today it has reached 42 degrees and tomorrow it is supposed to be 49 degrees...and I am not ready to be done with winter, nor cozying up in the kitchen.

NO SKIING TODAY

The plan had been to bushwhack a trail on skis on the Kickapoo Valley Reserve Sunday.  It was a lovely sunny day, however it was also 42 degrees which precluded skiing, way too wet a snow.  So we decided that we would snow shoe the course we might later want to ski.  For years, that is when winter was real here, and we actually got snow, we entered the Reserve from here...

 

 

 

 

right off of Highway 131, about 1 mile north of the Reserve Building.  This is a very long valley with its own 'stream' running through it.  It leads down to the Old 131, which we cross over, traverse some frozen, grassy marshland, until we get to the Kickapoo River.  We snow shoed along the river for quite a long ways, always a stunning sight.

 

 

 

Despite the warmth, the snow was still deep, and the 'hike' a real workout.

 

Time out to rest and contemplate the beauty of this place.

 

 

 

A stop just before we cross over the slough.

 

 

 

There were some wet spots, but we never broke through.

 

This took us nearly 3 hours, all of which  were punctuated with a winter beauty we have been robbed of for the past few years.

 

Unless we get more snow, there still won't be good skiing, but I have already skied and snow shoed more this year than the last two years combined....I won't complain.

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The National Geographic has an article in their latest issue about the healing powers of being out in nature.  We have had a pretty tough year, and I can attest to how nature balms my soul.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



I LOVE THE KICKAPOO VALLEY RESERVE

Sunday was a beautiful warmish winter day so despite my sinus problems and Freddie's stuffiness, we decided to go for a 'short' hike on the Reserve.  We were looking for ice caves, but amid all the beauty it almost did not matter that we found only smallish ones.

 

Here at the start of our hike, we are entering the woods near Bridge 10.

 

 

The snow is rather wet, but did not deter us at all.

 

This is the kind of scene we cast our eyes on nearly every step of the way.

 

 

 

The shapes, forms, rhythms of nature apparent everywhere.

 

 

 

 

One of the ice caves we visited.

 

 

 

 

 

...and another...

 

I am always struck by how beautiful even the simplest thing, a lone leaf upon the snow, becomes in the winter.

 

 

 

The color, the texture, the form of this branch was stunning,

 

 

as was the 'hair' on this River Birch.

 

Winter, despite the sometimes bitter cold is such a gift to the senses!  The snow, in its brilliance and purity, serves as a backdrop, an appealing canvas for the starkness of dormant living things. 

 

Winter is the blessing of the seasons, where beauty just sticks you in the eye!!!