baking is fun?
11Jun08
i’ve been quite hesitant to post about my last cycle. intro to baking finished up last week and i found something out about myself. i like baking. if you would have asked me 3 weeks ago what i enjoyed more, baking or cooking, i would have laughed and said cooking, hands down. if you were to ask me that now, i’m not sure what i would say.
throughout the cycle we learned how to do simple things like kneading dough and being patient with the process. we made breads, pies, tarts, ginache, laminated doughs like croissants and pastries, puff pastries, muffins, biscuits, . . .the list goes on. i really enjoyed learning the process of having patience with the process and staying disciplined. i learned a lot about myself throughout this process.
check out this photostream on my flickr account and look at the delicious goodness we made.
going for a run
03Jun08
after moving out here to portland leaving my racing bike back in iowa, i knew i wouldn’t be able to do any triathlons. since moving i’ve had an itch to get back in a road race. tonight i registered for the portland marathon.
. . . stay tuned.
the commuter
29May08
cartoon by jim borgman
a full house
26May08
last monday our good friends gabriel & jaclyn arrived in portland. they are in the middle of a grand road trip to alaska and are stopping in portland via the “long route.” first they stopped in denver to stay with a friend, then los angeles to go sailing for a few days with a friend, and now here in portland for the last week. they leave today to finish the last leg of their trip through british columbia and on into the great frontier. gabriel will be a guide in the alaskan backcountry while jaclyn nanny’s for a family for the summer.
on friday night, our good friends ren & rebecca flew in from iowa city. just before that, however, our old buddy pete found out the gang was going to be in town, so he jumped a train down from seattle. so friday night we went to bailey’s taproom for a tasty brew, hit up the farmers market saturday morning, then a hike in the sun up by the rose and japanese gardens. (we also cracked open my homebrew, but that post will be coming later) yesterday we rented a van, piled in in road trip fashion and hit the coast. after spending time at haystack rock in cannon beach, looking at the abundance of life in such a small area, we walked through town in search for a kite. then we drove further down the coast to find the right spot to put some wind under our stringed rainbows.
now, pete has boarded his train and is safely home, gabriel and jaclyn will be packing up and heading out this morning, and ren and rebecca will be here until this friday for some more portland shenanigans.
(p.s. if you didn’t put it together, that is 7 people in our 550 sq. ft. apartment. 
)
intro to garde manger
21May08as i said before, garde manger is mainly just a fancy word for the cold kitchen, however that is not how it is literally translated. that said, intro to garde manger was a great class. we learned the basic components of salads, appetizers, and hors d’oeuvre.
overall it was a fun class with a lot of opportunity for creativity and experimenting. i’m really looking forward to the challenge of advanced garde manger. that will come around next cycle after i finish this current one. for this cycle we are in our first baking course. everything i see and hear in this class is new to me. i don’t know much of anything about baking, so i really look forward to getting my hands dirty and taking it out on some dough. this first week we’ve been strictly working with bread dough and in the coming two weeks we’ll be doing some pastries, cookies, and all other sorts of baked goodness.
stay tuned.
unscrewamerica.org
05May08
this could very well be the coolest, most well thought out website i’ve been to in a long long time. it’s loaded with all kinds of fun graphics and sound effects, and the info they give doesn’t seem to stop. they have done their research and then some. check it out. and while you’re at it, change a few light bulbs.
(thanks, ren, for reminding me of this link. roar!)
