Five points for whomever catches the Arrested Development reference.
06 July 2009
Pretty Fast
A little taste from our recent travels, on the fast boat from Tallinn to Helsinki...
Five points for whomever catches the Arrested Development reference.
Five points for whomever catches the Arrested Development reference.
Moving Along
I haven't written all that much about pregnancy so far, but thought a little overview was in order, for those interested. I haven't wanted to write too much about pregnancy and babies and whatnot because while I am in fact experiencing pregnancy, and there will be, in fact, a baby, I am still FUN. Right? RIGHT? KATE IS FUN!
Anyway.
I'm just over 18 weeks pregnant and things are going really well over all. Sure, I have my own internal furnace that has a broken control knob, and minor emotional outbursts [Minor, right, Keith? Keith? Why are you hiding in the corner?]. But, I am also feeling physically great, eating well (minus yesterday's run-in with far too many sour gummy candies bought in bulk from the grocery), and starting to look the part.
My current favorite pasttime
2 weeks ago I felt a large bump in my stomach and thought, Oh no! Some horrific growth that wants to eat my baby! I ran into one of my homebirth midwives that evening at the bus stop, and she was all, "Uh, do you think it was the baby?" Sure, okay... that's a reasonable explantation. That night my uterine monster had moved, and I concluded that it was, in fact, a baby.
1 week ago I awoke to something pushing on me from the inside, which was a very grounding and surreal moment. Keith and I sometimes joke that maybe I'm not actually pregnant, maybe I'm just eating a lot more and convincing myself I have a reason to sleep all the time. I remember reading odd stories of psychological phenomena where women were so sure they were pregnant and their bellies grew and they experienced all the same symptoms. With one woman, when her doctor told her definitively that she WAS NOT WITH CHILD, her stomach deflated on the spot. How peculiar.
Last night, as Keith and I were indulging on our current American TV favorite, Burn Notice (a program that, my brother tells me, one is most likely to become acquainted with on long, international flights), we were both able to feel the baby FROM THE OUTSIDE. This was cool for me, but it was really amazing for Keith, who no longer has to rely on my convincing arguments to believe that we really will have a baby in five-ish months.
According to babycenter.com, our baby is about the size of a bell pepper when measured from head to butt (legs will be added into the calculation in a couple weeks once they stretch out, so really s/he is probably around 8 or 9 inches).
I have yet to gain any weight, which, let's be honest, I'm not protesting. I'm eating my protein and produce, drinking udders-ful of milk, and mostly staying away from refined sugars, so there's not much else I can do. Except wait. And one day, I will wake up to what feels like another appendage hanging from my person, and I will eat these words and drown my sorrows in piles of lollipops and marshmallows.
Next week when we see our midwife we will get to hear the heartbeat for the first time, via a fetal stethescope. We opted out of the optional ultrasound for various reasons I will explain in a later post so hold on to your judgements until you can really let loose, and I am really looking forward to hearing this sound for the first time.
In Sweden the midwife model of maternity care is used (versus the U.S.'s obstetric model of care). This means that every woman receives prenatal care and gives birth with a midwife, and only sees an OB if they elect to, or if complications arise. The first midwife I saw wasn't fluent in English, and as neither Keith or I am fluent in Swedish, this clearly wasn't going to work. The second midwife we saw was truly great, so we will see her throughout the pregnancy (next week will be our second visit with her, our third in total). We have opted to have a homebirth (again-- it will be so much better to judge this decision if you wait until I explain myself fully!), which is not very common in Sweden (since their hospital care is so excellent, it seems), but it's something that was really important to me. So, we have met with the midwives that will attend the homebirth, and they are excellent as well. They each work in a clinic or hospital full-time, but attend homebirths on the side. This is a slightly different structure from the homebirth model in the U.S. (which is quite rare, as well). Typically, if you chose homebirth in the U.S. you will see that midwife for your prenatal care as well, receiving "continuity of care". I was a bit put off at first that this wouldn't be possible here (even if I gave birth in the hospital, I would not be attended by the midwife I see at the clinic). However, I am quite pleased with all the midwives I've met, so this doesn't bother me now.
So, that's my goings-on in a nutshell. Thanks for enduring.
Anyway.
I'm just over 18 weeks pregnant and things are going really well over all. Sure, I have my own internal furnace that has a broken control knob, and minor emotional outbursts [Minor, right, Keith? Keith? Why are you hiding in the corner?]. But, I am also feeling physically great, eating well (minus yesterday's run-in with far too many sour gummy candies bought in bulk from the grocery), and starting to look the part.
My current favorite pasttime2 weeks ago I felt a large bump in my stomach and thought, Oh no! Some horrific growth that wants to eat my baby! I ran into one of my homebirth midwives that evening at the bus stop, and she was all, "Uh, do you think it was the baby?" Sure, okay... that's a reasonable explantation. That night my uterine monster had moved, and I concluded that it was, in fact, a baby.
1 week ago I awoke to something pushing on me from the inside, which was a very grounding and surreal moment. Keith and I sometimes joke that maybe I'm not actually pregnant, maybe I'm just eating a lot more and convincing myself I have a reason to sleep all the time. I remember reading odd stories of psychological phenomena where women were so sure they were pregnant and their bellies grew and they experienced all the same symptoms. With one woman, when her doctor told her definitively that she WAS NOT WITH CHILD, her stomach deflated on the spot. How peculiar.
Last night, as Keith and I were indulging on our current American TV favorite, Burn Notice (a program that, my brother tells me, one is most likely to become acquainted with on long, international flights), we were both able to feel the baby FROM THE OUTSIDE. This was cool for me, but it was really amazing for Keith, who no longer has to rely on my convincing arguments to believe that we really will have a baby in five-ish months.
According to babycenter.com, our baby is about the size of a bell pepper when measured from head to butt (legs will be added into the calculation in a couple weeks once they stretch out, so really s/he is probably around 8 or 9 inches).
I have yet to gain any weight, which, let's be honest, I'm not protesting. I'm eating my protein and produce, drinking udders-ful of milk, and mostly staying away from refined sugars, so there's not much else I can do. Except wait. And one day, I will wake up to what feels like another appendage hanging from my person, and I will eat these words and drown my sorrows in piles of lollipops and marshmallows.
Next week when we see our midwife we will get to hear the heartbeat for the first time, via a fetal stethescope. We opted out of the optional ultrasound for various reasons I will explain in a later post so hold on to your judgements until you can really let loose, and I am really looking forward to hearing this sound for the first time.
In Sweden the midwife model of maternity care is used (versus the U.S.'s obstetric model of care). This means that every woman receives prenatal care and gives birth with a midwife, and only sees an OB if they elect to, or if complications arise. The first midwife I saw wasn't fluent in English, and as neither Keith or I am fluent in Swedish, this clearly wasn't going to work. The second midwife we saw was truly great, so we will see her throughout the pregnancy (next week will be our second visit with her, our third in total). We have opted to have a homebirth (again-- it will be so much better to judge this decision if you wait until I explain myself fully!), which is not very common in Sweden (since their hospital care is so excellent, it seems), but it's something that was really important to me. So, we have met with the midwives that will attend the homebirth, and they are excellent as well. They each work in a clinic or hospital full-time, but attend homebirths on the side. This is a slightly different structure from the homebirth model in the U.S. (which is quite rare, as well). Typically, if you chose homebirth in the U.S. you will see that midwife for your prenatal care as well, receiving "continuity of care". I was a bit put off at first that this wouldn't be possible here (even if I gave birth in the hospital, I would not be attended by the midwife I see at the clinic). However, I am quite pleased with all the midwives I've met, so this doesn't bother me now.
So, that's my goings-on in a nutshell. Thanks for enduring.
03 July 2009
heated conflict
If you happened to see a tired-looking crazy lady carrying a ginormous box with a fan under her arm while wearing a shirt that says "Baby Yourself" on it around Nordstan mall today, that was me. While it is perfectly lovely outside, our apartment heats up at the butt crack of Dawn (and do remember that Dawn's butt crack sinks a bit deeper here in Sweden than it probably does in your neck of the woods) and there has been NO WIND to swirl things around, so basically it's miserable 24/7, and extra-miserable from the hours of 6 am to 11 pm.
Last night around dinner time as Keith and I lay as still as we could without ceasing to contain life, I told him I felt conflicted. Thinking I was still pondering what to do with the evening as we had been earlier, he asked if I'd rather eat dinner or watch a movie.
[** Slight Derivation: This reminds me of the morning of our rehearsal dinner, the day before our wedding, when Keith called to see what needed to be taken care of. I uttered to him, "I'm sick!!" and he so kindly and innocently replied, "Oh, baby! Do you need some DayQuil or ColdEase or something?", not quite understanding the seriousness of which my bridesmaids had taken it upon themselves to properly unbachlorette me, a task which led me to spend 14 hours letting the reflex that is the opposite of swallowing introduce me to my toilet over and over and over. Despite the evidence, we actually do communicate fairly well. **End Derivation]
No, no, I said, feeling a far deeper conflict than dinner or movie. Sometimes, I explained, I want to do good things for the world and save all the children from a hut in Africa while my brilliant, altruistic husband disperses the cheap medicines he's created. But other times, like today when it is 79 degrees out, I want to move back to a land that believes in air-conditioning and have a giant house with a giant coolant system that hums so loudly I can't even hear myself think which is totally okay because all I need to do is drink mojitos all day by the pool. And therein, my friends, lies the conflict.
So anyway, we are now the proud owners of a Really Powerful Fan that has made my life bearable again. I don't usually think of myself as so unadaptable to temperature, but every now and again I am poignantly reminded that I am truly my Father's Daughter and in this case that means I also possess a less diverse range of temperate comfort. Tomorrow we will go to the lake (er, A Lake, since I don't actually know which lake we will go to but there are thousands of them so it doesn't matter) before which I will entertain My Other Conflict that is No Skin Cancer vs. Tinted Skin, a battle I so strongly fight for in each summer's beginning, but usually defect to the enemy by summer's end.
Last night around dinner time as Keith and I lay as still as we could without ceasing to contain life, I told him I felt conflicted. Thinking I was still pondering what to do with the evening as we had been earlier, he asked if I'd rather eat dinner or watch a movie.
[** Slight Derivation: This reminds me of the morning of our rehearsal dinner, the day before our wedding, when Keith called to see what needed to be taken care of. I uttered to him, "I'm sick!!" and he so kindly and innocently replied, "Oh, baby! Do you need some DayQuil or ColdEase or something?", not quite understanding the seriousness of which my bridesmaids had taken it upon themselves to properly unbachlorette me, a task which led me to spend 14 hours letting the reflex that is the opposite of swallowing introduce me to my toilet over and over and over. Despite the evidence, we actually do communicate fairly well. **End Derivation]
No, no, I said, feeling a far deeper conflict than dinner or movie. Sometimes, I explained, I want to do good things for the world and save all the children from a hut in Africa while my brilliant, altruistic husband disperses the cheap medicines he's created. But other times, like today when it is 79 degrees out, I want to move back to a land that believes in air-conditioning and have a giant house with a giant coolant system that hums so loudly I can't even hear myself think which is totally okay because all I need to do is drink mojitos all day by the pool. And therein, my friends, lies the conflict.
So anyway, we are now the proud owners of a Really Powerful Fan that has made my life bearable again. I don't usually think of myself as so unadaptable to temperature, but every now and again I am poignantly reminded that I am truly my Father's Daughter and in this case that means I also possess a less diverse range of temperate comfort. Tomorrow we will go to the lake (er, A Lake, since I don't actually know which lake we will go to but there are thousands of them so it doesn't matter) before which I will entertain My Other Conflict that is No Skin Cancer vs. Tinted Skin, a battle I so strongly fight for in each summer's beginning, but usually defect to the enemy by summer's end.
ADVENTURES OF BABY SPICE
Keith and I are trying to see how many countries Baby Spice can visit without a passport. We're up to five, having added two earlier this week as we galavanted with Keith's parents on their Scandinavian Adventure:
Baby Spice enjoying the coastal views from the Gulf of Finland in Tallinn, Estonia
Baby Spice helpless against my antics in Helsinki, Finland
Baby Spice enjoying the coastal views from the Gulf of Finland in Tallinn, Estonia
Baby Spice helpless against my antics in Helsinki, FinlandStay tuned for more ADVENTURES OF BABY SPICE.
13 June 2009
Cooka-cooka-coo!
My absence can only be explained by a never-ending desire for homemade chicken salad that has required me to run all over town finding croissants and spending my time meticulously removing the good stuff from chicken bones and making sure nothing... questionable... enters my salad, followed by my quest to recreate the perfect honey mustard dressing one of my first employers, Everyday Gourmet (it was a high-end deli - are we surprised? I didn't think so) used on their amazing sandwiches. And so, here I am, ready to share my wealth of new knowledge with you. My mom made a casual mention of her delicious curried chicken salad when we talked earlier this week which may have set the wheels of desire in motion for me, but after some unofficial data collection via blogs and message boards, it seems true that every pregnant woman everywhere starts craving chicken salad after they get over being utterly repulsed by meat. Was/is this true for you?
I'm no chicken salad connoisseur, but I've taken what I think is a more traditional chicken salad approach this week. Here it is:
I don't measure very well, so basically I take equal parts cut up chicken, halved grapes, and chopped walnuts, add about half a chopped onion, and whatever fresh or dried herb seems appropriate that I have (this week I've used fresh oregano and dried sage, and a third batch without any herbal enhancements). To this I add enough plain Greek yogurt to get it moist enough for my liking (ha ha, I said moist!), some lemon juice (1/4 to 1/2 a lemon depending how much salad there is-- the lemon should enhance the other flavors, not overwhelm them), and freshly ground salt and pepper. I had been adding a bit of Dijon mustard into the mix, until I started making some honey mustard sauce which I now excessively slather across the croissant. The sauce: roughly equal parts plain yogurt, honey, and Dijon mustard, a little rice wine vinegar, and salt, pepper, and cayenne to taste. Slice a croissant (or other desired carbo bundle) and enjoy 37 seconds in heaven, or however long it takes you to inhale.
If you have a favorite chicken salad recipe, will you post it in the comments so that I can explore my options?
I'm no chicken salad connoisseur, but I've taken what I think is a more traditional chicken salad approach this week. Here it is:
I don't measure very well, so basically I take equal parts cut up chicken, halved grapes, and chopped walnuts, add about half a chopped onion, and whatever fresh or dried herb seems appropriate that I have (this week I've used fresh oregano and dried sage, and a third batch without any herbal enhancements). To this I add enough plain Greek yogurt to get it moist enough for my liking (ha ha, I said moist!), some lemon juice (1/4 to 1/2 a lemon depending how much salad there is-- the lemon should enhance the other flavors, not overwhelm them), and freshly ground salt and pepper. I had been adding a bit of Dijon mustard into the mix, until I started making some honey mustard sauce which I now excessively slather across the croissant. The sauce: roughly equal parts plain yogurt, honey, and Dijon mustard, a little rice wine vinegar, and salt, pepper, and cayenne to taste. Slice a croissant (or other desired carbo bundle) and enjoy 37 seconds in heaven, or however long it takes you to inhale.
If you have a favorite chicken salad recipe, will you post it in the comments so that I can explore my options?
03 June 2009
why thank you very much
A great honour has been bestowed upon me, one I am not worthy of receiving, yet one I will accept nonetheless. LeAnna, my friend over at The Wonders Of, passed on to me the One Lovely Blog Award. This is my first blog award of sorts, and I must admit that I'm just a little excited about it.
I think I get to make an acceptance speech now, right?
Ahem, is this thing on? Yeah, yes? Okay, um, okay. Well, I have been writing this blog for over three years now, which seems like a long time but really feels the same as saying, "I've brushed my teeth for the past 27 years." Both things have happened with varying degrees of regularity, but I feel at my best when I am consistently consistent. Thanks for trekking along with me.
Whew, glad that's over.
Now for the easy part: As a recipient of the One Lovely Blog Award, it becomes my privilege to pass on this award to blogs that I happen to particularly like. Without further ado (adieu? I don't understand the context of this phrase), I give the One Lovely Blog Award to the following Blogs:
Dot&Line Day 2 Day, showcasing the beautiful work and creative mind of Annie, my cousin-friend. Annie displays some of her custom pieces, posts artist profiles, and hosts give-aways here. Also, one of her stunning lampshades was just featured in Fox News' iMAG slide show, "Luxury for Less". Way to go, Annie!
Nursing Birth is only a couple months old, but already has many followers. Written by a Labor & Delivery nurse in a large, teaching hospital, this nurse is a birth advocate operating in, at times, quite adversive circumstances. Her voice is a valuable one, speaking from both experience and compassion.
here be hippogriffs is a recent find for me, and I am tumbling towards the end of the 5 1/2 years of archives. I don't remeber exactly how I stumbled upon this, but I love Julia's brilliant wit and straight-forwardness. While she is probably classified as a Mommy Blogger and spent a lot of time writing about infertility struggles, her writing goes far beyond these topics as well and provides many a laugh-out-loud moments.
Homebirth: A Midwife Mutiny is written by an ultra-feisty, extremely competent homebirth midwife in Australia, where pending legislation is threatening to make such women criminals. While this busy woman doesn't update all that often now, there are again loads of archives (with great pictures and videos of homebirth, including a very awesome breech birth), and this site is a totally inspiring read for anyone either considering homebirth or who is quick to criticize such a choice.
And, a brand-newbie: dear c jane where did you get...? I always love knowing where to get special little things, and sharing resources, and that type of thing. This blog is written by cjane, also author of c jane enjoy it, as an answer to the numerous emails she received about various goodies featured in her pictures. A nice source of eye candy, at the very least!
And last, but not least, 101cookbooks, my favorite food blog. I am not a naturally aspiring "whole foods" chef, but this site totally inspires me to hunt down new ingredients and try combinations that aren't obvious to me. Heidi also reviews cookbooks and interviews other culinary geniuses, so in the end it's a really beautiful collaborative effort towards eating well, in both the health sense and the palatable sense.
02 June 2009
rolling along
One of my favorite bloggers, Dooce, recently posted about how her and others' mindsets in a second pregnancy tend to be far more relaxed than in the first. As I am sitting here munching on frozen, raw, cookie dough I suppose I should not be surprised to discover that on the Scale of Pregnancy Relaxation I'm all the way down in the islands smoking a joint while listening to Enya and enjoying a full-body massage and a caiprihinia laced with prozac. Most of these things pertain to "DOs!" and "DON'Ts" that people swear will make or break your child but in the end I would argue that a deprived, vengeful woman could do far more damage than a sip of wine and a piece of deli meat. Do women in Japan stop eating sushi every time they are pregnant? Do the French forgo wine and those scrumptious cheeses for months at a time? It's probably not worth getting into it too much since for every person that feels as I do there will be one that feels exactly the opposite, and really, that's fine. What I'm excited about is not being totally paranoid for 9 months and doing what feels like is in tune with my body. That's all I have to say about that.
In other news, this first trimester business is almost over! Was that quick? Because wow, it sure felt quick.
Things I liked about the first trimester: Being pregnant; the subtle feelings of pregnancy, reinforcing the fact that I am, in fact, pregnant; eating lots of spicy, delicious, food; telling people, "I'm pregnant"; the slightly protruding belly that I am proud of, not wanting to hide; meeting with my midwife; talking with Keith about being parents; replacing migraine pills with acupuncture; knowing the size of Baby Spice has progressed from that of a sesame seed to that of a medium shrimp; Keith and I deciding on a place of birth for our child.
Things I did not like about the first trimester: feeling queasy; not wanting to eat and then starving and then feeling more queasy; feeling hung over for weeks at a time; slowing down my workouts as my pelvis painfully readjusted itself; reading BabyCenter threads about why c-sections are not a big deal and epidurals not having side effects.
Looks like the pros outweigh the cons, so I'm happy.
In other news, this first trimester business is almost over! Was that quick? Because wow, it sure felt quick.
Things I liked about the first trimester: Being pregnant; the subtle feelings of pregnancy, reinforcing the fact that I am, in fact, pregnant; eating lots of spicy, delicious, food; telling people, "I'm pregnant"; the slightly protruding belly that I am proud of, not wanting to hide; meeting with my midwife; talking with Keith about being parents; replacing migraine pills with acupuncture; knowing the size of Baby Spice has progressed from that of a sesame seed to that of a medium shrimp; Keith and I deciding on a place of birth for our child.
Things I did not like about the first trimester: feeling queasy; not wanting to eat and then starving and then feeling more queasy; feeling hung over for weeks at a time; slowing down my workouts as my pelvis painfully readjusted itself; reading BabyCenter threads about why c-sections are not a big deal and epidurals not having side effects.
Looks like the pros outweigh the cons, so I'm happy.
26 May 2009
opinions needed UPDATED
It's 4pm and I am just getting my morning coffee. This is due in part to the fact that, after getting up briefly to inhale some Cheerios around 6:45am, I promptly went back to bed and stayed there until noon. It is also due to the fact that said Cheerios used up the precious few last drops of milk we had and I will not drink my coffee without something from a cow mixed in.
But, that's not what I'm here to talk about.
I hate shoe shopping. Gone are the days of my elementary life, when I could waltz into K-Mart and adorn my feet in cheap plastic that made me happy as the day is long. While I love cute shoes, this is not a mutual relationship and I tend to pay dearly with either aching feet or inappropriate footwear.
Last week, I indulged my self with a pair of Ecco sandals (the Gladiator Groove, in black). Now, however, I am having second thoughts, induced partially by the term "cankle" and partially by Keith's reaction to the credit card bill. I must give him credit, for he does exhibit great restraint in pronouncing moral judgment on something he finds so ghastly, and yet his exclamation of a slightly-too-forceful, "So... You must really like those shoes... HUH!?!?" with his eyebrows raised to his hairline reveals that yes, in fact, a tiny part of his soul did just die, and I am responsible.
So, here is the thing. I like the look of these sandals on their own. I love how they feel on my feet, like I actually could walk to Norway and back on my own personal fjörd pilgrimage and still be up for dancing when I return. I like how they look with pants. I am simply not sure how they look when the ankle strap is revealed, and don't know how much the impending "stretch" of the strap will improve things. I am not worried about the price because at the end of the day I know that good shoes cost more for a reason, and that reason is, I want to still be using my feet in 60 years.
So, what do you think? Keep or return?
***UPDATE: I returned these shoes and I continue the seemingly-futile search. My mom agrees that ankle straps = death, and my dad was right that a picture of my feet in the shoes would be more the evidence needed. I thought of that, and couldn't bring myself to post a picture of my feet in these shoes since the cankles were just.. so.. pronounced, and so realized that if I couldn't bare my soles to the internet I was not very likely to be comfortable in real life. The quest continues.
But, that's not what I'm here to talk about.
I hate shoe shopping. Gone are the days of my elementary life, when I could waltz into K-Mart and adorn my feet in cheap plastic that made me happy as the day is long. While I love cute shoes, this is not a mutual relationship and I tend to pay dearly with either aching feet or inappropriate footwear.
Last week, I indulged my self with a pair of Ecco sandals (the Gladiator Groove, in black). Now, however, I am having second thoughts, induced partially by the term "cankle" and partially by Keith's reaction to the credit card bill. I must give him credit, for he does exhibit great restraint in pronouncing moral judgment on something he finds so ghastly, and yet his exclamation of a slightly-too-forceful, "So... You must really like those shoes... HUH!?!?" with his eyebrows raised to his hairline reveals that yes, in fact, a tiny part of his soul did just die, and I am responsible.
So, here is the thing. I like the look of these sandals on their own. I love how they feel on my feet, like I actually could walk to Norway and back on my own personal fjörd pilgrimage and still be up for dancing when I return. I like how they look with pants. I am simply not sure how they look when the ankle strap is revealed, and don't know how much the impending "stretch" of the strap will improve things. I am not worried about the price because at the end of the day I know that good shoes cost more for a reason, and that reason is, I want to still be using my feet in 60 years.
So, what do you think? Keep or return?
***UPDATE: I returned these shoes and I continue the seemingly-futile search. My mom agrees that ankle straps = death, and my dad was right that a picture of my feet in the shoes would be more the evidence needed. I thought of that, and couldn't bring myself to post a picture of my feet in these shoes since the cankles were just.. so.. pronounced, and so realized that if I couldn't bare my soles to the internet I was not very likely to be comfortable in real life. The quest continues.
23 May 2009
Why yes, that does sound lovely!
This post is for my darling husband, who has been slaving away all week on his Very Important Paper but has found strength to utter things like, "Boy, wouldn't it be great to have some chocolate chip cookies again?" and, "Do we need anything from the store to make chocolate chip cookies?" and, my personal favorite, "Mmmm, wouldn't it be good to make chocolate chip cookies to take to the BBQ tonight? But... I don't... have time... to make them..."
This morning in between my busy schedule of Not Working and Reading Blogs I was moved to action by the love in my heart. Also, I have become fascinated with the idea of Freezing Things, and I really wanted to try out freezing some cookie dough balls for later consumption ("later" as in "this afternoon").
I've always used the recipe on the back of the chocolate chip bag (generic ACME chips in high school was my start) as a guide, but I like to deviate from the norm. Here's my current, slightly-modified recipe, and notes as to what is different from the typical, very popular and very Google-able recipe:
Keith, you can come home now, your cookies are ready.
This morning in between my busy schedule of Not Working and Reading Blogs I was moved to action by the love in my heart. Also, I have become fascinated with the idea of Freezing Things, and I really wanted to try out freezing some cookie dough balls for later consumption ("later" as in "this afternoon").
I've always used the recipe on the back of the chocolate chip bag (generic ACME chips in high school was my start) as a guide, but I like to deviate from the norm. Here's my current, slightly-modified recipe, and notes as to what is different from the typical, very popular and very Google-able recipe:
- 2 c flour (I cut it down from 2 1/4 c to get a wetter dough. Also, I use 1 c. white all-purpose, and 1 c of what I think is rye. This adds just a little hearty crunchy/chewy that I like)
- 1 ts baking powder (I haven't found baking soda here yet, this works fine.)
- 2 ts salt (I double the salt from 1 ts, because I like salty with my sweet. I also sometimes sprinkle salt on top of the tray before putting it in the oven.)
- 1 c (2 sticks) butter, melted (this also equates to 225 grams, something I've had to look up EVERY SINGLE TIME I've made cookies in Sweden, since they don't know what a tablespoon is, much less mark their butter in these negligable measurements. I like melting as opposed to softening because it makes the cookies spread out more while they bake.)
- 3/4 c granulated sugar
- 3/4 c packed brown sugar
- some vanilla extract (I just open the bottle and let it flow... 2 or 3 ts, probably.)
- 2 large eggs
- 1 200-gram block of dark chocolate cut into smallish squares (no chips that I've found here, and the chunks make the cookies appear a bit more "rustic"! I love "rustic"!)
- 1 cup chopped nuts (sometimes, sometimes not.)
Keith, you can come home now, your cookies are ready.
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