Still obviously winter here
We woke up this morning to find everything iced over. There were cars across the street that looked like sheets of water from a very heavy rain had instantly frozen over them. Henry and I were supposed to crash a playgroup today, but after hearing from Dave that all the streets were bad and everyone he saw on the walk in to work was slipping and sliding, we decided to just stay home. Which meant another day looming ahead of us with no plans, nothing to do, and nowhere we could go. Slightly depressing, but we persevered.
For the past few weeks I've been wanting to make some bread, so after settling Henry down with a quick breakfast, I got out Fanny Farmer and decided to make clover leaf biscuits. It's been a while since I kneaded dough in this house and I quickly remembered why: there's no room on my kitchen counters for it, so I made good use of a large wooden cutting board and the stove top, hopefully not kneading any burners out of whack. Because our house is so cool, I had some trouble finding a source of warmth that was warm enough to get the dough to rise, but not so warm that it would rise too quickly. I tried Fanny Farmer's recommendation of filling a pan with hot water and putting it and the dough (in a separate covered bowl) in the oven. After an hour it hadn't risen much at all so I turned the oven on just until it warmed up and then put the bowl back in and hoped that would do it. It seemed to work out all right.
Henry and I banged on some drums and messed around on iTunes while the dough was rising, then got out the griddle for some pumpkin pancakes. I'm not kidding when I say this: we ate the entire batch, both of us hoping that Dave wasn't planning on coming home for lunch because we didn't want to share. And lest you think that since I'm the adult, I ate a lot more than Henry did, let me just say, you'd be wrong. The kid threw them down one after the other, barely stopping to breathe. I see great things in his future.
While I was making the pancakes I punched down the dough and rolled out a bunch of one inch balls. Three of them in each of the "bowls" in a muffin tin make the cloverleaf. Since the oven had been on to keep the cooked pancakes warm, the stovetop was nice and toasty, so there was no problem trying to figure out what to do with the biscuits for the second rise.
After lunch, while waiting for the biscuits to bake, Henry and I settled under a blanket on the couch and watched "Surf's Up". Well, I watched it. Henry watched the first twenty minutes, but then did a lot of running around. What's the fastest way to get rid of my kid? Ask him for a cuddle. The biscuits came out great. My mom told me after the first time I made these biscuits that the first time she made them they were little round rocks rolling around in the muffin tins. Every time I've made them since hearing that story I've expected to pull hard little rocks out of my oven. So far so good, knock on wood.
Right now Henry's upstairs napping, the dog is next to me snoring, and I'm feeling a little droopy myself. My house smells like bacon, pumpkin pancakes, and fresh-baked bread. If I took a nap, I wonder what I'd dream about? Probably breakfast, which is not a bad thing.
And I just realized, I wrote a post that's mostly about making biscuits. My life is complete.
And Happy Birthday Leo!