Category Archives: Food

In which this non-baker makes Christmas cookies

Food, Memories, ,

Our basement remodel is nearly finished and we are in the process of putting everything back to where it belongs. I’m being a grown-up and donating or throwing away things I don’t use or don’t need. It’s a tough process because maybe, someday, I might use the three burner food warmer or the old electric frying pan.

One of the items I thought about donating was a bread maker that was covered in all kinds of disgusting dust including scented cat litter dust, dryer vent dust and construction work dust. After dusting it off (and vacuuming it really well) I made the first loaf of bread it has manufactured in probably a decade. It was pretty good and didn’t taste at all like Fresh Step® with Febreze Multi-Cat Litter. I’m keeping the bread maker.

Another item I considered tossing was a cookie press kit that I bought when the kids were young because my mother (despite being a hoarder ) gave away the cookie press kit from my childhood. I have fond memories of making cookies with my mom using her cookie press kit like the one below.

vintage cookie press with discs
Vintage cookie press

I mostly remember the cookies made with the Christmas tree disk. We’d dye the dough green before putting the dough in the press chamber. They always were brown around the edges and a not-very-pinetree-green color on top.

Dean looked at the discs in my kit and marveled that they could become cookie shapes. I decided to make cookies to see if I wanted to keep the kit, so set to work softening butter and preheating the oven after finding a recipe online.

Before I continue — I am not a baker. I can bake, but I don’t make a habit of it. I think I like the idea of being a baker, but it always seems a tad too much trouble. Anyway, with the recipe in front of me and the oven preheated, I proceeded to make the dough and figure out the cookie press.

It took me a while to understand where the chamber went, how to open it, how to fill it and how to get the ratcheting thing to work, but I did eventually. I chose a disc that I thought would make a star shaped cookie.

Cookie press loaded to make star shaped cookies
Cookie press loaded to make star shaped cookies

I was right. Star shaped cookies were created from the disc.

Cookie stars with sprinkles
Cookie stars with sprinkles

After that I tried the Christmas tree, then something with a long oval hole and holes all around it which turned out to be a flower. Maybe a poinsettia?

Here are some cookies baking.

cookies baking
Cookies baking

Finally, the finished product. They were tasty. I’m keeping the cookie press. I may make cookies again in 2026.

delicious cookies
Delicious cookies

Camping Meal Memories

Food, Memories,
Example deal from woot.com
Example deal from woot.com

I check woot.com every day and a lot of time they have deals for dehydrated meals — the kind you might take camping or have in your pantry to prepare for a disaster. My brain always says “yuck” but something else in me says “yum.” A couple of years ago, visiting the family lake house in Wisconsin, I saw a container of dehydrated beef stroganoff and had a strong desire to make it, but it was there for my nephew to make in case of an emergency, not for me to make because I wondered what it tasted like. Besides, I told myself, it probably was disgusting.

Jack and "Cinder"
The cook, not cooking

Why, then, does part of me that want to eat dehydrated food? Not because I am a wilderness camper. Not because I like disgusting things, but because I have a memory of loving the food that Jack Burgoyne made for us in 1976 when I accompanied his family on a “caravan holiday” in Scotland. Normally his wife, Pat, cooked but when on vacation — at least that one– Jack made dinners and they were, as far as I recall, always from a freeze-dried packet. And, to me, they were delicious.

So that’s why I always stop and ponder buying a bucket of freeze dried lasagne or curry or Jamaican jerk rice with chicken from woot.com or consider making freeze dried beef stroganoff on trips to the lake house — memories of a long-ago trip to Loch Sween and a week in a mobile home on the grounds of an ancient castle and meals made by a kind and good and funny and wonderful man who left this world too soon.

Frankly…the best pizza I’ve ever tasted!

Food, Rave, ,

We try to go out for dinner once a week or so. Sometimes more often, sometimes less often. Last night was our planned night out and Dean suggested a new restaurant he’d read about in the Washington Post. A restaurant in Kensington. We rarely go to Kensington for dinner — in fact the only restaurant in that area we’ve eaten at is one of Black’s eateries: Black Market Bistro.

Dean warned me that the restaurant he’d read about served only pizza. That was fine, I like pizza. We could not find the restaurant right away, so drove around a bit found parking (free!! — Kensington is NOT Bethesda) and followed Dean’s iPhone directions to the restaurant. We’d driven right past it but didn’t see Frankly…Pizza! on the awning until we were a few yards away. We walked past about 8 tables of patrons enjoying the warm spring evening, eating pizza outside, under the awning, and headed indoors to be seated. We would have preferred to eat outdoors, but got a nice table inside the eclectically decorated, but pizza themed, restaurant. At first it seemed very loud, but either we got used to it or the noise quickly died down.

Our waiter was energetic and friendly and suggested we choose a pizza each. Dean wavered between a clam pizza or a sausage pizza, settling on the sausage pizza. I chose the clam. They also served house made sodas, wine and beer on tap. I chose a NZ sauvignon blanc and Dean chose an IPA. Dean ordered an arugula salad, which was delicious, but I was keeping my appetite for my pizza.

My pizza was delicious. I think it is the best pizza I have ever eaten. The crust was perfect — thinish but puffed up at the edges — and wonderfully chewy. The toppings, mozzarella Romano, garlic and olive oil were amazing. Together the crust and toppings were heavenly. Dean’s pizza tasted more like a regular pizza. Good, but not as good as mine.

I can’t wait to go back to Frankly…Pizza. I will definitely take my daughter who thinks the only restaurant that can make a decent white pizza is Pines of Rome. She is so wrong.