Hamburger Buns

We had pulled pork barbecue for dinner yesterday, but sadly, we had no homemade hamburger buns to eat with it. I had to remedy that problem today.

Before....



And 15 minutes later...

Looking for the Girls

The new game the kids and I play on our walks these days is Spot the Honeybee. Aksel and I went to a park about 6 blocks away and there was tons of clover in full bloom. Aksel has a good eye.



Within a few seconds, he had spotted one hard at work.



On the way home we passed a huge flowering bush. Bees were everywhere. Could be ours.

Is Baguette Dough Supposed to be this Sticky?

Because the dough that I made this morning seems to be stuck to everything.

I've made baguettes from this recipe (from The Professional Pastry Chef) a couple of times before -- once a full recipe and the second time a "small batch" version and I just don't remember. The full batch recipe makes an extraordinary amount of dough as it calls for nearly 5 pounds of flour and 6 cups of water. It's certainly too much to fit into my mixer, but for whatever crazy reason, I try to make it fit anyway. Flour flies everywhere, a watery yeast mixture sloshes across the counter. But, I got it mixed together, kneaded to a point where it looked like dough, and let it rest and rise for an hour and a half.

Dividing and pounding the dough into "torpedo shaped" loaves proves to be a challenge, however. The dough sticks everywhere -- on my hands, on the table, on the scale, in the bowl. A generous dose of flour thrown on the table doesn't seem to help. It only adds another fine layer of flour to the already dusted floor. I just can't clean up more sticky dough right now. So, I escaped the kitchen and my little 8-10 oz blobs of dough sitting in piles of flour on the table. Maybe (hopefully) when I return after their (and my) rest, they will be a more cooperative.

Blackberry-Sour Cream Pie

Malin declared this pie as her all time favorite. All that's left after one evening's dessert is one lonely piece. The recipe is from the cookbook, Pie. The blackberries and raspberries were picked last summer up at Butler's Orchard.

A Hive on a Porch

It's about time I posted pictures of the hive. We live in a city in a row house that has a second floor sleeping porch. The porch is on the south side of the house and runs the length of our back room -- it's about 5 feet wide by 20 feet long.

Karl placed the hive on a stand on the far end of the porch. There is a slit through the exterior wall through which a little tunnel built on the landing platform allows bees to go in and out.








The following picture is of Karl installing the nuc into the hive on May 1st.


After just a week, Karl opened the hive to make sure the queen was there and all was well. The bees already had made quite a bit of honey. You can see where the honey is already capped.



Can you spot the queen? It's sort of like a Where's Waldo book.

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

With the last of the strawberries we picked, I baked a pie. Yum!

Strawberry Jam

After school yesterday, the kids and I went down to Shlagel Farm to pick strawberries. It's become an annual ritual; Malin knows her birthday is when strawberry season is in full swing. We picked about 6 lbs and then ended up buying a huge flat of day old berries for jam. Strawbery jam production began in full force after the kids were in bed. We have eight jars so far and probably enough berries for one more batch, but I'm just too tired right now.

20,000 New Pets

So we're keeping bees in the city.  On our second floor sleeping porch.  Yes, I think we may be crazy.

Karl's dad, Bill, has been a beekeeper for as long as Karl can remember and this was something that Karl and I had been thinking about doing for a couple of years.  Karl took a class through the Maryland Beekeepers Association earlier this year to get a feel for what he needed to do.  Bill then generously gave us one of his hives and spent a week with us rebuilding our porch so that it would be structurally stable for this whole endeavor. 

We've had our bees for ten days and so far so good, I guess.  When the weather is decent, there are a couple dozen bees flying around the opening to the hive at any given time.  I can live with that.  I did get a bit freaked out yesterday when I went outside and there was a LOUD buzzing sound.  I looked up to see a couple hundred (at least) bees swarming around the hive opening and then landing on the wall of the house.  A patch of wall at least 18 inches square was thickly covered with bees.

Fearing our poor bees were beginning to swarm, I had Karl come home and survey the situation.  He called the guy we got our bees from, a very experienced Maryland beekeeper, and he talked us off the ledge.  It seems that a bunch of baby bees may have been taking advantage of the beautiful weather and decided to test their wings all at the same time. Within a few minutes, we were back into the normal routine of our few bees buzzing quietly above our heads.  Phew.