Sailors Take Warning

Good morning, my friends. There's bright blue sky and a dark cloud hanging over the Three Cats Ranch this morning. Earlier, there was a dark red sky, and you know how that goes: Red sky at morning, sailors take warning.

Happily, I'm not a sailor because I have to go out and do some running around today.

My first stop is to get a haircut. Then, I'm taking my camera in for service and cleaning. There's nothing wrong with it mechanically, but I've noticed some spots on my pictures that would indicate a dirty sensor. Also, it got a little bit of sand on it when we were visiting Lake Powell back in September. The lens started grinding with its in-and-out operation. Fortunately, it seemed to fix itself, but I have an idea there's now sand inside the camera housing. In any case, it gets a lot of use, and it needs its spa time, just like a sewing machine. These mechanical divas we all live with...sigh. 

When that's all done, I'm going to pick up the items that have accumulated on my grocery shopping list. Also...chanterelle mushrooms. I'm thinking I might be able to find some a Wholly-Too-Expensive Foods. If so, we'll have our annual dinner of Chanterelle Mushroom Risotto. Okay, and when all of that is done, I can come home and, hopefully, get back to my sewing.

Yesterday, I took the first stitches on January's block for "A Year in the Garden." 

While we watched the news last night, I stitched a few more of the pink flowers.

Also, yesterday morning, I dusted and rearranged the upper shelf in the image below. That took only a few minutes. Today's work on the lower shelf will take longer. It contains cooking wines, cooking oils, and lots of spices and seasonings. Most everything there will continue to stay there, but I'll need to move things around to dust the shelf. With so many little bottles of thisses and thats, I expect it will take a while....if I even have time. It might have to wait until tomorrow.

I had some housekeeping chores to do, but eventually made my way into the sewing room. Sadie was there waiting to see what her part in this process would be.

Nothing can really happen on this until I've added a border to all the quilt blocks. I trimmed them around the edges to give them a nice straight edge, and then sewed 1-1/2 inch strips around all four sides. I'm choosing solids to coordinate with fabrics in the block.

There are nine blocks altogether. I was only halfway through the third block when I needed to stop for the day.

There was a new recipe to try for dinner. It used an ingredient I'd never heard of in the form of this "chili crisp." I wasn't even sure where to find it in the grocery store, but it was in the Asian food section. I bought the milder version, but there was a hotter one. Just looking at it inside the jar, it appears as if it would set your innards on fire.

This is Broken Dumpling Soup with Pork and Cabbage. The chili crisp (above) is mixed in with some rice vinegar and soy sauce to make a "sauce" that is added at the table. The recipe made way more than we needed, and so I'll only make half the amount if I make this again. And I will. It added some flavor, but what I noticed most was the nice fragrance as I ladled it into the hot soup. It also uses wonton wrappers in place of regular noodles. It was very tasty. We liked it.

The original recipe (link above) was weirdly written with ingredients listed out of order and instructions that were hard to follow. Also, it was extremely salty. In addition to the soy sauce included in the "sauce," more soy sauce was added along with the vegetable broth. Also, it calls for a "small head" of Napa cabbage, and I'm here to tell you such a thing does not exist. When a recipe calls for a "small head," I substitute Savoy cabbage. Cabbage is cabbage, if you want to know the truth. The Napa and Savoy versions are more wrinkly than regular cabbage, but you could probably just use regular cabbage if you wanted to. In any case, I rewrote the recipe to a way that suited our tastes better. Look at both, and see what you think.

Okay, so I'm writing fast this morning, and I'm not really expecting to do much more than run around town today. I'm going to take tomorrow off from blogging. Besides...I'm worried about spooks inhabiting my computer. You never know what might happen. When I come back on Friday, I'll have the reveal of the "Spices" quilt for you. And between now and then...watch out for witches and ghosts.