Thursday, July 21, 2011

Raspberry Sorbet Fail

Heap o' raspberries.
I'm thinking the cuby part
isn't supposed to be sitting
directly on the base.
It's been a bumper year for raspberries at Le Jardin du Curly Girl. Koko and I have been eating as much as we can right from the bushes and I've been harvesting the rest. This week I decided to try making sorbet. I borrowed an old ice cream maker from the-best-neighbor-in-the-world since I didn't have one and just learned that you need one to make sorbet. TBNITW had never used it as it was handed down to her and had been since sitting in her basement. I even found the user manual online, read up on what I needed and I thought I was good to go.
I love this juicer! It's from my mother's
house and goes perfectly with the
color I painted my kitchen.
I don't even know why I have paper cups
in the house, but I'm glad I do.
I went out and picked a heap o' raspberries, juiced an orange (ok, it was a Cutie, but since I only need a couple of tablespoons it would more than suffice), zested a lemon and combined all the prepped ingredients in the freezer bowl of the maker. I then layered the ice and salt in the maker to the top like the instructions said. Turned it on and zippo, immediately realizing that there was some major piece of the ice cream maker that was missing. I think it needs the blender bottom part between the base and the maker cube. TBNITW wasn't home and wouldn't be for the rest of the day. What's a Curly Girl to do? I broke out the paper cups I happened to have in the house and the bamboo skewers I happened to have in the house and (hopefully) rescued my failed sorbet by making popsicles. It'd be a damn shame waste of a quart of lovely, fresh-off-the-vine, organic raspberries if they don't work out. We'll see in a few hours...  Next up: Raspberry Buttermilk Cake!

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Today's Reality Check: Starvation in Somalia

"Two-year-old, Aden Salaad, looks up toward his mother, unseen, as she bathes him in a tub at a Doctors Without Borders hospital, where Aden is receiving treatment for malnutrition, in Dagahaley Camp, outside Dadaab, Kenya, Monday, July 11, 2011. U.N. refugee chief Antonio Guterres said Sunday that drought-ridden Somalia is the "worst humanitarian disaster" in the world, after meeting with refugees who endured unspeakable hardship to reach the world's largest refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya."
(AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Here are some organizations you can donate to (clickable):
Doctors Without Borders
UNHCR
The Kenya Red Cross
Oxfam 
The World Food Program

Friday, July 1, 2011

I've Been Waiting All Year For This

This photo was taken moments after they were picked from the backyard
and seconds before they were eaten for my breakfast. Ah, summer.