Well, I can tell it's fall because the baking itch, while borderline compulsive all year round, becomes insurmountable. Studying? Family time? Errands? Student loans? Chores? None of these things are as important as getting my next baking fix. Sorry, floors.

Also about this time every year, I become fixated on certain foods. Last year it was soup; I seriously craved soup at every meal. Last night's soup was reheated in the morning, topped with a poached egg, and consumed as breakfast, and whatever was left was scooped into a tupperware and eaten cold with a plastic fork for lunch. It was pathetic. This year, I have a couple of obsessions to fiddle around with.

First, the wacky cake. Inspired by Homesick Texan's beautiful post, I've now made this twice in the last week. It's just so... easy. It's like cheating. Less than an hour from the time you say "I want chocolate cake", one is being driven to it's sweet demise by the forkful into your mouth. You don't even have a bowl to wash. The second time I made it, I subbed out 2 of the tablespoons of flour for 2 more of cocoa powder, and I'm not at all sorry. Next time, I'll use coffee instead of water. But even just as it's written, it's well wrth the um, 6 minutes of time it takes to prep the cake, and the 15 seconds it takes to sprinkle your slice with powdered sugar.

Secondly, I'm back into the bread world. After a ridiculously frustrating time trying to find (regular, plain, active dry) yeast in this fun-forsaken town, I resigned myself to using the Waitrose instant yeast. Then, in a brilliant stroke of inspiration, I phoned up the goodly folk at Falko Konditormeister, who "sold" (for uber-cheap) me some fresh yeast. I stirred a pinch of this, along with some flour and water and a tiny sprinkle of sugar, into a soft dough starter and let it hang out in the fridge until it rose hopefully to the top of the bowl, peeking through the foil as if it were just begging to come out and play.

Then, after pinching about a handful off of it to make into my long-term starter, I stirred the rest of it along with more flour and water and a leeetle salt into some pseudo-sourdough. I let it rise by the heater (and, for a couple of hours, in my lap), then shaped into two boules that rose again, were scored (not deeply enough, alas) and shoved in our oven. Now our house smells grood, like sourdough and fried chicken (dinner) and pumpkin seeds (hallowe'en). There are also two moderately loves round loaves of pseudo-sourdough bread sitting on the kitchen counter, a little dark on one side, a little under-risen (from the shallow scoring), but still soft and warm and fragrant in that special way that only fresh bread can be.

So if you want some fresh bread, head o'er this way. In the meantime, what's your most recent food obsession?

Photo dump time! Here are a few photos from the last week or so:



Me and the man playing guitar. Yeah, maybe we're bad parents for letting our kid stand on the furniture like that, but he doesn't fall off really all that often...



Besides, as you can see here, he's ridiculously cute.



The man with wearing a jester hat and wielding two remotes at some friends' house two weeks ago after church.



Passwurd for clime laddr plz.



Super tasty smashburgers, inspired by this video.



Yeah, we'll be making these again soon.



The man's shoes, pic courtesy of Jeni.



Two happy cats on our kitchen table.



Looking the other way, without flash.



The man standing up for a drink of juice. He can walk on his own for a few feet, and will push that walker toy behind him in the photo all around the house.



Eliminate back pain with the new and improved patented ergonomic Cat-Rest!

That's it for now. Adios!

Sorry the blog's gotten the shaft for the last couple of months. I'm busy, yes; studying, classes, and hanging with Matt and HB takes up most of my day. But it's more than that. I feel like I just don't have anything new to say. School is challenging. Baby is cute and tough. Husband is awesome. Baking is good. And so on.

So, I'll turn the content over to you, reader, if you're even still out there. What do you wish I'd post? More photo dumps? Recipes? Vet School stuff? Post-weaning thoughts on breastfeeding? I'm open to suggestions of any variety.

I miss you guys, Mary and K and Bianca and Miranda and Becky and Amy and Jess and Gretchen and Rachelle and Nana and all my bloggy friends (um, and everyone else I may have missed).

Yay! Back to dairy cow nutritional strategies and eating Wacky Cake!

(I thought Jeni had posted about this, but I guess not.  Last Monday we got two cats, Theia and Katzen.  Pics and vids coming soon!)

Hosea is pretty good about handing his sippy cup back to us when he's done drinking, but whenever Jeni and I are both around for his meals he'll chose to only give it to one or the other of us.  Unfortunately, he usually chooses the person whose doing dishes or at the stove cooking rather than whoever is sitting in front of him to feed him.  Yesterday at lunch Jeni wasn't around so I figured he'd be happy to hand his cup back to me.  No such luck.  He refused to relinquish the cup to me and instead brandished it at Katzen, demanding she take it.  I think the episode left them both a little confused.

Geez, do I ever love this baby. He's been a big ol' grump lately, between the teeth (up to 8!), the vaccinations, and the wrestling with naps. But man, is he ever cute. He holds stuff up to his ear like a phone, saying "Hello" or "Hiiiiii", plays the djembe with abandon, and confidently climbs onto every single piece of furniture we own. He likes to climb onto the chair in his room and just stare out the window for minutes on end. This afternoon, Matt and I walked into the living room to see Hosea just standing there, dancing along to Dave Matthews like there was nothing more natural.

Here's the wee bairn showing off his style. We call it "trousers head man":

And here he is playing with all the fascinating toys in the creche at church. He's a total bulldozer there, standing on other kids and pushing everything over.



Here's a nice pic of my hus-man, showing off both his awesome dreads and his mad sweater skillz:



And, a bonus: Cooking With the Prices!

Sausage Gnocchi, M+J+HB-style.
This was inspired by AJ this summer, personalised with what was in our fridge/grocery store.

First, get some awesome sausages. We have a leg up on you US-bound folk on this one, since the Scots know how to make sausage like nobody else. Make do with the best dang sausage you can find. Cook sausage using your preferred method (we baked it). Chop up into eatable pieces (smaller than the ones shown in the picture, anyway).



While the sausages are cooking, saute some onion, garlic, and tomatoes in several glugs of olive oil with some herbs and a squeeze of tomato paste. add a little water if you need to. You know, until it looks about right. Set aside, covered.


Boil some water and cook the gnocchi until it floats. Make sure it's all out of the bag first, and don't put the bag into the water. Just the pasta. Okay, now drain the gnocchi but don't rinse it.



Return the tomato sauce to the heat, and when it's bubbling a little toss in about 2 cups of finely chopped kale. Let it cook for about 2 minutes, until it's wilted but still a bit crunchy.




Dump in the sausage and mix, then stir in the gnocchi. If you weren't cheap +/- broke, you'd top with grated Parmesan. We did not.




Here's the finished product:



Here's the baby's portion. He ate it all. With gusto.


I'll post another cute video in the next wee while, so keep an eye out!
Edit: Put it up in the post below!

p.s. We're all doing pretty well and school's going great so far. Matt's Bday is Monday! And we get the cats Monday! And house group is Monday! Everything exciting happens Monday!