Let the Baking Begin...

Tomorrow will be the big Holiday baking day here at the Sour Dough and considering the rest of my month's travel schedule, I better make the most of it too!

Judging from the pile of baking supplies on top of my wine cart



I'd say I have a long day ahead of me.

I'm still on west coast time, so prepping for the day of baking isn't too bad and I've got the PGA Q-School on the Golf Channel (volume turned down) and the Time Life Treasury of Christmas Collection to keep my company.

I've already got the candied and dried fruit for my special fruit cake all chopped up and macerating in rum.



I've cleaned out the bottom and half of the top shelf of my fridge to handle the containers of finished baked goods



and now two rolls of refrigerator cookie dough are resting comfortably under a half hotel pan with a large sourdough ciabatta has joined the cookies for a long winter's overnight rest.

I was in Vegas for the last half of the week. It came on the heels of my Santa Monica/LA trip of the first half of the week. I ate at two of my favorite restaurants in both places, Cafe Del Rey in Santa Monica and Craftsteak in the MGM Grand in Vegas.

I've been eating at Cafe Del Rey for almost thirteen years and blogged about my meals there before. Craftsteak is a newer "must go to when in town" restaurant for me but I never fail to have a fantastic albeit expensive steak there and they make the best Sidecar I've ever had outside of the Algonquin.

But, what saved me in Vegas wasn't the Sidecar and the steak but rather my Brisk Brew.




You see, Vegas hotel rooms don't have coffee makers in them because they want you to have to go down to the hotel deli/coffee shop at 5am and drop some coins in a slot machines on the way to get your caffeine fix.

I love my Brisk Brew for making coffee, tea, and even instant soup. I can't tell you the number of times even delayed in an airport after all the shops have closed that this little gadget has saved my life (and that of some fellow travelers). Unfortunately, Zelco has discontinued the product. The Voltage Valet looks to be a close replacement and is priced about the same as I paid for my Brisk Brew.

What is on my baking list for tomorrow besides fruitcake?

Iced Lime Refrigerator Cookies
Vanilla and Chocolate Checkerboards
Rum Balls made with homemade shortbread
Cutout Cookies
No Bake Cookies
Fudge
Raspberry Linzer cookies
Spritz

and if I have time, white chocolate dipped pretzels.

A good old fashioned Christmas goodie package if I say so myself.

Words About Stuff

Look! It's typing here.

And LB isn't responsible either.

I've been traveling quite a bit for business. I'm not sure if that means the economy is getting better or that my projects are just all on the same time path. Whichever it has kept me from home, this blog, and most importantly baking bread. I'd like to say this post means a return to baking bread and other treats and delights but unfortunately my travel schedule is only going to get more hectic for the rest of year.

Starting tomorrow, November 30, I'm back in LA for a few days and then onto Las Vegas until the end of the week. I'm home for the weekend but off to Philly for Monday and then Wednesday I fly to Houston where, if everything goes right, along with some business I'm going to get a chance to spend some time in the kitchen with a very special person. After Houston, it is Boston for the weekend and then off to Charlotte, NC to work on a huge sporting venue for the week. By the time I get home on the 18th of December, I will have only one weekend to get ready for the holidays.

The good news of all that travel?

This year's Christmas presents are going to be bought in airports around the country. Also, you may have noticed that some of the cities on my itinerary are some fine eating cities. The added bonus is they are also some of the best golfing cities in the country. So, I'll be traveling with not only my job folders but armed with a list of golf courses I and good restaurants a girl can enjoy a fine scotch and steak in after nine.

Speaking of Christmas presents, I came home from Thanksgiving in Bristol, TN to find a package waiting for me. I opened it find my brother and his wife had sent me a fantastic set of melodramas and romances from the late 50's and early 60's.



They know I love old movies and have a special place in my collection for those fanatastic Technicolor and Cinemascope movies that feature the sets, costumes and of course some wonderful performances by not only well known stars but some of the most overlooked actors of the 20th Century like Barbara Stanwyck, Jane Wyman, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Rock Hudson, Hope Lange, Cary Grant, and the dreamy Jeff Chandler. I can't wait for the first really snowy day to make a huge pot of soup, bake some bread, and fire up the DVD player.

There will be some cooking going on this weekend. Look at what I stopped at the fishmonger and picked up this morning on my way back from the gym.



Aren't those two lovely filets of wild Pacific salmon? I'm going to ban sear them and make a nice salad for dinner later tonight. But first I have to finish getting ready for this week's travel and if I have time, go catch up on the Sunday NYT that have piled up and since the sun is shining maybe even go hit a bucket of balls at the driving range.

Oh, and then there is finish packing. As you can see



LB thinks he should be packed to come along for this trip. I wish as I miss his furry little face while I'm gone.

Remember When I Said I Would Be Home...

I lied.

Well, I didn't lie. My boss lied to me. I'm sitting here right now after packing for a one day/one night trip to New Orleans. Flight leaves at 5:55am tomorrow and I will be on our job site by 11am.

Good news?

I'm going to New Orleans, the Disneyland of food.

It will be the first trip I've made back to the Big Easy since Hurricane Katrina. I can't wait to have my Po'Boy at Serio's and then my dinner at this place near the Garden District that I can never remember the name of but the bar is filled with boxing memorabilia (I tell the cab driver that and they always seem to find the place) that has the best bbq shrimp I've ever had.

Bad news?

I'm going to miss the Po'Boy Preservation Festival by one week.

May have to do my duty and bring a few home. If you are on NW2196 on Friday, I'm the lady who checked her computer bag so she could bring the cooler of shrimp and crawfish Po'Boys on as carry on.

Weekend Cat Blogging: Mom Went on a Sailing Trip and All I Got Was This Lousy Mouse

We're hosting Weekend Cat Blogging again this weekend and, as usual, Mom is nowhere to be found because she is out in the nice bright sun hitting these stupid little white balls with a big stick at another stick that pokes out from a dumb hole far, far, far away from where she tries to hit the stupid little white ball and inventing new ways to add the phrase "G#$ D!#$ It!" to the beginning of every sentence .

Meaning, I'm left holding the bag or in this case



the catnip filled mouse she brought back for me from her vacation sailing trip and her three day business trip to Florida.

Mom had a great time on her sailing vacation across Lake Superior. She said despite the fact that the weather wasn't perfect and it was a bit cooler than they would have liked, it was really nice to be so far away from civilization that the cellphone didn't work and the only communication with the outside world was the marine radio and the AM/FM radio in the galley.

Unfortunately, Mom also had a camera malfunction. The little card that goes into her digital camera can't be found on her computer and the camera doesn't seem to know it has a 10GB memory card. She did get some pictures on the internal memory off the camera though. She needs a new digital camera if you ask me.

So, until she either figures out how to get all the great pictures of her trip off or gets some pictures from her friends, she can't show you the galley kitchen she cooked in or the big, big freighter that Mama Breadchick's next door neighbor is the steward on.

They shared adjoining locks at the Soo Locks with the neighbor's boat and Mom and the neighbor had a nice chat over the deck railings while the neighbor's boat was lowered so it could go on Lake Huron and Mom's boat was raised so it could go on Lake Superior. It was fun to see the looks on the tourists watching from the veiwing stands because compared to the big boat, Mom's 38 foot sailboat was really tiny.

Once out in Lake Superior Mom made good use of the galley but not the grill because it rained almost every day, especially when it was close to dinner time. Mom also said the oven was funny to work in because she had to bake things in shifts it was so tiny, even tinier than the one she has here!

One night Mom made a complete foil dinner in the oven



of spicy mini ground turkey meatloafs, potatoes with carrots,



and those braised greens with bacon she wrote about here. Everyone loved the turkey meatloaf because mom used cumin, smoked chipolte chile powder, and some jalapeno juice in them.



For dessert, Mom made a simple bowl of fresh berries with a splash of cointreau and demerara sugar sprinkled on top.



Another big hit on the sailboat was a polenta crusted ratatouille tart



Mom saw on her friend, Patricia's blog, Technicolor Kitchen, right before she left for her vacation. She oven roasted the veggies and served it with a big lettuce salad made with heirloom Black Seeded Simpson lettuce picked up at the farmer's market in the Soo.

The crust was a bit crumbly Mom said so she is going to play with it this week because she is making the tart on Monday to take to work all week as lunch.

Mom even baked bread a few times while on the boat, including making the BBA bagels! She did those once they made it to Isle Royale becasue the boat wasn't rocking too much and she could use a bigger oven on the boat moored next to them, a big 60' powerboat with a full kitchen. She shared some of the bagels with the people on that boat and they said they were the best bagels they had ever had except for ones they got in NYC!

Mom says she will have a catch up post for the BBA Challenge really soon because she also made the Poor Man's Brioche while on her vacation. Mom is real glad that the BBA Challenge is at your own pace because with her travel schedule the past two months, she hasn't had the time to bake once a week.

One other bread Mom made while on vacation but not on the sail boat was the Bread Baking Babes bread of the month. Not to give anything away, Mom said that she wasn't sure that her family in Michigan would like the bread but was really happy everyone LOVED it.

On one of the days while Mom was on vacation, someone in her office called her about a business trip she needed to go on the day after she got home from Michigan. They were one day out of Whitefish Bay and on deck enjoying a pocket of sunshine when someone heard a cellphone ringing. Mom said the wind was blowing just right because she had half a bar on her cellphone. The person from her office was a bit surprised that she was someplace without cellphone coverage and internet.

Mom said she was surprised her cellphone even worked! It didn't work for long because they got cut off but it must have worked long enough because when Mom got home her airline tickets and everything for her Florida trip were waiting for her.

Anyways, Mom didn't get home until 9pm on Tuesday night this past week and had to be on another airplane at 11am on Wednesday morning to go to Florida. Needless to say, this didn't make me very happy and I showed her how unhappy I was by jumping into her suitcase while she was trying to pack her bag with nice clean business clothes



and grooming myself all over her favorite brown business suit



so she could take some cat hair with her. Pretty funny of me huh?!

You can tell Mom travels a lot by all the tore off plane side baggage claim tickets on her suitcase.

Mom was even more surprised when she got back from Florida and she saw how big her tomato plants



and the rest of her garden and grown, especially the tomato plant from Tennessee which is shoulder high. She found a few tomatoes starting to grow on the Tennessee plant.



Even if the humans don't like all the rain we've had in June and July, Mom's garden sure does!

Well, I can't think of anything else you need to know about what Mom has been up to except to say she is really glad to be home for the rest of the month and excited about getting back into the kitchen to bake some more of the BBA breads she's missed and putter with a few recipes she's testing and to catch up with all her friends on the internet and in person.

She knows she owes a few of you some emails to tell you how fantastic your breads are looking and she has a post about a family restaurant in Northern Michigan that makes the best pie ever. She also wants to tell you about some new bread bakers she is really proud of and has been meaning to write about forever.

If you want to join in Weekend Cat Blogging this weekend, just leave us a link on the comments. If you want to check out what all the kitties have been up to this past week, check back on Sunday evening to visit the links left by everyone!

And now I have to nap with my new mouse



because writing this post has been exhausting....

Where in the World is Breadchick?

Sorry for the lack of posts the last week and a few days.

That pesky job that pays the flour bill has been a bit hectic again and when you combine the crazy job with a two day business trip that turned into three because of canceled flights, rental car blues, and one long road trip from Kitchener, Ontario to NYC, you have silence here at The Sour Dough.

Despite the hassles of travel at the end of the week, there are a few redeeming food related incidents to report. I had Weedhopper with me for this trip and, since he is as much of a food lover as I am, our free time was spent searching out food that was interesting and tasty.

This trip that meant introducing Weedhopper to the joys of eating a perfectly prepared juicy steak of good Canadian beef from Alberta, the finer points of maple crullers at Tim Hortons, and proper hash browns, country ham and the best waffles on earth at that place I fondly refer to as the red neck version of Denny's, Waffle House; not to mention the damn fine wings we had at the airport hotel in Buffalo where we regaled the bar with crazy stories about life on the road as audio engineers.

While none of that, Alberta beef excepting, is haute cuisine, sometimes stick to your ribs comfort food is just what a body needs; especially when the trip has taken on all the appearances of a sequel of "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles".

Because at the end of the day, when you roll into your hotel room at 2am sans half your luggage that the airline has "misplaced" and have to get up a few hours later to try and catch yet another flight home, what you really need isn't a salad and no fat turkey sandwich from the room service menu but the triple stack of chocolate chip pancakes lightly dusted with powdered sugar and a side of sausage links from the 24 hour IHOP right next door.

Roadside Surprises and Cuisine

I know, I know... I promised you my last two vacation posts earlier this week but what can I say? Work is work and well, I've been trying all week to hang onto that relaxed vacation feeling.

One of the best things about traveling by car on vacation is all the fun things you discover roadside. Part of my vacation plan was to just "wing it" in regards to where I was headed each day and to stay off interstate highways. I had hotel reservations each night in a different town about sixty miles apart but how I got from Point A to Point B was entirely open to my whim and whimsy.



For example, two different times I was driving along the General Lee/General Jackson highway (Route 11) and a side road would just call to me to drive down and discover what is at the end of the road. Both times I discovered lovely covered bridges



crossing over pretty little creeks.



Another day, I decided to completely re-route myself and drive back the way I had just come and take a highway marked scenic. I found myself in what probably was my favorite small Virgina town, Front Royal where along with visiting the house of Belle Boyd, the notorious Confederate Spy, I sat in the town square



eating my lunch, reading a book, and watching the world go by.

On the day I headed to the Shenandoah National Park to drive the Skyline Drive, I pulled up to a stop light looked right and thought I had traveled back in time all because of these guys!



One thing was constant though in all my travels, if I got a craving for a mid-day breakfast all I had to do was look for was the black and yellow roadside sign for a Waffle House.



If you aren't familiar with Waffle House, it is the Southern version of Denny's but better.



I get excited when I drive up to this building because I know I'm minutes from a pecan waffle, side order of real hash browns and a slice of country ham.



And if I can't find a Waffle House I can find a Dunkin' Donuts that not only sells me a big coffee and a creme filled long john,



but I can get some bait...