Crabapplesauce

Since when making a clear jelly you aren't supposed to squish or disturb the stewed apple bits, I had a good quantity of said bits left over after the jelly-making process. Although the bits were pretty tart, it seemed a shame to throw them out, so I ran them through my food mill and made some gorgeous crabapplesauce. I added a bit of agave nectar to make it more palatable. It's definitely not your average grocery store applesauce, but I think it would be nice on things like pancakes, or in small quantities on its own.

Crabapple jelly (also known as syrup)

When I was biking home the other day, I took a different route through Woodbine Park and noticed several crabapple trees full of fruit. I'd recently read online that you can use them to make jelly, so I convinced Sean that it would be a good idea to walk down to the park and pick a bagful with me (we got about four times as many as are pictured above). We brought back many pounds worth, and today I got around to washing them, cutting them up, discarding all of the wormy apples, and attempting to make jelly.


I quartered the apples, boiled them for several minutes, then rigged up this little cheesecloth-and-strainer system to drain the apples (without squishing them, which is apparently the key to a clear jelly).


Unfortunately, the jelly, while pretty, never actually jelled. I don't have a cooking thermometer, so I don't think I got it to the right temperature. It did thicken up, however, and will make a lovely syrup on things like semolina pudding and pancakes.

I think it turned out quite nice and pretty clear, and has a flavor reminiscent of pomegranate. Sean says it is a bit more like cough syrup. Ah, well...

Meet Steve

So I'm a little behind in updating my blog. Sorry about that! Will make up for it. Here's a creature I made sort of in the vein of the dino I posted on the 26th.

This guy is some kind of bear/wolverine creature, and Sean and I have decided that his name is Steve. I think I'm going to start selling some of my creatures on Etsy, since I haven't had anything up there for a long time. If you're interested, check out my shop sometime in the next week!




So I'm a little behind in updating my blog. Sorry about that! Will make up for it. Here's a creature I made sort of in the vein of the dino I posted on the 26th.

This guy is some kind of bear/wolverine creature, and Sean and I have decided that his name is Steve. I think I'm going to start selling some of my creatures on Etsy, since I haven't had anything up there for a long time. If you're interested, check out my shop sometime in the next week!

Here's the link for now: http://www.etsy.com/shop/Blonderland/

I may or may not have anything up by the time you check.

Another 10-minute model sketch

Here's another drawing from the same model session as the previous post. This was another 10-minuter, and was drawn with a 3H pencil.

TSA Open life drawing session (male model)

I went to another open life drawing session at the Toronto School of Art last night. We had a slim male model this time. The top drawing represents a 5-minute sketch, and the bottom is part of a 10-minute sketch.

Crocheted dino

I started making a "general creature shape" at my knitting group a couple sessions ago. As I was trying to figure out what to turn it into, the topic of dinosaurs came up, so I decided to create a little dino. He turned out looking a little more like Godzilla or an alien/crocodile hybrid, but I think he's fun regardless of how you interpret his looks.

Vegan snickerdoodles

I'm working on a recipe for vegan snickerdoodles, and am trying to make a not-super-unhealthy version. This one used whole wheat flour, chickpea flour, applesauce, and canola oil, whereas my last batch used Earth Balance and white/wheat nutri blend flour. I think these ones actually turned out quite well, except I'm going to try leaving out the chickpea flour next time. The flavor is a little too strong for my tastes.

The glass next to the plate of cookies is homemade almond milk. (I tried using a little bit of xanthan gum in it to prevent the separation that occurs when you just blend water and almonds, but I used just a little too much, so it turned out too thick this time. Lesson learned!)

Toronto Vegetarian Food Fair Poster

If you were wondering what the people drawings I posted last week were being drawn for, now you know! Sean and I put together this poster for the 26th Annual Toronto Vegetarian Food Fair, which is the largest gathering of its kind in North America. I arrived in Canada just in time to enjoy last year's, so I'm looking forward to gorging myself again this time around, and maybe catching a few of the speakers and cooking demonstrations.

Hapa potstickers

For dinner last night, I made "hapa potstickers." They were Italian-flavored, with a kale, caramelized onion, and vegan ricotta filling, but I folded them potsticker-style, and used potsticker wrappers instead of traditional semolina pasta dough. I topped the dish off with the tomato sauce I made yesterday and some fresh basil from the garden.

(Hapa, if you don't know, is a Hawaiian word meaning "half" and generally describes people of half-Asian descent, like The Rock, Tommy Chong, Enrique Iglesias, Ann Curry, Kristin Kreuk, Russell Wong, Tiger Woods, Sean Lennon, Keanu Reeves, and me!)

Here they are before being cooked, and a shot of the filling that went inside them. (I meant to take a nice shot of all of the pretty folded dumplings before I boiled them, but forgot until I only had four left, and these were the ones I'd made in a hurry and were the least attractive. Sigh.)

Homegrown tomato sauce

I made tomato sauce yesterday using tomatoes, basil, parsley, pepper, and oregano from my garden. Hooray!

Burger

I didn't bake this bun, but I grew the lettuce and the tomato, and made the chickpea burger and the cheese from scratch!

A dog and a squirrel

Cue Dug the dog: "Squirrel!" (If you don't know what this is from, you should watch Up. I think Dug was possibly the best part of the movie.)

Dug the Dog Master sound bite

Girl with a burrito

Girl with a skewer

Eating ice cream

(Vegan ice cream, of course!)

Eating spaghetti

Woman with a piece of sushi

Kid with a vegetarian meatball

Kid on a bike

Guy with a goatee

Woman with a sandwich

Guy with a cupcake

This is one of many characters I'm drawing for a poster (final will be posted when it's done). More to follow!

And a final life drawing

I hope to post more (different) new stuff starting tomorrow! This is one of two drawings I did with charcoal. It's amazing how much more information you can get onto the paper in a limited amount of time using charcoal instead of a regular graphite pencil. I think this was a four minute pose.

And another life drawing

These are two more one minute sketches from yesterday's session.

Another life drawing make-up post

These were both five minute poses. (The scribbly thing on the model's back in the second drawing was a tattoo.)

Life drawing session

I've been out of town for a few days, so please excuse the tardiness of this post! I'll post some make-up images from a three-hour life drawing session I attended yesterday. The longest poses were five minutes each, but most were one to four minutes (all of the above were one minute poses). It was very good practice, and a bit of a blur by the time it was all over.

These images were the first few I drew. Sometimes I think my first drawing from sessions like these is my favorite.

Clock creatures revisited: 5

Clock creatures revisited: 4

Clock creatures revisited: 3

Clock creatures revisited: 2

Clock creatures revisited: 1