Mrs. Rorer's Chocolate Blanc Mange

I had a hankering to try a new recipe, and had some milk to use up, so I spent way too long looking for a simple blanc mange recipe.  There are a lot of them.  Blanc Mange goes way back to when it was a main dish of rice and chicken cooked in almond milk, to various forms as it changes to become the corn flour/corn starch recipe of today.   There are a lot of mid 19th century recipes using egg whites as an addition, but not necessarily cooked.   I found several fancy recipes for a layered pudding and finally found this simple recipe, for what is basically a moulded chocolate pudding, in a fairly modern form.

Mrs. Rorer's New Cook Book, 1902

This was a simple recipe.  I'll admit I used the microwave instead of a double boiler, but it worked.  

Ingredients -  

1 pint milk (2 cups)

4 tbsp sugar

3 tbsp corn starch or corn flour

2 oz chocolate

chop the chocolate.   Mix the milk and sugar together and stir to dissolve.   Heat until almost boiling and remove 1/2 cup of the milk and set it aside.   Into the small portion of milk, add the corn starch and stir until mixed in completely.   Add the chopped chocolate to the rest of the milk and heat until the chocolate melts, stirring until it is well blended.  Add the milk/cornstarch mixture back into the pot, and heat it up until it thickens and just starts to boil.   Stir constantly so it doesn't burn.   Pour into dishes or a prepared mould.

I used standard bakers chocolate. I think using chocolate rather than cocoa may have helped it firm up to be a mouldable pudding.   If I had to substitute cocoa, I'd add 1 or 2 tablespoons of sugar, and a bit more cornstarch to make up for this.

Using a double boiler minimises the risk of burning, and if you don't have an official double boiler pot, just stick a not melting mixing bowl over a pot of boiling water.   Stainless works well, but a quality glass one should be fine too.  Just don't use plastic.  I used a glass bowl in the microwave.  I set it on high for 3 minutes to heat up, removed the portion of milk and added the chocolate, set it at 1 minute and stirred after each time.  It took less than 3 minutes melt and stir in the chocolate.  I added the reserved milk/cornstarch mixture and heated it for another 2 minutes until it was thick.   If you undercook the cornstarch it will taste a bit raw and starch.  Fully cooked, it's nice, thick and a bit creamy.

Iused little cups for moulds.   This makes about 2.5 cups of pudding, so a proper pudding mould in that size would be very effective for a display piece.   I stuck the cups in the fridge to cool.  It didn't take too long before I could tip the pudding out onto the plate.  I didn't serve it with cream or milk, but a bit of whipped cream on top would be a lovely addition.

It's a nice, simple and easy pudding.  The ability to mould this makes it suitable for a fancy presentation.  Definitely a recipe to use again.

Afterthought lifeline

simple shawl with handspun yarn

I'm using up a bunch of odds and ends of handspun yarn to make a shawl.  I've been dyeing much of it as it was various shades of white.  Most of it is a merino/silk blend but there are a couple of skeins of plain merino yarn as well.  I didn't date these bits and pieces but some of the skeins may be over a decade old, just sitting, waiting to be used.   It's the problem when you get 100g or 200g bags of fibre to try.  It's a great sample but what do you do with it afterwards?  It's not enough for much other than mitts or hats.   So I've been saving it and looking through a bin or two, I realised that I had a lot of it.   I'm hoping I have enough to make a reasonably good sized shawl, since I like a more functional garment rather than a decorative one.   It's a simple pattern, with stockinette stitch stripes, with a yarn over pattern between them.  It's slower than the last couple of shawls that I knit that were garter stitch, but easier to keep track of since the front and back are different, and increases are all on the back.    

lifeline added picking up stitches from back

I've knitted almost to the halfway mark, and my fingers are crossed that I don't run out of yarn.  There is a lot of pale green, grey and that peachy pink colour but not so much of the darker greens.   I tried some blue which I thought was the same weight, but turned out to be totally not at all.  I didn't like the way it felt, being so much thicker, so after 3 rows I decided it had to go.  I couldn't imagine frogging each stitch individually since there are already almost 200 stitches per row.  The problem was that I was going to have to rip back to a yarn over row so picking up the stitches from the front was going to be more difficult.   A quick search showed a method of picking up the stitches from the back and for the yarn over row, this was perfect.   It took only a few minutes to take a darning needle threaded with crochet cotton to pick up all the stitches.   I did a quick check, found one missed stitch, but it was only 7 stitches from the end of the row, so I slipped them off the needle and re-picked them up.   I checked again, decided it was good and I will admit that I did hold my breath a bit while I pulled that lifeline out.   Success!  It looks good.

needle threaded through the stitches on lifeline

I'm ready to knit again.   I'm not sure I like that peachy colour, so may need to over-dye it to tone it down a bit.   I don't have enough grey to alternate stripes but the pale green looks like it works as a lighter colour as well.   I'm still wondering how come it turned out so pale, while the other skein with it, was so dark.  Looking at the photos, I'm really glad I got rid of the blue.  I'm also really happy about the technique of picking up a lifeline from the back of the work.  It was so easy.

 

December update

I updated my operating system in early December and bam, I was unable to post any photos to my blog.  All the suggestions made no sense, since there weren't any of those options that I could find in my settings.  Finally though, this morning, I found a hint, tried it and poof things seem to be back to normal.   I did some dyeing over the holidays.  These red mittens were supposed to be made with the Newfoundland mitten pattern.  However the grey was too similar to the blues and yellows in the yarn and the lack of contrast made the mittens dull and unexceptional.  I even tried two different greys, one quite a lot  darker than this one.  Neither looked good, so I settled with a simple cable up the centre.   They look fairly nice, although simpler than I'd wanted.  They are mittens though, so very warm and wearable.

The yarn was leftover commercial wool from other projects.  I had some white which I didn't think was enough for two mittens, and bits of grey.  Both were similar weights.  I'd wanted to dye the yarn pink and blue, with the dyes blending where meeting to make purples.   I had been using quite old dyes, and while usually they are fine, these had obviously started to thicken.  When the pinks started turning red, I mixed in some yellows to change up the colour way a bit.   It looked really good in the skein!   It's nice enough knit up, but this does show how you really can't necessarily gauge how a skein will look when knit up.

Also, more dyeing, these two skeins were dyed in the same vat, at the same time.  They are totally different greens.   The small dark green skein was a slightly off white compared to the lighter green, but not dark enough for this difference in colour.  They were obviously two different breeds of sheep, but both were wool so the take up shouldn't have been quite this dramatic.  Luckily, this yarn is for a shawl with light and darks, so it should work just fine.

Also, sometimes commercial sock yarn doesn't look like you think it will knit up.  This yarn looked bright and cheery in the skein.  I knew it wasn't red and green type holiday colours, but it looked festive and so bright that I made a quick pair of socks from it.  Once knit up, I could tell that they aren't Xmas socks though, they are spring socks.   Pretty and pastel.   Nice enough and it's a German yarn, so a very good quality.  It knit up like a dream.   I've found though that a lot of the imported German super washes, do fine in the washer, but don't like the dryer, so these are hang to dry only, just to be sure.

I hope everyone's holiday time was full of good things.  We got to see family only because we could all only find one day that worked for everyone.  It turned out to be the only day without freezing rain, or ridiculous snow squalls and blizzard conditions.  We had it far easier than other parts of our province, but still, I didn't leave the house even for groceries for a couple of weeks, between the weather and holidays. 

 

Soup a la Julienne

This is a vegetable soup which is quick to make up and surprisingly delicious.   It could easily be served with fried snippets, or bread triangles fried in a bit of butter to make a lovely lunch meal.  I make this for my own lunch during the winter when there are no leftovers handy.  Sometimes I also add a little leftover meat, which of course makes it a little more filling. 

 Sadly, I've only been able to find the recipe book, The Dominion Home Cookbook, 1868, published in Toronto, on microfiche, which really is a more difficult format to work with. Still it's a tasty, simple recipe.

Soup al la Julienne or Vegetable Soup - The Dominion Home Cookbook 1868 (Toronto)

Soup al la Julienne or Vegetable.  Cut various kinds of vegetables in pieces, celery, carrots, turnips, onions &c., and having put two ounces of butter in the bottom of a stew-lan, put the vegetables on the top of the butter, together with any others that may be in season.  Stew or fry them over a slow fire, keeping them stirred, and adding a little of the stock occasionally; soak small pieces of crust or bread in the remainder of the broth or stock, and when the vegetables are nearly stewed, add them and warm them up together.

5 cups chopped veggies -  carrots, onions, celery, turnip, mushrooms, leeks or whatever you have on hand.   If you are also using softer veggies, add them a little later so they don't over cook.

1 litre broth or stock, 

water

bread crumbs, or some crust pieces if you want the soup thickened.

1/4 cup butter. (half that will do fine if you want a less rich soup)

Method

Put butter in a stew or soup pot.  Start it melting.  Add the chopped veggies and stir periodically until they are almost cooked.   Add the broth, a bit of water to thin the soup out a bit or add volume (1/2 cup - to 2 cups).  Add any more delicate veggies at this time : peas, beans, cabbage, etc.  

Heat up and simmer until the vegetables are tender and the soup is heated through.  Add soaked bread bits if you want it thicker.

Inadvertently Monochromatic Photos

Recently it's felt both busy and so slow!  We've had snow squalls and storms arriving early this year.  We've had Alberta Clippers coming in off the lakes one right after  another, making miserable driving conditions as well as some unseasonably cold weather!  I missed one of my guilds  holiday gathering due to miserable weather,  track bare to snow covered roads and a crazy amount of snow in my driveway.   The other club travelled down to Port Rowan to visit a member's studio and have lunch at a local restaurant.   The day was sunny and lovely when we left.  It had clouded over and had started changing when we left the studio for the restaurant.   It was snowing when we left, with freezing drizzle.   I didn't get a photo of the harbour when we left, but you couldn't see the end of the boat houses or the end of the pier due to the weather.  Lunch had okay food but great company and the drive home wasn't too horrible.  I wasn't driving though, so that was helpful.

I cast on a pair of mittens.  Usually my mittens are fairly utilitarian, plain knit with anything fancier being in the yarns that I use.   Sometimes I dye some fancy yarn, blend fancier fibres or blend rolags on the blending board to make unique colour blends.   This time I decided to try cabled mittens.   I actually used a pattern to make sure I knew how to set the cables into the mitts so they were on the top of the hand.  I also tried a new finishing technique for the ends of the mitts, which I think I may try a few more times.  They still need blocking, but they worked out well.  I didn't like the pattern's placement or size of the thumb, so I did rip the first one back to the cuff and used a simple peasant thumb.  It doesn't look quite as clean as the other one, but I'll dig up another pattern and give it another try.   It's always good to have other techniques to use.

I also cleaned up and tried another knitting machine.  It is a LK100, a chunky gauge plastic machine.   I had to change the sponge bar.   That's the bit of foam that holds the needles in place and is a pretty easy, although fussy fix on this machine.  The fussiest part was re-inserting the needles.  I had to wipe off some gunky stuff and clean up some needles too.   It assembled easily.   I tried it out a few times and decided I wasn't up to the learning curve at this time.   I have a Bond Ultimate Sweater machine.  It's a very basic, manual machine with a fairly big learning curve, and it's a bit noisy.  This machine is a slightly fancier, less versatile version of the Bond.   The plus side is that there are extra base pieces, that can be attached to make a frankensteined knitting bed that is really long.  That would be great for afghans or baby blankets.   Anyway, it didn't take long before I'd packed it all up in its box and set up the SK151 again.   

The SK151 is also a chunky machine.  It's also manual, however it's a metal bed machine and more complex knitting carriage.  This means it's quieter and a bit easier to use.  Also because I'd played around making a bunch of hats with various yarns, I also have some of that learning curve mastered.   I do believe that my Circular Sock Machine, albeit antique, had a much smaller and easier learning curve that this flat bed.   So with the 151 set up, I put on another hat, but this time to try cables.   The hat is a little smaller than I wanted and took a fair bit more time than I'd anticipated, but I learned a lot.  I was getting faster at the end.  It's also my own pattern, which made me really happy.

My next project is a really simple sweater.  I should probably make a small sweater for a child or baby, but I have no little ones to knit for.  I cast on a learning sweater for me.   I got to the shoulder with minimal issues.  I managed to drop a few stitches , caught them all on stitch markers and took a break.  I read a machine knitting forum while I had my tea, and I normally don't find basic questions silly or dumb, but really, there were a few of them, and the questions that I view as common sense and intuitive made me feel pretty confident about my few skills.  I fixed the errant stitches and finished up, totally realising where I made my mistake in the first place.   So I have the back of a sweater done and am just writing out the instructions for the sleeves and front  so I can hopefully finish it up in a few days.

I also finished plying the last of the fleece that A gave me last spring.   I have probably about 2000 - 2200 yards of 2 ply yarn waiting for me to decide what to knit with it.   I think it will be a sweater for me, but will I dye it or use it in its natural colour?   Also, I haven't quite found a pattern for it yet.  Once I decide on those things, I'll get tit started.  That will be a good winter project.

The Weaver's Fall sale was quite successful.  I was happy with selling 5 scarves, maybe more since for some reason I didn't get back my inventory sheet and I only had one copy.  Most of the scarves were acrylic blends, acrylic or cotton blends and they get a bit of a bad rap in the guild as most of the members like fancy weaves or expensive fibres.   Since I don't have that budget, I've been weaving with what I can afford, and it certainly paid off in this economy as I sold the most in the guild!  Go me!

I can't wait for the days to start getting longer.   The dull days, combined with few sunlight hours is quite wearing.  In order to weave or knit, machine or by hand, I've got extra lights on during the day as well as lights on plants, despite them being in the big windows.   Maybe spring will be as early as our winter started!

Stupid weather, and meh stuff in life.

We had great seats for a mediocre concert!

 We went to a concert the other night.   I was looking forward to seeing the 2 artists because they don't travel very often anymore.  While they aren't pumping out the hits any longer, George Canyon and Aaron Prichett have a long history in Canadian Country Music.  It was a charity benefit concert, which is the first thing which should have tipped me off that maybe it wasn't like a regular concert.  Then too it was to be a mix of holiday and their hit songs.   Meh, is the best review I can give.   There were few actual songs of any kind in comparison to the anecdotes, stories, humour, call outs , so many call outs to family, friends, the stage hands, the charity guy, the guy who just joined them.   All this took time from actual music which is really what I wanted to see.    The show consisted of two 45 minute sets.  The second set sadly had fewer songs than the first set, by a noticeable amount. The charity sales pitch rambled and was all over the place and too long.   I think if they'd had someone help edit and fine tune the stories and the charity sales pitch, it wouldn't have dragged nearly so much and they could have gotten both a more effective use of them, and more music in. I will say that the few songs that George Canyon sang, showed that his voice is a smooth and strong as ever. I'd have loved to hear more of him singing.

The weather had been stupid on Friday.  It actually started snowing on Thursday and just never stopped.  We were lucky with our timing for leaving for the concert, which was a bit over an hour drive away.  We caught a break in the weather and had taken the major  highway, so it was well plowed and salted.  There was only one snow squall which affected us, and not for long.  That made it a much nicer trip despite the squall warnings and lake effect snow.  We decided not to drive home in snow squalls in the dark.  The hotel we chose turned out to be a suite with a full kitchen and separate bedroom.  The only odd thing was that it was a converted 1881 building, and our inside room had no windows, although 2 skylights.  It was reasonably priced too, 

Another meh project is the newest scarves on the loom.  I put two on because I had just enough yarn, if I dressed the loom correctly.  It's a DK yarn weight and I put it on the rigid heddle loom, so it's in between heddle sizes.   I'm a bit worried that the sett is a little too loose, but we'll see once it's off the loom.  The main issue I have is that it's pastel and the pale blue and ecru on the white just seem to look grungy to me.  I much prefer weaving and working with brighter colours.   Hopefully it will look better once it's finished.   The yellow reed hook was a gift from my friend E.   She cut them out of plastic and shared them.  It's a nice size, comfortable to hold and works beautifully on my loom.

The weather has been stupid the past few days, with snowfall warnings, lots of snow and horrid roads.   A few days before though, I looked out the window and saw this pretty sunset.  The sky had a lot more purple in it, over the orange and pink, but this is close.   I snapped a photo from the window because I worried that the sunset would be gone by the time I got outside.  I was right on that and happy I'd taken a quick snapshot before I tried to race outside.   It had faded quickly.

I'm working on making a sweater on a knitting machine.  I've made a bunch of hats which are great projects to learn the basics.  A sweater has a lot more steps and techniques, so we'll see how it turns out.  I picked up some less expensive yarn to learn with so I wouldn't waste or wear out the handspun yarn I've been spinning since the summer.     I've over 1800 yards spun so far, more or less, so that should hopefully be enough for a sweater.  Spinning yarn for a project can take a while, so I'd rather learn on commercial yarn.  Hopefully I'll have a wearable project out of this experiment, even if it is just some sort of man-made fibre.   I also finished a pair of cabled wool mittens which I'm pretty happy with, just no photo yet.  I just sewed in the last ends of the second mitten a few minutes ago, so a good end to the day.

Daily Life

The new hens seemed to be settling in with the old chooks.     After two weeks in the barn, so they'd know where home was, I let the girls out to free range on a nice day.  I had to think about that though because white hens are much easier to see, so a bit of an easy target for predators.   We'd had snow and it melted, so I was hopeful all would be well.   Unfortunately when I went to tuck them in to the barn in the evening, one of the leghorns was missing!  I looked all over the yard and I couldn't find her.  With sadness, I locked up the barn and decided to keep them inside for the foreseeable future, to keep the other leghorn safe.    Luckily, the next afternoon, the missing hen was fussing close to the barn.  Even more so on the lucky front, she was really hungry and I was able to lure her into the barn with a scoop of food and moving it a short distance at a time to get her into safety.   She's in the barn now, and doing fine after whatever adventure she had.  We've only had a missing hen return after being gone for an evening once before, so it was a happy occasion.  

We had snow squalls in the forecast, with lake effect snow expected to be close to 50 cm.  I figured it was time to put the rest of the garden to bed for the winter.   In the spring I'd purchased 2 bales of straw and left them out all summer to hopefully start rotting.  One way or the other I'd be able to use them for mulch in the fall, but rotting straw already starts the composting process.   I had cleaned out all of one bed and most of the other.   I also planted 46 cloves of hard necked garlic.  It will be interesting to see how many garlic plants actually germinate.  It starts to grow early which always makes me happy.

 I opened the one straw bale and the inside was nicely starting to compost, so I used the straw to put a 6 inch layer of star over both garden beds to let the straw work over the winter.   Also, because every spring, I find a nest in the straw from some unknown animal, I wanted to set up the space in case they needed it this winter too.   Both raised beds are set nicely for the winter.  I left the two kale plants in because they are still growing, will last over the winter and give us fresh greens early in the spring, until they go to seed.

Thankfully, we didn't get 50 cm of snow.  Also, the weather warmed up a bit, and what snow we did have, melted quickly.   I peered out the window one afternoon and the sunset was amazing.   I didn't catch the colours properly because I knew in the time it would take to run outside, I'd miss it, so I took the photo from my window.   The sky was blue, purple, orange and that bottom bit was a glorious pink.    Between the numerous cloudy skies and dusk coming at 4:30ish,  I often miss the rare pretty sunsets just due to timing. 

 I'm totally not impressed with it being dark by 5:35pm!  With the fewer daylight hours, and keeping the chooks inside, the older girls aren't laying eggs right now.  They need about 16 hours of daylight to encourage them to lay.   I could put a light in the barn, but I just deal with fewer eggs rather than do that.   The new leghorns, being young are giving us eggs which is nice.   They are tiny pullet eggs though which makes for some interesting guessing at how many pullet eggs equal a normal sized egg.  Today's eggs were marginally bigger, maybe almost a commercial small size!  Yay for that!