use real butter

Recipe: cheesecake

We prepped a late dinner Sunday evening. As Jeremy opened the door to the deck to get the grill going, we noticed a nice little layer of snow everywhere. [I realize I talk about the weather a lot. It’s not because I’m trying to be polite, it’s because I am a bit of a weather dork.] Just a few hours earlier we were in Boulder, enjoying these:

tulips on pearl street

April is like that around here. Can’t make up its mind about the seasons. That’s sort of how I felt about this month’s Daring Bakers challenge… I couldn’t make up my mind about the flavor – so I did both.

daring bakers, baybeee – we knead to bake!

The official line: The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey’s Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge. The unofficial line is that Jenny rocks it along with our Superstahhh founders, Lis of La Mia Cucina and Ivonne of Cream Puffs in Venice. I heart them all.

**Jump for more butter**

I was planning to do a recipe tonight, but we have had a busy social schedule as well as work schedule. Work hard, play harder, right? Recipe tomorrow. Tonight let’s just have a little fun…

Yesterday evening we had dinner at our friends’ house in Boulder. I can’t tell you how long it has been since a foodie (other than family) has cooked for us! This was such a treat. Not only are they a really awesome couple, but their dogs are amazing – four Border Collies. Two of them are competitive in agility trials. Jane gave us a little demo in the front yard. She’s so fast – it took her less than two seconds to do this exercise:

go girl!

It’s quite the amazing thing to be around dogs as smart and fast and active as these when you live with a happy-go-lucky dopey dog like Kaweah. These dogs in particular are Ferraris. They make Kaweah look like a Honda Accord four-door sedan. Sedan, I said. No turbo option.

jane loves her toy

I won’t bore you with a recap of all the ski talk, geek talk, photography talk, computer talk, dog talk. Instead, feast your eyes on the lovely and delicious dinner that B (the husband) made.

goat cheese and green chile croquettes

**Jump for more butter**

I’ll have a recipe for you all tomorrow. Right now I’m baking up some tried and true recipes for some of my favorite dudes while rocking out in my kitchen to some good tunes. And I’m going to rattle on like a dope. I’m just not in the right mindset to come up with new recipes to make and shoot lately. Must be party-lag. It’s waning fast though. Even as I type, ideas are leaking into my mental desktop. Nice.

tulip(s) that nichole and luke brought for me

I know that several folks have complained about Daylight Saving Time kicking in, if for no other reason, the loss of an hour is pretty distressing for those of us with a shitload of stuff to do. But despite losing that precious hour, I kinda like that it stays light later. [Sorry babe, those of us in the higher latitudes experience far greater variations in daylight – but you know I still love ya.] The days are getting longer here… we’re on the upswing! That always puts an extra spring in my step. I mean more so than usual. Jeremy was explaining (in his calm, cool, collected and professorial way) why Daylight Saving Time is a crap concept and my mind just wandered off, smiling. I know it’s stupid, but I like it. I like it.

feels like spring

**Jump for more butter**