use real butter

Recipe: french silk pie

I was packing a few last kitchen items Tuesday evening when I looked up to see a nice rosy glow on James Peak. It’s been a while since I’ve had the leisure to notice sunset because our time has been sucked up with a project of sorts.

sunset on james peak

Early Wednesday morning, we piled a bunch of stuff, ourselves, two mountain bikes, and the dog into two cars and headed west because we had an appointment at noon. Jeremy took Kaweah in the Outback (Subie) and I followed in the WRX (Roo). He told me later that she faced backwards for the first 30 minutes to see where I was before she settled down for the 4.5 hour drive.

the view from the gas station at copper mountain

road trippin’ through colorado

we closed on a great little place in crested butte!

i celebrated with a raspberry lime fizzy drink avec umbrella

This post is coming to you from the new Crested Butte branch of use real butter! Butter headquarters remains in Nederland (near Boulder), but I’ll be working periodically from the CB office too. We’re still unpacking stuff, but Kaweah really digs the new place and every window has a view of a towering snowy mountain (because we are surrounded by towering snow-capped mountains). So let’s celebrate with some pie – some French silk pie. It’s super smooth which might be why it has “silk” in the name, but if you’ve ever chomped on silk (which I have), it’s got NOTHING on this pie!

am i right?

Start with the crust. I made a chocolate cookie crumb crust. Actually, I originally crushed a bunch of organic chocolate graham cracker bunnies (Annie’s brand), but the color was too light for what I had in mind. Those crumbs went into a bag for later projects and I resorted to an organic Oreo cookie (Newman-O’s). You know the drill, split the cookies open and scrape off the cream filling, then introduce the chocolate cookies to the food processor.

for the crust: organic oreos, butter, sugar, vanilla extract

scrape away the cream filling

combine cookie crumbs, sugar, vanilla, and melted butter

press into a pie plate or baking pan and bake

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Recipe: baked egg rolls

I love staying up past midnight. It always seems I get a second wind around 10:00 pm and then I’ll grudgingly go to bed around 1:00 am out of guilt. I get under the covers and close my eyes, and then the hamsters in my brain will run a hundred miles an hour until I finally nod off. Thing is, I love waking up early too. In winter, early is a relative term, but I can always be sure to wake with the sun or a good snowfall report. This is problematic as we march toward the summer solstice. Unlike my “younger” years, I find my body, mind, and general mood are much improved with a decent (6-8 hours) amount of sleep. I’m shifting my bedtime earlier, especially because mornings are becoming the best time to do anything outside before it gets too hot!

snow is melting, trails are flooding

budding pasques (a month later than last year)

blooming pasque flowers

It is that lovely time of season when we will look at one another and ask, “Hike, mountain bike, trail run, or ski?” Actually, if skiing is involved then it’s going to be a hike-ski or a bike-ski because the approaches are no longer covered in snow. It’s all good. And I know the snow will be back. Meanwhile, I’ve been craving terrible (but delicious) foods like egg rolls of the fried variety. When it comes to fried foods, my downfall is the crunchy. I LOVE THE CRUNCHY. And while I can and do occasionally fry things at home, my preference is to avoid frying for two reasons: 1) it isn’t that good for you and 2) I hate cleaning up the mess. So the other day when I was contemplating making vegetable egg rolls, but dreading the whole idea of frying, I decided to bake them instead.

spring roll wrappers

sesame oil, soy sauce, shaoxing cooking sherry, cabbage, carrots, garlic, ginger, bamboo shoots, sprouts, shiitakes, green onions

prepped

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Recipe: sparkling watermelon agua fresca

There has been all manner of blerg going on for the past few days (really, the past couple of months). We’ve been troopers, getting through one thing after another. It’s mentally and physically taxing such that I have resorted to filtering out the negativity more than usual. I don’t want to spend my energy on that. Interestingly, this activity has revealed who the positive people are in my circles. Of course, I don’t mean sunshine and lollipops “happy happy! joy joy!” people (they make me want to hurl). I like folks who are realists, yet still spread good vibes and kindness with a side of snark or sass. These folks are the ones who consistently bring a smile to my face or teach me to be more thoughtful. So thanks, friends, for keeping it real. Here are some things that have been great so far this week:

finding the time to step out and catch sunset

we installed new blinds to keep the house cooler this summer (yes!!!)

sushi with my sweetheart

a mustard blooming in the yard

We’ve swapped out the flannel sheets in favor of cooler cotton sheets. The windows remain open overnight because temperatures are no longer dipping below freezing. And there is no snow in the forecast (*sob*). From now until the first snowfall of the ski season, it’s all about staying cool for me. While water tends to be my beverage of choice, I occasionally indulge in iced tea (although the caffeine makes me bonkers), an Arnold Palmer, or some fruity juicy thing like an agua fresca. In this case, we’re making a sparkling watermelon agua fresca.

watermelon, limes, sugar, seltzer water

combine water and sugar to make a simple syrup

juice the limes

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