Catching up

The snow finally started melting in earnest yesterday - our backyard is now a large mud puddle that Miikka tries to bring into the house on a regular basis. Someone will be having a bath soon!

I have been doing a lot of baking since the snow started. Last weekend, before the snow, I made a loaf of egg bread - a nice, light sandwich loaf. On Monday, day one of being snowed in, I baked a (small) batch of chocolate chip cookies. Those didn't last out the week. On Tuesday, I baked banana bread. Yesterday, I baked brownies. I have to confess that these were brownies out of a box, but they were Ghirardelli, and they are very good. Today, I plan to bake a loaf of cracked wheat bread from a recipe I found on the New York Times. If it is good, I will try to remember to link to it.

Tomorrow is a sort of holiday at work - it is President's Day, which is a federal and state holiday, but since the Arkansas State Legislature is in session, state agencies have to at least have a skeleton crew. I volunteered, because it means I can take a day off later, which I am going to do so I can go to Austin with Benjamin at the end of March. To reward those of us to come in, I have decided to bake my favorite pumpkin muffins. Good thing I have been walking a lot and going to the gym.

For our Valentine's Day dinner tonight, we are roasting a Falling Sky Farms chicken, the same chicken used by Ashley's at the Capital Hotel - only the best restaurant in Little Rock (in my humble opinion). I used to be scared of roasting a chicken, but since we have been buying chickens at the Conway Locally Grown Market, I have gotten pretty good at it. It helps to have such good, fresh chicken to work with. Anyway, we usually have the chicken with roasted potatoes and carrots, then use the leftover for another meal, later in the week. So good.

My other food obsession lately has been oatmeal pancakes. I discovered them on Orangette, and fell in love. We made them for breakfast today, and I can't wait to have some of the leftover pancakes later this week for breakfast...

And that's where I am right now. Getting ready to clean the kitchen so I can bake bread and mix up muffins. Happy Valentine's!