Darienne

Thanks for all the answers about the apples. It's true, we had a very hot early spring and then it got cold again.

How are the bees looking in your area? What bees? I guess that's your answer. ...although I don't recall a heavy bee season the year before. And it was not a mast year either. Our pollinators have gone the way of the Dodo. We used to raise hard-shelled gourds, but the extra chore of being a sexual slave to the lustful gourd flowers became just too onerous. Did you have blossoms on the apple tree? We have a small tree in our tiny urban backyard here in Toronto. Last year, the tree was afoam with blossom, then bore thousands of apples (every single one of which was sampled and thrown by squirrels. Every. Single. One.). This year, we had no blossom and, of course, now no fruit. I know that sometimes apples and other fruiters will alternate -- heavy set one year, almost nothing the next. Don't know if that's what happened this year or something else. It was a really mild winter and there was a late frost -- but was it severe enough to stop the blossoms? Toronto lilacs were full of bloom this spring. Is there an Ontario Agriculture office that might have info on stuff like that? I know the US ag offices always did, but another thing I don't know about how it works here yet. ETA: My apologies for the construction of that last sentence. Haven't had coffee yet! OK. Last year, as mentioned, we had a plethora of apples. All good. No problems. And Ed says that there were not many blossoms this year. Our ornamental cherry was full of blossoms...but then we don't eat the fruits. Other people in our area reported the usual lilac blooms, but then we are higher than the surrounding countryside and the trees are not protected as in a city. I don't know about the agricultural reportage either. However, there is the wonderful local resource to whom one reports all strange and wonderful natural occurrences, and I can write to him and ask. He'll know. hmmm...on the other hand, we have more wild grapevine than since 1995. I'm hoping for wild grape jelly makings this year. And I do know about the coffee in the am situation.

How are the bees looking in your area? What bees? I guess that's your answer. ...although I don't recall a heavy bee season the year before. And it was not a mast year either. Our pollinators have gone the way of the Dodo. We used to raise hard-shelled gourds, but the extra chore of being a sexual slave to the lustful gourd flowers became just too onerous.

Coconut milk/cream makes a fine ice cream base and there are many suitable recipes online. I'm sure you could use rice or soy milk also.

I have a question. What could be happening to my apple trees? Right behind the house are two apple trees, a Mac and a Northern Spy. Last year they had more apples than I have seen in 17 years of living on the farm. Apples up the wazoo and farther even. We ate them, cooked them, made litres and litres of apple juice. Froze apple sauce. Left hundreds on the ground. We are finally running out of last year's apples. This year? NO APPLES. Well, maybe one or two. What is going on? (I might add that we had almost no lilacs this year either and the farm is covered with lilac trees. It's usually property line to property line in lilacs.)

The 'wafer' type candies are perfect for kids to work on. You make larger circles or shapes from the basic 'dough' and then when it has dried...about 24 hours...you can give the children small snack bags with different colored royal icing inside them, pricked with a pin, and let them loose. They have a ball!

They look incredibly delicious!!!

A food mill might take care of the peel.

Each year I add new ice creams to my repertoire, but the old (well, old as of 4 years old) favorites just keep being made over and over. Vietnamese Coffee Ice Cream is always on the list. Along with Butterscotch Toffee Ice Cream and a kitchen sink kind which is more or less vanilla with endless inclusions.

I'm speechless. And double the offer if I order right now!

Small bits. I'll often put the un-churned ice cream mix in a stainless steel bowl into the freezer for one hour before churning it. To keep the bowl cold, I put a big fat elastic piece around the outside casing, and then slip two or three gel pacs...the kind for aches and pains...under the band and that keeps the bowl good and cold. We have a few freezers in our life: two big ones and two fridge type ones. The coldest freezer is the dog food freezer (our dogs eat real meat) and I use it for my ice cream freezer. It's so cold that some containers of churned ice cream have to go into the kitchen fridge freezer to keep them scoop-able in under 20 minutes.

The same goes for me. I feel if I am reasonably careful and frugal...which I am...it will all equal out in the end. OTOH, DH is a comparison shopper. Drives me crazy. I just leave him to it. He's happy. I'm happy. What more could a human ask for?

When I was a young'un, my Mother taught me to make salad dressing (the only thing cooking-wise I ever learned from her) and it always had a dash of Lea & Perrins. Now I have been married 52 1/2 years and we currently have two bottles on the go, and have run through an uncounted number of bottles over the decades. I don't always use it, it's true, but it is a part of life. ps. My parents were not of British extraction either. What dries out to the point of being tossed is pure creamed coconut which I still don't 'know' how to use. Our daughter's Grenadian BF, who is a terrific cook, uses it when he comes and needs it. Otherwise it sits and takes up its space, unhonored.

My tomatillos are not thriving this year. Last year they did. But it's early times yet. We've had tons of rain...and then days and days without rain. Right now we are without rain and I am diligently watering my small patch (container gardening) and waiting and hoping.

Thanks for the Kelsey Nixon cake. Just lovely. Found the recipe online. I have a friend who loves peanut butter and chocolate and each year for her birthday, I make her some featuring both. This sounds like fun (and so simple). Sometimes I gotta go with simple. And yummy. But simple.

On our twice yearly cross-USA trip to Utah, we often have lunch at Taco Bell. It is not high tone, but it fills several on-the-Interstate requirements. We'll report back about the Cantina Bowls as we try them.

Try googling David Lebovitz Tahini and Almond Cookies. That will give you the correct URL. I took the URL from the top of the proper page, but I couldn't get it to work either. Sorry.

Tahini and Almond Cookies http://www.davidlebo...cookies-recipe/ Just posted about these yesterday. Excellent biscuit. I added cardamom to them. Short and delicious.

Tahini and Almond Cookies http://www.davidlebo...cookies-recipe/ Very short. Very tasty.

1. Didn't pay anything like that price for the cheese. 2. Saw that ad in my search. 3. Costco. Hmmm....it actually could have been Costco I guess. If there is one thing consistent about our local Peterpatch Costco it's the fact that there is no consistency to it. And you can never find anyone to help. Well, except for the food hander-outers and they are not 'of' Costco. So, Ed could have bought it and then when we looked for it...again last week...and it wasn't there... What I really want is a simple single store which will get it in for me. I am going to go back to our local Sobeys where I now know the owner a bit...it was over the Poblanos that we first really met...and beg him to carry it. It might work. Thanks for the help.

We don't have any trouble finding Jack cheese in our area...we often buy it from our favorite bulk food store. But still...it's not the way it is in the States. And Pepper Jack was very available and it was nippy, the way I like it. On the other hand, we don't have to search for aged, sharp Cheddar in Canada. Balderson has some fairly seriously aged cheddars. We've tried the Pepper Havarti and found it lacking in sharpness for us. Our weekend guest brought us a lovely Pepper Jack from her Sobey's...but it's out of our regular 'snack bracket'. Ed bought something in No Frills yesterday: The Bright Cheese House Jalapeno Cheese Ball - it's a cheddar and cream(?) cheese sort of spreadable thingy and it's good and nippy. It wasn't too expensive.

Thanks, Beth Wilson. I phoned and the lady wasn't sure they had in any of the cheese I want. It was on order (?) Didn't ask. She said if we were coming through, we could ask a couple of weeks ahead of time. Oh well. We'll try our best. Our local Sobey's and the one in Cambridge has a huge range of Balderson Cheeses...but not the Jack with Peppers. Alas!

A couple of months ago, DH brought home a package of Balderson Monteray Jack with Hot Peppers. Oh, I did like it. And oh, I did not keep track of which supermarket it came from. And we have retraced our steps and I've phoned various stores...no one carries it. No one will get it for us. Who knows which supermarket carries this cheese? And I don't mean in teeny weeny packets. I mean your regular $6 or $7 dollar package. Help please. If it's on the way to Toronto, in Toronto or in Ottawa, I can get a family member to get some for us. Yes, it's that bad.

What exactly is the hokkaido. Could not get it on Google. (Did not try VERY hard, I admit).

Made a Triple Ginger Ice Cream, a recipe on eG by Food Man. http://forums.egullet.org/index.php/topic/128733-triple-ginger-ice-cream/page__hl__%2Btriple+%2Bginger+%2Bice+%2Bcream Very , very nice. I did do my usual alterations, in that my ice cream base is a cornstarch one and I don't use heavy cream or eggs. Oh, and I cut down the amount of sugar from 9 oz to only 7.45 (which is a cup) and the word is still out as to whether that was too much or not. Oh, and a very small part of the sugar was corn syrup and I added the pinch of salt. Right. With all those changes, it was the recipe.