pretending it's spring

Despite what our pretty, floral wall calendar tells us, we are still looking at a sea of white in our yard. All that snow is still lingering and today, while sunny, was a whopping 27 degrees accompanied by 20 mph winds. We are all a bit stir crazy and wishing spring would actually show its face around these parts.

In a bid to lift our spirits, tonight we had a quintessential upstate/western NY spring-summer BBQ. We grilled chicken leg quarters using the perennial favorite Cornell Chicken recipe and boiled us up some Syracuse salt potatoes that we dipped in a melted butter/parsley mixture. (Recipes for both the chicken and potatoes can be found here.) If you have yet to try these regional New York State favorites, you are truly missing out. Around here, this is your standard church or fire department barbecue fundraiser and a long time staple at the State Fair. Alongside we had watermelon wedges (way out of season courtesy of Costa Rica and our local grocery store) and a simple arugula salad dressed with lemon juice and olive oil. To drink, of course it was lemonade. To finish it all off, it had to be strawberry shortcake.

The girls are so desperate for spring, they were outside burying fallen branches in the ground in the hopes that they will suddenly sprout blossoms or leaves.

dutch baby

We ate a Dutch Baby for breakfast. It was delicious! And no, this isn't some kind of cannabalistic ritual. A Dutch Baby is an egg-based oven pancake that you top with powdered sugar and a good squirt of fresh lemon juice.

I used this recipe from the folks over at Cooks Country. The basic concept is you mix together eggs, milk, and flour. Pour this very loose batter into a pre-heated skilled (I used my cast iron skillet) and bake. While baking, it puffs up and starts to climb out of the pan, which makes it kind on fun to watch.

After you take it out, and begin its sugar and lemon juice treatment, the baby shrinks a bit. The texture and taste is somewhat like a thick crepe. We ate ours with fresh sliced strawberries!

In related news, we are cooking up another kind of baby here, too. Not a Dutch baby, but an American baby with a pinch of Irish, Welch, English and a sprinkle of Italian and French. And no, we won't eat this baby. He or she is expected to arrive in mid September. The girls are hoping for a little brother (and so is Tim, secretly, though he claims he has no preference). Me, I'm partial to girls.