Poppyseeds & Possums

I settled on the Cook's Illustrated recipe for Lemon Poppyseed Muffins. As with everything else I've made in the cookbook, it was an awesome recipe. I made a fatal mistake and I'm pretty sure the poppyseeds were rancid :O. No one has gotten sick and the muffins tasted good, so I guess all's well that ends well. The batter was yummy enough to eat without baking it. Using mini-bundt cake pans is harder than it looks. I don't know how you get the muffins to sit flat without slicing off the bottom.

After the last batch came out of the oven, I found a possum in a tree near my front door. I tried to scare it away, but it was quite content to stay put - despite me yelling menacing things like "shoe!" (or is that "shew!" or "shoo") and swatting the tree with a broom. Now I know what that sound out my window has been and whose been leaving all those half-eaten berries on my doorstep. I don't like possums. They look like big rats.

Weirdest Sinatra Lyric

From "I Won't Dance":

Heaven help us
I'm not made of asbestos

Well, me neither!

More Quotes for Buzzy

This past week when I think of my grandpa, I think of the Alun Lewis poem "Goodbye":

And all the countless things I shall remember
Lay mummy-cloths of silence round my head

David Gray Lyrics

I just discovered David Gray. I love these lyrics:

This Year's Love

Easy Way to Cry (I'm not depressed from one night stands though ;), so except that part :P.

Lemon Poppyseed Muffins

I need to find the mother of all recipes for lemon poppyseed muffins. I'm trying to decide between:

Mark Bittman's variation of pound cake
Cook's Illustrated's variation of their master muffin recipe
or just Lemon Duncan Hines cake mix with poppyseeds added.

I have these cool mini-bundt pans that I can't wait to use.

Lasagna

Back to baking after a short hiatus. Was working on other compulsive projects. I made lasagna from scratch, but used a no boil noodle recipe. It was really stressful. I had all of these good ingredients and worried it would all be surrounded with hard, gross noodles.

Sonic Chill was on the radio and I heard some songs I hadn't heard since they first came out - They Might Be Giants and Cocteau Twins. I'd link, but they only keep playlists online for a week:

10pm Hour

Last Broadcast - Doves
Pepper Tree - Cocteau Twins
Opened Once - Jeff Buckley
Sascha - Jolie Holland
All That I Have - Grant Lee Buffalo
Orbit of Me - Delerium
Obscurity Knocks - Trash Can Sinatras
In My Room - Everything But The Girl
Biological - Air
Inhaler - Hooverphonic
Track 3 - Sigur Ros

11pm Hour

Distractions - Zero 7
Try Whistling This - Neil Finn
Honestly OK - Dido
Anniversary - The Cure
Lit Up - Lush
Sail to the Moon - Radiohead
Venus as a Boy - Bjork
Smokey - Red House Painters
We Are Mice - Azure Ray
Fearless - American Music Club


This is a really boring post. I feel better having admitted that.

Roasted Tomatoes

I made this great recipe from Real Simple. I'd never roasted tomatoes before. I was really worried about a dish that wanted me to roast tomatoes at 450 degrees for 40 mins. The whole dish was roasted tomatoes with shrimp and feta. It was really good.