Flour

Flour continues to be one of our favorite bakeries in Boston.  We were regulars at the South End location on Washington Street but because of the crowds, we started coming over to the second location at Fort Point Channel.  

The line here was long also.  The Artwalk and Volvo Ocean Race events were taking place and this was one of the few eateries open on Sunday.

After close to 30 minutes in line, John brought out the coffee, raspberry soda and desserts. It's always nice to have dessert first.   

He normally orders the Pain au Raisin but they were sold out.  So we were left with our old standbys - the chocolate chip cookie is made with Scharffenberger chocolate  (there are no chips but rather chunks of melted chocolate) and the marvelous sour cream coffee cake with the perfect crumb.   

Then after another 15 minutes, we got our sandwiches.  John is holding the egg & bacon sandwich with homemade aioli, tomato and arugula.  In the basket is the fabulous BLT.  What makes the sandwiches so unique is that Flour uses their own bread.

Choco Pies

Choco Pies are our newest fun food.  They're like a Whoopie pie with a marshmallow filling but dipped in chocolate.  John and I first discovered these when we watched the Korean movie "The Way Home".  This is an absolutely endearing film is about a little boy who is unexpectedly dropped off at his grandmother's house in a remote village for what seem like several months.  The boy is spoiled and a brat but slowly begins to learn about love and humility from his grandmother.  The choco pies remind me of the grandmother's self sacrificing love of the little boy.

I found these at the local C mart in Chinatown and my Korean neighbor, Sookie, recognized them as Korean, remarked that she hadn't had one in ages, and immediately wolfed one down.  

Basil and Lemons part II (Lemon Yogurt Cake)

This is all I have left of the Meyer lemons that Joanne brought over from San Francisco.  I'm trying ways to stretch out the lemon usage.   The Lemon Yogurt Cake from Dorie Greenspan's book Baking was intriguing and even more so because it didn't require a pound of butter.

I'm actually a terrible baker in that I refuse to follow recipes to a T.  My husband doesn't think I can bake proper cookies (except for the chocolate chip cookies from the Mrs Fields Cookie Book) - "they don't taste right".  I don't measure accurately which is really important in baking for the correct chemical reactions to occur.  However, even with my loose measuring - less sugar that what the recipe asked for 3/4 i/o 1 cup, poured some vanilla in it, and a rough 1/2 cup of yogurt (basically what I left over), the cake came out beautifully.  I did use almond meal for the almond flour (I think they're the same).  Instead of the lemon marmalade, I saved the juice of the lemon, poured it into a bowl with 1/4 cup sugar, mixed it and microwaved it for 2- 30 second intevals.  Surprise!  I came out with a really nice lemony syrup.

The cake was wonderful - the Meyer lemons are so much more aromatic than the normal lemons.

Basil and Lemons part I

I'm continuing with the basil and lemon theme from the previous post.  I thought I'd make pesto for our contractor who is working on our bathroom.  My husband was appalled when he learned that I hadn't been feeding him.   Turns out the contractor eats everything except for pesto.

So I'm serving the pesto over spaghetti to John for dinner.  Along with some pan-fried scallops.

Below is a quick pesto recipe:

1 1/2 cups chopped basil leaves

3 cloves garlic (you may add more if you wish)

1/4 cup pine nuts

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/4 grated parmigiano cheese (more or less depending on your taste)

Squeeze of lemon juice

Salt and pepper 

Paprika

Throw everything into a food processor until smooth.

The scallops are even easier.  No photos - they were eaten right away.  I bought 7 extra large ones.  Wash with cold water and pat dry with a towel and put in a bowl.  Sprinkle with salt, pepper and paprika to taste.   In a frying pan, add some olive oil - 1 tablespoon and when hot, add the scallops, cook about a couple of minutes on each side until firm.  Serve with some lemon.

Miss Trish of Capri for Target

These poor sandals are waiting for the sun to come out again.  I usually miss the launch dates of the designer lines at Target because of work but I managed to snag the last two pairs in my size of the Miss Trish of Capri sandals last month.   These sandals make me smile - especially at $29.99!

Boston Public Garden

Some photos of the garden at 4:00 pm yesterday.

I've been told that the flowers in the Netherlands are like this.

  This view reminds me of Monet and Giverny.  Sigh!   

Rainy Day but a least Spring is here!

We had one of the longest winters this year or so I'm told.  Can you believe a snow flurry as late as April 18th - to be exact?!  

Being laid off has given me some time to rediscover Boston.  I had two friends visit me back to back last week. I marched them all over Boston after having them attend gym classed with me in the morning.

 Joanne brought over some Meyer lemons from her backyard in San Francisco. (I tried to grow a dwarf lemon tree indoors but we had to get rid of it because of the fruit flies) We tried out one of the recipes from the April issue of Gourmet magazine.  We nixed any recipe that used over a stick of butter and settled on "Lemon Snow Pudding with Basil Custard Sauce" which didn't use any.   We were initially horrified with the packed cup of basil leaves that the recipe asked for - "What is this?  Pesto sauce?"  Actually, the leaves were steeped in the milk for the custard.  The ensuing product was a disproportionate amount lemon snow with a little less that 2 cups of custard if we were to follow the magazine photo as opposed to the directions for using the custard as topping for the snow.  The Lemon Snow was delicious - unexpected and really light.  It falls into my category of grown-up desserts.