Awww....

The other day, when I woke up (after it had snowed), here is what greeted me out the back window:

Happy New Year!

catching up a little

Tom made Christmas Eve Lasagna tonight.  YUM.  I'm on call, so there was no wine to go with it.... oh well.  Did I take a photo?  No.
However, I do have a photo of one of Tom's recent culinary adventures: pho.

Tom has made Pho several times recently.  It's delicious, wonderful on a snowy night, and a great way to use up leftover vegetables.  Perfect!

Christmas lights are prettier in the snow

On either side of the front walk, we have these little solar-powered LED lights that change from green to red to blue.  On Sunday night/into Monday, we got about 9" of snow.  So now (at night), the light gets reflected off of the snow -- which makes it particularly pretty!

and the natural side effect of left over cream cheese….

Is bagels.  When you have the tastiest cream cheese, aside from making cheesecake, what does one do with it?  Well, I don't know about anyone else -- but Tom makes bagels.  Beautiful, delicious carb-bombs (as my parents call them).

I don't know about too much that's better than fresh bagels with homemade cream cheese!

the carnivorous Thanksgiving guests

Jeff and Jen had smoked both a turkey and a ham for dinner (there was also corn soufflé, cranberry compote, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top, a mushroom dressing, roasted brussel sprouts -- to name a few).  Sarah and I decided that clearly -- the turkey legs were the way to go!

Tom's Thanksgiving contribution

Every year, Tom brings dinner rolls to the Leftwiches.  This year was no exception…. they were delicious (as usual)!

cheesecake goodness

Most every year, Tom and I join our friends Jeff & Jen Leftwich at their house for Thanksgiving.  It is a glorious event: fantastic food, and fun people (Jeff & Jen's family, friends, and neighbors come -- so there are 25-30 people each year, if the not-so-little people are included in the head count).
The Leftwiches are cheesecake aficionados.  Every year for Christmas, Jeff makes cheesecakes as gifts -- he uses a recipe that has been handed down from his mother (and her mother…)  It's good stuff.
As we had so enjoyed the pumpkin cheesecake (Sarah Spencer's recipe) from journal club earlier this month, I decided that this year, my contribution to the Thanksgiving festivities would be a pumpkin cheesecake.  Except knowing this would be my offering to the Leftwiches, I figured it had to be "Leftwich worthy."
Step one: make the cream cheese.

This is actually quite easy; it only requires that you remember to start this process several days before you want to make the cheesecake -- as it takes ~48 hours.  You simply put milk & cream in a big pot with a mesophilic starter culture and some renet, and let it sit for a day -- then drain it with a cheese cloth for another day.  Since we get our milk delivered fresh from a local dairy, this ends up being awesome cream cheese.
Step two: make the graham crackers for the graham cracker crust.  And since we're going all out, then start out by grinding the wheat berries for the whole wheat flour!  This step (making the graham crackers, not grinding the wheat berries) ended up being more difficult than I thought -- mostly because it was very easy to burn the graham crackers.  But after two attempts, I got something usable.

The dough is actually quite basic, and really tasty.  Since it is made with molasses and brown sugar, it's basically a flat version of gingerbread…. yum.  This translated into a lovely graham cracker crust:

Step three: use the cream cheese to make the cheesecake batter, and cook it into a cheesecake.

My intention was to take a final photo, after I'd transferred the cake onto a serving platter, and garnished it with the whipped cream (just a dollop on top!) and bourbon-soaked pecans.  I guess the good news is that the cake was consumed so rapidly by all of the guests, that I never had a chance to take that last photo.
And, was it worth it?  Absolutely.  It was the best cheesecake I've ever had.  A wonderful combination of sweet & tangy/tart.  And fluffy.  And since the cream cheese is so easy to make -- I see no reason why I wouldn't do that part again.  As for the graham cracker crust: could you tell the difference?  Without a doubt.  And it was really good.  But it definitely required a whole new level of Pain In The Ass, so I'd say the biggest bang for my buck was the homemade cream cheese rather than the homemade graham crackers…..

fun trip to Phoenix

Tom and I had a great time during our annual fall pilgrimage to Phoenix.  Our first full day there, we enjoyed great weather as we listened to Jim Bolek play at the AZ Local Fest.  We actually had a lot of rain on day #2, but that's ok -- our big event for the day was cooking a Thanksgiving dinner for Alma, Tyler & Michelle.  The rest of our trip was simply relaxing…. mostly sitting poolside, soaking up the warm sunshine.  And, of course, I went jogging a few times.  I love jogging at sea level!!!
We are already looking forward to returning in the late winter/early spring.

the Cornell Ornithology lab

Fortunately, by the end of the day, Lanie was feeling a little bit better -- so she took me to the Cornell Ornithology lab.
This was a cool place.  First of all, there is a nice "lobby" area with big picture windows, where you can sit and watch the birds.  Lanie says this is also a popular place to go in the winter to try to soak up some UV light.

There are also a number of trails that meander around the property.  And since it was a gorgeous fall day -- it was really a lovely way to appreciate a late afternoon.

 It's amazing the photos one can now capture with a simple cell phone….

 We thought this was pretty cool: neither one of us had ever seen this stage of a beaver's hard work before:

fantastic last day in Ithaca

My last day in Ithaca was bittersweet.  The unfortunate part was that Lanie wasn't feeling good, so she spent most of the day in bed.  The good part is that the weather was unbelievably good, so I decided to explore Cornell.
What a beautiful campus!  The skies were clear, the leaves were brilliant, and the air was crisp.  I enjoyed walking around -- and particularly liked the botanical gardens and the apple orchards.

Visiting Kateri at Wells

We had a lovely (if not brief) visit with Kateri today.  

She looks well, and her surroundings are gorgeous!  I think she chose an excellent school!!!

The weirdest thing....

I flew through Detroit today, on my way to visit Lanie in Ithaca. I stopped in the magazine & junk food store, and was surprised when the clerk said, Yes -- they do have fruit -- apples.  Despite her pointing me in the right direction, I still had trouble finding them:

Individually packaged apples.  (And if you're wondering, No -- they were NOT good.)

a happy consequence of climate change

We have an an unusually warm fall.  For example, in September we shattered the old record with regard to average daily high by 12 degrees.  It is now then end of October, and we have not yet had any significant frost.  While this is rather dismaying, it also provides for gorgeous flowers in our yard for long after they should be gone…. so I picked these today.

visit from my parents

My parents came to visit last week -- we had a great time.  I confess, however -- I didn't take photos.  Sorry!
But I can report that we had a couple of very nice walks (including a trip to Button Rock, where Tom was happy to fish for the afternoon) and a trip into Boulder.  Somehow, even though my parents have come out here maybe a dozen times before, we'd never taken them to the Dushanbe Tea House.

Well, we fixed that sad state of affairs!  The Dushanbe Tea House was a "sister city" project between Dushanbe, Tajikistan and Boulder.  They built a teahouse for Boulder (and after getting all of the carvings completed, took it apart -- crated/boxed all of the pieces, sent them to Boulder, and then had people come re-assemble the building) and people from Boulder went there and set up internet.  I suspect Boulder got the better end of the deal.  Anyways, we all had tea and a very tasty lunch -- which was good nutrition prior to heading to Pearl Street to do some shopping.
Another Dear Diary event was that my dad actually wanted to go to a thrift store (gasp!) and even bought two shirts (double gasp!!).  So when you see him next, ask him his thoughts on Goodwill….
And we had great afternoon visiting the Liberty Puzzle factory.  It was cool to see how the puzzles were made, and my parents bought us a Hallowe'en puzzle (well, actually -- a Dia de los Muertos puzzle) which we promptly assembled:

they're here!

We finally have new chairs!!!  

When Tom and I moved into this house (seems hard to believe it's been 8 years already!) we spent a LOT of money up front.  (I know you know what I mean… everything from blinds for the windows to appliances to furniture.  It adds up.)  Basically, we ran out of money at the time.  So our dining room chairs we purchased from Overstock.com.  At the time it seemed awesome -- but 8 years later -- not so much.
Basically, even though those chairs have only been used maybe 50 times, they'd already become uncomfortable.  The big seat cushions were already saggy…. not a place you wanted to linger for an evening.
So, we finally decided to buy new chairs!  We went back to the furniture maker who made the table, and bought chairs that actually match the table (go figure -- a real set!).  They took ~2 months before they were delivered -- and worth the wait.  We are so excited about how they look and feel… they are very, very comfortable.
To celebrate, on the evening that they were delivered, Tom made a fresh pasta dinner -- and we had sides from the garden (greens, tomatoes, roasted carrots).  And, of course, a great bottle of wine.
Now, if Tom wants to tell the story of the purchasing weekend -- I'll let him do it.  Suffice it to say, he has declared that purchasing furniture as a couple is something that, perhaps, people should do while they're engaged -- because if you can survive that, your marriage can survive anything!!!!

Rajah the Doodle!

We are dog-sitting for a friend -- we have a very sweet Golden Doodle named Rajah (which means "king" in Hindi) staying with us for 2 weeks.  I have the day off today, so we decided to go for a hike.  It was a good day!  First of all, Rajah loves the car.  I love watching Rajah in the car:

We hiked up to one of our favorite spots: the overlook at the end of Meyer's Gulch.

Of course, one of the reasons to pick this trail is the aspen viewing…..

On the way home, Rajah was too tired to stick his head out the window.  But Tom kept the windows open, which kept plenty of breeze in the car.  This view cracked me up!

squash pie

Last week I was in the grocery store, and they had a huge bin filled with Colorado grown squash.  So I bought a butternut squash, and two Red Kuri squash.
Now, if truth be told, I was thinking about recipes that I'd seen that had called for Kabocha squash -- but since I've never seen this variety, I had no idea what I was looking for….
So when I came home and discovered that Red Kuri squash wasn't what I thought it was -- I went to the internet to find recipes.
Well, it turns out that (happily enough) Red Kuri squash and Kabocha squash are similar: sweet (when roasted) & creamy/easily pureed.  So what to do with the squash?  After making a couple of dinners out of one squash, with the remaining squash I made pie.

I was intrigued by this recipe because it uses very little added sugar.  For those of you who know me well, you know that while I am not carb averse, I try to avoid added sugars/concentrated sweets.  I will tell you: this squash was so sweet on its own, I'd recommend trying only 1/3 cup of sugar rather than 1/2 cup.  It was delicious!!!

Here's the recipe -- it was EASY.  (Bonus)

For the "crust":
1 1/4 cup roasted peanuts (I used pecans)
3 TBSP sugar
1 1/2 TBSP egg whites
After roasting and then cooling the nuts, process with the sugar (in the Cuisinart) until you have a fine mixture (like a coarse flour).  Add the egg whites, pulse until it comes together.  Press into a buttered pie plate, and bake the crust for 8-10 minutes; allow to cool completely before filling.

For the pie:
2 cups Kuri Squash (roasted, skinned and pureed)
1 cup of cream
2 eggs
1/2 cup sugar (here's where I'm going to try 1/3 cup)
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4-1/2 tsp ground ginger (I used 1/2 tsp; we like ginger!)
1/2 tsp salt
(I would also recommend to add some nutmeg or allspice… or whatever you want)
Process all ingredients together (I just dumped my roasted squash into the Cuisinart, so I didn't have to do any work to puree it, then added the remaining ingredients one at a time).  Pour into the crust, and bake @325' for 50-60 min -- until "just about set" in the middle.  Cool for 6 hours or more (overnight is fine).

The whole pie, if you use the entire 1/2 cup of sugar, has 160g of carbs (so only 14.5g per slice, if you cut it into 12 slices) -- of which, only 100g is added sugars.  So if I try it again with 1/3 cup of sugar, each slice would only have 5.5g of added sugar.  Not bad.

GNP -- the home of the vault toilet

Another one for Lanie:

I must say, Glacier National Park has an amazing array of vault toilets.  Now, this may not seem like something to brag about, but after hiking 5 or more miles into a backcountry lake, I find it impressive that nearly every destination has a BIFFY (bathroom in forest for you).  I sure appreciated them!

Finally, here was the view from the Many Glacier hotel, where we had our drinks & sausages.  Not bad, eh?  (After all, we are nearly in Canada!)

The day just stayed perfect

We were so lucky -- the skies just stayed blue. 

We took a slightly different route home, around lake Josephine.  Tom went searching for fish; we were perplexed that there were none -- but it was still beautiful.....

Here is the boat dock at Swiftcurrent Lake, which will take you to the Many Glacier hotel.  We didn't take the boat, but we went to the hotel on our way out, and had a drink and a nice sausage sampler platter. 

Awesome wildlife

One of the best things about today was the animals we saw:

A mama and her baby goat

A small herd of (I believe) adult mountain sheep

And, of course, lots of "tiny bears."  We also saw a black bear on our way out of the park today, but my photos pretty much show a black spec on the mountain....

Grinnell Glacier or bust!

I admit -- the glacier itself is a little anti-climactic.  This is because it has mostly melted.  But it was a great hike on a perfect day....

"On a scale of 1 to 10, today was a 14." Mark Rosenblum

Well, we waited and waited for the weather to improve.... And we were rewarded.  There are so many superlatives that I could use to describe today that I don't think I should even try!  We saved our best for last: our 11.5 mile hike to the Grinnell Glacier. 

First of all, the weather was fantastic.  Very blue skies, with highs around 60, I'd guess.  

Last views of St. Mary's

Here was a shot from the Logan Pass parking lot:

And one from a pull-out on the Going to the Sun Road:

Trail wildlife

Today, we saw a Hoary Marmot.  I thought marmots only hung out at elevations higher than 10,000 feet.  But now I'm guessing they live anywhere higher than tree line. 

And, for yesterday –– I forgot this one:

I think they are juvenile sheep.

Hidden Lake

Today we decided to return to the St. Mary/Going to the Sun area of Glacier.  There wasn't a lot of sun, but we soldiered on!  We drove up to Logan Pass -- which is amusing in and of itself, as it is the major Continental Divide pass here -- at 6,600 feet.  We hiked 3 miles to Hidden Lake, which was beautiful. 

We had been quite optimistic about the fishing, but no bites....

This photo makes it look like we were hiking in the snow -- but we weren't.....

They're watching us!

Who is "they?"  In this case, Verizon. 

When we got close to the border this morning, my cell phone started going nuts with text messages. 

Day in Waterton

Today's forecast for the Many Glacier area was 50 degrees and raining half the day.  We decided it was NOT the best day to attempt the Grinnell Glacier!  The forecast in Waterton, however, was for cloudy but no real rain.... So off we went. 

Since we've been hiking fairly long distances, we had no desire to bite off anything substantial.  We chose a 4-mile round trip to a nice waterfall.  Then, we went to the Prince of Wales Hotel for afternoon tea.  Overpriced?  Terribly!!  A nice way to spend a dreary afternoon?  Absolutely!!!

Here is the hotel from the outside: