Last week my brother and his family were in town. Yay!

My niece is 13 (isn’t she adorable?) and really, really, really into doing her nails. This is a girl after my own heart; I, too, cannot resist the glitter and glam of nail polish. I totally get her obsession. Painted toenails makes the world a happier place. That’s such a reasonable perspective. Thanks to my niece my toenails are currently painted emerald green, and I have to admit, I love ‘em!

Anyway, on one of our outings we stopped by the local Ulta to check out their selection of nail polish, scrubs, body polishes, yummy smelling shampoos and hair doodads. And then we made the mistake of wandering over to the lip gloss aisle.

Holy moly …

Here’s a line of lip gloss from Urban Decay called Pocket Rocket. On the cap is a photo of a fella, in this case a fella in scrubs (we assume a doctor or some such.)

Huh. Okay.

Then you tilt the cap slightly and all his clothes fall off!

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

If you don’t like healthcare professionals, what about firemen?

HELLO!

Needless to say, we enjoyed the lip gloss aisle almost as much as the nail polish aisle.

< His/Hers >

About this diptych project >>>

One of the beautiful things about Winter is the explosion of citrus—a burst of sunshine amidst all that dreary cold weather. Mother Nature takes care of us, doesn’t she?

My mother has a couple of citrus trees that are exploding with fruit right now. Jack and I have been checking them every week waiting for them to ripen. Finally, the kumquats have gotten big, fat and super sweet. I think I ate as many as I picked off the tree. Mmmmrrmm, good.

But there’s no way I can eat that many kumquats so I went looking for ways to preserve them. Opposite of a traditional orange the peel of a kumquat is sweet while the inside is bitter, therefore, it’s important to do something that uses the rind.

As it happens, orange marmalade is my favorite spread so kumquat marmalade seemed a logical direction. I’ve never made it before, but most of the recipes that I checked online complain about the labor intensity. Ugh. Long drawn out recipes are so not for me. I don’t have that kind of time. So, I tried a few different things and found a tip that gets you marmalade in a snap.

Here are the ups and downs. See if it works for you.

The biggest pain in the behind is separating the seeds and guts from the rind of the kumquat. Everyone complained about how time consuming that can be. Why do it?

Basically, you only want to cook down the rinds for your marmalade. However, you want to save the seeds/guts, which contain natural pectin, and wrap them in a cheese cloth to cook WITH the rinds in order to thicken and stickify the marmalade. In the end you’ll pluck the bundled up guts out and throw it away.

Some people recommend cutting the kumquats in half horizontally and using a melon baller to scoop out the insides. My verdict: YUCK!

Others recommended quartering the kumquats and cutting out the guts. My verdict: SUPER YUCK! I have had more fun watching paint dry!

Finally, I figured out a method that was super fast, easy and relatively mess-free, giving you perfect clean skins and kumquat bodies every time.

You slice the kumquats in half length-wise.

Then point the flesh away from you and invert the kumquat inside out. The skin and guts will begin to separate pretty easily.

And voila, you’ll have beautiful kumquat skins in no time.

Gather up the guts and seeds in a large piece of cheese cloth. I ended up putting everything in my favorite nut milk bag and it worked great.

Squeeze out as much juice as you can. You’ll witness the pectin from the thickness of the juice.

Then, you’re supposed to slice up the rinds in long thin matchsticks, but I don’t have patience for that, so I threw them all into my little hand held mini-chop and went to town on it.

Next, weigh your rinds. This recipe’s ratio is based upon weight. I ended up with about 1 pound of rinds.

To this I added 1 pound of sugar. Instead of white sugar I used coconut sugar, which is a lot lower on the GI scale. It’s also brown, so expect it to darken the marmalade quite a bit. If you’re using traditional white sugar, the marmalade will stay fairly light.

At this point you can also add spices (cinnamon sticks, allspice, cloves) to your bag of guts (that sounds weird, doesn’t it? Bag of guts. Who says that?) although no spices are necessary, so don’t feel like you need to give in to peer pressure or anything. Stand strong! Or don’t. Whatever makes you happy.

Now, dump everything in a non-reactive pot, add 2 cups of water and bring to a rolling boil, uncovered.

Once it starts boiling, turn the temp down to medium-high to keep it mildly bubbling up for the next 45 to 60 minutes or until the water evaporates off and the concoction thickens.

Stir occasionally only after the first 15 minutes to keep the marmalade from burning on the bottom.

And then ta da! You’ve got marmalade.

Enjoy!

Kumquat marmalade
makes 1 pint

1 pound kumquat rinds (about 4 cups of whole kumquats)
1 pound sugar
2 cups water

1. Separate kumquats rinds and guts/seeds.
2. Save guts/seeds in cheese cloth bundle and squeeze juice from pulp into cooking pot.
3. Slice up kumquat rinds.
4. Add kumquat rinds to guts bundle and juice in a non-reactive cooking pot.
5. Add sugar and water then bring to rolling boil.
6. Once boiling lower the temp to medium-high to maintain a mild boil for 45-60 minutes or until the marmalade thickens to desired consistency.
7. Stir occasionally only after first 15 minutes.

Cleaning out one’s phone is a lot like cleaning out one’s purse: freaky.

You know how you find little bits of odds and ends, stray change, random sticky notes, a lone crumbly TUMS? That’s what my phone seems like to me.

I just downloaded the latest round of photos and came across a few that made me smile and chuckle, and even more that made me slap my forehead and admit, “Only I would take this photo.”

Here’s a peek.

Hello, Bree and grandma!

Ever use that phone app called My Sketch? It turns any photo into a cool pencil sketch. It has about a dozen filters. It’s pretty fun.

Hannah, snuggled on my shins. This cat likes to lay on your body like no one I’ve met before. I cannot tell you how many times I have woken up, laying on my side, to find this cat stretched across my hip. Awkward, lemme tell ya.

Lab booties. I was late (of course) heading to lab and forgot to exchange my flip flops for real shoes. Whoops. I was quite the envy of my lab mates that day!

Abby. ‘Nuf said.

Mom’s idea of a simple lunch.

Airplane snack food: green mango with chili dip.

Our constant companions when the dog and I go on our daily walk. ‘Tis Spring now, which means there are nine million babies, too.

Toe socks. The perfect compromise for that important transition time between non-flip flop weather and flip flop weather.

Again, why am I always taking pictures of my feet? I don’t even want to know what that says about my psyche.

Way back in October 2011, I commiserated with you about trying to choose paint for our kitchen. Originally, I was leaning towards the blues and greys.

But y’all screamed, NO, don’t do it! You commented, e-mailed and called me warning me not to go so dark. In the comments Kim Fasching (I would link to her, but the link no longer works) suggested, “Pull something pinkish from the granite and cut it by half with white.”

I looked at the counter tops again.

Hmmm. Mauve? Really? I dunno. I’m not really a mauve kinda girl. 1980s color schemes screamed in my mind.

But then I thought about it some more and hauled myself back to the store for more paint samples. Gee, if that many people thought I should go pinkish then I needed to give it some serious consideration.

I finally narrowed it down to two shades of mauve and then left it up to Jack to choose the final color while I took off for Vietnam. (I’m so helpful that way.) And when I came home it was all painted and done. My sweetheart rocks!

Here’s what it looks like today.

I love it! Thank you, Kim Fasching and everyone else who chimed in. You did us good!

The mauve that we chose actually has a hint of dusky rose in. It’s fairly light, but still gives the room warmth, which is what we were looking for.

We also had this great rug with dusky rose and pale green that was handed down from family and in one of the guest bedrooms. However, it didn’t really match there so I brought it into the kitchen and it now works beautifully with the mauve walls. Even better, the busy pattern camouflages the vestiges of a busy kitchen (aka food crumbs and pets) and adds a little punch of pattern while grounding the floor.

The once hated too-pink counter tops now work for me.

Along this wall between two doorways there used to be a never-used second sink. The kitchen is small and doesn’t need a second sink so we ripped it out and tucked a little floating folding table there along with a pair of bar stools that we’ve had stashed in a closet for two years. (Coincidentally, the sage green upholstery in the bar stools is picked up nicely in the rug. Hooyah!)

Given its awkward location in a traffic pattern, the table’s small footprint works well. It’s a great spot to sit and eat breakfast, layout cookbooks or just to sit, sip wine and chat while someone else does all the cooking. We also mounted a small computer and monitor on a swinging arm so that we can surf the net for recipes, watch the news, DVDs or Netflix while we cook in the kitchen. I have to say, it’s been a favorite addition to the space. But in the event we needed more space, we can simply move the stools and drop the table flat against the wall lickety split.

I haven’t decided what, if anything, to put on the walls above the monitor. I’m not in a hurry and nothing has jumped out at me, so for now I’ll just wait. Plus, I think this arrangement will only last a year or two. We hope to put a door there that will lead into a walk-in pantry.

I also added a pot rack to our setup and we love it. Good storage and easy access equals divine in my eyes.

And finally, I rotated in artwork from other places in the house to match the new mauve walls. The color that I originally balked at has turned out to be wonderfully warm and neutral.

Thanks, guys. We could not have done it without you!

For Jack’s birthday weekend I cooked up a storm of good grub, including an experimental vegan version of pecan pie. My man is from Oklahoma where pecan pies are a food staple, like milk, butter and bread. He knows and loves his pecan pie. I should have known starting out that my vegan version would be a disaster.

Don’t get me wrong, it tasted good, but it didn’t taste like the “traditional” pecan pie that folks from the South know and love. Jack took one bite and lifted an eyebrow at me, “This is a lot of things, but it is NOT pecan pie.” And then a 5-minute lecture ensued about what “pecan pie” is supposed to taste like.

Sigh. Okay.

Birthday pie (actually, it was more of a tart) was a no-go. It just sat on the counter looking lonely and dissed. I felt so bad for it and berated myself for calling it “pecan pie”, a loaded term if ever there was one. Augh! I should have called it something else, like “loony pie” and it would have at least been enjoyed for the delish freakishness that it was.

Fine. On to Plan B.

Well, after all that cooking (and subsequent rejection) I was not about to spend a minute more on birthday dessert than I had to. I was feeling a little deflated.

I opened the freezer door and stared inside it for a full minute hoping a coconut cake would magically appear. Not for Jack, but for me!

It didn’t.

Instead, I pulled out these frozen muffin top things that I had recently bought thinking we might try them out for an easy semi-healthy weeknight dessert. And then I pulled out a pint of vegan ice cream. (If you haven’t had Coconut Bliss’s Dark Chocolate, it’s awesome!)

Easy ice cream sandwiches would save the day. Jack jumped on it. Yay.

While I toasted up the muffin tops, Jack took the pint of ice cream and started sawing at it with a bread knife.

What the …?? Oh, my gosh! What are you doing, you crazy dude?

Whoa. Uh …

… that’s kind of … snort … brilliant.

Instant ice cream sandwich. No mess, no fuss.

So easy. So satisfying.

And the birthday was saved.

< His/Hers >

About this diptych project >>>

We eat pizza fairly regularly in this house. Jack makes a mean pizza dough.

This is a total left turn, but you know how there are certain things that one spouse does better than the other? Well, pizza dough, fresh bread, homemade pasta, hummus and apple pies are a part of Jack’s genius. I have long since given up even attempting these things. When it’s suggested that I make apple pie, I spontaneously lose my hearing? Heh? Apple pie? I’m sorry, yo no hablo English!

It’s gotten to the point that Mr. Genius will even remind me, “Baby, you can’t make hummus good as me!”

And you know what? He’s right. He IS much better at it then I am. Therefore, I no longer attempt making hummus, leaving it to the genius instead. I feel the same way about cleaning the floors. He’s WAY better at it than I am.

Ha! Who’s the genius now, eh?

Anyhow, back to pizza. We’re constantly experimenting with our pizza toppings. A couple months ago we sprinkled radicchio on top (it’s in season now and therefore, cheap, and therefore, it makes its way into my fridge.) Wooooo, we loved it! So much that we had radicchio pizza the next night, too. And then several times since.

•••

Radicchio is a member of the chicory family so it has a bitterness to it when raw. However, if you roast it then that bitterness will turn nutty. Like magic!

And the beauty of this topping is that it’s very easy to prepare and doesn’t need anything to accompany it. Here’s a quick recipe:

1. Slice up half a head of radicchio. I have found that to be more than enough for one medium to large sized pizza.
2. Sprinkle with a little oil (I particularly like it with walnut oil), balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper.
3. Then massage the oil and vinegar into the radicchio with your hands to get it nice and coated. Plus, who doesn’t like a little massage?
4. Sprinkle radicchio on top of pizza and cook at high heat for however long your pizza takes (approx. 10-12 minutes).

Cheater method:
And then here’s my version of the “personal” pizza using some leftover Indian naan bread. I toast the naan in a toaster oven for 2-3 minutes first. Add a very thin layer of mayo (or not, I just love mayo on everything), add the radicchio and then toast the pizza again for another 5 minutes. (Don’t pay any attention to how disgusting and burned my oven pan looks. Eeek.)

Don’t worry that the radicchio turns brown, that’s a good thing.

There you have it, a personal pizza with just one topping that it scrumptious and ready in less than 10 minutes.

Enjoy!

If you’re in Berkeley, Calif. sometime, make sure and stop by Cinnaholic for a little sugar rush and dash of happiness.

And psst. Don’t tell anyone, but they’re vegan. GASP!

Yes, it’s true. And they’re delicious!

They’ve got all kinds of interesting flavors. Jack was a real trooper and helped me taste-test several different flavor combos. He’s a good nut that way.

Above: Blueberry Pie (left) and the “plain”, called Old Skool (right).

All the rolls start out with the basic cinnamon roll as a base. On top of that they add the crazy good toppings. Here, the fella is adding peanut butter for a PB&J roll. Mmmmmmm.

Located across the street from the UC Berkeley campus, it’s a hot spot for students.

Above we’ve got the Strawberry and the Smores.

I can’t remember which we ended up liking best—I think we had fallen into sugar comas—but we did indeed enjoy the heck out of ‘em and would highly recommend.

Mmmmmm. Just thinking about them, is making me hungry!

•••

P.S. If you’re not swinging through Berkeley anytime soon, no worries, they’ll ship them to you!

It’s rainy here today. Has been for the past two days. They say we’ll have the sunshine back tomorrow. Hmm, I feel a little sad about it. Last year we had something like 30 straight days of rain. It seemed like too much then. This year has been the exact opposite with practically no rain (or snow for our nearby mountains) and we could really use it. ‘Tis dry, my friends, too dry! Such a dry Winter does not bode well for the Summer.

I’m not complaining though, a little rain is better than no rain. I’ll take what we can get.

Gloomy weather inspires indoor projects though, doesn’t it? Indoor projects scream two things to me: cleaning closets or crafts.

I’ll take crafts for $1000, Alex!

This project is: How to revive a cast iron door stop … with nail polish.

Yes! I said it! Nail polish!

Ta da!

Nail polish has become one of my favorite crafting paints. It’s enamel. It’s cheap. It comes in 8 million colors. It has a paint brush built in, so it’s neat and tidy. No mess, no fuss and it lasts for ages.

What more can you ask for?

I had this thrifted cast iron door stop that was left outside for a good decade. It was completely rusted and looked awful. But I needed a door stop (Jack kept throwing away my leaky bag of sand out of embarrassment) and this one was free.

So, I scrubbed the heck out of the poor bird with a wire brush and then whipped out a bunch of nail polish like a kamikaze Picasso. Colors I didn’t have (like lime green) I picked up for $0.99.

And voila, good as new!

I LOVE nail polish! I’m telling you, there are a million uses for it besides just painting your nails.