Recipe: Fruitcake

A couple of you asked for the recipe of the fruitcake you all sampled yesterday, so here it is! I think it came from an issue of Clean Eating magazine, but I'm not sure. Note: the fruit has to marinate in the liqueur for a day before you can begin baking.

Ingredients:

Fruit:
1 cup unsweetened dried cranberries
1 cup unsweetened dried apricots, chopped
1/2 cup crystallized (candied) ginger, chopped
1/2 cup liqueur of choice (I used Southern Comfort this time; I've also used Kahlua.)

1/4 cup flour

Dry Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups flour
2 t baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice

Wet Ingredients:
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla

1. Combine fruit and alcohol. Let stand 1 day, stirring occasionally

2. Grease and flour a loaf pan. Preheat oven to 250F.

3. Sprinkle 1/4 cup flour into the fruit mix, and stir.

4. In smallish bowl, whisk dry ingredients together.

5. In larger bowl, mix oil and sugar, then add the rest of wet ingredients.

6. Add dry ingredients to wet. Add fruit. Stir. Will be very heavy.

7. Glop into pan. Smooth the top. Cover with tin foil.

8. Place 9 x 13 pan, 2/3 full of water, on lower rack.

9. Put loaf on middle rack. Bake 2 1/2 hours.

Yum!

Leaf Play

A field, some trees, a whole lotta leaves, and five toddlers

makes for a whole lotta exploration

and fun.

Add a rusty old standpipe

and you have even more entertainment!

(Because, really, what is that thing for, besides filling with leaves?)

We love the autumn!

Party Time!

Thank you, Nora. We loved your hats!

It's the Most Wonderful Day...

♫ ♫...of the week.♫ ♪

Orally yours, Addie

It looks benign enough. Perhaps we were icing cupcakes? Sadly, no.

Though it's not toxic, and might even help settle a queasy stomach, it's not precisely food*...

Num, num, nummy!

*If it's not entirely clear from the picture, that is a piece of sidewalk chalk.
Yes, indeedy.
Rest assured, it was taken from her promptly,
right after I took these pictures.
(Parenting tip: The pictures of mischief will bring more laughter in years to come than the sweet pictures. Sweet pictures bring smiles. Mischief brings laughter. They all give you stories. If what's going on isn't deadly, reach for the camera before you clean it up!!!)

Menu Monday

Monday: Spinach pie, beet-cabbage salad
Spinach pie is one of those things they eat with middling enthusiasm. They don't dislike it, they don't rave. They just eat it. (Which is fine!)

Tuesday: Gyros. (Slices of lightly spiced ground turkey loaf in yogurt sauce, tucked into a pita with veggies. Ella is getting slices of the veggie meatballs the rest of us will have on Wednesday.)

This they liked.

Wednesday: Spaghetti and eggplant-tomato sauce with veggie meatballs.


Thursday: Singapore noodles (tofu and various veggies on vermicelli with a spicy sauce)

Friday: Presidential chili

Didn't get this far. We had peanut-butter sandwiches instead. :-)

Reproach!

If you have cause to correct Dries for some misdemeanor, you will almost certainly get This Look. It's not just the face, though that's certainly a picture, it's the whole body. Doesn't his pose just scream "How could you treat me so???" All he needs to add is the back of the hand to his forehead. Such pathos, poor lad.

He's not angry, he's just ... pained. Pained that I could ... prevent him from whapping someone. Or stealing a toy. Or sitting on the puppy. Or... well, Dries is a busy boy. The list for potential correction is long. But no, he's not angry. He's pained. Pained and oh, so reproachful. Look at that face.

I should be ashamed, no?

What We're Up To

Our theme for the month is "Let's Get Moving!" Each week will be focussed on a different mode of getting around. The first week? The one method they have at their disposal: Feet!

Outings:

We will go for a few walks, of course. We will walk, we will march, we will skip, gallop, shuffle, jump, slide, because there are all sorts of ways you can move using feet. One walk will, weather permitting, end at the park for a picnic.

Games and Activities:

Given that it's November and the weather is going to become increasingly uncooperative, I've planned some rowdy indoor activities just in case. We'll be making an obstacle course with this and that around the house. We'll also be having races -- basic footraces (in which no one will win or lose, we'll all just run like stink), egg and spoon race (where the 'egg' will be a dollop of playdough), and we'll try having a race while running backwards!

We'll be playing "Hop Little Bunnies" with a transportation theme all month: we'll be cars and busses and airplanes and trains...

Crafts:

Lacing cards (because we walk in shoes, and shoes have laces! Okay, mostly their shoes have velcro, but velcro they can manage.)

Footprint mural. We'll paint the soles of their bare feet and have them walk along a long strip of paper.

Menu Monday

Monday: Black bean soup, cornbread, salad
Total hit. Everyone had multiple helpings. The link is to the recipe, for anyone who'd like to try it at home. Hint: a significant part of the appeal was that I served the thick soup over chunks of slightly stale cornbread. I think they viewed it as some sort of gravy for the bread...

Tuesday: Vegetable stew, biscuits 
Hit and miss. Some liked it, some didn't.

Wednesday: Veggie burgers (made with egg, tofu, walnuts) and carrot salad

Thursday: Meatloaf, Southwest bean salad

Friday: Baked beans, broccoli