Ginger scones to soothe abandonment upon discovering your parents are really enjoying their retirement

Phone: (rings)

Father: Hello? 

Daughter (me): Hello, Father. I have a question about my taxes. 

Father: Okay. 

Daughter: (Explains daunting tax issue.)

Father: Hm. I dunno about that one. You'll have to call H&R Block.

Daughter: (Sighs) Okay. 

Father: Guess where your mom and I are.

Daughter: I dunno. St. George?

Father: (chuckles to himself) Sitting on the beach in Hawaii.

Distraught Daughter: ...

These are the kind of scones you make during times such as this. You will gratefully use the good, spicy ginger your mother brought you as a 

"Heh, heh, well we-are-retired-now-gift and we knew you guys would want to come, so we didn't tell you" gift. 

You are crushed knowing that your parents now have a life outside of home and family, but you soldier on.

Maybe they're thinking they can return to their lives of youth and leisure that they possessed before they had children. 

It's an awkward thought.

You'll console yourself about never having been anywhere tropical by eating too many of these spicy ginger scones. Your mother will tell you to stop being over-dramatic because you've "traveled all over the world." 

Whatever that means. 

You'll want to top these scones with some rich, salted butter, and maybe some jam. You really don't want to take away from the spicy-tropically-gingeryness of the scone itself. You'll probably need to stay in bed with a pot of tea a bit longer than usual.

(On an unrelated side note, this vintage table cloth has the same pattern as my tea pot!)

Brown Butter Blueberry Muffins

Thank you, Joy the Baker. Thank you for existing. Thank you for creating these blueberry muffins so perfectly crafted with brown butter, the Goddess of all butters.

    I made these muffins at the beginning of my spring break last week. They were just the excuse I needed to not exercise and not leave my house 'cept for stocking up on baking ingredients. I did a lot of baking that week. Sometimes I wonder why I haven't dropped out of university yet to fly to Paris and enroll in pastry school. Heaven knows it's all my heart really wants. But the sensible part of my brain has insisted that I stay and finish my Linguistics degree. The unsensible part of my brain, the portion not wanting to run off to Paris, keeps tacking on new,  exciting minors, ensuring I never graduate and remain a professional student (bordering on spinster aunt/cat lady) forever. Pray this doesn't happen for real. I'm not going to be bashful about admitting that one of my listed hobbies would be "planning my school schedule." I'm sure my advisors are pretty tired of me asking if they know what the class schedule will look like for Fall 2014.

   Regardless of study stresses, whether or not you have them, whether or not you are a grown-up with a grown-up job, (what I wouldn't give for a sunny office as head librarian!) you should make these muffins. I promise they'll help wash down any Type-A control-freak issues you may be having.

I tweaked this recipe just a teeny tiny bit. I found the batter to need a good 1/3 cup more milk and the topping to need double the amount of butter, melted, not cold. I'll post said recipe later. For now, enjoy your Sunday morning!

What Posses Me: Downton Abbey

Oooh yeah.

happy spring & easy chopped garlic tutorial

 These lovelies are real. 

So are these. Real flowers for realsies. 

Winter, 

You are always welcome as long as there are fires to be had, tea to be sipped, fatty things to be baked. You offer a chance to reflect upon the year and excuses to sleep in. 

Buh-bye now. 

This is real, too. And lovely & easy. And convenient. And smelly. Here's the deal...

You: hate peeling and chopping garlic, nay despise it, 

but have an abundance of fresh garlic on hand

 left over from the summer farmers markets. 

What you are going to do is chop it up, 

chop all of it up, and drown it in olive oil. 

Put it in a nice glass jar. 

Refrigerate it.

     Don't skimp on the amount of garlic you get to peelin' and choppin'. You want to chop so much garlic that your hands will reek for days. That's how you know you've done a good job. And then at the end of your ordeal you can sit back and rest assured that you'll have fresh garlic

a'waiting your culinary imagination to spark without the hassle of preparing the cloves individually. 

You are welcome.