Angela Law

animal lover, gardener, knitter, and gourmet cook
 
food & drink

bottled

Last night, we bottled two batches of wine. One was called Trio Blanca (which is comprised of Chenin Blanc, Sauvignon Blanc, and Pinot Blanc) and the other was a Petite Sirah Zinfandel. Both tasted pretty good last night, but they’ll be even better with a little aging on the racks. I’m actually sort of behind on my wine-making this year. These have been ready to bottle for a few weeks now. Plus, I have 3 more kits just waiting to be made. I guess it’ll get done eventually. I’m probably going to make a 6th batch of wine this summer because I like doing things two batches at a time (it saves me a little effort plus it’s always nice to put 50+ bottles of wine on the racks at once).

So, by drinking wine last night, I guess we were bucking the Cinco de Mayo trend. We’ll have to make up for it this evening by having Margaritas.

music

beautiful silence

The silence is beautiful no longer. The website featuring local bands (local to my basement, anyway) has finally been launched. Check out Beautiful Silence for all the details…

food & drink, gardening & landscaping

what’s up

It seems all I have been doing is working in the yard/garden, cooking, cleaning wine bottles, and typing recipes. It’s quite apparent that I haven’t been spending all of my time blogging as of late.

All of the yard work/gardening isn’t a bad thing. I’ve actually been enjoying myself while working on it. This year I got a jump on things. There’s still a lot to do, but at the rate I’m going, I’ll get to it soon enough.

Today, I received an order from Gardener’s Supply. I ordered some new tomato cages, which I’m quite excited about and some willow fencing for my blueberry bushes. It seems the rabbits rather enjoy eating the blueberry bushes I put in last year. They nibbled them down to stubs over the winter (after eating every leaf off of them in the summer). I think they’ll survive if I can keep the rabbits away from them this year. Plus, I got two more blueberry bushes last week and I don’t want the rabbits near them. Hence, the fence (I would like to actually eat some blueberries at some point).

I transplanted all of my tomato plants over the weekend. I have a bunch of pepper plants that need to be transplanted, but I don’t have enough room under my grow lights for all of them so I’ve been procrastinating. I knew I should’ve gotten the bigger grow light system. Of course, had I done that, I probably just would’ve planted more stuff anyway and had the same issue.

As for cooking, sometimes I don’t know what gets into me when I’m making up my menus (Yes, I make up menus. I’m anal retentive, remember? Sometimes, I even have menus made up weeks in advance. How about that? Those of you who don’t make up menus obviously aren’t eating as well as we are. So there.) Anyway, the past two days, I got off work at 3, started cooking, and had supper ready at 6. So much for an afternoon nap…

I am so behind on my wine-making for the year. I have 3 kits sitting in my basement just waiting to be fermented. I need to get on that. Plus, I have 2 kits that are ready to be bottled, so I’ve been getting my bottles organized and started cleaning them yesterday. Hopefully, we’ll do some bottling this weekend.

I’ve been spending my evenings typing recipes (at least I get to sit while I do that). My mom got some new recipe software (her previous recipes were entered on a Mac and my parent’s haven’t had a Mac in probably 10 years, so it was time for an overhaul). I volunteered to type her recipes, so I’ve been spending time each night typing away.

It makes me wonder what I do with my free time all winter when there isn’t any gardening to do, wine to make, or recipes to type. Sure, I cook a lot in the winter (probably more so than the summer), but just what do I do with all of my time? Come to think of it, it’s been a while since I read a book…

food & drink, motorcycles

first ride

I took my first motorcycle ride of the new season today. Brian’s been after me to go for a ride with him for a month now, but the weather hasn’t been warm enough (in my opinion) so I passed until now. Today was pretty nice, but it was quite chilly on the bike. I’m glad I went because we’re planning an overnight trip sometime in the next month or two and I’m going to make sure it’s good and warm out before we decide on a date. I thought temps in the 60s were going to be warm enough, but I think 70s would be more suitable.

Jake stayed at my parent’s last night, so today was supposed to be a work day. We got some stuff done, but never as much as I’d like. The ride didn’t take too much time out of our day–we just ran to Conzatti’s to grab some lunch and Parmesan cheese (which is needed for tonight’s supper). I found out the hard way that if you’re going to buy Italian food, don’t bother going anywhere else–you’ll pay too much.

Shortly, we’re going to start cooking supper. We’re trying out a new manicotti recipe tonight. My current recipe just doesn’t thrill me like it used to so I guess it’s time to try something new. The recipe I linked to is the first of three that I’m going to try. I’ll be sure to post the results of the manicotti cookoff at some point in the future.