Friday, February 18, 2011

Mennonite Girls Cooking Class

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As many of you know, I’m privileged to be part of the the “Mennonite Girls Can Cook “ blog.

Well… we had our very first experience of actually cooking together this evening.

We were asked by Lepp Farm Market in Abbotsford (see side bar on the MGCC blog) if we would be interested in teaching a cooking class.

We talked it over, thought it could work and arranged a date with Charlotte Lepp who then added us to the list of their very popular cooking classes.

It was a bit scary but gratifying to hear that our class sold out quickly .

So tonight Lovella, Anneliese, Julie, Kathy and I tied on our aprons and and demonstrated how to cook Borscht, Rollkuchen and Cinnamon Buns.

What fun we had – those attending the class were so supportive and encouraging and we enjoyed interacting with them as we cooked and baked.

And the food – well, it was superb! All of the recipes are on our blog and will be in the upcoming cookbook.

Here are a few pictures from our evening.

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Lists in hand, Lovella and Kathy shop for our ingredients

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We had the pick of the crop at Lepp Farm Market

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Charlotte Lepp and Lovella go over a few last minute details

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while the rest of us started the food prep.

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Lovella, Julie, Bev, Kathy and Anneliese.

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Adding veggies to Julie’s Borscht.

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Lovella rolls out the Rollkuchen.

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Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves as much as we were.

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Enjoying Kathy’s cinnamon buns after the class was over.

Thank you Rob and Charlotte for inviting us. It was a fun experience for all of us and we’re already looking forward to the next class in April.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Bird Watching

We’ve been bird watching lately.  With the big windows in our new room we have a front row seat to the bird feeder in the back yard.

 

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Red Winged Blackbirds – one comes first then a flutter of black with flashes of red and the bird seed disappears in a hurry!

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House Finches – with their rosy coloured plumage.

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And Song Sparrows.

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This one got a bit peeved that the Starlings had eaten all the suet and gave the empty cage a good kick to vent his feelings!

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A Spotted Towhee – not the best picture but evidence that we’ve seen him.

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In front of our house we can see Eagles at the top of the neighbour’s Cottonwood tree surveying their world. 

This past week there were 3  of them there at one time.

This is just a smattering of what we’ve seen this past week.  My neighbour had an Evening Grosbeak visit her this week.

We’ve not seen one at our feeder yet but we’ll be keeping our eyes peeled and our camera at the ready to document him when he comes!