Magpie Musing

Of course yes, it's April Fool's Day. It's also the birthday of Gil Scott-Heron (b. 1949), and the anniversary of the day that Singapore became a British crown colony (in 1867), and the date that...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/04/april-1st.html

I'm not going to lie: the spice cake with the baked icing intrigued me, because "baked icing". I had never heard of such a thing. But I am a person that owns two copies of The Joy of Cookin...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/03/in-which-we-attempt-that-baked-icing.html

The last two of Mrs. Wright's recipe cards are for desserts that are a little off the beaten path. When was the last time you had a dessert with concord grades, or a baked icing? Indeed, when hav...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/02/time-for-dessert-part-3-of-3.html

The next two desserts are both familiar and not particularly exotic: Pecan Tassies and a Lemon Loaf Cake. It is possible that I kept the card for the pecan tassies because of another neighbor who...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/02/time-for-dessert-part-2-of-3.html

In all the time that I knew Mrs. Wright, what I knew her for - kitchen-wise - was dessert. It is, therefore, no surprise to me that I kept six recipes for sweets (seven if you include the "desser...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/02/time-for-dessert-part-1-of-3.html

Next up in the cavalcade of index cards: Dressings and Condiments. Mrs. Wright's raw cranberry relish is much like my mother's - that is, raw cranberries and a whole orange, with some sugar - ...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/02/never-olive-oil.html

As promised, here are some more of Mrs. Wright's recipe cards. I kept only a tiny handful that fall into the category of main courses - a pot roast, some meatballs, a chicken dish, and a thorough...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/02/mrs-wrights-main-courses.html

For years, really, like (counts on fingers) 18 years, I have had an envelope with a little stack of recipe cards in it. I move it from time to time, not wanting to throw the cards out, but not re...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/02/all-about-jello.html

I am feeling reasonably chuffed because tonight I finished Adriene's 30 day FLOW journey - and the last practice was wordless. Yeah, I had to keep peeking at the screen, but yeah, I did it.* ...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/01/i-did-it.html

 Jeff Buckley stroked my cheek and told me I had beautiful skin.  I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art with Jimmie Dale Gilmore. Lou Reed gave me a scented candle. (Actually his first w...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/01/two-truths-and-lie-musician-edition.html

It’s almost the end of January, but it’s not too late to report on New Year’s Resolutions, is it? Although, maybe they aren’t really *new year* resolutions – because some are short term...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2024/01/26-days-into-new-year.html

Hmm. The folder of draft posts coughed up this picture of a list from 5 May 2019 - yes, four years ago. What was I thinking? I believe I moved the nine bark, and it died where I put it.  The...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2023/05/annals-of-gardening-5-may-2019.html

Need I tell you of the wonders of library books? Of course not, but I will. They are free (well, but for the modest sums folded into our taxes)! You don't need to give them house room when you ar...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2023/03/library-books-and-ephemera.html

Every few weeks, I bake a batch of cookies and mail them off to the college kid. This morning, I was looking for a gingersnap/molasses cookie recipe in my mother's black book , but I got sidetra...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2023/02/in-which-some-oatmeal-cookies-lead-to.html

An article in the Times about a handful of states that are trying to legislate against ESG investing included this aside: > Keeping an eye on how climate change may affect a stock ho...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2023/02/who-sits-on-boards.html

My day, two days ago, my Wednesday, was bookended by cracks. Wednesday, 8:30 am I am fascinated by the marking paint that touches nearly every bit of the train platform. It’s neon orange, ...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2023/02/cracks.html

Sometimes the universe conspires and magpies come at you from all sides. All three of these magpies came to me this past week.(Click the pix for more information.) A friend sent a link to a pod...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2022/04/magpie-on-magpies.html

You know how you buy a QUART of buttermilk because a recipe needs a little bit, and then the quart sits there in the fridge until it's over the hill and you throw it out, thereby wasting most of ...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2022/02/i-have-solved-buttermilk-problem.html

About a month ago, I posted a picture of an envelope on Facebook... ...with a comment: See that envelope? That's in the outgoing mail. Does it have a check in it? It does not. It has a note...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2022/02/my-crankiness-knows-no-bounds-and-yet.html

The summer before I went to college, my mother and I made a patchwork quilt for my dorm room. It wasn’t fancy, just a log cabin pattern made of 2” x 6” strips made into 6” blocks. And it ...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2022/01/the-warmth-of-quilt.html

An old family friend died today. They lived around the corner from us, and when we moved around the block, they lived down the street.  My father first met Wally when he came around a corner an...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2021/05/punch-line-absence.html

"Why," asked my husband, "do you have a reducer on your desk?" Well, it's not really my *desk* - it's really our dining room table, but I have been working from home for ten and a half mon...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2021/01/on-saints-and-plumbing-parts.html

It is a perennial conundrum that I used to rail about the child's "required" book logs, back when she was in elementary school, and yet I delight in recording the books I've read via my Goodreads...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2021/01/book-log-2020.html

Has 2020 been anything but a technical challenge? It's certainly not been a signature bake, and if it's a showstopper, it's the kind that falls down and uses salt in place of sugar. Our Chr...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2020/12/technical-challenge.html

When I got married, one of my cousins put together a recipe book, of family recipes from my paternal grandparents side of the family. The recipes had originally been written out by our grandfathe...

http://www.magpiemusing.com/2020/11/the-punch-fueled-post-pandemic-pot-luck.html