Also... Carrots!!!

Adventures in GF/Vegan Baking Continue...

This was a labor of love for one of many going away potluck parties for our friends Kim & Butch... 

A whole bunch of fake hostess cakes before they were demolished!

I was so glad that this part worked! And J & I were so amazed at how much these taste like their non GF/Vegan counterparts!

Chocolate Cupcake Recipe

¾ cup brown rice flour

¼ cup potato starch

¼ cup almond meal (if you are avoiding nuts you can just add more brown rice flour)

½ cup dutch cocoa powder

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

1 cup packed brown sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

½ cup of milk of choice (I used unsweetened soy)

½ cup of earth balance

1 flax egg (1 TBS ground golden flax whisked with 3 TBS hot water & left to sit and gel up for 5 minutes before using)

¾ cup of hot water or coffee

* Preheat oven to 350º. Generously grease cupcake pan. (I think this works best without cupcake papers… Set aside.

* Place all ingredients, except hot water or coffee, in large bowl and blend on low speed with electric mixer. Add hot water or coffee and mix until thoroughly blended. Pour into prepared pan.

* Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center of cakes comes out clean. Cool cake in pan on wire rack for 10 minutes. Remove cakes from pan and cool completely on wire rack. Serves 12. MUST BE COOL BEFORE ASSEMBLING/FILLING!!! Otherwise... gross.

Filling Recipe

¾ cup organic shortening

¼ cup earth balance

3 ½ cups of confectioners sugar, sifted

1 ½ tsp Vanilla extract

¼ cup soy milk

·       Blend shortening and margarine together until they are combined and fluffy.

·       Gradually add sugar and continue to mix

·       Add vanilla and soymilk and mix for about 5 minutes or until fluffy

Ganache

1/3 cup soymilk


1/2 cup gluten free chocolate chips

* In a small sauce pan, boil the milk, add in the chocolate chips and mix/stir immediately. Turn the heat off and keep stirring until the ganache is smooth and fully mixed.

ASSEMBLE!!!

I think Michelle at http://glutenfreefix.com/gluten-free-hostess-cupcakes/2350/

Shows the assemblage best… I didn’t use her recipe but I followed her method of putting it all together. Post Punk Kitchen uses a pastry tip and pumps the filling into the cakes without cutting them… The cake recipe I used is an adaptation of Carol Fenster’s chocolate cake recipe, veganized & minus the xantham gum. Also, most sites have a second frosting recipe for the squiggle on top but I just put the extra ¾ or so of filling in a small Ziploc bag and cut a tiny corner off to squiggle it on… ALSO: once I filled them and put the ganache on top with a spoon I popped them in the fridge for ten minutes to set the ganache. ENJOY!!! 

 

Long lost blog....

It has been way too long and a busy busy year of working on art, applying for tenure, and chasing a now almost two year old... Here are some pictures in no particular order. more soon! :)

Its been a while since we posted on here and we have been super busy (and sleepy!) Margot is seven months old now, has two teeth, weighs over 20lbs, and can crawl backwards!!! Time flies!!! She is becoming such an interesting and sweet person, its so rad.

Jeremy's garden this year has been so prolific and wonderful. We have harvested sweet potatoes, turnips, kale, chard, tatsoi, cabbage, pak choi, recently from the fall/winter crops and will have lots of greens through till spring.

We also harvested indigo and dyed some silk while our amazing friend and wonderful artist, Catherine Stack was visiting from Brooklyn. More soon!!!

cute people!

digging up tubers with cat!

farmers

harvesting indigo

indigo leaves sorted for dyeing

indigo dyed silk

part one of our collaborative print with Catherine Stack

hanging out with cat, making art, letting the baby sleep on me...

Jeremy cutting a piece of indigo dyed silk for Catherine

bye Catherine!!!

hanging out in the clover

Say Hello Marshmallow!

We have a lot to catch up on. We haven’t been posting on here for a few months since we were busy welcoming our new baby daughter Margot into our lives. What an amazing change.  Yes, we are tired, and yes this is the hardest thing we have ever done, but its also the best thing we have ever done. Labor was amazing. Jeremy was right there the whole time supporting me and making me feel safe and loved. We also had a totally rad midwife who supported both of us, and a doula/friend/neighbor who helped us at home (thanks JEN!) It was a long labor with a lot of challenges, 38 hours total with 6 hours of pushing. I used no pain medication and was able to have a completely natural childbirth. After that experience I am convinced that I can do anything… that women can do anything… and I have a new level of respect for all mamas. (and their partners) Completely life changing. I never knew I had it in me. I am so thankful to my daughter for showing me what we can do. J  

I remember in graduate school, my teacher Carol Mavor talked to us about studying boredom… now I feel like it must have been particularly interesting to her because, as a mother, she rarely experienced it. I have not been bored once since this little girl has come into our lives… the littlest things seem so wonderous – huge gifts from the universe like our daughter’s smile (and now laugh), and her totally tripping out watching Jeremy play the guitar, and her ever increasing repertoire of coos and squeaks. Its so fun to imagine what it must be like for her to see/hear/smell/feel all of these things for the first time. Our house may be a little bit of a mess right now but we are all so in love and its wonderful.

Its definitely an adjustment caring for a small person 24/7. We are learning how to kind of keep our house in order and get back to creative pursuits.  Jeremy gets mad love for completely doing the garden on his own this year. I think its one of our best and it is all him. We have had so much food come out of it already that we are freezing stuff and sharing with friends & neighbors. J did backbreaking work to make the veg/pigment garden nice AND he planted tons of flowers in the front of the house right before Margot came home to welcome her. Our roses out front (that he pruned) came out huge this year… so much beautiful green energy coming out of that man! Also, I am posting a picture of Jeremy’s owl decoy again, installed in the garden. He put it in our strawberry patch and it works! We actually have huge amounts of unharmed strawberries this year. We have been freezing them and making smoothies.  This is also the first year that our beets have worked so we have been eating them cooked, pickled, and as greens. Our carrots have also done well. All in all it feels like a very productive fertile year in our garden, Jeremy has been kicking some serious ass – all while very tired, we do have an infant after all!  Now that I am healed from labor I am so thrilled to be back out there helping him and getting my hands in the dirt.  Right now Margot is only 2 months old, so I still spend a lot of time feeding her… but I can do little 20-45 minute stretches of gardening while Jeremy hangs out with her if its too hot for her to be outside with us.

So what are our plans for the summer? Well in very exciting news, Jeremy got his chambered paulownia board split back apart and now he just has to drill out the chambers, glue it back together, and finish shaping/sealing it. (that sounds really simple as I type it, because he has gotten past some of the hardest parts of this process) The board is beautiful and I cannot wait to see it all done. He has worked so hard on it and its amazing especially since he is teaching himself. I am really proud of him for doing this. The idea is that this board will be a family heirloom for Margot to ride when she is a bit bigger. Pretty cool. Jer is also teaching silkscreen once a week with our friend Fennella. We are also growing pigments and working on our quilts. Trying to really finish our book too. I am going to post pics of Margot’s quilt that we made together. We used some of our indigo dyed cotton to embroider it. We are going to make new drawing quilts for a show next year with our dying projects from this summer’s garden and the stuff we dyed last year too. I have a solo show at Galerie LJ in the fall. I am making drawings/paintings and some new wooden sculptures with gofun on them. Super stoked about that. Jeremy and I are also talking about a collaborative animation for that show and maybe some collaborative drawings too. I always like our collabs the best. Glad I have summer off to do this and take care of my baby girl, lots of drawing while nursing going on! We are also excited to go to the beach and see Bubbie and introduce Margot to our dear old friend the ocean.

That’s the update for now. I hope you are all well and that your gardens are booming  & blooming and your studios are full of good energy.  We will try to be better on the blog update front! I have to get J to post surfboard pictures soon!

Much love from Virginia,

Allyson, Jeremy, & Margot

p.s. OH & if you got us a gift for our little sweetie, thank you’s are coming. We decided to silkscreen them ourselves (sleep deprivation insanity, anyone?) so it took a while to get that together. But they are done, and they are rad so look out in your mailboxes for some love soon.

Gathering energy at Brian & Jennie's a few days before Margot's birth

Jeremy hard at work a few days before Margot's birth.

Our collaborative quilt for Margot.

Our collaborative mobile for Margot.

J's amazing rocking horse toy for Margot... built with hand tools in our garage.

First strawberry harvest.

Sweeties.

Margot at 6 weeks!

Bright eyed.

She's already a ham.

Capitalizing on our sleep deprivation.

Our garden, thanks to Jeremy!

Flax already in bloom.

Carrots!

The first toy we bought for Margot, by Yoshitomo Nara.

My sweet Mother's Day present from J, beautiful new shoes!

We have strawberries thanks to this guy... Jeremy's owl decoy in action.

Happy Holidays!

We have had a crazy fall and early winter with warm weather and lots of shows! It is the day after Christmas and now we a looking to hibernate and finish some projects before the spring arrives. When spring arrives we will have a new addition to our family. We are so excited! So much preparation and things to do to get ready for! Check out some of our fall and winter projects! We will continue to update everyone as things progress!

Here is our homemade minorah made from a recycled pine 2x2 with drilled holes that was a garden post.

(Our fancy one is packed away)

Here is our baby tree that we got from the alley way behind the house. We used a Coffee filter as our tree skirt. We put special ornaments on there including: A Peachpit monkey & Porcelain Kitty from Kim Boggs, Macaroni given to us by Freddie Farraro for our wedding, a Glass Walnut from Kristen Smith, Patrick Costello, and Vicki Long, a friendship bracelet from Cat Stack, a bracelet from Grandma Dorothy, a Jingle shell, SandDollar and a Starfish Star.

We also Harvested some Celery, Kale, and a Napa Cabbage for some good Holiday eats

 Here are some of our fall adventures!

Homemade Owl Decoy

PVCC Faculty Show

Allyson and I both had works in the Galerie LJ Winter show... this is one of her new ones. We also sent three collaborative pieces!

Fricktoria's last shoulder photo opportunity before Momma M took her back to Wisconsin. Sadly, she was not as excited about Allyson's preggo belly as we are and had started to share her feelings pretty aggressively... we miss you Fricky!

Jeremy and I made this zine, "Lichen Ocean"to be released at Pictoplasma in NYC in November. It includes handdrawn, relief printed, silkscreened, and xeroxed pages and a silkscreened poster. Big props to J who pulled all of the prints since Ally couldn't do it with her belly! He pulled some 800 prints total! 

You can find the zine here if you want to buy one:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/88447826/lichen-ocean-limited-edition-zine-with?ref=v1_other_2

Jeremy's rad piece for "Let There Be Light" at PVCC!!!

October Garden

Jeremy is helping our friend Brian build an art car that will be a little boat. Here it is in-progress!