The Fifth of November

Happy Guy Fawkes day!

I hope you do something exciting for it. Like build marshmallow effigies and burn them, or watch V for Vendetta.

Muller Yogurt

My very favorite kind of yogurt in the entire world is Muller yogurt. (imagine the umlauts above the u). And it  makes me so sad every time I go to buy yogurt that American yogurt is so not-delicious. In fact, Muller yogurt was one of the wonderful perks of going back to London in 2010. It's just so smooth and creamy. It doesn't have the nasty grainy texture that American yogurt has. And it's not so thick as Greek yogurt. It is such the best. 

A couple of weeks ago I was in Harvard Square and a woman approached me and offered me a pot of yogurt. I didn't even really look at her and said "no, thank you" out of hand. She took the rejection well and moved on to waiting to cross the street. Since she was still standing near me I took a moment to look at what her hat said. It said Muller yogurt! I just turned down the opportunity to eat free Muller Yogurt, in the United States. What was I thinking?! But by then it was a little late for me to be like "actually, I will take your free yogurt..." 

This morning I stopped at the grocery store at the end of my bike ride to pick up a couple things I need for some muffins I want to make this week. I was in the yogurt aisle looking for plain yogurt and guess what I found??

Yes! It is! It's Muller Yogurt! In the US! It's days like this that I especially love living on the East Coast. 

I got my yogurt home (one each of strawberry and choco balls) and it's just as good as I remember. Smooth and creamy and delicious. Now I just have to hope that they bring the toffee yogurt over soon too.

Amish Oatmeal

Back in 2008 when I was living in merry ole' England the woman who cooked for us made the best breakfasts. About once a week she'd make this dish--Amish Oatmeal--and she would serve it with cream and fruit. It was what we all looked forward to every week. And she didn't always make it the same day every week so it made for much anticipation. My second favorite breakfast food she would make were these fantastic waffles. But I don't really remember anything more about them than that. Whereas Amish Oatmeal was so beloved that I managed to get the recipe and make it for myself now. My favorite way to eat it is warm with sliced strawberries and cream on top, but when strawberries aren't to be had plain is good, or just cream, or a little brown sugar. Pretty much anything you would normally put on oatmeal.

Incidentally, I don't actually care for oatmeal. I have tried very hard to learn to like oatmeal because it's filling and I know it's good for me, but I just don't like the texture. This however has a totally different texture. It's a baked oatmeal, and in many ways is more akin to an oatmeal cookie than to actual oatmeal. Basically it's amazing.

1900 House

Some number of years ago, my mother brought home a movie from the library and we watched it together. It was a documentary called The 1900 House (I must really like movies with the word number 1900 in them...). When I say documentary, I mean it's a reality TV show/documentary. Basically Channel 4 created this four part documentary to see what would happen if you took a modern family (a 1999 family) and put them in a home styled from the year 1900. So they called in all kinds of social historians and developed this house. It is a house in Suburban London on what was a lower-middle class street in they 1900. And they removed all traces of modern life and outfitted it in period wallpapers and furniture and gas lighting--the works. And then they found a family that was willing to live in this home and abide by 1900 rules: wear the clothes, eat the food, and live the lives of a lower-middle class family in the year 1900 for 3 months. It's really a pretty fantastic experiment.

Every handful of years now I remember how much I enjoyed watching this the first time and check it out from the library again. So this week I've been watching it while I get ready in the morning. It's pretty fantastic.

Daru Rooke--Historian and Curator of living history museums

The Moors

So for those of you who follow Sherlock on Masterpiece Mysteries this week's episode was "The Hound of the Baskervilles." I was really impressed; they always do such an amazing job creating a modern tale out of these old detective stories. While I read The Hound of the Baskervilles not that many months ago, I seemed to have conveniently forgotten that it takes place in Dartmoor, Devon. Oh, Devon! Of course I was jolted back to remembrance when Benedict Cumberbatch stands on top this outcropping of rock:

Dartmoor National Park!

looking at this view:

Oh, the moors!

Remember when we went to the West Country? Remember how awesome it was? And how much you fell in love with Devon and Cornwall? Widecombe in the Moor? I absolutely love the way the UK allows whole towns and villages to be completely inside national parks (another good example is Betwys y Coed--inside Snowdonia National Park in Wales). I feel like that would never happen in the States. Sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of my television (in traditional 5 year-old style) watching Sherlock only reminded me of how much I miss England, and how much I love the West Country.

Sherlock

Back in 2010 when I was living in England I was introduced to Sherlock by a couple of good friends of mine (who incidentally were also living in England). Unfortunately for me, Sherlock came out the same week that I was going home so I only got to watch one episode before I flew back to the States. And then I had to wait six months for PBS to pick it up and air it. (I find it super annoying that we have to wait like 6 months to get the good shows over here.) So anyways. Season 1 was fantastic. Loved it. And this week Season 2 began! I watched the first episode this morning and it was just as amazing as I remember the first season being. And I'm really excited for the episode next week. It is always impressive to me how good of a job they did at taking these awesome stories and modernizing them.

Rain

When I left the house this morning it was a little bit drizzly and so I donned my raincoat and packed my umbrella. As I was walking to the catch the train to work (yeah, I live in a city where I take the train to work) a familiar scent greeted me. I guess it was just the greenery mixed with the rain compounded by the fact that I was wearing my rain coat, but it reminded me of England. Oh England, how I miss thy "green and pleasant land" (from "Milton"--William Blake). That is one thing that I really love about Boston. Now that the trees have come into leaf, the city sometimes has a very England-y feel. Someday I'll go back.

On a totally and completely different note. Today, Maurice Sendak died. No more wild things and no more Little Bear. Sad day. Though I did discover that apparently there are two more books that are sequels to Where the Wild Things Are. I'm going to have to go find them.

Hot Cross Buns

So back in 2010 I posted about Hot Cross Buns and you probably thought it was a one-time occurance. Well, I've made them again (though I don't think I made them any times between then and now). And today I want to tell you a little more about their history. These buns are a traditional Good Friday food, and so naturally that's when I made them. It seems that the cross represents the crucifixion but Wikipedia (aren't my sources great? and I call myself a librarian) doesn't seem to say anything about how it came to be a tradition, so I guess we will just have to remain unenlightened for a while longer (maybe next year when I make them I'll be inclined to doing more proper research).

When I went to make these this time I looked for the recipe I used ages ago, but I really have no idea where it came from and the one I ended up using was significantly easier, though I didn't actually love it. (I also have no recollection to what my last attempt tasted like for a comparison.) I think that next time I'll try another recipe yet again because these ones were kind of dry and I didn't love that. One thing I did like though was that I used cherry juice-infused craisins instead of raisins and that was pretty tasty. Though I was just reading about a variation that uses chocolate chips instead and that would probably be even better. I was prompted to try these fancy craisins to see how the might work to solve the great tea-ring debate. I have another package of craisins and I want to try them in the tea-ring in concert with a recipe for glace cherries I found to see if that will solve the issue--I'm not sure that it will really be an adequate substitute.

Tag Galaxy

Yesterday was my last day of LIS 415--Information Organization. For reasons I don't quite understand that class ended this week (though I have two assignments for it due next week), but my other class still has two weeks left. I don't understand and I don't actually really care either--that's the funny thing about grad school: I find that I just don't care a lot about the random workings of the school or it's idiosyncrasies.

But, so in our class we had our final lecture and we talked about all kinds of cool things and so I want to highlight some of them here. My favorite website we saw is a way to visualize information and really has no discernible purpose other than to be incredibly pretty. Somebody obviously had way too much time on their hands, but that doesn't change the fact that it is really cool.

In case you're curious, these are pictures of Devon+Sea+Landscape. I think it captures Devon's beauty pretty well, don't you?

So play around with this website; it's called Tag Galaxy.

Downton Abbey

A number of people have been asking me for the last few months if I'd seen Downton Abbey. And they all tell me that I'd love it. I mean, period BBC mini series? Starring Dan Stevens (Edward Ferris in Sense and Sensibility), Brendan Coyle (Nicholas Higgins in North and South), and Maggie Smith? How would I not love it? Somehow when someone told me it was a "period piece" I had assumed 19th century, perhaps because that is mostly what I watch, so I wasn't prepared for this show set on the eve of World War I. Nevertheless, I'm really quite enjoying it. I've been enjoying learning a tiny bit more about the upheaval between the classes that the war caused. And it reminds me of just how much I miss England. It's been over a year and a half since I've been, and it drives me mad. But, lest I digress. I really am impressed with Downton Abbey. The only grief I have with it is that I can't watch the next episode for two whole days, and after that I must wait an entire week. I don't know what I'm going to do with myself (other than perhaps actually getting things done).

Dan Stevens and Michelle Dockery

Brendan Coyle and Joanne Froggatt

One a penny, two a penny

Everyone remembers that song they learned in third or fourth grade called "Hot cross buns," right? Did you ever stop to think that maybe that song was based on a real kind of food? Well, if that thought never occurred to you, then maybe it's time for it to. Today (well and yesterday) I made Hot Cross Buns. I had some raisins left over from my adventures in December, and since I had some extra time because of the holiday today I thought that I would make buns. These buns are rather time intensive so I actually had to make the dough last night so it could rise in the fridge overnight, but it was so worth it. They really are delicious. It was nice to take a moment and remember the good times in England. They still eat these there. In the old days one a penny buns were larger than two a penny buns, but if you get the two a penny buns then I think you still ended up with more bun at the end.