Tag: Cinnamon

Making it Work > Cinnamon

Expanded Family, Same Old Traditions

Posted on by pioneerintrees

The week gone by was, well, life changing. Not just for me, but for my whole family, and for Bree, the wonderful girl who has joined it. All sorts of meetings and stress are behind us, and while there are likely many challenges ahead, we’re feeling pretty peaceful for now. We’re at the cabin, happy to show her around and share with her some of our traditions. She has already noted that we are a very “singy” family … so when we did our Disney princess challenge on the way in (in which one person sings a Disney song and the others try to name the movie faster than the others), she wasn’t overly surprised.

The other day she asked what exactly we DO up here. I think she’s figuring it out, and is starting to find her own groove. She’s been swimming, enjoying big breakfasts and plenty of baking, relaxing, exploring the woods. She likes to fish but is terrified of boats. We’ll have to work on that.

Today has been a day to make a few of the comfort foods that we love to eat when at the cabin. Buttermilk biscuits for breakfast…

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Annie ate 7. Omg.
Cinnamon buns for an afternoon snack …

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I only ate 3. 
Pasta salad, chicken parmesan and Gingerbread cake to take with us to Andrea & Mike’s for dinner…

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Once around the fridge pasta salad.

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Paul flattens and breads chicken, then fries it. Mmmm.

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Gingerbread cake is cooling. Almost ready to make the icing.
A good day so far!!

Peace out.

 

Back to Reality Cinnamon Buns

Posted on by pioneerintrees

Today we have to leave the cabin and get back to routines and learning and extra curriculars and all of the jobs that I didn’t get around to in the summer. I even got up early in order to maximize the morning here – that’s virtually unheard of. The only other time I got up early this summer was when I had to get up to pee at around 5:30 and through my squinty eyes glimpsed the most beautiful sunrise. I yelled at Paul and we went down to the shore and took it in for a few minutes, snapped a photo, then went back to bed for 2 hours. I really should get up earlier. Today it was misty and mysterious at 7. I wandered down to the boathouse and saw two loons fishing in the bay. They dove and I could watch them scooting around about a foot under the surface. Very cool. Never seen that before!! Of course Paul went for his morning swim off the point, so I had to take more photos…

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I puttered around the grounds, picking up more pinecones for the Kindies and filling up the kindling box. Then inside to a warm fire. I figured that if we have to leave, it should be after we’ve consumed a dozen cinnamon buns. Here’s my old faithful recipe, no idea where it came from… been using it for decades:

Jiffy Cinnamon Buns

Filling:

1/3 cup butter, soft

1 cup brown sugar, packed

3 tsp cinnamon

toasted nuts or dried fruit (if desired)

Dough:

2 cups all purpose flour

2 Tbsp granulated sugar

4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup butter, cold, in pieces

1 cup milk, soured with 3 tsp white vinegar OR 1 cup buttermilk

Mix the first 4 ingredients together in a large bowl. Cut in the cold butter till you can’t see it in there anymore. Make a well. Add the cold milk. Stir only till moistened (about 15 stirs). Dump it onto a floured countertop. Sprinkle a bit more flour on top and knead & turn it about 4 times, then spread out into a rectangular shape.

Mix together the first 3 filling ingredients. Spread onto the rectangle. Sprinkle with whatever you want inside the buns. Add raisins if you never want my kids to eat them.

Roll up lengthwise. Cut into 12 pieces – approx. 1″ wide. Put into a greased 9×12″ pan or muffin tins. Whatever floats your boat. Bake at 400 degrees (where the hell is the degrees sign on a keyboard?). Invert onto a platter while still hot or you’ll never get them out.

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Eat.