cookies, milk bread (soft course), and san fancisco style bread (french bread mode)

Chocolate cookies (40 mins)
i followed zoji recipe for making chocolate cookies. (used whole wheat flour and more chocolate chips) delicious. but a bit too sweet for me. too oily too.

[About buying flour]
I went to bulk barn buying bread flour! because perhaps the one I bought from Walmart was the wrong kind and I didn't find bread flour in metro. I happened to hear the conversation between two bakers :) and they reminded me of Bulk Barn just in the University Plaza. I am so glad that I went to the store! I found several kinds of flour for making bread! I got three kinds - unbleached bread machine flour, white bread machine flour, and sourdough bread flour (they also name it "San Francisco style bread - I probably wouldn't think of San Fran style if I only see sourdough. :)) I guess I can use the three bags (total $3) to make 3 loafs of bread. Just to test them!


milk bread (3 hrs)
unlike the first loaf of milk bread i made, this loaf was very beautiful and tasty. :) the unbleached bread machine flour is used.

San Francisco Style Bread (5 hrs) - baked by selecting the French Bread mode.
Favorite!

I thought I would never use French Bread mode when I first got the bread machine - simply because I never like french bread - they are so hard and sometimes too chewing.? But this is perfect!!! except that the recipe that I found on Bulk Barn website needs to be adjusted - The dough was too high -

So next time, I will follow the basic French Bread recipe - only change this: sourdough flour when bread flour, salt, sugar, is called, use whole wheat flour or unbleached bread flour when all-purpose flour is called in the recipe. The bread is just perfect :) Super soft and rich texture inside. Not sour but has the kind of taste that reminds you of San Fran harbor. Don and Ian love it too. Will definitely make it again.

p.s. Ian第一次流鼻血 (右邊鼻孔) when the machine was baking the bread - 嚇到我們了. 我去房間移一下大電腦的檔案 不到三分鐘 回到客廳看到滿地的鮮血撒在童書跟地板上 跟他一起在客聽的當當也不知道這怎麼發生的。還好Ian很勇健 我輕壓一下鼻梁 沒有再流了 :) 看起來像是太乾燥 但也有可能稍微碰撞到(?) 因為鮮血印有些看起來像是噴發的(?) 當下我愣住一秒, 好像回到從前教自然課下課後,一個皮小孩跌倒流血的意外,還好這次我很快就回神- 先檢查,止血,之後當當轉得很快,建議冰敷 只是Ian只給我們敷一下,就覺得很好笑的爬走了（他一點感覺也沒有 可能也不知道地上的血是什麼/哪來的吧）
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Note - my recipe: whole wheat bread for egg+veggie+cheese sandwich
1. add oil to pan. fry an egg, add spinach later.
2. add a little bit of salt. some 帕馬森 cheese
3. toast two slices of bread
4. combine bread, egg, a piece of american cheese, spinach, 帕馬森 cheese, and a little bit of Italian salad dressing or others.

Yummy!

Cake, milk (soft course) bread, and 100% whole wheat bread

Bread machine :)

Dec - 13- 2011 Each person in our family got a new "toy" today :) Don got a new pair of shoes, I got a bread machine (Zoji mini), and Ian got a fisher-price table.

I thought we would have started enjoying these little "presents" at least till Christmas. But we ended up in the Children's hospital that night - because Ian had high fevers - 40 C. He head was extremely hot. It was almost hard to cuddle him. But anyway, when he finally cooled down (after taking Advil), he looked fine. So a viral infection again. I wondered if the virus looks like a little fire.

蛋糕一號 蘋果葡萄乾蛋糕
As to the bread maker :) its size was perfectly compact, just what I imagined. Since I didn't have bread flour, I used the machine to make a cake in the afternoon. It was just fine. Didn't put enough sugar ? Perhaps cakes are meant to be very sweet... Flour was old (because the cake wasn't fluffy. The loaf was kind of heavy and short) ?

麵包一號 Milk bread - soft course
The second one was baked while we were in the emergency room >"< Of course everything went wrong in a night like that. (Ian was fine when I put all ingredients into the machine though). So the milk soft course bread is a failure. short, heavy, with a giant hole inside its body (sorry)! possible attributes to the failure:

(1) yeast is old - but wasn't expired?
(2) all purpose flour is old - which is possible since it doesn't make good cakes too. But the recipe only calls 2 Tb...
(3) "bread and rolls" flour is wrong - I am not sure... perhaps.
(4) Didn't install knead securely. when I washed the pan, I found there is "a ring of" "bread?" stuck under the knead. and since there was a hole inside the bread - yeast might not get mixed into the dough.
(5) milk was cold - maybe
(6) yeast touched butter even though it wasn't melted.

麵包二號 100% whole wheat (regular) bread
success :) beautiful!
I measured all ingredients accurately this time. except used a little little bit less salt.
used new yeast (quick raise from a bottle). used whole wheat flour. made sure knead installed correctly. put butter away from yeast. Actually I saved some flour to be placed under yeast. I also used regular baking setting this time.

I am so glad that it looks perfect. not so thick or hard crust, and ok soft inside. I am especially happy because it wasn't salty - perfect for my baby. :)

I just drove by.

I just drove by. Lyrics.
I always go the other way but my car drove me down today
To a little house on the older side of town
Back when things were never hard I used to play there in that yard
And I just drove by to see if things had changed
Cokes were just a nickel then and across the street at the five and ten
A lot of things were cheap and square and strange
And the life that we had might have been but it was one we loved believin' in
And I just drove by to see if things had changed
I wondered now if love is still the way it was back then
I need to know that life is still a place worth livin' in
There it is just like it was a house where there was always love
And I just drove by to see if things had changed
[ guitar ]
In a world that seen it's better days it's good to know some things remain the same
Though standing still is not times way
Take to heart while in it's spring oh love is just a fragile thing
And I just drove by to see if things had changed
I wondered now if love is still the way it was back then...
I just drove by to see if things had changed

賀 免疫系統第一次作用。

好像做了一個很長的夢

夢裡 沒有過去 沒有未來

只有很多泡泡劇

還有一對生病 以致在家的娃娃 + 複雜的事都不能做所以懶洋洋的媽媽

其實只過了一個(漫長的)禮拜 ...

爸爸好像也感冒了?

my seperation anxiety

i can't feel myself. it's extremely difficult for me not seeing ian for such a long time (perhaps just 2 hours so far.) And my heart sinks when i find myself forget to say goodbye to ian. and he must be so confused and maybe sad if he already learns this expression because he doesn't know if we are coming back for him.

i am so nervous. anxious. we both cried when driving away from his nanny's. :(

夢見老師。

又一次夢見陳佩正老師。這次他已經康復回到學校教課。我感動的抱住他! 問他有沒有聽到我們錄給他的那些對話。他點頭說有。我不好意思的說，後來好一段時間沒有錄了。他的辦公室變得很現代化很新穎，（整棟樓都是新的，他好像還是穿著涼鞋）不變的是，我還是坐在他對面的椅子上，聽著他說最近教學上的創新跟發現，還帶著他給我的一堆資料回家研究，隔天要跟著老師的班上去陽明山戶外上課。

一切都好真實，尤其是那個等了好久，令人掉淚的擁抱。

屋漏偏逢連夜雨。

話說，我們住的公寓跟從前indiana的CV比起來真是十萬八千里。

浴室有個氣窗，每逢下雨或融雪就會漏水。上個月開始，水壓不足，洗澡洗一半會停水，或是馬桶沖水之後，洗手台就會沒有水。昨天開始，洗手台的水龍頭漏水，今天發現，洗手台下的櫃子大淹水。

更不用說，隔壁每天清晨五六點開始在木地板乒乒碰碰爆走狂跑（牆壁的這一邊不巧就是我們的床...），又時常哭天搶地的小女孩了。

雖然現在想起來CV也是偶爾有浴室洗手台的問題...。

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今天發現，原來travel medical insurance (幾乎所有北美的都是一樣) 沒有cover預產期九週內的旅行。我的Bloomington trip到底該怎麼辦???

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