A Few Changes

It’s been a while since I’ve published anything here. I apologize.

We’ve moved out of the Big City to a little jewel of a place 50 miles out in the country.  About a year ago, we decided that the value of our Big City house had risen high enough that we could achieve a long-held dream of owning a little place mortgage-free out in the country.  We’re not too far out – it’s a 30-minute drive on good highway to a small town with a Safeway. I’m in the Big City once a week for my business and usually make a side trip to Costco and Whole Foods while I’m there.

In about 6 weeks, it will be the 1-year anniversary of saying goodbye to our Big City house and moving in to our country house.  The downsizing wasn’t too drastic.  This is a jewel of a place, 3 bedrooms, 2 bath, 1500 square feet on a quarter acre. The past year however has been a whirlwind of unpacking, arranging (I still don’t have the storage shed out back organized), scoping things out and making new friends.  I now have a friend who raises chickens and I buy fresh eggs from him for 2 dollars per dozen.

It’s taken nearly a year, but life has started to settle down.  There no longer any unpacked boxes in the living room. There is a brand-new KitchenAid double-oven range in the kitchen.  Sweet Lady Wife has organized the pantry.  I’m now to the point where I can resume doing what I love: cooking and blogging about it.

Recipes you see here may change a bit. For example, this house is designed with the kitchen in the center (one of the things we love about it).  As a result though, using the oven heats up the whole house. So getting my breadmaking recipes tuned to the 4000-foot elevation will have to wait until summer is over. And I’m starting to adjust some of my recipes to use the slow-cooker instead of the oven. Look for a slow-cooker version of Julia Childs’ Boeuf Bourguignon appearing here soon.  I have all the ingredients for a from-scratch devil’s food cake with chocolate buttercream frosting sitting here waiting until it cools down a bit.

In the meantime, I can sit on my back deck, enjoy the mountain view, some wine, brie, and a baguette. I can sit on my front porch at night and see the Big Dipper.  Life is good.