After almost two weeks home I am still getting back into the swing of things. Upon returning home I immediately came down with a cold with lots of sinus congestion. My residency was a creative break from normal life but it wasn’t a relaxing vacation. I was quite busy working (see blogpost #1). The hectic schedule caught up with me, and my body just needed to rest. So I spent four and half days on the couch sneezing, blowing my nose, drinking tea, knitting and watching shows on netflix.
Once my head cleared, I organized my haul from my time at Penland and started the task of grinding off the rough spots on some pieces and photographing my work for my portfolio and to put some up on Etsy. Documenting my work can be slow and tedious, trying to get the right lighting for the initial image and then editing. Needless to say it is my least favorite part of the process. I would much rather get my hands into some clay and start creating some of the things that started swirling in my head during my residency.
I also helped set up some work from The Cabbagetown Clay and Glassworks, the co-operative studio where I work, at Eventide, a new brewery in Grant Park, http://eventidebrewing.com. They display art in their tasting room for when they give tours of the brewery and when they have other events. They have some good brews and at the moment they are selling growlers- check them out at My Friends Growler shop, http://www.myfriendsgrowlershop.com.
Ultimately it was nice to get back to some of my normal day-to-day activities and see my friends and family again. I capped the week off by going to a Super Bowl fondue party and to a dinner with family friends. Since we were celebrating three birthdays, I got to indulge another favorite activity — baking. Even though you follow a recipe, it’s very creative to learn about and mix ingredients and see the results. I made an Upside Down Apple Pie with a homemade cream cheese crust which is Delicious! I found the recipe a few years back on the blog The Cutting Edge of Ordinary and it has spoiled me for any other apple pie recipes. http://thecuttingedgeofordinary.blogspot.com/2009/10/upside-down-apple-pie.html
Upside Down Apple Pie
recipe from The Cutting Edge of Ordinary
Which she got from Mr. Food.com
½ cup packed light brown sugar
½ cup chopped pecans
2 refrigerated pie crusts (or you can make your own, either way it is delicious)
1 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup all purpose flour
¾ teaspoon cinnamon
5 large Granny Smith apples, or other firm apples,
peeled, cored and cut into ½ inch slices
If you have an apple, peeler, corer machine now is the time to use it!Preheat the oven to 375.
Coat a deep-dish pie plate with nonstick cooking spray and line it with parchment or waxed paper. Coat the paper with cooking spray also.
In a small bowl combine 4 tablespoons of melted butter, the brown sugar and the pecans. Mix well and spread evenly over the bottom of the pie plate. Place one of the crusts in the pie plate, pressing it firmly against the nut mixture and up the sides of the plate. Set aside.
Note: If you make your own pie crust I recommend using a cream cheese crust. The cream cheese provides a tangy flavor that compliments the apples. The Joy of Cooking has a good pie crust recipe as does Martha Stewart.
In a large bowl, combine the granulated sugar, flour, cinnamon and the remaining 2 tablespoons of melted butter. Mix well. Add the apples in and toss gently to coat. Spoon into the piecrust.
Place the second crust over the apple mixture. Trim and fold the edges together to seal. Cut some slits in the top of the crust for venting.
Bake 1 to 1 ¼ hours or until crust is golden brown. Preparation Tip: To make sure you don’t have to do any cleanup, position a cookie sheet on the bottom oven rack to catch any juices that may leak from the pie while it’s baking. Mine did drip!
To invert the pie. I placed a plate that was larger than the pie on top of it and just flipped it over. Remove the pie plate then gently lift the paper. Allow to cool. Or if you can’t wait, let it cool just a bit and dig in while it’s still warm.
Lil Bee Writes 