We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.

      Life! I'm pretty sure we're taking about life here. I'm almost positive. almost. Fucking Hemminway and shit. Also fucking life and shit... am i right??


This is where I start stuff:

...and sometimes finish it (Hey! like this blog post i started two weeks ago and you to post on twice a week. Remember that? The golden age.) Because i fucking love making things, dUh. oBvioulsy. Anyway: i've got like one hundred projects going on like lamps and sewing and collages and moon jars and:

Silk Screening! Boom.

This is something i've been trying to do for a while...  forever... 2007. At the time  i was working at a post house in SF, and my friend Kat was like "There's this silk screening class..." and i was like, "What's that?" then, "Let's go" and then i didn't. True story.

But also i've been talking about doing it for the last six months, and gradually picking up the supplies. So actually i was going to do my laundry but:

no one disturbs Harvey. motivation attained.

The last two things i needed was a t-shirt and fabric for the screen. So first i went to target to get a trendy travel coffee mug and since Michael's is near by it was like the heavens shown through the sky, lighting a path to a crafty haven where all my silk screening dreams could come true.

Except they don't sell fabric, who knew? So instead i bought a black t-shirt which was perfect until i realized i bought black shirt paint. Cool. No point in going to Michael's whatsoever. probably just street lamps anyway.

Luckily i had to go to Joanne fabric anyway for fabric (duh) and got some nylon that will hopefully work for my screen (but i don't know because you have to get the right gauge, and that's too complicated for me/it wasn't listed), so i picked up a grey shirt. Also they have crazy sales.

4 dollars! (two paper routes).

So then i actually had to build the screen. Phil was wondering around the house like, "give me something to do," so i did.

Also fucking nature, right?

It's like a giant ice cup that you'd never want to drink out of.

Anyway, Phil cut the wood perfectly on the lines i gave him, just like we all knew he would. Also the batteries for the screw gun were dead, so i just stapled it. Wa-la!:

Perfect. (clearly a Pappas production) Also now i can make the vale i've always dreamed of! (jk, jk.)

so then i built a light box out of about 50 cents of aluminum foil and 12 dollars of packaging tape (figures not accurate).

If you want to learn to silk screen yourself i used this website.

Now i just need a dark room. Luckily there's a creepy attic off my room which is perfect for darkness and horrifying children. (I don't even want to talk about the sounds that come from these walls at night)

It even has the fan they say is good for drying the photo emulsion paint for the screen (like it was meant to be).

So i started painting the screen, and of course it's just dripping through, and of course Nanc comes up to use the computer and is like, "What the fuck are you doing now?" and of course i'm covered with paint and of course she's like, "Lauren, the printer doesn't work." And of course it doesn't. This is the life and times of Lauren Pappas after all. But it actually does work if you know how to use a computer, which one of us does.

My screen was not getting covered at all in paint and i was like, "I failed!" but *spoiler alert: everything was okay... maybe.

You have to let your screen sit for a few hours in pitch dark, so in the meantime i made breakfast oatmeal pumpkin cookies i found on pintrest. All you need is this (salt not included):

Except raisins, cause fuck them. Am i right? 

Also totally passed the time watching Phil in his natural habitat.

Anyway:

Ta-da! (except really i had another 2 hours so i binge watched girls).

So this next part i can only talk about because it had to happen in the dark, and in this case, the pitch dark of night (aka 6pm). I put the transparency and a piece of glass over it into the light box, threw a beach towel over it, and turned on the light box. Because i used 40 watt bulbs, it should only take 16 min...

and there was nothing. So i left it for half an hour and: 

Nothing. I was like, "What the fuck?" So i asked this girl at work who's like an artist and stuff and she was like, "Um... did you wash it?" And no, cause why would i do that? that requires, like, following the directions.

 

So it sort of worked, but it all sort of didn't. 

I mean clearly there's an image there, but there's also a ton of bubble holes for paint to slip through:

Also the photo emulsion paint totally dripped through the bottom.

Needless to say, this isn't going to work. Smaller gauge, longer burn time, wash the screen. To be continued.

So clearly now I'm a master silk screen-er. clearly. Nailed it. But if Hemminway's right, then we are all just apprentices in this great circle of life. 

NaaaaaaAAAA siBenyA! Na ba ti sicha pa...

sitchiko benya, oh yeah benyaaaaaa...

Everybody loves fall.

 It's beautiful out. You know why?

Fall.

    I mean, who doesn't love fall? Crazy people. Only crazy people don't unconditionally love the majestic beatitude that is fall. You don't want to be a crazy person, do you? No pressure.


Today I made the mistake of waking up and going on pinterest, where i found this:

And it's incredible.

It's chocolate cake with pumpkin cheesecake in the middle. For the record, i'm not the biggest pumpkin person. In fact, i'm not a pumpkin person at all! I'm just a regular person. But what i'm trying to say here, is that aside from the occasional pumpkin pie,  I don't really like pumpkin flavored items. But you know what guys? It's fucking fall. And i'm not a crazy person, so i guess i'm just going to have to man up and make this delicious, wonderfully delightful cake. Also why you don't get out of bed hungry and go on pinterest when you have an unscheduled day ahead of you. I think that's a lesson we can all take home.

Also every once in a while you feel like eating like a fat kid being indulgent. Anyway i got pumped! and was like, "Ok, let's do this!" And then i high-fived myself.


You gotta start with the chocolate cake. That little gem has to cool before you can begin construction.

 Also you can get this recipe here if you love pumpkin things/fall/being a copycat/can't come over my house for a piece.

When i put these in the oven they were super watery and i was like, "ugh..." and Nanc was like, "No way those are gonna cook right" and the recipe also called for a cup of hot water, which i thought was really weird but anyway:


Step 2: Cheesecake.

Which is actually just cream cheese city with some sugar skyscrapers.  ...well other stuff too (like canned pumpkin and eggs), but this is the heart of it.

The recipe actually calls for pumpkin pie spice, but when i went to the store i was like, "6 dollars?! Who am i, Rockefeller?" so i found a recipe and made it because we have every spice in the world. 

 Except all spice. Isn't it ironic, don't you think? Which oBviously you do unless you don't like Alanis Morissette, in which case you're and idiot:

Anyway we didn't need allspice, so none of this matters.

Measure out the ingredients... Pappas style! We'll need a spoonful of laughter of ground cinnamon:

2 hints of patience, and a morsel of a i don't have a 1/8th of a teaspoon. 

When i was living in San Francisco i went with my friend to this vegan raw food restaurant for reasons i can't remember, but obviously stemming from some desire to inflict punishment upon our selves... anyway instead of calling the dish the fo-food it was horribly attempting to imitate,  they called it a feeling. Then when you went to order you were supposed to say, "I'm feeling..." and then what ever the name of your dish was. So of course we were both like, "I'm not doing that" and of course there was some exorbitantly flamboyant lady in the corner who declared she was "seeking satisfaction" in the overly dramatic voice of a person who feels they were born for the theatre, but are not. Anyway i took the lesser of two evils and was like, "I'll have the enthusiastic" which was actually the name of my dish and not at all what i was feeling, but apparently was acceptable enough for the waitress, who then turned to my friend and was like, "And how are you feeling?" So my friend who would not have any of this and was like, "I'll have the enchiladas." "So you're feeling passionately." The waitress said, nodding knowingly in the soft voice of someone who feels like they really understand you and are making a connection. And my friends was like:

"I'll have the enchiladas."

Spices are pretty.
 

And our cheesecake is complete.
Which is perfect because now it's time for the old swap-a-ru!

perfectly in focus. Wait for it...

Boom! Perfect. Watery my butt, they look delightful. And you know what? Chicken taco time.

The special sauce is sour cream and salsa mixed together. Ingenious. Add a little Tabasco if you're spicy, which oBviously i am.

Here's a picture of Harvey in the wilderness:

Okay, now i think it's time to make our frosting.

Put a ton of fat in a bowl:

Aka a stick and a half of butter and a cup of canola oil. Then add a ton of powdered sugar and the rest of the pumpkin spice. The pumpkin spice recipe makes about two teaspoons, which is conveniently what you need for this recipe and obviously these two unrelated sites are working together in some kind of underground pumpkin movement. They love fall.

So at this point I taste it, and it's really really sweet, and needs more flavor. Also the recipe calls for two more cups! of powdered sugar at this stage which, no. So i'm like, okay, the cheesequake cheesecake's cooking, i'll go upstairs and start writing. So half an hour later i come down and Nanc is like, "That frosting is terrible. You need to do something about it. Definitely more butter." So i'm like, "I totally agree." and i go to open the door of the oven and she's like "Stop! you'll hurt the cheesecake!" Which apparently cheesecakes are super sensitive. I didn't know. I do know the story of my friend(pictured above)'s mom yelling at his friends to "walk softly, i've got a cheesecake in the oven!" Which just made her sound a little nutty, but apparently she was right on. Shout out to Nanc on this one. So i leave (carefully not to disturb the cheesecake) and i come back about half an hour later at which point Nanc was nice enough to turn off the oven and set the timer for the cheesecake to cool for an hour. She then reminded me again that the frosting was terrible, which is probably because letting it sit will do nothing.

This cake is going to be gigantic. Nanc and i putz-ed around with the frosting a little and decided it needed more spice, so a dash of kindness, a few more hints of patience, and a drizzle of vanilla later and we still have a super sweet, but well flavored icing. If you make this recipe i recommend slowly adding the powdered sugar and tasting after every trough of sensibility (half of a cup). Seriously you'll need less then half the recommended amount. Which also means we would have had enough powdered sugar in house and i'm down $2.19. Whatever.

When every thing cools make your ganache.

Which is basically just heated heavy cream and chocolate chips.

 It get's spread on both sides of the cheesecake layer

Time to frost!

My cousin taught me this cool trick where you keep dipping your knife in hot water and it makes it easier to smooth the cake. Anyway time to pipe!

 ...which is not my specialty. 

Man there's so much stuff in this cake. If only it had hot fudge...

Now that's what i call a cake!

 Just look at those three brown pools... of longing. Slightly ghetto, but overall delicious.

Beautiful. Man nothing says fall like pumpkin cheesecake sandwiched in between two chocolate cakes with a chocolate ganache spread, butter sugar frosting and some hot fudge. Nothing like a good old artery clog to bring out the fall in all of us.

The icing is sweet, but the cake itself really isn't, so they complement each other pretty well. Nanc told me to "read up" on Swiss butter cream for next time.

Anyway, this cake is delicious. No regrets.

Memorial Day

“The brave die never, though they sleep in dust: Their courage nerves a thousand living men.” -Minot J. Savage

Man if there's anything i like more the cooking, it's quotes. TGIMemorial Day! Am i right? 

Here's a good one i stole from good old Davey T: "Today is a day of remembrance, not barbeques and beer. A day to remember the fallen, and thank the returned. If you see a veteran, or an active service member, be sure to thank them. Or I'll find you..."

I believe that's true, he will find you. But also well spoken. I happen to know a Vietnam vet pretty well:

 

 

Who coincidentally want's to celebrate with a bbq and some beer. So that's convenient. Beacuse:

“How important it is for us to recognize and celebrate our heroes and she-roes!” — Maya Angelou

 Too true Maya Angelou. (Rhymes!) Additional shout out to Mr Specs who is also a Nam Vet and invited to dinner. And to my Uncle George who was in the military forever and is just in general a personal hero.

First what Phil has preemptively Thumbs uped is a cucumber gimlet:

Which is not the same thing as the cucumber fizz from my last post (though it is the same picture of Phil, i forgot to get one of him drinking it, sue me!)
  

It's basically 2 parts cucumber juice, 1 part gin, and a squirt of lime and simple syrup.Yum. Fun Fact: Cucumber Juice was William Henry Harrison's favorite beverage (according to my high school history teacher so really who knows) and he was an Army General. He also wanted to show he was tough, and didn't wear a jacket to his inauguration speech so 30 days 12hrs and 30mins later he died of pneumonia. Which is why you should always wear a jacked. ALWAYS!

Actually i think it was Zachary Taylor who like cucumber juice. anyway...

Food!

So we've got grilled bread with homemade ricotta with tomato sardine salad or olive oil and basil, grilled shrimp marinated in lime, garlic and cilantro, roasted vegetables, bacon wrapped potatoes, sausage cheddar meatballs. Most of these recipes are from Martha Stewart but the ricotta is from Smitten Kitchen. It's kind of a random spread because i was being as indecisive as congress. 

"Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.” -Mark Twain (nice segway)

Oh, and Banana Cream Pie.

Duh. 

I think Harvey's got the right idea.

But wait, what do you do in the morning with left over bacon wrapped potatoes and sausage cheddar meat balls?

YOU FUCKING SCRAMBLE THEM!

SON.

And then you hope you make it through the rest of your day without having a heart attack.

I am proud to be an American. Because an American can eat anything on the face of this earth as long as he has two pieces of bread.” -Bill Cosby

Thanks Bill. But especially thank you to all those who are serving/have served. 

"These heroes are dead. They died for liberty - they died for us. They are at rest. They sleep in the land they made free, under the flag they rendered stainless, under the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows, and the embracing vines. They sleep beneath the shadows of the clouds, careless alike of sunshine or of storm, each in the windowless Place of Rest. Earth may run red with other wars - they are at peace. In the midst of battle, in the roar of conflict, they found the serenity of death. I have one sentiment for soldiers living and dead: cheers for the living; tears for the dead." -- Robert G. Ingersoll