Over the past Labor Day weekend, I felt like a little girl on Christmas morning, having just received a new play kitchen!
No, we haven’t moved…but we did rearrange some furniture in our apartment, and now I have a new toy! A “Hoosier kitchen.”
My hubby’s mom received this Hoosier many years ago, and she painstakingly refurbished it, stripping off multiple layers of paint and restoring it to its original glory. And it’s still in the family; F. has carted it with him wherever he’s moved — which I find amazing given its somewhat rickety and delicate build, circa 1912! It’s served mainly as a computer desk & miscellaneous junk storage hutch, but now it’s back in its original role in the kitchen as my new Baking Center and I can hardly get over my excitement! Especially since we’ve always had only this much counter space to work with, the addition of the Hoosier really upgrades the overall cooking experience in our kitchen! Take a look…
Baking supplies and spices in the top cabinet, fold-out flour dispenser (big pink thing) and jars of beans and grains in the left cabinet.
Making gazpacho at the Hoosier
We love the new setup!
And since we have so much garden produce at the moment, I’ve been working hard in the kitchen to use it up and bake things to put in the freezer for the coming winter. Here are some of my baking projects this past weekend: Italian Lamb Meatloaf (I added about a cup of shredded zucchini to the recipe, excess water squeezed out), Wild Grape freezer jam from grapes in our alley, gazpacho (we ate that up right away!), mixed herb pesto, and zucchini spice muffins; I had written up what I hoped would be a zucchini spice cookie recipe, but the batter was too wet, and so it turned into yummy muffins. They’re similar (no surprise!) to these Whole Wheat Zucchini Muffins.
Weekend cooking projects
