What with it having been The Sainted Husband’s birthday and all, he got to pick the cake/sweet of his choice in order to facilitate our family’s celebration of his natal day, and these are what he asked for: Dominion Brewing’s Oak Barrel Stout Cupcakes.

Full disclosure: He works (on occasion, as [...]]]>

What with it having been The Sainted Husband’s birthday and all, he got to pick the cake/sweet of his choice in order to facilitate our family’s celebration of his natal day, and these are what he asked for: Dominion Brewing’s Oak Barrel Stout Cupcakes.

Full disclosure: He works (on occasion, as a second job) for the brewery that makes this beer, doing tastings for them at various local shops that carry it. He got the job, however, because he was already a huge fan of the brand generally and happens to have a way with people that made him a good candidate. In other words, the following may read as something of an infomercial, but it’s not intended that way. Nobody from Coastal Brewing/Dominion asked me to make this post or to push their brand, it’s just that we’re big fans in my house. The opinions presented here are my own.

For instance – I imagine you could just as easily make these cupcakes with Guinness, but since Guinness (and lots of other Stouts out there on the market) don’t brew the same way Dominion does, I don’t know that you’d get the same flavor profiles at all. The Dominion stout is brewed with vanilla, among other things, and I think whatever it is they chuck in there when making it makes it the perfect base for these cakes. Anyway, onward!

For the cupcakes themselves, this is the stack of ingredients used — Dominion Oak Barrel Stout, two sticks unsalted butter, a couple of eggies, sour cream, unsweetened cocoa (it calls for Dutch process but the Ghirardelli was what I had on hand), salt, baking soda, sugar, and flour. I used cake flour but the recipe calls for all-purpose; I think whatever your preference is will do fine.

So the recipe calls for one cup of Dominion Oak Barrel Stout, so we opened a bottle straight out of the fridge and measured that out:

You chuck a couple of room-temp sticks of unsalted butter into a saucepan and pour the beer over. This sounds vile, but actually it smelled totally amazing:

You simmer that until the butter melts and it’s combined, then add in some unsweetened cocoa powder (I sifted mine but the recipe didn’t ask me to):

And you whisk that all together until a) it smells like heaven, and b) it’s all combined. I didn’t take pics of the boring combining of flour, salt, baking soda, etc. (actually I just forgot during that part to take a snap), but you put all this stuff together and that’s your batter, which you then use to fill 24 cupcake tins (with cute paper liners?) and toss ‘em in the oven:

I have a tiny oven that still manages not to bake evenly, so I flipped mine around back-to-front at about the middle of the baking to keep things even.

While those cool, make the filling, which really is the most magic part of this whole process, because this stuff I could easily slather onto just about anything. It’s four ounces of bittersweet chocolate (which translates to roughly half a cup. If I did this over again I would double this portion of the recipe because I felt like I was a bit short when filling the cupcakes) with simmered heavy cream poured over to melt it:

There is also a tablespoon of butter that’s called for in this ganache, but I forgot to add it and it didn’t seem to cause any detriment as folks who came over later devoured the cupcakes without a complaint; this is possibly because in lieu of the optional Irish Whiskey called for in the recipe, I added a tablespoon of Lagavulin scotch to my ganache, but your mileage may of course vary. Anyway, so you make the ganache, cut the middles out of the cupcakes, then put the ganache into a piping bag (or a ziplock with the corners cut off) and fill the cored cupcakes with it:

Once this part is finished, you make the buttercream frosting. If you’ve never made this before, here’s what it is: An ungodly amount of confectioner’s sugar mixed with butter to try and hold it together, and a liquid of some sort, usually milk. This recipe has you replace the milk with Bailey’s Irish Cream. Yes, it really is as good as you’d think. First you whip a stick of butter until it’s light and fluffy, which takes a few minutes to do properly; then you add in the sugar one tablespoon at a time. I used child labor for this part:

Which is to say, our six year old Miss Plum wanted to help make Daddy’s cupcakes. Now, the recipe proportions called for here seemed a little off to me, and I did find that the frosting was getting terribly dry about a half cup before all the sugar was incorporated. All I did was chuck in Bailey’s until it smoothed out, so to be honest I have no idea how much eventually made it into the frosting; all I know is that it was fabulous!

So at that point you just frost the cupcakes, and voila, NOM!

Enjoy! And happy almost-Autumn/Back-to-School!

Cooper Circle Caulfield Beanie

This was one of those times when I really wondered if I had gone ’round the bend. I cast on for this thing on Tuesday afternoon (August 17, 2010, Future Self, when [...]]]> Well, ok, it’s the Caulfield Beanie, but close enough for alliterative awesome, I think.

Cooper Circle Caulfield Beanie

This was one of those times when I really wondered if I had gone ’round the bend. I cast on for this thing on Tuesday afternoon (August 17, 2010, Future Self, when you can’t remember and are trying to update your Ravelry page or tell somebody when it was or somebody asks you AGAIN “How long does it take you do something like that?” and you have no idea and go check the blog to find out…) with the express intent of having a birthday present for The Sainted Husband’s birthday on Friday, August 20th.

Lovely crown decreases

You might think (unless you are familiar with me and my methods of doing things) that I would choose a simple, fat gauge beanie in all knit stitch, so as to be sure to complete it on time. But NO! It was not to be any such thing. I had in mind something to show off this yarn, which by the way is going to put a serious hurtin’ on me in the future as I will require more of it, so I dug through my Ravelry faves and came upon The Family Trunk Project’s Caulfield Beanie.

Thoughtful Tom is Thoughtful

Then I considered using a different yarn, because I am in deep smit with this one and wasn’t sure I was ready to give it up, but no. It needed to be his. And so it came to pass that the Caulfield Beanie met Neighborhood Fiber Company’s Studio Worsted in colorway Cooper Circle.

I had many a moment of “Oh crap, this thing is ginormous, there’s no way it’s going to fit, wtf was I thinking using this yarn on these needles and…ooooh pretty! squishy! pattern-y!”, but clearly once again the knitting goggles (far less fun than beer goggles) were on and the hat is a good size for him. (That, or he’s just got a truly ginormous noggin, dunno — either way the hat works, so I’ll roll with that. )

So in summary:

• Pattern: Family Trunk Project Caulfield Beanie
• Yarn: Neighborhood Fiber Company Studio Worsted, “Cooper Circle” colorway, purchased from Fibre Space yarn shop in Old Town Alexandria
• Needles: US 8 Addi Turbo 24″ circular
• Cast on: 08/17/2010
• Cast off: 08/20/2010
• Mods: Just the yarn (though Cormo would NEVER suck, this particular yarn was what I wanted to knit with this time), and using Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Cast-On method for casting on.
• Notes: Knitting this thing was awesome. The cast on and set-up row were a bit of a nightmare as it’s a very specific repeat that you really have to pay attention to; I ended up getting to use some of my insanely cute owl and penguin glass stitch markers – 8 of them! – to make it easy to keep track of where I was, but I was dorky and didn’t think to try that until I was a couple rows in, so it was very slow going until then. This yarn is the most exquisite color I think I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with, though the yarn itself was a bit splitty; I am now trying to determine if I could sell off some plasma or something in order to afford a sweater’s worth for myself.

Last night I finished, for the second time, the owl cabling of my o w l s sweater. The first time around, I’d put the whole sweater on different needles because the size 8s [...]]]> There is something about nearing the end of a project that makes my eyesight diminish and go into the west.

Last night I finished, for the second time, the owl cabling of my o w l s sweater. The first time around, I’d put the whole sweater on different needles because the size 8s were the only ones whose cable was long enough to allow for trying it on, and then forgot to switch back to the 10s. Ooops. Ripped that back to the sleeve/body join, started again with the 10s.

Except.

I also apparently knit the sleeves on the size 8s, and didn’t knit them long enough after all, despite having tried them on many (many) times.

Last night, as I knit the neck ribbing and thought in glee of going on a button-eyes supply search online when the sweater was finished, I looked at the ribbing and thought, that looks awesome! ALMOST DONE!! And I knit on in a frenzy.

Then, as I took a short alcohol break (it was that kind of Tuesday), something told me that, before I bound off, I should probably try the sweater on again, just in cases.

Yeah.

So the sweater, although lovely through the bust-shaping, did not fit. It didn’t go up over the tops of my shoulders at all, the sleeves that I wanted to be gauntlet-cuff length were suddenly two inches shorter than when I last tried them on, and all in all it was just…not good.

So. Once again, I will have to rip out my beautiful cabled owls all the way back to the body/sleeve join, only this time I will have to add another 2 or 3 inches to the sleeves, as well as adding maybe 20 more stitches in increases to said sleeves in order to make sure there’s some ease over my upper arms.

Poo. If this thing wasn’t for Rhinebeck, it would go into a probably-multi-month time-out. But it is, and I was just crowing about having found my enthusiasm again, so I refuse to admit defeat.

Gonna need more alcohol, though.

There was a time in the past couple of years when my knitting (and really, most of my crafting) was stagnant. Nothing felt inspiring, and except for very brief episodes when I would dig into stash or pick up an old project [...]]]> I feel as if I am discovering my knitting all over again.

There was a time in the past couple of years when my knitting (and really, most of my crafting) was stagnant. Nothing felt inspiring, and except for very brief episodes when I would dig into stash or pick up an old project and try to regain my mojo, nothing would stick. I actually began the mental conversation with myself about whether or not it was time to simply gather up all my painstakingly collected tools and supplies and simply sell them off or give them away so that I could seek out what might bring that spark of creativity back into my life. I missed it, that spark, and so even such madness as those thoughts weren’t as appalling as they would have been three years ago.

Slowly, though, and in part I think because I have never stopped reading my blogroll and I have begun to see other — beloved and familiar — voices emerging from hibernation with similar stories, I can feel it coming back to me.

Just this evening in my quiet house I sat down and went looking for the yarn I used to knit my husband’s Valentine sweater (Beck by Jane Ellison; the post for the finished sweater is here) in Ravelry. It’s discontinued, and it appears that full sweaters’ worth of the stuff are thin on the ground, so I decided since I was craving tweed, I’d go see if there was an equivalent yarn floating around out there that I could discover and lay in for a day of inspiration down the road. And with that, I was down the rabbit hole. (that last link is a Rav link and there is talk of a Knitalong for that sweater with the Third Street Ravelers in Philadelphia.)

All of a sudden, not only is my knitting mojo returned (o w l s  sweater nearly done that’s currently on the needles, another sweater swatched for and ready to launch, a third in the works right behind that one and, after this weekend’s visit with Ravelers springviolet and constermonster, I am again craving a sock on the needles), but so has my sewing and crafting desire and inspiration.

The fall Knitscene? I want to knit nearly every item in it. A ton of exciting patterns in the Fall Knitty and Twist Collective issues, too. I’ve got something like four quilts in progress that are suddenly interesting again, and I am getting back into sewing because I discovered that I love retro fashion and the retro inspired items showing up in the Fall couture/RTW collections, and want to attend Viva Las Vegas this year.

I am horribly out of practice in keeping this blog (and thus, you) up to date, and I wasn’t ever particularly good at making sure I took photos of things I knew I wanted to tell you about during the daytime/in good light/in interesting ways to begin with. But I feel as if I owe it to anybody still around to read all this drivel — and to myself, as an exercise in continuing the joyous return of this feeling of…I don’t know, joy in craft? (Anticipation, enjoyment of what’s going on right now, happiness in what’s already been created — the whole circle is suddenly real and interesting to me again, and if there hadn’t been a few old names and faces posting again recently, I don’t know if I would have returned fully to this place.) — anyway, as if it suddenly matters to me again to be here in this space and to share what’s going on with you, even if it’s just to tell you about it when I haven’t got anything in particular to show you.

So. Thanks for being there. What’s new with you?  I really want to know, and I’m excited and interested to see what’s going on all over again. Oh, and before the apologist posts start about how xx post isn’t about knitting or whatever, please know that whatever it is you have to share with me on your blog or in comments, I’m interested in it. (well ok, not interested in the spam…but everything else!) This blog may be called YarnGeek, but really I geek out over all KINDS of stuff, and I’m happy to share it all indiscriminately with any of you still interested in reading about any of it. So Huzzah, y’all. I can’t wait to keep going.

A visit from my knitting friend from Philly over the 4th of July weekend has again ignited my Will to Knit, and I picked up my in-progress owls sweater with a renewed interest. I am supposed to be going to Rhinebeck for the first time with this friend and her Philly knitting [...]]]> Bandwagoning, anyone?

A visit from my knitting friend from Philly over the 4th of July weekend has again ignited my Will to Knit, and I picked up my in-progress owls sweater with a renewed interest. I am supposed to be going to Rhinebeck for the first time with this friend and her Philly knitting posse, into which I have been inexplicably accepted by way of their Ravelry boards. (Thanks, y’all, for being so welcoming!) The House Color for said Rhinebeck jaunt has been decreed to be Blue, and thus, o w l s in navy blue Cascade Eco+ Wool, with some handspun as contrast trim because it matched.

In Which:

There is actual *shaping* in this sweater, something I have never before incorporated into my knitting . I added short rows for my (ridiculous, really) bust size of F, in addition to the shaping included in the pattern itself, which is free on Ravelry. To add the bust shaping, I loosely followed a tutorial on Knitty, which in turn uses White Lies Designs’ Shapely Tank pattern. My gauge for this thing is pretty wonky, though, so I’m doing kind of a lot of wingin’ it.

I am about 7 rows from putting the body on some scrap yarn and beginning the sleeves, and herein lies one of my two primary debates — I really love the handspun I am using for contrast on this sweater, and I haven’t got enough handspun for any kind of big project. There is just enough to use for edging on the hem, neck, and sleeve cuffs, and if I wanted to cardiganize this, I would have enough to do that, too, I believe. The questions, then, are: 1) to cardigan or not to cardigan? and 2), short sleeves, three-quarter sleeves (where I am presently leaning) or the long sleeves the pattern is written to include? Please do weigh in on the comments, as I need to decide soon and am torn multiple directions for this decision. My Libran Self requires every outside opinion possible as data before making a decision!

Handspun contrast in question:

My favorite part of this so far, other than the fact that I think this particular yarn + gauge combination makes my hands and brain happier than any other, is the shaping.

But that’s before I get to start cabling in the owls.

This spring seemed to just zoom by like a comet.

As seems to have been par for the course of late, my knitting and spinning activities have taken a serious backseat to other life events. We bought our first home last August, my youngest stepson [...]]]> How neglected thou art!

This spring seemed to just zoom by like a comet.

As seems to have been par for the course of late, my knitting and spinning activities have taken a serious backseat to other life events. We bought our first home last August, my youngest stepson is deploying with his Army unit to Afghanistan, and life has generally just swept us up and along with it.

The only fiber-related thing I have to show for the spring so far would be some handspun, from some gorgeous Verb for Keeping Warm luxury fiber club bits I’d been hoarding.

sorry for the lousy iPhone camera resolution!

There’s a second skein spun from a combination of Dyak Craft (formerly Grafton Fibers) batt and Verb fibers, but a story goes along with the photo that requires ANOTHER photo, so how about we go on with that in another post? Gives me an excuse to get back into the swing of things.

The only other new thing around our place was pretty epic, though:

iPad: the Unboxing

Clearly I must return to the blog, since I will have lost The Sainted Husband to his new electronic Mistress.

How’re YOU?

St. Louis Cathedral in Jackson Square

We left on a Wednesday and returned on Sunday, and in between was a whirlwind trip that was part vacation, part logistical wedding assistance, part gluttony (oh, [...]]]> I mentioned that I’d knitted the shawl in my last post for a wedding we attended in New Orleans.

St. Louis Cathedral in Jackson Square

We left on a Wednesday and returned on Sunday, and in between was a whirlwind trip that was part vacation, part logistical wedding assistance, part gluttony (oh, Etoufee, how I love you), and nearly all awesome.

Things in New Orleans that we need here: “Go Cups”. (Which, to the uninitiated, may sound like something terribly rude, but which are in fact, to those in the know, cups in which one absconds from a given waterhole carrying one’s alcoholic drink along WITH. It’s magic, I tell you.) The bride from the wedding we just attended. (if she wanted to bring her puppy and husband along with her, that’d be schweet, too, but we wouldn’t want to ask for too much.) Several other friends and loved ones. Old New Orleans Rum, formerly known as Cane Rum. Cafe Du Monde, damnnit.

Those earrings. GAH.

Things here that are not in New Orleans: My cats. Our house. My yarn/wool stash. My job. Etcetera.

So presumably that evens us out, right?