Today's Agenda: Homemade Ice Cream Cake

This evening we celebrate a couple of family birthdays.  In an effort to use more of what we already have, I'm looking for something unique for my son's cake.  I'm planning on a simple ice-cream cake, with the ice cream being homemade fresh from our beautiful little cow's cream.  There's so much of the white stuff, we've got to be creative putting it to work!!  By rights, I should be hitting the cheese-making hard today (since I'm out of refrigerator space and milk bottles :) ), but then there's also that big garden to catch up on (SUCH a rainy Spring we're having!).  Ahhh....one day at a time, and make the time to enjoy the things that I am getting done (by not overbooking and stressing myself!)

My plan for my homemade ice cream cake is simple.  I'll cheat a little and use a boxed cake mix (unless my conscience gets the better of me).  I'll make a chocolate cake mix and mix up a quick batch of probably vanilla ice cream in my Cuisinart icecream maker.  I love this Cuisinart ice cream maker because it is simple, fast, and easy to use, and requires no salt or ice.  It has a gel-filled bowl that you freeze which replaces all of that mess.  So literally in half an hour you can have delicious home made ice cream without very much of a mess at all. 

When the ice cream is first finished it is about the consistency of soft-serve ice cream.  That will make it easy to spread over the finished cake, and then I'll freeze it to let it harden up a little more.  I haven't quite decided yet whether to cut the cake horizontally in half and layer it, but I am thinking I will probably do that.  If I'm very ambitious I may make a batch of chocolate, too, and layer that in somewhere.  We'll see, but I'll be sure to let you all know how it comes out!

(NB: I'm able to make two batches of homemade icecream because I've bought a spare bowl for my icecream maker, so I have the two frozen and ready to go.  Without two bowls, you'd have to wait hours or another day to refreeze the bowl in order to be able to make a second batch.  I find that spare bowl well worth the additional investment!)

Spring Has Sprung and Blossom is Born!

It's been pretty exciting and busy around here as of late.  Spring pretty much decided to arrive, albeit a very wet one, and so the gardening has started in earnest.  Additionally, our first-calf Jersey heifer finally decided to give it up and calve, and so last weekend we welcomed Blossom to the farm's fold on a drizzly but beautiful Sunday morning.  Everything went as smooth as could be.  Baby is strong and healthy, Momma is sound, quiet, and milking like an experienced cow.  We're putting up close to 5 gallons of milk per day!  Which means it's time for me to get busy. 

We've already had the first homemade ice cream from the fresh cream; it was Oh so good!  Next week I'll be jumping right back into making fresh cheese with the milk.  Cannot wait for that again, and to try some of the soft cheese in my homemade ravioli (the newest trick I learned this week - how to make homemade ravioli).

But for now, here are a couple of my favorite pics of the newborn babe for your viewing pleasure :)

It's Spring! Finally....

It's taken so long for Spring to actually get here in the Northeast.  We had a long, cold, but fun winter, and since then more cold and lots of rain.  BUT we're finally seeing some weather that's more seasonal, although still plenty of showers.  We've finally gotten the garden tilled and planting has begun!  The question is, though....will it ever end?  LOL  Who knows.  I've got a gigantic garden (well, I am feeding 6!)  But it's a labor of love that keeps us more and more self-sufficient, and I trust my food over anything I get anywhere else any day!

Mother's Day brought me a trip around to Lowe's and the local Farm and Garden store, where we bought fruit trees for our little orchard and cole-crop plants for the garden.  We came home and my husband planted the trees for me.  Really, it was a great gift and a great day...and I can't wait until we can out back and sit under the trees and pick a healthy, yummy snack.  Now that we have the orchard started, we're considering bee-keeping.  So yes, next up is hunting for some great bee keeping books.  And maybe learning how to make Mead ;)

Here are a few books I'm considering - do please feel free to make suggestions in the comments below!!

• Beekeeping For Dummies 
• The Backyard Beekeeper - Revised and Updated: An Absolute Beginner's Guide to Keeping Bees in Your Yard and Garden
• The Complete Idiot's Guide to Beekeeping
• The Complete Guide to Beekeeping for Fun & Profit: Everything You Need to Know Explained Simply (Back-To-Basics Farming)
• The Compleat Meadmaker : Home Production of Honey Wine From Your First Batch to Award-winning Fruit and Herb Variations
• How to Make Honey Mead with Recipes

In the midst of all this, I've also refinished the hardwood floors in 5 rooms of our old labor-of-love 1901 Farmhouse.  Shellac was the chosen product and method in keeping with the age and period of the house, which has always been kept very original.  I'm LOVING the result.  But more on that another day.  Oh - and my kitchen pasta maker arrived, but as the rooms were all disassembled and not able to be walked on, that, unfortunately, has not made it out of the box.  But I do expect it will be making an appearance very soon :)