Pyromaniac Kittens

Because the kittens tried to burn their owners' house down, they were adopted out to my ex-boyfriend's mother on account of my Facebook post.

My friends had taken in some week-old strays who were super sick from the abandoned lot next to their house. Winter was coming anyway and they needed help. Fast forward several months and they were out of town, and I was stopping by the house every day to put out food, water and clean out the trays.

Now my friends are renting an old house and it's far from in good shape. It's so old that it has one of the built-in floor furnaces. But no one was worried because it didn't work.

Well, until it suddenly decided to. I arrived at the house one afternoon to a very ugly smell. Burning plastic. The kittens had knocked a plastic tupperware-style container on it and it was melting through the grate and dripping molten plastic onto the furnace itself.

Step 1: pry off the plastic that I could.

Step 2: locate the thermostat and shut off the heat. First, those floor furnaces aren't connected to the thermostat (at least in this case). Secondly, there was no off switch. They have the exact same thermostat as I do, so I know damn well where the off switch is and it was not there. I popped off the lid and adjusted the mercury switch, but that really didn't do anything because it wasn't wired into the floor furnace anyway.

Step 3: call friends. Leave message. Call again. Smoke is still rising.

Step 3.5: get on Facebook on my phone and find friends that way and tell them turn on their phone. Finally get on friends and the smoke alarm goes off.

Step 4: climb up on couch to reach smoke detector. Pop it open to find that it doesn't have any guts. Find second alarm located on really messy dresser buried under a stack of books and other paraphernalia  Throw alarm outside so that it will shut the hell up.

Step 5: learn that furnace has no off switch. Apparently, one has to crawl down into the spider kingdom, I mean, the crawl space and blow out the pilot light. I didn't even know it had been lit.

Step 6: locate a pair of pliers and rip away the rest of the semi-molten plastic still on the grate and dripping.

Step 7: scold Mr. Fluff for trying to chew on the hot plastic pieces.

Step 8&9: repeat steps 6-7 several times.

Step 10: hang out to make sure the plastic has burned off and won't catch anything on fire.

Step 11: call other friend and leave a message saying that you can't make it tonight because you're babysitting pyromaniac kittens (and then not explain what that meant for 2 days).

Step 12: have spouse stop by the house the following morning (while I'm at work) to make sure it's still standing. Receive text stating, "Help! I'm being attacked by kittens."

Step 13: post semi-amusing text to Facebook and wait for my ex-boyfriend's sister (who still is a friend) to ask if they're up for adoption because her mother was looking for a kitten.

I think my friends for whom I was babysitting were more than ready to agree.

Also, the lightbulb in the room with the litterbox burnt out and I couldn't find any spares on hand, so I ended up cleaning it out with help from the flashlight on my phone, but the kittens thought that this was the best toy ever. At least my phone hasn't caught fire yet.

Mulberry Pie

I'd forgotten how GREAT fresh berries can taste! ...Or what strange looks you can get by picking mulberry trees in a public park.

Here is my mulberry pie recipe that I copied from somewhere on the net and adapted (sorry, person, for not giving you proper credit). I also inherited a lot of baking books from my grandmother, which is cool, but a lot of the old school cookbooks don't give ingredient amounts! They just expect you to know!

Regardless, here's PIE!

Fresh mulberries:
1. Verify what a ripe mulberry looks like (if you're not already sure)
2. Pick desired amount of mulberries - prepare to get your hands juicy
3. Freeze for a few hours to kill off all the tiny insects
4. Wash thoroughly
5. (Optional) De-stem mulberries (I don't bother with this step, you'll never know in the pie)

Pie:
Ingredient List
3 cups mulberries
2/3 cup white sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/8-1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8-/14 teaspoon nutmeg
Pie crust package from store (2 crusts)
1/2 tablespoon butter

Directions:
1. Preheat oven 400F
2. Combine mulberries, sugar, flour, cinnamon and nutmeg in a bowl. Mix well.
3. Roll out pie crust in pie tin.
4. Add mulberry mixture. Dot with butter.
5. Add other pie crust on top. Squeeze edges of crusts together and tuck inside pie tin.
6. Bake 15 min.
7. Lower temp to 350F and bake 30 min.
8. Cool.

Serve a la mode with ice cream if you wish.

It's really that easy! And fresh berries = NOM NOM NOM.           

Making Mead

I will be continually updating this post for the near future from start until bottling.

This recipe is actually based on a mistake that was turned into a triumph by my friend and fellow mead-maker, John.

As of the moment, I'm calling this Baby Hellhound: Wayfarer Mead. Why? Because all my drinks will be under the label Baby Hellhound (after my dog), and Wayfarer...um...because that was what was first in my head.

It starts with making a dry mead and then straining through a sweetening tea at the end. Totally unorthodox, but it worked out fantastically for him. Let's see if I can duplicate it!

I'm writing down exactly what I did. Feel free to deviate from anything I added or did. Also, let me know how it turns out!

Baby Hellhound: Wayfarer, Attempt #1

5 gallon batch

Ingredients 
5 gallons of room temp spring water
11.5 lbs Ambrosia Honey, Colorado Western Slope (via amazon.com)
1 teaspoons yeast nutrient
2 teaspoons yeast energizer
campden tablets
1 package Red Star Pasteur Champagne Dry Yeast
5 1 oz packets Herbal Alchemy's Vampire's Kiss tea (1 per gallon)

List of Tools
Fermenting bucket (or carboy)
Carboy (for racking)
Paint mixer drill extension (that has been dedicated to only making mead/wine/beer)
Electric drill (make SURE your battery is powered!)
No-rinse sanitizer
Airlock
Mortar & pestle
Teaspoon
Tablespoon
Spatula
Coffee filters (not needed for months)
Bowl (or beaker) for yeast rehydration
Cleaning washcloth
Hydrometer

Day 1 (Friday, April 13, 2012)
Part 1 - Sanitize Everything.

Okay, back up. Start by CLEANING your fermenting area. Yes, that means the dishes from lunch and whatever that crusty stuff is. And those long dead flowers your spouse gave you. Give yourself plenty of room to work.

Follow the instructions on your particular sanitizer about how to use it. Follow those instructions on everything you'll be using today. Or boil items to kill off all the germs. List for me as follows:
Fermenting bucket (or carboy)
Paint mixer drill extension
Airlock
Mortar & pestle
Teaspoon
Tablespoon
Spatula
Bowl (or beaker) for yeast rehydration
Cleaning washcloth
Hydrometer

Part 2 - Dumping Everything in the Bucket

I went with the no boil method. If you choose to boil or otherwise heat your must (unfermented honey mixture), go for it. There are plenty of forums out there on how to do that.

At this time and only if you want to, crush some campden tablets (1 per gallon) in your mortar & pestle (or under a spoon) and stir into the must to kill all wild yeasts and bacteria. You'll have to wait 24 hours to pitch your yeast then, so that the sulphites don't attack your yeast too.

I'm taking my chances with Mother Nature. No boil & no campden tablets for me.

Rehydrate your yeast according to instructions. Place your honey in some warm water to make pouring smoother (but don't mix the honey IN the water).

Take a break while your yeast rehydrates.

Pour in 2 gallons of water. Add all the honey. This will take time and patience to get almost every last drop. Add yeast nutrients & energizer. Fill with water up to the 5 gallon mark on your bucket. If you're bucket or carboy doesn't have nifty markers, I used a little under 4 and 1/2 gallons of water to make a total 5 gallon batch.

Attach your sanitized drill bit to the drill and go mad scientist on it. Maniacal laughter encouraged. Mix the honey until it's dissolved into the water. This takes awhile. I mixed for a good 5 minutes and then some. The must also needs lots of oxygen in it in order for the yeast to work its magic.

If your yeast is ready and your must is uniform at room temperature, pitch the yeast!

Lock down your fermenting bucket's lid -- or put the bung in your carboy -- and slide on the airlock. Crush a campden tablet and add that into water and fill up to your airlock's fill line. We don't want bacterial growth in our airlocks!

Pitching temp 79 degrees

OG 1.0803

Store in darkness and wait.

Day 3 (Sunday, April 15, 2012)

Sweet smelling carbon dioxide bubbles!

Updates to follow.