Monday, March 9, 2009

I love the smell of oranges in the morning!

The weekend in South Louisiana saw beautiful weather. It was the kind of weekend where you throw open all the windows and spend the day outside. Glorious I tell you.
Lil' Pickles played a little golf.
Twin A played Supergirl by catching a ride on Mommy's unmanicured feet.

Twin B lounged around on a blanket, watching the clouds roll by.
When I opened my kitchen window in the morning to let the breeze pass through, the overwhelming scent of orange blossoms took my breath away. I was used to smelling them in Southern California, but not so much around here. One of my neighbors has a tree or two, they must.
I glanced over at the enormous bag of California navel oranges on my counter and starting thinking. Mmmmm, honey orange pancakes sounded delightful!
I added the zest of one orange, replaced 1/4 Cup of the liquid with fresh squeezed orange juice, and approx. 1/2 Tablespoon of honey to our pancake mix.
Oh they tasted glorious and very SPRINGY. Is springy a word? It is now, note it in your dictionaries.
They smelled amazing while cooking too. I fell so much in love with the orange taste, I later whipped up a batch of my great grandmother's sugar cookies, with the addition of the zest of one orange and 1 tsp lemon extract. YUM!
No one ate just ONE cookie. It was more like three or four at a time. When I get home, I'll add my great grandmother's Lazy Day Sugar Cookie recipe. It is the best sugar cookie recipe I've ever tried (and I've tried A LOT!).
EDITED TO ADD RECIPE
Grandma Katcher's Lazy Day Sugar Cookies
1/2 Cup butter
1/2 Cup shortening
1/2 Cup granulated sugar
1/2 Cup powdered sugar (sift me please!)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1/2 tsp. cream of tartar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 1/4 Cups flour (sift me too!)
Cream butter, shortening and sugars in large bowl. Add vanilla and egg, mix well. Sift together remaining ingredients, then slowly add to butter mixture. Roll balls of about 1 tsp. dough. Put a few Tablespoons of granulated sugar into a small bowl. Dip the bottom of a flat bottom glass into the sugar and flatten the cookies. Re-dip glass after flattening each cookie. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 10-12 minutes.
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Let's not forget that tomorrow is the SITS Spring Fling! I'll have a small giveaway to join in on the festivities, so remember to stop back by.
Oh oh!!! We had a crawfish boil yesterday. I have loads of pictures and will pop up a recipe for ya so y'all can try a boil yourself (you can boil any shellfish using this recipe. Works well with crabs and shrimp too).

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, how I wish I could have been there! I'm from Louisiana and many things I miss about it.

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~pen~ said...

Oh yes! Love orange blossoms as well. An orchard lived behind me...the state bought the land, there was a freeze, the trees died, now we have a dead orchard...but, when it was in bloom before...smelled so nice! I;ll check back for the recipe for the sugar cookies. Have a springy day love!

The Blonde Duck said...

That sounds like a fabulous weeekend! Don't you just love gorgeous weekends?

Alexis AKA MOM said...

Sounds yummy my dear! Love the pictures!

Anonymous said...

Sounds awesome. I'm always amzed how a bit of zest can really add to a recipe!

Roxane said...

What precious candid pictures! :) Cant wait to try the sugar cookies they sound delicious.

The Rambler said...

I so want to make the pancakes. It's 11 pm and I want to make them.

Right now. ;)

Curse you!