I never thought I would like yoga

04.27.09 | 1 Comment

Ok, I just gave it away in the title… I used to think I didn’t like yoga and then I tried it again. Guess, what? I liked it!

In the past, I tried the hot kind, Bikram. It seriously annoyed me because I was feeling unusually hot, I was breathing everybody else’s hot air and then I was drenched in sweat and would go outside in the cold. Brrrrr.

After that experience, I convinced myself I hated it. Voices in my head would tell me “I can’t stay still”, ” I don’t like holding a pose forever, my brain gets bored and irritated”, “I need movement”, “I’m not a hippie”.

All of these voices polluted and fogged up the perception of myself and the different kinds of yoga I could try. I’ve been sticking to Pilates since I sorta stopped dancing and then I did nothing during the winter. Yes, my belly rolls have grown. So spring popped its head out (although today it still felt like winter) and I decided to try something new. I dragged my butt to a yoga studio a few blocks away from work and took a beginners Iyengar class. To be honest, I don’t know what that means.

The class was slow, it used props and the instructor twisted us in many directions. I have to say, I don’t feel like I got a workout from this class, but I got a massage. A nice, deep spine massage all the way up to my tight shoulders and neck. I will go back.

A fresh layer of paint

04.20.09 | 2 Comments

Man, things have been busy! Work, cheese making and… re-designing my blog! That’s right, I’m sick and tired of this red face, so I’m giving it a fresh look. I’m spring cleaning and repainting the facade!

Bear with me, I’ll be back soon.
A bientot!

Trip to the store

04.04.09 | 5 Comments

Guess what we’re doing this weekend…

Stephanie’s happy walk

04.01.09 | 3 Comments

We just came back from a 4 day trip to the greater Las Vegas region. Before diving into sin city’s entertainment overload, we visited Hoover Dam, camped near Lake Mead and hiked down a canyon wash to the Colorado river and up to the best hot springs ever!

Thinking back to our adventure, aside from the dip in the hot springs, the best memory I have was to be in the sun and wear shorts (which is unusual for me), feeling the air caress my legs. It felt so good! I had to express it. Justin captured it.

steph-walking-happy
Firefox users: if you want to make me stop walking, just press the ‘Esc’ key.

After drying, well… waxing

03.12.09 | 2 Comments

Our first urban Cheddar air dried in our oven (off of course!) for a week, flipping it twice a day. It formed a nice, fairly solid rind and started smelling like real cheese rather than yogurt!

It was ready to get waxed. We melted just under 5 pounds of wax in a purchased-for-this-particular-purpose pot and dipped the cheese in the red liquid. It surprisingly cooled really fast which made the process of turning and dipping the cheese in the wax multiple times reasonably quick.

Here’s a shot right after the first dip. Justin posted some other really cool photos!

Half waxed urban Cheddar #1

Since then, we made Cheddar #2 and Gouda #1 is air drying right now. Man, we’re going to have a lot of cheese in a few months!

Urban Cheddar #1

03.04.09 | 2 Comments

So we live in a city and yes, we made our first Farmhouse Cheddaaaaaar! Here’s how it went…

1 – Heat up two gallons of whole milk to 90°F

1-pot-of-2-gallons-of-milk

2 – Add cultures and wait 45 minutes. Add Rennet and wait 45 minutes.

3 – The milk turns into something that looks very much like yogurt. It’s time to cut the curds!

2-cut-the-curds

4 – Cook the curds again in a bath of water (in the sink) and bring the temperature up to 100°F… no more than 2 degrees every 5 minutes, which is supposed to take about 30 minutes but really took us 45. We’re learning.

3-cook-the-curds-again

5 – Hang the curds.

5-hang-the-curds

6 – Line the mold with the cheese cloth and press it increasing the weight and turning the cheese periodically.
This process led us to put together a kick ass cheese press engineered and built by Justin. Tah-dah!!

cheese-press

7 – Take the cheese out of the mold and let it air dry for several days, turning it multiple times a day so moisture doesn’t collect at the bottom for too long.

6-cheddar-after-being-pressed

8 – Wax the cheese and age it for at least 1 month. Ideally you want to wait for more than 6 months. Patience!

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