You might want to make this very soon. And be sure to get some vanilla ice cream to have with it. 

Here's the story: I basically used this recipe (scroll down for the English version). I actually used the shortbread crust recipe from The Joy of Cooking, which I used for the jar pies I made at Christmas. It's pretty similar, just with the ingredients halved and the addition of a little lemon zest. I think the original crust would have been too thick in my tart dish, so choose which recipe to use based on the size of your dish. I only had cherry and blueberry preserves, but lots of fresh apricots, so I made a little fresh jam by cooking down some peeled, chopped apricots, with a little brown sugar (because I like that brown sugar flavor), and a dash of vanilla. Once it was cooked down I dissolved a little cornstarch in some water and added that to thicken it. The recipe doesn't mention putting the tart back in the oven once you arrange the apricot halves, but since it's called a Roasted Apricot Tart, that's what I did. It took a good 25-30 minutes for the apricots to cook through and get a little soft. The apricots aren't peeled, so if you have pre-made jam, this is a pretty quick and easy recipe. It was about as good as you would think, which is to say Holy Cow that is one tasty tart! I will be making it again, and soon. Next up, I think I may need to try this recipe. 

I have a whole bunch of recommendations for you in this post, but mostly I want to talk about the book in the photo up there. I was quite lucky to be offered a copy from the publisher to read and review quite a little while ago, and I finally managed to site down and read last weekend. 

The Butcher and the Vegetarian was written by Tara Austen Weaver, author of the lovely Tea and Cookies blog, which I don't know how I've missed all this time, but it's now bookmarked in my cooking folder. In her book she tells her story of her encounters with meat (recommended by her doctor to help her overcome some health issues) after a lifetime as a vegetarian. There are a lot of books out there these days about our food supply and eating responsibly, and I've found some of them to be rather preachy and alarmist, but this was much different. Tara is very balanced in her book, and she writes with warmth and a little self-deprecating humor that I really connected with. I have actually been thinking about eating less meat, and eating better, more humanely raised meat when I do. I especially liked the sections  where she visited some smaller farms where the farmers are doing just that, and I definitely want to start looking for some sources for those types of products in my area. I was just the sort of thing I've been wanting to learn more about.

I think a lot of this thinking on my part has come from having my chickens for the last three and a half years. I love gathering and cooking their eggs, knowing that they spend their days wandering wherever they please, pecking and scratching and eating a diet with such variety. Those girls are spoiled, I tell you. They get fruit and vegetable scraps from the little café at work, all sorts of bugs, a handful of scratch every morning, and also their regular chicken feed. When I hear about factory egg farms, and how the birds are treated I know I never want to have a store bought egg again. 

So anyway, I highly recommend The Butcher and the Vegetarian, it's a good read, particularly if you are thinking about improving the way you eat.

So here are some other things I recommend right now:

• In my continuing quest to drink more water, I've started filling a pitcher with water filtered in our Brita filter and then adding ribbons of cucumber sliced lengthwise and a few sprigs of mint. So much better than plain! I'm not sure why, but I think it is much more thirst quenching.
• Netflix has all eight seasons of McLeod's Daughters, and I've been totally addicted. It's an Australian series about a bunch of women ranchers. I have to say, however, it went downhill into soap opera territory the last couple seasons. I loved the first three seasons the best. 
• I've reviewed a lot of cooking apps for the iPhone over at APPlesauce, and now that I've been trying them all out for a little while, the Epicurious app seems to be winning as my favorite. It's free, which of course earns it bonus points, but I would have paid for it if I had to. 
• My current favorite podcast (well, videocast, really) is Working Class Foodies. They're quick, just six or eight minutes, and full of all sorts of delicious recipes and tips, and everything is fresh but also cheap.

  

 
 
I bought some tiny Forelle pears, just because they were so pretty. 

Oh how I love summer fruit. Most of the time I just like eating it as is, but I seem to have developed a weekend baking habit. Actually, I made one of these cherry tarts on a weekday, but that was for a farewell lunch at work, so it's not really the same thing at all, right? So, about these cherry tarts…the first one I made following this recipe exactly. It was quite good, although not spectacular, and was quickly consumed by my co-workers, much to the disappointment of Mr. HeyLucy. So I promised to make another one for him, only this time I decided to make it even better. I used mascarpone instead of cream cheese, and added a little lemon zest and juice to the creamy filling at the very end. I also brushed the cherries with cherry preserves, rather than raspberry, because that's what I had and it just seemed to make more sense. Strangely, the original recipe called for a six ounce package of cream cheese. Silly Martha, everywhere I looked, cream cheese is usually in eight ounce packages. I thought the mascarpone version was pretty perfect, very light and creamy. The lemon added a nice bit of tang. I am quite pleased with my adjustments. Also, it's just really pretty, no? 

Our air conditioner is currently refusing to come on before 8:30 pm, so I've been busy cleaning up the porch and making it into a couple extra rooms. It gets the morning sun, but it's lovely and shady the rest of the day. Things will be re-arranged throughout the summer, but I spent a good part of my afternoon here, reading a good book. I planted some lavender and mint in the pot in the corner. The chickens haven't discovered it yet. I'm also working on painting a table and set of chairs. One day I'd love to find a daybed, so we can really stretch out and relax.

I never thought about it before, but we use a lot of herbs and spices when we cook around here. Maybe it's because Mr. HeyLucy is trying to consume less sodium, or maybe our taste buds are just dim and need more spice to wake them up these days. Whatever the case, the spice cupboard was out of hand. I had most things in little metal watchmaker's tins, which look quite nice. Once upon a time I had big plans to hang up a magnetic bar to hold them, so they'd be right at our fingertips whenever we needed them. There were just a few problems with that scenario. I'd need at least five bars to hold everything. The lids on some of the tins were loose, and would be prone to falling off if they were hung vertically. And it was just too darn hard to find what we were looking for in all those stacks of identical tins. Also, I buy most of my herbs and spices in bulk, so I was constantly filling those little plastic bags too full, so when I got home, only about half would fit and the shelf was filling up with bags, tins, and spicy dust. 

So. I decided to re-do the whole mess. I raided our drawer of jars (Mr. HeyLucy likes jars, and would like to save them all. I suppose I should be grateful in this case), and headed to World Market to stock up on some more from their selection of 99 cent spice jars.

I had some label rubber stamps from way back, so I just stamped them and cut them out and glued them to the jars. It's nothing fancy, but it was a very satisfying craft project. Our shelf of herbs and spices is so pretty now, and things are much easier to find. 

 

I think this may turn into a cooking blog for the summer. I've been making so many delicious things (if I do say so myself). This weekend there was a pie, one of the best I've ever tried.

 

I used this recipe, and I highly recommend it. I left out the kirch, and I cheated and used pre-made pie crust from Trader Joe's. I was so happy to find the crusts in the freezer section, all rolled out in perfect circles, with an ingredient list that wasn't much more than flour and butter. I make good pie crust, but it's so messy and I just don't enjoy it, so I've seldom made pies. I think that is about to change. The filling was sweet and tart at the same time, neither overwhelming the other. My nectarines weren't very ripe, but it still worked. 

And one last photo, because it's still peony season. 

Number one: I'm pretty sure rhubarb season is just about over, but I've made this rhubarb compote twice, swapping vanilla for the orange liquer, and it was delicious and super easy.

My favorite way to enjoy it is like this: 

With a some Greek yogurt and granola. I was eating for breakfast, but it was such a treat, I've started having it for dessert.

Number two: I've been trying to drink more water and less diet coke. But plain water is boring, so I've been making lots of iced herbal teas. I funnel it into this pretty bottle, and take it to work. In no time at all I can drink the whole 750 ml. I had a little Monin raspberry syrup in the cupboard, and added a tiny bit to some ginger tea. Another nice combination was ginger tea with lemon and mint. 

Number three: I tend to have insomnia, and now that the sun is coming up even earlier, it's a struggle to sleep past 5 or 6 o'clock. I have never, ever been a morning person, but I've decided to let my insomnia work for me. Instead of tossing and turning I've just been getting up and puttering around the house. Of course this means I have to work on going to bed earlier. I've managed to be in bed before 11, but I need to work up to 10 0'clock. I'm slowly getting some serious spring cleaning done in these early morning hours.

 

 So far I've managed to transplant some herbs one morning, cleaned and organized my shelf of spices (more on that later) and my shelf of baking items, and made a dent in a pile of ironing. All before work!  

Some good things in my world right now:

There are four ducklings all together, two khaki campbells and two cayugas. They are from a straight run, so we don't know if they are male or female, but I'm hoping that we have at least a couple girls so we can have duck eggs. I'll tell you more soon, they're keeping me quite busy at the moment.

Also, it's one of the best times of the year, peony season!

I mentioned this book a little while ago, and this past week I just went to town with the bread baking. I think I've figured out this yeast thing, and I'm so happy about it! After a little research I decided to try reducing the amount of yeast I used just a little bit because we are at a higher altitude (4000 feet above sea level, to be exact). I made the basic boule recipe from the book, and used half all-purpose flour and half white whole wheat flour. It was just a little denser than I had hoped, but really delicious. I think the denseness was probably because of the wheat flour, and I can live with that. I made it seem very artisanal and peasant-y. So, with one recipe, you can basically make four loaves of bread. Here's what I ended up with: first was just your basic boule. We sliced and ate half of it just with butter and honey.

The rest of the loaf was sliced and torn into pieces which I added to simple green salads for our lunches one day (red leaf lettuce, tomatoes, avocado, sun dried tomatoes and a little asiago cheese) tossed with a balsamic vinaigrette (grainy dijon mustard, olive oil, garlic, herbes de Provence and balsamic vinegar). It was so good, I need to remember to make it again soon.

Then I baked some little baguettes and made sandwiches with grilled eggplant, roasted red peppers, sun-dried tomatoes, feta and arugula. Dressed with just olive oil and vinegar, they were also really delicious. I didn't get pictures, but they were also very pretty sandwiches. The sturdiness of the bread held up well with the juiciness of the filling ingredients. Mr. HeyLucy said it was one of the best sandwiches he's had, which is pretty high praise, coming from a carnivore like him.

Next up was pita bread. I should have probably done several smaller pitas, but I made one big one. It just took a few minutes to bake, and it was amazing the way it just puffed up.

 

Isn't it pretty? It was so big I sliced it into quarters. I made myself a breakfast sandwich with scrambled eggs, cheese, salsa, and sour cream. Mr. Heylucy made himself a sandwich of cucumbers, tomatoes and feta cheese. 

Last night I used the last of that batch to make a pizza. Topped with bleu cheese, Canadian bacon, sliced apples and caramelized shallots, it was perfect (I was inspired by this tart from the Artisan Bread website). I also served it with arugula dressed simply with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and freshly ground pepper, and just piled it on top of the pizza. It was so delicious. I want to make it again very soon. 

I can't recommend Artisan Bread in Five Minutes enough. I've already got another batch in the refrigerator, just waiting to be baked. I may never buy bread again. 
 
  
 I also wanted to add: there are a few things you will want to invest in, if you start baking bread regularly. I was lucky enough to get a pizza baking stone as a wedding present all those years ago, and a stone is really probably the most essential tool to have. I also did get a pizza peel, which is great for sliding breads (especially flatbreads) into the oven. I found it at World Market for about $15. I also have a dough scraper, which was just a few dollars at Target. Other then those items (and a container for storing your dough, of course), you can get started pretty quickly. I just mix up the dough with a wooden spoon, right in the big plastic lidded bowl I use to store it in.