I thought I’d throw this picture up for my three daughters who all love apple pie ala mode… but then — I guess — who doesn’t? This is actually my favorite version of apple pie with a topping of glazed nuts ( easy to do yourself) plus sugar,butter, flour and some spices. I like to use Pine nuts and Pecans.
This ice cream is a bit unique in that its butterfat content is very high… which if you didn’t already know makes ice cream yummy… but also a bit challenging to make as it takes much longer to set up! Most French Vanilla Ice Cream recipes call for an extraordinary amount of egg yolks… and we like to make ours fairly traditional. We use vanilla beans, and some folks like to also add a splash of brandy … I couldn’t resist using a few teaspoons of Amarula…. purely for medicinal reasons.
So, Kristin & Karen… this awaits you next time you find your way here. 🙂
I am sorry if I seem cynical, it isn’t my nature, but I am reading about the budget woes of Cal Poly State University in San Luis Obispo and from what I can see they have hired two more ‘administrators.’ Doesn’t sound like a problem to me… at least for administrators.
Cal Poly is not alone, the entire State University system has gone crazy in their pursuit of building little administrative empires. Forbes.com just published a fascinating article on what they call “Bureaucratic U.”
Here are a couple of excerpts:
The ballooning of college administration has resulted in a sharp decline in labor productivity at colleges during a period of technological advancement that has improved productivity in most other industries. It has also occurred at a time when students are getting less for their money: Instruction has shifted from full-time professors to underpaid and overworked adjunct faculty. Three-fourths of new instructor jobs created over the past 20 years have been part-time positions. If the employment trends of the last decade are sustained, then administrative employees will outnumber instructors at four-year colleges by 2014.
Did you know that an academic dean at a doctoral institution receives a median salary of $190,000 (plus generous fringe benefits) or that the median salary of an assistant dean is above $116,000? The College & University Professional Association for Human Resources found that last year senior administrators recorded a third consecutive year of 4% pay increases and a twelfth consecutive year of pay increases above inflation. Nearly 10% of the 425,000 administrative and support staff employees at 272 research institutions earned a salary above $100,000 last year, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
So, did you know that all of the discussion has surrounded cutting faculty and nothing has been offered regarding administration reductions.
Oh yeah, I forgot… they hired more administrators at Cal Poly.
This year our apple tree is being very productive and the age old question I am asked is ‘can you have too many apple pies?’ The answer is a simple one… you freeze the ones you make until there is no more room … then you eat what’s left over!
Tough job this ‘eatingapple pie thing’… but someone’s got to do it! I plan to have one ‘a la mode’ this weekend. 😉 Oh yeah, I am making the ice cream ,too.
Well, it’s pie making season again and our first apple pie of the year was sent to the freezer with a seasoned sugar crust. Personally, I like a strudel or cobbler style topping … but I am sure there will be plenty of apples for all sorts of uses!
Laura’s cooking away on her apple sauce… so all’s right in the world!
It would be very pretentious to talk about my vineyard — which in reality is but one giant Concord Grape vine ( with a 6″ diameter base) flowing continuously over a large arbor. However, I find them enjoyable… especially toward the end when I leave a few on the vine to ‘gewurtz’… to ripen fully and become wonderfully sweet.
This year I am debating whether or not to make wine or jelly and it depends on whether or not we snack on them along the way. The interesting thing is a basic batch of wine requires far less Concord Grapes than regular California grapes… many recipes start off with multiples of 6 pounds of Concord per 1 gallon of water… whereas most other grapes skip the water and use just 20 pounds of grapes.
One good thing may come out of this economy and that is more folks will have to learn to do things themselves… cook, raise their own food and make wine!
