Tuesday

Farm Roasted Chicken

There are few dinners more farmhouse classic than the chicken in a pot or Farm Roasted Chicken.   It's simple flavors combine to be what we call God's meal.  What I love is how it looks like you have prepared something so special, but secretly you know it took less than twenty minutes and just a few ingredients.  It makes you a hero!


To make the perfect Farm Roasted Chicken you need to purchase a whole chicken.  Look for one that is plump and fresh.  Bring it home and unwrap it.  Clean it with fresh water and make sure there aren't any pin feathers.  Preheat your oven to 425 degrees.   Get out a large dutch oven or a large flat roasting pan.  

Bring together a lemon or a lime.  Some flaky salt and pepper.  Some soft butter.  A cluster of garlic, and a bunch of fresh thyme.  Reach inside the chicken cavity and make sure you remove any "extras" they might package in there such as the heart, liver etc.   Run the inside of the cavity with two teaspoons of flaky salt and a half a teaspoon of fresh ground pepper.  Quarter the lemon or lime and add to the cavity along with the thyme.  Slice the garlic cloves and add to the cavity.  Using some kitchen twine, tie the legs together to help keep the juices in the breast meat.


Place in your roasting pan or Dutch oven and rub with softened butter and run in a teaspoon of flaky salt and ground pepper.  Using butter helps to make the skin brown and become crispy.  You'll love it!  Add rough cut root vegetable like, potatoes, carrots, parsnips, leeks, etc.  Add a cup of chicken broth. around the veggies.  


Place in a preheated 425 oven and bake for an hour and a half.  Bring out of the oven and let rest for 20.  This allows the juices to pull into the white meat and make it buttery good.  I like to add a little butter to the drippings with the vegetables and stir around until the juices thicken into a gravy without flour (gluten free).  If you wanted to add a little flour and heat into a gravy you could and it would be thick fabulousness.

You can see in the pictures above I had to snitch a piece of the skin off the leg.  It was unbelievable.  Crispy with golden butter and a hint of salt and pepper.  How can something so simple be oh that good?  Pull off the drumsticks, legs, and slice the breasts.  Any leftovers can be pulled and refrigerated, and I will tell you, it's even better the next day.

I hope this post helps inspire you to purchase a whole bird and enjoy every bit of the experience of making something so humble and good.

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Monday

Harvest Star and Black Eyed Susan Patterns

You have been asking for a couple of years when we would release the patterns for the Harvest Star and the Black Eyed Susan Barn Quilt, and today if the day they are completed and in The Shop.  This was for sure one of those patterns that was worth the wait.  We were so happy to add full color diagrams and templates to these two patterns and to offer them as a PDF Download for those of you who can not wait for snail mail.


Each of the patterns has the color design diagram, a black and white diagram template, a Prairie Paints color pallet and our step by step guide to painting a barn quilt.  These patterns will fit any size barn quilt you are wanting to paint from the itty bitty to the "momma pull over the car" size.


You can find them in The Shop this week during our Spring Sale where everything is 20% off with no code needed & free shipping too!  We hope you love these patterns as much as we love them!  They are a joy to paint and we'll let you in on a little secret...the fabric quilt patterns are in the works and with testers as we speak...or write!


But beyond sales and new products we hope you are all hanging in there through this Covid quarantine time.  We miss seeing all of you at workshops and classes, but we know we will be be back together soon.  Please stay healthy and happy, and keep finding something everyday to celebrate, dream and create.  

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Friday

Keep Your Face to the Sun

Keep Your Face to the Sun and You'll Never See the Shadows, is one of my favorite embroidery patterns.  It was designed about twelve years ago for a young friend who had lost her mother to cancer.  As she was trying to figure out how to make choices that each young adult gets to make, we would talk about this saying and that the "shadows" were fear and the "sun" was the love around her.


Last week the image of my original sampler for this design popped up into my personal Facebook feed at a particular moment when I was feeling a bit overwhelmed with worry about our current situation with Covid19.   It was a sign and a message from my past and brought me comfort in the remembrance that we can get through any tough time by focusing our attention on love.   

I am so happy to share this pattern with you at no cost.  It is a simple stitch to make, the more primitive the sweeter the message looks.  All of the letters are stitched in a simple Backstitch, and I purposefully allowed for my lives to not match to give it a more primitive look.   


In addition to the lettering being primitive, I added scraps of fabric in an overlay method of Sashiko Stitching to look tattered, mended and loved.  To add the scraps of fabric to the base piece of fabric, I used a little glue stick and glued the fabric in place and let it dry prior to stitching.  I added rough dashes and x's to the patches and then stitched the sun and flower stems over the patches.  


It is a simple pattern to stitch and helped my get me mind off of things.  I often share about celebrating, dreaming and creating.  Sometimes the creating comes first in just making something that is familiar like baking bread, or gardening, or simple no-thinking stitching.  This is for you.


To get the pattern for this stitch, shoot me an email at tweetledeedesigns@gmail.com and I will send you the PDF for the artwork and the instructions for the stitching.  My gift to you!  I am also making up kits for the Prim Stitch version of this pattern complete with painted buttons and everything you need to make it.  Just go to Our Shop to get your order in.  I think I have enough fabric and goodies to put together 15 kits.

I hope that you have made it through another week healthy and hanging in there.  There really is no magic cure to this situation for any of us, other than to focus on love, one day at a time.  You are all in our prayers and thoughts.  Elbow bumps and blown kisses.  xo
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Wednesday

Homestead 80/20 Bread

With the extra meals being prepared at home now, we have brought out our family's favorite recipes to bring a little extra comfort.  For me there is just about nothing more comforting that a hot slice of homemade bread slathered with butter.  My hubs loves to slather his in honey, but that is another story.

I learned how to make bread on our farm as a little girl.  It's funny how many skills you lean on when you can't go to a grocery store or restaurant for your meals.   My grandma had this huge, deep, metal, hand-crank bread maker.  I loved turning the handle to knead the bread.  The best type of bread was a mixture of wheat and white.  I love to call it my 80/20 bread.  


I love the texture of this bread with 80% enriched baking 20% fresh ground wheat.  If you don't have the ability to grind your own wheat, you can find 100% ground whole wheat in most baking sections of stores.  The other ingredients are so easy and simple.  I do want to add a link for my favorite flour.  I absolutely love Big J Milling , Golden Loaf Baking Flour.  It is so good!  Everything I make with it is light and perfect in texture.  


Homestead 80/20 Bread

3 cups of warm water
3 Tbs Olive Oil
2 Tbs Honey
1 Teas. Flaky Salt
2 1/2 Fast Rising Yeast

Mix together is a mixer or large bowl.

Slowly add 2 cups of Whole Wheat Flour mix together.  Add 3 cups of flour one cup at a time.  Mix together and switch to your kneading attachment if using a mixer.  Add the last two cups of flour if needed.  Up to 7 cups total.  Add a little Olive Oil if you thing the dough is too dry.  The dough should be soft and slightly sticky.  Preheat over to 375 degrees.

Let the dough rise for a half hour, divide into two halves.  Spray a loaf baking pan and form the dough halves into loaf shape and carefully lift into pan.  Tap the pan on the bottom to remove any air bubbles.  Let rise 15 minutes.  

Bake for 15 to 20 minutes.  Remove from oven and brush with butter or olive oil.  Enjoy with a slather of butter.

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