Thank you so much to Noel and W. for working on the new design for GWAC. I’m so blessed to have your pearly and flowery artistic muscles behind all this. Thank God I have you guys. For all the crafts I do, I can’t draw to save my life. Take, for example, my attempt to draw the two of you:

See?!?

Salamat guid sa tanan tanan! Thank you for everything!

I owe you cookies.

For the longest time, I’ve had a master wishlist of things to bake/cook. Like anyone interested in baking and cooking, I have an ever-evolving, gargantuan list of all of my want-to-bakes: French macarrons, Sans Rival, Buche De Noel, petit fours, panettone, panna cotta, a proper English trifle, buko pie like the ones they used to sell in El Ideal in Silay City…the list is as long as my memories of food (and those are historically plentiful.)

But, there’s a Special List. I’ve started calling it the Dandelion List, because when I get the chance to wish on a dandelion, more often than not, I will wish for the gumption to start making the things on this list. It’s been in my head since I was 12 years old, when I first made a cake all by myself (an all-together-too-rich butter cake with buttercream frosting from Let’s Cook With Nora). I realized then that maybe if I gave baking a chance it would do me the same favor, so I’ve been baking (and wishing) ever since.

The Dandelion List is different because it’s made up of dishes from the wonderful cooks in my family – on both Mama’s and Papa’s sides. These are the legendary recipes that I’ve had to think twice about recreating. Why? Because there are delicious standards to live up to! And I often feel that a successful dish doesn’t just depend on a tried-and-true recipe, but on the person wielding the wooden spoon. If it’s your signature dish, no one can quite make it like you. Cooking is a science, yes, but it’s partly magic as well. As the cook, you impart your own brand of sorcery to any dish you make.

But I DO want to try, even if these talented cooks set the bar pretty high. Because I often think about how the hands that made those dishes were fashioned from the same genetic cloth as my own. The attempt is my way of honoring not just the culinary history that’s so much a part of my family names, but the potential in me to bake as well as they can.

So, here is the GWAC’s Dandelion List Of Deliciousness. One that I hope to tackle, one cup of flour (or rice!) at a time.

       The GWAC’s Dandelion List Of Deliciousness

Lola Pin’s Daffodil Cake

Tia Minda’s Parker House Rolls

Auntie Betty’s White Chocolate Raspberry Cake

Manang Cynthia’s Empanadas

Lola Pin’s Sago Pudding with Meringue

Mama’s Hopia

Tia Minda’s Orange Chiffon Cake

Manang Flo-Flo’s Siakoy

Mama’s Callos

Tito Boy’s Tuna Ceviche

Tito Boy’s Paella

Lola Pin’s Fresh Pineapple Candy

P.S. The yellow dandelion image you see above is actually beautiful fabric that the UK company St Jude’s carries. They have the prettiest fabric with eclectic designs made by their own roster of artists. Another great craftster resource is the St Jude blog All Things Considered, with art news and design ideas from that country across the way, one I hope to visit some day.

There’s this TVC for HP Printers with Gwen Stefani that’s grown on me. It was released last year but I’ve been catching it on TV a lot these past few days. Makes the craftster in me say, “I know what she means.”

Official website HERE.

The site has many fun things to do, like custom-make your own greeting cards, CD covers and mini posters with designs by Gwen. So much to do with all these do-it-yourself printables. Not only are they free, but the possibilities are endless.

Just imagine this on an apron (through the wonders of photo transfer paper):

Or this on an oversized tote bag (a chica way to lug groceries?):

On the site, you can even make a Harajuku-inspired paper doll version of yourself.

This is me. Teehee.

Happy Harajuku days to you!

There may be many dinnerware companies and brands out there (just browse through these dizzying collections from Martha Stewart, Pottery Barn and Crate & Barrel,) but Corelle holds top spot in my heart.

Growing up, I ate the best meals on Corelle plates. Mama had (and still has) an almost pious devotion to the brand and sent them whenever she could from the US. She believed that only Corelle could withstand the rigorous cross-continental trek in a Balikbayan Box from Los Angeles, CA to Victorias, Negros Occidental. And she was right. Through all those years, we never received a broken plate, cup, saucer or bowl as we unearthed the treasures from those brown boxes. That was good, and not just because nothing was wasted — broken plates were believed to be a sign of ill luck. I don’t know if the superstition is specifically an Illonggo one, but I have strong memories of it growing up. I remember always being somehow relieved whenever there were no broken plates hiding between the Spam and the Betty Crocker Devil’s Food Cake Mix in those boxes!

We ate a lot so we wore those plates out. These days, we still have Corelle in the house, but I have a sentimental attachement to the Corelle pattern of my childhood, Old Town Blue, which is the image above. They don’t manufacture it anymore and whenever I see it in flea markets, it always tugs at my memories like a child at her mother’s apron strings.

The company now makes many new, hip designs and in more modern shapes, too. Whole new sets to fall in love with! My favorites:

Vintage Lace

Whimsical Dots

Kitu

Here’s hoping your plates remain whole — and brimming with good memories.

I love this cartoon! And it has nothing to do at all with this post, but it’s so darn funny I decided to include it anyway.

I’ve decided that the GWAC blog is going to host something called the “I/C Project Series.”

I/C stands for Inspiration/Creation.

I often find that the memory of a good meal, a photo, a person or an interesting piece of artwork sets me off on a crazy, crafty, cook-y ride. I have fun translating those into my crafts and baking, by taking a flavor, a color, a smell–any aspect of the original piece that appeals to me–and reworking it into a project. The end result is something handcrafted that (hopefully) celebrates some elements of the original piece, but now with a curly twist!

I’ve shortened the words “inspiration” and “creation” to “I/C” as a pun for “I see” (yay, puns!), and also because they were too long and sounded a bit Hallmark-y in the first place. Tee hee.

I hope to encourage the craftster in you to take in and appreciate those details in your everyday life that have the potential to take you on a creative journey. There’s so much you can draw from—your own history, the travels you take, even your daily routine.

Let’s get started with my first I/C project, a croquembouche-inspired chocolate cake, pictures of which you’ll see above.

I hope you set off on your own I/C ideas too!

I’m a frustrated dressmaker, and I say this because the most complicated things I can sew well are drawstring jammies or skirts. Sewing zippers terrifies and fascinates me at the same time, and it’s this kind of interest in clothes construction that makes me ferret out designers and costumers, if only to look at their pieces and marvel at how talented they are.

I’ve been stalking Jaqueline Durran online ever since I saw the green dress she designed for Keira Knightley’s character Cecilia Tallis from the movie Atonement.

It appears in the movie only about a fourth of the film’s running time, but it’s the one thing I remember visually. Granted, a LOT happens to Cecilia in this dress (watch the movie!), but I think it’s more because of how rich that green is.

Green is my favorite color and before the dress above, my favorite green movie outfit was this one, worn by Estella in the fountain scene of Cuaron’s Great Expectations:

But just look at how stunning THIS dress is:

Ah, lovely. If you look closely, there’s delicate cutwork on her neckline and all that graceful drapery around her hips.

What’s even more fascinating is the story of how Jaqueline Durran, who was nominated for an Academy Award for the costumes in this film, found the perfect shade of green. After poring through all the green silk and organza in London, she zeroed in on three choices: a lime-green silk, a black and green organza and another type of green chiffon. A master dyer studied the swatches and special-dyed 100 yards of plain white fabric into the combination of all those hues.

And no wonder I was drawn to Durran’s costumes. She also designed those in another film I love, Pride & Prejudice:

And she assisted my costume hero, Trisha Biggar, for Star Wars Episode II:

In a parallel universe, I’m a costume designer who has yards of special fabric at her disposal and can pleat and smock and construct corsets with my eyes closed.

In this lifetime, though, I still can’t do a decent zipper! Tutorials for cookies, anyone?

I don’t know why I alliterate so much. I just noticed how much of it I do on this blog. How strange. At least it’s better than rhyming, that’s what I say.

Anyhow, Toni of Wifely Steps tagged me with the 123 Book Tag.

Rules:
1) Pick up the nearest book of at least 123 pages.

2) Open the book to page 123.

3) Find the fifth sentence.

4) Post the next three sentences.

5) Tag five people. (Do I even KNOW five people with blogs?)

Sadly, I don’t have some groundbreaking piece of literature to wow you with. I don’t even have a cookbook nearby! The nearest grab-able book I have is this:

The Chicago Manual of Style: The Essential Guide for Writers, Editors, and Publishers (14th Edition)

Not as exciting as Toni’s The Other Boleyn Girl! I use this for work but have a copy at home. I know it sounds horribly academic, but it’s actually an invaluable resource for anyone who writes, copy edits and proofreads. A tome for nerds.

Here are the sentences from page 123, following the rules of the tag:

“Blueprints (“blues”), vandykes (brown prints), and silver prints are all different forms of photographic prints made from the negatives that are to be used in offset printing. They do not show the quality of image to be attained in the final printing, but they provide a means of checking the accuracy of the contents. As with repro, the editor should check to see that all parts are in place and all previous corrections have been made.”

Zzzz. Maybe I should have picked the second closest book, Sex And The Single Witch (!), given to me by my friend Kim, who is a witch in her own way. Haha.

I’m tagging: Via (You haven’t blogged in a while!), Mitzi (Ikaw din.), Jen (What are we doing for your birthday?), Jazz (Since you probably have all those feminist books on your nightstand.) and Vicky (Bakit hindi tayo nagkita nung Christmas ha?).

So, GWAC is at its new address. I’m still getting used to being here, so if you see bugs and stuff, think back to the day you first handled yarn and a crochet hook. Unless your first name is Martha and your last is Stewart, I don’t think crochet came that easily (well, now, maybe Martha didn’t sail through it at first either!) I was getting a wee bit frustrated at learning all the ins and outs of Wordpress because I wanted to get things up and running all in one night. But I realized that getting accustomed to this odd language is really like learning a new craft. Patience, patience, patience. If I can devote six hours to baking and decorating a cake, I can do this!

I’m operating on a bare-bones template for now, but there’s newer, curlier stuff to come!

Thank you again to Noel for the heavy lifting and for convincing me to migrate over.

And thanks to you for following me to my new home.

And thanks to the month of April, for coming just in time.

Flour prices in the US more than doubled in the past month. This means that all types of baked goods—from cupcakes to pizza—are going to cost you more per bite.

Heard this all on CNN yesterday and was quite dismayed by the news. This impacts home bakers like me who will find pricier flour on grocery shelves.

This is all because of rising wheat prices in the US, owing partly to the increased demand for ethanol. (Ethanol is a substance derived from corn that has a myriad of uses, but mostly as a fuel.) Farmers are now planting more corn than wheat. And with the dollar’s poor showing in recent months, foreigners are turning to the US for their wheat needs. I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard that 59% of wheat produced in the US is EXPORTED, dwindling the supply here and puffing up prices like a properly made soufflé!

Globally, poor weather conditions didn’t help the growth of wheat crops around the world either. There was a winter freeze in the US and droughts in Australia and France.

A 50-pound bag of flour is now $37, up from $16 just four weeks ago. CNN tells the story of how such a jump in prices is affecting Manhattan pizzeria owner Joe Vicari, who feels bad for charging his “working people” customers $5 for two slices. I understand how Joe feels. If baking was where I got my dough (oh, the puns just keep coming), I would feel bad as well for making customers pay more for a cupcake or two. Someone who’s in the business of making money from baking/cooking has to love it fiercely. If their life’s purpose becomes less affordable for patrons to enjoy, then it just becomes, well, less purposeful.

I’m due for my next bag of flour and plan to monitor the prices over the next few weeks. Hunker down, bakers, we’ll pull through somehow!

When flour prices turn ridiculous, I’m just going to vent all this frustration into sewing projects. I have a lot cloth to work with from years of collecting a yard or two here and there. Oh, and some pretty Japanese paper! And yarn too! Ok, getting ahead of myself. Pulling back now. Haha.

For the CNN article on the flour fiasco, click HERE.

By the way, the poster above was an ad for Gold Medal brand flour in 1941 (I just love retro food packaging, don’t you?), the year when the company started enriching their flour, upping the thiamine content and adding calcium and iron to it. This was because studies at that time showed that millions of Americans were suffering from inadequate diets. Flour is such an integral part of nutrition and, on a deeper level, our palate’s memories the world over. I hope this whole thing blows over soon.

The crafting and cooking life is a crazy life if you don’t have an outlet for it. Ideas crowd your brain like the mosh pit at a Pearl Jam concert. The more obvious thing to do is to MAKE all of these ideas but there are only 24 hours in a day, and you only have two hands.

So you bide your time. You let the ideas pile up into big mounds of colored silk in your brain. You get by. But then you find yourself awake at 2 am in a foreign city (not good, because you don’t even know where you ARE when it happens.) What was that, you ask in the dark. The answer is an idea for a skirt, appearing to you from the ether, floating through the wispy levels of your sleep. On the way back home, you start seeing quilt patterns on the bathroom tiles in the airport. Finally, when you find yourself studying Japanese fabric patterns online at 6:30 am before you head off to work the day after your flight gets in, you realize you’re turning into a freak. A crafts freak.

So you decide to do something about it. Buy a notebook, write down all your ideas, flesh them out one by one. Sketch them out, even if you could never draw to save your life. And write about them, as much as you can.

You stop fighting your craftster self. You realize that you are, after all, the granddaughter of two amazing craftsters: one who could whip Swiss meringue into airy peaks by hand, and another who lived until she was 102 years old, quilting on a manual sewing machine up until she was 98.

So hello there, my craftster self. And hello to you.