Glogg recipe

This is something I’ve made for years and years.  Be careful drinking it!  It will hit you like a sledgehammer.  A delicious, Swedish, Yuletide sledgehammer.

Glogg

Heat one bottle dry red wine with one sliced orange, 3/4 cups raisins, 1/2 cup blanched almonds, 6 cardamom pods, 5 cloves, and a cinnamon stick. (spices should be tied in cheesecloth to be removed before drinking)

In another saucepan, combine a bottle of brandy and a pound of sugar. Heat a little, then flame the brandy to melt the sugar. (This is where I invariably set something- a spoon, kitchen towel, the counter- on fire).

When the sugar has completely dissolved and the flame is extinguished, mix the mixture with the wine.

Spoon into mugs with an orange slice, a few raisins, and almonds in each glass.

Français : Verre de vin chaud (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Krampusnacht in Austria

Krampusnacht in Austria

LOVE the pics in this piece.  I have got to make it to Austria some November.

Yule and mistletoe

So, yeah.  We’re making a go of this incense thing.  I’ve been making incense for the sabbats anyways, and one of my favorite parts is gathering the ingredients.  For Samhain, we gathered fresh cypress needles from a cemetery.  They were LOVELY.  They really made the incense pop.

For Yule, we began scanning the landscape for mistletoe.  I’ve gathered some in the past, but this was Bear’s first go.  He scouted out the perfect candidates, and we collected quite the haul on the full moon.

Mistletoe haul

This was another instance where it’s good to have the tall husband.  And it really does add a great green note to the incense.  Again, I’m not going to reveal my full recipe, but we did use colophony pine resin from Portugal and some great spices.

Attached to an ornamental pear tree of some sort

The ingredients for the kyphi are coming together nicely too.  We made a trip to the international market, and I found beautiful golden raisins and dried dates to use.  I was looking for galangal root, but all I found was galangal powder.  So I’ll be doing some looking.

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On the home front, my uncle passed away.  It seems like people are dropping like flies, and it’s happening faster and faster.  That makes 7 in 2.5 years.  It sucks, and I’m feeling kind of disconnected right now.  I’m focusing on incense and Yule, and trying to make this a good Yule for myself, Bear, and J.  Hopefully it will be great.

I’m going within, and it’s nice.

Please pay special attention to Abercrombie boy.  He’s my favorite.  🙂

 

Samhain, Rememberance, Yule presents, and NaNoWriMo

Sorry I’ve been quiet.  The death of my ex hit me pretty hard, and I haven’t done a lot of anything, including NaNoWriMo.  I’m at roughly 1900 words, and it’s day 7.  I need to decide to either catch up or give up.  I’m not going to be hard on myself either way, I’m just going to see how much writing I CAN get done.  It would be great to finish the last 35K of my first book before the end of the year.

Samhain was relatively low key.  We were babysitting some rats for a couple that Bear met on Reddit, and they came over to visit their kids.  We invited them to share some of the corn chowder I made, and we had a great time shooting the shit.  It turns out that we all have loads in common, though they’re a bit younger.   So I didn’t get to do some big ritual like I had planned, but it was very nice and mellow, and was exactly what I needed.

One thing I DID do, however, was to write letters to both my ex and my father.  The letter to my ex was mostly an apology for not getting to see him more.  The letter to my dad was..  Well…  Angry.  I got to say a lot of things that I needed to get off of my chest.  It was very cruel, very honest, and very cathartic.  I intended to burn them, but didn’t get to it until tonight.  It was nice to watch the flame spread over the paper and let go of the things I needed to let go of.

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I finally feel like Samhain tide is over, and now I’m starting to think about Yule.  I have plans for my altar, and I’ve already started looking for what I want.  I can’t afford the ingredients for the incense yet, but I know what I’ll be using.

After reading this post by The Witch of Forest Grove, I realized that I wanted to make Yule presents.  I haven’t done that in quite some time, and I truly didn’t have any better ideas.  I can only give so many people so many damn candles before they start throwing them at me.

So this Yule, I decided to make liquers.  I do this by infusing cheap vodka with various fruits and herbs, and I’ve done it a few times before.  It’s been a while, however.  So this year, I decided to give it a shot again, and also try some new things.  For my first experiment, I infused the vodka with roasted pumpkin and Werther’s Originals candies.  I wanted a rich butterscotch flavor, and it really does come out.  It’s been infusing for maybe 20 days now, and I’m going to strain it and add more roasted pumpkin.  The candies were interesting to work with, however, as they contain quite a lot of fat.  That fat separated and created an interesting look.  Nothing smells rancid or iffy at all so far.

 

Pumpkin butterscotch liquer

 

I have plans for two other batches.  One will be elderberry/mandarin orange and the other will be lavender/lemon/vanilla.  I just need to save the cash for the vodka.  Even cheap vodka is expensive when you’re using this much of it.

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So, new words written since my last post: 1900
Writing goal: Do the terrible thing to the character I really like so that the story can close  *sigh*