Twisted Twigs

Twisted-looking twigs

Like sculpted antelope horns

Greet me in the woods.

Junco Party

These little minxes won't let me get near enough to photograph their gatherings - they all take off in a fluster. So, unfortunately I had to resort to 'armchair photography' and only had one visitor come within range through the window.

A Bunch o'Crock

Even though I leave my butter out of the fridge in winter, it is still not spreadable on bread. I looked around and read about how the French use water around their butter crocks or butter bells to keep the butter soft. It sounded like a reasonable workaround, except that I wasn't prepared to mess around with repackaging/scooping the butter into a bell-shaped dish and then placing it upside down into water. 

I found this one online that is effectively one dish that will take an ordinary shaped piece of butter, sitting over a larger crock that has water in it. I ordered it to give it a try ...

I thought it would work, in theory, if the French bell crock worked, but I was wrong. We couldn't detect any difference in spread-ability between this specially housed slab of butter and my regular butter dish without a watery base. 

Here are the 3 pieces of the set

Very disappointing.

Wait, What?

 I came across this very disturbing image in a Food magazine last week.

I don't know about you, but this looks rather risqué to me. Am I the only one with a one-track mind?

The text next to it claims it's a Copper Salt Mill - not a good look!