I Scream, You Scream...

 I think I have mentioned that we are going through a bit of a heat wave here.  It breaks 90 each and every day, which doesn't seem like a lot when 100 and humid are were the norm growing up, but when there is no breeze and no air conditioning to be found, it is hot.  So we have been trying to keep cool as best we can.  Our pool is our usual go to, but right now it is being shocked back into health after contracting a fungus so I had to come up with something else.  And this really didn't help.  So we made ice cream!

Not much to it actually.  I improvised a bit since we didn't have any half and half but we did have crema espesa (a type of heavy cream) and I thought that would do.  I gathered ingredients, I gathered some measuring tools and I sat the girls down.

I measured.  They poured.

 And then I told them to put the small bag of cream, vanilla and sugar into the bag filled with ice and salt.  After it was tightly zipped, of course.  They didn't think I was serious.  And even as Stinkerbell was doing as I asked, she looked like she didn't believe that this was right. 

 I zipped the bags, handed one to each girl and told them to go wild.  They were pretty tame at first.  But when I showed them what I meant by shaking the bags, they really got into it.  So much so that MadHatter actually split her outer bag and we had to get a new one.  

 It took a couple of minutes of shaking.  I think it took a lot less than normal because we started with a heavier (and much thicker) cream.  But what we got in the end really looked like ice cream...

 Now, I just had to hope it tasted like it because I promised the girls home made ice cream.

And her verdict was...

Awesome!  And she was so proud that she made it all by herself!

The picky one took a moment to decide but then I couldn't get a picture of her smiling at me to give me her verdict because she just kept shoveling it in...

 I broke out the Magic Shell and made it a real treat.  

I think we found a new treat.  And we beat the heat. 

An Innovative way to Beat this Heat

Here is an innovative way to beat the heat that we are experiencing here in Chile.  You post video's of your girls skiing.  All those mittens and heavy jackets.  All that snow, it has to make you cooler, right?  Worth a shot...

Stinkerbell getting all set for her first time on the slopes.

Stinkerbell on her first lift ride.

Stinkerbell SKIING!

MadHatter on her ski's.  She is getting so good.

A chat with MadHatter.

The day we became Oenologists

About a week ago, B's cousin's wife-to-be (got that?) texted me and asked what we were doing this past weekend.  We didn't have any real plans I told her so she asked if we would like to come with them on Saturday to a vineyard nearby and make our own bottle of wine, and have lunch.  She had me at wine...

Saturday morning we loaded the kids in the car and headed on a small road trip to the Colchagua Valley.  We had been here for a mini-vacation about a year and a half ago, but since this is one of the prime wine areas in Chile, we did not have a chance to see everything in the short three days we were there.  I was excited about going back since we were headed to MontGras Vineyards, a stop we hadn't had time to make on our last trip.  And we were going to do more than just take the tour and have lunch;  we were going to make our own bottle of wine too.

We arrived in time for our 12:30 tour.  Yep, in Chile you can't just walk in and taste.  You have to make an appointment and you have to take the tour.  Well, you don't have to, but if you would like to taste their wines you do.   Now, I have taken more wine tours here in Chile than I care to talk about.  More than I even care to remember.  But we weren't just there to taste, we were there to create.   They have a program that allows you to create your own bottle of red wine and take it home with you.  Skipping the tour sounded like a good option to me but we there for other reasons too.  See, F and L are getting married in July.  They wanted some engagement pictures taken - and perhaps a few to remember the day.

While we were waiting, the offered us a glass of their Rose.

She loves, loves, loves her Papa!

My girls like wine tours.  They get to picks some grapes and eat them.  They get to run in the open air.  They get to eat crackers and cookies to their hearts content.  They get to color while mom and dad taste wine.  Who wouldn't love it?

At the end of the tour they split us into those who were simply going to taste and those who were going to taste and create.  Those of us there to create got our own table set with 3 glasses each, a beaker, a funnel, a calculator and a pencil.  A calculator???  This involves math??? Hand me some wine, please.

We were then given instructions, and some wine...finally.  They filled our three glasses with a Merlot, a Carmenere, and a Cabernet Sauvignon.  Our instructions were to taste each varietal and determine the best mix for our own personal blend.

If we loved the Cab, but only slightly liked the Merlot, then make it a mostly Cab blend with a splash of Merlot and a modest amount of Carmenere.  The only caveat was that you had to mix at least two of the three.  Percentages were up to you.  So we tasted, we debated and then all four of us mixed completely different wines.  B loves the Carmenere hence his mix of 50% Carm, 40% Merlot and 10% Cab.  I, on the other hand, love Cab and Merlot so I mixed mine 40% each with a 20% Carm.  We tasted each others mixes just to see what the difference was.  Oh, who am I kidding, we drank them down. 

And all the while we were doing this, Stinkerbell was off coloring pictures in the adjacent wine cellar.  Wine just isn't her thing.  Yet.

And then came the math.  The beakers we were using at our tables were 100 ml.  The one we would be using to fill our bottle was 750 ml.  We had to convert the percentages from the smaller to the larger.  Thank goodness B is an engineer and can basically do Calculus in his head, much less simple conversions.

We grabbed our place mats that had our conversions on them and proceeded to fill the Big Guy.  Some of us were more precise than others.  Some of us had to take a break in between...

Once we got the Big Guy full we needed to take a picture.  Funny enough, the vineyard thought the same thing and provided cute flags...

 We corked...

We sealed...

We labeled...

And, of course, I named mine The Boss.

We got in some fun time between pictures... And then headed off to Viu Manent to lunch.  Best. Lunch. In. Colchagua!  And the fact that you can pick grapes (table grapes) from your parking spot, and take them home with you, is a huge bonus.

And they have a horse training center right on site, right next to your lunch table, is not bad either.  The girls ate, played, ate, played and just got to get the sillies out.  It made it a bit more relaxing for all of us.  Until Stinkerbell climbed the horse jump and knocked off one the top bar.  Just as I was telling B that she shouldn't be doing that because those bars are meant to break away.  No harm, no foul.  She was just fine.  And the girls had a blast...

And then I took a ton of pictures for the engagement session.  None posted at this point because they aren't  mine to share.  Let's just say it was a great day!  Highly recommend it if you ever visit Chile!