One Left!

My limited edition of La Luxure Parfum Solid Parfum in honor of Erzulie only has one left! Once they're gone, they're gone!

[Retro Recipe Monday] Boiled Chicken With Parsley Sauce

So, as I'm pretty sick of Thoughts on Buffets, I'm sure you are too. Let's move it along to Grand Diplome Cooking Course, published in 1971 during the hay day of overly complicated cooking techniques, a la Julia Childs. It's not that most of this stuff is strange or weird to our modern palate, it's just that we all work in one fashion or another and the idea of doing this whole thing on like a Tuesday seems daunting. Also boiled? Eeeeeeh . . .

Boiled Chicken with Parsley Sauce
5 lb fowl or roasting chicken
1 large carrot, quartered
1 large onion, quartered
2 stalks celery (optional)
bouquet garni
6 peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon salt
cold water
1/4 pound sliced bacon (for garnish)

Parsley sauce
1 large bunch of fresh parsley
2 cups milk
1 bay leaf
1 blade of mace
6 peppercorns
3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
salt and pepper

This recipe is an excellent example of the first method of boiling. Serves 6 people.

Method
Set the bird on its back in a large saucepan. Surround it with vegetables, bouquet garni, peppercorns and salt. For a fowl, pour in enough water barely to cover; for a roasting chicken add enough to just cover the thighs. Put lid on pan and bring slowly to a boil. Simmer fowl 2 hours and roasting chicken 1 1/4 hours or until tender and no pink juice runs out when thigh is pierced with a fork. Turn bird over from time to time. When cooked allow to cool slightly in the pain.

To prepare sauce, remove parsley sprigs from stalks, reserving them and wash well. Boil sprigs for 7 minutes in salted water, drain, squeeze dry and rub through a strainer to make 1 tablepoon parsley puree.

Infuse milk by heating it almost to boiling and keeping hot for 7 minutes with bay leaf, mace, peppercorns and parsley stalks; then strain it. Melt butter and when foaming, remove from heat and stir in the flour. Pour on milk and bring to a boil, stirring until sauce thickens. Simmer 2 minutes, add parsley puree and season. Keep warm. Cook bacon until crisp and drain it on paper towel.

Drain chicken, carve (discarding the skin from fowl), and arrange on a platter. Spoon over some of the sauce, serving the rest separately, and garnish the dish with bacon. Serve with boiled rice or mashed potatoes.

Final Wishes

A Witchvox reader recently asked me what I thought should be done to ensure that her wishes were followed to have a Wiccan funeral, what to do for the funeral and what to do about her Catholic family, though her children are fine with her religion.

My response:

The best thing you can do imo is to start by making a will if you haven't already with your wishes in it and inform your kids (or next of kin) about your decision. Having this document legally drawn up by a lawyer will insure that your wishes are followed. Next, I would say you want to decide who you would like to conduct your burial for you and to inform them that while you are not dying, you want to plan for your future and ensure someone you know and trust conducts the ceremony for you. I personally would then consider a few points:

* How do I want my life celebrated? It's often natural that some people will be sad and grieve if your passing is sudden or unexpected, how would you like to celebrate your life while still leaving room for grieving? A picture board? A dvd with your happiest moments? For people to share memories of you?

* Think of this as one of the most important rituals you'll go through. What do you want to wear for it? Which chants/hymns, etc. do you want to be sang during it? Which god/dess/es do you want invoked to assist you in your passing? Are there any readings from any sacred texts that you want? Do you want to be buried with any other objects? Or herbs? What kind of flowers or charities do you want to use?

* How do you want to be buried? In the ground naturally? Cremated and your ashes spread in a special place? Interned? A standard burial with a fancy coffin? What cemetary do you want to be buried at if you want to be buried? What kind of headstone if so?

* Your family who is Catholic are going to need to grieve your loss too. Are you willing to do a traditional wake in addition to your Wiccan burial? Have a priest involved at all even for a short prayer for them? Prayers to Mary? Or allow for a memorial service where you're not present but gives them a chance to grieve in a way that's familiar to them?

* Make sure your affairs are in order - that your children (or next of kin) know where your important papers are, that they know how your life insurance works (if applicable), how to access security boxes and bank accounts, where your deed and car title is if applicable and that they know who your lawyer is and what your wishes are in terms of a long hospital stay (do you not want to be kept alive through machines? Do you want a do not resuscitate order? If you have a long term terminal illness, do you want hospice care?)

Have a question? Email me at corvaxgirl [at] gmail [dottie] com

Summer Solstice: As Is Tradition

Hi nice people! Thanks for joining the circus! So let's get right down to it. So far I've been celebrating Summer Solstice the super traditional way: by bleeding like a stuck pig with my period and being in a state of complete anxiety and shying away from the sun.

Maybe earlier in the week was a better example, getting local wine at the local winery, getting my spinning wheel (finally) fully assembled, picking out fresh localish food from the market, finishing up errands, cleaning the house so it sparkles but today . . .no.

This kitchen witch feels too strung out to even cook something today, J. and I will be going to Wegman's to get some kind of prepared meal that my picky stomach will perhaps not reject. I'm going to do a v. short bout of child care where hopefully I will just take the middle child to gymnastics where I can watch her and spin and not get into a battle of wills :: fingers crossed!::. I'm a nervous wreck, my hormones are on a horrific roller coaster so I feel clingy and needy (and then! Like I want to push other people away! Oh howdy I'm a treat today). I'm nervous because things are going waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too well for me. I'm used to struggle, I'm used to doing whatever it takes to survive, I'm used to failing and feeling like I've been punched in the face and leaping back up and doing it better, faster, stronger. Success rattles my cage horribly. I can fail a million times and it just inspires me more. But success? Manifesting what I've been working towards? Oh man, I become an anxious wreck who is curled in a ball on the couch.

I have three romantica pieces in final piles right now (and one of those is in contract), my pieces have been top o' the page on WitchVox, my first magical product launch was a success, my first craft fair was a success, my house is presentable, I look a little thinner and my chaotic schedule will be significantly more stable in the beginning of July giving me time to really focus on writing my kitchen witch book and going to the gym. Also, I've been to the dentist and will be scheduling my annual shortly. Did I mention that I will likely be completely out of credit card debt potentially six months to a year faster than I had planned and my finances for the month are working out fine?

Normal people would be all, Good show, self! Well done! Let's get an inexpensive bottle of champagne to celebrate and bask in our awesomeness!

*My* brain because of my background is all, hmmmm. This can't be right. How can I fuck this up? I know! Buy a ton of useless shit so there's no hope of getting out of debt, refuse to sit down and do the writing, make a mess of the house, maybe run something over like a nail or something or key my own new car and what can I do to fuck up all my healthy functioning relationships? Maybe you'd also like to pick at your failed marriage too just for funsies as this is when shit really started rolling down hill three years ago!

I haven't done any of that negative stuff yet (well. Except for some picking because as Carrie Bradshaw said, I'm an emotional cutter), but it's a struggle honestly. All I can think is oh shit oh shit oh shit what's going to go wrong? I'm used to thriving in chaos, I did for the first 28 years of my life. It's hard to not create drama to distract myself from what I'm attempting to do because then I don't have to be real and being real sometimes is . . hard. But I never want to find myself in a position where I've created a mask for myself that I can't take off, that scares the piss out of me.

So here's my Solstice celebration: terrified, panicky and likely eating food out of a tin and hiding from the outside world as much as possible. Happy Solstice!

Finding Your Pagan Moral Compass: On Forgiveness

Sometimes being Pagan is challenging. We have a much murkier moral structure than many other world religions, especially if you're more of a “freelance” Pagan like myself. There's honestly not any one-belief structure I subscribe to in its entirety, which makes for days where I miss being Catholic in my own way. While it wasn't always easy to adhere to the belief structure, there was a structure to follow for everything. You could expect Mass to go a certain way, you could expect sinning to go a certain way and you could expect forgiveness to go a certain way and you could expect death to go a certain way. As a creative of habit and structure, I miss those certainties even if they weren't always necessarily certain in my own head as a Catholic.

Read the rest here at WitchVox

La Luxure Attracting Solid Parfum Launch

This dreamily sensual rich fragrance is a sexy rose base with notes of coquettish jasmine, warm ginger, creamy coconut, decadent champagne and a pop of creamy pink sparkle. Each tin is covered with a hand embroidered piece of damask with Erzulie's Veve. The solid part of the perfume is made from coconut oil, bees wax, organic shea butter, organic cocoa butter and Vitamin E. Naturally, each parfum will be fixed through prayer, offerings of pink flowers, chocolates, pink pirouettes and raspberry wine were made to Her and magical working. The only animal this has been tested on is me (you're welcome!)

There are only five of these that will be offered and once they're gone, they're gone. They are available for purchase here

La Luxure was made in honor of Erzulie. It can be worn as a devotion to Erzulie but also functions as an attracting glamour to attract a potential partner or to get your current partner in the mood. ;)

Heads Up: Two of the Five Limited Edition Erzulie Parfums (La Luxure) Are Spoken For

There will be pics on Thursday, but just wanted to let you know! Once they're gone, they're gone. More info here

Recipe Monday: Amazon's Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes

As you may have been able to put together, I suck at baking. It is not a coincidence that v. few baking recipes have appeared on Recipe Monday. Luckily for you, my friend Amazon from Dangerous Women not only serves up thoughtful posts about feminism but also bakes delicious treats. Enjoy!

Amazon's Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes


Cupcakes:
3 C granulated sugar
1 C margarine
1 C peanut butter
½ C yoghurt
2 tsp vanilla
4 eggs

1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
4 C flour
1 C cocoa
1 C large chocolate chips


Frosting:
3 C icing sugar
2 C butter
1½ C peanut butter




1) Combine the sugar and the wet ingredients and cream them together

2) Add the baking powder, baking soda, salt and flour, and blend until smooth

3) Add the chocolate chips and stir until well-mixed

4) Add the cocoa and blend carefully to achieve a "marble" effect (or just add the cocoa with the rest of the dry stuff -- it works either way)

5) Spoon into lined muffin cups (much easier to clean up AND to remove from the pan)

6) Bake until done (in my oven, this takes about 40 minutes, however my oven is a bit messed up. You'll probably find that it takes only about 20 minutes in yours)

7) Allow to cool completely

8) Frost with peanutbutter (or chocolate) icing

9) Serve and enjoy

10) Om-Nom-Nom!


Makes about 36 cupcakes. (I think -- the original recipe I made makes about 18, and the recipe I've presented here is the doubled version thereof).

Pre-Release Announcement: First Magical Product Release!

I will be releasing my solid parfum in honor of Erzulie called La Luxure. It can be worn as a devotion to Erzulie but also functions as an attracting glamour to attract a potential partner or to get your current partner in the mood. ;) The dreamily sensual rich fragrance is a sexy rose base with notes of coquettish jasmine, warm ginger, creamy coconut, decadent champagne and a pop of creamy pink sparkle. Each tin is covered with a hand embroidered piece of damask with Erzulie's Veve. The solid part of the perfume is made from coconut oil, bees wax, organic shea butter, organic cocoa butter and Vitamin E. Naturally, each parfum will be fixed through prayer, offerings and magical working. The only animal this has been tested on is me (you're welcome!)

There are only five of these that will be offered and once they're gone, they're gone. Each parfum will cost $20 and $3 shipping to the U.S. International orders will be accepted, but please drop me a line so we can figure out shipping. They will be available through my Etsy shop. If you would rather just go through Paypal, drop me a line and we'll work that out.

I will also accept pre-release reservations for the parfum by comments to this entry and/or an email to corvaxgirl [at] gmail [dottie] com , but if you don't pay by Thursday then your parfum will be back up for general sales.