Milk Calendar Mondays

Well here we are...the final Milk Calendar Monday. I'd like to add "ever" to the end of that last sentence, but who knows, it may come back...but not for a long, long time.

The new calendar arrived a few weeks ago and I do admit that, at first glance, the recipes look more interesting via Indian, Thai, Greek and Vietnamese influences, but it also keeps some of what really bugged me in the 2008 calendar--I don' think anyone will successfully convince me that adding three cups of milk to a curry is a good thing.

The final 2008 recipe is their Almond Cranberry Loaf. Gosh, it looked pretty on the calendar...and it was marginally seasonal--cranberries always get me into a Christmassy mood. The recipe read well enough, and as usual the "for the adventurous" recommendation of adding dried apricots and substituting hazelnuts for almonds made me sigh...heavily.

Here, I admit to a couple of changes, to suit what was in my pantry. I'd actually run out of milk the day I made this, so instead I used the equal amount of yoghurt. I also was in the midst of fruitcaking (yes, I am a charter member, founding president and chief fruit macertator of the Fruitcake Liberation Front), so I was up to my elbows in pecans and chucked them into the bread instead of almonds. But I did use the apricots as recommended for the adventurous.

The bread itself wasn't too bad--a bit heavy, and I do like my fruit breads fruitier. Overall, a mostly inoffensive cake.

For those of you who want to relive my pain, here's a link to all the Milk Calendar Monday adventures.

I don't know about you, but I think I deserve a mug of heavily cognac-ed egg nog after this year-long adventure.


cheers!
jasmine