Pancakes and Maple Syrup

 Stacy said if I needed an adventure this month, to let her know. I definitely did and tossed out a couple dates to her. She confirmed which one worked best for her. I tossed some ideas her way and we never really settled on anything specific. Then I saw a post for a Pancake Breakfast at Riveredge Nature Center in Newburg. Stacy was game. I bought tickets.

Riveredge Nature Center is in Newburg. It is open every day dawn until dusk. The Visitor Center is open Monday-Saturday 8:30-4:30. It is $5/person for a trail fee. 

We both remember going there in elementary school for maple syrup and pancake breakfast. Stacy distinctly remembers it raining and eating outside so was a bit concerned about the weather forecast (cold and rainy). I was like no worries there's a shuttle. I didn't realize we could have to eat outside. 

The Pancake Breakfast was $15/person. We checked in at the visitor center and got our tickets. Then we walked to the Sugarbush House for breakfast. The walk was about 1/2 mile along a very well maintained path. Or you could have taken a shuttle. The weather held so it was not a bad walk. 

We got to see the maple trees tapped for syrup. Blue bags are the new buckets apparently. 

For breakfast you got 2 pancakes, a piece of ham, and some pickles. Apparently in Southeast WI, pickles and maple syrup are a thing. I remember getting pickle spear as a kid with my maple syrup. These were just pickle chips. Either way they are good. Plus they pour fresh maple syrup over your pancakes.

We went out side to eat in the covered picnic area. They came around with fresh off the griddle pancakes and we each had one more. Overall it was a very good breakfast.

On the way back to the car, we checked out one of the play areas.. briefly.. I attempted to climb up the rope net and it was an epic fail. I only made it only rung and fell face first. Getting down was an adventure. Turns out scooting down on my butt worked best. It was not my brightest idea.

We wanted to check out a bridge but the trail was closed because of sugar dragon nesting area. I guess I will have to come back and explore at a future date when the sugar dragons are all hatched. 

It was a fun morning and only just the beginning of our adventure. More adventure fun coming soon. 

25 in 2025 -- Explore At Least One New Park or Trail -- Lowes Creek

I am always on the look out for new trails or parks to explore. I've done most of the ones around here. So when I'm at baseball or having adventures, I am on the lookout for a new park or trail or even a random path to explore. I got lucky when I found out our friends lived within walking distance of a county park. 

Since it was a beautiful day and I had some time to kill, I decided to go check out the county park. The hubby even came with me. 

Lowes Creek is part of the Eau Claire County Park System. If you actually park, like a state park, you need to pay an entrance fee. It is $6/day or $35/year and gains you access to all the county parks. 

Because of spring thaw many of the more challenging trails were closed due to muddy conditions. This made me sad as I'm always up for a good hike. The hubby was probably secretly glad as he is not a hiker and prefers much easier terrain. 

Since our options were limited we walk the snowshoe/cross county ski trail. It is a giant grassy loop that is fairly flat. To me it was pretty boring probably because of everything still being brown from winter. Hopefully we can explore when it's lush and green and fully of critters. 

I am glad Eau Claire County Park System has well maintained parks. I may have to explore other parks (and pay the $6 fee) on future visits.. or at least explore some of the other trails at Lowes Creek. 

I wonder what other trails and parks I will explore this year. Stay tuned to find out if I stumble across any other ones. 

25 in 2025 -- Try One New Pizza Place -- Tony Capony Pizza

 When our friends invited us up for St. Patrick's Dinner, they invited us up a day early and said we could have a pizza and pajama party. They also said their friends brought pizza from a new place so we will order from there. We are always up for good pizza.

Tony Capony has been serving up pizza for more than 20 years in Eau Claire. We just found out about them. They are open daily from 11-9. I surprised we've not heard of them before. 

We ordered 3 large pizzas. 

The Five Meat Combo Classic which was Pepperoni, Canadian Bacon, Beef Sausage, Italian Sausage, and Bacon

The Humble Pie Classic which was Pepperoni, Italian Sausage, Onions, and Green Peppers -- no onions. 

Sausage and Pepperoni.

We wanted thin crust but ended up with hand tossed. 

The pizza was very good. We definitely would order again especially if we can get thin crust. On the Five Meat Combo it said bacon bits it was chunks of bacon. The 5 meat was definitely my favorite. The hubby favored the pepperoni and sausage. 

Tony Capony is definitely worth the price. I know this may be our new pizza place when we go to Eau Claire or at least on the south side. 

7453. Make gnocchi

 When I saw that the Little Chute Library was having a gnocchi making class, I immediately signed up. Danielle offered to come with me. 

Local Chef Spencer Webster volunteered to teach us how to make gnocchi. I thought we were making regular gnocchi but we were making goat cheese gnocchi with tomato fig sauce. I was intrigued to say the least. 

Gnocchi is an Italian Potato dumpling but instead of potato we were going to use goat cheese. Apparently the fig sauce was going to compliment the goat cheese. Okay... we shall see. 

We were given the ingredients for the gnocchi. Flour, Eggs, Goat Cheese, Nutmeg, Pepper. It was a pretty simple recipe.

First we mixed the goat cheese and flour together and got it crumbly.

Then we added the eggs and kneaded well.

We wanted to make sure it sprung back when poked. This takes longer than you think. This is why I don't make putzy things. I am too impatient.

We added the spices and continued to knead until it sprung back.

Then we got a lesson in shaping the gnocchi. This step works best when the dough has been chilled for several hours. Spencer showed how to make snakes with the dough.

Then he cut it into pieces and showed us how to roll the gnocchi using a fork to get the grooves. There is a such a thing as a gnocchi board which has built in grooves for this purpose. But if you don't want to spend $10 on Amazon the back of fork works too. The grooves are only there to hold sauce.. so be lazy and just cut off pieces.

I did try rolling a gnocchi. It was harder than it looked.

Since process was going to take a while, Danielle and I headed out with our dough. I had way to much going on to wait around to try tomato fig sauce.

A few days later, I busted out the dough and rolled my dough into gnocchi snakes and chopped them into pieces which I then rolled on the back of a fork.

I boiled my gnocchi for about 2-3 minutes until tender.

Since I didn't have fig sauce, I just used olive oil and pepperoni. It was pretty dang tasty. If I didn't know there was goat cheese in it, I wouldn't have known. Nutmeg was the dominate flavor but I think that was because we had too much nutmeg and pepper. 

I definitely enjoyed the culinary experience. Now to convince the hubby that we need to have proper potato gnocchi sometime. 

6012. Get donuts from Miriam’s bakery in Fredonia

I am a sucker for a good donut. When Mom and Ryan told me about the bakery in Fredonia that had great donuts, I had to check it out. 

Miriams's Bakery is an Amish Made bakery featuring breads, donuts, muffins, bars, cakes, pies cinnamon rolls, and more. There open Tuesday-Sunday 5-2. They do not take credit cards so make sure you have cash. 

I was heading down to my parents and they wanted me to stop and get hot ham for lunch from Miriam's. They said they have the best hot ham. I figured it was a good time to get some donuts.

Miriam's is not a large bakery by any means. It actually makes Simple Simon seem big. They have 2 glass cases and a couple of racks full of baked goods. 

The donuts looked homemade and amazing. Each one a little different so definitely not massed produced. You might say they were imperfect looking but I kind of liked that. I picked up a half dozen. Each donut was $1.50

So far I have not found anything to beat Munster Donuts but these rate right up there. The cake donut was not dense but nice and fluffy. They yeast donuts were light and airy. The icing was not too sweet. I loved the toasted coconut. 

Between Cedar Valley Cheese and Miriam's my trips home are going to start getting costly. I love the little local shops though. I have plans on checking out a couple more this year. 

If you haven't checked out Miriam's yet, go grab some donuts. You will thank me.

25 in 2025 -- See at least one live performance -- Little Women

 When I met Heather at The Lion King last month, she told me her kiddo got a part in the school play. Of course, I had to go to support him. The closer the play got though, the crazier life became. I was able to carve out a bit of time to run and see Little Women

Hortonville High School put on Little Women as their spring play. I've seen the movie. I've read the book. I even listened to a spin off called Little Vampire Women, which I actually enjoyed. Little Women is not my favorite book my any means but I'm not a fan of the classics to begin with. I at least knew the story so I wasn't totally unaware of what was happening or what was going to happen.

The students of Hortonville High School did a fabulous job performing Little Women. The entire cast and crew were amazing. I finally really understood the story. I may not have enjoyed it any more but I least can now talk intelligentially about it. Even though it was a high school production it could have been a professional production.

The kiddo also did a fabulous job in his role. Despite a minor set back at the beginning of the month, they were able to perform without any problems.. and did not get injured trying to run back on stage for curtain call. It was fun to watch them perform.

I also got to see my Lil's kiddo perform who also did wonderfully. We had to check the program to confirm our suspicions but we were right. 

I did bring back memories of my high school days of watching my friends and classmates perform in musicals and plays. Those were such fun times.

Maybe in the future, I will find another play or musical at one of the local high schools to go to just because I can.. maybe I should think about hanging out with the adult girl scouts again. They do this kind of thing all the time.

Again congratulations to all the performers of Little Women. 

Strolling the Streets of Oshkosh for Chocolate

 For the last couple of years, Heather and I have done Death by Chocolate but we were kind of over it. We decided to change things up this year and do the Chocolate Stroll in Oshkosh. They were a week apart so in theory we could have done both this year. 

The Chocolate Stroll in Oshkosh was $20/person and gave you 15 different treats along Main Street. You could pick up your ticket as early as 12:30 and as late as 2:00 from the Discover Oshkosh Office. I thought we had to get at at the Convention Center and the kind Legion people directed us back outside to the correct place. We literally walked past the Discover Oshkosh Office to get to the Convention Center. Oops.

We picked up our punch card and a bag to tote our treats home in. Then we started our journey in the snow. Yup it was a typical February Day.. at least it wasn't bitter cold and by the end the snow pretty much stopped. It just made for a sloppy walk.. good thing we wore boots.

We actually did the route backwards so we could eat at Caramel Crisp where we parked. This actually worked out well since there usually wasn't a crowd at each stop. 

This nice thing about the Chocolate Stroll was most treats were wrapped to go so we didn't have to try to consume 15 treats. There were some places we had to eat at but for the most part we could tote our treats with us. 

A couple of the stops offered hot chocolate which was great on a cold winter day. 

Fremorah, a cute little boutique, offered a chocolate fountain with various treats to dip in. I went with a strawberry because this my favorite way to eat a strawberry. 

Pivot Nutrition was one of the places that offered hot chocolate. It was located on the second floor so we had to navigate slippery, wet stairs. Surprisingly neither of us injured ourselves. But it was worth the climb to see the Friends themed beverage and an orange couch. Even though it is a healthy place, it was a fun place to visit.

By the time we got to Caramel Crisp we were done and didn't need any additional treats. They gave us chocolate covered popcorn. I so can't wait to try it. 

Overall, we said we would definitely come back down here again. It was a good time and cheaper than Appleton. I'm glad they change it from a hot chocolate walk to a chocolate stroll because that was a lot of hot chocolate the one time we did that. 

This is a very family friend event as well so check it out next year if you want some tasty chocolate treats at a great deal.