Saskatoon Berry Perogies

My mom spelled it "Peroku" on the recipe - German???
No photos yet - too busy eating them to upload any - besides they really aren't very pretty. Doughy mounds. BUT OHHH SOOOO GOOD. My grandma used to make them. Not sure if it was a Mennonite thing or a Saskatoon thing. I can tell you I haven't met very many people who have had them over the years - most people don't even know what the berries are.....
We always ate them as a meal. Not a well rounded healthy meal but one us kids gorged ourselves on - there was never enough perogies..... I don't remember any side dishes or anything. Maybe I just couldn't have been bothered with them. Unfortunately my Grandma isn't around to ask anymore.....
Anyways.
The recipe...

Dough
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp vegetable oil
3/4 cup warm water
1 egg, well beaten

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients. Place on floured surface and knead well. If you are the proud owner of a standing mixer this is MUCH easier. I just got one as a wedding present (thank you mom and sister) I dumped the ingredients in and let it go for a few moments and voila! LOVE IT.
Roll into ball. Let stand in warm place for 1/2 hour to soften and rise a little.

Fruit
4 cups Saskatoon Berries (I have never tried this with any other fruit - that would be sacrilege)
1 cup sugar
1 tbsp flour

Mix together

Pinch off dough in apricot sized pieces. Roll out into circles. Place some berries and sugar mixture on top. Fold in half and seal edges with fingers dipped in flour.

Bring a pot of water to boil with 2 tsp salt. Boil a few peruko at a time 5 - 7 minutes. Drain.

Serve with melted butter poured on top.

Now I'm not sure if I'm not shoving enough berries in my perogies or where I have gone wrong but today I am doubling my dough receipe in order to use up all of the berries I have left. The perogies are HUGE and I honestly don't feel like I could shove anymore berries in them without worrying about them exploding... The trick with these is to not have them open up in the boiling water. If you do the juice all drains out and they become dry - not as much fun. I only had one open on me this time - my first time I was not nearly as successful...

I'll stick a couple iphone photos in here later. I'm telling you they are NOT pretty. I also do not photograph food very well. But they are so so tasty.

I'l share another little story here before I go. Hubby is out golfing and I'm waiting for the dough to rise...
I LOVE saskatoons. Saskatoon is my favourite pie and as far as I am concerned the only pie worth making/eating. But it is really hard to get saskatoon berries in BC - well where I am in BC. So I have to wait until they are ready and then our local grocery store gets a few in. Only once. That's it, All year. And I'm lucky I get that. Most grocery stores don't bother with them since no one knows what they are out there.
So I knew it was time this year and kept checking the grocery store and annoying the poor produce guy. Everyday for a week he was saying maybe tomorrow. I'd get up at 8:00am go straight to the grocery store (unemployed last week!) only to find out they didn't come....
This Tuesday - after a full week of checking everyday - I got a call to work. I forgot to go to the store on my way home to check and only remembered Wednesday afternoon. Wednesday night I got off work at 9:00pm - the store was open until 10 so I ran in to check.
THEY WERE IN. BUT THERE WAS ONLY 2 CARTONS LEFT. That is enough for maybe 2 pies. That is it. I was soooo sad. I like to freeze them so I can have them all year. I bought my 2 cartons and asked if there would be anymore but the guy didn't sound hopeful.
I came home and slowly went down the stairs to the kitchen. I was so upset with myself for forgetting on Tuesday, I turned on the light in the kitchen and screamed.
My husband (I love calling him that!) had been to the grocery store and bought ALL OF THE BERRIES. He bought 10 cartons leaving the 2 I bought behind. I now had a dozen cartons!!!!! I was sooooo happy!!!!!! They took up the entire kitchen table.
It took me awhile this morning to wash and freeze them all but I am happy to say I have enough berries to make one pie a month until Saskatoon berry season next year. There was even a few left over from that so I made a few pies to take to work this week and the perogies today..... Now we ration the remaining berries.....
Happy Saskatchewan girl stuck in B.C.

My dough must be ready now. Back to perogy making...

I want to try this....

From design sponge

I Made my Dress.

From Our Wedding Part 1

From Our Wedding Part 1

From Our Wedding Part 1

From Our Wedding part 2

From Our Wedding part 2

Yup.
And I love it. Why haven't we started a tradition that requires you to wear your dress every other week after you are married???
I started it in January after meeting with a talented cutter who's words of wisdom were to start immediately and get a mock up done by the end of the month.
I tried. It proved to be far more difficult then I had thought. Said cutter also told me not to make a bustier style top as the cups would be difficult. She was right, they were extraordinarily difficult. I made 14 of them. Big, small, crooked, flat, etc etc etc.
Meanwhile the skirt was no easy feat either. I knew I wanted silk tulle before I had even decided what the final style would be and when I saw Vera Wang's (insert name I can't remember here) dress and tried it on I was in love. I almost bought it. But the top wasn't flattering on me and it didn't have any leopard print! As subtly as I could I examined the layers in it the second time I tried it on.
Layer 1 - silk charmeuse with a crin around the hem
Layers 2 & 3 - silk organza
Layers 4 & 5 - silk chiffon
Layer 6 - silk tulle
Layer 7 - silk tulle cut in narrow strips
Mine didn't end up being identical but it did exactly what I had hoped in the wind on the beach and looked so like and airy. And the grosgrain belt was to DIE for.
I was worried the whole time I was making it that it wasn't going to turn out - it would be to wacky, or inappropriate. Part of me wished I had started it sooner so I could still buy one f I had too.
My amazing friend Ellie dyed the belt grosgrain for me and my amazing friends Petra and Cathy were always available to help with fittings and phone calls.
At the beginning of April I finally finished it. That included the embroidery I put on the inside. Right on my tummy. I didn't hem it though. I thought I could treat myself and pay someone to do that for me. I'm so glad I did - what a nightmare it would have been. I also discovered I had to quit dieting as it was starting to get too big and I did not want to deal with the cups again if I got any smaller. (I had to sacrifice a favourite bra that wasn't easily replaceable as it was to make them work hence the weirdness on the inside view in that area - it is my bra that I covered in matching fabric and sewed in by hand)
I'm so happy with the way it turned out. Sorry to go on and on about it but it really was a dream come true. And the fact that I can say it was all me - no one else has ever had that dress - makes me even happier......

A few little facts about it:
cost - who the crap knows! If I included labour it would easily have cost more then the Vera Wang dress, just materials maybe around $2000. There was a few 'miss-purchases' shall we call them.
amount of fabric in dress - well for just the top two layers there was 21 yards of tulle.
hem width - the bottom of each layer was about 8 yards around making it more then a full circle skirt
ivory or white? - both! I would buy the wrong shade and say screw it and use it, it's all mixed up
the leopard print - it came from a local fabric store and was a cheap acetate fabric. I actually used the wrong side of the fabric because it was a little softer then the right side
grosgrain - was hard to find a 3", ended up ordering online from a new york company and had to buy the whole roll, and as I said my friend dyed it for me
something old - my grandmother's sewing label sent to me from my sister, and hiding in the hem is a doily she crocheted.

Now I have plans to make a shorter sleeker version of the skirt so I could possibly wear it again one day, maybe as a guest at someone else's wedding??? I still have lots of the leopard print for a matching pencil skirt as well... In the meantime it hangs in my closet. There are still bits of sticks and plants in it from Mexico that I don't want to remove.....

Our wedding video (yup again)

Got the NEW version with the songs I like. You can hear our vows this time!!!!
YAY!!!

The REAL long version of our wedding from Angela Bright on Vimeo.

MISSING SUNGLASSES

MISSING AS OF MAY 21 2011
ONE PAIR PURPLE BETSEY JOHNSON SUNGLASSES
LAST SEEN BOOGIE BOARDING ON THE BEACH IN TULUM MEXICO
IF SEEN DO NOT TRY TO APPROACH BUT REPORT IMMEDIATELY TO ME

From These are not the missing sunglasses

Yah. I lost a few pairs of sunglasses in the ocean. But the betsey johnson ones were my favourites. A few other pairs tried to go missing as well but somehow eagle eye Cathy was able to spot them sitting on the bottom a few waves later..... There was also a few sets of keys. (You'd think we would have learned after the first pair of sunglasses!)
So if any of you find them - not sure how the currents work down there - maybe they'll show up on the east coast of Canada? :)
Oh and I also lost a brown hair elastic - just saying...

I'm getting our photos from our photographer today! Here is the last set of sneak peeks!

From Our Wedding

I'm pretty sure we are laughing at my dad with the waiter in the headlock in this photo..

From Our Wedding

Luc and his ladies

From Our Wedding

From Our Wedding

From Our Wedding

Me and my dad before I walked down the aisle

From Our Wedding

From Our Wedding

Can't wait to see the rest later today!

Taking over the world....

I have a plan. It involves bridal wear. And I decided next time I was between films I would get to work on it.
Well it has been a week and I have been doing 10 hour days on it and i have nothing to show for it! Seriously I don't work this hard on my real jobs. My problem is I'm not quite as talented as my imagination would have me believe. Stupid imagination.
My plans is starting with patterns for various bodices and skirts that could be wedding dresses (or bridesmaids dresses) I'm been working on one bodice all week. I'm still tweaking the actual pattern never mind the sewing instructions. It takes me forever. I've made it 4 times this week already. I still have to try and figure out the other sizes too or right now I will only be able to sell sz 10's as that is my mannequin size.
It looks good though non?

Taking a break from this bodice today though - trying a skirt....