apple dumplins

hi all,
one of our planners thought you may like to try your hand at making her apple dumplings! here’s the recipe below…
dumpling pastry:
4 cups flour
2 cups shortening
1 cup ice cold water
1 teaspoon salt
4 large apples, peeled and cored
4 tablespoons brown sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon **NOTE: she indicates in her recipe that it says to spoon in 1 tbsp brown sugar and 1 tsp of cinnamon – yet the total cinnamon amount in the ingredients list is 2 tsp. so she only put in 1/2 tsp for each of the apples to equal 2 tsp…
preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
lightly grease a cake pan.
prepare dumpling pastry. roll the pastry into a rectangle, 10 by 8 inches. cut into 4 (4-inch squares) with pastry cutter or knife. place apple on each square. spoon 1 tablespoon brown sugar and 1 teaspoon cinnamon into the center of each apple. moisten corners, pinching edges of pastry to seal. brush with slightly beaten egg and sprinkle with additional sugar. bake 30 minutes or until crust is golden and apples are tender.

i missed out when she brought them into work, but the consensus is/was they were delicious!!!!!

bike-loving designs

marc hummel, a philadelphia native and founder of b minus designs, makes these really cool bike-loving products that i thought you would enjoy. all b minus designs are screenprinted by hand. check them out below, along with a short interview with marc.

interview with marc:
where are you from?
philadelphia! south philly, to be precise.
when did you create b minus designs?
in the fall of 2004.
why did you start b minus designs?
my friend leah and i came up with the idea for the “bicycles are for lovers” design while goofing around in our dorm rooms our freshman year of college. our school was in a fairly rural part of new jersey, and we both thought tandem bicycles were the coolest things on the planet. we decided to use our design to launch a t-shirt company that would eventually buy us our very own tandem!
we eventually got our wish, when a fellow student saw our web site and offered us (free!), a red tandem bicycle he had taking up space in his shed. the bike still needs a lot of work, but we’re siked our plot was successful!
what was your inspiration? (this may be a bit off topic, but I’d like to mention it…):
in the summer of 2009, we decided to make b minus designs a 100% non-profit company. the proceeds of every sale go toward my fundraising goal for the 2010 “climate ride,” a charity bicycle trip from new york to washington, d.c.
check out more info. about b minus designs.