Tag Archives: cooking

Kettle corn

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My boss brought in a bag of freshly made kettle corn yesterday. I had a handful today. Crunchy, sweet, salty goodness. I try to make this at home but it’s just not the same. 

The recipe is fairly easy:
1/4 cup oil
1/3 – 1/2 cup popcorn
1/4 cup granulated sugar, can be all white or half white and half brown
1/4 tsp salt, optional 

Heat oil and three kernels of popcorn in a large 4-6 quart pan with a lid until the corn pops. Add the rest of the popcorn and sugar. Cover and shake until the popping slows to 2-3 pops. Immediately dump popped corn into another container. (I use a parchment lined cookie sheet.) Sprinkle with salt. Fill pan with hot water to make clean-up easier. 

I also use a Whirley-Pop Popcorn Maker. It has a stirring rod in the bottom that you turn so you don’t have to shake the pan.  I don’t work for or receive any compensation from Whirley-Pop.  I just love their popcorn maker. 

I brought my knitting with me again today hoping I can work on the eyelet sweater during lunch. 

Eyelet sweater size 1-2 yrs

 

Having twin granddaughters means having to make double.  This is a combination of 3 patterns so does that make it an original?

Crabby Bay Fries

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Mr. Aitch and I went out for lunch yesterday, which is something we don’t do very often.  It was later than usual for lunch.  For me.  He dropped me off at the fabric store while he took his truck to have the tires checked.  They were out of balance.  Usually I can spend hours looking around a store but I felt that he was going to be back soon so I purchased my things and went outside to wait for him. 
 
While waiting, I played several games of solitaire on my phone.  I’m so glad I could entertain myself.  I was really hungry and my stomach was growling.  I hadn’t eaten anything up to that time and I had spent an hour weeding my flower beds earlier in the morning.
 
We got to the restaurant around 1:15 and placed our order in right away.  Mr. Aitch had hot wings.  I ordered Crabby Bay Fries.  I usually don’t order fries but these were smothered in a hot, creamy crab dip.  This could have served 3-4 people.  It was delicious.  Other than Mr. Aitch sampling 2-3 fries, I ate the entire plate.
 
I had water the rest of the day as I was still full from lunch.  Mr. Aitch wanted some popcorn while we watched an old movie last night.  Real popcorn, not the microwave stuff.  And real butter.  No salt for me.  I had a small bowl.  Such buttery goodness.

Tomorrow is another day

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I’m really looking forward to cleaning tomorrow.  Yes, looking forward to cleaning.  I managed to clean out one kitchen cabinet (or is it a cupboard?) last Monday even though I had visitors.  I arranged my spices (in alphabetical order by bottle size) and threw out all the old ones.

My best friend and I talked last night and she mentioned her step-daughter-in-law(?) and her obsession with organizing her spices.  I don’t know how other people do their spices but if they aren’t in some type of order, how can you find what you need without going through the entire cabinet?  Unless you only use salt and pepper, how do find things?

I am certainly not OCD…just look at the rest of my house.

Tomorrow I will tackle the cabinet above the microwave/range hood and possibly the one where I keep my dishes.  Maybe even a drawer or three.

Our community yard sale is tomorrow.  I’m not participating but may have my own yard sale later in the summer.  I need less clutter, less things, less emotional attachment to stuff.

Wish me luck!

Summer hours

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We started “summer hours” at our office last week (though I started it this week.)  We work four 10-hour days with either Monday or Friday off.  I chose Mondays.  Mr. Aitch works either Fridays or Saturdays and is choir directors at church so Mondays seemed to be the best day for us.  Makes for nice long weekends.  The kicker is getting to work an hour earlier and staying an hour later.  So did I set my alarm to get up an hour earlier?  No.  Just a half hour earlier.  I won’t eat breakfast at home until we switch back to our regular hours after Labor Day.

So my plan for this past weekend was to continue my cleaning.  Didn’t happen as planned.  Friday night my daughter-in-law called asking if she and their two kids could spend the weekend with us.  My son works nights and is off Monday and Tuesday nights.  They only have one car so he brought them Saturday and picked them up last evening.  My grandson is four and wants constant interaction.  Play with me, Nona.  Not a lot of cleaning done over the weekend.

I got up to the armhole openings on the second eyelet sweater and started the first sleeve four times.  I dropped a stitch and had to start over.  I had an extra stitch and had to start over.  I don’t know what I did and had a huge gap and started over.  I’m well into the sleeve and should finish it tonight and possible finish the second sleeve so I can start to join everything.  Goal is to have the sweater finished Friday night.

I did get a couple of loads of laundry done.  I even cleaned out one cabinet in the kitchen yesterday morning.  Spices.  What is the shelf life of spices and flavorings?  We moved into this house 16 years ago.  I threw out some spices that I brought from my other house.  Granted I hadn’t used them in the past 16 years so it was safe to say I didn’t need them.  This was long overdue.

Treasures I found were an apple baker and a garlic baker.  Both in their original packaging and both brand spanking new.  One was a gift and one I had purchased.

I had paper plates and plastic spoons and forks taking up most of a shelf.  We don’t really use paper plates very much unless it’s a BIG party.  Same with plastic ware.  So those things went into a box to be put in the basement with the other picnic-type things.

Our community yard sale is this weekend.  I doubt I will be ready for it but will continue to clean out drawers, cabinets, closets and rooms.  Maybe I will have my own yard sale later in the summer.