Another Book O' Tips

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You know me, I love books about saving money--especially ones full of tips.  So, I was glad to review Cheaper, Better, Faster by Mary Hunt.  This book is really a revised edition of her book Tiptionary.  I remember having a copy of this book about ten years ago.  The tips were only broadly divided and lumped together.  It was one of those books that you could leave in the bathroom for reading when you just needed something light for a few minutes (similar to Uncle John's Bathroom Reader).

When I read the introduction to this book, it sounded like it was a new and improved version of the old one. I didn't find this to be so.  Improved to me would have been an improvement in the formatting and the ease of use of this book.  I am the kind of person who loves charts and being able to come back to information easily.   This book is really formatted for bathroom reading, like the old one.  It can be read 1/4-1/2 a page at a time.  It can be read in any type of order.  It is simply a book to read for fun--for ideas.  As the author says in the beginning of the book, no one could do all of the ideas in this book in their lifetime.  You can just look through and find the ones that sound fun to try!

If you love money saving tips, but would prefer to browse through them in book form than on the internet, then you'll enjoy this book.  My mom enjoys it, but I don't.  It's hard for me to find my way around it and at this point in my life, I prefer organized books of tips that I can use and refer to easily rather than ones that need me to sit down and read.  My life just doesn't allow for that right now.  But, my mom, who's in her 60s, does have the time to sit in the evenings with a book and a cup of tea.    

So, that's how I'd describe this book.  It's for folks who have time to sit, but not for those who don't!

Please note that I received a complimentary copy of this book for review from Revell Books.

Free Piano Practice Page

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In practicing and teaching piano at home, I realized that I needed an efficient record sheet for my kids to mark their practice days, but I didn't want to waste a lot of paper.  I made a sheet that I've posted here.  

As I start making my own printables for homeschooling, I'm going to be posting them on this blog:  http://lovetopaint.wordpress.com/    Wordpress allows me to attach files easier than blogger.  On my wordpress blog, I keep my lists of favorite books and resources.  

Freezing doorway!

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Yesterday, I went over to our front door and was surprised to feel how cold it was by the door.  I was so puzzled.  I caulked around the outside of the inside trim of the door last spring when I realized cold air was pouring in there.  I couldn't understand why it was so cold.  We have a storm door on the door and I'd caulked...  what else could be wrong?

I went over to the door and held my hand up to the door frame.  First, I put my hand around the outside of the trim.  No air coming in.

Then I put it up to the gap between the frame and the door.  

Air.  Air!!!  

Why?

I moved my hand around and discovered that the air was coming from where the trim meets the door frame. I wish I could draw a picture to illustrate....  but since I can't--picture an arch of the door trim around your door frame.  Last year, I caulked on the outside where the trim met the wall.  Now the air was still coming in where the trim meets the frame on the inside edge!

I pulled out a tube of clear caulk from the basement and quickly caulked all four edges where the trim meets the door frame.  

This morning I went over by the door frame.

It felt warm.  It felt WARM!  YIPPEE!

Caulk is a wonderful thing.  A very wonderful thing :)   

Soup!

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The best food for winter meals is soup.  I didn't grow up eating soup much.  Southern California weather and wearing shorts on Christmas Day.   But, now that I live where it snows and is cold throughout the winter, I love soup.  It warms one's bones on a chilly day.

Since I didn't grow up eating soup, I don't exactly have a lot of family soup recipes to make regularly.  I've found a few along the way from Simply in Season and America's Test Kitchen's Family Cookbook.  

But, when I saw a cookbook titled 300 Sensational Soups, I was very excited to try some new soups!


This cookbook by Carla Snyder and Meredith Deeds is packed with easy to follow recipes and great pictures.  It's published by Robert Rose Publishing and as usual they've done a great job making this cookbook easy to cook from.  

I made two soups and my mom made one.  The first soup I made was a corn chowder with ham.  I used some leftover ham cooked in my crockpot a few weeks ago.  My family gobbled up the soup and we had only enough leftovers for one bowl.  

The second soup I made was the Wild Mushroom and Orzo Soup with Italian Meatballs.  The soup was rich and flavorful.  I would recommend diluting it a little bit though.  We found it almost too strong.  The meatballs in the soup were spiced wonderfully and yummy.  My pickiest eater wouldn't eat it, but mushrooms aren't a vegetable she's willing to eat.  

My mom made the Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup.  She found it to be too thick and very mild.  Many of the soups do call for heavy cream.  She was surprised that she didn't like it more.

This is one of those cookbooks that gives you great recipes to start with.  Adjust the thickness and flavors to your family's tastes.  With the corn chowder, I used frozen corn.  With the wild mushroom soup, I substituted regular white mushrooms.  These are more affordable substitutions for me that don't sacrifice a lot of flavor.  I also often substitute milk plus some butter for half and half.  1 cup milk plus 3 Tbsp. butter can be substituted for 1 cup half and half.  1 cup half and half can be substituted for 1 cup of heavy cream to help make a recipe lighter and healthier.  

If you're looking for a soup cookbook with yummy recipes, I'd definitely check this one out!

Please note that I received a complimentary copy of this cookbook for review from Robert Rose Publishing.  

February Doldrums

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It's February and I can feel it.  We were without a furnace on Tuesday and Wednesday.  I really felt it then.  usually it's my husband who misses spring and the warmer weather.  Right now, it's me.  One of the things I look forward to is picking strawberries at a farm nearby in May.  There's nothing like fresh, homemade jam.

When I was a kid, my grandma always made jam and jellies.  My mom learned how, but I never did.  I wish I had.  I've honestly been very intimidated by canning.  So, I have been looking for a good cookbook to help me learn how.  Two years ago I reviewed a canning cookbook published by Storey Publishing.  The recipes were good and it had a ton of information, but many of the recipes used Pomona pectin--which happens to be quite expensive.  One of my prerequisites for a cookbook I'll use over and over is that the recipes use affordable ingredients.  That one didn't fit the bill.  So, I've continued to look for a solid canning cookbook that would fit easily on any cookbook shelf (since the cookbook space in my kitchen has filled up) that would help me feel like I can tackle canning jam and be successful at it.  

So, I was excited to discover that the publisher of Simply in Season, Herald Press, published a canning cookbook:  Saving the Seasons: How to Can, Freeze, or Dry Almost Anything.



This book is a nice size.  It's a thin volume, but it's just the right size for all the information that I found on the pages inside.  
I asked a friend of mine to look it over and give me her opinion of the cookbook.  She is an expert canner who is well known in my church for her jams, jellies, salsas, and condiments! She liked it.  She loved the pictures and was very interested to find out who the photographer was.  She was tempted to purchase the cookbook just for the photographs!  Her opinion is that is a great book for beginners - clear directions, good explanations,  The step by step pictorial directions are easy to follow.  The recipes are a good selection and are almost identical to the recipes she already uses--which have worked well for her for years.  She also thought there was a good selection of tomato based canning recipes.  The Farmer's Market Salsa recipe looked interesting to her.  She did try the marmalade recipe and it turned out just the recipe said it would.  
When I opened up this cookbook, I was immediately reminded of all the things I love about Simply in Season.  Both cookbooks are simply written and are easy to understand.  I did love the photographs.  The photographer did a wonderful job of capturing candids, portraits, and still lifes.  Saving the Seasons has the basic recipes that I want and more.  I don't have tons of time to look all over the internet for good directions and illustrations of how to can.  I need all the information in one place.  In the back of the cookbook, the author biographies reveal that Mary runs a CSA from her family's farm.  Susanna is her daughter.  Susanna is now involved in urban community farming in Pittsburgh, PA.  Mary has had lots of customers over the years ask for canning recipes.  This cookbook was the fruit of her effort to provide them with a good place to start.  I think the authors succeeded in doing just what they set out to do.  I am even inspired to seriously consider purchasing a dehydrator.  The information included answered one of my big questions--like the financial cost of using a dehydrator vs. an oven.  
This cookbook isn't as large as many canning cookbooks, but it's a lot more useable than many I've seen.  It will have a place in my kitchen for many years.  
If you're interested in canning and haven't done much before, I'd highly recommend this cookbook!  It is one that will be easy to use and follow.  And-- there's always the great pictures to look at!
Please note that I received a complimentary copy of this cookbook for review from Herald Press.  

Parmesan-Cheddar Crackers with Poppy Seeds . . . You Can't Eat Just One!

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There are two very big silver-maple trees in our backyard, one of which always holds onto its leaves for dear life, as if to let them go might be painful.


But the wind that swooshed in last week, compliments of Sandy, stripped most of them off within a day or two. The yard is now cushioned like a feather bed with its leaves. You can hardly spot a patch of grass anywhere.


I know winter is on its way when that stubborn tree is almost bare. The leaves on the ground are so dried out, and so thickly layered, they positively crunch underfoot. It's like walking on a field of  saltines, or maybe thousands of Wheat Thins.

Hey . . . did someone just mention crackers?


About this recipe . . .

Adapted from Gourmet, these babies are addictive. Once your cracker-loving friends and family get samples, they'll keep coming back for more, so anticipate the demand. Make a lot.

What aspects of the recipe did I change? The original formula called for 3 parts white flour and 1 part cornmeal, but I decided to use a combo of mostly white flour, a little rye flour for added flavor, and just a wee smidgen of cornmeal so that mealy aspect would be limited. I also used Parmigiano Reggiano cheese along with some sharp cheddar, instead of using all cheddar, and I added in a couple pinches of dried thyme, well crushed, as well as a dab of garlic powder. And, I upped the baking powder slightly because, gosh, the spirit moved me.

I decided, just for the heck of it, to cut mine out with a scalloped-edge cookie cutter, but feel free to simply cut your rolled-out dough with a pastry wheel if you like, leaving far fewer dough scraps. That would also allow you to avoid transferring your unbaked crackers to another surface, one by one, as I had to do. Bake them long enough, and they'll be quite crispy and dark golden brown around the edges, which is what you want if you're going for maximum crunch.

These crackers smell ferociously good when they're baking, just so you know. (Forewarned is forearmed, theoretically at least.)

Parmesan-Cheddar Crackers with Poppy Seeds

(For a printable version of this recipe, click here!)

Yield: Makes approximately 6 dozen crackers

Ingredients:

3/4 cup and 1 tablespoon unbleached all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons rye flour
1 tablespoon well-ground yellow cornmeal
1 tablespoon poppy seeds (I used Holland Blue poppy seeds from Penzey's.)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 cup (half of one stick) unsalted butter, cold and cut into very small chunks
1/2 cup well grated parmesan cheese (I used Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.)
1/2 cup well grated sharp or extra-sharp yellow cheddar cheese
4 to 5 tablespoons very cold water

1 egg, large
1 tablespoon water
fine sea salt

In a big bowl, whisk together the white flour, rye flour, cornmeal, poppy seeds, and baking powder.  Cut in the butter with a pastry blender, or use your fingertips, until the mixture has lots of small coarse lumps. Add in all of the grated cheese, and mix with a fork. Sprinkle 4 tablespoons of the cold water evenly over the dry ingredients, and stir with the fork until well distributed. Add in the final tablespoon of water if it still seems really dry.

Dump your dough out onto a clean work surface, and smear the dough away from you a few times to distribute the fat. Now, use a scraper to gather all the dough together again and shape it into a ball. Cut the ball in half. Press each half into a disk about 1" thick, and wrap the halves in plastic wrap. Let them rest in the fridge for an hour or so.



Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. (Or roll your dough directly onto the paper or onto mats, if you're not using a cookie cutter. See "Or, alternately," in the instructions below).

On a floured piece of parchment or a rolling mat or a pastry cloth, roll out one of your dough disks using a floured rolling pin (leaving the other disk refrigerated while you work with the first disk). Try to roll the dough evenly, so it's no more than 1/8th of an inch thick all over. Cut the dough with small, simply-shaped, cookie cutters of your choice and place the pieces on your prepared baking surface, lifting them with a thin offset spatula. (Or, alternately, roll your dough disk out directly onto the parchment sheet or silicone sheet upon which it will bake, and use a pastry wheel or sharp knife to slice the crackers into rows in both directions.)

Pierce each unbaked cracker with the tines of a fork; this will help the crackers lay flat and keep their shape as they bake.

In a small bowl, whisk together the egg and the 1 tablespoon of water. Use a pastry brush, or even your index finger, to lightly coat each cracker. This egg wash will make the cracker tops nicely shiny and help them to brown. 
Take a pinch of fine sea salt and sprinkle a tiny bit on each cracker (remember, the cheese in the crackers is pretty salty too, so you don't need much added salt). 


Bake the crackers until they're deeply golden on the bottom and on the edges. This might take  12 to 15 minutes or more. If you want to help ensure crispness, turn the oven off when they're done and let the crackers sit in there for another minute or two. Let the crackers cool on the baking sheets, or if the crackers are on parchment, slide that off onto a cooling rack. Keep the cooled crackers in an airtight container.


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Dead Man's Peanut Butter Cupcakes

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Devil's Food & Dead Man's Peanut Butter Mousse
Slathered in chocolate fudge.
Oh yea. 

We're revisiting my Dead Man's Peanut Butter Pie recipe today, with a few fun tweaks.

Today I found myself wrestling with a familiar peanut butter and chocolate craving.  In such situations I have the following options:

1. Go to the store and buy all the available peanut butter cups. Of course, this isn't much of an option since getting out of the house with two small children and going anywhere requires nearly as much planning and preparation as a mission to Mars.
2. Eat peanut butter from jar with a spoon, dipping it into that 20lb bag of chocolate chips I have. Also not a great option, since with this method of consumption, any semblance of portion control vanishes and I just bought skinny jeans.
3. Bake something with peanut butter and chocolate for the blog, while wearing said skinny jeans and pretend that they will encourage restraint while tasting and testing.

I think we all know how this worked out.




So today we're working with the base of my Dead Man's Peanut Butter Pie, which is actually a relative of my scrumptious cream cheese frosting. We're just adding peanut butter to the cream cheese, whip cream and sugar mixture, so naturally it doubles as a topping for cupcakes too. Though, I like to think of this rich and creamy concoction as more of a peanut butter mousse than a sugary-sweet frosting.

We're also taking a page from hi-hat cupcakes and dipping the peanut butter death into a fudge-y chocolate coating. Though it might seem like you're asking for trouble, inverting a cupcake into molten chocolate, the process actually works like a charm.  If I can do this with a toddler clinging to one leg and a squirming six-month-old hitched under one arm without any frosting falling off, you can too.

So let's get down to it, starting with the cake.


I decided to try a new chocolate cake recipe today. Now, usually when I want a cake recipe or to be inspired, I first look to expert--i.e. baking math oriented--cake makers like Nick Malgieri, Rose Beranbaum, and Susan Purdy. Today however, I'm trying out a new recipe from one of my Thomas Keller cookbooks.

I've had my eye on an interesting cupcake from Ad Hoc at Home. It's not an oil cake or a butter cake, but something a little different. The fats in the recipe come from a generous amount of sour cream and a little melted butter. Since I adore sour cream as a tenderizer in my coffee and pound cakes, I gave it a go and you should too. You'll find the recipe quite simple to make and the texture surprisingly light and moist.

Ad Hoc At Home's Devil's Food Cupcakes
from Ad Hoc At Home
yields 24 cupcakes
1 2/3 cups (188g) cake flour
1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon (33g) unsweetened alkalized cocoa powder (dutch processed)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 cups (330g) granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup sour cream
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
6 tablespoons (3 oz) unsalted butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 350°F and prep cup cake pans with 24 paper liners.

Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and sugar into the bowl of your mixer. Stir in the salt and equip the paddle attachment.

In a separate bowl combine the buttermilk and sour cream, whisking until smooth.

In yet another bowl, combine the eggs and melted butter.

Now turn your mixer onto medium low and add your buttermilk mixture to the bowl in thirds, alternating with the egg-butter mixture. Scrape down the bowl, as needed to ensure everything is combined.

Divide the batter into your cupcake cups, filling each cup roughly half full.  Bake for 10 minutes and then rotate the pan(s) and bake for another 10 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Remove the cupcakes from the oven and allow to cool completely on wire racks before continuing.

(Cupcakes are best frosted and eaten the same day they are baked but can be refrigerated for up to 2 days. Bring to room temperature before serving.)

I guess I couldn't be bothered to remove the paper liner
on the other half of the cupcake before photographing it.

 While your cupcakes are baking, get cracking on the peanut butter mousse.

Dead Man's Peanut Butter Mousse Frosting
yields enough to kill anyone
2 1/4 cups heavy whipping cream, (recommend 40% ultra)
1/4 cup plus two tablespoons granulated sugar
12 ounces cream cheese (none of that low fat stuff)
1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter
1 1/2 cup powdered sugar, sifted

Beat the heavy cream and sugar together in the bowl of your mixer until stiff peaks form. Scrape the whipped cream into a second mixing bowl and it set aside. Now add the peanut butter, cream cheese and powdered sugar to the mixing bowl (you don't need to wash it) and equip the paddle. Beat the mixture on medium speed until smooth and creamy. Reduce speed to low and add the whipped cream, beating until just blended.

Refrigerate the peanut butter mousse mixture for a couple hours before using.

By then your cupcakes should be baked, cooled and ready to rock.

Grab your peanut butter frosting and fill a piping bag with it. We're not going to go mile-high on the cupcakes, simply because the peanut butter mousse is heavier than that marshmallow stuff typically used on hi hats.  Still we're going to be pretty generous. To frost cupcakes like these, use a bag equipped with a large round tip (believe I'm using an Ateco 804). Hold tip steady just above the center of the cupcake and squeeze a large blob onto the cupcake. Now lift your tip and hold it steady again just above the blob you just piped and pipe a smaller blob. Very technical language, I know. This is why I'll never teach baking.

Once you've blobbed all your cupcakes, place them on a sheet pan and then stash them in your freezer.  They need to freeze for at least 30 minutes, until they're firm to the touch before proceeding to the next step.

Chocolate Glaze
4 cups chocolate chips
1/3 cup canola oil

1/2 cup chopped peanuts (optional)

Combine chocolate chips and oil in a large heat safe bowl and microwave in 30 second bursts, stirring often until smooth.

Pour this mixture into a narrow vessel, deep enough to accommodate your cupcake and the chocolate.

Now we're ready to get down to business.


After their rest in the freezer you'll find the cupcakes are now very sturdy. I wouldn't juggle them, but they'll certainly survive a dunk into your chocolate.

Slowly dip the cupcake, submerging the top completely in the chocolate. (Try to avoid coating the paper liners as it makes them pesky to peel and eat later.)




Once dunked, quickly remove and set upright. Transfer to the freezer again briefly to set the chocolate coating. 
If desired, sprinkle the freshly dipped cupcakes with chopped peanuts. 

Or just be a little weird and decorate these deadly-delicious cupcakes with little chocolate dead men, white chocolate skulls (piped onto parchment and allowed to set), or whatever other dark ideas you can dream up. 
The cupcakes are best eaten the same day, or store in the refrigerator for up to 2 days. Allow the cupcakes to stand at room temperature for 15 minutes before serving. 
Enjoy! They're good. 





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