Husband Needs Cooking Lessons!

 Please read til the end and then tell me if you think my husband needs cooking lessons. I'm not complaining. I know  . . it sounds like a complaint. Some days I overload myself. Some days, if you're going to do something, it makes sense to do a LOT of something and get it over with and have only one big mess to clean up.

This morning Vince wanted pancakes. He's been wanting pancakes. Could Vince make pancakes? Apparently NOT! So I made pancakes with bacon for me and ham for him.

Then I started canning. We go through a lot of cannellini beans with using them in smoothies and we love them. I thought I had measured out enough beans to make 14 quarts but apparently, while Vince is in cooking classes, Judy should be taking math classes!  :)

I filled the 14 quarts and still had more beans. I filled 7 pints using the cooking liquid from the second boil of the beans and added no salt. Those will be for smoothies. One pint broke in the canner, dang it. Maybe Judy needs canning lessons too!  :)

While the canner was cooling down, and releasing pressure, I cooked dinner.

It's quick. It's easy. It's delicious and there's always leftovers. I like this recipe because it doesn't have any added sugar. The one I used to use had brown sugar added.

That's a half gallon jar so it's a lot of leftovers. We don't even serve it over rice - just cabbage, ground beef, onions, carrots and the sauce.

Once the kitchen was cleaned from that, I ran downstairs and buried today's veggie scraps. I do this almost every day. You can see that my garden soil is looking halfway decent. I do have a compost bin but . . mice have become quit a problem and I'm not sure if part of the problem isn't the compost bin. It's way back from the house and the neighbor has one too but they really made a mess in mine. I suppose there's nothing to keep them from digging through my raised beds but it seems like, with the compost bin, it's a constant buffet for them. Here, I'll use one raised bed one day, another the next and then I'll also use the mineral tubs. I'd like to think the mice don't get in those but I'm sure they do.

Then I came in, got the jars out of the canner. That's when I realized one pint that had broken. Had to let the canner finish cooling down and clean up that mess. Thank goodness it wasn't a greasy mess. I think I might have cracked that jar the other day. I remember hitting one and thinking . . I hope I didn't break that. The jar that cracked was one I got out of the dishwasher (because I'm almost completely out of jars) so I'm betting that's what happened. It was one of my Azure jars so that makes me sad .. sad about the beans and sad about the jar.

Nice looking beans.

Tomorrow we're having roasted chicken for lunch because I need leftover chicken to make soup for Tuesday. Got the chicken seasoned and in the fridge. Got the countertops sanitized and all the chicken germs/bacteria cleaned up. Whew I was tired!

One last thing to do was take the dogs out for a walk. Oscar will not go out with Vince if I'm home. Maybe our dogs need to to take obedience classes! I take them one at a time so that took a little while. Came in. It was about 5:30. I thought I would sit down and read my email and look what's in my inbox!

SEVEN emails from Vince with recipes he wants me to make. I'm thinking . . I have spent the entire day in the kitchen and you're sending me recipes to try. I think I'm going to propose that I'll be the canner and he can be the cook - breakfast and dinner . . and clean up the messes and I'll keep the jars filled and the garden going. Sounds reasonable to me. Thoughts??  :)

Thursday

 Most of my days are so normal and predictable that most anything that is out of the ordinary seems weird. Today was out of the ordinary and a bit frustrating.

When we lived in Nevada, MO and in Texas, I loved my doctors. Here . . not so much. Every year when I see the doctor for my annual Medicare visit, I say I'm not going back. We do have a doctor that we pay a membership fee and can go as often as we like. I go there for things like ear infection, or allergy shots but I don't go to the doctor but once or twice a year. If it's anything I need Medicare to pay for, I have to go to a Medicare doctor and the membership doctor isn't a Medicare doctor.

We also have a naturopath that we talk to every few months and she does us more good than any MD around here. Obviously, I'm not happy with our medical care.

You know I have alpha gal -- maybe I'm over it. I've read that can happen. I have a colonoscopy coming up and the doctor and anesthesiologist always ask questions about that . . When was my last reaction? Do I ever eat beef? Do I eat any products that contain or were made from beef? Their questioning always makes me nervous, though I know there won't be any problems. Yesterday I was thinking . . what if I get an alpha gal test done and it shows I no longer have it . . then I won't have to go through the alpha gal questions. I sent my doctor's office a note asking if they would order an alpha gal test. I explained that I haven't had any incidents in years, I'm eating EVERYTHING now and would like to know if I can stop going through the alpha gal protocol for every procedure - even dental work. 

NO. They wrote me back and said something like "We have no diagnosis of alpha gal. We can talk about this at your next visit." Next visit is AFTER colonoscopy - two months after. 

I looked back through my records and from my first visit with this doctor in 2020, I told them I have alpha gal and it's on all my records, in the notes of every visit I've made. Not only that but they prescribed an epi-pen for me to keep because the ones I had were expired. What on earth would it hurt for me to get a blood test to see if I still have it??

So, I thought . . fine . . I'll get my medical records. Called the hospital in Kentucky where I went at least three times between 2002 and 2006. Nope, they only keep records for 10 years. Called the hospital in Nevada, MO and they were by far the most helpful. They only keep records for 10 years and we've been gone from there 15 years. They MAY have them in off sight storage so they're checking that. The lady I talked to . . her son-in-law has alpha gal so she was understanding. 

Called the hospital in Louisiana where I had to go once while visiting family. Nope - they only keep the records 10 years.

Called the hospital in Texas, who would have the records from when I did get tested in 2013. Nope . . only keep the records 10 years.

I can go to Quest and get a blood test on my own and pay for it for $149. I will do that next week. I should have done that and not even bothered with contacting the doctor. 

When I think about this whole thing . . I got bit by a tick and got a disease that no one even knew existed. I had numerous ER visits to four hospitals and no one had a clue what it was. The last ER visits was July 15, 2009. I had one more incident in about 2013 when a neighbor gave us ground beef from a cow they had raised and had butchered and they were complaining because there was so much fat. Vince grilled burgers and he was complaining about the fat flaming up. About midnight, I had an episode. The doctor in Nevada, MO had told me he had no idea what was causing it but he told me to take a cold shower and Benadryl and that might help. That night I did that - took a Benadryl and a cold shower and that stopped the reaction. I didn't want to go back to bed because I was afraid after taking the Benadryl, I would fall back asleep and then not wake up if my air passages closed up and I couldn't breathe so I stayed up and played on the computer. I knew all I had eaten that day was the hamburger so I googled "hamburger, hives, itching". Alpha gal popped up, along with Dr. Platts-Mills, who pretty much made the connection between the reaction and the tick and is really one of those on the forefront of so much that's been done to help those suffering with alpha-gal. I sent him an email at about 3 a.m. and said something like "I think I have alpha-gal" and told him my story. He wrote me back and we corresponded a couple of times. 

The naturopath told me that there are other issues alpha gal can cause besides the anaphylaxis issues and she thinks I should get tested before I say I decide on my own that I no longer have it.

So, I kinda feel like I've done all the work with getting myself through these reactions, discovering what was causing it, and here I am, thinking I'm over it and my doctor will not even order a blood test. 

It's frustrating!

Then . . I got up this morning planning to make sourdough sandwich bread, which I make every week. Then Vince asked me to make the sourdough rye too. OK . . I can do that. 

The rye dough needs to spend about 24 hours in the fridge so I will bake it tomorrow. 

But  . . the sandwich bread . . turned into the dough on steroids! I did everything as I always do - every week!! I always use my wall oven for all the baking. I put the bread in there. It needs to bake for 45 - 50 minutes. About 20 minutes into the baking, I was downstairs and I could smell something weird. I tried to ignore it but decided I'd better go upstairs and check it. The bread had risen so high, it was touching the top of the oven!

It was too big to leave in the wall oven so I had to take all the cast iron out of the stove/oven, turn the oven on, let it pre-heat and finish baking the bread.

When I bake bread or cornbread in cast iron, I don't clean the pan. I just stick it in the oven, then when I'm ready to use it again, I use a brush, scrub it (dry), then wipe it out with a damp towel, oil it, and heat on the stove. Then it's ready to go again. So . . most of my cast iron pans have crumbs in them!

I can't get over how much that bread rose in the oven. Here's what it looked like going into the oven.

Has anyone ever had that happen before? It's just sourdough . . no added yeast.

The bread tastes great. I told Vince it should last twice as long because one slice is as big as two regular slices. Vince did volunteer to try a slice of it and he says it tastes great. Just weird!

America - 250 Progress

 I will try to do my best to not overload the posts with this project but I'm really excited that I may be able to get this one AND A Worthy Patriot stitched before July 4.

Before I start with the good news, I should tell you what happened last night. It isn't the end of the world but I was frustrated. I don't have the called for floss so I found this one and it was already on a frame. That saved me a good bit of time . . almost! I think the piece of linen was something like 18" x 26". I had it loaded on the frame with the 18" side being the width. I had my floss and the chart out and I thought . . I'd better check this to make sure it's right. Nope.

The linen needed to be 19" wide by 12" deep. This piece has been on the frame for a while. I wasn't sure if I had pulled a thread along the sides to make sure it was straight. I only had about 1-1/2" extra on each side and if it wasn't straight, I could have been in trouble. I had no other empty frames and this frame was 19". That would have been too close so I took linen off a longer frame, trimmed about 3" off one vertical side of the linen and sewed it onto the leader and onto the frame.

I had been working in the sewing room on the linen getting it folded and in the boxes so the room was a mess - more of a mess than normal. The sewing machine chair was full of stuff. There was a big pile on top of the sewing machine and there is zero light in that end of the room. I brought in a big flashlight, took everything out of the chair, off the sewing machine and off the cutting table, sat it all on the floor, got this done. I probably make it sound way worse than it was but it was all happening about midnight and I was tired.

So . . I couldn't wait to start so I sat down and made about 64 stitches. Today I made 650 stitches. That could be a record. I'm 3.02% done with this project.

My goal is to finish this one in mid-April, then work on A Worthy Patriot the rest of April, May and June and have them both framed and on the wall for July 4. We'll see. There will be days when I probably won't get any stitching done - we each have medical procedures (routine stiff mostly) and a couple of trips to Kansas City. I don't stitch on 40 count linen when I'm with Debbie so no stitching on this on Wednesdays.

All I can do is give it my best shot and if I don't have it finished by Independence Day, I should have it done soon thereafter.

What I'm trying to do is work over to the left side. With the dogs' decisions to sit on my lap, I'm not able to use the lap stand. Using the Lowery, it's kinda hard to be able to reach the left side because of the tight spot where I'm stitching so if I can sit on the bed and stitch using the lap stand, that will work. Any time I put them in bed, they go under the covers and go to sleep. If I could get a couple of hours each day stitching like that, it would help me a lot! Isn't it crazy how the dogs rule my life?  :)

The Cannellini Bean Smoothie Report

 Last night I peeled two bananas, stuck them in a container and placed them in the freezer. This morning I took them out, put them in the blender, added about 1/2 cup of chocolate milk, 1-1/2 cups of whole milk, 1 T. cacao powder, 1-1/2 tsp. vanilla and the whole pint of cannellini beans. The beans were home canned with no salt, no oil - just beans and water. The beans wasn't a lot of space in the jar and maybe 1/2 cup of liquid, which was a bit thick - typical liquid from cooking beans. I ended up adding a bit more milk because it was too thick.

It was absolutely delicious. Both of us kept saying "Why didn't we think of this sooner?" It was quite filling.

For lunch, I made oven BBQ country style pork ribs and this Tomato Baked White Beans with Feta and Lemon Parsley Oil.Vince ate a salad but I knew I wasn't going to be able to eat that much. Those beans were so good! 

I added everything to Cronometer and this is what it tells me.

That may be the first time in the almost three years I've been tracking what I eat that I reached the protein goal and didn't go over on fats. I didn't use any butter or bacon fat today, which is kinda weird.

The carbs are low enough I think I'll have a Dr. Pepper!

Also, we both met our iron (exceeded!) our iron requirements, as well as several other minerals. I haven't been paying much attention to my iron intake but with Vince being deficient (I am not), I'm trying to increase what he gets. According to Cronometer, I got 171% of my iron requirements, which is 13.7 mg. What I'm reading says I need 8.7 mg per day and even if I go up to about 20 mg per day, it should be ok. I'll talk to the naturopath about that.

America - 250 Chart/Project

 Plum Street Samplers created this chart for a summer (2025) retreat project at The Attic in Mesa, AZ. Almost always, the retreat pieces are exclusive to attendees of the retreat for a year. Then, often they will be released for other stitchers to purchase.

With this project, mainly because of the sesquicentennial, every stitcher seemed to want that chart NOW. My understanding is that The Attic and Plum Street/Paulette Stewart decided it was a good idea to release it to the public since so many people wanted it in time to get it stitched by July 4, 2026. They graciously (VERY graciously!) agreed that The Attic would be able to sell it sometime after the first of this year. As soon as I heard that, I called and got on the list and my copy arrived a few weeks ago.

The called for linen is Smoky Quartz by Fiber on a Whim. I don't think I have that linen but I have a couple that are probably close.

The top piece isn't nearly as green as it looks. The cover photo for this piece looks like it's much lighter but when I look at Smoky Quartz online and found this and it looks more like my top piece of linen (plus that one is already on a frame and ready to start stitching!)

This one is 301 wide x 162 high and stitched area will be 15" x 8-1/2". It isn't huge but there's a lot of stitching on it.

It was going to take a lot of dedication to get this stitched and framed by July 4 BUT then look what Plum Street has coming out at market and should be going out to stitchers in mid March. A Worthy Patriot!

The first email I saw about A Worthy Patriot was a kit with linen, floss and the chart, or just the chart. I debated about getting the kit but, knowing how much linen I have, I decided finding something in my stash was a good choice. The called for linen is Coffee Stain by Cedar River Linen. Look what I found while searching for linen for America - 250.

It's sometimes takes a while to get linen from Cedar River so I was very happy to find that piece. Now I'm wondering if I should stitch both pieces on the same linen and make them more like a matching pair or, stitch them on different linens just for variety. Thoughts?

A Worthy Patriot is 191 wide x 280 high. On 40 count linen, the stitched area will be 9-1/2" x 14" so almost the exact same dimensions but one is longer and narrower and one is shorter and wider but just one inch in all directions. They will be a great matching pair.

My confidence is not very high that I will get both of these stitched, especially in time to have them framed, by July 4.

Dry Beans & Nutrition

 For the disclaimer . . I am not a nutritionist. I know nothing about medicine. I think humans should be able to live on Dr. Pepper! Don't believe anything I say!  :)  

Vince had blood work done recently and his iron level was low. I was shocked that it was recommended that he takes a children's gummy vitamin. He isn't going to do that! I checked the ingredient list and the first ingredient is glucose syrup. The second is sugar.  Farther down the list is palm oil. Yes, they do have a good bit of iron in them but I started looking to see which foods are high in iron. I wish that we had been taught more about nutrition in school. We've learned a lot in the past few years but I think back to how nice it would have been had we known 40 or more years ago what we know now and we still have a whole lot to learn.

We also struggle to get enough protein and have both been drinking a protein shake every day. I don't like any of the artificial sweeteners, nor do I like Stevia which is in so many of them. We found one at Natural Grocer that has no sweetener at all but it's about $40 and with both of us using it, we go through at least one, sometimes 1-1/2 containers of it each week. 

Tonight I was looking up foods rich in iron. Because of the oxalates in spinach, we try not to eat too much of that but another recommended foods is cannellini beans - most any beans really. We LOVE cannellini beans and buy 50 pounds of them from Azure, usually once a year.

As I was looking at the nutritional value in cannellini beans, mainly to check the iron they provide, I noticed the protein. I already knew beans were high in protein but it hit me . . why can't I make a protein shake using cannellini beans. When I can them, I don't add anything - no salt, no fat . . I could just dump a pint jar of beans in the blender, add bananas or blueberries or strawberries, milk or chocolate milk . . and have a smoothie with about the same protein I'm getting from some of the powdered mix, plus more iron and LESS money. And, I won't have to store those containers of protein powder!

Why didn't I think of this before now?

There are many recipes online for protein shakes using cannellini beans. We're going to try this one tomorrow.

I'll report back on what we think!

Valentine's Day Eve

NOTE: There are some Amazon links below. These are affiliate links which means if you order through them, I will get a very small commission. Please don't feel like you NEED to do that or that I expect it. Thanks!

This is really funny. I can remember my mom complaining because mom said that my grandma always talked about how busy she was and she didn't seem to do anything. Mom was a teacher, had the two of us kids and we were probably in middle or high school at the time so we probably did keep mom hopping. Now, I get ready to write this post and I'm probably about the age my grandma was at that time - and I'm thinking about how busy I was today. I felt like we didn't stop but then when I go to write what we did . . we weren't THAT busy.  :)

But, here's my "diary" entry for today.

Vince had told me earlier in the week that he wanted to take me out for Valentine's Day but he didn't want to go to Joplin on a Saturday. He said we could go anywhere I wanted to go. So, I said I wanted to go to Louisiana and eat crawfish. Nope, that was a bit too far.  :)  There aren't that many places in town that I like that he likes so I suggested Magic Noodle. I guess you would call it a Thai type place but I'm not even sure. There's a Mexican restaurant in town, very authentic, very nice people, that I went to with Jeremy and Angie before Vince moved here (2020) and I love it. Sometimes when Vince is gone, I'll go there and eat. Vince and I did go there once and I thought he said he didn't like it. But today he tells me that's not true. We were passing there on our way home and he said "We never go there". I said "I love that place but thought you didn't like it." Nope, he loves it too. OK . . Haven't been in 5 years but maybe we'll go there sometime.

I'm kinda getting out of order here . . Vince wanted to go to Michael's and get something and he had a 40% off coupon. It was on the app so I had it too but I only bought stuff that was already on sale. They had quite a bit of Christmas stuff for 70 or 75% off! I got some ribbon, a velvety feeling reindeer and a shaggy red 8 or 10" Christmas tree. I got a little fake green Christmas tree - about 8".  Mostly it was things I could put with my Christmas cross stitched small pillows.

Then Vince wanted new coffee cups so he went to T. J. Maxx, didn't find them there; went to Target and found a couple there. I didn't get anything at either place. In fact, I stayed in the car at Target.

Then we went to eat. Magic Noodle used to be my favorite place but the last few times, it wasn't so great and I doubt we go back. It wasn't horrible but it wasn't great.

From there, we went to Walmart. Vince needed something. I stayed in the car again. My knee is fairly ok but definitely not perfect. I try to stay off it as much as I can so I don't ever mind staying in the car while he goes in and shops. From Walmart, we went home. Said we weren't leaving again probably til Tuesday. Yay!

A while back, on the old blog no doubt, I had mentioned that I was folding linen and wrapping it around comic book board and securing the linen with alligator clips. I use the 2.2" clear ones with teeth. Then I stand the linen up, kinda on its side standing up so when I open the bins, I'm looking down at the folded edge and I can see exactly which linen is what color. These are the bins I've been using. They're Hefty 40 quart Hi-Rise. When we bought the first ones, we got them from Lowe's but Walmart has them marked down now so, for six, it was about $30 less from Walmart.

Before using these, I had my linen stacked in Rubbermaid totes and it took a lot of digging to get to the linen in the bottom of the tote. I love the Hi-Rise totes. It's so easy to find the color of linen I need. I still have several totes that have linen so I'm going to get it all in these Hi-Rise bins.

So . . back to what we did today . . the totes are heavy when loaded. I can pick them up but I had stacked them three high so if I needed the bottom one, I had to move two, then lift the bottom one up onto a table to get to a bottom tote.

A couple of days ago, I asked Vince about ordering another wire shelf unit. In my current sewing room, the lighting is not good. The corner in the back is way dark. Vince has said he'll have lights added but we aren't staying here. I don't know when we'll actually do it but I don't want to spend the money having more lights added. The room/lighting is fine for what most people would want. I could get a floor lamp of some kind and be fine. There was nothing in that corner and I had planned to move the sewing room recliner into that corner, put a magnifying light there and I could sit in there and cross stitch if Vince wanted to watch something on TV that I didn't want to watch. Then I realized almost every wall in that room has shelving units against them and the bottom shelves would be so much fun for the dogs to grab things to destroy. I would never to have the dogs in there and they would not be quiet if I stayed in there and they were not with me. That got me to thinking . . what could I do with that corner to maximize storage.

I had measured and knew I could fit a 60" long, 48" deep shelf unit in the corner. Vince had two he had ordered and had not used so he said I could have one of those. 

When we got back from eating lunch out, we started putting the shelf together. We had the bottom shelf on and Nicole called. She had been to town today and went by Crumbl Cookie to get cookies for Addie for Valentine's Day. They had a Dubai Chocolate Strawberry Brownie today but when Nicole got here, they were sold out. When Nicole told Addie that they had been out of the Dubai Chocolate Brownie, Addie looked online and they had them listed again so Nicole wanted me to run to Crumble, get the brownies and she will come here tomorrow to get them. We stopped putting the shelves together, went back to Joplin, got them, came home and finished putting the shelf together. 

There's a start! I will be able to get 6 of the linen tubs on each of the third, fourth and fifth shelves. I won't need that many tubs for linen. I probably will need three or four more tubs for the linen but I can store other things in those Hi-Rise tubs. They stack so nicely and six per shelf is a perfect fit. That will give me the second shelf and the top shelf for things. Now I have sewing machines stacked on the top shelf and still have four more to get up there but I was running out of steam. 

Lots of work left before I get that sewing room organized but I'm making progress!

Finish #3 for 2026

 I had been working on a WIP but when Debbie and I stitch together, we're working on patriotic pieces. It's hard for me to see 40 count linen without a magnifier so I've been working on small pieces on 36 count linen. After stitching on this piece with her this week, I only had a bit more to get done so I finished it last night.

And why go to bed even though it was 2 a.m. when I could learn play with Chat GPT, I stayed up a bit later and came up with this:

I didn't want the white mat but I just said "straighten photo and add a frame" and that's what I got.

I tried again and said "straighten photo and add a blue frame and this is what I got.

Next, I asked it to straighten and enhance photo, no mat, add a 2" brown border with 1" between the edge of the stitching and the border. I think the space between the stitching and the border is more on top and bottom than on the sides but for the first time I've used this, I think I did good.

It was fun. Something else to play with instead of doing other things I should be doing!

Sourdough Sunday

 It's Superbowl Sunday for some but it was Sourdough Sunday here. Maybe every Sunday will be Sourdough Sunday! Anyone want to do that with me? We could try a new recipe on Sunday or Saturday or whatever day you want.

I have a friend who is just getting into sourdough and she was having some issues with her starter and wondered if her kitchen was too cool. Maybe . . I think my starter must have acclimated itself to our freezing cold house in the winter. Having an electric heat pump in an area that gets as cold as it gets here and having one unit for a house with a basement . . not good!

About 1 a.m. this morning I went upstairs and fed the starter. It was in a quart jar and with the feeding, it was almost to the halfway point in the jars. I thought about putting it in a half gallon jar and figured that was overkill so I didn't do it. Almost always I put the jar in a bowl with a bit of water in it so if it overflows, it won't be such a mess to clean up but I didn't do that either.

While I was upstairs, I fed a second jar of sourdough and got another jar of buttermilk started and just forgot to put on the bowl under the quart jar.

You can see that it didn't seem bothered by the cold. The starter on the right, in the 1-1/2 pint jar, is for the Same-Day Sourdough Wonder Bread Copycat Recipe that has been my favorite sourdough sandwich bread for quite a while. I do substitute fresh milled flour (hard white) and add a bit more water but otherwise, it's the same exact recipe.

Even with the overflow, I had enough starter in the quart jar to make two batches of crackers.

There's the sandwich dough rising. In the two pint jars are crackers that have lemon balm added. The 1-1/2 pint jar on the right has rosemary added. I'm working on using up the herbs I dried last year since it won't be long til I'll have more herbs to save.

In the background, the jar on the left is the starter that was left after the two batches of crackers. It's fed and I'll have to feed it again tomorrow to get enough to make English muffins Tuesday.  The glass container in the middle was about 3/4 full of discard so I put most of it in the blue canister and left just a bit in the glass container. That starter has been in the fridge without having been fed for probably 6 months so I'm going to feed it and get it happy and active again and start using it for the crackers, which we're eating instead of chips and store bought crackers so we use a lot of them. I'll probably transfer the starter from the blue canister to a half gallon glass jar - just because of how I feel about plastic.

The pint jar is sitting there to show how much the bread rose. You may can see a couple of green specks on the bread. Just as I was shaping it into a loaf, Vince asked if I could add rosemary to that so I did but I mostly just patted the dough out, sprinkled rosemary on top, then rolled it and shaped it so it probably isn't going to be real pretty inside . . we'll see when I slice it tomorrow.

I did make cookies yesterday. These were the ones that were supposed to be tea cakes but tasted more like store bought slice and bake cookies. Definitely not my idea of tea cakes but I suppose I could have screwed up the recipe.

I had seen these bottles of finishing sugar and thought they might be fun and different. I have used lavender before and Vince never liked it so I put strawberry on most of them. Vince tried the lavender and loved it. Men!  :) I'll try another tea cake recipe soon and use the sugar on them too.

I don't remember if I mentioned on here that I made marshmallows last week.

They were fun to make and they were very good but . . who sits and eats marshmallows? We did but that's not something we normally do. This is the recipe I used and they are made by soaking dried marshmallow root, then straining the liquid and using that. They were sweetened with honey and the color came from butterfly pea flowers so, as far as junk food goes, they were halfway healthy.

Yes, I've been stitching too. And, at some point this week I'm going to plant broccoli seeds and get some artichoke, pepper and tomato seeds started in cups that I can keep indoors til time to set them outside. Gardening season will be here before I know it.

Vince, The Greatest Bargain Finder

 I get so frustrated with Vince and his shopping. He LOVES to shop. He loves to shop alone and I love for him to shop alone! He likes to go down the aisles and look at EVERYTHING. In Walmart, there are several aisles that have all the markdowns concentrated in one area. I have zero interest in walking down those aisles and looking at everything. I go to the store with a list. If it isn't on my list, I don't even notice. Last week, or week before maybe, we did go to Walmart and I asked Vince to meet me in the grocery area in 20 minutes. It didn't take me 20 minutes to get what I needed so I was kinda browsing and I did pick up some things not on my list.

This is probably going to sound crazy to everyone but me but when I get a new phone, I keep my old phone and even though it's no longer activated to be used as a phone for making calls, I will keep it upstairs and use it for taking pictures when I'm cooking. I can email the pictures to me via WiFi and then prepare the blog posts or Facebook entries from my computer downstairs.

A few months ago, we switched to T-Mobile and got new phones. My old phone is not holding a charge. I have to keep it on the charger, take it off, take a picture and put it back on the charger. I don't want to have to do that. I forget to put it back on the charger and then I need it and it's dead. 

While Vince was checking out the bargain aisle at Walmart, he found U. S. Cellular phones phones that were marked down to 75 cents each!! He bought two, and gave one to me to keep upstairs for my photos in the kitchen (or anywhere I want to use them upstairs). Can you believe 75 cents for a phone? And, they came with a wall plug and a cord and there's room for an memory card (or whatever you call it to insert to have more memory). I can't believe it got those but I'm happy he did. 

Every time I take my real phone upstairs, I leave it and have to go back up and get it when I realize it's up there. Now I can not even bother to take my real phone upstairs!

I wouldn't do this because the screen is too small on a phone but I could put Markup (the stitching app) on one of those phones!

Vanilla Extract Experiments

 In the 1980's, we had neighbors who were from Laredo, Texas. They gave me a container - maybe 1/2 gallon of Mexican vanilla from Mexico. I know there's some questions about whether there are "things" in the vanilla that aren't necessarily healthy but it's all I used until I started making my own extract. Those neighbors from Laredo ended up bringing me bottles and bottles of the vanilla from Mexico and I didn't run out until maybe 2010 and then I had to order the vanilla with a rooster on the bottle. When we lived in Texas, there was a Mexican restaurant that sold those big bottles so I guess I was on the road to becoming a vanilla snob and then . . I found where I could order beans and make my own extract.

It was probably late 2021 when I came across a Facebook group that orders vanilla beans. It's a pre-order and it sometimes takes weeks to get the beans. I've ordered probably 8 - 10 different batches of a variety of beans. I think the last order I placed was in mid-2024 so all of the beans I've had "brewing" are ready to use and I've tried all of them. 

By far . . by miles and miles . . the Indonesian beans that were brewed in bourbon are my favorite. Favorite as in I would give away all the other extracts if I could get pounds and pounds of the Indonesian beans. Every time I walk by that jar of extract in the kitchen, I open it and smell it. It's so good . . have I said that enough?  :)

The beans from Indonesia don't seem to become available often. I had kinda stopped reading the posts from the vanilla group because . . how much vanilla extract does a girl need and I wanted to try every bean they offered.

Y'all! I have Youtube on and a commercial just came on "Do you want to make your own vanilla extract?" and it linked to another vanilla bean seller. How weird???

OK . . back to the post . . 

Today I checked the site to see what kind of beans they have and beans from Ecuador. I did a little research to compare these to Indonesian beans and found this. My take is that the Ecuadorian vanilla would be good in my homemade vanilla pudding, ice cream, icing, shakes, etc. - dishes that aren't cooked. The Indonesian vanilla is probably better suited for cakes, pies, cookies, creme brulee - things that are cooked or baked. Of course, I'll try baking with the Ecuadorian vanilla and see what I think.

To make a long story a bit shorter . . I ordered some of the Ecuadorian beans. I'm guessing I won't have them before May or June. I'm going to continue to watch for more Indonesian beans. Those are so, so amazing.

A New Instant Pot

 A quick check on Amazon tells me I ordered my first Instant Pot in 2014 and then another one in 2015 so the fact that they've both recently stopped working is not disappointing. I've used those things so, so much and I'm very pleased with how long they lasted. A couple of months ago, one of them wouldn't do anything. I had already loaded the cooking container with food, stuck it in the pot, plugged it in . . nothing! I switched to another outlet in case it was that. Nothing. No problem, there's a second one. I transferred the food to it and it worked fine. Last week I "boiled" some eggs in it. Very fresh eggs are hard to peel but for some reason, pressure cooking them for about 5 minutes, then dropping the egg in ice water makes the peeling come off easily without tearing up the egg. I did the eggs like I always do, took them out and they were about 1/3 cooked. Tossed those, put more in and they cooked fine so I figured I had some setting wrong. 

Last week I was going to cook a whole meal in there and could not get it to work. It would achieve pressure, cook for 2 minutes no matter how long I had it set to cook and then, just go off - screen went black. This morning I wanted to cook quesabirria taco meat for tomorrow. I told Vince . . we may have to run to Walmart for a new Instant Pot if this one doesn't work. Oh . . he was on that! He was more than happy to go to Walmart. I said  . . just wait. I want to see if this one works. It did . . perfectly! We're having leftover gumbo for dinner so I wanted to make more potato salad. I put two eggs in it . . didn't work. What in the world is wrong with it? 

I have a Ninja Foodi 14 in 1 that's 6.5 quart but I don't keep any of those "extra" pots on the counter and that thing, according to Amazon, weighs 24 pounds and that's a bit much for me to lift off a shelf, carry into the kitchen and return when I'm done. I will still use it for some of the specialty things it does but not for my main pressure cooker.

Vince said "I think it's time to replace the Instant Pot so we started looking online. I ended up ordering the Instant Pot Rio (6 quart). It was on sale for $89 and it does all the things I would ever want it to do - pressure cooking, slow cooking, rice, yogurt, steam, warm. In the older models, the insert with the food would spin when you were trying to stir. There was a "clip" you could buy and I never did . . always planned to do it. I see that the new models, the insert doesn't spin when you're stirring. That's something I will appreciate.

The Gumbo "Recipe"

 Several folks asked about my gumbo recipe. I don't really have a recipe and it's so easy, you don't need a recipe. I made a pot of gumbo today and I tried to document how I did it all. 

There are a million - probably more - ways to make gumbo. This is the way I do it. I had always made my own roux. My sister told me recently that she now buys her roux already made in a jar. I mentioned it on Facebook and every one of my friends in Louisiana who responded said they now use store bought roux. I tried it for the gumbo I made today and I will NEVER make roux again!  :)  This is the roux I ordered. Prompt shipping and very expertly packaged with foam peanuts and bubble wrap.

Let me also say that there are several brands of roux in a jar and there's the one where the flour is cooked in oil and there's a "dry" roux where the flour is toasted in the oven. I used the one in the jars with the oil.

I use a Lodge #8 cast iron Dutch oven. I would guess that it makes enough gumbo for at least 8 hungry adults. According to Google, it holds 5 quarts. Of course, you don't have to make 5 quarts. I probably made 4 quarts. We both had it for lunch and I had a 1/2 gallon jar and a quart jar left over (3 quarts left over) and between us, we probably ate about a quart for lunch before I filled up the jars for leftovers.

I do as much as I can the day before. I'm sure some people make their gumbo the same day but I'm not real sure how. I do think it's better the day after it's made but did all the prep work yesterday, got it all put together and simmering by about 6 this morning and we ate about 2 p.m. so that gave it a good bit of time for the flavors to blend.

What you will need for my method of gumbo. There are many ways to make gumbo but in my world, tomatoes do NOT go in gumbo!

• A chicken - don't get the tiniest one you can find. Don't get the biggest one you can find. You need some fat in the broth to make it good! If you're using a pot bigger than I used, you can whatever size chicken will fit into your pot (along with all the other ingredients).
• Seasonings (I use a good Cajun seasoning - Cajun Redhead; salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, red pepper, bay leaves - whatever you want. Those are the ones I use).
• Two onions, 1 large bell pepper, 3 stalks of celery, several cloves of garlic, sliced green onions, chopped parsley. I usually use one jalapeno pepper too.
• Roux
• Sausage

NOTE - sausage: To me, the sausage makes the gumbo. Here, I cannot get sausage anywhere near what I like to use. When I go to Louisiana or when Chad goes, we bring back lots of sausage. It doesn't matter how many times or how big the print is, even if it says CAJUN, I haven't found any in this area to be good, flavorful cajun type sausage. Hopefully those of you in larger areas can find good sausage.

Yesterday's activities:

• Boiled a chicken in a pot of water with salt, 3 quartered onions, 5 garlic cloves, 6 stalks of celery and a couple of bay leaves.
• Removed the chicken from the pot and let it cool.
• Strained and poured the broth into one half gallon jar and one 1-1/2 pint jar.
• Picked the meat off the bones. Put that in a quart jar.
• Chopped two onions, 4 cloves of garlic, 2 large stalks of celery and 1-1/2 bell peppers. Those filled one 1-1/2 pint jar. I sauteed it all but pulled half of the veggies out to freeze for another batch of gumbo in a couple of weeks.
• Sliced and browned the sausage.

As it cooled, it all went into the fridge.

Today's Activities:

1. Slice the sausage and brown it in the Dutch oven. Once browned, remove the sausage, leaving the grease in the pot unless there's a massive amount and then you can remove whatever isn't needed for the gumbo.

2. Add a bit of bacon grease, butter - oil of your preference - to the skillet/Dutch oven if there isn't enough left from the sausage and add the onions, celery, garlic and peppers. Saute til they're all tender.

3. Add warm/hot broth (water if you don't have broth but it's so much better with a good, rich broth) and add a couple of bay leaves.  

4. Add roux. I used about one-third of the jar. I started with about 1/4 cup and then added, letting it all simmer for a few minutes and adding more as needed. What's "needed"? Gumbo isn't supposed to be thin or watering and it isn't supposed to be thick like gravy. You will learn how thick or thin you like yours.

5. Gently stir until all of the roux has "melted" into the water. Add more roux if needed to get the gumbo to the right consistency.

6. Add the chicken to the gumbo and let simmer at least a few hours.

7. It will be great to eat the same day (over rice with a bit file' added to each bowl) but it will be better the next day.

Here's the quick version of the recipe:

Boil a chicken. Save the broth.
Cook sliced sausage in Dutch oven, remove and set aside.
Saute chopped onions, peppers and celery in same Dutch oven.
Add hot broth or water (homemade broth is much better).
Add roux until the gumbo is the desired thickness.
Add shredded chicken. Add sausage if desired.
Taste and add seasonings to taste.
Before serving, add chopped green onions and parsley.

Please ask if something doesn't look right. 

Smoked Gouda Tomato Soup

 A week or so ago I was watching a YouTube video and the lady was making a Smoked Gouda Tomato soup. She was making changes and I don't know if she shared the recipe. I found this recipe for Rich and Creamy Smoked Gouda Tomato Soup. It was very easy to make and it was very good. I will be making it again. The recipe made enough for us to have it for at least two meals. We also had sandwiches with the soup.

Advice:  I had two different packages of smoked Gouda. The first one I opened and thankfully tried before putting it in the soup. It had a horrible chemical/fake smoke taste that was quite overwhelming. I cut off a piece to taste and threw the rest of it out.

This one was mild and not overwhelmingly smokey.

I'm sure there are lots of smoked Gouda varieties out there. I don't even remember the brand of the one I didn't like and Vince has already taken the trash out so . . if anyone is interested, I can look at Walmart or Sams and see if I recognize it. I remember that it was more in a wedge.

Biscuit Recipe I Use

 Sharon asked in a comment about my biscuit recipe. This is the recipe I use. I have it taped inside one of my cabinet doors. It's so simple, you would think I could remember it but I don't. I use buttermilk and it's pretty thick so I usually have to use 1 full cup of buttermilk and if the dough still seems a little dry, I'll add a bit more just in little drizzles until I get the consistency I want.

This is the picture I posted yesterday.

I like biscuits in layers and I know we are supposed to handle biscuit dough as little as possible but I roll it out a little narrower than my biscuit cutter. I think my cutter is 2" and if that's right, I would roll the dough out to be about 1-3/4" by however long  .. probably 14 or 15 inches. Then I fold the dough over. Make the fold about 4" in, then fold that over and keep folding it over until your dough is about 1-3/4" x 4"' but it actually keeps getting bigger so by the time you're done folding, it's probably 1-3/4" x about 6". Then gently roll that that until the dough is big enough to get about 8 biscuits. You're mostly rolling it to smash it down a bit and get the layers to stick together. Use as little flour as possible during the rolling process.

To bake them, I use a cast iron skillet. When I first started making the biscuits, I heat the skillet just enough to melt about 2 T. of butter. Then remove it from the heat and allow the skillet to cool a bit (it won't get completely cold). Add one biscuit to the skillet, top side down to get the top buttered, then turn it right side up and position it in the skillet. Keep doing that til all the biscuits have buttered tops. They can be squeezed in but shouldn't be too squished. I think I use an 8" skillet and mine are almost touching . . maybe 1/16th" apart . . maybe some are touching.

Bake as directed. Enjoy!

We don't eat them all so I'll stick them in a zipper bag after they've cooled. The next day I slice them in half like a sandwich, add butter to a skillet and toast them on their cut side. That gets them warm all the way through and gives you a buttery, toasted edge. I think I like them best the second and third day than I do the first day.

A Bread Baking Comment

 Panto Pam left this comment on my bread baking post and I think it's something that might help others, especially those of you who have a bread maker and have never been 100% happy with it. Thanks, Pam, for sharing this. It's a great idea.

Pam, if you see this, will you share which bread maker you use please? Thanks!

I've been making our bread for the past several years. My bread got much better after I bought a bread machine. I only use the dough cycle and then I shape the dough into whatever type bread I need for the final rise and baking. I use the same recipe for everything, so I made my own "mixes" by putting all the dry ingredients, minus the instant yeast, into quart jars. Whenever I make bread, I put the wet ingredients into the bread machine and then dump the "mix" and add the yeast. I'm hoping by leaving this comment, this will inspire someone who has a bread machine collecting dust in a closet to get it out and use it. I never did like bread made in the machine, but the dough cycle is a wonderful tool.

January 2026 Stitching Report

 Can you believe January is already over and February is here? Yesterday Vince and I were complaining about the cold and the snow and I said . . just think in less than 10 months, we get to start winter all over again!  I love snow but I love snow that is gone after about three days. We've had snow for 10 days now. The sun comes out and even though in those 10 days, we've had ONE day when the temp got above freezing . . all the way up to 33 degrees. We're getting down to single digits most nights. And when the sun comes out, snow starts to melt and then the temps drop below freezing and we wake up to more ice and slick surfaces.  The good news is that one day early next week, our high is going to be in the 50's (I think).

OK . . back to the stitching report.

Starts & Finishes:

1. On January 1, I started the Blessing Sampler which was Christmas in my Heart 1843. I finished it on January 22. I have ordered the frame and it should be here the second week of February.

2. On January 22, I started Wynter and I finished him yesterday, January 31. I added a couple more snowflakes to make him just a bit taller because I'm hoping he will fit in the little arched frame I bought at Hobby Lobby this week. I left off his name on the left side because, as I had mentioned, other snowmen I make won't have names so he doesn't really need one either.

Purchases:

I think I've done great with purchases in January. Several times, I saw a chart on flosstubes, pulled it up on the computer and decided against it. I have to remind myself that I have so many charts I want to stitch so why buy more?

I did buy a couple of things and I'm good with what I bought.

Purchase #1 was the Quilted Anniversary chart from Colour and Cotton which included floss and linen.

Even though samplers will probably always be my first love, I think I'm becoming more of a seasonal stitcher. I want to stitch Valentine's then Spring and Easter. I will probably stitch patriotic at least through July 4 but I saw this Valentine's Day chart and the display piece and I ordered both of those. It's Love Notes and I got the PDF and ordered the display through Paisleys & Polka Dots.

Do I expect to have this finished by Valentine's Day? Doubtful but I will have it finished for next year.

I also ordered 6 skeins of three different green flosses from Colour & Cotton. I want to get started on Dasher & Dancer and I want the perfect shade of green. I'm still not sure I've found the perfect shade but I will use one of those three greens!

I did order one more chart but it isn't here and I don't think it's even on the shop's website. It has been shipped so I will count it in the February purchases.

That's it for the purchases.

Goals Set and Achieved:

My stitching goal is at least 400 stitches per day. I stuck with that
and met that goal. The only day I didn't record at least 400 stitches was on January 1. I had my settings in Markup so that my day ended at 2 a.m. because I'm often up stitching til that time and it seemed to me that my day shouldn't end until I went to bed but after the little mixup with stitching numbers on 1/1, I changed my settings back to where my day ends at midnight. What happened was I started stitching at midnight but Vince was still up for a while and I got 218 stitches made before 2 a.m. and then it switched over to January 2. I didn't get any more stitching time on January 1 until after midnight that night and I had already switched the tracker to go to the next day at midight. You can see that I made 758 stitches on January 2 so at least 200 of those were made in the early morning hours of January 1. So, I'm counting that as having made my goal.

Changes to Goal:

I am going to allow myself up to two days each month to get some things fully finished. I cannot stitch 400 stitches each day AND find time to sew things into pillows or get pieces laced and framed. If I don't have anything I want to get fully finished, I'll just stitch those two days but from now forward, my goal will be to stitch at least 400 stitches per day except for two days for finishing, if needed. 

I had intended to work on WIPS every month but I didn't do that in January. I could have set Wynter aside and spent a few days working on a WIP just to say I did it but I didn't have any WIPS I could get finished and not working on Wynter meant he would have been another WIP to carry into February so at least I didn't add any WIPS yet this year.

Goals for February:

1. Start and Finish Love Notes. I may not be able to fully finish it but I would like to finish the stitching.

2. Work on a WIP - either Noel Sampler or New Year Sampler.