hipjazz's Profile

I'm trying to wean myself off the sweetness altogether. People drink coffee black; why not hot chocolate? Surely someone else out there is doing this, it's just hard to Google. =P

Current recipe: 1 cup whole milk, 2-3 tablespoons cocoa powder, 1/2 tablespoon raw sugar, splash of vanilla.

(Why yes, I do eat 90% cacao chocolate bars for yums, why do you ask?)

Keep fresh, washed berries and grapes in the fridge, and a bag of frozen blueberries in the freezer. The blueberries can be eaten without thawing (my one year old with her nine teeth does fine, no choking).

You can make up a couple batches of muffins, pancakes, and/or waffles and stick them in the freezer as well. They do actually take a minute in the microwave, but they're homemade and healthy if you make them that way.

THANK YOU!! I've got two little kids who love to climb under the desk and tug on cords; even if I neatly ran them along the floor, desk, whatever, that's not any kind of toddler-proof. Besides, this solution is pretty.

I'll second that; if you have a stand mixer, a hand mixer seems redundant. This is coming from someone who did all her stirring with a spoon for years before finally buying a now-beloved Kitchenaid. I still only use it for heavy-duty stuff--kneading dough, whipping egg whites--and do most everything else by hand. Spoons are easier to wash than are beaters and blender parts.

Yup, it's an unripe tomato. I've had about ten of them just sitting on the vine for weeks and weeks...they're never going to turn red!

Ooh, I love the foot-to-foot beds too! I've got a designated kids' room that currently holds two, soon to be three, so any space-saving multi-bed ideas you've got are helpful.

I get the aversion to unitaskers; everything you own should earn its place in your home; but if you make scones at least once a week, then I'd call it a useful item that doesn't need alternate uses to be worth owning.

That said: I wonder if you could make (round, obviously) scones in a muffin pan? Or a giant one in a pie pan that you could then cut into triangles? Or perhaps you could press the dough into a pie pan, then cut the triangles and unmold them onto a cookie sheet.

If you buy a scone pan and it's pretty enough, you could use it as a serving dish. All those little sections are just begging to be filled with small things like candy and nuts and dried fruit and crackers.

I'm surprised to see the negativity...my Sprouts (Southlake, TX) is a great (and popular!) source for good produce at a fair price. Their bulk section is small but has what I need, and the employees and managers are all friendly and helpful. Most importantly, they put their Green & Black's chocolate bars on sale pretty frequently. =)

I don't buy much from their packaged goods or freezer sections, because those do tend to be expensive, but I do get meat and cheese there when it's on special. So: produce, meat, cheese, and bulk goods...that's why I love me some Sprouts.

Full info: the nearest Whole Foods is 30 minutes away (and too expensive for regular shopping), the nearest Central Market (swoon indeed) is just as far, and I'm more interested in getting lots of good food at a good price than I am in making sure everything is strictly local, organic, etc. (Oh--and Trader Joe's? Hours and hours away.) That said, I'm planning to check out our open-air farmers' market next weekend...I do prefer to buy from the actual people that grow my food, rather than trying to figure out where the groceries at the store are from.

"The Way to Cook" by Julia Child --good explanations and pictures, teaches a little bit of everything.

"I'm Just Here for the Food" and "I'm Just Here for More Food" by Alton Brown if you're a chemistry/science nerd who likes lots of details about WHY food cooks the way it does.

Joy of Cooking --it's like the allrecipes.com of cookbooks.