IzzyIzzy's Profile

Ooh, the only pie crust I love more than a graham cracker crust is an Oreo crust. My favorite use for graham cracker crust (and it's gotten some rave reviews at parties)- an extra-thick graham crust, filled with dark chocolate ganache and topped with lots of Italian meringue, browned with a kitchen torch. S'more pie. Awesome.

My Mom converted a church into her home, and it is fabulous!

The 100-year-old church she purchased had been sitting empty on the market for YEARS when she bought it. No one else in the area had enough creativity to see that is could be something -anything- other than a church. There is absolutely no way it was going to be turned into a "community space" by anyone. Rather, she has turned it into a warm, welcoming home (and her office!) I think the idea that all former churches need to be turned into "community centers" of some sort is ridiculous. If that were the only option, all these beautiful, historic buildings would simply be demolished and (wasteful) new buildings would be built.

She has NOT spent a ton of $$ on renovations- and the idea that you HAVE to do all kind of renovations to make a space usable is ridiculous. She has been super-creative and uses the space without having made many permanent changes at all. She turned 2 half-baths into one full bath in the basement/downstairs, and added a half-bath upstairs; that is it. A fabric "wall" divides a bedroom off the main living space, and semi-permanent walls made from sheets of frosted, tempered glass and a bit of wood have turned one small corner into her home office, where she sees clients. We do love daydreaming about different things that could be done to make the space better/prettier/more usable, but they are all optional. The space is totally livable, and lovely, and her total cost- including purchasing the property and all renovations- has been maybe $40k. Yes, Forty Thousand- not four hundred thousand.

The space is beautiful. The wood floors are AMAZING, the high ceilings are beautiful, and the place is peaceful and warm. My Mom loves imagining all the weddings, baptisms, and other joyous events that have taken place there- she truly appreciates the history of the place and all the people that have spent time there. It is an amazing home.

We do a "lite" version of this with our large built-in bookshelves. Each shelf gets a category (or 2 categories), and then the shelf is color-organized. So, it's still easy to find a book (because you can immediately narrow down which shelf it is on), and I have a good memory for what color all the books are. It is MUCH more visually calming than having the books alphabetical by author, but not so COLOR CODED *BAM* that it takes over the space. Lots of people don't even notice it unless it comes up in conversation, though design buffs often notice it right away ;-)

I like to buy some pizza dough & cheese (or a frozen cheese pizza) and use ingredients from the salad bar for pizza toppings! Easy way to pack tons of veggies on a pizza without having a bunch of leftovers I may not be interested in using the next day.

I've painted every rental I've ever been in (and had to paint all but one of them back to the original colors), and it's always been SO worth it. I can't imagine living anywhere with nothing but white walls- I would go insane.

This is perhaps the best dresser revival I've ever seen. I'm curious, though, how much those (cool!) new handles cost. My guess would be much, much more than the cost of the dresser itself...

The thing with any gluten-free flour is that you can't just use it alone- you need to use a combination of gluten-free flours to get good results. (And typically an ingredient that will act like gluten- either guar gum or xanthan gum). So if you're looking for a recipe with ONLY sorghum flour, you're probably going to be disappointed. But, I've found that sorghum flour is one of the very best flours for GF baking when combined correctly, and I use it in most of my GF baked goods, typically mixed with rice flour (brown and/or white), and tapioca flour or corn starch.

Must agree with the advice to find a cast-iron pan, preferably a vintage one. I had been using the "good" (expensive!) Calphalon nonstick pans, but even those are flaking after only a couple years. I recently got my great-grandmother's cast iron skillet from my Mom, and damn- that may be the best gift I've ever received! I will never buy a nonstick skillet again- it is MUCH less sticky than the best non-stick, and cleaning it is a breeze.

Once you've made them a couple times and gotten the hang of their weird quirks, macarons aren't that bad- and, really, these seem like just as much work (if not more).

I miss this market so much. I'm in Boulder now, where there is also a huge, incredibly popular farmers' market, but it just isn't the same. Madison's really is a friendly market, and the circular setup makes for a great traffic flow (unlike the cluster&*$% in Boulder, complete with 2 dogs for every 3 people....)