Christmas Food

We didn't do a whole lot of cooking for Christmas this year. So there wasn't all that much to take photos of. We did find a fantastic instant mashed potatos that we loved. But that was about it.

For New Years eve since a boat load of family are showing up we should be doing a lot of cooking. Of which I better take photos of and post photos of on here.

Upcoming Trip to New York City

This trip is going to be tons of fun. And the food is going to rock! My only problem will be getting a camera small enugh to take into the restraunt with me. I might barrow my dads camera so I don't miss any thing.

We are planing to go to a few places. One is a tapas like restaurant, another is my favorite crepe place and what ever tasty things cross out paths. Possibly even pictures of wedding food.

I have a very busy weekend and on Friday I get to start my trip with a 3m train rind into New York City. Woot. :3

Pancakes...

When making pancakes, using a cup of half&half does not work as well as you would think. I did this and needed to add about 2 1/2 cups of water to the mix to thin it out enugh to pour. I also addes 2 table spoons of vanilla extract and half a teaspoon of cinimun.

I could not taste the cinnamon nor did i get much from the vanilla. However if I liked strawberries this would be very tasty with them. I am going to have them with whipped cream for desert tonight.

Next time I'm just going to drive out to the store for milk.

How to Clean Copper

Have you ever seen tarnished copper? It can be dingy, almost black with possible spots of green corrosion. This is the type of copper I would find at garage sales. Whether it was jewelry, pots or decorative molds. it's it is handled enough or old enough it will get tarnished.

But what can you do? I happened to get an insanely good deal on a huge copper bowl ($2) but when I first tryed to clean it the inter net said to use salt and vinegar. It worked so well I could smell the fresh sent of copper. it also made a few corossions spots and tarnished right away.

So this time I called my aunt and told her my story. She listened and told me her little secret. Her secret shocked me because I was expecting to have to go hunting for some dollar store item that was discontinued years ago. Instead she told me to use ketchup.

Ketchup.

So I grabbed a soft cloth and the bottle of ketchup out of the pantry and got to work. it took about a half of a cup to clean both sides and a little rubbing but it worked. It isn't fresh out of the box new and shiny but it is clean. I'll be cleaning it again to see if i can make it shiny.

Ketchup will make copper jewelry shiny. Just be sure to rinse it well so you arn't smelling ketchup all day like I did. I think ketchup is the best way to clean copper.

Hamburger with Fried Egg

I would not have thought of it. But I was playing with Stumble and on one of the pages I happened to see a burger with a poached egg on top. At the time I thought it was a fried egg and was thinking only yum.

Let's just say it seemed like I was trying to make the worlds smallest burger patty last night. I had squished it out and put the needed dimple in the center, but it still shrank to half it's size or less. But it was oh so juicy!

I fried the eggs in the same pan as the burger mostly to save on washing. for an experiment I think it turned out very very well. :3

Chicken Soup

While my dad is the chef of the family the earliest memory I have is making chicken noodle soup and bread with my mom. I think they were the same day but now it's a bit foggy.  When we were talking about this one day she almost cried she was that happy. I found it a little weird but oh well. I have no idea how it came up but it did.

I also made her promise not to tell my dad.

In the memory I'm very little. Little enough to have to stand on a chair to just see onto the counter but tall enough to crack my head on the corner of it. This made the every thing seem gigantic to me. The yellow plastic bowl wasalmost as big as I remebered but the color was far brighter. This was the bowl that we made the bread in.

With the soup I mostly just remember looking over the edge of the pot while my mom stirred it. The pot that we made the soup in? It is so teeny tiny that I almost think it's a different pot. Abit we have since acquired a truly huge pot that we can boil several lobsters at once.

Needless me and my mom haven't done much cooking since. The last time I can remember was when I was heating up a crepe. That ended up with me getting a mild bun from the frying pan and her smashing a plate on the counter.

Is Dinner Ready Yet?

My dad has always done 90% of the cooking in our home. Always.Because he loves cooking (and is amazing at it) my mom just went with it. She says she let's him do it because he loves it. She also cleans up the kitchen afterwards so I guess it's a good trade off. Unless it looks like a tornado zipped thru severaltims and then a bomb went off. Then we all help because my dad is usaly asleep on the coutch recovering from all that cooking.

Because my dad worked all day we rarely ate before 8pm.

 When I think back on it my mom would get a call from my dad. He would ask her what she wanted for dinner that night and to set out the majority of what he needed. Then after he got home, & changed cloths, he would get to work cooking. Most of this I missed because I would be outside running around with my sister. And Fridays were pizza/Chinese food night.

Things are still the same these days.

My sister has since moved to New York City and my mom has two jobs now, but my dad still does most of the cooking. And my mom still does most of the cleaning. It's funny how it all works out.