I took a holiday break for a bit but I’m back! I am sure we all had a busy couple of weeks with baking, cooking, visiting with friends, wrapping and giving gifts, etc. The funny thing that has always struck me is how much time and preparation go into the holidays and how quickly they fly by. Are you picking up what I’m laying down? LOL
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I have some tips for you and a recipe and an assortment of other finds, observations and “check this out!” things.
Handy Tips
- You know how sometimes wooden furniture gets a dent in it when something is dropped on it? There is a way to bring it back where it should be or near there if the ding is deep. Take out your steam iron and get to work! Put a piece of cloth ( I use something without any nap so that fibers don’t leave little indents) on the dent. With your steam iron onto a hotter setting and filled with water iron the spot where the dent is. You can’t just leave the iron sit on there since you don’t want to do more damage to the furniture. The moisture from the steam iron will put moisture into the wood and the result is that the dent lifts up. I have done this countless times. It works!
- Sticking with the furniture theme, I have a fix for the white water rings that you get from cups and glasses. This works best when the ring is fresh and to varying degrees if it is not. Put some mayonnaise on the ring and let it set for a good while. Then take a soft cloth and wipe the area. Presto! Chango! Water ring has left the building!
- I put my Christmas cards and some decorations up with a ring of masking tape. A handy trick is to take a little piece of painter’s tape and put it up before you put your masking tape ring up. Painter’s tape is meant to come off without damaging the surface it is on. Your decorations, or other items you may put up, come off without a hitch and the painter’s tape saves the day.
- This year I finally did something that I had seen long ago but never remembered. All of my rolls of wrapping paper that I had opened are now safely tucked away with an empty toilet paper roll or empty paper towel roll keeping them from coming open and getting messed up. There also is no damage done from scotch tape if that is what you used to use to keep your wrapping paper in line like I did. Just take an empty roll and using scissors cut a slit the length of the tube. You then slip it on your roll of wrapping paper like a cuff. It works like a charm to keep those pesky rolls from unwinding and ruining the paper.
Is anyone suffering from dry and/or cracked fingers due to the cold weather? I know I am. My son, who is a UPS driver and handles cardboard packages all day, taught me a trick. Put some oatmeal in an old foot from the pair of panty hose or a knee high. Then you tie it shut and rub your hands or any other dry area. He swears by this method. This Makes Sense
You know how eggs or really egg yolks had a really bad reputation for years, like decades? Now, current thinking is they are good for you and Healthline website says that up to 3 whole eggs a day is fine and they have studies that have been done to prove this. It turns out that eggs do have a lot of cholesterol in them but the more you consume, the less your liver makes. Anyway, eggs have protein and B vitamins in them. You absorb protein slowly so it keeps you fuller, longer and B vitamins are used by your body to make energy. One egg has 6 grams of protein in it and about 15% of your daily requirement of B vitamins. I call that a WIN/WIN!
Attention All Cat and Dog Owners!
My Mom used to put on a classical radio station for her dog when she left the house. The rest of the family and I called it BOW WOW music. Well, as with most things, Mom was right! The doggies and even your fine feline friends enjoy and are calmed by music. You can find a classical music station or there are other more specifically targeted sources for music. There are at least 2 volumes of Canine Lullabies available for purchase on Amazon. I am sure they would be great for cats too. Turns out that shelters, boarding kennels and vet offices use this music to “calm the savage beast” too! If you want to spend more money there is something called, iCalmDog for about $90. These are mini speakers with pre-loaded music which feature, and I quote from a techy article in the latest AARP magazine, “psychoacoutstically designed” sounds for dogs. The music is called Through A Dog’s Ear and features classical piano in versions that are slower, simplified and in a lower key just for Fido. Not to be out done by the dogs, cats have the iCalmCats for $70 which has the feline version of the piano music. If you would like to learn more the website is; https://icalmpet.com/
Recipe
Cinnamon and Spice Sweet Potato Bread
Sweet potatoes do a wonderful job of keeping the bread extremely soft and moist. It’s almost like cake it’s so soft, springy, and bouncey. The interior is tender with a dense, moist crumb, and the crust is firmer and slightly chewy. The sweet potatoes are complimented by a variety of comforting and warming spices including, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice and cloves. The bread is robustly spiced and full of hearty flavor. If you like sweet potatoes, carrot cake, or pumpkin-based recipes, you’ll love this bread.
INGREDIENTS:
about 1 1/2 cups mashed sweet potatoes (2 medium or 1 very large)
3 tablespoons water
2 large eggs
1/2 cup canola or vegetable oil
1/4 cup buttermilk (or yogurt, Greek yogurt, sour cream, or buttermilk powder)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
pinch salt, optional and to taste
DIRECTIONS:
- Preheat oven to 350F. Spray one 9-by-5-inch loaf pan (what I used), or two 8-by-4-inch loaf pans, or a 10-cup Bundt pan, or a muffin pan with floured cooking spray or grease and flour the pan(s); set aside.
- Peel the sweet potatoes and chop them into 1-inch sized chunks. Place chunks in a large, shallow microwave-safe bowl. Add 3 tablespoons water, cover with plastic wrap, and cook on high power for 15 to 17 minutes, or until potatoes are very fork-tender. Pour off any water. Mash sweet potatoes with a fork. Allow them to cool momentarily so you don’t scramble the eggs.
- To the sweet potatoes, add the eggs, oil, buttermilk, vanilla and whisk until combined; set aside. (I used buttermilk powder and added 1 tablespoon powder to the dry ingredients and 1/4 cup water to this wet mixture)
- In a large mixing bowl, combine the dry ingredients – flour, sugars, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice, cloves, optional salt, and whisk to combine. Pour the wet sweet potato mixture over the dry ingredients, and stir to incorporate. Take your time stirring until no stray bits of dry ingredients are visible, folding and scraping the bottom of the bowl with a spatula as necessary because it’s very easy to miss dry ingredients hiding at the bottom of the bowl in this batter. Stir and fold with a gentle hand as to not over-mix and over-develop the gluten, which results in tougher bread.
- Turn batter out into prepared pan(s), smoothing the top lightly with a spatula. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes for a 9×5 pan, or until top is domed, golden, loaf is springy to the touch, and cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Tent pan with foil in the last 15 minutes of cooking if top is browning a bit fast before interior has cooked through. I estimate that 8×4 loaves will take about 40 to 45 minutes, a Bundt about 1 hour, muffins about 18-20 minutes, but I haven’t tried those versions and they are just guesstimates.
- Allow bread to cool in pan for 10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely. Bread will keep at room temperature for up to 1 week. I store my bread by wrapping the completely cooled loaf in plastic wrap, and then placing loaf inside a gallon-sized Ziplock.
* This recipe turned out fantastic! It was super moist and delicious! I doubled the recipe because I knew one loaf would never do for my family. I wasn’t mistaken!
*This recipe is courtesy of averiecooks.com .
One last thing I wanted to share with you is my cookie board from our Christmas Eve celebration. I could have made it prettier with some candy canes and other accoutrements but my troops are interested in easy access to the goodies. With that in mind I used my chartcuterie board and set up a cookie board. If you remember from an earlier post, I made this board last year.
Thanks for reading my blog! Have a wonderful week! See you next Sunday.
