Scratch Food with a Side of Geek Mom and Pop Culture.
I don’t know about anybody else, but here in Ontario, August is always the hottest time of the year. Heating up the kitchen with the oven? Ain’t nobody got time fo dat. Eggs are a huge staple over in my household. In baking, I constantly use them as the universal binder and leaven-er that they’re…
It’s been crazy busy lately, and I’ve been trying to clean out the chest freezer for the annual defrost (which I happened to miss last year, and possibly the year before, and *maybe* the year before that as evidenced by the package of bacon I found in the bottom from 2010). Hey, it was in the…
I have an addiction to collecting cookbooks, which is weird, cause I so seldom use them. I might flip through them and get some ideas, but usually a recipe gets modified on paper before I ever put it to the stove. I don’t like using convenience foods that are full of junk ingredients, and it…
If someone had asked me what I thought my most popular post of all time would be, I would not have guessed it would be Chinese fry batters. It consistently is in my top three posts every day. The people have spoken! And they want to make their own Chinese food. This suits me just…
My food processor might just be my new best friend. I mean I love my KitchenAid stand mixer too, but I might just love my food processor just a little bit more–at least, until I get the pasta attachments for it. Then those two will be a love match. Pasta’s been on my to-do list…
I made an awesome vegan soup. One that you can feed to all your carnivorous friends and they will like it. I know this because my husband had seconds of this recipe. He is always “meh” about soup, especially if it includes “hippie things” like wild rice. So, I’ve been bragging about my awesome vegan dish….
Okay, I know it’s not a super exciting post. Whee, vegetable stock! It has to be done though because t’s a building block to great things, and the honest truth is that if you peel your vegetables and throw them in the green bin, or if you tend to discard things like the dinged up…
My holiday traditions have changed greatly since I moved away from my family and married. For many years, I was content to do Christmas as my husband’s family did: visiting his grandfather on the farm on Christmas Eve, doing the Christmas day thing with my husband’s parents, and then Christmas dinner at whoever’s turn it…
I hate frozen broccoli. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t discover this out until after I had bought a giant bag of organic frozen broccoli florets from Costco. Note to self: no matter how great a deal it seems, it’s a waste of money if you hate it. So… what to do with enough mushy broccoli…
You may know that carrot, celery and onion make a great base for all kinds of soup and sauces. Did you know the mixture has a specific name? It’s called Mirepoix (meer-pwah) after the French Duke of Mirepoix. Common standard then in French cooking for the moniker to come from the aristocratic patron; the Duke…