Ok, so this actually takes a lot of time to get everything to freeze up properly. But, hands on time, it only takes 5 minutes or so. And no churning! So I am classifying this as both fast and easy.
I needed something to do with a quickly over-ripening watermelon -- since it is just the hubby and me at home and he won't eat watermelon (kinda weird, right?). This stuff is creamy sweet and tastes like summer!
It is based of Martha Stewart's recent recipe for Peach Sherbet. Using the same basic recipe, you could make any kind of sherbet you want from fleshy fruit (i.e. I'm not sure how stuff like citrus would turn out... but if you try it, let me know!).
You'll need a food processor, probably -- though you might be able to get away with a blender.
I realize I haven't posted anything in over two months! Mostly, I am aware of this because my mom has been reminding me every other day. So:
This one's for you, Mom!
But really, this was literally for her. I gave my mom this table runner for Mothers' Day. She loves the stars. I often think she wishes I would have been an astrophysicist instead of a biophysicist.
You may or may not know, but the traditional first anniversary gift is paper. WAAAAY, back when, the hubby and I had just completed our first trip out of the country and I wanted to give him something to commemorate our trip. So I decided to give him a map that we could put more and more pins in as we had more and more trips.
I have a chest freezer and I love it. But for some reason, it always takes at least 24 hours for stuff to thaw in my fridge -- and I am not really great about remembering to take stuff out of the freezer the night before. So, I generally take something out the morning I plan to use it, and come home from work to find it still frozen solid. Then we end up eating cereal for dinner...
I could always leave the item at room temperature to thaw but that is unsafe. Or I could use the microwave defrost setting but I think that gives food an odd taste and texture (and besides, some of the containers that the food is frozen stuck to should probably not be microwaved).
So, cereal it is...
Except, the physicist in me knows better!
I love recipes where you are done with the active part before your oven even heats up. And, as my husband says, the answer to "Would you like some cornbread?" is always "Yes!" So, here's my favorite cornbread recipe that always turns out perfectly moist on the inside and nice and crisp on the outside. And it has a great corn-y taste! Here I make muffins but I also love this as a cake (made in a skillet or in a normal cake pan) and as pancakes (though I would add a bit more milk to the batter for pancakes).
My father is, without a doubt, a computer geek. So, for his birthday this year I made him some prints of technical diagrams from important patents from computer history -- namely the vacuum tube, the transistor, and the integrated circuit. Happily, these documents are in the public domain if the patent is expired (that's the whole point of public disclosure), and the diagrams are pretty easy to find. You could do this for any of your giftee's interests related to inventions (automobiles, motorcycles, tools, cameras, food packaging, watches, airplanes, music equipment, firearms... you could go on and on!). I aged the paper so this would also be really attractive with botanical prints, architecture, or bugs... I am really into bugs lately.
It's been a long winter and I am dying to get out in the garden. Since that stinking groundhog says we have another century or so of winter left, I am having to make do by potting (and re-potting) around the house. So today we are doing another terrarium. There is no shortage of gumball terrarium tutorials on the web, but they really are incredibly easy. I slapped mine together a few years ago with some plastic wrap to protect the gumball machine and no drainage to speak of so I thought it high time to redo mine in a reasonable manner and to add a little variety of plants.
I highly recommend stripping out all the innards of the machine, leaving only the base, the globe, and the top. Then fit an old plastic container to the space in the base (a Chinese take-out soup container worked well for me) and cut it so that the top of the container sits just below the rim of the base (so that the globe will sit correctly in the base). If you want to do this really well, you would probably seal the meeting between base, container, and globe with some sort of sealant (preferably clear). I didn't.
I used to hate the crust. Of any crusted dessert. But when I started making them myself, and flavoring them to my taste, I really began to appreciate them. Really. I could almost do without the filling. Almost.
My favorites tend to be rolled crusts for pies or crumb crusts from cheesecakes and tarts but lately I have really been hankering shortbread. And I love this crust because it is easy (you can't really overwork this dough like you can with most rolled doughs), it is super fast, and it uses ingredients I always have on hand. There is nothing worse than getting all prepared to bake something and then realizing you are out of graham crackers or chocolate wafers.
Ok... there's really a whole lot in the world that is worse than that, but it still is pretty frustrating.
This is an incredibly easy recipe that yields a buttery, tender, cookie-like crust. I love it!
It is March in Middle America after a particularly rough winter. To me, that is not heralding spring (we've got a few more weeks here before I get to venture out into the garden), but the beginning of road construction season. Since I drive on the interstate more than your average Joe, this is more of a self service announcement - but I will pretend that it is a public service.
We can solve the problem of construction delays WITH THE POWER OF SCIENCE!
We don't have a terribly small kitchen. But I have a ton of kitchen stuff. So I could always use more kitchen space. A while ago I got really sick of unstacking ten different pots and pans (and lids!) every time I needed one so I knew I needed a hanging solution. But the ceilings in my kitchen are pretty low, so hanging from the ceiling was certainly not an option. We did, however, have a kind of awkward area across the island from the main work triangle area. Normally I would use the wall space to hang pretty, pretty pictures, as I do with almost all the wall space in my house (funny story: I've been trying to do posture exercises, but I can't find any bare wall space to do them on! I think I may have a problem...) but this turned into the perfect place to hang my pots and pans.
I love plants. And I love old science equipment. So when I saw this old desiccator (used to keep chemicals, especially powders and crystals, in a low humidity environment so they won't clump or otherwise get ruined as quickly) for a great deal at an antique store (my MIL actually bought it for me, isn't she sweet?) I knew it would make a great terrarium. The basics of a terrarium are: container, plants that love high humidity, soil, and something to help drainage so roots don't stay so wet that they rot. That's all I have here. I put a layer of pebbles at the bottom, filled the remainder of the bottom with soil, and then planted some succulent plants and clippings of plants that I have on hand. This makes a great home for my Christmas cacti that I could never keep humid enough in the furnace heated winters for them to bloom - until this year! I put in any pieces that fall off my other plants - usually because I knock them off while watering - and they take off!
One of my very first posts described my "current projects" (which, of course, are less than half of the projects I ever end up working on at any given time). I have made significant headway on the throw pillows for our new couch though. In fact, I have probably made too many already! Though I have two more (embroidered G's on a navy field) in the works.
The centerpiece is a pillow with a cross-stitched Napoleonic Royal Bee in navy blue on an ivory field. I have seen a similar motif screen printed a bunch but I have seen much (if any) embroidered and I really love the texture of embroidery - even if it just cross-stitch. I couldn't find a free bee pattern that I liked a whole bunch so I printed the picture of a queen bee from ClipArt ETC to use as the inspiration for my pattern. I traced the pattern onto graph paper, getting rid of a lot of the detail in some places and adding more stripes and different wing patterns in others, so that the pattern would be easier to stitch. I only did half of the bee this way and then filled in the other half so that I would have a symmetric pattern. I used a crown from this pattern. The wreath was modified from this pattern and if I could find what I drew, I would share it with you.
The first of the Kids' Experiments will focus on my wheel-house: physics. We will start by exploring the motion of objects - beginning with those influenced by gravity. These aren't the most exciting of experiments, but they are essential for a solid foundation so we can do the fun stuff later!
I spent some time with my five-year old niece this weekend and, as always, I was blown away by how much she already knows about the world around her. Of course, as her doting aunt, I think she is incredibly brilliant, but the educator in me firmly believes that most of her success in learning is because of the amazing job my brother and sister-in-law do at keeping her rapidly developing mind engaged. While many kids have the benefit of such involved parents (and other relatives), Iz is incredibly advantaged because a.) she has a ton of science and technically savvy role models in her family (two engineers, two physicists, a med student, a linguist - and that is just my siblings and sibs-in-law!) and b.) those role models (mostly her parents) engage her in scientific thought in a way that makes it fun.
For her fifth birthday, the rooster and I (the two physicists) made a year of science experiments for Iz to do with her parents. I want all children to have the advantage of being able to learn this stuff early (when it is much easier because you haven't convinced yourself that things work in ways that they really don't!) so I am going to make the experiments we put together for Iz available to anyone who wants them as the series "Kids' Experiments." They will be much more extensive in detail than their original form. Most of the document is a guide for parents/guardians/educators to learn the material well so that they can adapt the material and can guide the child in his/her scientific exploration.
In terms of time commitment, I anticipate it will be big! My brother and sister-in-law can spend a week or more on one of these topics in terms of preliminary discussions, pointing stuff out in everyday life, and follow-up discussions (the actual experiments are generally under 30 minutes!). It is not "all science, all the time," but Iz (and her younger brother, and other highly engaged children I know) have inquiry peppered into life (not just at special educational times) and this is the approach I would recommend with these modules - don't just sit down and get it done all at once.
In practical terms of use, stuff in blue and instructors worksheets are for adults only and should never ever be directly told to a child. I really love the approach of teaching science (and specifically physics) by never actually telling a student the answer but by asking guiding questions to help him/her arrive at the answer on their own (Is this the Socratic method? - teehee). College students hate this! Like, REALLY hate this. But it's important for people to go through this process to really learn (and more importantly, to unlearn misconceptions!). This is why it takes so long. But it will be worth it when the child you love is able to make amazing extrapolations about what they have learned so far. And the investment you make in your child learning science early will allow that child to learn more science much more easily later on (again, we are talking real science, not stamp collecting). And just as with monetary investment, the earlier you start, the bigger the eventual pay-off will be. Start investing today!
And as is the case with Iz, I am always happy to answer any questions that arise in the course of your experiments. I know kids ask confounding questions sometimes! Don't hesitate to ask!
The rooster and I both love our contoured memory foam pillows but I was tired of using ill-fitting standard pillowcases if I wanted to match my decor. I couldn't find any tutorials for a contoured pillowcase, and this won't be much of one, but it will be an outline of an approach you can take, should you wish to make one for yourself.
There were really only two things I wanted from my pillow case: It had to be asymmetric so that there was more material on the curvy side than on the flat side (so that the case would actually fit!) and it had to have an envelope opening because I am sick of pillowcases sliding off. If I didn't have the envelope opening, it would have been a lot easier to make.
This is pretty much a sweet potato casserole that isn't pretending to be a side dish. The filling can be pureed to make it more like a pie filling, if you prefer. You can likely omit the sugar from the filling all together and it would still be delicious (since the candied yams are... well...candied). Butter and salt can be adjusted significantly (or perhaps even omitted entirely) depending on your preferences and health needs. You can also omit the pecans. Try adding 1c oats (in addition or instead of the nuts).
Note: Candied Yams are not actually yams! They are sweet potatoes (apparently there is a difference, but it is a difference I intend to continue to ignore). Feel free to use fresh mashed sweet potatoes, if you like (and want to control the sugar).
I love onions and garlic (and other members of the allium
family e.g. shallots, leeks, chives)!However, I have a very sensitive nose (my youngest sister calls me a
smelly person). I often have the problem of, having chopped an onion or garlic
to prepare the evening meal, and having washed my hands thoroughly with soap
and water after said preparation (and then again several more times throughout
the evening), waking up the following morning with onion funk hands!
Note: This chemistry will probably work
well for other offensive smells due to thiols (e.g. skunk!) but I don't
plan to go get sprayed by a skunk to find out. If you have occasion to
test this hypothesis, please let me know (and also, sorry you got
sprayed by a skunk - that stinks!).
There are numerous Old Wives’ Tales that claim to remedy
this situation.The one that prompted
this post was rubbing your hands with stainless steel.Intrigued, I looked into the literature of
onion funk before designing two experiments.
This has a rich mushroom-y taste, even just using button mushrooms, and, more importantly, cooks up in less time than it takes to cook your pasta.
Preparation time: 5 min
Cooking time: 10 min
4 Tbsp butter or alternate saute oil
16 oz whole mushrooms - separate the stems from the tops, chop the stems, slice the tops.
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced (I use the jarred stuff, so you probably should reduce this if you use fresh)
1 cup cream
1/4 c grated Parmesan or similar
Salt & Pepper & herbs to taste
Start your pasta water boiling and prep your produce. Melt the butter in large skillet over med-high. When it is fragrant and bubbly, add onions, garlic, and mushroom stems. Cook until soft (4-5 min), stirring occasionally.
I know it's a bit late for you for Valentine's Day (unless you are like me, in which case, this will work well for a last minute idea), but I always have a hard time buying cards to go with gifts. It feels a bit weird to me to pay upwards of $4 for someone to kinda sorta say how I feel for me. So I usually just ignore it and a shove a gift at someone, mumbling "This is from me, I hope you like it." Except when it comes to St. Valentine's Day.
When the rooster and I started dating, for some reason, though it is quite out of character for both of us, we decided to have a sickeningly sweet first Valentine's together (perhaps because we weren't actually together - we were dating long distance). So I made him a little booklet with an illustrated poem.
Though my rhyming skills have fallen off over the years, and it seems they get uglier and uglier as the years go by, the tradition of me making him a little illustrated booklet in lieu of a card has stuck. They are not very pretty to look at - that's kind of part of the tradition - but they are heartfelt and they always have a theme.
I have seen a few similar tutorials online about ruffling but not much dealing with the "knife-edge" type pillow (as opposed to one that is more disk shaped). Here, using leftover fabric from my duvet cover, I make a simple, round, ruffled, throw pillow. The ruffling is what makes it so forgiving of messed up measurements, crooked sewing, and other gaffs.
We start with two strips of fabric of equal length and width (I am going to rip off the hemmed edge on the piece shown here). The dimensions of the strips depend on the dimensions of the pillow. I would recommend doubling the circumference for the length and having the radius plus 2 inches for the width. Making the strip shorter means you will have fewer/shallower ruffles. Making the strips narrower means you will have to have a larger center piece.
Every Monday or so on my blog will be Mad Science
Monday.On these days my posts will be
related to science.
I have mentioned on my Facebook page that I will
have a series "Modern Wives' Tales: Examining, Explaining, Debunking or
Improving Old Wives' Tales."
I also intend to have small blurbs about the
science that occurs in the home arts (I foresee a lot related to cooking, since
cooking is mostly chemistry!), like the mentions I have already made in recipes
(e.g. why you should bloom your spices before using them in a slow cooker).
Most
importantly, I plan a series of educational activities for children.
To understand why I plan to have these posts (and why they
are different from the majority approach of the world), it is helpful to understand
some of my philosophy about science and science literacy.
I taught Physics for Elementary Education Majors for a
number of years.Most of my students
resented having to be there because they "wouldn't be teaching this stuff to
kids".But I always started the
semester with a little motivation.
Science is not about
knowing a set of facts.Science is a way
of thinking about the world.
When I was a kid, the only "science" we had in
elementary school was identifying things.We named the clouds.We named
whales.We named dinosaurs.This is not science.This is
stamp collecting.
Happily, our education system is changing, and students are
learning to focus less and less on "what" and more and more on
"how" and "why."Kids are naturally curious about the world they live in. They observe
and test how it works.They ask
"why" (Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?)It can be really annoying at times!
Somewhere along the line, most people stop doing this.But when we stop asking why and how, we are
less able to critically evaluate the world we live in.We don't ask how and why about the line a politician is feeding
us.We don't ask how or why about the
claims some manufacturer is making about a product.Every day we are asked to make decisions with
our votes and with our pocketbooks and we will be ill-equipped to do so if we
don't approach these decisions with a scientific way of thinking (understand, I
am not saying cold or unemotional).As
the National Academy of Sciences puts it, in addition to understanding some
aspects of science facts (what one might consider "book learnin"), a
scientifically literate person can pose and evaluate arguments based on
evidence and apply conclusions from such arguments appropriately.Don't you think an increase in this rational
approach, say, in the political arena, would benefit society greatly?
My Mad Science Monday posts are my attempt to infuse science
into our daily lives.It will never be
enough to simply observe what happened.For instance, when I post about what best works to remove the onion funk
from your hands, I will never leave it there.You will know how and why.I
expect to spend hours reading academic journals about the compounds released by
the onion, the interaction with the skin, and how to neutralize it.I will put it in non-scientific terms but I
will never dumb it down.When I post
kids' science experiments, it will never end at "see what
happened."Sometimes the parent or guardian
won't know the answer. Sometimes the answer is a little too complicated for
developing minds. But it isn't science unless you at least think about how and
why a thing happens.
Here's an example of when asking how and why can help avoid catastrophic consequences.
To illustrate why delving into the how and why of a what is important, consider the low birth-weight paradox (an example of the very fascinating Simpson's Paradox). The "what" here is that low-birth weight children born to smoking mothers have lower infant mortality than low-birth-weight children born to non-smoking mothers. If we were to stop here, to not consider the how and why of this observation, we might decide that women who are at risk of delivering low birth-weight babies for other reasons should begin (or continue) smoking through pregnancy. However, because we know that smoking is generally bad for health, we intuit that this makes no sense.
We are right. We have to think of the how and why. Smoking during pregnancy causes increased likelihood of low birth-weight. So the infants born to smoking mothers will represent a whole range of conditions, but most of them will only have low birth-weight and no other health conditions to contend with. The infants born to non-smoking mothers are generally of normal weight. But, of course, at least some of the babies born to non-smoking mothers will still have low birth weight. And these babies will typically be of low birth-weight because they have some other malady that is a much greater risk to their health than low birth-weight alone.
By focusing only on the "what" and not the "how" or the "why," we gloss over the proper conclusion to the data: smoking doesn't make low-birth weight infants healthier; it makes generally healthy infants low-birth weight.
Of course, this case seems obvious to us, but if we don't think about why and how, we don't think about what other information we might need to make a decision (here it would be useful to know the relative numbers of low birth-weight to normal birth-weight infants in each group!).
I think that approaching life this way is important because
it is empowering.Of course, there are
questions in life that will never have a testable answer (then we get into
philosophy and theology), but to understand the mechanisms of the world around
you is to be able to influence those mechanisms.I want that empowerment everyone, especially
our children.
*End motivational speech*
If you have some science-y topic you would like to know more
about, please let me know.In the
comments, I’d like to hear about your experiences with science in school!Also, has there been a time when you have
been (or wished you were more) empowered by science literacy?
Disclaimer: The "fast" part is in the preparation - you know, since slow cookers are, by definition, slow. This recipe is adapted from a stew recipe in the book Slow Cooker Revolution, which, if you want to really learn how to be a slow cooker ninja, I highly recommend. It is very hearty and freezes great.
Pro Tip about "blooming" aromatics and spices.
You should "bloom" your onion, celery, garlic, and seasonings by microwaving or sauteing with 2Tbsps of oil for about 5 min (stir halfway in the microwave) or until the onion is soft. Blooming makes a big difference to flavor because a.) Your slow cooker doesn't reach the temperatures necessary to cause the chemical reactions that make the beautiful onion-y, herb-y, and spice-y flavor complexities and b.) These flavors are soluble in oil, not water so it is useful to first extract the flavors into an oil (olive oil and butter are my favorites) and then distribute that oil (and thus the flavor) throughout the dish.With out blooming, the great flavors of your herbs and spices remain trapped and cannot reach their full potential. When I am in a hurry, as I was here, I skip the blooming before slow cooking and I always regret it.
Prep Time: Less than 10 minutes Cook time 5-7 hours on High, 9-11 hours on Low + 30 minutes on High Ingredients:
Recommended: 2Tbsp of some oil
1 Large onion, chopped
1 rib celery, chopped
6 cloves garlic, minced
Seasoning
2 bay leaves (I use more because mine are pretty old)
1/4 tsp Cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp thyme (you can really up this you like more herb-y-ness)
2 tsp paprika
Generous grinding of pepper
1 lb dried red kidney beans
14oz (or 1 package) of your preferred sausage (I use a smoked sausage, but andouille would be great), cut to your preferred size (I prefer to quarter the link then slice in 1/2 chunks so I get a piece of sausage in almost every bite)
Liquid
4 c chicken stock (I actually use a sodium free bullion and water and it turns out pretty well)
3 c water
1 1/2 c rice
(After blooming) Add everything but the rice to your slow cooker and cook for 5-7 hours on High or 9-11 hours on Low. Add your rice and cook on high for 1/2 hour. You may wish to add more seasonings (I like hot sauce on mine). Enjoy!
I've been meaning to make a new cover for my feather comforter for some
time now. Since the cover is fairly large, and since it will be filled
with something fluffy, this is a project that is very forgiving of
stitching (and even cutting) that isn't straight.
We have a queen sized bed and I wanted to make some matching pillowcases and throw pillows, so I bought a king flat sheet and a coordinating king sheet set to use for fabric (bought after the new year, when linens are on sale, this cost me less than $25). I think this was plenty for us but if you have a king bed you might need to buy another flat sheet or some fabric. Before you ever get started, make sure to pre-wash and dry your fabric so that it has already shrunk as much as it is going to. Iron the fabric so that you make accurate measurements and cuts.
To make the duvet cover, you are really just sewing large rectangle that has an opening in one end. Measure your comforter width and length and measure, mark, and cut your two flat sheets so that you allow for a seam allowance and, if you choose to do this part, the french seam/sham flange edge. I generally do a 1/2" seam allowance and I did about a 1" flange so I added 3" to my comforter dimensions. I would not recommend making the duvet cover oversized for the comforter because I think you tend to get more lumping that way.
This is one of our favorite weeknight meals. It makes a fairly large pot of food (I think we get 8 pretty generous portions out of it - this will depend on how much squash you use) and it freezes beautifully. It takes about 30 - 45 minutes from start to finish, depending on how fast you can cut up produce (if you don't buy pre-cut) and how mushy you like the squash cooked.
It is based off a recipe from Better Homes and Gardens but I have made a few substitutions to make it less hoity-toity (Who can find pappardelle in their typical grocery?? And why Marsala instead of whatever dry red wine you have on had? Pine nuts?? BHG, do you know how much pine nuts cost?? This is really uncharacteristically haughty for them.) and to change the flavor profile slightly (I like marjoram more than sage but I think dill, thyme, savory, rosemary, and pretty much anything else would work great too.
First off, these things are gorgeous. Just beautiful. But they are also super tasty - like crispy, orange toffee. They seem to also go by the name Florentines.
My first post should really be titled "Half-finished endeavours." It will be about some
project I am working on (with pictures!) and then I will immediately put
up a post with a recipe that worked really well for me (Pecan Lace cookies). Thanks for stopping by.
My hubby and I
recently bought a Rococo revival couch at an antique store and, though I
love it, it looks a bit bare. So the current project is rev it up with
a bunch of throw pillows. It is a yellow couch so I am going with a
bunch of navy and cream fabrics for the pillow. The centerpiece is a
Napoleonic royal bee that I have finally finished embroidering and the
circular pillows will have large embroidered G's.
.jpg "Easy/Fast: Slow Cooker Red Beans & Rice")
