[chocomouse]

I made Len's Buns today, with BakerAunt's usual substitution of buttermilk for the water. I scaled up the recipe and made 6 round "sandwich thins" plus 10 hot dog buns using KABC's New England Hot Dog Bun pan (which I dislike and have only used a couple of times over the years). I've made dinner buns from Len's recipe several times, but somehow this time they are even better; perhaps I screwed up the scaling, not sure. However, they are not soft enough to make a good hot dog bun. I guess a hot dog bun should be made out of fluffy white store-type bread dough. They are delicious, chewy and crispy on the outside.

[chocomouse]

My husband had a meatloaf sandwich with potato chips. I had leftover tomato-veggie soup and cottage cheese with blueberries and pineapple. Easy meal. I also made Chex Mix, a Super Bowl snack for Sunday.

[chocomouse]

I baked an upside down apple cake this morning. I use a 14 inch diameter pizza pan that I do not use for pizza, so that it made a rather thin cake that was nice and crispy on the edge and top. I poured a thin layer (might increase this amount next time) of caramel sauce in the greased pan, and arranged sliced apples in a circular pattern to cover that. I daubbed the cake batter over that and sprinkled with sparkling sugar. I flipped it out of the pan as soon as it came out of the oven; any excess caramel in the pan I just scraped out and distributed over the apples. It is very good.

[chocomouse]

Tonight we had blueberry pancakes with sausage links. I used the new maple syrup dispenser I bought at KABC. It works, it does not drip!! woo hoo! It does have a slow drizzle, as many of the reviewers complained; you have to be patient. But I feel that is not a big problem. I'm very happy with it, and recommend it.

[chocomouse]

Len, that soup sounds delicious! Did you whiz the veggies or leave them chunky? It's different. I usually just toss in a bunch of veggies and seasonings for plain vegetable soup. I have quite a bit of turkey stock left, plus a 15 pound turkey in the freezer I should think about cooking soon.

[chocomouse]

Tonight we had meatloaf, baked potato, and winter squash. Great minds, Joan! And also, our mothers must have/had great minds also - my name is also Joan!

[chocomouse]

Leftovers here. I just finished off all the raw veggies that were still edible and put a little Ranch dressing over them. Hubby had a weird looking mess of stuff on his plate. Now I get to clean the bottom half of the refrigerator tomorrow.

[chocomouse]

Last week I got scheduled for my 1st dose, 75 or over with 2 of the qualifying medical conditions, for February 16. I leave the house to go to the grocery store once every 2 weeks, and the drive-up pharmacy window every couple of months. My son, a first responder, got his 1st yesterday. My grand-daughter, who has a class of 20 third graders, in person, is nowhere near close to getting hers, it will be another 3-4 months. This does not seem quite right.

[chocomouse]

I've wondered if advertisers, etc, realize that putting black ink on many colored backgrounds renders the ad impossible for lots of us to read? I suppose they think it's showing their technical talent.

[chocomouse]

For dinner tonight, I've made beef stew, using our favorite recipe from our days living in Germany. It calls for vinegar (to tenderize, as the German beef is quite tough) and caraway seeds, which give it a flavor people seem to love or hate. We love it.

[chocomouse]

I made 18 small plain white flour dinner rolls. Yesterday I made two loaves of our usual buttermilk whole wheat oatmeal sandwich bread.

[chocomouse]

That's great, Mike! For me, the big deal was getting rid of the magnifying glass I carried in my bag, mostly to read ingredient and nutrition labels at the grocery store.

[chocomouse]

He got your order, BakerAunt, and assume he replied to you. Now you'll be able to expand your repertoire! For my husband's birthday, I gave him the maple syrup dispenser that KAF has been advertising heavily. We have purchased maybe 15-25 different containers over the years, specifically for syrup. None needed to be fancy, I just wanted something that would not drip all over the table and would keep the syrup covered in the fridge. None worked - they all dripped. We haven't used this new dispenser yet, but it looks like it might work better than most.

[chocomouse]

Italiancook, I was going to suggest you follow a dill pickle recipe and just make the juice, but now I'm going to check out the link Kimbob posted. If I have almost enough pickle juice, just not quite, I top it off with water. I've also used sweet pickle juice, entirely or partially, and find that works too, although I think I get a better "rye" flavor with the dill. I do add lots of mustard seeds, dill seeds, and caraway to get that rye flavor.

[chocomouse]

Good luck with the eye surgery tomorrow, Mike. You'll be back to baking better than ever, with more accurate measurements (ha!) now.

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