Sally’s Kitchen & Stuff

For those that know me sort of well, you’d know that I’m a spontaneous passionate sort of person. As in, I have a short attention span, but when I clomp on to a topic, I will be obssesed until I know pretty much everything there is to know about it (in a generalist point of view) and then lose interest.

I just built my first paper model yesterday, and I think I’ll probably fill a book shelf with them before the fever burns off. To those of you who has no idea what paper modelling is, it’s like regular models, but printed on card stock. I started by using 67lb paper, but eventually I’ll move up to 150 glossy for the harder stuff. If you’re interested, Yamaha’s papercraft site is a good place to start.

To those who are interested, this is my first model. I’ll take a picture tonight and post on Saturday.

When was the last time you checked what you’ve got in the freezer? Do you know what’s in your freezer? Do you think there might be a colony of dead lobsters that have evolved their own political systems by now? (I’m quoting Gaiman, in case you thought that was a stroke of MY brilliance.)

Sometimes stuff just piles up. All the little things we pick up at the grocery store (on impluse, *ahem*) and not use, all the little new sauces that seemed really cool to have around the house but never use, all the tins of white asparagus and shitake mushrooms that…that…tastes GROSS but you can’t bear to throw out. Then you finally go grocery shopping for the umteenth time without  a list - again - and pick up more stuff - that you can’t use - and find out - woefully - that you no longer have room for more crap.

Sounds familiar?

Time to take a kichen inventory.

You will need:
Scissors.
Disposable mini tupperware containers.
Sticky labels (I just use the little ones)
A Sharpie marker. (they don’t smudge when the paper gets wet)
Transparent office tape. Scotch tape will do.
Old coffee/cookie tins lying around, we’ll need those as well
Have a garbage bag handy, and have another bag for the food bank.
For inventorying, I use soft sheets of magnet cut into little bits and the upper half of my fridge.

• Take everything out of your pantry. Pasta, cans, dried herbs, cookie mixes. Take it ALL out.
• Check the expiry dates. If it’s expired, it goes in the garbage bag.
• Now look at the rest of the stuff. What will you NOT eat? For me, it’s the cans of shitake mushrooms. Some of the cake mixes also. Non-perishable foods you’re not going to eat goes into the food bank baggie.
• Put all the herbs that are still in baggies into mini tupperware containers, then label and mark the expiry date on the SIDE of the container. If there’s no expiry date, write down the month/year of when you bought it. Dried herbs usually lose its intensity in 6-12 months. You can toast it a bit before you use it to release flavour if it’s getting too mild.
• Stack the containers, then turn sideways and put in a drawer, in an orientation where you can read the labels at a glace. You can use a cookie/chocolate box to put them in and keep them from rolling around.
• Organise cans by type - fruit? Veggie? Meat? Tomato paste based? Fish? Soup? Keep cans in a LOWER cupboard. I started doing that after one rummaging expedition turned into a bump on the head.
• Used coffee tins are great for keeping things like couscous, rice, and pasta. If you live in a cold/dry climate, you can get away with storing spaghetti in an open jar. I just pop the whole bag in there, top side up, and pop the lid on it. Label the side with a big label, and turn it so it faces you. Again - heavy things, lower cupboard.
• Things that are not used often - yeast and cake mixes in my case - can be stored in a higher cupboard.
• Make little magnets with some glossy paper, glue, and sheet magnets. Then cut out little dots from the leftovers. Use this to keep track of what you have in the cupboards. It’s like…magnetic poetry for organizing!

You can do the same thing with the freezer as well. The whole idea is to have everything organized, LABELED, and easily recognized at a glance. Just remember: tupperware is your friend.

None for you internet explorer suckers.

Here’s the downlink
and here’s where I first saw it: on Lifehacker.

The bill came back at $490. I think I must’ve had a heart attack. I don’t own a house - I rent an apartment. A ONE-bedroom apartment. One bedroom apartments should not have a 500 dollar hydro bill.

I can understand this if I live in Oakville, in a three bedroom house, growing POT, with the snow melting off my roof. But in a Toronto apartment on the top floor where I rarely have to turn on the heat? There has to be some mistake.

I have this ugly, laminated particle board THING from the 70’s. It’s a hand-me-down twice. It’s way too big for my living room.

I tend to bump right into corners at night due to my poor eyesight. I need something oval, in light colored wood to go with my bookshelf. Scary thing is, everywhere I looked, they’re rectangular. Checked Ikea - theirs are too big, and too square. I need something small, oval, and preferably foldable.

After repeated searches at various merchants, I’ve come to the conclusion that people just don’t make oval coffee tables. :p I’m almost tempted to make my own. In reality, I don’t need anything super steady: I just need something that would hold up a few mugs, have storage space underneath, and the color of light untreated pine. Something minimalist. Think BOX, but oval. Ok. Screw the oval. It’s not going to happen. But think simple.

Maybe something like this. But bigger. 3 ft. long by 1.5 ft. wide by around 2 ft. high.

Any ideas?

The meat bone soup recipe I have listed on this site is utterly freeze-able. It doesn’t contain anything that would fall apart after rapid reheating. That’s why I always make a HUGE pot that would fill up 6 24 oz containers AFTER we had our fill.

Here’s something about freezing stuff with tupperware containers: buy high quality stuff. If you ever drop a cheap container with frozen soup in it, it’d crack. Those "reusable" and disposable containers just won’t do it - the plastic isn’t flexible enough at sub-zero temperatures. But the high quality ones are expensive, and we can’t have them sitting in the freezer for a month! We can’t live without them! So here’s a easy solution.

Line the bottom of the containers with Saran wrap. You want it to not only be completely flush gainst the sides and bottom, but hanging over the edge, with enough to fold over the top. Fold the sides of the wrap OUT, and pour cold soup in. Put a lid on it, and freeze for 24 hours. When it’s nice and solid, just pop it out and wrap the tops with the extra. I have hunks of soup (ha) in the freezer that’s about 6 weeks old (you can store them for up to 3 months) and every week or so I have a soup dinner. Even though it’s just soup, you can add a lot of variety.

• Buy store bought dumplings of different flavours, and add them to soups after steaming.
• Add shrimp or egg noodles
• Add cooked rice, and let simmer for an hour for some almost instant congee
• Store some of it in clear stock (more goodies for the other container) to add flavour to stirfrys