It’s that time of year. Holiday shopping and rushing from one store to another. Black Friday shopping is like an open-air insane asylum. This brings the question of how to keep our kids safe and give the teens a bit of freedom.
Here are a few tips to use. I do look forward to reading what y’all share.
Have a designated check-in time. This would include a pic with the store logo. Repeat each time they switch stores.
Have a set gathering time and point. Rather it’s in front of a restaurant or just a point in the mall. No exclusions. Everyone must meet at this time and at this point.
Of course, if you are lucky enough to live in a really small town you can adjust these tips as applies to your family. I miss living in a small town. It’s easier to go and shop when you know pretty much everyone. In small towns, you don’t have the abductions because everyone knows a stunt like that will have dire consequences.
I look forward to reading your tips. Please feel free to share what you do as parents.
For the teens that may come across this. Understand this isn’t about controlling where you go. It’s about making sure you don’t become one of the 500k kids that go missing every year. Only 1% will come home.
There are a few pieces of equipment every kitchen should have. One is a great set of pots. I am not talking about fancy pots endorsed by some famous chef. I am talking tried and true cast iron. These pots can take a beating better than any new fancy blue diamond or copper nonsense pan. Cast iron pans (and pots) have been around forever in a day. For a good reason. They don’t release toxic chemicals as we have recently found out about the “must have Teflon” pans of the 90s. I remember when these coated pans came out. They were all the rage. Your kitchen wasn’t complete if you didn’t have them. Seriously stupid. After my mom past I made sure I got her old fashion Black Cast Iron pot. I love that thing. Cast iron pots or pans will hold a steady temperature. I also have a cast aluminum pot I inherited from my mom. It’s a great pot and I use it every year with I make fudge.
Utensils are another important part of your kitchen equipment. Know this, if you invest in enameled cast iron you need to get plastic or better yet wooden utensils. If you use metal spoons on enameled cast iron you will destroy it. Which is why I prefer the old fashioned cast iron. I do have two enameled pots. One is 4 quart and the other is 7.5 quart. Below will be a link to Christina Wilhelm’s video showing how to care for wooden utensils. My late mom never told me about this. She always throw them out once they started to splinter and break.
Kitchen towels are essential. Having quality kitchen towels are a god sent. If you watch these ladies from the 30’s and 40’s cook you never see them using paper towels even after they came out and available. They always washed their kitchen towels and took good care of them. I get it now. The quality of kitchen towels have fallen. But I have found chef’s kitchen towels to be a great quality. I also use flour sack towels. They are exactly that. Towels made from flour sacks. Amish women still use these items because they last if you take care of them. Stop giving your money to these big companies and start making the investment into kitchen towels. You can wash them with your regular towels and I haven’t really seen any increase in our laundry load.
Measuring devices. Rather it’s cups or spoons they are a must have for your kitchen. I have three or four sets of each. There is a difference between the measuring cups for liquid and dry. Usually the dry measuring cups come in a set of four to five. And the liquid may be glass with three cups together. They go from 1 cup all the way up to 8 cups. Depending on where you buy them from. Liquid cups tend to be glass rather than plastic and the glass ones are better. Yes, they can be heavier, and costs more. Remember this is an investment you will use for years.
What is Scratch Kitchen? I called this blog that because I will be making a gradual move to cooking from scratch and helping others learn to cook from scratch as well. Let’s take this journey together and take our kitchens and families back from the internet and the television. I have had a blog page with WordPress called Hornsandhaloblog.wordpress.com You can still go over there and get content that you won’t be getting here. This page will be cooking and canning only.
I will give you a link to my channel at YouTube.com. Over there will be videos regardless if the recipe is a bust or a success. And I will tell you why it was a bust. In the last box I will give you links to videos which I uploaded that gives hits to setup a scratch kitchen. Also, you may already have everything you need. Don’t buy fancy equipment or ingredients. Just simple cooking that our grandmothers did and if you were lucky, your mother did.
So, let’s take control of our kitchen and our food. Let’s get cooking y’all.
Here is a link to my new Scratch Kitchen and Home page. It’s the same style of content. Please know you are welcome to go there now that I am posting there daily.
From this upcoming Monday on, this page will no longer be. I will have a channel Scratch Kitchen & Home. It will be the same type of work. It will be easier since I retitled my YouTube channel I want to have a designated to represent the the content which will be on YouTube channel.
I hope you understand this change. We will cover the same content I promise.
This isn’t something I usually share here. However, after watching this brief documentary, I felt like I should. It is as you read in the title, this post is about Muckbangers. This is disturbing trend. If you don’t know what that is don’t worry.
First let’s look at what this trend is. It is the act if eating an insane amount of food while recording yourself. Does it sound disturbing? Good. Because it is. I enjoy watching cooking channels on YouTube as much as the next person. The people are very realistic. If they make a mistake, they own it. No hiding. They often use equipment you or I would have in our home. Plus, it’s not expensive to watch. Now let’s look at the disturbing side.
Imagine, watching someone gorge on enough food to feed a large family. But it’s only one or two people. They eat until they are miserable and often have a complete dramatic breakdown. It disgusting and wasteful. Where did this distrusting trend come from? According to Moon, Muckbang started in South Korea by people who were very lonely. They eat while recording themselves interacting with people. Where did it go to such a dark place?
In about 2010s this started going to a dark place with people like Nickado Avocado (Nick Perry) starting eating like a pig at a troft. He and his partner Oblin often eat insane amount of food and would start fighting out of the blue. Well, it was scripted to look spontaneous. Then there’s Trisha Paytasa if the spelling is wrong, I don’t care. This twit has jumped on every band wagon that rolled her direction. From mental illness like DID to being transgender. Diets. Done them. She once did a a five day foodless fast and lost some weight and gained back plus more. She has had melt downs on her kitchen floor. People wonder why America is the laughing stock of the world. WOW! With this stupidity being called entertainment, I can’t imagine why. Next is the dangers of the false illusions that come with it.
Health issues associated with this crazy eating are generally ignored. Waffle69 died in January of 2023. He made a lot of videos with himself eating large amounts of food. It was believed that he had a heart attack at 33. This guy didn’t make it to 40. Trisha, as I said above has recorded herself dieting and eating. Here’s what’s dangerous, the consequences of eating like this isn’t discussed. Another Muckbanger Zack Choi is on the other end. He seems to retain his idea weight while doing muckbangs. How? It’s called binge-purge. Muckgbang isn’t new. People with bulimia have been doing this for decades. Eat an insane amount of food then throw it up. There’s more to it, but I am not a doctor so I don’t feel too comfortable going into the depth of mental issues with bulimia. What I will say, there’s no way in hell these people like Zack can be eating this much food without either a, a fast metabolism or b, a crazy intense workout. Or there’s c and he eats with puking breaks. Other muckgbangers have thrown up on camera. Seriously! Holy cow! Why?
Now let’s look at the math. You figure the normal cost of a pizza deal is about $50 to $100. That’s pizza, bread sticks, drink, chicken wings, dessert for eight. Figure that soneone like Nickado and his partner will do about four of these orders bringing their total to approximately $800 to $1000. Now how many people could that money feed? Two large families, eight medium size families, or ten small families. A single adult could eat cooking at home or eating out for a month on that money. Do these muckgbangers eat all the food. I doubt it. So then what happens to this food?
Trash. Yep! It gets thrown out. There are millions of children in America alone, that could eat for six weeks on that food. This is what pusses me off about the muckgbangers culture. It’s wasteful. There are so many people who could eat this food and these selfish assholes are recording themselves eating, just to throw it up and then throw leftovers in the trash.
Today’s post cones from Amanda at the above site. Amanda grew up in Canada below the poverty line. Amanda is sharing twelve tips for frugual living that came out of the Great Depression. I know… There are hundreds of tips ir as we call them hacks. Let’sook at at least six of these. I have a feeling if I try to cover them all, we could be here awhile.
1. FORAGE. Now, make sure you know what is and isn’t safe to consume. Plus have a way to process these items.
2. LIVE WITHIN YOUR MEANS. They always lived within their means. As Americans, myself included, are notorious for living beyond their means. It’s the FOMO syndrome. Fear Of Missing Out. Now our credit card debt is out of control. Our national debt out of control. Perhaps, had the government heeded that lesson we wouldn’t be in the situation we’re currently in. That’s all I am going to say about that.
3. FIX, USE IT, OR DO WITHOUT. Like I posted last week, we are going to have streamline our spending. Over the last few decades, we’ve gotten spoiled and used to being able to replace something that broke. Wear a shirt more than twice, get rid of it. I have been reading Lessons from Madame Chic by Jennifer L. Scott. She wrote about gow she learned about a ten item closet. I will review her book later. The over all take away from the chapter I just finished, having ten core items with add on items will free up space in your closet. You will know exactly what you have and how to combine them. There was no get rid of something because you wore twice. No…
4. BACKYARD GARDENS. I can remember every summer we’d go to Watertown New York where my late mother was from. Her stepdad Joe would have a garden by the time we visited in July, there’d be tonatoes the size of baseballs. Good tomatoes. There was no gmos in the 1980s. Now we are being td that the backyard garden is bad for the environment. Bullshit! Grow your own food as much as possible. If you can raise meat animals, do it. Joe didn’t grow a huge amount. It was enought to help them get through the winter in up state New York. Uparound the Canadian border. Yeah!
Today’s post is from Lorraine at the above site. It is about having a day with your girlfriends. This is not something I have posted about. So let’s do this. Let’s talk about doing lunch in at home with just you and your girlfriends.
WHITE CENTERPIECE: Y’all know how I feel about centerpieces. I am so used to the ones that just over power a table or they are so big that they have to be moved. Why not decorate the room? Have shelves set up so you can put flowers, candles and whatever else you would like in the rolm without blocking the table up. Blocking the table! WTF? When you put a centerpiece on your dinning table you take up space that you could put food on. Plus they block the flow of conversations. Lastly, keep you decor simple. This will allow you to more thought into the menu. Let’s face it, your girlfriends aren’t going care about the decor. These gals are there for the food.
WINTER MENU: I have been looking at how the French approach food. It’s the polar opposite of us here in the states. Women in America are really up tight about eating in front of others. We fear how we will be judged. That should tell you about my family. The French however, see a meal as an art. They truly allow themselves the enjoyment of a meal rather it’s alone or with others. The most important thing is seasons. Use what is in season. Summer is strawberries and fish fresh from the water. Rather you live in the mountains on the borders of Germany or Spain, seasonal and fresh is best. Quiche Lorraine is the star of the meal. This plays into using what is seasonal perfectly.
Lorraine included recipes on her site. What kind of menu would you plan for a girl’s lunch in?
Today is Super Bowl, and I know a lot of people celebrate it. I don’t get it, but that’s me. I do have fond memories of my late father, and his brother would watch it. I won’t lie, I stayed for the food. Homemade dip for chips, crackers with cheese, and chili. I grew up in the northeast corner of Arkansas, about an hour drive from Memphis Tennessee. I got cold, not like Michigan, but a wet cold. The kind you could get sick if you were out for too long. So chili was perfect. Also, there were little smokies in the slow cooker.
Food Safety:
Super Bowl is in Nevada, famous for being hot and dry. This can be bad for dairy based salads. WATER. Drinking water is essential.
Fire Safety:
Keep 911 programmed in your phone. Fire extinguishers and lots of them. Perhaps have one person who will keep an eye out for fire risk.
That’s it. Enjoy your day with the people who are with you.
This year Mandy is doing a smaller feast for Lunar New Year. Here’s the dish she did which I never expected: Rice Pilaf. Yeah! Usually this is a Mediterranean, African, and Middle Eastern cuisines. Mandy does have two other videos on the Lunar New Year feast. The first is two years old it is little over a year old. The second is just under an hour from last year.
Red House Spice. Wei Guo shares what she (and her family) have made for generations.
The Woks Of Life. Bill and Judy with their two daughters Sarah and Kaitlin run this site. It’s the product of their quest to document their families history through food. Yeah! Boy are we glad they decided to share this quest. The recipes Bill and Judy with their daughters share in this post come from generations of cooking for the Lunar New Year. They cover every part of the feast.
This Fancy Friday’s post is from Genevieve at http://www.cafegenevieve.com. Genevieve shares five ways to feel French.
MAKE A FRENCH COCKTAIL. Start your day by drinking. Hell yeah! Says the person who accidentally wore slippers to Kroger yesterday. 😜
Transport Yourself To Paris Through Music. Okay. I don’t know about that one. I am a Classic and Hair Metal of the 1980s fan. But Ina Garten has a plalist so I may check it out. In the article there is a list that you can copy and paste to youtube. You will find the music there.
The Art Of Feeling Parisian: Shopping. Yeah! So my enjoyment of shopping is very limited. I don’t care for clothes shopping. Grocery and/or kitchen products, oh yeah! I am there.
Bing A French show On Netflix. Apparently, there’s no end to France based shows on Netflix. That is good. Where are the Russian, China, and/or Iran based shows without an agenda.just saying.
Beyond these things, try doing a personal enrichment class in French cooking. Or something like Wine Pairing and Charcuterie board class. Or consider an online class. That’s it for today.
This weeks bread post comes from Amanda from the above link. Last week was a German Bread, so I thought why not go to France. I have said tjis many times, I love a rustic bread. Why? It’s easy. You mix it in a bread maker and let it rise. Then put it in a Dutch Oven. Little if any kneading is needed.
There’s something so conforming about a rustic loaf of bread. It reminds me of going to Macaroni’s Bar and Grill. They bring out a loaf with olive oil with salt and pepper. Then everyone rips off a chunck. The bread is hot, crust, and so delicious.
This particular recipe calls for three cups of all-purpose flour. You could use bread flour. The protien content in bread flour is higher than all-purpose flour. So the bread flour will produce a chewier bread. All-purpose flour produces a more tender product. Making AP flour best for cakes, cookues, and so on.
Now that we went all food nerd, let’s look at scoring the bread. Go wild. Seriously! Let your imagination go.
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