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Zesty Mexican Style Bean Salad – Photo by J. Andrews
I modified this recipe from a recipe in an old Weight Watcher’s magazine. The original had raw green bell pepper and Great Northern beans in it instead, but back in the day before food allergies, I preferred it with roasted red pepper in a jar and garbanzo beans, and with some added spice enhancement. (Shocker, I know.) These days I can’t buy roasted red peppers at the store because of the citric acid, and I’ve been meaning to can my own so I could make this, but I hadn’t gotten around to it yet with everything else on my plate. So when Mary Kate and I decided to have a cookout, a light bulb went off that I could grill the red peppers and make this again. You could also broil the red peppers in your oven. (Not sure why that did not occur to me until I went to type up this post; I could have been making this all along. Sigh.)
Zesty Mexican Style Bean Salad
1 – 15 ounce can of black beans (Find a safe brand for you. I pressure can my own from dry beans.)
1 – 15 ounce can of garbanzo beans (Find a safe brand for you. I pressure can my own from dry beans.)
1 1/2 cups of chopped tomatoes
1 cup grilled or broiled red bell pepper (about one and half peppers)
1 cup of sliced green onions
1 cup of salsa (Make sure you use a safe for you brand. I used my home canned salsa.)
1/4 cup of red wine vinegar
2 Tablespoons of fresh chopped cilantro
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon of black pepper
1 teaspoon of Adobo seasoning (If you don’t have Adobo seasoning or you don’t have a safe version, mix 1/8 cup of paprika, 1 1/2 Tablespoons of ground black pepper, 1 Tablespoon of onion powder, 1 Tablespoon of dried oregano, 1 Tablespoon of ground cumin, 1/2 Tablespoon of ground chipotle, and 1/2 Tablespoon of garlic powder, this makes half a cup of seasoning)
hot sauce to taste (Use a safe for you brand. I used my own homemade version of Sriracha.)
Cut your red bell peppers into quarters and seed and de-stem them.
Quartered and de-seeded peppers – Photo by J. Andrews
Place the red bell pepper quarters on a hot grill or under the broiler in your oven on a rack with a cookie sheet under it, and grill/broil them until they have a bit of char and are tender. When they are done, take them off the grill or out of the oven and let them cool a bit.
Peppers on the grill – Photo by J. Andrews
In a large bowl, place the chopped tomatoes, sliced green onions, salsa, red wine vinegar, cilantro, salt, black pepper, and Adobo seasoning. Drain and rinse the black beans and garbanzo beans and add them to the bowl.
All ingredients except the grilled red pepper – Photo by J. Andrews
Now that your red bell pepper has probably cooled down a bit, either give them a quick spin in a food processor to chop them into small pieces, or chop them up finely with a knife, and put them in the large bowl.
Mix everything in the bowl together very well with a spatula or spoon. You want to make sure that none of the spices are clumping up. Taste it, and then decide how much hot sauce to need to add. Mix in the hot sauce really well.
Mix all ingredients together – Photo by J. Andrews
If you have safe chips, feel free to eat this with them. I don’t at the moment, but I’m happy just eating it with a fork or spoon. It also holds up very well in the refrigerator if you have leftovers.
Hot Dog with Ketchup, Mustard, Relish, and Red Cabbage Sauerkraut, and a bad attempt food styling using the sauerkraut juice – Photo by J. Andrews.
When I was diagnosed with the dairy allergy, I could still have Pearl and Boars Head hot dogs. And then came the corn allergy, and wiped out both of those choices too. So I was left with trying to make my own. The thing is you really need a KitchenAid Mixer with the Food Grinder attachment and the Sausage Stuffer accessory or a sausage stuffing machine (they have those, seriously, who knew?) to make this. Or you can just make them into patties and fry them. We did that with a bit of the leftover filling and it tasted hot dog-like.
You can get a beef collagen casing from LEM Products, which is what I did (I’m not saying it’s not corn contaminated, it probably is, but I seemed to tolerate them okay, and I only plan to do this once in a great while) or you can get someDeWied Natural Sheep Casings.
By the way, we have no affiliation with Amazon, the above links are just so that you can see the product and look at the information.
I didn’t grind my own meat but you could. I decided to cheat and get some ground beef because this was going to be a big enough process all on its own without getting all Denise crazy. You may also want to use a food processor, as discussed below to get a better texture in the filling. This recipe does take two days, so please read the whole thing.
Also before anyone asks, the hot dog bun pictured is not gluten-free or otherwise safe. I don’t have a safe hot dog bun yet, but I thought the pictures would look stupid if it was just a hot dog on a plate with condiments. Don’t worry, we fed it to my husband who has no food allergies.
Homemade Hot Dogs:
Again, this recipe does take two days, so please read the whole thing.
2 1/2 pounds of ground beef (don’t get any leaner than 80% or you’ll have really dry icky hot dogs)
1 Tablespoon and 1 teaspoon of kosher salt
1 cup of ice water
1 Tablespoon of ground mustard
1 Tablespoon of paprika
1 teaspoon of ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon of ground black pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons of garlic powder
2 Tablespoons of cane sugar syrup (You will need to make it ahead of time – there are two good recipes and I’ve used both before. The one from thekitchn.com makes about a quart, and the one from justapinch.com makes about two cups.)
hot dog casings (see notes above for your choices)
On the first day, take the ground beef, the kosher salt and the ice water and put it in a bowl. Knead the ingredients together with your hands until everything is well incorporated. Cover it with plastic wrap and let it sit in the fridge overnight.
Ground Beef Mixture
On the second day when you’re ready to start stuffing, place the mustard, paprika, coriander, black pepper and garlic power in a small bowl and mix well.
Spices before mixing
Take the ground beef out of the fridge and pour the spice mixture and the cane sugar syrup over the ground meat. Knead the spices and cane sugar syrup into the meat until everything is well incorporated.
Knead spices and cane sugar syrup into ground beef mixture
If you do not have a food processor, place the ground beef mixture into your KitchenAid mixer bowl, use the flat beater attachment and turn the mixer to high and beat for several several minutes. Just understand that the texture may be a bit more rustic than if you used a food processor. If you do have a food processor, in batches, process the ground beef mixture with the regular chopping blade and process into a fine paste.
Ground beef mixture in mixer
When you have finished processing the ground beef mixture either in the food processor or the mixture, spread a piece of parchment paper, or cling wrap out on a cookie sheet. I like to lay a sheet of parchment paper down first, just for ease of cleaning and it makes it easier to remove the paste later to put in the food grinder to stuff the casings. Spread the paste out on the cookie sheet so that it is a even layer across the cookie sheet. Place it in the freezer for 30 minutes.
Ground beef mixture spread out on cookie sheet
While you are waiting for the ground beef mixture to chill, set up your KitchenAid Mixer with the Food Grinder attachment and the Sausage Stuffer accessory. Depending on the size your casing you’ll need to choose the larger or smaller nozzle. I needed to use the smaller nozzle with the casing I chose, and I used very little of it. I probably have enough casings left to do 5 or 6 more batches. Slide the casing on the nozzle.
KitchenAid mixer set up with Food Grinder, Sausage Stuffer and with casing on nozzle
When the ground beef mixture has chillled, take it out, and place small-ish meat ball sized blobs of ground beef mixture in the food grinder. Slide a bit of the casing forward and tie the end closed before you start the mixer. Put the mixer on speed 4, and as meat comes out, hold the casing on the nozzle so that more casing does not slide out until the casing has been filled by the meat coming out. It’s easier said that done, and I found that it was helpful to have my husband assist me at this point, as I needed the two extra hands. Make sure you shut off the mixer just before the last bit of casing is filled as you’re going to want to have room to tie it off. Add more casing if you have more ground beef mixture and repeat this process to fill the casing. I will say that is easier if you have one person run the Food Grinder and one person deal with the casing.
Holding casing while mixture fills it
Once you have filled the casing, you are going to want to portion off your hotdogs by twisting the casing. Be careful, I broke one strand open trying to portion them off.
Twisting filled casing to portion hotdogsHot dogs after portioning
Preheat your oven to 225ºF and place your hotdogs on a rack on another sheet pan.
Hotdogs before cooking in oven
Place the hot dogs in the oven and cook until their internal temperature is 150ºF. This could take 40 minutes to an hour. Check them with a meat thermometer occasionally.
Hotdogs after coming out of the oven
Transfer them to a bowl of ice water, and when cool you can store them in the fridge or freezer to use later.
Cooked hotdogs cooling in ice water bath
We saved out a couple from the ice water bath, and fried them up immediately. After all, all that hard work had to be rewarded right?
Homemade Hotdogs fried in a skillet
We froze the remainder and took them to a cook out and grilled them.
Hot Dogs on the Grill – Photo by J. Andrews
Hot dog with ketchup, relish and mustard – Photo by J. Andrews
My name is Denise and I have an addiction to spices and some sort of spacial evaluation dysfunction where I am unable to translate how much a quantity of spice I am ordering will actually be in real life. I have a free standing wooden cabinet that is five feet tall and about a foot wide and a foot deep in which I keep all the spices. Except that I ran out of room, so I now also have a banker’s box which is full of spices, and a plastic file folder box full of chilies, which are both kept next to the spice cabinet, circled below. Oh, and looking at the picture, I forgot about jars on top of the spice cabinet, and the string of chilies hanging on the side. Oops.
My Spice Cabinet and Annexes
I also have a spreadsheet on my Google Drive which has my spice inventory on it, so that I can keep track of what I have, and can access it on my phone so that I do not buy something I already have while I am out and about. The spreadsheet has 169 items on it.
Screenshot of my Spice Inventory
One day, I believed that I was out of rosemary, which was annoying since I had just received a massive order from Penzey’s Spices not a month before. But since I had just ordered from Penzey’s, I did not have enough items to order to get free shipping. So I looked for other sources with shipping and ending up deciding that it was a good idea to order a pound of rosemary because it was such a good price.
What a one pound bag of rosemary looks like.
The picture you see above, note the helpful measure tape to show you how big it is in real life, depicts a pound of rosemary. I’m not sure how I’m going to use this much rosemary in my lifetime. What is even more ironic, is that I had forgotten that my friend Mary, the kale whisperer, had put in an order with Penzey’s a couple of weeks after I did, and I had purchased a four ounce bag of rosemary in her order. However, I had forgotten to note it on my spreadsheet and forgotten to mark it off on my to-do list. So I ordered a pound of rosemary, because I thought I didn’t have any, even though I did. So now in addition to the behemoth bag of rosemary above, I also have a four ounce bag kicking around.
We will not speak of the three pounds each of yellow and brown mustard seeds that may have been purchased before the rosemary incident and the two pounds of fennel seed that may have been purchased after. However, if anyone has some ideas for using massive quantities of fennel seed, I’d love to hear them.
Back in June, Mary Kate and Denise met up at the far side of Mary Kate’s apartment complex parking lot, with a super-long outdoor extension cord, a garage sale crock pot, a can of olive oil, some devil lye, and safety googles.
Denise and Mary Kate put safety first.
We were there to make soap. Safely outdoors, away from cars and buildings and enclosed spaces, lye and water were mixed, added to olive oil, and cooked in the crock pot until done. Or until it sorta kinda maybe looked a little bit like the pictures Denise got off the internet. Then we dumped it in a baking dish, and Denise took it to her in-laws — because soap needs to tour — before taking it home to cool completely.
Why make soap? Well, if you are Denise, there may be two soaps on the market that you might be able to use because the majority of soap is coconut oil-based. Add avoiding palm oil (because of cross-reaction possibilities with coconut allergies) and corn-derived ingredients, and good luck to you. If you’re Mary Kate, anything that involves mostly sitting around but also the possibility of destruction is good. Plus, there were safety googles.
The other reason is cost. Denise did the math when we were done: Her soap costs $26.78 for 64 oz (8 bars @ 8 oz each) which works out to 41 cents an ounce. The supplies for making this soap (not counting the equipment, which is reusable, and ran approximately $30 or so) cost $13.87 for 74.73 oz, which works out to 19 cents an ounce. It was also a few hours of fun.
Denise uses the soap for laundry detergent, dishwasher detergent, and shampoo, as well as for actual soap. This represents a significant cost savings. The olive oil soap is maybe not as pretty as commercial soap, but it works great and is gentle.
This soap is a “hot process” soap, meaning it uses heat to help the lye saponify (make into soap) the oil. There is also “cold process” soap, where time alone completes that reaction, and we do want to try that soon. The internet is full of recipes for soap, but this is the one we followed.
We made you a video. It’s really an automatic slide show of the photos we took set to music, and it runs about a minute. Enjoy (and be kind?).
If I was going to a cookout B.F.A. (Before Food Allergies), one of the things I’d pick up is a bag of marshmallows to toast. With the corn allergy, that’s pretty much not an option these days. I’ve been pinning recipes on how to deal with this for about a year, but I hadn’t gotten around to it yet because there were other things that were much more high priority. Plus it was going to be a significant effort because I’d have to make the cane sugar syrup to replace corn syrup and the powdered sugar (stuff at the store generally has corn starch in it) from scratch and that seems like a lot of steps in advance for so little a thing. But I’m going to a cookout in a week, and it seems like it’s finally time. Normally I’d list out the ingredients in the order that you’re going to use them, but since you’re going to have to make some ingredients ahead of time, I’ve listed those first.
Our friend Fred M. makes beautiful, ethereal, fluffy, light marshmallows, but I wanted these to stand up to getting stuck on a stick for toasting at the cookout so I upped the gelatin amount a bit in the recipes I found and tweaked. These marshmallows are a bit sturdy, but if you want them to be lighter with a little less structure, knock back the amount of gelatin by a tablespoon.
Marshmallows:
Ingredients:
1 1/4 cup of cane sugar syrup (You will need to make it ahead of time – there are two good recipes and I’ve used both before. The one from thekitchn.com makes about a quart, and the one from justapinch.com makes about two cups.)
1 1/2 cups of powdered sugar (You will need to make it ahead of time – here’s a recipe from glutenfreegigi.com on how to do it. I used tapioca starch.)
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract or another extract might be fun, such as cinnamon (Here’s a bunch of recipes for vanilla extract, make sure to use safe alcohol if corn or wheat are an issue for you. I used Luksusowa Vodka because it’s made only from potatoes, where some vodkas may also use grain or corn. Also you can make cinnamon extract by using whole cinnamon sticks instead of vanilla beans. It’s totally killer in coffee.)
4 Tablespoons of unflavored gelatin powder (Knox or Great Lakes are generally regarded as being okay if you’re not super sensitive to corn, again no affiliation with Amazon, just linking for reference)
1 1/4 cups of cold water, divided
1 1/2 cups of cane sugar (make sure you use a safe-for-you brand)
1/8 teaspoon of salt
1/2 cup tapioca starch (You could also use potato or arrowroot starch, whatever’s safe for you)
safe-for-you-oil for greasing the pan or you can use the oil in an oil mister as well
Kitchen Stuff you will need:
Stand mixer with the whisk beater attached
candy thermometer that will clip on the side a saucepan
3 or 4 quart saucepan
9 x 13 baking pan or another flat container to spread out your marshmallows
a pizza cutter or a sharp knife
the normal assortment of bowls, measuring cups, spatulas, forks or whisks and so on
Grease or spray your baking pan with the oil. Use a paper towel to wipe the pan and make sure that every surface is coated in a thin layer of oil. Put the baking pan and a spatula next to your stand mixer, which should already have the whisk beater on it and your splatter guard ready to go.
Mix a 1/2 cup of cold water in a measuring cup along with the vanilla. Put the gelatin into the bowl of the stand mixer, and pour the water and vanilla mixture over it while whisking it with a fork or a small whisk. Mix until there are no lumps. Put the bowl back into your stand mixer and attach it.
Gelatin, water, and vanilla extract well mixed
Place your saucepan on the burner and clip your candy thermometer to the side of the saucepan. Add the rest of the water (3/4 of a cup), and add the cane sugar, cane sugar syrup and salt. Don’t stir it up.
water, sugar, cane sugar, syrup and salt with candy thermometer
Place the saucepan over high head and bring it to a rapid boil. Boil until the sugar mixture measures some where between 245ºF and 250ºF. Don’t let it go any higher than 250ºF. Take the saucepan off the burner and remove the candy thermometer.
Sugar mixture at a boil
Turn on the stand mixer to medium and CAREFULLY pour the sugar mixture down the side of the stand mixer bowl. There will be some bubbling, so go slowly. Also it will freaking burn and hurt if you spill it on yourself, so please don’t.
When all the sugar mixture is in the mixing bowl and is mixed to together, make sure your splatter guard is down and increase the mixing speed to high. Continue to mix on high for 10 minutes. Make sure you do the full 10 minutes.
Whipping marshmallow mixture
Once the ten minutes is up, do not dally, get the marshmallow mixture into the baking pan as fast as you can as it will start to cool really fast, and you want to be able to spread it out in the pan. Use a spatula to scrap out the bowl, but it’s really think and sticky, so you won’t get every bit out. Once it’s in the pan, spray or coat your hands with your oil and spread out the marshmallow evenly.
Marshmallows spread evenly in baking pan
Let the marshmallows sit uncovered and at room temperature for 6 or more hours. Don’t let it go any longer than 24 hours though. Once they have cooled, mix your powdered sugar and tapioca starch in a bowl.
Powder sugar and tapioca starch mixture
Take a large cutting board or cookie sheet and sprinkle some of the powdered sugar mix on it. Then sprinkle the top of the marshmallow in the pan with the mixture and smooth it out over the surface. Flip the pan over onto your cutting board. Once you’ve got them out of the pan, sprinkle more of the mixture over the top of the marshmallow layer that was previously on the bottom of the pan.
Marshmallows powered before cutting
Cut your marshmallows using a sharp knife or a pizza cutter into small squares.
Marshmallow pieces cut by pizza cutter
Put each square in the bowl with the powdered sugar and tapioca and toss it until coated thoroughly. (If you have extra marshmallow coating afterwards, put it in a jar and use it the next time.)
Marshmallow being tossed in marshmallow coating
Store them in an airtight container at room temperature. They’ll last for a couple weeks if you don’t eat them right away. Take them to your cookout and toast them. If you can’t wait you can use your stove burner and a bamboo skewer 🙂
Toothpaste has been a challenge because the commercial versions have corn or coconut or both in them. For a while, I was just using a baking soda and hydrogen peroxide paste, and it was gross. It worked to some extent, but I hated the taste every morning, and sometimes I cheated and used my husband’s toothpaste (which is a bad idea, don’t do that). Then I came up with the bright idea to put peppermint essential oil in my mix to see if it helped the taste. It tasted better, but the peroxide seemed to evaporate off quickly and/or the baking soda all settled to the bottom in a cement like layer. So then after playing on Pinterest and Google, I decided to try a batch with some bentonite clay in it, and I’d read something about clove essential oil being good for dental health, so I added them to the mix. This may be too much information, but you know how your teeth get sort of fuzzy with plaque as you go through the day? Well, I saw a drastic reduction in fuzzy buildup when using this toothpaste. At this writing, I brushed my teeth 8 hours ago and my teeth pretty much feel like I just had a cleaning at the dentist. I know that the toothpaste looks gross in the picture, but it seems to be working well. Let me know what you think.
Toothpaste (Corn-Free and Coconut-Free)
Makes about a 4 ounce jar.
2 Tablespoons baking soda (use a safe-for-you brand, some are corn-contaminated, watch out)
2 Tablespoons bentonite clay (I used Living Clay, the Detox Clay Power)
3 Tablespoons hydrogen peroxide
3-4 drops of peppermint essential oil
3-4 drops of clove essential oil
Put your baking soda and clay in your jar. Add the peroxide and mix it with the clay and baking soda until it is smooth. I used a Popsicle stick, but you could use a chopstick or a barbecue skewer or a fork, whatever will fit in the jar. Your mixture is going to want to bubble up and rise a bit from the reaction between the baking soda and peroxide. Mix it back down. Add the peppermint and clove essential oil and mix well. Cover your jar with a lid. I dip my toothbrush in the jar to get the toothpaste, but I’m fairly comfortable with being uncouth, and I’m not sharing my jar with anyone else. (If that bothers you, they have empty toothpaste tubes on Amazon, no affiliation, yada, yada, etc.) If the baking soda has not finished reacting to the peroxide, you might find that it has bubbled up again when you open it and it will look a bit dried. It isn’t, just mix it up again.
So recently I’ve become concerned that I may be reacting to maple syrup. It stands to reason that with the number of types of tree pollen to which I am allergic that the sap of the tree might be an issue as well. I’ve noticed some correlation, but there were other potential issues during the same time frame, so I need to do some food challenges to verify whether it’s truly an issue or not. However, in the meantime, I need some syrupy stuff for waffles while I wait to do a challenge. As some you know, I’ve been canning to beat the band so that I have convenient, shelf stable, safe food and condiments, so I took a look in my canning books to see what I could find.
Now I’m not suggesting that you can this recipe, as I know that that’s a lot of work for most of you, and you might not be into the canning thing. But if you wanted to do that, the recipe is here. I’ve cut this down to a manageable amount for immediate use and made a suggestion for thickening it for a more substantial syrup. The recipe still makes 3 cups of syrup. Since that’s still kind of a lot, you can freeze a portion of it before you thicken it. Be aware that the pictures are some what deceptive because the batch I made was three times this size so that I ended up with 12 half pints of canned blueberry syrup. Also because there’s so much blueberry pulp left, I’ve provided you with some ideas for using it in other recipes at the end of this post. When food is so hard for many of us, we don’t want to waste anything.
Blueberry Syrup
Makes about 3-4 cups of syrup.
Ingredients:
4 cups of blueberries
3 cups of water (used divided, as described below)
1 1/2 Tablespoons of grated lemon zest
1 1/2 cups of white cane sugar
1 Tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
1-2 Tablespoons of arrowroot or tapioca flour (optional)
1-2 Tablespoons of water (optional)
Necessary equipment:
Stainless steel or other non-reactive (ceramic or enamel, do not use aluminum or cast iron) pot
Potato masher or large spoon
Strainer or colander
Cheesecloth (look in grocery stores where the utensils are, or in hardware stores or department stores where the canning stuff is)
Candy thermometer
Wash your blueberries and pick out any squished or yucky berries or any stems or leaves. You need to crush your berries. Place a thin layer of blueberries in a large stainless steel stockpot (the pot needs to be stainless steel or another non-reactive surface), and mash the berries with a potato masher or the back of a large spoon. Make sure they are all squished. Then add another layer and mash them, repeating until all the berries are mashed to bits.
Once the berries are all mangled, add 1 cup of the water and the lemon zest, and over medium heat, bring the mixture to a gentle boil. Allow the mixture to continue to boil gently for 5 minutes.
Set up your strainer so that it hangs over a deep bowl or other non reactive pot so that the strainer does not rest in the bowl or pot, but so that all of the blueberry mixture will drip into the bowl or pot, without coming out the sides or making a mess. The bowl or the pot should also be deep enough that the strainer will not come into contact with the liquid as it drips out of the strainer. Line the strainer with several layers of dampened cheesecloth. You want several layers so that it prevents any seeds or pulp from dripping into your juice. The reason for dampening your cheesecloth with water is so that the cheesecloth doesn’t absorb as much of your precious juice. Once you’ve got your strainer and the container for the juice to drip into properly situated, add the mixture to the strainer. Let it drip for at least two hours. If you’re a purist and you want a clear syrup, you let it drip undisturbed for at least two hours. If you’re like me, and not a purist, you let it drip for at least two hours and then you use a spatula to get as much of the juice as you can. (Keep the pulp, I’ll talk about what you can do with it later.)
Blueberry Mixture in Strainer
Wash the stainless steel stockpot you used to cook the blueberry mixture, and in the now clean pot, add the sugar and the remaining 2 cups of water.
Sugar and water mixture before boiling
Over medium high heat, bring the sugar mixture to a boil and cook until it measures 230ºF (you may need to adjust for altitude, we don’t have an altitude issue here). Add your blueberry juice, and increase the heat to high, and bring it to a boil. Boil for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Once your five minutes is up, remove the pot from the heat, and stir in your lemon juice.
Blueberry Syrup after cooking
At this point, if you’re going to put any of it in the freezer to save for later, pour that amount off into freezer safe and heat safe container and let it cool to room temp before sealing it and putting it in the freezer. If you’re satisfied with the syrup as it is, great, use it for pancakes, waffles, desserts, you name it.
(SAFETY NOTE: You CANNOT thicken the syrup if you are planning to can it, unless you use Clear Gel, which contains corn. No other thickening method is safe for canning, so if you are allergic to corn, just thicken it after you open the jars and when you are planning to use it.)
If you’d like to thicken the syrup, place the syrup back over medium heat. Mix 1 Tablespoon of tapioca or arrowroot with 1 Tablespoon of water to form a paste, and then whisk it slowly into the syrup. Continue to whisk until the paste is well incorporated with the syrup and the tapioca and arrowroot has cooked. If this isn’t sufficiently thick enough for you, repeat the process, until the syrup is the right consistency. Yay! You have blueberry syrup!
Now, let’s chat about that leftover pulp. There are a few ways you could use it:
(1) Put the leftover pulp in your pancake or waffle batter for blueberry overload. Yum!
(2) You can make yourself some blueberry butter/jam. Put the leftover pulp in a sauce pan with a cup of sugar and a tablespoon of lemon juice, and bring it to a boil over medium high heat, stirring frequently. Once it’s boiling, reduce the heat to medium, and stir frequently until the mixture thickens and holds its shape on a spoon. Store it in the fridge until you want to use it on toast, on ice cream, or just eating it with a spoon, haha!
(3) Make blueberry vinegar. Mix the pulp with 4 cups of white wine vinegar and put it in a glass jar, covering it with cheese cloth or a coffee filter and securing it with a rubber band. Let it sit on your counter top for a week or two, stirring it once a day to prevent any mold. Strain out the blueberry pulp, and you’ll have blueberry flavored vinegar to use for salad dressings or marinades.
So in Mary Kate’s inaugural kitchen story post she asked what the workhorse pieces in your kitchen are and if they had a history. My workhorse piece is my KitchenAid mixer. And it does have a bit of a story.
When I was a kid (there’s some debate over the exact age, I thought it was around 15, but my mother claims it was before that, maybe 12 or 13), my father decided to buy a KitchenAid mixer for my mother for Christmas. Now, this was mostly because my dad’s friend had bought one for his wife, and my father was a “Keep up with the Joneses” kind of guy. Keep in mind that my mother was working 10 or 12 hours a day, she wasn’t all that interested in cooking anyway, and I was basically responsible for getting dinner on the table at that age already. To complete the picture, my mom has often said that she made a pie once before I was born, just to say that she could do it, and that was enough. So a KitchenAid mixer wasn’t an appropriate gift for my mom in any stretch of the imagination.
I tried to explain this to my father while we were shopping. He didn’t listen, because that was not his thing anyway, and I have to admit that I didn’t try as hard as I could have to convince him that it was a stupid gift for my mother because. . . it was a KitchenAid mixer! (Cue heavenly chorus.) I knew that the use of the said KitchenAid mixer would default to me, as the main cook in the family. So sue me, I let appliance lust sway me from the straight and narrow path of insisting that my father pick a Christmas gift that my mom would actually like.
The KitchenAid mixer was purchased, and as predicted by me, my mother wanted nothing to do with it. So I used it during the years before I left for college. I didn’t take it with me because there really wasn’t a place you could stash a KitchenAid mixer in the dorm rooms at Wellesley, although I did have a food processor for making strawberry daiquiris. During my second year of law school, my mother finally decided to get a divorce. Let’s just say it was not a shock to anyone, and it was certainly about freaking time. When she told me she was moving out of the house, I told her that she needed to take the KitchenAid mixer. She was puzzled and said that she didn’t want it. I said, “I know you don’t, but I do.” She took the KitchenAid mixer, and since I was living in an apartment at that time, the KitchenAid mixer and I have been happily together since. I’m now 42 and my relationship with the KitchenAid mixer since its purchase has lasted either 27 or 30 years depending on who’s memory is accurate (maybe my sister will weigh in for a tie-breaker).
Last year I noticed that the KitchenAid mixer had developed an oil leak. I was devastated, but I did my Google-Fu and figured out what was probably wrong with it. And then I found out that the nearest service center was in another state and I might have to mail it. I couldn’t imagine mailing it, let alone the cost of mailing it, and the cost of the repair seemed excessive. So I did my Google-Fu again and found a video that showed you how to repair what was most likely the problem. I decided to take the risk. If I killed it, it’d had a good long run, and if I didn’t, I’d put the money I didn’t spend on the repair towards a new one. (They have purple ones now, just saying.)
So I ordered the materials and waited for them to arrive. When they did, I spread newspaper out on my kitchen floor, and got my Kindle Fire out so I could watch the video over and over again as I did the repair. It took me about an hour, just because I was working so carefully and slow to make sure I did it right, and I wanted to remove as much of the decades old grease as I could. When I got it back together, it worked like a charm. No leaks, no drips, no nothing. To celebrate, and to make up for contemplating replacing it for a younger, hotter, and purple model, I got it a purple dragon decal (go here on etsy, but she’s on vacation until July 5) to match my dragon tattoo. Here’s hoping for another thirty or so happy years!
Pretty purple dragon decal on Denise’s KitchenAid Mixer
