Ahem. One thing that Aunt Toby really hates is going out to what is considered ‘fine dining’ (which I realize is stretching things where your dear Aunty lives but the point is made), and some of the details are off.
The food is exquisite. The wine list divine. The wait staff attentive. The bathrooms artistic.
And paper napkins.
Ayyyyyyyy! It makes me want to stick a fork in my eye. Attention to detail after detail after detail – and paper napkins. They might even have white linen on the tables (usually under a piece of glass, which I also hate – what do they think I’m going to do – write my name on it?), but no cloth napkins. The wait staff might even have one over their arms or use one to help open the bottle of wine.
In our first episode of the kitchen chair Pull up a chair, we got the seat off the frame of the chair, took off the coverings and made a pattern. We also cut out the foam for the underseat and secured it to the seat itself with sticky tape.
Today, we make the seat beautiful again. You will need:
Fabric to cover the seat
Scissors – one large and one small for trimming in the corners.
Cloth tape measure
Staple gun
Hammer
Your seat pattern
One of Aunt Toby’s goals for writing this blog is to definitely get the point across that besides actual surgery or self-performed dentistry, there is nothing out there that any of us should say, “Nah…I could never do that.” Now, I also have to admit that I’m a big believer in starting something at the most basic level I can find and then working up to more complicated things, but the point is made. (more…)
Look into my eyes (you’ll have to do your own Transylvanian accent here, I’m afraid) and repeat after me…. “Beans are not just for chili and soups…beans are not just for chili and soups…”
You’re feeling your eyes getting heavier…and heavier…..
OK, enough of the hypnosis. I realize that there are readers who suspect that your Aunty is obsessed with beans. I love beans. But I realize a lot of people do not have the same affection for them that I do.
Well, today is YOUR day. I don’t know how anyone can say “Nyet” to a piece of cake that has:
No gluten
No processed sugar
A whole lot of fiber and protein
And tastes yummmmmmmy.
Now, when I did my quick and dirty search for desserts made with beans, the most popular item was brownies made with black beans. (more…)
It’s summer where we are (if you are in the Southern Hemisphere, dear reader, you know you are not but you might find this useful in any case), and trips to the lake, beach, and swimming pool are on a lot of people’s lists. Your Aunty is of an age when she remembers people slathering on iodine and baby oil, grilling themselves on the beach for hours at a time, and no one thinking anything about it. A lot of those people now look like the pair of ancient shoes and have had to have surgery for skin cancer but that is a discussion for another time.
OK, peoples!! The word ‘slaw’ is derived from the Dutch word for salad, so a slaw is a slaw is a slaw. Cole slaw (or, as some folks in the South refer to it, merely ‘slaw’) is shredded cabbage salad. The addition of carrots and oddments such as raisins (was this to get children to eat it?) is, as my father used to say, ‘commentary’, but it all comes down to shredded cabbage.
Now, here in the US, we seem to have two schools of thought on cole slaw (at least from the dressing side): mayonnaise-based dressings or vinegar-based dressings. I did a little bit of research and from what I can find, the original dressings used in Holland for cole slaw were cooked dressings containing eggs, sugar, flour, vinegar, salt, pepper and butter. Except for the flour, ‘mayo’ is not that far off the mark. However, some of us want something a little bit less creamy, which is where the vinegar-based salad dressings started to come into play.
Now, except for raisins (which I have rather strong opinions on in terms of cole slaw), your Aunt Toby is a ‘anything goes’ sort of slaw person. I’ve used everything from the cabbage family up to and including Chinese cabbage, kohlrabi, red and green cabbage, and broccoli, plus carrots. The bowl at the top of the page contains green cabbage, the stems from a couple of heads of broccoli, a quarter of a red onion, and three carrots. The total amount almost filled the bowl of my KitchenAid mixer. A whole lot of slaw.
For the dressing, I went light tonight – we were eating hamburgers and the thought of heaping mayo-based dressing on that did nothing for my appetite. Here’s the dressing I used and and because this is lemon juice based rather than vinegar-based it is bright and flavorful.
Lemon-ginger Slaw Dressing
The juice from one large lemon
2 T of sugar
1 handful of chopped fresh parsley (if you haven’t got it, it’s not a great loss, believe me)
1 T of LIGHT olive oil (the sort used for saute-ing or baking – don’t use virgin or extra-virgin in this)
Grate up some fresh ginger (about an inch or an inch and a half of one of the fingers) and use a loosely packed tablespoon
Mix all of that up in a bowl and taste. If this tastes too sweet, you can add more lemon juice or up to a 1/4 cup of cider vinegar to balance it off – this should taste just a little bit tart/sweet, with a ginger overtone to it. Bright, fruity taste.
My mama (with the accent on the second syllable), who went to her reward in 2006, sewed her way through everything from baby clothing to sport coats for my father and suits for herself. She never, ever made a muslin of anything. I’m not sure if that was because she had some sort of innate sense of how big things had to be or she was just lucky. I took a sewing class in high school where I had to make a tailored jacket and she once saw me hunched over, hand-sewing hair canvas into the fronts of the jacket and steam pressing the living daylights out of the thing. She told me that she thought I was a much better seamstress than she was but she’d never go through all that to produce a jacket. (more…)
Ahem. One thing that Aunt Toby really hates is going out to what is considered ‘fine dining’ (which I realize is stretching things where your dear Aunty lives but the point is made), and some of the details are off.
