BooksRule

Has anyone here used dried milk (mixed with water, of course) as a substitute in recipes when it calls for regular milk? I've used buttermilk powder instead of regular buttermilk before and it worked fine, but I've never used the dried milk in recipes. My googling seems to indicate that it works fine and you won't notice a difference in taste or texture, but I was curious to find out if this is true. I usually have half & half on hand (for my coffee), but rarely have milk. And I hate buying milk (even the smallest container) for a recipe that calls for 1/4 cup. I know you can freeze milk to use later, but I know myself and would put that off until the milk went bad.

I prefer salty over sweet, but combining them works, too, such as pretzels with a sweet/tangy raspberry pretzel dip, or salted cashews/peanuts with candy corn (the only way to eat candy corn in my opinion). I love Little Caesar's Pretzel Crust Pizza, but mainly due to the crust itself. I think my next salty snack recipe try is making some 'pretzel strips' using crescent roll dough cut into strips, brushed with the baking soda/water mixture and sprinkled with kosher salt and then baked. Right out of oven, brush with melted butter. I'm hoping they taste good (but would be more tender than a pizza dough would be, of course).

I took a 'baking hen' out of the freezer several days ago in anticipation of making gumbo this weekend. I got around to boiling the hen earlier today, but ran out of motivation before I finished the gumbo. So, I have a nice big container of chicken (I did take it off the bones before I stopped) and a huge pot of broth that's still cooling on the stove. I'll freeze both (tomorrow morning, which will give the broth a chance to let most of the fat rise to the top for me to skim) and will probably make the gumbo next weekend. At least the messy part is done (picking through the carcass getting all of the meat and having to wash my giant stew pot). I'll just have to make the roux, add it to the broth with some file powder and make a pot of rice. There really wasn't that much left to do, but I'm also trying to eat healthy and had my 'cheat' meal on Friday. So, it's really another week until I can have something like gumbo (it's mainly the roux that's the problem--pure fat and flour). I've never frozen the 'fixin's' before, so it if turns out well, I might buy up several hens, cook them, and freeze the broth/meat for later gumbos (sometimes it's hard to find hens around here except during holiday time and hens give chicken gumbo so much flavor). So now I have to figure out something else for dinner!

I'm late to this conversation, but just to get my two cents in: I vaguely remember the 'drop the clothespin into the bottle' game, but I never remembered us getting milk deliveries (earliest memories were of milk in waxed cardboard cartons, not glass), so I don't know where the bottles came from. I do remember as a pre-teen and early teen that most of us would have 'roller skating parties' at the local rink. We didn't have the whole rink to ourselves, but the invited kids would have their entrance fee/skate rentals paid for and I think some snacks from the concession stand. Not too expensive for the parents and it was a lot of fun. I spent a lot of Saturdays going round and round at the skating rink to early '70s tunes! (I had to go back and add the word 'roller', just to make it clear. I grew up in the deep south and have never put on a pair of ice skates. I was reminded a few minutes ago why I would never have had the patience to have and rear children. I was out in the front yard pulling weeds from a flower bed and listened to a conversation between the neighbor kids (boys about 7 or 8 and maybe a friend) playing basketball and arguing loudly about the one hogging the ball. The after-school sitter came out to tell them to share and after they whined a little and grumbled (and didn't share the ball), she gave them the ultimatum of no basketball for a week during any time she was staying with them and apparently after one of them mumbled something she took away the video games as well. When they needed to leave and two of them hadn't gotten into the car, she pulled out of the driveway and slowly started driving down the street, making them walk to the car (no danger, we live on a very quiet street and she was watching them). They are generally good kids (they even run to bring my trash can up from the curb for me almost every week), but have a lot of energy. I'm happy I raised cats instead.

There was one line that really made me laugh, mainly because it reminded me of co-workers who have to be talked out of over-decorating our library for events (such as wanting to use holiday-themed foil confetti): Cap: 'Remember, we have to clean up the place afterwards, so festoon accordingly.'

I've never seen this movie, so I recorded it. I'll weigh in my thoughts when I've had a chance to give it a watch. I do love that list of actors, though.

I watched 'The Devil Bat' this morning (a Bela Lugosi selection, since he's TCM's Star of the Month for October). It wasn't too bad, and the giant bats were even a little creepy when they were just being still and not flying around. I had to laugh at the on-screen description of the movie. Someone was definitely on the wrong page when they wrote it: 'Believing his employers swindled him out of company profits, a mad scientist invents gigantic baseball bats that attack anyone who wears a certain lotion--which his employers now do.' That would have been an entirely different, but maybe entertaining film.

I knew that somehow they would work Judd into the rescue efforts. I liked the food-themed quotes near the end: Paul: 'Look at him up there. Just buttering Cap up like garlic toast.' and: Owen: 'Some even might say that I waffled.' Mateo: 'Oh, you waffled, Cap. With syrup and a side of bacon.'

I noticed that, too. That was good.

Re-watching 'Mad Love'. Peter Lorre was so good in this movie. Before I watched this for the first time, I had only seen him in more comic-type roles ('The Raven', 'Arsenic & Old Lace', etc.). His portrayal of Dr. Gogol in this one makes my skin crawl. So creepy!

What does it say about me that I was worried most about the poor doggo on the plane? I was so afraid that he (she?) was going to get sucked out through that hole.

There's still a lot of day left, but so far it's been a pretty good one (even though I fell off the healthy eating wagon this week). As I was leaving to do some errands, one of my neighbors, who was mowing a lawn across the street, rode over on his mower and offered to mow my straggly front lawn (I have no grass in the back yard). Of course, I took him up on his offer, which means that not only do I now not have to mow this weekend, I can try to get started on some other yard work that I couldn't do until the yard was mowed. Then, I went to a book sale at a nearby public library and found a couple of books to fill in gaps in my vintage children's book collection and a nice stack of DVDs. To top it off, the next item on my errand list was to drive over to another library in the system that was about 1/2 hour away just to check out a copy of 'The Incredible Hulk' (I'm starting a re-watch of the MCU movies and didn't want to wait for the DVD to be sent over to the branch near me). As I pawed through the DVDs for sale, I found a copy of the movie. Yay for me! I'm now going to have a late lunch of chicken tenders, a couple of little lemon/cheese cakes, and a huge glass of iced tea. Maybe I'm just easy to please.

I hope all of you in Helene's path will stay safe (and flood-free). It looks like it's going to be a bad one. I live along the coast and I know I always feel bad wishing it away from my area (when I know that just means it's going to go another populated area), but I can't help it. You always hope hurricanes will fizzle out before they come ashore, but this one has a lot of warm water to fire it up.

I had no idea that this show was starting back tonight. I just happened to be checking the onscreen guide and saw it listed about 1 minute before it began. Not too bad, although I felt that I was a little behind on what everyone was doing, since I had totally forgotten how last season ended. I felt really bad for Judd when he realized that Owen hadn't come to see him to offer him his job back, but to get his advice on who to choose to replace him. Did the actress who plays Grace leave the show for good, or is she just gone for a little while?

Fritz: 'We can't meet the upstairs neighbor because the landlord said no pets. We have to keep the curtains closed 24 hours a day because the landlord said no pets. It's like living with Anne Frank.' (S.4, Ep.1 'Controlled burn') This quote was funny, but on a more serious note-- I know that Philip Stroh was supposed to be the 'big bad' on this show (and on 'Major Crimes'), but I found murderer/arsonist Bill Croelick to be creepier. I was glad that he was only on two episodes. And when I saw this episode way back for the first time, when Brenda walked in on him in her house (while carrying Kitty's carrier) I remember saying to myself 'Don't let him notice Kitty. Don't let him notice Kitty.' I feared for her life (Brenda could take care of herself).