Baby gates are AMAZING!

A baby gate was not something that I initially anticipated needing. We don’t have any stairs or accesses to dangerous spots, and we never considered the kitchen to be out of bounds. Plus, our daughter has always disliked being confined, and we generally let her go wherever she wants, as long as she stays out of trouble. Most of the gates I had seen her over $50 anyway, and I certainly wasn’t going to pay that kind of money for something that seemed so extraneous.

Then we decided to potty train our daughter, and I read John Rosemond’s Toilet Training Without Tantrums. I love pretty much all of John Rosemond’s books. He approaches child-rearing in a common-sense, old-fashioned manner, based on what has worked for the majority of people in the past. Some of his books are kinda repetitive, so I have just a basic set of A Family of Value, the Six-Point Plan for Raising Happy, Healthy Children, Making the ‘Terrible’ Two Terrific, and Toilet Training Without Tantrums.

I decided to start the potty training while my husband was travelling on business for a month. That way, I wouldn’t have to worry about cooking and could devote myself fully to cleaning up messes if necessary, especially if it took a long time for her to get it. You never really know with potty training; the kid could get it in a day, or it could take weeks. So I tried to prepare for the worst; I went ahead and stocked up on food and supplies in case we were stuck at home for a couple weeks.

Two of the recommendations for kids who struggle with potty training were a small timer and a baby gate. If necessary, the parent can set the timer to go off at likely times when the child should need to use the potty, whether the child realizes it or not. And if a child is particularly stubborn (especially older children), and the parent knows that the child understands the concept but simply refuses to use the potty, the gate can be used to confine the child in the bathroom, with his potty, toys and books, until he decides to use the potty.

Fortunately, my daughter had the potty 95% figured out by the second day, so I didn’t have to resort to either of those measures. But I found some other great uses for the baby gate!

Now, I don’t advocate blocking children into a room for hours at a time merely to avoid some annoyance. Toddlers and children need as much freedom as possible to explore and learn, and confinement doesn’t aid that. But in certain circumstances and for relatively short periods, having a child-free zone in your house can be a wonderful thing.

I started out putting the baby gate in the door to our bedroom, essentially gating our daughter OUT of one room, as opposed to IN to one room. I had put several boxes in there for sorting and organizing, and I didn’t want her undoing all my work. Even after I put the gate up, I didn’t immediately spend a lot of time in there where she couldn’t get to me. Most of the time I was out in the living room, and she didn’t need to be in our bedroom at all. Eventually she got used to the gate, and wouldn’t fuss if I went in there for short periods of time to do things like fold laundry or make the bed.

Once she had the potty training pretty well down, we decided it was (long past) time to teach her to put herself to sleep, and we started using the gate at nap times and bed times in the door to her room. When she gets ready for bed, we put the gate up, then do the book-reading routine in her room with her. Then we tell her it’s time for her to go to sleep in her bed, that she has a potty in the room if she needs it, and we’ll be right in the other room if she needs something. Whether she accepts this peacefully (10% of the time) or shrieks in outrage (90% of the time), we at least get some time alone without a toddler crawling all over us. Every five minutes or so, if she’s still upset, we go over and matter-of-factly repeat the reality of the situation to her. She usually decides to entertain herself after 5 or 10 minutes, and often falls asleep in her bed with a book.

During the day, I put the gate back in the door to our room so I can do things like fold laundry, use the phone, or just lie down without being walked on. The cat also appreciates a safe place where he can sleep without being jabbed with sticks and toys.

I believe that parental care is best for infants and small children, but especially if you are a full-time stay-at-home mom, sometimes you just need a break from being pawed and climbed on. A gate is great because the child can still see you, and you can easily step over it as you move through the house.

I ended up purchased the Evenflo Position and Lock Gate for about $10 from Wal-Mart. (Mine is neither pink nor blue, but a neutral wood color.) It’s perfect for what we need. It uses pressure to stay in place, so there’s no damage to the door frame, and it’s easy to move around. Pressure-mounted models are not safe for top-of-stairs use, though, so if you need to guard a staircase you’ll have to invest in a screw-in gate. My daughter has only worked it loose once, and that was after several cumulative days of yanking on it. If you reset it every day, if should hold fine.

Stock, stock and more stock

I have a tendency to get excited about projects and not think the whole thing through. Example: the other day I cooked my first whole chicken and decided to make a HUGE pot of stock from the remains, especially since I have a new stock pot that needed a test run. What I did NOT think about was where I was going to put 6 quarts of stock, since both my tiny freezer and tiny fridge are full to bursting.

I used a rough version of Julia Child’s stock recipe from her book The French Chef. This book contains all of the recipes from her television program of the same name. I like it because it has a lot of the same, basic recipes from her classics Mastering the Art of French Cooking I and II, but is less huge and tome-like; I don’t have to clear off an entire counter for it to rest open.

I forgot to save the chicken innards, so I just threw in the carcass, some extra meat, leftover leek trimming, carrots, celery and onions, and a little cloves, parsley, thyme and a bay leaf. What’s great about stock is that you can throw in pretty much anything: vegetable trimmings, leftover meat, whatever. Even peels and stuff you couldn’t normally eat will give it some flavor. I initially made the stock in this pot:

(That’s me in the mirror finish. Hi!) This stock pot holds twelve quarts, and while far from the largest available, it’s the biggest one I currently have. I covered the meat and vegetables with water, then simmered them (without boiling!) for a few hours. When I got tired of messing with it, I took a messy path to straining it out. I got out my SECOND biggest stock pot (8 quarts)

with the pasta insert inside

and poured the whole thing in there. I think I had about 6 quarts at the end. A pasta insert is basically a big colander that fits inside a large pot. You put the water in the pot, then the pasta (or whatever you’re cooking) inside the insert. When it’s done, you just lift the insert out

Ta da!!! and drain the pasta while leaving all the liquid in the pot. You can do multiple batches, you could cook the pasta then blanch some veggies, the possibilities are endless. Or, you can use it as a giant strainer with something to catch all your stock in! The insert brought up all the large pieces of bone, meat and vegetable, leaving a more-manageable pot of mostly liquid with some smaller pieces. I strained it again through a mesh sieve, then let it sit in a huge bowl in the fridge over night.

This morning I realized that I needed to do SOMETHING to get the huge bowl out of the fridge, so I poured the whole mess into my 6 and 3/4-quart Dutch oven and cooked it on the stove for several hours.

I started out with between 5 and 6 quarts, and ended up with this:

You can see the line higher up where the level originally was. I cooked it and cooked it until it had reduced to 6 or 7 cups, which is a much more reasonable amount for freezing. I was also able to take off a lot more fat and scum than I could yesterday. I’m letting it cool, then I’ll measure it into jars and freeze it for future use, being sure to dilute it with fresh water when I use it. It’s homemade stock concentrate!

For whatever reason, the stock didn’t congeal at all this time. The first time I made stock, it turned into a huge bowl of gel in the fridge and I freaked out, not realizing that that was desirable. Maybe I had a substandard chicken. I also went WAY overboard with the alliums; I think that I had enough leeks I could have left out the onion completely. Oh, well.

Then I had to clean up all the pots. Truthfully, though, if I hadn’t had all those gadgets, I would have had to ladle out all the chunks by hand, and it would have taken forever. Julia Child said something about using all the pots you need (skimping ultimately wastes time), but be sure to clean up as you go, and I’m sure that she knew what she was talking about.

Food storage: plastic edition

If you recall, a while back I spent a good amount of time transforming my food storage from plastic totes to glass jars. While I don’t regret that decision, I have repurposed many of my old plastic containers, and even purchased some new ones, as my storage needs evolve. Here’s some of what I’ve got going:

These were my original food storage containers; I think I got them mostly from Wal-Mart. While the specific names and designs are often changed, you can normally find them under the Sterilite brand, sometimes called ‘Ultra-Seal’ or ‘Ultra-Latch.’ They come in a variety of sizes, and all feature a sealing gasket and four latches on the lid to make sure it’s secure. The lids themselves are color-coded; no matter what size the actual container, if the lid color matches the colored rim, it will fit. For example, all three of the red-bordered containers have the same size lid:

What originally drew me to these containers was the helpful information on the label. As I’ve mentioned before, choosing the correct size for food storage containers can be problematic. For instance, I know that a regular bag of flour weighs five pounds, because that’s how it’s sold. But what volume is that? For the eyeballing-impaired (me), it is bewildering to stand before an aisle of containers with no idea if the cool-looking container is going to prove (barely) too small for what you need. Sterilite solved that problem for me! In the top photo, the large red container has a capacity of 16 cups, and the label reads ‘Holds one bag of flour.’ Genius! The small blue one reads, ‘Holds one box of baking soda.’ (That one actually held considerably more than that, but it’s the thought that counts, right? At least it wasn’t too small.)

Before I upgraded to glass, I had almost everything in these containers: flour, sugar, brown sugar, baking soda, powdered sugar, corn meal, etc. Now, I’m using them for 1) lesser-used items, or 2) refrigerated items.

#1 When I upgraded to Libbey glass jars on the counter for my most-used things (flour, sugar, oatmeal), I started putting the specialty stuff in the plastic bins in the cabinets: bread and cake flour, and whole-grain flours in the fridge (whole grains go bad faster at room temperature). I guess I don’t mind the using the ugly containers as long as I can’t see them.

#2 I’m not sure why I feel it’s important to keep refrigerated stuff in plastic. Maybe my aesthetic expectations are lower for stuff that’s in the fridge? And it’s probably better to use plastic for stuff that’s going to have condensation on it, so if it slips out of your hand it’ll just bounce.

Speaking of refrigerating flour, I recently bit the bullet and bought several bags of specialty flours from Bob’s Red Mill. They offer a great selection of unusual flours, and they sell small bags so you’re not committed to using up a whole bag of semolina flour, for example. Each bag holds between four and five cups, and the small red Sterilite container was perfect at 5.3 cups. Plus, they stack perfectly and are short enough to easily fit on the shelves of my small fridge. I’ve got a large red (16-cup) container of whole wheat flour in my fridge, too.

In the cabinet (room temperature), I have bread flour and cake flour in a large red (16-cup) and medium red (12.5-cup) containers. The green square is nearly identical to the red medium at 12.6 cups, and the small blue holds 2.5 cups.

Now that I’ve established how much I don’t like plastic bins out in plain view, allow me to completely contradict myself:

Since I’ve been doing a lot more baking, I’ve found that a 5-pound bag of flour just doesn’t last me long enough, so I’ve started buying 10-pound bags. The volume of that is over 30 cups, and if it was tricky to find a container for 5 pounds of flour, then it’s even worse for a 10-pound bag. Flour containers seem to come in 5-pound capacity or extra-huge-ginormous-professional-bakery-holds-50-pounds-of-flour-and-is-super-expensive capacity (this is cool, but out of my league). I considered a nice, special flour container like this one, but wondered if I could find something a little cheaper.

All it took was a little thinking outside the box: what you see in the picture is actually a pet food container, sold at Wal-Mart or Target for between $10 and $15. I already had one for the dry cat food (that stuff REEKS), and it really works great. The lid is hinged, so you can just toss it back, and it has a gasket and a sturdy latch. They stack pretty well (I’ve got one for all-purpose flour and one for bread flour), and the plastic is even tinted a little, so some of the light it kept out. There’s room for 10 pounds of flour and then some, so scooping will be easy. They’re light and tough, so leaving them out around a toddler and a cat shouldn’t be a problem.

The pet food container people have the labels figured out, too: instead of volume, they list capacity as ’4-pound bag of food,’ ’10-pound,’ ’25-pound,’ etc. This is the 10-pound bag capacity (coincidentally).

They also work great for dry pet food.

Sticky Pecan Caramel Rolls (and the rolling pin)

These are the Sticky Pecan Caramel Rolls (page 187) from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. I mixed up a batch of the Brioche dough (page 189) last week, then pulled some out of the fridge, rolled it out, and threw in the topping and filling today. It was so fast and easy! The caramel doesn’t even need to be cooked; you just cream together the butter and sugar and seasonings. Once you assemble them, they just rise for an hour, then bake for about 40 minutes.

As you can see, I bungled the assembly somewhat, but these still turned out delicious!  You don’t even have to use the dessert dough; you can substitute the basic white if that’s all you have. This cookbook never ceases to amaze me.

This was also my first time using my new rolling pin. For the most part, I loved my old pin; it’s a super-long wooden French-style from Bed, Bath & Beyond. I got used to using a pin without handles, and I love the control and feel you get with that style. I also love that there aren’t any crevices that have to be cleaned out! You can just use a dish scraper and scrape everything off, then wipe it clean with a wet rag.

The only potential drawback was its tapered design, which never really gave me any problems until I started making tortillas. Other doughs were thick enough that I could just tilt the pin to get the whole thing flat, but I was getting very uneven results with the tortilla dough. Plus, my old pin was getting marked up badly from using my pierogi press (which is AMAZING; I’ll have to do a post about it!); the blades were putting dents in it.

So I ordered the Ateco 19-Inch Maple Rolling Pin from Amazon. It came highly recommended, and so far I really like it. It’s not too expensive, and it has most of what I like in a rolling pin. It’s not tapered, so it rolls evenly, and it’s almost as long as my old one (once you get used to a long rolling pin, you just can’t go back). It’s maple like the old one, so (aside from doing things like rolling it over metal blades) it’s pretty sturdy. It’s not very heavy, and it even comes in a resealable plastic bag for storage if you want.

They make rolling pins that come with spacers so that you can roll dough to precise thicknesses, but the ones I found either 1) were WAY too short (like 13 inches), or 2) didn’t come with the most commonly required dough thickness (1/8″). I’d love to have spacers like that, but for now I’ll keep eyeballing!

I’ll still be keeping my old pin; it’ll be relegated to pierogi duty, and eventually when my daughter is older we can have two people rolling at the same time! But if I could only have one rolling pin, I’d have to go with the straight version.

Recipe: Caramel Apple Pizza

My lastest obsession is the food community website Serious Eats. I like Serious Eats because it’s accessible for everyone from beginning cooks to advanced foodies, and it’s not as snobby as some foodie websites. They recognize that things like fast and frozen foods have their places in the lexicon, (sometimes) even if just for the sake of fond memories. You can get great recipes for vegan Vietnamese cuisine right next to reviews for the latest fast food burger. There are restaurant reviews, product reviews, recipes for everything under the sun, great equipment recommendations and cooking techniques.

So far, one of the best recipes I’ve gotten from Serious Eats is Kenji Alt’s Foolproof Pan Pizza. It’s just about the best pan pizza I’ve ever had, although the recipe makes two 10″ pizzas, and my family only needs one for dinner. So I figured out a way to make a dessert pizza with the extra dough.

 

What you need:

1/2 recipe Foolproof Pan Pizza dough (Either halve the recipe, or make the whole thing and use half. Unused dough can be refrigerated for about 3 days.)

***Note about the dough: I know it says you can let it rise for up to 24 hours, but every time I’ve gone over 8 hours the dough has gone bad and I’ve had to throw it out. So I recommend either using it or chilling it IMMEDIATELY at the 8 hour point.***

unsalted butter (about 6 tablespoons, divided into 3 sets of 2 tablespoons each)

apples, peeled, cored and sliced or chopped (I think I used about 2 or 3 apples; depends on how many you want, really. Bear in mind they’ll shrink when they’re cooked.)

spices (cinnamon, sugar, whatever you like on apples)

1 recipe No-Cream Caramel Sauce (recipe below)

What you do:

1) Prepare the dough up through step 4. For your dessert pizza, use about 2 tablespoons of melted butter in the pan instead of olive oil.

2) While the dough is rising in the pan, sauté the apples in a skillet with a couple tablespoons of butter. Keep the heat fairly low; you want them to cook down slowly until they’re soft. If you prefer them crisper, don’t cook them very long; if you want them practically applesauce, then cook them longer. Bear in mind they’re going to spend a few minutes in the oven on the pizza.

3) Once the dough has risen (allow about 2 hours if it’s fresh, and at least 3 if it was previously refrigerated), follow step 5 and pat it out, releasing any air bubbles.

4) Spread your apples across the dough, then sprinkle with spices and another couple tablespoons of melted butter.

5) Bake for 12-15 minutes.

6) While pizza is baking, make the caramel sauce:

No-Cream Caramel Sauce

What you need:

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup milk

1 tablespoon flour

1 teaspoon vanilla

What you do:

The recipe I got literally said, ‘Bring to a boil. Cook for 3 minutes,’ so I’ll just tell you how I did it. I suspect that this is close to candy-making, which I have never done, so there may be a better way to do it than this; feel free to change it if you know what you’re doing.

1. Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium-to-medium-low heat.

2. Stir in the sugar and cook until dissolved.

3. Add the milk and stir until thoroughly combined.

4. Sprinkle in the flour, then raise heat to medium or medium-high and stir constantly until mixture reaches a good boil. Keep stirring while it boils for 3 minutes.

5. Reduce heat, add vanilla, and continue stirring until caramel thickens and darkens to your preference.

7) When your pizza is done, use a thin spatula to lift it from the pan and place it on a cutting board or other platter. Pour the caramel sauce over it, using as much or as little as you like. If you want the pizza to float, raft-like, in an ocean of caramel, make more caramel and put it all in a giant bowl. Cutting it might be hard if you do that.

8) Let it cool a little (the apples and caramel are going to stay hot for a while), then slice it up and serve. Ice cream or whipped cream would be great on this, or maybe that white sweet icing, if that’s your thing (it’s not mine).

Easiest homemade bread EVER!

As I have mentioned several times, I love the book Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day. It has transformed me from someone who was too scared to try homemade bread (despite the fact that I LOVE bread) into someone who thinks nothing of whipping up a few loaves to snack on. The one thing I’ve wanted to do is share the recipe so everyone else can know how great it is, but posting someone else’s intellectual property is a sketchy situation, ethically.

Until now! I just found the complete recipe and instructions, with pictures, posted for free on the Artisan Bread in Five website. This is the basic, fundamental recipe, the one that I use the most by far. It’s the perfect gateway for beginners, since it doesn’t require any special flours or anything.

Once you’ve tried it, you’ll definitely want to get the book and try the other versions!

On Crock-Pots….

Apparently Crock-Pots (all right, the non-brand name is ‘slow cooker,’ but who REALLY says ‘hook-and-pile’ instead of ‘Velcro’? No one, that’s who) are a regional thing. I grew up with one, but some people are as-yet uninitiated into the brilliant fellowship of Crock-Pots owners.

My Crock-Pot was on my mind today because I had to order a replacement stoneware crock (the inside part) for mine. Lesson 1: Don’t lend appliances to large groups of people you don’t know.

A while ago, my husband had a work thing that meant everyone had to stay there for a week. No going home, no leaving the area, etc. (It’s a military thing. Don’t ask.) While they were generously provided with MREs, several of the guys got together and thought, ‘Hey, we’ll make our own food that isn’t awful!’ (That was the other guys. My husband likes MREs, but would rather save his for a REAL emergency, like earthquakes or tsunamis or the collapse of civilization.) Anyway, my Crock-Pot, as well as other cooking utensils, was requisitioned to provide hot meals for the week. In addition to several things never coming back at all, the Crock-Pot came home with what appeared to be a long scratch on the inside of the crock. ‘Bummer,’ I thought. The inside is a kinda non-stick type of surface, so it sucked that it was scratched, but I figured it was still good, right?

Several months later, I noticed that the ‘scratch’ had a corresponding mark on the OUTSIDE of the crock. It didn’t line up perfectly, but was definitely enough for me to conclude that the problem was not as confined to the surface as I had previously believed. So I Googled ‘crock pot is cracked,’ and this blog post came up. ***WARNING: THIS STORY IS NOT FOR THE SQUEAMISH.***

Stoneware is a very nice material; is holds heat well for cooking and is generally pretty tough. But the same attributes that make it strong mean that when it DOES crack, those pieces are VERY sharp. Long story short, broken Crock-Pots can lead to hospitals, surgery and physical therapy. Lesson 2: Don’t use cracked stoneware.

Since I always strive to avoid those three things, I immediately ceased using my Crock-Pot. Fortunately, on the same post, there were links for replacing pretty much any part of any Crock-Pot that has broken or been lost. (For the curious and/or Google-illiterate, the link for Crock-Pot parts and support is here.)

It was a matter of minutes and about $25 (including shipping and taxes) to have a replacement crock shipped to my door. I had no problem paying for it, since I assume that the item in question was abused in a manner it was not built to withstand, and I take responsibility for that. Lesson 3: Crock-Pot has good customer service and it’s fairly simple to replace any parts as required.

The hardest part of the whole thing was deciding whether to replace the part or just replace the entire appliance. Since we got ours at Wal-Mart, there was only about a $5 difference between replacement of the crock and replacement of the whole thing. This was my first Crock-Pot as an adult, though, and my husband got it for me for Christmas, so I decided to stick with the known-to-be-reliable device and just replace the crock.

This whole things got me thinking: why is the Crock-Pot so important? What makes this cooking appliance so popular even after so many years? (In some cases, ‘so many years’ is literal: certain ones have been known to last for decades.) So I decided to list some of the reasons that I personally love my Crock-Pot.

1) In the summer, it heats up your kitchen much less than the oven. Where I live, we didn’t even turn on our heat this year, and it’ll only get warmer. In a few weeks, the last thing I’m going to want to do is heat up my entire house making roasts. Bleh. Crock-Pot keeps the heat contained in one little space. And if your oven’s not on, your a/c doesn’t have to work so hard, so you can save some on your power bill.

2) Unlike ovens and stovetops, Crock-Pot is safe to use unattended. When I was young, I remember my mom throwing dinner into the Crock-Pot first thing in the morning, then being free to run errands all day if necessary. When we got home, the smell of beef and potatoes would have permeated the entire house, without the risk of burning it down.

3) It is remarkably versatile. I usually use my Crock-Pot for the standard meat-and-veg, but there are TONS of recipes designed to be made in slow cookers, even some you’d never guess, like breads and desserts. My favorite Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day even has slow cooker variations! I used to know someone who made a hamburger soup (with evaporated milk, frozen French fries, cheese dip, sour cream…) in a slow cooker. *drool*

4) It’s easy. (Yay!) I love the days when I Crock-Pot (it’s a verb now. : ) ) Get up. Put meat in Crock-Pot. Turn on. Several hours later, put in a chopped potato, carrot and onion. Couple hours later, eat. It’s great. And virtually impossible to burn or even boil dry, since the design of the lid keeps all the liquid dripping back in. Depending on which one you get, it’ll even automatically switch to ‘warm’ once it’s done cooking, so if you’re running late it doesn’t overcook it.

5) They’re cheap! There are good-sized Crock-Pots to be had for around $25. Even the fanciest ones don’t break $100, which is unusual for a kitchen appliance. You can go as simple or as complicated as you want, from the basic high/low switch to touchscreen. There are tons of patterns and colors, including a line of NFL teams, and you can even get one personalized.

This turned out to the a really long post, so I’ll wait for another time to share some of the other cool things you can do with Crock-Pots.

My favorite spoon

How much would you be willing to pay for a great spoon? Ten dollars? Twenty? How about 22¢? Okay, I exaggerate: you actually have to pay 88¢.

My favorite spoon is a flat, straight-edged wooden one from Wal-Mart that comes in a pack of 4 wooden spoons for $0.88. Here’s my old one next to a new one I just picked up:

Why I love it:

1) The material: Wood is sturdy, so it doesn’t bend while mixing heavy dough. I make cookies and bread a lot, and plastic spoons just don’t have the strength to mix well. It’s also perfect for the surfaces of your pots and pans; it doesn’t scratch non-stick or enamel. Wood does have a tendency to stain, but that’s not really a con for me. It kinda becomes seasoned: with every use and wash, it gains color and the wood seems to get harder and tougher. At the same time, the material will wear itself into the shape of whatever you use it for most:

The older spoon has rounded edges, and the rough, splintery exterior has smoothed down so it’s comfortable to handle.

2) The shape: For a mixing spoon, you really, really want a round handle. I have some wooden utensils with handles similar to this one, but those can be extremely uncomfortable to hold, especially while mixing heavy dough.

I LOVE the straight edge to this spoon. Whether you’re getting the last of the shortening out of the bottom of a measuring cup, scraping the bottom of a sauce pot, or chopping up meat or vegetables in a saute pan, this spoon is perfect. There are other wooden utentils with larger straight edges (kinda like this) which I love for just scraping (e.g. browning ground meat, which requires scraping but not so much stirring), but for mixing and stirring, the smaller head is the best.

I have many wooden spoons, but this is the one that I always grab, whether cooking or baking. I now have doubles of the other, round-edged spoons that came with it, but I only go to those when all of the straight ones are dirty!

I have only two cons to this spoon: It has absolutely no bowl, so it’s impossible to scoop up anything to taste or transfer; both sides are perfectly flat. The other is that it only comes in the one length (12″). The spoons it comes with are 10″, 12″ and 14″; I wish that this one came in assorted lengths! I would use them all.

Oh, and I guess the last con would be that I can’t just buy bunches of these by themselves; I have to get the whole set. But for 88¢, it’s still a great deal. And if anyone is interested in some never-used extra spoons, just let me know.

(P.S. I forgot to mention: never wash wooden spoons in the dish washer. They will crack, and your beloved spoon of many years will be worthless. )

The butter crock, at long last

Everyone has had the experience: you have a pile of delicious pancakes steaming in front of you. You insert your knife into the butter and attempt to spread it evenly over the surface of said pancakes. Pancakes proceed to tear wide open as your knife drags the lump of rock-hard butter right through your breakfast.

What to do? Switch back to Country Crock? Microwave (and re-chill) your butter every time you want to use it? Leave it sitting out on the counter all the time, maintaining spreadable consistency but risking the stench of rancid dairy in your butter dish?

Ah, but there is an alternative option!

I have finally gotten my hands on a butter crock, specifically the Le Creuset Butter Crock in Caribbean. (I wanted Marseille, but that’s a new color and hasn’t made it to the outlet store yet. )

It’s hard to describe in words how this thing works, so I’ll put up the pictures and then have a go.

The thing that looks like the lid is actually the cup that holds the butter itself.

You soften your butter, then pack it into the cup. You don’t want it liquid, because then it will slide out when you invert it. It needs to be just soft enough to pack firmly.

This is the inside of the base. You pour cold water into the bottom up to the fill line, then pop the bell inside. The bottom of the bell is beneath the water, which keeps the butter airtight. You keep the butter crock at room temperature on your counter, replacing the water every couple of days, and the butter stays fresh, yet spreadable.

Depending on who you ask, you can keep the butter in there with fresh water for anywhere from 5 to 30 days. Truthfully, I think a lot of it will depend on your weather: how hot and humid it gets in your kitchen. This is not an item to store a product that you rarely use; this assumes that you’re going through butter fairly quickly, but not quickly enough to just let the sticks sit out by themselves.

Important tips for choosing a butter crock:

• Butter crocks are also called butter bells or French butter dishes.
• You want a crock that holds at least a stick of butter.
• Porous materials are not your friend. A marble version exists, but prolonged use has been known to leave mold. Stick with ceramic.
• Make sure you find one with a flat lid, or a flat knob on the lid. The bell is meant to be a serving dish, so it needs to be able to stand up on its own.

Important tips for using a butter crock:

• Make sure the inside of the bell is thoroughly dry before trying to pack the butter in. A wet surface prevents the butter from sticking, and increases the chances that the butter will fall out.
• Change the water religiously, especially if it gets dirty. (Crumbs in the butter will fall into the water.)
• Be aware of the climate in your kitchen. Hot and humid air will not only shorten the usable life of your butter, but can melt it and cause it to fall out. Don’t keep it next to the stove!

So far, I LOVE LOVE LOVE this thing. It’s Le Creuset, so of course it’s beautiful – like artwork on my counter. I’m so bad about remembering to thaw butter before serving pancakes or muffins or ANYTHING that requires spreadable butter; this has made my life so much easier. And it solves my problem of finding a butter dish to fit my stupid West Coast size butter sticks. Take THAT, California!

Here are some options for finding your very own butter crock:

Le Creuset: If you don’t like these colors, look around at different retailers; the company makes different colors for different stores. (If you live near a Le Creuset outlet, even better. There were at least five colors on the shelves at mine, and I got it at a much more reasonable price.)

The Original Butter Bell Crock: They have a large selection; you should be able to find one to match any style of decor. And they’re a little cheaper than Le Creuset. Some even come with a little spreader!

French-style (no lid knob): These are nice, with a little more vintage look.

The budget model: This is about the cheapest one you’re going to find, but be aware of a commensurate lack of quality. Some people use these and have no trouble, but like any inexpensive stoneware, the risks of cracking and crazing are higher. If you’re not sure you love this enough to pay out for an expensive one, this can be your trial run.

Make your own: vanilla extract

Vanilla extract is one thing that I keep running across in ‘things you shouldn’t buy’ lists. Reason number 1: it’s super easy to make at home. Reason number 2: It’s SO EXPENSIVE. It may not seem like much, but if you look at how tiny that bottle actually is, you’re paying quite a bit per fluid ounce. Even though I paid through the nose for an expensive bottle of single-barrel bourbon, the extract I’m making at home is running me about $2.00 per ounce, compared to over $3.00 per ounce at my Wal-Mart SuperCenter. And imagine if you bought the good stuff! This stuff is supposed to be good, but good grief!

What you need:

whole vanilla beans (This is the cheapest place to find good-quality beans.)

alcohol (Preferably good quality. Vodka is recommended because it has a neutral taste, but I used bourbon for its caramel and vanilla notes.)

bottles or jars, cleaned or sterilized (Half-pint canning jars are pretty cheap, although the large mouth is a little weird. You could always steep them in these, then transfer the extract to a prettier jar, especially if it’s a gift.)

time (I’ve read anywhere from 1 week to 6 months. I’m letting mine go long; figure it can’t hurt.)

What you do:

1. With a sharp knife, carefully slit each vanilla bean lengthwise, being careful not to cut the beans in half. Inside, you will find a paste of plant ooze and tiny black seeds; these are the ‘vanilla bean’ specks that you see in vanilla bean ice cream and things like that. If necessary, chop the beans into pieces so that it will fit into your jar.

2. Place the beans (or bean pieces) into the jar. You will need between three and four beans per 4-ounce jar.

3. Pour alcohol over the beans to cover. My 4-ounce jars took closer to 5-ounces of liquid to cover the beans. This is important because the alcohol preserves the beans; if they are exposed to air they can mold.

4. Cover each jar tightly and give it a good shake. You want the interior seeds to get washed out and float around in the liquid.

5. Store the jars in a cool, dark place. For the first week, shake each jar once a day; from then on, shake once a week.

I found that four half-pint canning jars fit perfectly into a large oatmeal container, so I just stacked them in there and put them in a (relatively) cool spot in my kitchen. That way they’re convenient when I need to shake them. I still have lots of beans left over, and a little bit of bourbon, and I don’t know how long it’s going to take me to use all of this up! That’s why they’d be great gifts…

I cobbled this together from recipes I found here and here. The second link also has directions for making vanilla paste, vanilla sugar, vanilla powder, vanilla salt… Fortunately, the package comes with a lot of extra beans.