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For My Chemist Friends: Beakers as Decorations
I'm in love with "The Urban Etiquette Handbook", this week's cover story in New York magazine. My favorite rules include "Pedestrians can die of secondhand smoke, too" and "Who pays the bill on a date? The asker pays, unless the woman does the asking - then the man should pay."
I've been asked a few etiquette questions recently; the other day our friend Andy was out at dinner with The Guy and me and asked, "When you're the third wheel, who are you supposed to sit across from?" First of all, Andy, when you're out with the two of us, you're not the third wheel, you are the guest of honor; we are both there to see you. Second, I looked it up in Emily Post's Etiquette, 16th Ed. (Yes, everyone, I'm a big dork - I do own this book, and what's even worse, I bought it for myself. I pretended it was for research for writing projects, but we all know that was just an excuse.) Emily Post, unfortunately, does not talk about dinner parties of three. She does, however, provide some hints: when seating people, alternate the women and the men. I think this could be safely extrapolated to indicate that a male guest should sit across from the woman when eating with a couple. I think, however, that a female guest should probably also sit across from the woman of the couple; for one thing, girls like to catch up, and for another, as New York magazine reminded us, women get special treatment when out to dinner.
PS - for those ladies who were at Roz's pre-wedding lunch a while back, Marianne was right, the person being toasted does not raise her glass or drink.
Posted by georgia at 06:06 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Once again, I'm going to try to keep track of my life with an appointment book. I've never been particularly good at this because I don't like to transfer information back and forth between books and computers and other books (and the calendar on my computer gives me lovely reminders whenever I have something scheduled, which a book can't do). But I've been getting tired of all the little pieces of paper crammed into pockets and purses with addresses, directions and phone numbers on them, so I went out to look for a good appointment book. Totally unsatisfied with the dinky little books available in the bookstore (and totally put off by their too bulky counterparts), I decided to make my own out of this cute, green, cloth-covered notebook. The fact that it cost half of what the dinkiest of those other things cost didn't hurt.
Since I've always been frustrated by the lines in appointment books (some days are very busy while others aren't, and it's a poor use of space) I left the pages open, with just the names of the months. This way I can use one set of pages for each week, but each day can take up as much (or as little) space as I need.
The only part of traditional appointment books that I thought I'd miss was the places to keep cards (with all the library cards, insurance cards, blood donor cards, and frequent coffee-buyer cards, my wallet would explode if I didn't have these pockets). Fortunately I had a box of photo corners, which work perfectly. Maybe they'll come off eventually, but who cares? I have more.
So now I have a cute little appointment book with everything I need (and only the things I need) in it, and it cost so much less than all those other books that I didn't like.
Posted by georgia at 10:07 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
I was flipping through Domino at the bookstore today (I know, I know, I should get a subscription) when I found an idea that made me want to jump up and down with excitement: one of their brilliant editors suggests using beakers, the kind you find in chemist's labs, as vases. I have a few very good friends who are chemists and biologists (or, more to the point, chemistry, biology, and bio-chem PhD candidates) and the majority are men. These men are not the kind who have stylish, minimalist vases from downtown galleries or the MoMA design store, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't have something to put flowers in when someone comes over for dinner, and beakers would be perfect (and, for them, very cheap). They would also make fantastic jars to keep pencils or kitchen utensils in, or you could even fill a few with pebbles, leaves, sea glass, or sand and line them up on a mantle.
Posted by georgia at 09:58 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
So I go to use my handy-dandy Swiffer duster thingy to tackle my bookshelf and, low and behold, the handle is missing. Again. I don't know how I do it, but every time I buy a new box of those things I use it once and it goes missing. However, determined not to let the dust bunnies living behind my picture frames win, I scanned the room for a solution. There it was, next to the empty Thai food container - my extra chopsticks. They fit perfect and, although they might not work quite as well, they did the trick: the dust is gone.
Posted by georgia at 11:08 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
The egg board likes to say that eggs are the perfect food, but I think quiche has them beat. Filled with protein, vegetables, and a few carbs, it's everything you need all wrapped up in an impressive package. So why don't we make them more often? Probably the crust. No one wants to spend the time making a crust from scratch, and store-bought crusts are not known for their taste and texture. So what's a rushed cook to do? Boil a potato, of course.
A few slices of boiled potato make a wonderful, fast crust that makes quiche-making a breeze. Just cut a soft potato in thin rounds, lie them in the bottom of a pan, smush them a little with a spoon to fill in the gaps, and pour the filling on top. What could be better than that? Well, maybe the fact that it allows you to make a kosher for Passover quiche.
We made a leek and brie quiche this weekend, with a very simple spur-of-the-moment recipe:
Leek and Brie Quiche with Potato Crust
3-4 potatoes
3 leeks (white and light-green parts only) rinsed, halved lengthwise and cut in 1/2 to 3/4 inch slices
Most of a wedge of brie, cut in small pieces (about 5/6th)
6 eggs
1 tablespoon butter
1. Clean potatoes and boil until fork goes all the way through.
2. Sautée leeks until whites turn translucent, about 6 minutes.
3. Slice potatoes (about 1/2 inch) and line bottom of 8"x8" baking pan with them. Smush potatoes with spoon to even out and fill in gaps.
4. Beat eggs in medium bowl and mix in brie and leeks.
5. Pour filling into pan and bake at 350 degrees until center is cooked 30-40 minutes (the center will rise slightly when done).
6. Serve with salad of mesclun and red wine vinaigrette.
Posted by georgia at 10:20 PM | Comments (4) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Spring is springing everywhere. The bright faces of daffodils are turning parks yellow, and the trees are dropping little white petals on the sidewalk. To take the beauty home with you, stop by a florist and grab an armful of bright blossoms, which will brighten your room for a couple days, or stop by the Farmer's Market for a pot of blossoms that will brighten your room for up to a couple weeks (and cost a lot less). Sure, those bouquets are gorgeous and romantic, and if The Guy were buying me flowers I'd hope he'd splurge, but when I'm buying for myself, I want the most bang for the buck. And a pot of tulips just starting to emerge is even more Spring-like than a vase of cut flowers, because you get to watch it come to life day after day.
Hint: for extra bang for your buck, look for the rare bulbs that mutate and produce two blooms.
Posted by georgia at 10:32 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
I was on the receiving end of some good tips from Tod Coleman, the new Food Editor at Saveur, formerly of Everyday Food, and I thought I'd pass them along:
I did not know this before, but apparently when your favorite Italian restaurant makes lasagna, they do not cook the noodles; they just put them in with the sauce and filling and stick the whole thing in the fridge, and by the time they're ready to cook it at night the noodles are soft. While I'm not usually in the habit of making dinner in the morning, I'll definitely keep this in mind for the next time I have a potluck to go to or a weekend party to cook for.
Tod, however, suggested another, faster way of cutting down on the hassle of making lasagna: while they were preparing for last month's issue of Everyday Food, he tried to take this principle and apply it in a smaller time frame. What they found (and included in the issue) was that if you just lay the noodles in very hot tap water while you prepare the rest of the filling, you can avoid the process of boiling water and having noodles stick to each other. I didn't try the lasagna in that issue, but I'll definitely try this technique.
Thanks, Tod.
Posted by georgia at 09:09 AM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Oooooooo... Check out this post from 101 Cookbooks today on Justin Spring's The Itty Bitty Kitchen Handbook. I cannot wait to get my hands on a copy. Until then I'll have to make do with the website, which offers tantalizing pictures and tips, and 101 Cookbook's review, which has nice long quotations from the book.
Posted by georgia at 06:40 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Those of us in crowded cities drool over apartments with giant windows. But big windows raise an apartment's price exponentially, and for good reason: a view of the outdoors provides all sorts of quality of life and health benefits. So what can you do if your apartment doesn't have them? Take a page out of Thomas Struth's book. In the early 90s Struth created a number of large photographs like the one above for a hospital in Switzerland, depicting the nearby countryside. This gave small hospital rooms the illusion of large windows and brought the outdoors in to lift patients' spirits and help them recover.
The same approach can do wonders for an apartment's windowless rooms and long dark hallways. You can follow Struth's example and mount a poster-sized print alone or go a more artsy direction and group a number of photos in varying sizes on the same wall. To achieve the soothing effects of real windows, keep your photos to a single topic (like snowy hills or the beach) and make sure all your scenes have lots of sunlight in them.
Posted by georgia at 10:43 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Last week I received this email from Jenny A: "I love to make Potato/cheese/broccoli/ham soup, but when I make it I make a ton! What is the safest way to can it, so I can have it when I want it?"
Though I'm not exactly a canning expert, I'm really interested in this question because it touches on the storage issues mentioned here a couple weeks ago, and on the themes in the NY Times article this week about the health department cracking down on sous vide cooking (not that we're trying anything that complicated in any of our kitchens). So, Jenny, to answer your question:
Canning requires a balance of acid and/or sugars that home cooks can easily achieve with jams or pickles. The sugars in pomagranate jelly and the vinegar in pickled green tomatoes keep the foods from going bad for a few months because they create extreme environments that are inhospitable to bacteria. Soups, on the other hand, and most of the foods we make at home, are going to be full of bacteria, and much more difficult to store and much less stable. This is why all the soups you find on market shelves have preservatives. There are some sites that give advice on canning soup, like this one, but they require a pressure cooker, and I can imagine that not all your results will be spectacular. The recipes also seem to require a certain balance of solids to liquids, so you'd have to modify your recipe.
The best way that I can think of to store soup, and the one recommended by almost all the websites I've read, is to do it the old-fashioned way and freeze it. I would recommend freezing it in single serving containers so that you can thaw only the amount you want to eat (it's not safe to reheat and freeze food a second time) and keeping it in small batches also helps it cook faster, which better prevents bacteria growth (the health department requires restaurants to store things in small batches for this reason). If you're worried about freezer burn, smooth some plastic wrap over the top of the soup, and don't forget, liquid expands when you freeze it, so don't fill your containers all the way or freeze soups in glass containers.
Posted by georgia at 11:34 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
I wasn't surprised when, a few months ago, the papers told us that wine had passed beer as the US's most popular alcoholic beverage. Wine has numerous applications in cooking and many health benefits, so it's not wonder people are buying more of it. The only problem is that because it's often much more expensive and complicated than beer, and because there are millions of variations out there, it's easy to get a not-so-great bottle - especially when you're on a budget like mine.
The solution? Buy your wine from someone you trust who knows more than you do. There's a bit of trial and error to finding the right wine store, but when you find a store with a buyer who shares your tastes you can stop spending extra to ensure you get a drinkable bottle of wine. My favorite place to buy wine? Slope Cellars; try their "cheap but tasty" boxes at $8.99 - $12.99.
Posted by georgia at 01:36 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
What's spoom? acerola? macédoine? And why are they on your menu? Enter The Food Lover's Companion, the little bible for foodies everywhere. With just a flick of the wrist (and a page), all your food questions can be answered. Of course, let's be realistic; how many times a year do you actually go to restaurants with ingredients you can't identify? Once? Less? And when you do, do you really want to be pulling out a book of definitions? Most of us won't even commit this faux pas in foreign countries where we don't speak the language. Well don't worry, you don't have to buy the book and schlep it around to get this fantastic resource; Epicurious.com has it online! So now when faced with the prospect of a challenging menu, you can just look it up ahead of time and query the words that give you a hard time. Or you can just order the thing that looks best, eat the food on your plate like a good foodie, and look up anything you really liked and want to know about when you get home.
Posted by georgia at 11:32 PM | Comments (2) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
You don't own a tablecloth, your plates are hand-me-downs, and your house napkins are a beautiful shade of white...paper. But if you add a pair of beautiful champagne flutes or wine glasses to the mix, everything will look fabulous. Because that is the amazing power of stemware. Quality stemware can make a table setting. The glitter of delicate glass floating high above the table catches the eye and gives the impression of elegance. So if you're setting your table on a budget, stop worrying about your mismatched plates and flatware, and save your money to splurge on stemware. It will make all the difference.
Posted by georgia at 10:07 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
What does it say about me that I love owning this book? I like to think it says that I'm starting figuring out how to have and run my own home. I know that it says that I don't want to have all my stained clothes dry-cleaned or buy new clothes when I ruin what I have. To many people (my siblings included) it probably says that I'm (still) a big dork.
The book itself is incredibly useful - how to get deodorant or pen out of a shirt can save your whole wardrobe - but the way it's put together baffles me. Each kind of stain has its own little page or two with descriptions of the stain and ways of getting rid of them, but these pages also have odd little sections about where the stain is most likely to occur (sleeve, pant leg, etc.), what time or year it is most likely to occur, and what time of day it is most likely to occur. Why on earth do we need this? Do we not know that tomato sauce can stain your sleeve while you cook or your lap if you drop your pasta? Do we not know that you can get these stains all year round or that you have to be most careful of them in the evening when most pasta-eating occurs? I doubt anyone who has ever eaten pasta doesn't know these things. And as if the existence of these sections was not confusing enough, some stains don't have them. Why is this? Why does salsa have a "Time of Occurrence" section while mustard doesn't? It's really feels like the people writing the book were stretching for content and just threw in the most obvious facts they could possibly find in lieu of coming up with something better. The other section I can't understand is the little section in the middle with pictures of different kinds of stains. Do people really not know what a ketchup stain looks like? And some of the pictures are in really poor taste - do I really need to see pictures of semen and vomit stains? (Of course, it could just mean that someone over at Quirk publishing has a great sense of humor.)
Despite the odd way this book is put together, I'm still going to enjoy owning it, and it's still going to get a lot of use. After all, it's a book that tells me how to get my clothes clean - and it's cute too.
It should probably noted (to save my reputation as a 20-something as well as to give credit where credit is due) that I did not purchase this book myself; it was a wonderful, thoughtful gift from my mother, who held off getting me these kinds of helpful books until I actually wanted and appreciated them. Thanks, Mom.
Posted by georgia at 11:58 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Valentine's Day demands tradition. Even if you give your Valentine a very individualized gift that you know she will love, you still want to add a small box of good chocolates or a bouquet of red and pink flowers to the mix so that you can benefit from the inherent romance that these symbols bring. Of course, these gifts come with a built-in pitfall: if you do them wrong, it will look like you didn't put any effort into buying the gift. To avoid this problem, make sure that everything you get is really high quality and individualized. If you're buying chocolates, make sure they're really good quality (Godiva and Scharffen Berger are both good, but something from a local chocolate store like The Chocolate Room in Brooklyn is even better), and make sure you get the kind of chocolate that your honey likes. And if you're giving flowers, avoid picking up a bunch of red roses at the market, since that obviously doesn't take much time or thought. Instead, mix the roses with other pink and red flowers like tulips, anemones, and peonies, or go to a good florist and splurge on one of the beautiful arrangements that they've already put together (like the one picture above, from everyone's favorite domestic diva). That way you'll get credit for giving a perfectly romantic Valentine's Day gift and for putting a lot of thought and caring into it as well.
Posted by georgia at 07:49 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Your chicken recipe calls for a tablespoon of fresh rosemary, your roasted tomatoes require a teaspoon of thyme, and you want to add chives to your mashed potatoes. By the end of the weekend, you have handfuls of fresh herbs sitting in a cup of water, and there isn't a recipe in the world that will use all of them up. Don't despair, there are lots of great things you can do with your leftover herbs. Use a small handful of sage to add flavor to a cup of green tea, blend some chives and thyme into butter or goat cheese with a Cuisinart and serve it with a baguette, leave sprigs of rosemary in a bottle of vodka for unusual martinis, or, if all that weekend cooking has worn you out, just drop a sachet of all your leftover aromatics into a bath.
Posted by georgia at 11:56 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
While making the Crumble Pomme Mangue from Chocolate & Zucchini, I remembered the wonderful trick a friends taught me in college for cutting and eating magoes. While she was studying in Taiwan she learned that instead of just peeling the skin off a mango and trying to eat keep your hands on a football of slimy sweetness, it's much easier to leave the skin on and use it to hold the flesh. Simply cut the sides off the mango as close to the pit as possible (this obviously works best if you cut the wider of the two sides, along the flat sides of the pit), then score the flesh into squares, being sure not to pierce the flesh (if you cut with a butter knife and keep your hand under the skin, this should be easy). Then simply turn the piece inside out to reveal a porcupine of fresh mango cubes, ready to be cut or bitten off the skin. The remaining thin pieces of mango still attached to the pit can be similarly dealt with (like the extra piece on top of the large piece in the photo).
The crumble itself was lovely and, best of all, so low on sugar that I didn't feel the least bit guilty polishing off the leftovers for breakfast the next day.
Posted by georgia at 11:55 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Now that the holidays are over, we look back at the time spent with our families and ask ourselves a traditional holiday question: how do we deal with our relatives? This is the question that has probably been asked since the beginning of human kind, or even before. And unfortunately this year I have the same answer to the question as I did last year: I don't know. Because let's face it, no matter how good we try to be, and no matter how good our relatives try to be, it's just a fact that the people we grew up with, the people we are tied to for the rest of our lives, will always seem just a little too strange, just a little too annoying, or just a little too, well, familiar to have a normal relationship with. We love them, we miss them, but in the end we're not all that sad that we don't live with them full time, because that would just be too much for us and, undoubtedly, for them.
There are, however, two things I took away from my wonderful time with my strange family this year:
1. Try to retain a feeling of understanding for your family, even when your brother is blessing the wine repeatedly and loudly in bad Hebrew and,
2. If they ask for something that they really want and it isn't too much trouble, just try to accommodate them, even if the request is as seemingly arbitrary as putting a picture of their cat and a pie on your blog.
So here it is, Maui and the apple pie under the Christmas tree -- and you're welcome Jennifer.
Posted by georgia at 11:35 PM | Comments (3) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Running out of wrapping paper and don't want to brave the throngs of shoppers downtown? Use up your last decorative bag at midnight and there's still a stack of presents waiting to be wrapped? Don't panic - the plain white paper sitting in your computer's printer will make a perfectly suitable wrapping paper at a moment's notice. Just take two pieces of paper and tape them together, overlapping them just 1/4 to 1/2 an inch, wrap the gift with the tape on the inside of the package, and align the ribbon so it camouflages the visible overlap. If you want to make the package a little more festive, just use a bit of whatever confetti or glitter you have sitting around, gluing them on the top of the package. Your gifts will be just as pretty as they would have with regular wrapping paper, and if anyone notices the difference, they'll probably just complement you on your ingenuity.
Posted by georgia at 11:31 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Festive centerpieces come in many forms: a vase of red roses, a bowl of globe Christmas ornaments, or a small pot of poinsettias, to name just a few. But for a very special Christmas centerpiece, there's almost nothing that can match the beauty and holiday spirit of sugarplums. These colorful, sparkling fruits evoke elegance and tradition, will definitely wow your guests, and, fortunately for all of us, are less expensive than roses and very easy to make. For an abundant centerpiece, buy an assortment of colorful fruits like tangerines, pears, small apples, cranberries, and grapes (especially useful as filling for the arrangement). Fill a small bowl with egg whites, whipped a little with a fork so they will break down and become more watery and a little bit frothy, and a large, shallow bowl with sugar (refined sugar, with its smaller pieces, works especially well). Cover each piece of fruit by brushing it with the egg whites or dipping it directly into the bowl, then drop it into the sugar and roll it until it's coated with sugar. Do each piece one at a time, setting them on parchment paper to dry, then arrange them in a pretty bowl or on a tiered candy stand, topping with a gold bow.
For a more minimalist centerpiece (and a shorter project), select just a few well-shaped pieces of fruit to display on a cake stand, as we have above.
Posted by georgia at 11:31 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Cooking in a small apartment kitchen presents many challenges - no counter space, overflowing cabinets, and the cheapest fridge and oven your landlord could find, to name just a few. Baking in a small kitchen presents even more problems. Rolling pins get lost in the depths of closets, extracts hide under bags of rice that are themselves hiding behind cans of tomatoes, bags of flour, and boxes of pasta, all of which are packed in so tightly that if you remove one item all the others come tumbling out of the cabinet as well. And worst of all, the whole tiny space gets so hot that dough turns to mush the second you try to roll it out.
Fortunately there are solutions to at least two of these problems. To give yourself the same advantage cooks with marble countertops have, just stick your cutting board into the freezer for the hour that you're chilling the dough and watch gleefully as your duckie-shaped cookies come off the counter without melting or loosing a foot. And to roll out dough without the aid of the long-lost rolling pin, use any smooth cylindrical item you have on hand; a clean glass works just fine, and a chilled bottle of Chardonnay is even better (like a nice heavy marble rolling pin).
If you run out of sugar or flour at the 11th hour there's not much you can do to salvage dessert, but an inadequate kitchen should never keep an intrepid cook from serving cookies and homemade pie on Christmas Eve.
Posted by georgia at 11:03 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Have a long Christmas card list but no money to spend on all the cute cards you see in the stores? Take a few minutes out of your evenings and make them yourself. Cut one-of-a-kind snowflakes while you're watching your favorite tv shows (don't worry, they'll be a lot better than the ones you made as a kid) and glue them to colored paper or card-stock.
Or, if you're short on time too, use a holiday-shaped cut-out like this snowflake hole-punch from Paper Source (for around $6) to cut the shapes out of paper and line them with a contrasting color of paper (the resulting confetti can be glued on card-stock). The two layers of these cards are held together by ribbons and metallic thread.
For Hanukkah cards, you can make Stars of David the same way you make snowflakes in nine easy steps:
1. fold a paper circle in half
2. fold the half-circle in thirds
3. fold the third in half lengthwise, then open
4. fold the third in half the other direction, then open
5. mark where the folds meet with a point
6. draw straight lines from the upper corners of the triangle through the point
7. draw straight lines 1/4 - 1/3 of an inch below the fist set of lines
8. cut out the resulting shape
9. unfold, and you have a star
(click above for larger image)
Posted by georgia at 10:58 PM | Comments (2) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Every year around this time a few thousand people head to the yarn store and start knitting scarves to give to loved ones at Christmas. Seven months from now an almost equal number of people look at the still half-finished scarf and try to decide whether it's worth working on for next Christmas.
Fortunately, a good friend pointed me toward a solution: The Giant Knitting Needles.
Ok, so they look weird and it takes a few minutes to get used to working with them, but by the end of a not-too-long afternoon I had a complete scarf ready for a gift box. Mine was made of three layers of yarn, which made it both impenetrable and expensive, but thinner yarns work just as well and produce a beautiful open stitch.
So go on, head to the yarn store - you won't be stuck looking for last minute gifts on Christmas Eve.
Posted by georgia at 10:00 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Now that Thanksgiving is over and the leftovers are done, we can finally give in to the daily barrage of Christmas ads and start decorating. Unlike the suburban husbands who were out in their yards rigging glow-in-the-dark santas on Thanksgiving, most of us don't like to turn our homes into RiteAid look-alikes a full month before Christmas. So start your decorating slowly (and tastefully) by making a little treat for your outdoor neighbors: make some strings of popcorn and cranberries to decorate the trees, bushes, or fire escape outside your window and add some holiday color to your view while making the local birds very happy.
Posted by georgia at 11:35 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Want to try your hand at canning but don't want to commit to all that equipment? Try putting a cooling rack in the bottom of your largest stockpot and using regular tongs to get the jars in and out of the pot. It will be a little trickier but should work just fine.
Posted by georgia at 11:28 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
After you steam or boil your fabulous frozen dumplings, you need a way to serve them. You can just pile them on a plate or in a bowl, or you can add a little extra Asian flavor by picking up a couple traditional bamboo steamers. For around $8, you can scatter them around the table or stack them and keep enough food on the table to last the whole night.
To effectively use the steamers, you have to keep the food from sticking to them. You can line them with wax paper or foil or go an easier, more traditional rout by lining them with cabbage leaves. Just steam or boil the leaves for a few seconds to soften them up and you've got the perfect way to dress up the baskets and make them functional (and if you run out of food, your guests can eat them).
Posted by georgia at 11:57 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
No, I haven't abandoned the blog, I've just been depressingly sick since Monday morning. Obviously I did not follow my own advice about drinking lots of yummy flavored water (and I did not avoid long bus and train rides - I think the guy hacking behind me on the Boston-NYC bus might be where I got this bug). Now that I'm feeling like myself again, I'm angry that I did not take any of the tried-and-true remedies that have kept me from getting sick in the past. So to remind myself not to be so forgetful next time, I've produced a run-down of the homeopathic staples that have proven themselves in the past.
Oscillococcinum
You've probably seen this advertised during flu season the last couple years. When I first saw the adds, I was really upset by them, because it turns out I'd been mispronouncing the stuff for years. But bruised ego notwithstanding, I'm glad they're advertising, because this remedy really works. Take it when you feel the very beginnings of the flu (it doesn't really work on a full-blown attack), and your symptoms will be much shorter lived. Many times I've been able to avert sickness altogether by taking it the minute I started feeling feverish. But Please Note: you have to take it as the package directs you, ie. one packet every six hours until the package is finished (I think there are 3 to package). And don't forget, it's a homeopathic, so don't take it within 20 minutes of eating, and caffine and menthol can hurt its affectiveness.
Vitamin C
My mom has a theory that if she doesn't blow her nose, her cold doesn't really go to full force. I don't buy that. But she has another theory that if you take 1,000 mg of Vitamin C every hour for the first few hours you feel a cold coming on (remember that scratchy warning feeling in the back of your throat?) you can kill the cold dead before it really starts. And this theory is one I live by. It might not work for the worst colds or the times my immune system's really worn down, but it does wonders otherwise. (How do you know when you've taken too much C? It will start going straight through you. Believe me, you'll notice.)
Esberitox
The most recent addition to my medicine cabinet, this supplement's tag-line is "More Powerful Than Echinacea Alone". And it is. It works great. Take it right when you start to feel a cold coming on and your chances for full recovery or avoidance jump (especially if you double-team with the C). Just remember, any form of echinacea stops working after the first two days, so only take it when you really need it. Ladies, this is especially important for you, because too much echinacea can thicken the outer walls of your eggs, leading to an increased chance of infertility.
Airborne
Ok, so I haven't tried this one yet, but my mother has started using it on trips and has come to swear by it. And if she's good enough to cull through the homeopathics and the supplements and find ones that have really helped me in the past, I'm sure this one is a good one too.
Thanks, Mom.
[By the way, my mom's work with teenagers got a great write-up in the local paper; see the article here, half way down, titled "Speaking From the Heart" ]
Posted by georgia at 12:46 AM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
(In keeping with yesterday's beverage theme: )
Now that cold and flu season has started (most of the people I work with are calling in sick), it's important to remember to stay hydrated. Instead of forcing yourself to chug a large glass of tap water every hour on the hour, make the water irresistible by flavoring it with your favorite fruit. My favorite water in the world is the water at the Ojai Valley Inn spa. They stock the hallways with coolers of ice water flavored with slices of oranges, lemons and cucumbers; it's so yummy you'll swallow it by the gallon and still want more.
Posted by georgia at 11:11 PM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
When you buy flowers as infrequently as I do, you want them to last as long as possible. Last week the folks at Apartment Therapy reminded me of one of the easiest ways to keep flowers alive longer: change the water. It's so simple, but I always forget to do it. Fresh water extends flowers' lives extra days, so you can enjoy them longer. (The article also has a great tip for keeping roses from sagging over -- it's a little involved for me since I don't usually have florist wire sitting around, but it's still a great idea.)
Posted by georgia at 11:28 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Nothing brightens up a room like flowers, and as the months get colder and colder a few blooms on the table will keep you feeling warm and happy and improve your quality of life. But flowers are expensive, and $15-$20 a week is enough to take a friend for drinks on Friday or buy a new wardrobe at the end of the year. The solution? Float a couple blooms in a shallow bowl for more bang for the buck. Ours was a gift from Crate and Barrel, but Ikea has one for only $3.99.
Posted by georgia at 03:21 PM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
When you were in college and you wanted to throw a party on a tiny budget, you made punch. This punch was made of cheap vodka and juices, or maybe even Kool-Aid. This sugary beverage had only two goals: to mask the taste of alcohol for the inexperienced drinkers and to make everyone very, very happy.
These days your guests are a little more discerning. You want to make something that tastes good and impresses your guests but still fits your budget. Our friend Dora solves all these problems by making sangria. It's the perfect solution because you can still buy your ingredients cheap (why waste good wine mixing it with juice?) and people love it. Since I'm partial to white wine, it had never occurred to me to make sangria, but earlier this summer Gourmet had some great recipes for alternatives to the traditional sangria recipe. The Peach White-Wine Sangria is wonderfully refreshing, I can't wait to try the Strawberry Peach variations and the Berry Rose Sangria looks amazing. Just don't make them too long before your guests arrive or there might not be any left.
Posted by georgia at 02:42 AM | Comments (1) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Just because you don't have a backyard or a roof-deck doesn't mean you can't host a barbeque. A couple weeks ago our friend Kevin threw a wonderful barbeque in the courtyard of a bar that just opened in our neighborhood. The bar still doesn't have a solid following and is often half empty, so they were thrilled to get an extra 60 customers for the evening, we got a great place to grill, and everyone had fun.
Of course, for those who don't have a grill they can carry around the city, many public parks have grills the public can use. Some require reservations, but others simply require sending someone early in the day to stake a claim. I don't know about you, but I'm going to grab some hot dogs, find a grill, and take advantage of the outdoors before the good weather disappears forever.
Posted by georgia at 01:41 AM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
My life, and the life of any busy twenty-something (or thirty-something or forty-something) requires a lot of caffeine. But a normal coffee maker is expensive, and we don't have anywhere to put it (our counter is the size of a postage stamp). Fortunately I found some good, cheap options.
In college I started with a single cup filter cone designed to sit nicely on a coffee cup. It cost around $3 and works great! So for years I bought pre-ground coffee to keep in the fridge, and whenever I needed a little help with an all-nighter I just put a kettle on the stove.
The only problem is that the cone takes a while to make more than one cup of coffee at a time, and now that my guy is just as addicted to coffee as I am, we need a better way to make it. Fortunately, a cousin gave us a beautiful little French Press, which fits nicely in a cupboard and makes great, fast coffee (and only costs around $30). He also gave us a little coffee grinder (also affordable at about $20), so now we have fresh, good coffee every morning. You can probably get any of these at a lot of places, but I have a fondness for Bed, Bath & Beyond (it's like a candy store of towels and storage systems and pepper mills), so those are the links above.
image courtesy bed bath and beyond
Posted by georgia at 01:05 AM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
So I've discovered a great secret: Putting whipped cream on anything turns it into an amazing dessert (girls, stop giggling).
The other night after work I wanted to make a nice dinner but was low on time and energy. So before I started cooking (ie boiling corn and throwing meat on the grill) I cut up some peaches and apricots, put them in a bowl with some sugar, and whipped some heavy cream I had left over from making a cream sauce. (I used a hand mixer to cut down on clean-up, but I usually just throw the cream and some sugar in a blender.) I stuck everything in the fridge, and after dinner I put the fruit in low glasses with a dollop of cream on top.
It was a fabulous (and impressive looking) dessert.
Posted by georgia at 01:24 AM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
This weekend while I was playing houseguest in Boston, my hosts sent me to the store to buy flowers to decorate a cake. I got to browse the whole selection at Whole Foods and picked out some beautiful roses.
Of course, I myself almost never buy flowers. There are a million beautiful flower shops that I pass every day, but flowers are an expense I just can't justify if it's not a special occasion.
A few days ago on Apartment Therapy, Ali commented that in Berkeley everyone just picks flowers from their neighbors' yards. And that's basically how I grew up. You weren't supposed to loot and pillage in other people's flower patches, but taking a flower or two from a fully blooming bush was absolutely fine. Unfortunately that's not really possible in New York. The few flowering bushes you find in front of brownstones and in parks are precious and should be left alone. (When we planted a rosebush outside our basement studio and someone took the one and only bloom, we were devastated.)
Thank goodness I discovered that there is a New York variation on the theme of flowers from the side of the road. Every night the flower guys at your corner grocers and delis go through the flowers and spruce them up, and one of the things they do is throw out the roses with broken stems. After becoming friends with my local flower guy, I realized that he was only too happy to give me the buds that were destined for the trash. I took them home, trimmed the stems (or what was left of them) put them in ice water to revive them or warm water to help them open up, and floated them in a glass bowl. I had beautiful flowers and a new friend to wave to on my way home at night.
Posted by georgia at 01:31 AM | Comments (0) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
Starting a kitchen from scratch is hard. In the days when you cooked in your mom's kitchen you probably never thought about all the time and money that went into building the collection of pots, pans, whisks and spatulas you used. Then one day you decided to make a batch of cookies and found yourself saying, "a cookie sheet costs what?!?"
Don't worry, there is a cheaper way: Restaurant Supply Catalogues.
With just a click on their websites, you can buy pots, pans, cookie sheets and even ovens, grills and booth seating for the same low prices restaurants get. You can also sign up for their catalogues and gush over $25 knives every couple months.
To see for yourself, try www.centralrestaurant.com or www.servu-online.com
Posted by georgia at 01:21 AM | Comments (2) | permalink | TrackBack | Email this post
