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Sunday, December 28, 2014

HAPPY NEW YEAR - 2015!!

Time to celebrate new beginnings! New hope! Old friends! To party and get our drink on!

We all have the hope for spring that comes with the new year, but many of us become impatient with waiting.  That's why so many of us Michiganders travel south to places like Florida this time of year. 

My husband and I did that very thing last year.  While there, my kind and generous cousins gifted us with some of their beautiful meyer lemons from the tree in their back yard.

 Meyer lemon trees nearly fall over with the weight of their own lemons this time of year in places like Florida and California.  Lemons can also be grown indoors in Michigan.  You can find dwarf lemon trees at garden centers such as Bordine's Nursery in the summer or order them online at sites such as Logee's.  Directions on how to care for an indoor lemon tree can be found here: How to Grow an Indoor Lemon Tree.

Once home, I transformed the lemons into marmalade, and also LIMONCELLO.  Limoncello is basically sweetened, lemon-flavored vodka.  It makes wonderful mixed drinks and is a perfect reminder of sunshine and clear skies during this gloomy time of year.

Limoncello will be my drink of choice this new year.

I am not going to pretend that I wrote the recipe for this classic drink.  Nor have I perfected it.  What I can tell you is that there is an excellent step-by-step recipe for it at America's Test Kitchen: LIMONCELLO RECIPE.   I can also tell you that the flavor seems to mellow and improve with time.  Further, it is excellent mixed with a bit of orange juice. Like a screwdriver with an extra burst of citrus sunshine.  You can view a list of mixed drink ideas using limoncello here:  Mixed Drinks with Limoncello.

I hope that you will consider trying or even making this fabulous drink this New Year 2015!

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As always, thank you for reading my blog!

Sunday, December 21, 2014

My Christmas Gift to You: Recipe for Peanut Brittle


  Merry Christmas, dear readers! (And a happy  Hanukkah, Kwanza, Solstice and "Festivus to the rest of us!") The onset of the holiday season, as well as a request made by a dear friend of mine from nursing school (Jerrica - this one's for you, girl!), have been the inspiration for my gift to  you all this year - my favorite candy recipe -
 PEANUT BRITTLE!

 You will need:

    A candy thermometer.
    A wooden spoon
    A 3 quart saucepan
    Either one half sheet pan, or 2 smaller cookie
    sheets.
    A cooling rack
    A stove
    Measuring cups & spoons

    Ingredients:

    2 cups granulated white sugar
    1 cup light corn syrup
    1/2 cup water
    1 cup (2 sticks) butter
    1 teaspoon baking soda
    As many dry roasted peanuts as you like (other nuts may be substituted as well)


DIRECTIONS:

1.  Combine the sugar, corn syrup and water in the 3 quart saucepan.

2  Cook on medium-low heat (setting 4-5 on an electric stove) and stir until the sugar dissolves.

3.  When syrup boils, blend in the butter. 

4.  Stir frequently after the mixture reaches the syrup stage (as marked on the candy thermometer). 

5.  Add nuts when the temperature reaches the soft crack stage (280 degrees F).

6.   Stir constantly until the temperature reaches the hard crack stage (305 degrees F).  Remove from the heat and quickly stir in the baking soda, mixing thoroughly.  Then, quickly pour the mixture onto the cookie sheet(s).

7.   Before the candy cools, spread it out as thinly as possible with the flat of the wooden spoon.

8.  Allow to cool completely. 

9.  When it is cool, loosen it from the cookie sheet by lifting up on one edge of the candy and/or slightly twisting the cookie sheet.  Then, crack into pieces and serve. 

Eat and enjoy!

The peanut brittle will last approximately 1 month in an airtight container, or even longer containerized in the refrigerator. 

BONUS TIPS:

    This recipe reminds me of chemistry class because you need to measure things out EXACTLY, and to read the candy thermometer PRECISELY.  This is very important!

 Do not try to walk away from this recipe to do or cook other things!  If you ignore it, you will burn it.

    Keep the candy moving - stir, stir, stir!  And stir deeply! Scrape the bottom of the pan with the wooden spoon.  Again, this is to avoid burning.

    Move quickly on steps 6 &7.  It is a good idea to measure out the baking soda ahead of time so that you can dump it into the mixture when the temperature is EXACTLY 305 degrees F.

    You do not need to grease the cookie sheets. There is enough butter in the recipe that it will not stick. I promise.

    To clean your pan, spoon and thermometer, simply run them under hot water until the candy dissolves off of them.  Or, you can find a lucky child to use the wooden spoon as an all-day sucker. 

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Thank you for reading!  Read more soon! :) 

Saturday, December 20, 2014

MY HOUSE PLANT "FAMILY"

Gardener friends!  What do YOU do to quell the gardening "itch" in the winter months? (Please comment below!)

You may gather from my posting of lists that I do a lot of "studying" of gardening information in the winter... and that's true.  But I also require more ways to stay connected to nature.  I honestly believe that if I did not have these outlets, I would GO COMPLETELY NUTS!!  LIKE A TRAPPED ANIMAL RAGING WITH CABIN FEVER!!!!  /throat clearing/  Anyway... here's what I do:

** SNICKERS : I walk the dog and take her to the dog park.  No matter how cold it is, she always demands that we go. This gets me out of the house no matter how much I feel like hibernating.  Snickers is also my primary connection to nature within my house.  She makes our house a home in many, many ways.


** BIRDS: I watch/ feed the birds.                   Flying. Garden. Beauty.                   'Nough said.








 **HOUSEPLANTS: I fuss over the houseplants.  Like Snickers, I feel like these plants are my pets! Is that strange? Is it weird that I named most of them? WELL I DID!  Plant roll call:

 AUDREY 3: ("Little Shop of Horrors" - get it? - no? ...)   I've had Audrey since I was in high school, which makes her at least 13 years old. "She" has moved with me from my parents house to at least 3 different apartments and 2 different houses.  Just last year she had 8 "babies" that I adopted out to various friends and neighbors.  When she was growing her clone babies she looked especially frighting/mighty.  Audrey is an Aloe.  I use her leaves to make sunburn balm in the summer or to soothe my skin when I make a cooking blunder. I occasionally put her leaf slime in smoothies. She is my oldest and most useful houseplant.


GINGER:   Ginger is my newest plant. I did not give her a very creative name.  She is simply an organic ginger rhizome that I bought and planted.  I consider her to be female because she smells good and will make edible babies the way that Audrey 3 did.  The tricks to planting a ginger rhizome are to buy an organic one that hasn't been sprayed with preservative chemicals, buy the freshest rhizome you can find, buy a rhizome with "nubs" on it that will grow into stems (like potato eyes - sort of), not to bury it too deep (1/4 inch of dirt on top will do), and to give it a sunny south facing window. VOILA! I see culinary opportunities in the future!

LIMEY:  Limey is my second newest plant. I got "him" this summer at Bordine's Nursery.  So far, he has made tiny flowers, but no limes. He is supposedly self-fertile with regard to fruit. I followed the directions, and am providing fertilizer and southern light exposure... but no limes so far.  It's only my first year with this plant, so perhaps it will produce next year.  But does anyone reading this have experience with indoor limes?  Any ideas for troubleshooting?  Please comment below if you can assist me!

I really love cooking with limes.  Mmm......






BAYBAY:   This is my bay tree that I bought a year ago.  Unfortunately, my poor Baybay got munched by tiny green caterpillars while sitting on the back deck this summer, so "he" is looking a bit bedraggled at the moment.

What? You thought my gardening skills were infallible? That my plants never get touched by pests or diseases? YOU SO CRAZY!

 I got Baybay at  Heavenly Scent Herb Farm in Fenton, MI about a year and a half ago.  Heavenly Scent is an awesome place to visit. They have a gorgeous garden, an herb shop, a gift shop and a restaurant. They even host weddings.  But I digress...   I use Baybay's leaves for cooking.  He also smells excellent when I brush by him and has proven to be a pretty tough plant.

ORI:   Sadly, I acquired this orchid at my mother's funeral, 3 years ago. Having it helps me feel connected to my mother, but thinking about Ori's origins makes me sad.  Fortunately, the sad memory is off-set by the beauty and toughness of this plant. Orchids are surprisingly easy to take care of.  The main thing is to NOT over-water. You can actually water it by putting 2 ice cubes (3T water) on top of the pot once a week, or even just spraying it with a thorough mist of water every week.  Eventually, the flowers do die. At that point you just cut the stem down to the second notch in the stem, and wait for new stems to grow. Occasionally (every 3 months or so), I put some 8-7-6 liquid miracle-gro houseplant food into a watering can and dribble this onto the orchid.  I use the remainder of what's in the watering can to fertilize the other plants.





                                             GENERAL TIPS FOR INDOOR PLANTS:
Do NOT fertilize often in the winter. The plants really aren't growing much during this season.  The only exception is supposed to be Limey (or other tropical plants that fruit in winter). I fertilize him more often in hope of limes.

Do NOT over-water any indoor plant. Watering once a week is fine for most indoor plants.  Once a month for the aloes or cacti is plenty. Orchids only require a few dribbles of water weekly (3 tablespoons, or 2 ice cubes.) Over-watering will kill indoor plants faster than anything.

Mist the plants with water from a spray bottle to prevent aphids/insects.  Try to avoid putting them over air vents to avoid drying as well (not always possible - it seems like builders like to put air vents under windows for some reason.) If you have to put a plant over an air vent, mist it more often and try to put it on a table/surface to give it some distance away from the vent.

Remember to rotate the plants to prevent lop-sided growth. (They won't die if you don't rotate, but all the leaves will be on one side of the plant only.)

I hope this helps someone!

Do YOU have indoor plant pets?  Tell me about them - comment below! :)

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Have 2 mins.? Click the “comments” (sometimes it says “no comments”) link at the bottom of the article and share your own ideas on this topic. I would LOVE to hear from you!

Have $? Click the donate buttons to the right to help humanity!

Broke? Donate blood to Red Cross.  Click the link under the donate  section to find out how. Or, click the "Greater Good" link under the donate section. On that site there are "give" buttons that cost you nothing but a glimpse at some advertisements, and still donate to charity.  Also, consider donating your time to a local charity this year.

As always, thank you for reading my blog!









Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Welcome To "MI" Home!


Welcome to my blog! This is my first attempt at blogging. So, I beg your patience.

My purpose is to share my own garden with others who also enjoy gardening.  I love reading other people's blogs that pertain to gardening, nature, preservation, cooking and health.  So I thought, "Why not share my garden as well?"

I don't pretend that this will be a particularly new topic for a blog, but I hope that it will be unique if for no other reason than that no two gardens are the same.

This spring, 2015, we (my husband, dog and I) moved to our new home on Clifford Lake in Brighton, Michigan. The moving-in process took some time, and I was unable to do much gardening this year.  I managed only to plant the wild roses that I have moved from my mother's house after she passed away to my previous house, and now to this one, a couple rugosa roses, a liberty apple tree, a dwarf mulberry tree and two dwarf pear trees.  Everything else was here before I  moved in.
A view of our home from the opposite side of the lake.  The fall color was astounding this year! :)


The garden that I inherited from the previous owner is very nice.  Someone had paid to have a brick pathway installed through the yard and down to the area in front of the sea wall on the lake. There are a couple well-established yew hedges, a couple burning bush, many Stella D'oro daylilies, some irises, some hostas, a few roses and other perennials.  It is currently a garden that is strictly decorative, and looks its best in June. I hope to take it to the next level: multi-season beauty combined with edible landscaping and some beneficial-insect-friendly plants.

To realize my goal, I have continued to research plants and gardening online, listen to several gardening podcasts, browse seed/plant catalogs and *drum roll please* am taking a master gardener course through Michigan State University Extension starting this January!! (I am very excited about this!)

I plan to share what I learn with you all via this blog, and hope that it will be of use.  Thank you for taking the time to read this! Please visit us again!

Have 1 sec.? Please click the “follow” or share buttons (g+, Facebook, pintrest) to the right of the blog text to share or follow this blog.

Have 2 mins.? Click the “comments” (sometimes it says “no comments”) link at the bottom of the article and share your own ideas on this topic. I would LOVE to hear from you!

Have $? Click the donate buttons to the right to help humanity!

Broke? Donate blood to Red Cross.  Click the link under the donate  section to find out how. Or, click the "Greater Good" link under the donate section. On that site there are "give" buttons that cost you nothing but a glimpse at some advertisements, and still donate to charity.  Also, consider donating your time to a local charity this year.

As always, thank you for reading my blog!