Lemon Juice + sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) = FUN!

My glass stove top was getting quite atrocious looking and I had long since run out of the cleaner I was supplied with when I bought my stove. I wanted it clean but didn't want to have to run to Home Depot just for over priced cleaner so I tried vinegar and baking soda. I got a lot of the gunk up, but still had a hard gunky ring where the pots sit. I tried copious more amounts of baking soda and vinegar and even picked up a razor blade to try to get the gunk off, but it still wasn't quite coming off.

I hypothesized that lemon juice is a stronger acid than vinegar so the combination of the stronger acid and the baking soda may be more effective on the gunk.

SUCCESS! I still had to scrape a lot with the razor blade, but I got the last of the gunk off. And working with the lemon juice smelled much better than the vinegar.  After I was done with the scraping, I blotted up with excess liquid with paper towel. Then took a soapy rag and wiped down the stove top.

spoiled food

I just found out what happens when Heavy whipping cream goes bad. I opened the carton and it was pink inside. Not just any pink, but an almost neon pink.

What was my first thought, aside from EEEW? "Huh, I wonder what bacteria caused that"

Once a lab geek, always a lab geek.

Cara Cara Oranges

About a year ago, a friend and I went to the Midtown Global Market over near Abbott Norwestern Hospital in S. Minneapolis. While there, I rediscovered my love of Bubble Tea and enjoyed perusing the various offerings of each booth. I came home with a couple different fruit and vegetables, one of which was a Cara Cara orange.

It looks like a typical orange on the outside, but inside it has a pinker flesh.

From the Sunkist website:

Cara Cara Oranges
Cara Cara oranges, a type of navel grown in California's San Joaquin Valley, are available January through April.  Their outward appearance is similar to other navels, but their interior is a distinctive pinkish red and has an exceptionally sweet flavor with a tangy cranberry-like zing.  Cara Caras are a rich source of Vitamins A and C, fiber and Lycopene.  A perfect snack served as wedges, they're also a colorful addition to beverages or squeezed into a vinaigrette salad dressing.

It's rare that I enjoy an orange as much as I enjoy a cara cara orange. So if you're ever in the mood for an orange, but not your typical navel orange, check out the cara cara orange.

French Press Coffee

I've never tried french press coffee. I knew that it required a different grind than the pre-ground FAC stuff I used to buy. But now that I have a shiny new cuisinart burr grinder, I wanna try it out.

I followed the directions I found on ehow.

I ground about 4T of beans for a course grind. At the same time I used my electric tea pot to boil water for about 3 cups of coffee. I let the water cool a couple minutes while I put the course grounds into the french press. I brewed mine for 5 minutes.

Evaluation:

Ease (1 easy-10 hard): 3
It's pretty easy and actually not that much more difficult that setting up my drip coffee maker.

Practicality (1 extremely practical- 10 not all that useful): 5
Compared to my drip coffee maker which I can set up the night before and program to go off when i get up, this is less practical. Its good for making just a couple cups of coffee though. This would be a great thing for weekend coffee when i have more time to savor and set up for coffee.

Taste (vs Drip coffee)
I'm not quite sure I taste much of a difference, but I always put a little sugar to my coffee. I did try it before I added sugar and felt it was slightly less bitter than my drip coffee. Possibly slightly more flavor in the french press coffee than the drip coffee too.

What's for Lunch 1/6/2010

My fiance despises asian food. I have a soft spot for it, especially when I make it at home. I recently found a recipe for a peanut sauce and rice stick noodles and set out to make it. I wasn't 100% about the peanut sauce because the recipe was peanut butter, soy sauce and vegetable broth mostly. That's a combo I'd never have come up with. I made the sauce per my Betty Crocker Cookbook. It made about a half a cup. I made the sauce ahead of time and stored in a jar in the fridge.

Today, upon returning from work, I warmed up some sauteed peppers (also sauteed ahead of time), sauteed a piece of cut up flank steak, and boiled some rice stick noodles. I heated up a couple dollups of sauce too. Mixed them together on a plate and feasted!

Recipe for Peanut Sauce:
1/2 c smooth peanut butter
2 T Soy Sauce
1t ginger
1/2t crushed red pepper
1/2 c vegetable or chicken broth

Rice Stick Noodles:
bring water to boil
boil rice stick noodles for 1 min


Evaluation of lunch:

Peanut Sauce: It didn't look like a lot of sauce when I put it on the steak,peppers and noodles, but it packed a very flavorful punch. I could definitely have halved the amount of sauce I gave myself and not lost any flavor. It had a definite peanut butter taste but with a surprise spiciness from the crushed red pepper.

The noodles : I didn't separate them well enough so some noodles weren't quite fully cooked. Overall they weren't too bad though.

I would definitely make this lunch for myself again. I thoroughly enjoyed my asian inspired lunch. The steak I added was an excellent addition for protein.

New kitchen gadgets

I now have a food processer and a coffee grinder. Hope to post about learning to use them soon!

Happy New Year!

Goals: 1x per week I will post a What's for dinner? post.

Any time I try a new recipe, I will blog it. And hopefully add a picture

Recently tried recipes I need to post about soon:
-- Lemon Angel Food bites
-- Crock pot hot beef
-- my own little chicken pasta casserole