Want to know how long to boil an egg to produce a creamy yolk? How long to cook a steak to make it medium rare? How many tablespoons are in a half cup? We put it all together in a simple-to-use and quite pretty two-page conversion chart (click to download the pdf). It will fit in many of our beautiful recipe binders. Continue reading
After buying our cookbook software, you can easily print off your cookbook at home for free. But of course it’s not really free, what with toner and paper and such. And you still might want to bind it together in something other than one of our nice recipe binders.
So here’s a great place where you can make your cookbook for around $8/each (6 books). The specs I’ve set out in the link give you 50 pages (black and white) with a color front and back cover, spiral binding and a clear plastic protective sheet over front and back. These folks do great work!
Last Labor Day, I went to a little soiree that featured some interesting eats. One of the interesting eats was potato chips made in the microwave. Wow, I thought, that sounds like a great way to take the labor out of Labor Day potato chip making, and also have some very fresh, tasty potato chips.
The potato chips were still warm at the Labor Day party, meaning they had just been made in small batches. I hunted out the hostess, who provided very simple instructions on how to make microwave potato chips.
Here is what she told me about how to make microwave potato chips:
1. Scrub potatoes and let dry. Peel if desired. Slice potatoes paper thin using a mandolin, a slicing slot on a four-sided cheese grater, a food processor fitted with a slicing blade, or a very sharp knife.
2. Next step in making microwave potato chips, clean the microwave’s rotating glass turntable, and spray it with vegetable oil spray (such as Pam, any flavor). Place the very thin slices of potato all over the turntable, spacing them neatly. (If your microwave oven turntable is not glass, use a large microwave-proof ceramic or glass plate instead). Spray the potato slices with another shot of vegetable spray, and then quickly sprinkle salt and any dry spice you prefer on the potato slices.
3. Microwave the potato slices approximately 5 minutes, watching carefully so the potato chips don’t burn (length of time will depend on your microwave’s wattage). If the potato chips are not golden brown and crisp at 5 minutes, try adding 30 seconds at a time to the cooking period, until you know what works for your microwave. (Hint: thicker cut potatoes will require longer cooking times.)
Several kitchen gadget companies have a gadget/device for making microwave potato chips (that resembles an old-fashioned film slide carousel). If you want to buy one, know that the microwave potato chip maker is round with slots to stand the thinly sliced potatoes for microwaving. Given my distaste for most kitchen gadgets, the glass turntable method seems just fine.
It doesn’t take long to make microwave potato chips. You can also make apple chips, sweet potato chips, carrot chips, even yam chips using the microwave this way. I like the fact that I don’t need anything fancy to make homemade potato chips, and the fat and oil is toned down significantly. And, that’s always a good thing to talk about in your family cookbook.
Happy Cookbooking,
Matilda
The sequence of events and facts in the following story are absolutely true. The names have been changed to protect the, well, you’ll figure it out.
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While I was visiting my dear friend, Ruth, and enjoying tea at her kitchen table, I noticed a rather large gap along the baseboard of her kitchen cupboard. “My, that’s big enough for something to live in,” I remarked. Ruth replied, “Oh, yes, I know. I need to fix it one of these days.” Continue reading
My father had some unusual tastes in food to a kid hanging around wondering what all the fuss was in the kitchen. Burnt toast eaten with sunny side up eggs was one combination I remember. The smell of charred forgotten toast still makes me think of him. Scrapple. Corn pancakes. He also liked raw oysters, and it wasn’t until I was in my mid-30s that I learned to appreciate them.
My father grew up in hard times just after the turn of the 20th century, when men changed their shirt collars instead of their shirts, and bread that you sliced yourself was a few pennies a loaf. Continue reading
Recipe software, recipe book software, cookbook software, whatever you want to call it to make your own cookbook, the key to success is how tech easy it is to use. Although I’m the Granny Guru around here at The Cookbook People, some things do scrabble my brain, and one of them is “tech issues”
Nothing is more frustrating that knowing you need to accomplish something with a software but don’t understand how to do it. Add a deadline, and waah! I can be in tears in no time. (I tend to always think the problem is me, not the software.) So when we created Matilda”s Fantastic Cookbook Software, we tried to take the “tech” out so anybody could use it. Continue reading
I just read this story about a daughter who wrote a cookbook for her mom and I couldn’t help getting teared up a little. Not just for her, but for all the other stories I’ve heard about people bonding with their mom or grandmother by making a family cookbook.
Sadly, so often these bonds grow when the daughter makes a cookbook in memorial to one who has passed on. If you are thinking about making a family cookbook, I can’t urge you strongly enough to use it as an opportunity to grow closer to those whom you care about.
Here’s the story.
A quote:
I wanted her to know the cookbook would live on and through that her memory and spirit would live on forever. When I gave her the news she just smiled and looked into my eyes and raised her hand with her fingers crossed.
I’m strongly considering carrying her cookbook in our store. It just seems in the perfect spirit of our company.