Over the Kitchen Counter: Angie's Place for Cooking and Crafts

Steel-Cut Oats in the Crock Pot

I love making steel-cut Irish oatmeal for breakfast but usually reserve it for the weekend because the unprocessed grains take a while to cook.  Although I first read about making this porridge in the crock pot around Christmas time I never did get around to trying out that method of preparing it.  Well, I've heard about the over-night slow cooking twice on t.v. in past few weeks and was reminded again about this short-cut.

Last night I added 4 cups of water to the crock and one cup of the oatmeal and set it to low.  It takes about 8 hours and this morning I woke up to the BEST Irish oatmeal.  It was so creamy and smooth - a much improved texture over the usual on-the-stove method.  The whole grains were swollen and soft, that great nutty flavour enhanced.  I will now always make my steel-cut oats this way - super easy and better tasting!

Quilt Album

I have taken photos of each of the quilts I've made - some right from the fabric cutting stage.  While I did include a couple small pictures in my 'year in review' scrapbook album, I haven't really done anything else with the photos.  I do think it's worth remembering when and how I made each quilt, along with the trials and tribulations of the process.

I decided to make a small album to keep the photos in and here's what I came up with.  I started with a Minutes PicFolio pocket album from Creative Memories.  I added a photo of each quilt and a photo of its label (if there was one).  Once I had all the photos in the sleeves, I went back and mounted each on an appropriate photo mat.  I then had the great idea to use 2-sided journaling mats so that I could write the details of each quilt on the back of the matted photo.  I wanted the information to be documented but didn't necessarily need it to be on display so this was the perfect way to have both.  I left the first page of the album for a journal box explaining why I started quilting (I haven't written it yet) and then was able to have the 2-page spread for each quilt.  When I didn't have a matching label for the quilt I just added another photo of either the back of the quilt or another close-up photo of the front.

I have actually already filled one album and will have to start another with my next quilting project.  The good thing about starting these albums early on is that it is much easier to keep it up to date rather than having to try to remember all the specifics years from now.  It's less over-whelming to do it now while the details are fresh and the photos are manageable.  I just might have to move to a larger format if I keep churning out quilts!  (Luckily, there are larger PicFolio albums with expandable capabilities!)

Lemon Blueberry Muffins

These Lemon Blueberry Muffins are so simple and basic but boy, are they good!  They are super fast to make and you can even try raspberries, cranberries, or raisins in the mix instead of the fresh or frozen blueberries.  Enjoy!

Lemon Blueberry Muffins

1 cup milk

grated rind & juice of 1 lemon

1/2 cup butter

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1/2 tsp vanilla

1/2 tsp salt

2 cups flour

1 Tbsp baking powder

1/2 cup blueberries

greased 12 cup muffin pan, 350 degree F oven, 20-25 mins.

Craftsy February BOM

The February block designs for the Craftsy Block-of-the-month project both used half-square triangles - something I have come to not like so much.  (It's fussy matching up those points!).  The instructor taught 2 different methods for creating the hsts, a magic method where you stitch all around 2 squares of fabric and then cut them in quarters, and a traditional drawn-line method where you mark a diagonal line through the 2 squares and then stitch on either side of the line and cut them apart.  I preferred the first method but I loved both blocks made for February.

The first block is the Balkan Puzzle block and I absolutely adore the finished design.  The points aren't too bad on my block and it did turn out to be the right size in the end.

The second block is the Chunky Chevron and I like this one too!  It's certainly going to be a sampler quilt at the end of the year, with so many different block designs.

While I don't like doing hst these blocks came together without incident and were not bad to make.  I think the designs will be more challenging in the upcoming months, with curved edges and paper piecing, dresden's and foundation piecing, I'm going to be learning a lot of new techniques!

Don't forget this Craftsy BOM class is FREE and you can join in at any time.  You can use fabrics you already have so there need be no extra cost involved to play along - and you get to learn so much and have a finished quilt at the end of the year!  I'm glad I'm all caught up now...and I can't wait until March!!!

Paper Storage

I have quite a selection of patterned paper and card stock in my workshop, both for scrapbooking and card making.  It can get overwhelming to sort and store all the different types and brands of paper but I think I have a pretty good handle on it.

For my scrapbooking I use Creative Memories products exclusively.  I just prefer their designs and kits and find it easiest to have a uniform style if I keep to one company - plus I love the quality of the paper!  I usually buy Power Palettes which contain all the components in one design: tone-on-tone and designer print paper, stickers, paper embellishments, and photo mats & journal boxes.   I store the opened palettes in plastic folders, with full 12x12 sheets in the back, mats, embellishments, and journal boxes (and scraps) in the front.  I have the old style folders but Creative Memories now has new style Power Palette Folders with 6 pockets designed specifically to hold the complete Power Palette.  I'm going to order those next time!

I've been scrappin' up a storm lately and have almost depleted my entire stash of paper!  When a Palette has no more 12x12 sheets I save the scraps and left overs to use in random pages here and there and when the remnants get too few I dump them into my scrap tote.  It feels so good to have made such good use of all that paper and I am totally ready to order new some new Palette designs and start fresh!

For my card-making I use Stampin' Up paper and products.  I like to store the card stock in the SU plastic pockets they used to sell.  I've over-filled some of them and the closing flaps have split and broken so I'll eventually replace them with the new polypropylene vertical paper holders SU now carries.  For my designer print paper I picked up some Cropper Hopper vertical storage solutions (which I assume are very similar to the new SU model) and they have worked well to keep the different categories separate.  There are plastic dividers to organize each print and it's very easy to pull out what you need.

I really love to have everything organized and it helps me be more creative to see what I have.  If everything's a jumble I just get frustrated and can't get started so it's in my best interest to tidy up after each session.  Having a place for everything makes it very easy to do that.  I recently went through all my CM papers and tossed out scraps that were too small (just make a decision what that size will be and stick to it!) and pieces that were mis-shapen from punches and the Cricut.  It actually really made me want to start scrapbooking when I had all my remaining Palettes all sorted out.  I could see which ones still had 12x12 sheets and which ones could work with upcoming pages I have to do!

Heat Sealer

When someone accidentally ripped off the zip-top portion of the re-sealable tortilla package I remembered my Doubleseal vacuum heat sealer and used it to close the bag.  I've had this gadget for years and used to use it all the time to package up meats and produce purchased at the farmer's market (where food is simply wrapped in paper).  It both sucks out the air from the package and uses a heated wire to melt and seal the plastic.

I'll admit it has been hiding in my cupboard for a while now but I still occasionally use it to seal up chip and snack bags or bags of rice or beans.  I still have several rolls of the material to make your own bags and I'm definitely going to start using it again to vacuum-seal food before putting it into freezer bags.  Since my daily household head-count will be getting smaller over the next year or so I will have to portion out more foods for the freezer as we down-size our grocery shopping (since I still like to get the 'club-pack' discount!) and I'm sure I will be using my sealer a lot more frequently.

I think it's a worth-while small appliance if you like to take advantage of sales, large-size packages, preserve summer produce, and you rely on the freezer for longer term storage.  I've been checking out the vacuum food sealers on the net and there are several brands availabe these days (eg. FoodSaver, Seal-a-Meal) with more durable material for freezer storage and better vacuum systems.  They've really come a long way since I got my little machine and now I want to upgrade to one of the fancier models myself!

Blueberry Cream Muffins

Sometimes things just aren't meant to be!  I got everything ready to make and film a recipe for Raspberry Cream Muffins but realized I had frozen blueberries rather than raspberries.  Never mind...blueberries would work just as well in this simple recipe.  So I continued on and baked up these tender, scrumptious muffins and was very excited to share the process with you.  Well...you know how things go and you get busy.  The video camera got set aside and a few days passed - during which we happily devoured all the muffins.  Then came time to film my next video recipe and I discovered my camera memory card was full so I quickly deleted a few videos to make room.  You guessed it!  I deleted my still unsaved Blueberry Cream Muffin videos.  I guess with the missing raspberries and the deleted film you were just meant to get the written version of Blueberry Cream Muffins!  They are delightful and I will re-film the recipe, with raspberries, as soon as I can - it's worth it (and I'm sure no one here will mind eating another batch)!  In the meantime, try out the blueberry ones!

Raspberry or Blueberry Cream Muffins

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 cup butter

2/3 cup sugar

2 large eggs

1/2 cup sour cream

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup coarsely chopped raspberries (or whole blueberries)

350 degrees F, greased 12 cup muffin pan, 30-35 mins.

Combine dry ingredients and set aside. Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, then beat in sour cream & vanilla. Add flour mixture and stir just to combine. Fold in berries and fill muffin cups. Bake at 350 for 30-35 mins. Let stand in pan 10 mins. then remove and cool on rack.

Jillibean Thank You Card

Today's card was made to thank Carissa at Happily Ever After Paper Crafter for sending me a jillibean paper pad and baker's twine when I won her blog candy.  I showed you the prize on February 10th and mentioned there were a couple patterns in the paper pack which were not Christmas themed and I used them on this card.  After layering the kraft card stock with the flower paper I trimmed the star paper using the scalloped border punch from SU.  I added a strip of textured vanilla card stock to show off the 'thank you', cut using my Cricut and the Calligraphy Collection cartridge.  I added a flower from the Prima Orange collection - it sets off the card nicely but doesn't add too much bulk since I'm sending the card in the mail.

Inside the card I layered 2 strips of patterned paper and then cut out the vanilla card stock using the Shadow Feature Key on <Image4> from the same cartridge.  I used my Gypsy's Hide feature to remove the inner line of the frame and cut the shape as a solid block so I could write my message on it.  I inked the edges with some brown chalk ink from Creative Memories.

Homemade Memories Scrapbook Layout

This is another layout for my album of my friends and me scrapbooking.  It's just a small, 7x7" album so there's not a lot of room to work with but I do like to add a couple photos per page.  This time I used the Fabulous papers and embellishments from Creative Memories.  I did a lot of layering and used the Border Maker to add a scalloped edge.  I used clear stickers for my titles and added a couple of paper flowers as well.  The colours of each photo mat co-ordinate with what we are wearing in the photos so the layout looks colourful yet unified.

Chocolate Zucchini Loaf

This easy and scrumptious Chocolate Zucchini Loaf tastes just like chocolate cake...no, really!  It smells so chocolaty while it's in the oven and makes a perfectly textured quick bread.  I'm sure very few would refuse this snack - just leave out the word 'zucchini' when you serve it...(they'll never know!)

Chocolate Zucchini Loaf

6 Tbsp butter

1 cup sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup grated zucchini (peel on)

1-1/2 cups flour

1/4 cup cocoa

1-1/4 tsp baking powder

3/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 cup milk

1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

350 degrees F, 9.5” loaf pan, 60 mins.