Last year, I talked about purchasing a new mixer. I did and, after almost a year of use, it broke. What happened is that I used it to make too many heavy doughs for bread, going over the mixer’s capabilities. So, I needed to get a new one.
Continue reading “My New Mixer Problems and Buying Another New Mixer”
In October 2023, I announced I will begin learning to make my own bread from scratch. Since then, I struggled to learn how to make bread. Part of the problem was new baker mistakes while the other problem was my mixer.
When I started making bread, I was using an almost 30 year old mixer and it had major problems. Earlier this year, I replaced it with a new mixer. Even though the new mixer is smaller than the old one, it runs much better and does a better job at mixing dough and kneading the bread. This was further improved when I purchased a different style dough hook from Amazon. The dough hook is not from the same brand as the mixer (Kitchenaid) but it was designed to not allow the dough ride up the dough hook while mixing. It works really well and is very easy to clean. It is stainless steel too!
Today, my white bread looks really good! I am now able to make it the same way consistently without any abnormalities from loaf to loaf.
Continue reading “Making Homemade Bread Progress Report: One-ish Year Later”
It’s been a few months since I talked about baking bread in a post. I wanted to give a monthly update about how well I’m doing with my bread baking skills, but I ended up not.
In the mean time, things happened in my kitchen. One of those things was problems with my mixer. This was the main reason for my decision to not post updates. I was finally able to get a new one… over a month after I decided to stop using the old one! (I don’t know why it took so long to ship, but there it is) Instead, I decided to focus on baking deserts. I could make them with a hand mixer, which I had.
In order to get myself back to posting about my baking adventures, I decided to write a post about what happened. This way I can update everyone on what happened before I talk in depth about what I baked.
Continue reading “Update on My Baking Process: Mixer Problems, Bread Baking, and Deserts I Now Love”
During a recent shopping trip to a local Dollar Tree, I found a section of the store dedicated to gardening. Normally this section would have a lot of gardening inspired home decor, but this time they had a lot of things that would be perfect for just gardening.
Among the gardening supplies were seeds for flowers and herbs. Also, there was something called a Rocket Herb and Rocket Flower. I heard of them before, but I never saw one for sale in person. I thought about purchasing one of the Rocket Herbs, but I initially had so many doubts about how well it would work, I decided to walk away from it. While looking around the store, I finally decided to purchase one of the Rocket Herbs that grows Sweet Basil.
Continue reading “Rocket Herb Sweet Basil- What is It and How Does it Work”
For many years, I have wanted to make improvements in my house. Despite the fact most of the improvements are not something I can do myself (I don’t have the time, energy, know how, I need more people than just me to work on it, ect.) I am focusing on all the things I can do myself. This includes purchasing new things for the house!
For this post, I wanted to stick to the things I know for a fact I am currently using and am happy with. I have other things I purchased for the house, such as a cube bookcase for my closet, but I haven’t used them or they didn’t work out the way I planned them to. So, I decided not to talk about those things in this post.
Continue reading “Things I Recently Purchased for My House and Why- January 2024”
Ever since 2022, I began to order more groceries online. Whenever I say this, people sometimes believe I am placing a pickup order at a local grocery store. Instead, I am purchasing more groceries online and having them shipped to my house.
To be honest, I don’t like doing this. For me, groceries need to be purchased in person. I want to see what I am actually purchasing before I pay money for them. I want to see what kind of quality they are, how beat up the boxes are, and how fresh the fruits and veggies are. If I can’t touch them or look at them in person, I’m not interested in purchasing them. This is why shopping for groceries online makes me so upset.
Continue reading “Ordering More Groceries Online and Why I’m Doing It More Frequently”
It is the season when people begin to consume all kinds of hot beverages, including hot chocolate and hot coco. I drink hot cocoa year round as an alternative to coffee, but for others they only drink it during the Christmas/Winter time. While doing research for a new hot coco recipe, I remembered I call hot cocoa hot chocolate. This isn’t right, but I’m someone who uses the names interchangeably for the same beverage: Hot cocoa!
If you are like me, then you probably want to know the difference between the two drinks. There are many posts online talking about the difference between the two drinks (Such as ) so this post is not really new, revolutionary news. Yet, it is truly important if you are looking for a recipe with certain ingredients in it.
Hot cocoa is made from cocoa powder. On the other hand, hot chocolate is made from an actual bar of chocolate. No matter which drink you want to make, both contain cocoa powder and also contain some sort of sugar. There are variations of both, cocoa for an example can have sugar infused with vanilla beans. Hot chocolate can be made with chocolate bars with flavors in it, such as peppermint. Yet, both need to be prepared different and stored differently.
Hot cocoa’s ingredients needs an air tight lid and stored away from any moisture. The bars of chocolate for hot chocolate needs to be stored somewhere cool so the bar won’t melt. As for the preparation, hot cocoa is easier to prepare than hot chocolate. Hot cocoa needs a warm liquid, such as milk or water heated in the microwave, to dissolve the power mixture in. As for Hot chocolate, the bar of chocolate needs to be melted and then stored into the warm milk or water.
Both drinks are great options for the holiday season. I prefer hot cocoa because of the ease of storing it (No refrigerator required!) and the ease of preparation. (Heat the milk, stir in the mix, then drink) I also prefer it over hot chocolate because many chocolate bars have ingredients that I am allergic to. Buying or creating a hot cocoa mix from scratch is the best way for me to avoid exposing myself to my allergens. Even though I’m a fan of hot cocoa, I do like hot chocolate. If I find a bar of chocolate without my allergens, I like to make it. To me, hot chocolate is always thicker and, depending on the chocolate bar I use, has better flavors than hot cocoa. Especially if I use a peppermint chocolate bar!
In closing, I always suggest anyone interested in drinking hot cocoa and hot chocolate, but don’t know which one they will enjoy more, to try both. Not everyone has the same allergens that I do (Thank goodness!) so someone may love hot chocolate more than cocoa. Just make sure you dedicate some time to make hot chocolate. It is easy to accedently make the chocolate burn, so take the time to do research before trying. Search for recipes and watch tutorials on how to melt chocolate properly. If you don’t have the time to research or actually make hot chocolate, then hot cocoa will be the best way to enjoy a warm, chocolate drink this winter holiday season!
Well, that’s all for now! Thank you for reading!
Earlier this fall, I wrote a post about trying to make my own pumpkin puree out of a pumpkin I purchased in store. I wanted to use the puree to make pumpkin pies out of. I was worried I purchased the wrong type of pumpkin for pies. Sadly, I was right. So, in late October, I went searching for a new pumpkin that would be good for pies. I found not one, but two pumpkins. They are small but I was very happy to find them!
Continue reading “Making My Own Pumpkin Puree for Pumpkin Pies- Part 2”
A while ago, I talked about my intention to make bread from scratch as well as why I’m doing it in a post. Now that I have had some time to bake bread over and over again, I can honestly say that I love how my bread tastes! It isn’t like the store bought breads, but I still like my bread more. It is heavier and denser than the store bought bread. Even though this is natural for the type of bread I make, it does require me to cut thinner slices. I still haven’t master cutting the right size slice, so the bread is still larger than I want it to be.
Even though the problems I’m currently having with my bread isn’t a big deal, I’m still struggling mastering the recipe. My goal is to eventually become good enough at making the recipe that the only thing I need to review in the cookbook is the exact measurements for each ingredient. I still haven’t made it that far. Because of this, I have made many mistake loafs of bread.
Continue reading “Update on Baking Homemade Bread: The Good, The Bad, and The Tasty Mistakes”
My attempts at baking homemade bread and cookies have been a great success! I still don’t feel like I mastered the recipes, but I am still excited about how they turn out. Now that I feel optimistic about my baking skills, I decided to make a list of foods I want to learn how to bake. In true-to-myself fashion, the list is long. Very long.
Even though the list is long, there are certain recipes I want to learn how to make more than others. This week, I will be attempting to make more foods to celebrate Halloween and my birthday next week. I narrowed down the food to five to focus my attention on, as well as write on this list. At least one of the foods on this list will be made this week. If something stops me from working on it, I will work on it next week.
Continue reading “A Few Foods I Want to Learn How to Baking From Scratch (And Why)”