It Happened Again

Blessings Darlings!

As y'all already know, I make a lot of things from scratch, or almost-scratch.  Like - my husband LOVES having Kahlua in his coffee in the evening.  He does this three or so times a week.  Kahlua is a pricy bitch, so I make my own.

And when we moved I lost my usual recipe.

No problem, go online and find another (the original was pulled from being online, because it was shared from a book without the author's permission, and the author or publisher said "Oh, HELL no!")

Since I've made stuff several times, it wasn't hard finding a recipe that I could tell had about the right proportions of coffee to sugar.  But in looking over the recipe, I could tell that the person who POSTED it (to Wikihow, which my protection software identified as a 'malicious' site) clearly had never made it. 

The first clue was that s/he said it would make about a quart of Kahlua-substitute.  Well, yes, the recipe called for 4 cups of liquid.  But the 4 1/2 cups of solids added, which dissolved into the liquids, DO TAKE UP SPACE.  Not one cup of space per cup of sugar/instant coffee, but enough space that the recipe made 6 cups, not 'about a quart'.

The second clue was that, since the mix was 50% higher in volume that was presented, the proof (alcohol content) of the finished product was going to be WAY too low given the relative volume of alcohol the recipe called form. 

To get around these problems, I used nice high-proof Everclear instead of most of the rum that was called for, and used brown sugar instead of white sugar to replace some of the flavor the rum would have brought to the recipe.  I could wing it, because I have experience and mad math skillz.

This isn't only a problem in online recipes, BTW.

And, for you Pagans/witches/wiccans out there - it's not only a problem in cooking.

But more on THAT in a future post!

Frondly, Fern

This week's eats.

Blessings Darlings!
We just inventoried the freezers - okay, the Spawn did it for me. Which means some meat is labels "Mystery Meat" because he doesn't recognize it on sight and didn't ask me.  And the list doesn't tell me what FORM the meat is in - is the beef slices, a roast, or cubes?  Dunno!

We'll be eating mostly out of the freezer this month, since last month Spawn's work hours were cut radically so he can't buy much in the way of groceries this month.  Which is life, and it's not TOO bad because last month the stores had a HUGE amount of meat reduced/sell NOW and I bought what I could then.  The freezer's pretty full, and we have spring greens coming out of the lawn and a few from the garden.  And we still have some canned green beans, and I'm sprouting mung beans, etc.

So, this is what we'll eat from May 5 till May 18:

Thursday, May 3 - baked chicken (4 pieces for 3 people), rice, salad, zucchini

Friday,, May 4 - Yaki Soba (it's Japanese Lo Mein, sort of) with 1.5 lb of veggies (cabbage, carrots, mushrooms) and 9 oz pork

Saturday,  May 5 - Home-made Pizza (Cheese, red pepper, some pepperoni), Salad

Sunday, May 6 - Pulled Pork (Leftovers from making it a few weeks back), rolls, slaw (I had mine as part of a green salad and no slaw)

Monday, May 7 - Leftovers.

Tuesday, May 8 - Bi Bim Bop - sort of Korean Fried rice, with bean sprouts, carrots, spinach, mushrooms, zucchini, fiddleheads, some beef, special sauce.

Weds, May 9 -  egg rolls (using the leftover pulled pork, some shrimp, lots and lots of cabbage)

Thurs, May 10 - tacos. Filling will be half bean, half beef.

Friday May 11 - Fried chicken.  Because we can. Salad, broccoli, potatoes

Saturday, May 12 - Spaghetti, red sauce, salad.

Sunday, May 13 - Ribs, slaw, corn bread/hush puppies, salad

Monday May 14 - Leftovers

Tuesday, May 15 - Fried Fish, broccoli, buns? or some other starch.

Wednesday,  May 16 Kalbi (korean BBQ), rice, salad, green beans

Thursday, May 17 - Veggie Omelets, fresh bread, fruit

Friday, May 18 - baked whole chicken, salad, baked potatoes, spinach

I'll need to buy egg roll wrappers, eggs, milk, OJ, salad stuff, butter, ketchup, and a few more items, but not much.  Still, more than the $15 (1/4 of his take home pay) that the Spawn will be kicking in for the next few weeks.

How's your food budget doing?

Frondly, Fern