Kitchen Gadgets

I am a kitchen gadget junkie. I admit it. If it looks s useful and cool, I find myself buying it. I have a couple of different ice cream machines, and lots of cool little whiz bangs to help me cook. I had to buy a zester even though I know I could get the lemon zest without a specialized tool. I have a set of those cool checkerboard cake making pans I have only used once. I have a thing that looks like a grilled cheese maker but instead is to make little pies.

My favorite and most used gadget is the Egg and Muffin Toaster, I like this thing so much I have bought it as gifts for other people. I went to the store to buy a new toaster when I found this fancy machine. It has regular toast slots but it also has a little pot on the front and extra buttons on the side. The little pot at the front can be used to steam poach eggs, steam scramble eggs or make a mini omelet. In addition you can also to warm up bacon, sausage, ham etc. while you are cooking the eggs. The coolest part in case you want to make your own Egg Mcmuffin, is that the buttons on the side allow you to time the whole production so that when your muffin pops up, your eggs are done.

It is just a neat and quick way to make poached eggs, hard boil eggs, or make an entire breakfast sandwich in an easy and less mess way. If you eat this type of stuff for breakfast and want a fun cooking toy, give this thing a try.

Visit the web page for a movies and better pictures.

http://www.eggandmuffintoaster.com/

Favorite recipe web page

Allrecipes.com has got to be one of the slickest recipe web pages you can find. I can always find any recipe I am looking for here. The extras are what make it so neat though.

You can create a profile for free and then save recipes you find in your “recipe box”. You can also create “shopping lists” based on the recipes you choose. When you view the shopping list you can de-select the items you already have on hand and then print out the list to take shopping with you. Another feature is to change the recipe serving size. Have you ever seen a recipe you like but it makes 8 servings and there are only 2 in your house? On each recipe page there is the option to change the serving size and it adjusts the ingredient measurements for you. This is handy for making recipes yield smaller or larger servings.

But enough with technology. This recipe is from Grandmas recipe box and is written in pen, there is no help with yields on the card. Simpler times!

I had some cranberries in my freezer and I am going to thaw them to make this recipe.

Cranberry-Orange Tea Bread

2 cups flour
1 ½ teaspoons Baking powder
½ teaspoon soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
½ cup chopped nuts
2 cups fresh cranberries- chopped
grated rind of 1 orange and juice
¼ cup Oleo (grandma used oleo, margarine or butter works)
1 egg- well beaten
Preheat oven to 325 degrees

In mixing bowl, stir together flour baking powder, soda, salt, sugar, nuts and cranberries.
Combine rind, juice and enough water to make ¾ cup
Beat in to first mixture until dampened and completely mixed
Pour into greased 9×5x3 loaf pan and bake in pre-heated oven for 1 hour 10 minutes Toothpick test to make sure it’s done (insert a toothpick near the center, if it comes out clean, it’s done)
Let it cool for 10 minutes
Turn out on to a cooling rack

Will keep for about 1 week.

I hope everyone likes this one. Grandma made it a lot.