Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Baffle Me

  Recently I've noticed a few things that cause me ask why.  Why? 10X mirror? I mean, without it, I'd never be able to do my eyebrows again. So I appreciate this little product. But when I occasionally look up, down, left of right of my eyebrows I get a little start. Let's just say 10X mirrors magnify the good, the bad and the saggy to way bigger than life.

And then I am totally baffled by the object in the picture. I have three climate knobs and they each have the identical raised pattern. So I'm wondering. It can't be braille for a few reasons. 1) a person who reads braille should probably not be driving. 2) If all three knobs have the identical markings it can't be for identification purposes. 3) You push the entire knob and so anywhere you hit is going to get results. So, why?

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ First Snow for Pups

For some reason the snow and arrival of winter weather threw me. I mean, I live in an area that certainly gives huge clues of climate changes. And winter comes every stinkin year. There are degrees of winter, but, it isn't a "hmmmm, did we have winter this year?" kind of a place. Ya know. 

I spose I shoulda prepared the pups. But I just didn't think I needed to. Yet. 

Here are the degrees of winter awareness and acceptance. In this instance there are four degrees. 

The first response was porch statuing. That is where they refused to move and turned to stone. Once I stepped out into the white foreign substance they followed. (They'd probably make me test their food and drink if they could speak and owned scepters. No, wait. I think they do consider me a food tester. Except I'm eating people food that they legitimately think is theirs.)

Second was the discovery phase where they basked in the newness of it all. Many minutes in the still silence of the gray blanket of cold were punctuated with deep sniffing and snoodling. 

Thirdly was the discovery of this amazing, miraculous substance's perks. It's edible. Thin layers of it could be broken off and consumed. Greedy snow grazing commenced.

Finally, the marking of the snow. This is their snow. Nobody but nobody needs to doubt that. 

At least they didn't stand and bark at it. 

Scraps and Snippets ~ Okay, Not Pretty, But EASY and Pretty Tasty ~ Vegan Chili Cheese Dogs

This is one of those almost embarrassing recipes. You know, open a bag, toss in a canned item, apply heat, Bammo!

Vegan Chili Cheese Dogs

1 Package LightLife Smart Dogs (Or other of choice) (8 dogs)

1 16 ounce can of chili spiced beans (I used chili sauced pinto beans)

Approx 1/2 Cup shredded Vegan cheese (I used Daiya's Pepperjack) 

Hot dog buns

Toppings: 

Ketchup

Mustard

chopped onions

dill or sweet pickle relish

Preheat oven to 350. Semi-slice the hot dogs longwise down the middle. Slice only half way through the dog. Open the dog and lay sliced side down and pop in the oven for about 10 minutes. I'd line the pan with parchment paper or grease the pan, as my hot dogs stuck a bit. 

This will heat the hot dog through a bit and give a nice warm surface for the beans and cheese. 

Flip the hot dogs over and spoon beans over the dogs. Sprinkle cheese over them. With vegan cheese, in my opinion, less is better. 

Place the pan back in the oven for 14 minutes. If desired, turn oven to broil until cheese is fully melted. 

Open hot dog buns, slide a chili dog onto each bun and top as desired.

Scraps and Snippets ~ Chocolate Fudge Cake Two Ways.

 This is the chocolate fudge decadent cake I made for my brother and sister-in-laws' wedding in October. It was dense, fudge, moist and delicious. All that was left on the plate was a few smears. 

A week or so later the little kids and I whipped up a batch as cupcakes. Delicious. Even after the near misses that happen when 7, 5 and 3 year olds are involved in a baking process. And even though the batch made enough cupcakes we had some several days out. 

Chocolate Fudge Cake and Cupcakes 

27-32 cupcakes (60ish mini cupcakes) or 3 round or 8 x 8 layers

2 1/2 Cups sugar

1 Cup and 2 TBSP of Earth Balance or coconut oil or mix

3 teaspoons baking powder

1+ teaspoon salt

1 Cup cocoa powder

1 1/2 Cups strong hot coffee

1 1/2 Cups milk of choice (chocolate soy or almond adds a nice punch)

1/2 Cup chocolate chips

3 TBSP apple cider vinegar

2 teaspoons vanilla

In small bowl place milk and vinegar, set aside. In an additional small bowl pour the hot coffee over the chocolate chips and stir on and off until they are melted, add vanilla and set aside. Cream butter substitute and sugar together. Add salt and baking powder and mix well. Add the milk and vinegar mixture and incorporate. Pour in chocolate mixture and mix and finally mix in the flour and stir until the flour is fully mixed in. 

Grease and flour pans or line cupcake pans. 

Preheat oven to 350. Pour the batter into the pans equally or fill the cupcake liners almost 2/3rds full. 

Bake 20-25 minutes testing the cake/cupcakes with a knife that should come out clean for cakes. Cupcakes bake for 15-18 minutes (mini cupcakes 12-14 minutes) 

Remove and let cool

Frosting. 

Ratios because I do something different every stinking time: 

Approximately 1 cup vegan butter, vegan cream cheese or shortening to 3 cups powdered sugar (for fudge frosting use 2/3 or to taste cup of cocoa for powdered sugar). A splash of vanilla (about 1 teaspoon) (if you want wedding frosting taste use a half splash of almond extract, too)  Mix well. Add more powdered sugar or cocoa if wet or if too stiff add a TBSP or so of non-dairy milk (or coffee if you are making fudge and want mocha frosting) until you get the consistency you want. 

When the cake or cupcakes are cooled, frost. For the raspberry wedding cake I had washed and dried 2 cups of raspberries and placed them on the frosted cake. I then melted 1 cup of chocolate chips in a heated 2/3 Cup of non-dairy milk. Then drizzle over the raspberries and cake layers. 

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ NaNOWriMO Will I or Won't I?

So. I have two major reasons I'm not participating in NaNoWriMo this year. 

Can you guess what they might be? 

Scraps and Snippets ~ Garlic Rosemary Pumpkin Biscuits

Garlic Rosemary Pumpkin Biscuits

2 Cups flour (with additional for rolling dough - I used whole wheat pastry flour)

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder (if you use garlic salt skip the salt)

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon chopped dried rosemary (or try sage)

⅓ Cup butter, margarine or shortening

¾ Cup pumpkin (don’t get pumpkin pie filling because that has sweet seasonings)

¼ Cup water or milk

Preheat oven to 450.

Mix flour, baking powder, salt, garlic and rosemary together. With a fork cut in the fat until the mixture resembles coarse uniform meal. Mix pumpkin with milk/water in a small bowl. Pour into the flour mixture and stir until mixed and the dough pulls away from the bowl. (This doesn’t take long, basically once the dry disappears it’s ready) Pat the dough into a circle about a ½ inch thick on a flour dusted surface. Use a glass rim or biscuit cutter dipped in flour to cut out circles. Scoop up the remaining dough and flatten and repeat. You’ll get approx 10 biscuits. Bake at 450 for 12 minutes.

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ And We Helped

I said helped, not yelped. Though there was a wee bit of vocalizing. 

I took the girls to go vote yesterday. 

Can I just RAVE about dog seat belts? Amazing invention. One end clicks into the seatbelt buckle. The other attaches to the collar or harness rings. They can stand on their hind legs and stick their heads out the window, get down on the floor, wrestle, etc, but they are restrained. LOVE. 

So I seat belted them in and they sucked wind (ha, ha) for the five mile trip. Then I left them with a window rolled down for fresh air. The temperature was perfect, very low 60s. I came out five whole minutes later wondering what they did while I was inside. They were perfect angels. (I think) No one came stumbling into the building looking like they had gotten a sneak-bark attack. 

They both needed a nap after the adventure though. And a treat, of course.