Same Day No Knead Bread

For those of you that don’t want to wait, here’s a no knead bread that takes about 90 minutes from bowl to bake. I’m usually busy doing other stuff and just let it sit longer than an hour, but if you’re in a pinch, you can rush it along.

(Recipe Below)

Same Day No Knead Bread

INGREDIENTS

6 c. flour
1 T. salt
1 T. yeast
1/2 tsp. sugar
3 c. warm water (about 130 degrees)

Mix dry ingredients in bowl. Add water. Mix, scraping down the sides; cover with plastic wrap and set aside in a non-drafty place for an hour (or 6+ hours if you’re doing other things).

Place dutch oven in your oven and preheat to 450.

While it’s pre-heating, stir your dough again, scraping down the sides, then transfer to a piece of parchment, then put parchment and dough back in your bowl (this helps for easy transfer in a minute). Cover it with a towel while you wait for oven to pre-heat OR about 20 minutes.

Once oven is at temp, dust the top of the dough and make a few cuts in it (or not), and then transfer dough to HOT pot. Cover an bake @ 450 for 30 min. with lid on, then remove lid and bake 10 more minutes to brown (I move to a baking sheet for all-over “brownness” – but you can leave in the DO if you’d like.

Enjoy the heck out of that bread!

Avocado On Toast

Another obsession. Avocado on toast.

I love toast. I love avocado. Those two together, harmony.

One avocado makes enough for a couple day’s worth of 1oz. servings. I take 1 avocado, blended with lime and salt and stored it in a container in the fridge. In the morning (or afternoon, or night):

Avocado on Toast
1 piece of whole wheat toast
1 ounce avacado spread
7 grams bacon crumbles (optional, but yummy)

The possibilities are endless. Slide a fried egg under there. Mmm.

Walgreens Haul 4/16/12

This post is about coupons, Walgreens and Register Rewards.

I haven’t been to Walgreens for a while. My obsession with that store goes in waves. It begins with a some good deals, sheer excitement. Register Rewards, sales, and coupons that stack up to fantastic savings. I feel rich, high, excitement! I’ve made multiple trips to the stores, stocked, stacked and multiplied my savings. The week ends with Rewards still in my hand, armed and ready for the next week.

There is nothing. No sales, no excitement, nothing to add to my bounty.

Followed by a week where there looks to be some good deals, but since I don’t stand on Monday mornings, waiting for the store to open, all the stock is gone (or worse yet, there WAS NO STOCK on the best deals). I run my triangle of stores (they are close, so I’m not wasting too much gas, just time and sanity) and leave empty-handed. I’m furious with Walgreens, and tell myself I’m done. I’m hanging up my Walgreens monthly coupon book, Register Rewards and I’m not checking any blogs to see what deals are steals this week.

And I don’t. And then I find the expired Register Reward in my purse a week later, and kick myself for snipping off my own nose to spite my face.

Not  all times does my lag in Walgreens visits begin and end in the scenario above. Sometimes I am simply too busy to clip, watch, and save. I miss out on deals, my coupons expire. It happens. This week, however, with wrestling season officially behind me, soccer season yet to start, I had more time. My stash from last fall is dwindling. The deals matched my coupons and my mood. I made a Walgreens run.

My main stash-dwindling issues are pictured: toilet paper, disinfecting wipes, dish detergent. The NasalEase was the deali-o, the tomato paste a filler.

The real savings here is that the NasalEase is on sale for $9 and comes with a $9 Register Reward (so FREE but you pay tax). I also had a $5 off coupon, with makes this one a $4 money maker. That is good stuff. The Lysol wipes are on sale for $2/6. The packs I found were buy 1 get 1 free. So I got 4 for the price of 1. PLUS, I had a $1 off coupon. So I got them even cheaper. Score. The Dawn is on sale for $.99, and I had a .$50 off coupon for that.

So I got:
2 Dawn
3 Hunts
12 Lysol Wipes
4 packs of toilet paper
3 NasalEase

All for under $18.63. PLUS I still have a Register Reward for $9. So, really more like $9.63.

Not bad. Not bad at all.

2012 Book List

The Hunger Games


I did not expect this to interest me at all. But, one day when one of the boys put it down in the car, I picked it up and started to read it. It had me, I looked forward to reading it each time and I finished it.

The Lovely Bones

1/2
This was a book club read. It wasn’t horrific, but it wasn’t my cup of tea. I’ll be honest, the whole “heaven” thing threw me off a bit and didn’t jive with my vision of it. Not that that is the end all, be all, but it seemed more like she was in purgatory. That said, it should bring about some interesting discussion amongst the ladies at book club.

A Heart of Stone


This is probably not the book to follow-up with after reading The Lovely Bones, as it deals with… some similar circumstances. Sort of. Stand alone it was still probably a “two” for me just because it was OK. I wouldn’t stop someone from reading it but wouldn’t gush over it either. It would have made a good discussion book, though, for a book club.

A Yellow Raft in Blue Water

  1/2
This was an interesting book. I didn’t have the stellar reaction that some people had, but I liked it enough.

Catching Fire (The Hunger Games, Book 2)


If you liked The Hunger Games like I did, this is worth a read. I was told the second and third book were the best. I haven’t read the third yet, but I would say that the second book in the trilogy is at least as interesting as the first. I plan on reading the third book, too, after a little bit of a “book break” from the series.

Reading

The Memory of Running

Happy Thanksgiving (And A Free MP3)

Happy Thanksgiving all.

Something to be thankful for? FREE Mp3 for Amazon Students

A deal too good not to share. Realizing it doesn’t apply to all, probably most, ignore that part and take my Thanksgiving greeting. We’re off to the cousin’s for some gobble-gobble goodness. My morning has been spent drinking coffee, making pumpkin bread. It’s hard not to have the smells of Thanksgiving festivity in the house (since I’m not hosting). The bread helped with that problem.

Peace, love and gratitude for an abundance of joy.

Attempting A Two-Strand Twist

I don’t know why I bothered trying. I mean, really. It is hard enough for me to manage a french braid, let alone anything else. But, since I’ve been trying new things on my hair, I thought… why not? (I can give you reasons, but it is too late now.)

Seven dollars later, I’m armed with a sectioning comb (something I could have done with a regular comb) and some hair ties. I skipped on purchasing a specific hair product to style my hair, though. I figured I was already deeper in than I should be. I re-wet my hair a bit, got out the tub of IC Hair Gel and went to town.

I’ma tell you straight up, my hair isn’t a big fan of gel. So I was scared. But I needed something with a little hold. In my quest to simplify, I haven’t been purchasing much in the ways of styling products, and have been using up what I have on the boys. So, the IC Gel was it.

The minute I sectioned off my hair, I knew the girl in the video was a pro and I… well, I wasn’t. I immediately felt the frustration of a novice as my hands fumbled with the strands and my twists looked like child’s play. But I couldn’t just stop.

I made four horrific twists(mangles) in my hair, secured them all, held a mirror up to see the front and back, and then angrily ripped each one out. Mentally spanking myself, I detangled my gel-laden hair, holding back a whimper of defeat. I had lost. I knew it. I was at terms with it.

Defeated but not broken, I knew I could either wash my hair again (not a good idea since it was close to bedtime) or “set it” to dry. I decided on two twisted buns (basically two low pigtails, twisted until they are buns behind my ears, secured). One was up a bit higher than the other, but I was at a point where caring wasn’t priority. I went on about my business, hoping that I wouldn’t look too horrid the next day since I had to work.. I slept with my bonnet on, per the norm.

The next day I released the pigtails and did little else, but a little head tossing. Here was the morning look:

 

I did flat-iron the bangs. Excuse the blinding glare reflected by my forehead.

I wasn’t entirely unhappy. It was different from the usual (either flat-ironed or air-dried), and I welcomed the change. It wasn’t 100% dry, though. My hair takes forever to dry. I contemplated hitting it with the blowdryer, but thought that might be a bad idea. Throughout the day I fluffed it up a little bit. I couldn’t get a decent picture of it, though.

This was later in the day, completely dry, after fluffing.

 

I’ve let my hair dry like this before. It’s nice to revisit again as an option. It looks OK and I like it for something different. Since I just had my hair relaxed last week, my top was pretty flat. I’m not ditching the two-strand twists just yet, but I need a bit more time to review some tutorials.

Wah I’m Sick

Still not feeling so great. Have a cold that settled in my throat and bronchial tube, runny nose. Stayed in bed all day, except for the shower. Watched a lot of TV, thankful for the laptop. Hate being sick. Five days off of work and I have to feel cruddy.

Contemplating forcing myself to go to a movie with Frank. The kids (3 youngest) are saying at their cousin’s house tonight and the oldest is hanging with his girlfriend. Would be a nice night for us to do a little something. We’ll see.