A moving addendum: the kitchen slims down, like it or not

We had some plans for the things that would go with us to the new place. Some of those ideas have gotten a bit nipped in the bud recently.

We weren't going to take the microwave, for space reasons and because we knew it was probably not going to last much longer, but it conveniently died a couple of weeks ago before we got around to dealing with it. We went out and bought an extra electric kettle for heating water. (Our old one is at the apartment.)

We were going to take the toaster oven, but it turns out that the best space for it is too close to the fridge, and we were reluctant to take up any of the rest of the kitchen real estate with it. Besides, there is a brand-new stove/oven in the apartment. Mr. Fixit went out and bought a toaster. (Pattern here?)

We were going to take the bread machine (I love my bread machine), but we did buy a stand mixer with dough hook at the thrift store, last winter. Because of storage issues and the age of the bread machine (it came from a yard sale almost four years ago), we have decided to send it to e-waste as well.

When we said new adventures, I wasn't expecting this much of a turnover in gadgetry. But better to figure it out now, I guess, than to have a storage room full of half-working kitchen gear.

Saturday thrifting: we found a mixer

At the thrift shop this afternoon, Mr. Fixit found us a stand mixer, one of the last generation made in the U.S. before production went overseas. It has two glass bowls, and all its beaters and dough hooks. Our hand mixer is twenty-five years old, so it's  time for a replacement. And a stand mixer with a dough hook could also replace our bread machine, if or when that's needed.

A plum-purple purse for me (the photo makes it look darker than it is). An extra, not a need, but a nice extra.

Something else that's better than this snapshot makes it look: a big scarf, a Linnea-in-Monet's-Garden mix of purple and green and all those things. I saw it by accident when I was helping Mr. Fixit carry the mixer parts from the back of the store. My justification is that if I ever get tired of wearing it, it would make a great table scarf.

The thing I was really after and did need: a lightweight denim-type shirt. 

So, a more-than-expectedly successful thrifting trip.

In recent yard saling

The past two weeks of yard-saling have been minimal for me--there just wasn't much that I was looking for. We were short on time last Saturday, so our stop at a rummage sale had to be a quick one: I found a 1990's crocheting book (did we ever really wear sweaters with Christmas lightbulbs appliqued across the shoulders?), and a big hardcover copy of Things Cooks Love. Not that I'm so adventurous with kitchen gadgets, but it looked like fun.

The only other thing that came home lately (other than a few finds for Mr. Fixit) was a set of queen-size sheets for our bed, by accident. We were at a clearing-out-a-house sale, and I saw some dark green sheets that I thought might work either as Christmas tablecloths or just for fabric. I bought two sheets (there weren't any pillowcases) for three dollars, not worrying about what size they were. When I got them home and washed them, they turned out to be queen size and in quite decent shape, except for a stain in the middle of the top sheet, where you wouldn't want it for a tablecloth but also where you'd  never see it on the bed when it's covered with a blanket. So there you go.

What are the really basic cooking skills?

This is not a new post, but I'd never seen it before, and the comments are interesting (and I don't think there are any really rude ones). What should everybody (that is, not every cook, just every normal person) know how to do in a kitchen?

I agree with the one comment that everybody, no matter what their circumstances or food style, should know how to make three different main meals more or less from scratch, something simple but decent enough that they could also feed a friend or two. It's a reasonable-enough don't-leave-home-without-it goal, and it's one that they could probably learn from just one issue of a family or food magazine. If you have and use tools like a slow cooker, this can be even easier. Our Treehouse classic: open lid, put in sauerkraut, put in meat, put on lid, plug in, turn on.  Cook.

What's your personal survival list?  What do kids need to learn so that they don't end up like this poor guy on the Possum 911 line?  (Fast-forward to 13:27.)

The Organized Kitchen: toaster ovens, leftovers, menu planning

Mama Squirrel likes any kitchen ideas that make life easier and give her more time to do important things. (Like play checkers with Crayons.) Here are a couple of squirrel kitchen tips.

1. We are a microwave-less family, not so much by principle as just by the fact that we've never owned one and have never felt we really needed one. What we've always had, though, besides the big oven, is a toaster oven. Originally we had one from Mama Squirrel's previous life (before squirrelings), but when that eventually went kaput we acquired a more modern programmable one. It actually looks (and beeps) like a microwave.

The advantages to having more than one source of oven heat are that you can bake two things at different temperatures if you need to (like baked beans at 350 degrees and a pan of biscuits at 450), and that you don't have to heat up the big oven if you're cooking a small amount of something. We have a lidded casserole that just fits into the toaster oven space, and we've also baked many things in it in an 8-inch square pan. About the only things we haven't baked in it are cookies (our pans are too big), muffins (although I do bake muffin batter in it, in an 8-inch pan), and any recipe big enough to need one of our plus-size casseroles.

And it also makes toast.

2. Menu Planning: Mama Squirrel's current binge of planned-ahead meals is in its third week, and she's discovered something that makes this planning easier. The Squirrels always shop on Saturdays (and it's not usually possible to make another trip during the week). This means that certain foods are more plentiful, say, from Saturday to Wednesday. By Wednesday, the bananas are gone, the cold cuts are eaten up, and so on. So: our week's menu starts on Wednesday, rather than on the more obvious Saturday. I can plan the meals from Wednesday to Friday based on what's still left in the fridge and the cupboard, and make sure that anything we need for the after-shopping days on goes on the grocery list. If I want to make banana muffins, I write them in for sometime after Saturday, and make sure I buy bananas.

Of course this does mess up the lovely menu forms that you can print out online (nobody's menu form starts on Wednesday), but still it's working.

3. Favourite kitchen tools: a four-cup glass measuring cup (you can mix all kinds of things right in it), sharp scissors (for cutting open those irritating, harder-than-ever-to-open cereal box liners), clothes pins (for pinning all the opened bags back together again), lots of measuring spoons (check thrift shops), a rubber spatula, and a decent can opener. Mama Squirrel has had better luck with the first few than with that last one. Cheap can openers rust and bend, and even the expensive one we once bought doesn't cut the way it used to. Inventors of kitchen improvements: there is a niche there that needs to be filled.

Oh, and a permanent marker. You need one handy if you're going to be putting leftovers in margarine tubs or other non-see-through containers. There's nothing like opening a container of yogurt and getting diced tomatoes instead..