The Kitchen: all things delicious and disastrous

Aon: Get an air-popper. Wonderful things— they won't burn the popcorn and they don't leave half of it unpopped, either. And as a bonus, a pound bag of real popcorn costs a little more than one packet of microwave popcorn and makes a lot more.

I've had no toaster disasters to speak of, however, you know how you're not supposed to put a fork in a toaster?

I once, rather stupidly put a knife in a blender.. whilst it was on. Electrocuted myself. It did not give me super powers though I am more prone to friction shocks then ever before...

In general you're not supposed to poke anything conductive in a toaster. Not good because it can short them out.

We have a very nice stainless-steel Dualit upright toaster. It doesn't seem like you can easily buy an American toaster of that quality without it being WAY expensive and intended for restaurants.

And we needed a new blender....

NEEDED. Needed a blender. We have a bad-ass Black & Decker dual processor now, in the end everything turned out well.

I'm not so trusting of all these microwave recipes I see online every now and then, are they some kind of urban-legend if they work?

They work for certain dubious values of "work", I believe.

Good blenders are worth it. We have a powerful kitchenaid one that handles pretty much anything I throw at it.

Maddy: Truly now...This must be kept in mind.

I am making flank steak rolls tonight with a provolone onion and spinach filling. Gonna be AMAZING.

I'll be doing something Mexican-related tonight. Not quite sure what.

I will be eating Hot Pockets for dinner tonight.

@Funny: Arepas or Empanadas are always good.

It will probably be fajitas actually. Trying to get my family to do anything more interesting and different than enchiladas never succeeds.

What kind of Fajitas?

Fajitas with ground beef like stuff and onions and peppers.

oh man beef rolls turned out awesome.

I need to make a dinner disaster soon so that Greg stops taking me for granted. :D

I'm watching Extra Virgin on the Cooking Channel and am inspired by Gabrielli's recipe for Limoncello. It might be kind of fun to do infused alcohol samplers for the Christmas gift exchange.

A friend of mine makes her own limoncello. It's delicious.

Do that and some kind of berry infused and maybe cherry. Hmmmm. I'll keep it in mind throughout the growing season.

I generally just make clove vodka; i.e. throw about a dozen cloves into a full bottle of vodka, leave it somewhere out of reach for a few months, and then deliciousness.

Just cloves and vodka? Hmmmm, another idea.

sounds way spicey

Yep. Nice if you like the taste of cloves, which I do. One could also do cinnamon or cinnamon/clove. Vanilla is also easy to do, toss in a whole vanilla pod or two.

I could do a winter sampler and a summer sampler. The spices for winter and fruit for summer.

vanilla would be nice, might try that one.

I'm up in the air with Vodka, sometimes I love it, sometimes I hate it.

Maybe I'll play around with pairings. Clear alcohols with fruit and bourbon with the spices.