A few weeks ago I bought a bunch of new kitchen appliances online, and they started to slowly trickle in. I got a cheapo blender, because I didn't want to pay for the one that I really want; a small 4 cup food processor; and a dehydrator; then I 'inherited' a bread maker from my parents. Also, for my last birthday (in July) H bought me the ingredients to make homemade vegetable based soap. So, for the past couple weeks I've been playing house!
I started with the bread maker. I went hunting for wonderful bread recipes. I have recipes for desert bread, wheat bread, sandwich bread, french bread, sourdough bread, fruit bread, pizza dough... anything you could imagine. The first one I made tasted delicious, but the yeast messed up somehow and it never rose. It was as dense as a rock. We nibbled and then tossed it in the trash. Then I successfully made a blueberry oatmeal bread that rocked my socks, and then an nut bread that we used for sandwiches for a week. I'm 2 for 2 so far with successes in my bread maker. One day I'll get good at it.
A few days before Thanksgiving, I made a white bean soup that was delicious, if I do say so myself. I had to finely chop onion, carrots, garlic, tomatoes (which was a disaster) so I got to use my food processor. Then I added bay leaves, oregano, cilantro, and half pureed (in my blender!) half whole white beans. YUMMM!
Also, two weekends ago I spent the afternoon chopping and dicing to make some dehydrated snacks. The dehydrator worked wonderfully. I sliced red and green apples - the granny smith are perfect for this - and made apple chips; I also dehydrated bananas, which were more difficult to slice thin enough to dehydrate successfully. Then I did some red bell peppers, and I plan on dehydrating carrots and oranges as well. Best of all, I made 100% fruit, no sugar added fruit leather. It's like healthy fruit roll ups. The simplest way is to just pour a layer of apple sauce on the screens that lay on top of the dehydrator trays. It was so successful that next time I'd like to puree more fruits, like bananas, citrus and berries, to add to the apple sauce.
Now, for the most fun part. H and I made vegetable based soap last week. Our recipe included almost mostly olive oil, and then the rest made up of coconut oil, jojoba oil, and sweet almond oil. We scented it with lavender and peppermint. There are a few systems of soap making; we used lye to create the chemical reaction with the oils, that makes something called 'trace' which is, essentially, the point where the mixture begins to become creamy and harden. For the number of things that can go wrong when making soap, I was so ecstatic that our first attempt was successful.
Our soap is now hardening in our guest room, and it smells awesome. The only, very minor, hiccup in this all is that we didn't have wax paper to line our mold with so the soap has been sitting upside down on a table for over a week, and is still stuck in the mold. Hmmm. After we leap that hurdle, I plan to gift most of the soap for Christmas stockings. I also have recipes for liquid soaps that sound amazing. I can make shampoo, dish soap, puppy soap, hand soap... I'm never buying soap again.
Photos of some of my homemaking adventures are soon to come!
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