Whenever I hear the words “active” and “passive” used in the same sentence, my mind immediately goes to the sense of someone trying to sell me on some idea in which, if I actively invest now, I will be able to sit back and collect passive income from that investment. I tend to be 100% cynical about those types of offers, so when I hear or see one, I’m immediately tuned out – no interest – not quite that dumb – ain’t gettin’ my money –
Recently, while I was writing and researching about depression (my last post), I came across an article that stated that what some people think is depression in someone is simply someone who lives a passive lifestyle. I’ve vaguely mentioned having someone be concerned about my socialization, or lack thereof. I’ve been struggling with that thought, and I did recently recognize that in the 7-1/2 years I’ve lived in Pennsburg, my socialization (lack of) has been the same! I’m having difficulty understanding why this is suddenly an issue, all the while realizing that this person’s life has had some major changes recently, and it’s HER lifestyle that has changed, not mine, and just because I don’t want to do the things she does to keep herself occupied doesn’t mean I don’t socialize. I mentioned in my last blog that I’m not interested in making new acquaintances simply because we share a commonality. I also don’t consider every person I’ve ever interacted with a friend just because I know him/her.
For 7-1/2 years, I have gone to appointments for hair, nails and all things medical. I am a ‘regular’ at my grocery store of choice, so I’ve gotten to know a few of the employees well enough to have a small interaction when possible. I make an occasional run to Walmart (when necessary) and go to the Dollar Tree store since it’s right there too. I occasionally go to the UPS store if I have to ship something or have an Amazon return. For several years, my bestie and I tried to meet for lunch on the last Friday of every month at her quitting time from work so we could spend time together one-on-one. I am on Facebook and involved actively in two groups – one about books and reading (DOH!) and one about things Pennsylvania Dutch. Honestly, I think I get plenty of socialization just being on social media!
And then, I have a great deal of socialization in this blogging world. I’m getting to know people and learn about people by the blogs they write and by the way they respond to my blog. I never really thought about it before, but there some bloggers to whom I’m loyal, whose every blog I see posted by them is one I will go to read, regardless of the topic. Every blog post is a chance to see beyond the computer screen to the person putting their words out there, and that makes me recognize that I am socializing, just not face-to-face.
So, okay, I live a passive lifestyle, but that doesn’t mean I am a passive person. My brother is probably the only one in the people who know me who know that I have a very reactive temper, and that occasionally it takes over my sanity. In those moments, when vitriol is known to make itself available for assistance, I’ve allowed it. In that way, I am very much like my mother, but at a much lower scale. When one of us children would do something to raise her anger level, she tended to punish first and find out the details later. I abhor physical abuse to children by adults for that reason alone. I am also very aggressive when I see someone hurting someone I care about, physically or verbally. I may not be a mama bear, but I have the instincts of one!
I recently (two days ago) found an article that is very accurate in showing who I am. The article is called If These 11 Things Describe You, You’re Probably A Low-Key Introvert (bolde.com), and I clearly see myself in 9 of the 11 things listed (excluding #7 and #8). I rather like that naming of it, and this article doesn’t exist because I’m the only one (there is safety in numbers, right?).
Therefore, I wish to go on record about three things of which I’m certain:
I (CONTENTEDLY) LIVE A PASSIVE LIFESTYLE, and
I AM A LOW-KEY INTROVERT and
I AM OKAY WITH BOTH OF THOSE THINGS ABOUT MYSELF WITH NO PLANS FOR CHANGE.
DISCLOSURE: This post will discuss depression both at a factual level and at a personal level. If this kind of content is in any way upsetting to you to read, please close the post without continuing to read.
I’m not certain that anyone who has lived or lives with depression is all that excited that depression gets its own awareness month. I suppose that November is the logical month, since this is the time of year when S.A.D. (Seasonal Affective Disorder) occurs for some people. S.A.D. is psychologically labeled as a form of depression. Its onset is thought to be because less daylight may trigger a chemical change in the brain leading to symptoms of depression.
S.A.D. became an actual diagnosis in 1984. However, although at the time it was not named nor recognized, I first experienced the symptoms of it in fall of 1975. I wasn’t ever naturally perky, vivacious and outgoing, so I only knew that I tended to feel noticeably melancholy, and I adjusted to the feeling so that it became ‘normal’. While I did feel more “down” than usual, it wasn’t a big deal because I didn’t live my life as “up”. It was only when the feeling started occurring annually, usually sometime between the last week of September and the first week of October, that I recognized the pattern.
I wasn’t officially diagnosed as suffering through S.A.D. until I was in my early 50s, when I ended up with a doctor who listened to me mention the annual onset of melancholy as I had told every new doctor who had previously undertaken my care. When Jenn listened, heard me and nodded in understanding, labeling what I went through with a name and assuring me that many people suffer in the same way, I was finally able to understand it and begin to accept it. I learned to bundle up and get outside on sunny days from September through February, raise my face up directly at the sun, close my eyes and just be for a few moments. Now, every year, I recognize the melancholy at its onset, and know that it’s temporary and it’s not a bad reflection on me. And people don’t notice the mood I’m in because I’ve perfected wearing the mask of happy, perky, etc. in public, a mask I needed to form and wear in order to survive 20+ years on the front line in the hotel industry.
I’ve had a few times in my life where I was very depressed, but those were always times when there was a BIG change in my life that impacted me enough to struggle with whether I wanted to keep going. My friend Melissa, who also suffers with clinical depression (100% chemical imbalance in her brain), once said, “I don’t want to kill myself. I just don’t want to go on living this way anymore.”
Exactly! I have no desire to commit suicide, and to be honest, here is probably the biggest reason: There was a man in the church my family moved to after we were all adults. It was a larger church than the small one I grew up in (where everybody knew everybody else’s business). I was living about 35 minutes from “home”, but I tried to join my mother at least once a month for a church service. At the very first service, I noticed a man wearing a blue mask and I asked my mom why with curiosity. The answer was nothing I would have expected. This man wore this mask whenever he was around people, because he had terrible scars on his lower face and mouth area. And those scars came from the fact that he attempted to swallow a gun but didn’t succeed. Think about that again – a man put a gun into his mouth with the intention of committing suicide, pulled the trigger, and somehow the bullet went down in aim far enough to slip between two vertebrae in his neck. His face and mouth were so disfigured because he hadn’t pushed the gun very far into his mouth and the recoil caused the injuries.
Yes, that’s a horrible story to know, but what I came away with from it is that suicide can fail. Truly, I realized that if I were to attempt – and fail – it would be the ultimate way in which I could disappoint my parents, and I knew the guilt of that would eat me alive. So, I have made a pledge that I will not commit suicide and have even said to my PCP, “I won’t commit suicide, because with my luck, I’d fail.”
In 2017, I suffered what would be diagnosed as a major depressive episode. (Again, I’ve never been a perky extrovert, but I never thought of myself as depressed, either!). It was the end of January when I actually could feel that I was depressed – not suicidal – but really doing nothing more than barely existing. Personal hygiene became something I cared nothing about. I didn’t read, didn’t watch TV, ate sporadically and mostly just sat. Melissa’s words came back to me – “I just don’t to go on living this way.” And yes, there was a small difficult emotion playing into that time – an action by someone that intellectually made sense, but emotionally made me feel completely forgotten and uncared for.
As a result of that episode, I now take an antidepressant in addition to the one I take for S.A.D. And I still have issues with motivation at times, but I recognize now that the lack of being motivated for physical activity is 90% because of my health, and not my mental state. I can lay awake while I wait for Mr. Sandman and actually see myself doing a whole bunch of things when I get up the next day. Well, you probably have heard the saying that “the path to hell is paved with good intentions…”
That’s the Readers Digest Condensed Version of my personal experience with depression. Now on to some facts I’d like to share:
Depression is considered a high-functioning mental illness. High-functioning mental illness is a term used to describe those living with a mental illness that most people don’t detect.
Approximately 3.8% of the population experience depression, including 5% of adults (4% among men and 6% among women), and 5.7% of adults older than 60 years. That means that approximately 280 million people in the world suffer from depression. It’s interesting to note, however, that only 7 million of that population have been officially diagnosed and are, or have, received treatment for that diagnosis.
When I was growing up, there was a stigma associated with needing help with the feeling of depression, whether through therapy, medication or both. People who couldn’t seem to deal with things that life threw at them without needing help were thought to be weak. And at a time in society where outward impressions were a big priority, people didn’t seek help because they didn’t want to risk having someone(s) in their peer group finding out and thus being labeled as weak.
There are two basic types of depression. Depression that stems from a traumatic event or events can be helped by spending time with a qualified therapist who can help work through the many and varied emotions around a specific event(s). Some may only need short-term therapy sessions to understand the emotions behind the depression and learn to accept and manage those emotions. For some, that therapy opens up a can of hidden emotions from other events or situations, and the therapeutic sessions may run for a longer time. Others may suffer with a chemical imbalance within the brain often brought on with a change in hormonal balance within the body or faulty mood regulation within the brain. Spending time with a qualified therapist can help determine if the depression is emotionally based or chemically based. If chemically based, you will be referred to a psychiatrist who will be able to work with you to find medications that can help balance the brain’s chemical measurements and bring relief.
These are facts that many people have heard or heard enough about to recognize depression as an illness. But it seems that their recognition is as far as their grasp goes. Depression can be well-hidden from those around us. Those of us who are diagnosed but still able to function in daily life, do tend to keep the diagnosis well-hidden, because the diagnosis itself makes us feel vulnerable.
I am clinically diagnosed with depression, and only because I annually experience S.A.D. to some degree and have had an episode of major depression (documented by my request in my medical chart), am I willing to accept (more or less) the diagnosis. But I don’t feel depressed. Oh, I may have a moment now and again when something happens that makes me sad, but I don’t carry around depression on my shoulders. When asked by someone why I’m not more social, it’s truthful to say that I am most content when I am by myself. To be around strangers for a specific reason sounds like a waste of time for me, because it doesn’t allow me the opportunity to develop a one-on-one relationship with any of those people around me. Also, despite my own issues (and I have a lifetime subscription to issues), I am comfortable enough with who I am to be comfortable by myself. For example, there is a loved one in my life who constantly needs to have conversation going around him/her, and that conversation is pure surface and trivial matters. When we are in a car, I am quite content to enjoy the silence – both to keep me more focused as a driver as well as to let me enjoy the scenery. But within less than 2 minutes of silence, this person will again speak up and share another unimportant story. It is apparently important that I know that a mutual friend won $50 playing the lottery or bowled a perfect 300 game in the bowling league that person belongs to or caught a 15″ catfish when he went fishing (last week, yesterday, doesn’t matter when). It is that important to this person to have conversation – as equally as important as my desire for silence – and so I listen, albeit not very closely, because I have nothing to add. However, knowing that all relationships require compromise, I say nothing about how much I dislike constant conversation like that because I believe it makes that person feel more comfortable in conversation than I am discomfortable with it.
But again, my appreciation of silence and my contentment of being alone doesn’t mean I’m depressed in some way. That is just how my life is, and I enjoy my life by giving myself those things.
This is getting long, but there are two more points I want to make. The first point is how people react to finding out that a person is experiencing an episode of sadness (not only just depression). When people say, “Let me know if you need anything”, it’s an empty platitude that allows that person to move on and go back to his/her own life without guilt. Even without being a depressive, I have never found it comfortable, much less easy, to reach out for help, and especially when I need it. I can remember incidents where I found it uncomfortable as far back as my teenage years, and I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten even less willing as time goes on. I know this relates back to my childhood, when my parents strongly reinforced the idea of not letting them see you sweat, don’t let them see that you can’t accomplish anything you think that they think you should be able to do. Because of that, I tend not to mutter the words of being called on if needed, and instead tend to show up fairly actively in just checking in once or twice a week. I also include in that checking in the question, “What can I do to help you today, even though you’d rather not admit that someone doing something for you will make you feel ‘weak’?” I might show up every 10 days of so with that person’s favorite donut and a cup of coffee, or with a ready-to-heat up meal I make that I know they enjoy. It’s one thing to offer to make yourself available to reach out if they need something; it’s another thing to do something that you know might be appreciated without waiting to be asked.
And the other point I have to make is, when there is a suicide, the words like, “If only he/she had talked to me” or “I wish he/she would have come and talked to me” make me cringe!
I know the statement above to be true. There are multiple reasons to remain silent about our feelings. I have chosen to speak about these feelings to others from time to time, and while they may listen, they can’t grasp the emotions because they’ve never experienced them (or never equated what they might be feeling as a negative emotion). Have you ever had a “meh” day? “Meh” being described where there was very little energy physically, mentally and/or emotionally that you foresaw in your life for the next 24 hours? If you’ve ever felt like you had a day that meant nothing good was headed your way, nor did you think there was anything bad headed your way either, then you’ve had a “meh” day. And if you can relate to what a “meh” day feels like, just multiply that times infinity, and that’s why depression feels like for me. There are things that make me smile, times where I’m in a moment and having a fabulous time, but most of the time, my days are “meh”.
And please understand this, which is a difficult pill to swallow: Suicide is a choice. (A Ph.D. I worked with said that to me because of a patient who would sometimes call and if that doctor was in session and couldn’t take the call, would make comments about committing suicide if she wasn’t that important to him.) Hell no, it’s not a smart choice, and that choice doesn’t happen overnight. As humans, we can suggest and advice people we care about to make a different choice, but we have no capacity to make that person change his/her choice. “If only” doesn’t erase what happened. Again, to me, that comment feels self-satisfying, a way to stave off any guilt be suggesting that if you had been in the picture, maybe things would have turned out differently. Think about it logically, and committing suicide is done without conversation beforehand and always when the person is alone.
This has gotten way longer than I thought it would be, despite having read the draft multiple times and edited some out each time. This may be boring to read to some or many of you. But…if I’ve given a deeper understanding of depression from my own experiences, or if I’d made you look at yourself or others in your life armed with this knowledge and understanding, then my mission has been accomplished! And, yes, you are getting this blog on the last day of November, but I’ve probably given 10 or more hours in writing and reading and re-reading and editing and re-reading, etc. to it, so it’s taken me a while to get it ready to publish. (If there were 31 days in November, you’d probably still get this on the last day of the month because there are still ways to edit this that I’ve run out of time to do!)
I recently stumbled across a video about a speech given at a college graduation and was held captive to what was being said within just a few sentences. I couldn’t copy the link from it, although I was able to share it to my social media feed. Finally, I remembered that I hadn’t checked YouTube, and voila, it was there!!!
I am not going to say anything about it first because I don’t want to prejudice your thoughts by sharing mine. Please, please – take a few minutes from your busy schedule to listen carefully to what this young college graduate has to tell us… (Speech starts at 2:28)
Did you find yourself nodding as you listened, nodding in agreement when your already known beliefs were stated by the speaker, and nodding with understanding when you discovered a new and/or deeper level of understanding about her topic?
I say this in awareness that it is a generalization, but males tend to defend who they are by their current career occupation. They are masters of defining themselves by what they do. And I’m sure that can be traced all the way back to a time when it was expected that the man was going to bring home the bacon and protect his family. Those were his roles, and those were the things by which he was judged. The better he succeeded in those roles, the more remarkable he was seen in the eyes of others. But society has grown long past those being the only roles that men were expected to fulfill. What matters more in today’s society is who the man is as a total being – ability as well as sensibility.
Not that we women are so much better. If asked, “What do you do?”, we would surely state an occupation if we worked outside of the home, and then other things such as volunteer work, help with PTA projects, Girl Scout projects, church projects, etc. I suspect it is rare that either man or woman answers first and foremost with what are the two most important things to be actively doing 24/7/365. “I am a husband/wife and father/mother (if applicable).” “I am a caretaker for my ailing father/mother.” “I am a foster parent.” Taking care of others, in whatever capacity, is what I believe is the biggest role we can fill in our lifetimes. And while the ‘whom’ of where your caring goes may change along your life’s journey, the act should never cease.
Not to throw her under the bus in any means but my best friend’s emails to me are all about what she’s done since the last time she emailed me. Went here, went there, stopped here, stopped there, went to a haircut appointment, exterminator came for quarterly inspection and on and on and on. She is a perfect example of a human doing. Now that she is retired, she goes to various senior centers for various activities four days a week. She pretty much has a routine of what she does at each center, so every email reminds me of where she did her tai chi and where she went to play weekly bingo, etc. I mean, I’m glad she’s having a good time, but my inner sense is telling me that, after recently retiring and then losing her husband just weeks later, she needs to fill her time with doing because she’s never learned how to just “be”. I’ve vaguely approached that a couple of times with her and she’ll tell me that she’s having “fun”, but I still suspect there is more under the surface that she is just wanting to avoid.
And yes, my emails to her also include things I have done, but I always share a bit of a story behind it – excitement, frustration, whatever emotion the act raises up.
Meanwhile, it’s difficult for her to think that it’s okay for me to not have a social life like she does, going out and about.
I’ve never been a social butterfly that I can remember. When it comes to real friendships, I have always preferred quantity over quality. I believe the word “friend” is actually overused these days, and social media has exacerbated that fact. In my remaining time on this earth, I do not want to create a circle of acquaintances – of people I know through a commonality we share. Those are people who are often labeled by others as friends, but for me, my true friends are people about whom I know who they are as beings (and usually what they do as well).
Anyhow, I’ve gone off on a tangent, I know. I guess I just wanted to explain why this speech really connected so deeply with me and why I hope it might enlighten others to be more conscious about who they are than what they do. And now I’m going to go back and listen to that speech yet another time! Thanks for listening!
Recipes? Did someone say they wanted recipes? Well, I still have some tested recipes to type up, and some recipes that I haven’t even tried yet, but I’ve got a few I can share with you. And because I’ve been making a lot of new recipes lately, I have remembered to have my camera at the ready (most times) so I can share the finished products with you visually.
DISCLAIMER: I am presenting these recipes to you exactly as I received them. When making the various baked recipes, I had to bake some of them longer than the amount of time stated in the recipe. The element in my oven is less than 3 years old, but the oven itself is very old (nothing is digital, including the clock). Since that happened with different recipes, I’m going to blame it on my oven and not on the actual recipe. Just an F.Y.I. to keep your eyes open for timing if you make any of these.
Nettie’s Chicken (Note: This recipe was received via video and did not have a “title”. I chose this title to honor the dear friend who forwarded the video to me.) Ingredients: 2-3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts flour 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. pepper 1 tsp. oregano 1/2 stick butter 2 cloves minced garlic 1 tbsp. soy sauce 1 tbsp. white vinegar 3 tbsp. honey
Instructions: ⦁ Pat dry your chicken breasts. Using sharp knife, make cross-hatch marks on the top of each breast. (Cross hatch is making diagonal parallel cuts that do not go the whole way through the meat, then repeating the process in the opposite direction.) ⦁ Place the butter in a pan and place it on medium heat to melt butter. ⦁ While the butter is melting, mix together the salt, pepper and oregano and rub into the chicken, then dredge each breast through flour to coat the entire piece. ⦁ Place in pan with the top side up, turning at 15 minutes (20 minutes if you are using really thick pieces of meat). ⦁ Once the meat has been turned, add the minced garlic, soy sauce, white vinegar and honey into pan between pieces of meat. Stir together and allow the meat to continue cooking for about 10 minutes. Then turn the chicken over again to allow the bottoms to cook in the broth for another 5 minutes. ⦁ Use a meat thermometer to check if the internal temperature has reached 160°. Continue simmering until meat has reached the required temperature, turning over if necessary.
Definitely a yummy in my tummy recipe!
Caramelitas
Ingredients: 1 cup all-purpose flour 1 cup rolled oats ¾ cup brown sugar 1 teaspoon baking soda 10 oz bag of baking caramels ¾ cup melted butter ½ cup whipping cream 1 cup chocolate chips
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C) and lightly grease a square baking pan (8×8 in size).
Over medium heat in saucepan, combine heavy cream and caramels. Cook the mixture while stirring constantly until it becomes smooth. Once smooth, remove the saucepan from the heat and set it aside.
In a medium-sized bowl, combine the melted butter, brown sugar, flour, oats, and baking soda. Mix until thoroughly combined.
Take a baking dish and press half of the mixture into it, creating an even layer at the bottom.
Place the baking dish in the oven and bake the crust for around 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, remove the dish from the oven.
Sprinkle the chocolate chips evenly over the top of the partially baked crust.
Pour the previously prepared caramel mixture over the chocolate chips, ensuring an even distribution.
Now, take the remaining half of the oat mixture and evenly spread it over the caramel layer, creating a top layer for the bars.
Return the baking dish to the oven and bake for an additional 20 minutes, or until the bars turn golden brown.
Allow to cool completely before serving!
Slow Cooker Sweet Ginger Pork Chops
(Note: This recipe can be used for boneless chicken breasts or thighs as well.) Ingredients: Boneless pork chops 1/4 c. brown sugar 1/4 c. tomato sauce 1/4 c. soy sauce 4 tbsp. honey 1 tbsp. white vinegar 1 tsp. ground ginger 2 cloves crushed garlic 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. pepper
Instructions:
Place a single layer of meat in the bottom of your crockpot.
In a bowl, combine the rest of the ingredients and whisk together thoroughly.
Pour sauce evenly over meat, making sure there is no uncovered meat showing.
Cook on low for four hours. Check the internal temperature of the meat (145° for pork or 160° for chicken). Continue cooking until the required temperatures are reached.
The sauce has a little bit of a bite to it and is great for over rice as a side dish.
Parmesan Baked Chicken
Ingredients: 4 boneless chicken breasts or 6 boneless chicken thighs 3/4 cup Parmesan cheese 1/2 cup Italian breadcrumbs 1 tbsp. olive oil 1 tsp. black pepper 1 tsp garlic powder
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350°. Line baking sheet with foil or parchment.
In a shallow bowl, mix together Parmesan cheese, bread crumbs, pepper and garlic powder.
Pat chicken pieces dry on both sides, then drizzle olive oil on both sides, rubbing it in to cover the meat. Dip chicken pieces into the mixed dry breading and press down to coat both sides evenly. Bake 25-35 minutes, or until internal temperature is 160°. (For a crisper crust, broil for an additional 2-3 minutes.)
Removed from oven and let rest for 5 minutes before serving.
This recipe can also be used with boneless pork chops.
NOTE: I suggest putting half of the dry ingredients in a plastic bag and shaking to cover the meat. You probably won’t use all of the breading the recipe calls for, but you can save the other half. You can use it as breading for other items as well.
While the oil is heating, use your hands to mix the ingredients and roll them into small balls.
Fry in batches to avoid overloading. Fry until golden brown.
Remove from oil and place on paper towels to drain.
Serve with marinara sauce if desired.
NOTES: This recipe is intended as an appetizer or a snack. However, the amount of ingredients only made 9 small balls for me. I would probably triple the recipe if making for an appetizer. I would also consider using other flavors of shredded cheese, like cheddar or pepper jack, depending upon your tastes. Also, I did actually fry these in oil (and they didn’t absorb much because they weren’t in the oil that long). I would definitely consider doing them in the air fryer. The amount of cheese balls this made was perfect for me as a complete dinner! Oh, and the breading is so light (unlike mozzarella sticks), that you really do taste just cheese!
I could get addicted to these easily!
Toasted Ravioli
Ingredients: 1-1/2 pound bag of beef or cheese ravioli, fresh or frozen (place frozen ravioli in fridge to thaw before using) 1 cup buttermilk (ways to substitute buttermilk follow this recipe) 2 eggs 2 cups Italian breadcrumbs 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. black pepper vegetable oil Shredded Parmesan cheese (optional) Instructions:
In a bowl, mix buttermilk and eggs together.
In a second bowl, mix breadcrumbs, salt and pepper.
Dip each ravioli in the milk mixture, then press into bread crumb mixture, coating both sides.
Place on a large baking sheet, and then place the baking sheet into the freezer for about 30 minutes or until completely firm to the touch.
Place about 2 inches of oil in pan and heat to 350°.
When oil is heated, place several ravioli in the oil. Cook for about 4-5 minutes, flipping halfway, until both sides are golden. Do not overcrowd the pan.
Remove from pan and place on paper towel lined plate or pan. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese if desired.
Serve with marinara sauce if desired.
NOTES: This recipe is intended as an appetizer as it makes quite a few pieces. Once I had them all in the freezer and firm, I took many of them off the baking sheet and put in a zippered bag, returning to the freezer for a future time. I also chose to use the ‘mini’ raviolis because they were small enough to just pop the whole thing into your mouth. BUTTERMILK SUBSTITUTES: 1 cup buttermilk = 1 Tablespoon white vinegar + enough milk to measure 1 cup 1 cup buttermilk = 1 Tablespoon lemon juice + enough milk to measure 1 cup 1 cup buttermilk = 1 cup plain yogurt 1 cup buttermilk = 1 and ¾ teaspoon cream of tartar + 1 cup of milk Stir together and let sit for about 5 minutes. For those who are lactose intolerant, you can also use coconut milk.
Baked Stuffing Balls
Whether you call it stuffing, filling or dressing, this bread cube mixture seasoned with flavorings like onion, celery, sage, etc. is always a part of our Thanksgiving feast. I first thought that perhaps it was ‘invented’ as a way to serve something to help fill dinner guests’ tummies up, but it’s an integral part of our turkey tradition. We like it so much that our mom not only stuffed the bird but made extra and baked it in a loaf pan outside the turkey. We’d slice it down and pan fry it in a little butter or use two slices instead of bread for our leftover turkey sandwiches. This recipe works perfectly for me because I can make it once and then freeze each separate stuffing ball, cooked or uncooked, and have stuffing as a side dish for other meals!
Ingredients: 3/4 cup unsalted butter 1/2 cup finely diced onion 1/2 cup finely diced celery 1-1/2 tsp. salt 1/2 tsp. pepper 2 tsp. dried sage 1 tsp. dried thyme 2 eggs 1/2 cup chicken broth or stock 10 cups cubed bread (I used 15 slices to make 10 cups) 1/2 cup chopped parsley
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 °. Line baking sheet with foil and spray it with cooking spray.
Melt butter in skillet over medium heat. Add onion and celery and cook until softened, about 5 minutes.
Add salt, pepper, sage and thyme and cook another full minute to release the herbs’ fragrances. Turn off cooktop and remove pan from heat to cool slightly.
In a large bowl, whisk together eggs and chicken broth. Stir in bread cubes and parsley, then pour butter mixture over the top. Mix until combined. (This goes easier mixing with your hands.)
Form mixture into 2″ balls and place on baking sheet. Bake until golden brown and crisp, about 20 minutes.
Serve warm, top with gravy if desired.
NOTES: The only thing that I have negative about this recipe is that the thyme tasted overpowering to me. I just won’t use it the next time. I got 6 balls from these measurements; it would be easy to cut the recipe in half if you just want to have them for one meal.
This last one isn’t exactly a ‘recipe’, just something I tried and liked, talked about it and other people liked it too, so I thought I’d share it.
It’s no secret that I like chicken. Sometimes I want to make a specific recipe but sometimes I don’t want to go to that much work. One day, I had just a few pieces left in a bag of Lay’s Sour Cream and Cheddarchips and thought about how they might taste good as a sort of breading over my chicken breast. I put them in a zipper bag, crushed them up completely (hands first and then my meat mallet!). I cut my breast into 4 pieces, as I usually do since I seldom eat more than half at a time, tossed it in the bag, and shook it up (remember Shake ‘n Bake? Same principle). The pieces weren’t totally covered since I hadn’t used an egg wash, but I was okay with that. Let me say that my taste buds thought it was incredible! The texture difference between the chip crumbs and the chicken meat was pleasant. The flavor of the chips was mild but pleasant. I have also done this with barbeque chips and even Cool Ranch Doritos! My friend tried it with barbequed chips but did an egg wash first. They liked it too. So, whenever you want some kind of variety for your chicken, just think about chip chicken!
(Oh, and remember the breading that I mentioned you would have left over from making the Parmesan Baked Chicken? Works exactly the same!)
Sorry the photo is blurry. Still tasted good!!
I still have at least 20 more recipes to try, then type up to share! My grocery store receipts lately have had some unusual ingredients along with regular groceries! I’ll keep working on them! Enjoy trying these in the meantime!
Surprise! Although I use this title with the word “hacks” for every entry regarding my kitchen, I don’t always have actual hacks to offer to you. But I actually do want to share some things which have been tested and used which are, indeed, actual hacks.
I want to start these hacks by talking about brown flour. Don’t furrow your eyebrows and think to yourself, “Whachu talkin’ ’bout, Willis? Flour is white, always white!” I won’t disagree, but I’m using the word “brown” as an action verb, not as an adjective. I am referring to the fact that white flour can be browned. If you only ever use jarred/canned gravy and never make anything with a sauce that requires thickening, you can move on to the next paragraph. Whether you make a flour slurry or a roux with flour to make a sauce thicker, the white of the flour will lighten whatever you are going to use it for. Now, for poultry or things like sausage gravy, that’s no big deal. But if you want to make a beef gravy, or thicken a darker type of broth, browning will darken the flour so that it isn’t so evident when mixing it in. I learned this trick in my grandma’s kitchen – she always made a flour slurry for her gravies, and she used browned flour even for her poultry gravies. My mom used a corn starch slurry, which I think is easier in determining when the liquid is thick enough. I did that as well, until making a roux became popular on all of the cooking shows. Now I do that, mostly because I feel like I have more control over adding liquid to the thickener than adding thickener to the liquid. Living alone, I only want gravy if I’ve got a little bit of chicken or beef leftovers, and then I make a small amount of gravy (using stock, if necessary) and add the meat so it gets hot. Over mashed potatoes, noodles of some kind, or even rice, this is like a comfort meal without a lot of stress. Anyhow, to brown flour, simply toss flour into a non-stick pan, turn the heat on to medium and stir casually. It will take a while to begin to brown, and you don’t want to always be stirring because the flour needs to be in contact with the pan in order to get browned. Whenever I make my brown flour, I always make enough to use with several meals and broths and keep it in an airtight plastic container.
Moving on, let me ask this. Do you prefer to make your own ground beef patties instead of purchasing the pre-made ones? (I know I do, especially considering the difference in price between a pound of beef and a package of a pound of premade patties!). Rather than have a variety of weights when forming your patties, or paying for a plastic patty press, just save the lid from your (regular sized) peanut butter jar before tossing the empty jar! This lid will hold 4 ounces (a quarter pound) of ground beef pressed into the top. Make your job even easier by placing a piece of parchment or waxed paper just slightly larger than the lid inside before pressing the meat in, and you’ll be able to easily lift the patty out. I never know when I’m going to be hungry for a good (as in non-fast food) burger, so I buy a pound of ground beef and make 4 equally-sized patties and then flash freeze them. Once frozen enough, I stack them up with a piece of wax paper between and freeze them in a zippered bag. When I want a burger, I can easily remove a single patty, let it thaw and then cook it up!
I recently bought myself a silicone cupcake pan, again, seeing silicone products being used often on cooking shows. I liked the idea of an easy cleanup when a recipe calls for making something in the tins without cupcake papers and saving a few pennies on cupcake papers as well. I tried it out recently on one of the new recipes I’ll be passing off to you. I found that I had to bake past the time that the recipe called for, but maybe my oven temperature is off.
Most food products we buy today are marked with an “expiration date”. Well, that’s what we think those dates mean, but that’s not necessarily true! Products will have a “best by” or “best before” or “sell by” or “use by”. However, only “use by” products are subject to truly expiring. “Sell by” products means that the product will begin to deteriorate after that date. Milk containers are “sell by” items that will slowly sour in a week or so. The remaining two, especially on shelf stable products, are dates that are the manufacturers’ estimate of when the product will begin to lose its peak quality. This means that even after the date has passed, if stored correctly in an undamaged can in a cool, dry place away from direct heat, some items may be safe to consume for up to two years past that date. Use your eyes and your nose to judge any changes in odor, texture and appearance of the item. The rule is “When it doubt, throw it out.” But with the price of groceries these days, none of us want to throw out food that is still edible!
If the major big meals (think Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc.) are always held in your home with you doing all of the cooking, before you start putting pans on your cooktop, get out your aluminum foil. Cover your entire cooktop with the foil, then carefully cut out where your burners are. When it’s time to do the clean-up, carefully ball up and remove the foil cover. You will be surprised what splatters have occurred while you’re cooking once you lift off the aluminum foil and discover how much cleaning you WON’T have to do on your stovetop! Now if we only had a solution for all of the other clean-up involved after we’ve stuffed our bellies!
Last, but not least, there are always “hints” about ways to store certain foods to help keep them fresh longer. One I keep hearing about is turning your jar of peanut butter upside down so that the oil that usually appears on the top when opening the jar, will use gravity to move to the bottom. I don’t eat a lot of peanut butter, but there are occasions when peanut butter toast or a peanut butter and banana sandwich (also on toast) make my taste buds smile. A small jar of peanut butter lasts me a while therefore! And peanut butter is one of the few products I purchase by brand name because the generic product doesn’t have the same fresh peanut taste. So, I decided to give this hint a try. And since I mentioned bananas, which I buy for cereal, a sandwich or sometimes just a snack, often brown for me because I don’t eat them every day. I end up grabbing a very ripe banana and just peeling it and eating it because I don’t want to waste it (and no, I’m not freezing it to make banana bread in the future!). So, I keep hearing about keeping the tops of your bananas covered because the air reaching into the pores at the top of the stem that make the banana ripen so quickly. I thought I’d give that a try.
Were they both good hints? Were they both myths that didn’t work? Was one good and one bad? You be the judge:
This has been in my house for 9 days.
Bottom of the peanut butter jar that is empty
Top of the jar where peanut butter is full
Obviously, wrapping the stems of bananas does give them a longer time to avoid rotting.
Obviously, turning a peanut butter jar may or may not work out. (NOTE: This jar has remained the same way for over two months whether it sits right-side up or upside down – and there was a small amount of the oil when I last opened the lid.)
When I saw this, I immediately thought about using it on my blog as an “excuse” for my being so quiet on my blog of late! Whose murder, you wonder? If I told you, and it’s yours, then it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?
I’ve started organizing what feels like a hoard of recipes that I want to try and then possibly share. I even purchased a quart each of cultured buttermilk (they were out-of-stock of uncultured buttermilk, I guess?) and a quart of heavy whipping cream, after choosing recipes that required one or the other. I’ve got a stock now of cans of sweetened condensed milk and a few cans of evaporated milk.
I have a fair share of savory recipes in my hoard, but for the first time ever, I have an equal amount of sweet recipes. I’m more interested in attempting – and tasting! – them right now.
Also for the first time ever, I had a recipe failure! Egad! It was a 3-ingredient 5-minute fudge. Unfortunately, the fudge never completely set up solidly, even after putting it in the freezer for more than 24 hours! (Hmmm, I guess I could say that I murdered that recipe!)
I also tried a recipe called Amish Cinnamon Bread. It came out like it was supposed to, but I was not at all impressed with the finished product. I was thinking that it might be similar to a pound cake, but I was totally wrong! It was not sweet in any way and my two taste-testers both said that it was very dry. I also tried a recipe called Cream Cheese Cookies and, except for the sprinkling of powdered sugar on the top, it had a vague taste of cream cheese and nothing else! I deemed them so horrible that I didn’t even pass any to my taste testers.
I hope to soon be finished with planning this murder so I can start typing up the tried-and-true recipes to share!
And, if you have even a hint that you might be the person on whom I commit murder, best stay away from me…all this time in my kitchen, where the sharp knives are kept…just sayin’…
My bestie and I had fallen behind in our ‘adventures’. Instead of trying to figure out what the other wants or needs, we now commit to 4 different events or adventures a year, 1 for each of our birthdays and 1 each for Christmas. Recently, due to some changes in her life (her husband passed away in August, after declining quickly in the last stages of an incurable disease). She also finally decided to retire at the young age of 70.5 years, which she chose to do just weeks before her husband’s passing. Now, we had the time to look at possible adventures, and we found two small theatre performances that we thought we’d enjoy. One was at McCoole’s, a place we had been to before, and was called “Women are From Mars, Men are From Uranus”. The other was called “Morning After Grace” and was in the Montgomery Theatre, about 25 minutes away, and was a new venue for us. It just so happened that the shows were only 4 days apart and on one of those days we weren’t seeing a show, we were both signed up for a crafting class!
The first show we saw at McCoole’s wasn’t a comedy, but with a title like “Women are From Mars, Men are From Uranus”, it made sense that this would be some kind of gentle male-bashing comedy. WRONG! It was some written in-house thing about two lab scientists accidently releasing something that created a woman and a man. The story was dull, and the female lab scientist was so monotone that one would think she was on the first read-through of the script. The woman that was created wore different pieces of yoga wear throughout each scene, and it was so skintight it was distracting, and there was no denying that the audience could tell when she was cold. If somebody asked me to rate it, I would give it a “1”, but only to assure that it was known that I didn’t ignore the request. It was an absolute waste of $25, in my opinion. The day out was only salvaged by the fact that dinner afterwards was at Red Robin, where neither of us had been since I moved from the one in Lancaster.
As truly bad as that show was, the absolute opposite is true of “Morning After Grace.” The story had three characters who each had something internally that they needed to deal with. Agnus had just buried his wife, Grace, who was killed in a vehicle accident. Ollie is suffering from the fact that he and his son have had no contact for some years and not knowing how to rekindle their relationship. Abigail is a woman who sometimes drinks too much but spends her time advising other people how to fix what’s wrong in their lives to avoid looking at what’s wrong in her own life.
Comedic? Darn tooting it was! These are three ‘senior citizens’ who each feel they have lived long enough to earn the right to say what’s on their minds without a filter. Plus, the show opens up with Abigail and Agnus asleep on a couch as the result of a one-night stand. They met because….well, she crashed Angus’ wife’s funeral!
The best part is that, while we all laughed our way through the dialog, each person has an internal dilemma that needs “fixed”. And the shocker comes when we find out that Grace, Agnus’ wife, died in that vehicle accident on the way to meet her lover.
The cast got a standing ovation, and it was well deserved. I would go back and see it again, just to see if I could concentrate on the depth of the words each spoke and not just the laughter.
As weather turns colder, even though we’re supposed to have a mild winter that is warmer than usual, we won’t be making any plans to see anything until at least March. Neither of us likes to drive at night (gotta love those matinees!) and neither of us likes to drive in bad weather, so we’ll be keeping our eyes open for events happening in the spring.
Meanwhile, I have more than enough books to get me through the winter (and spring, and summer), and I’m very much behind on some craft things, so let old man Winter show up whenever as early as December 1st (I have my nesting pantry list but I haven’t gotten too much of it yet.) I’m ready for soups and stews and grilled cheese sandwiches and hot chocolate and toast!
Oh, and I have such a hoard of recipes to try out for possible sharing and that will keep me quite busy as well!
Helpful serving hint: If you are going to be slicing more than one piece of a cake at one time, wrap a piece of parchment paper over your knife’s sharp edge before slicing the first piece. The knife will still be sharp enough through the paper to make the cut, but your knife won’t gather crumbs of the cake when you then carry over to the next slice as you cut it. You can start at one end of the parchment paper and work your way over to the other side so that each slice you make starts with a perfectly clean and smooth cutting surface.
Helpful recipe hint: Have you ever wondered why some recipes say, “melted butter” and others say, “butter, melted”? Well, take note! It’s because one way (melted butter) you measure the butter once it is melted. The other way (butter, melted) you measure the butter before it’s melted!
Helpful recipe hint: If a recipe calls for buttermilk and you don’t have any (it’s certainly not something you’ll randomly find hanging out in my fridge!), you can make your own by combining 1 cup of milk with 1 tablespoon of white vinegar or lemon juice. Let it sit for a few minutes before using it.
Helpful produce tip: Store an apple (any type) with your potatoes to keep them from sprouting.
Helpful baking tip: To get your cookies to appear perfectly round, place an appropriately sized glass upside down over each of them before putting your baking sheet into the oven and move the glass several times in a circle. This repeated movement will touch different places on the dough as you swirl it, shaping it perfectly!
Helpful baking tip #2: I knew this tip but I haven’t baked cookies in about 10 years, so I thought I’d remind everyone else as well. If you are using a recipe that includes butter or margarine, once your dough is thoroughly mixed, put it into the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. This will help your butter/margarine get cold again, which will keep the cookies from spreading out so much and becoming flat.
I think there has seldom been a day that I haven’t looked at recipes offered on the Internet (several articles usually appear on my default home page). Lately, I seem to be finding the same recipes across various links, which frustrates me as a poor use of my time. I also seem to be finding more recipes that call for items that people (at least those I know) don’t keep on hand – things like buttermilk or heavy cream, “fresh” spices as opposed to the dry ones I have in my cupboard, etc. I have collected some recipes to share, after I’ve tried them first.
Having said that, when I saw this recipe it immediately made me wonder if it’s the same way my grandma used to make it. She would make this when fresh fruits came into season, and sometimes she’d use it as a shortcake substitution. We didn’t just do strawberries over shortcake, but blueberries, raspberries, blackberries as well as peaches. We always ate our shortcakes in a bowl with milk and sugar, and I still like that better than whipped topping or ice cream.
I don’t know if this recipe is exact (it’s been at least 50 years since I’ve had any), but I’m pretty pleased with the taste and texture.
Other Optional Additions: 2/3 cup nuts of any kind or/and chocolate chips
Garnish topping: powdered sugar
13 x 9 pan sprayed or lined with parchment paper
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Grease a 9- x 13-inch baking pan with cooking oil spray or lined with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, using an electric beater, beat the eggs and sugar until light and fluffy.
In a medium-size bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt, then gradually beat into the egg mixture.
In a small saucepan over low heat, heat milk and butter until butter is melted.
Gradually add to batter, beating until combined.
Stir in the vanilla or any flavoring you’re using.
Pour mixture into the prepared baking pan.
Bake 30 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Let cool completely, then cut into squares.
Garnish with sprinkled powdered sugar. (I garnished mine with the powdered sugar as soon as the pan was cool to the touch, because I wanted it to melt in a bit.)
I can attest and confirm what Brian writes here. My mentor of 20 years ago labeled me as a “knowledge sponge”, which is a compliment I still highly treasure. As I get older, I’m so much more interested in knowing things beyond those school subjects.
I decided several years ago to downgrade my cable package since I watch very little TV (mostly because, if I’m sitting down, it’s likely that my nose is in a book). In the past year, I realized that, at most, I might watch 12 of the 159 channels included in my package. I’d lost HGTV, TLC, The Food Network and Hallmark with the downgrade. My routine was to watch one of the half-hour segments of my chosen news station, preferably at noon, and if I did watch the noon news, I’d go to a station named BUZZR, which played re-runs of old classic game shows. I would watch Match Game for a half-hour, two half-hour segments of Tattletales, and maybe hang around for a little bit of Password. On the weekends, when the news station only offered a 6 PM slot for Saturday and Sunday, I tried to catch the Sunday show because it included a segment called “The Week in Review” and showed quick informative recaps of the stories around the region during the previous week.
Any other time my television was on was to watch a movie from Amazon Prime. It often took me two to three days to see a movie through from beginning to end – making it obvious to me that my attention span wasn’t as good for visual entertainment as it is for written entertainment.
With inflation making prices quickly double from what they were, and utilities and landlords raising their prices to help avoid the bite of inflation themselves, I needed to make some decisions about what ‘luxuries’ I could forego. I bit my nails until I was around 30 years old, when I finally gave up that habit (which I find totally disgusting now!) and treated myself with manicures and, of course, since you’re already there, pedicures. I scheduled my services only once a month, but I admit that made me happy to see my nails freshly painted, especially when I got a design on the ring finger of each hand. Last summer, I made the decision to cut back on the pedicures to once every two months. My toes never showed to anyone but me unless I was wearing flip flops or the occasional sandal, and to be honest, I was fine with them being sans polish.
I also backed off from getting my hair cut every 7 to 8 weeks to every 11 or 12 weeks. It just so happened that I had an appointment for early February and my hairdresser tested positive for COVID (not unexpected since her husband brought it home late last year and they didn’t segregate themselves in any way). She gave me the option to cancel if I wanted, and while we would both be masked, I always had to unhook my mask and hold my hand over it on my nose and mouth when she needed to cut near my ears. I just decided it wasn’t worth it and let her know I’d call back to reschedule. As my hair got a little longer, I was able to pull it back into a tiny ponytail at the nape of my neck, and it helped in letting air get to the back of my neck which was always a place I’d easily gather sweat (some of you may remember my post called, “I am a Sweater”.
With eliminating those two “luxuries” my monthly income was once again able to cover my monthly expenses. However, I was used to having a little bit of “play” money left over to go out once a month for lunch with my bestie or make the occasional trip to a thrift store. I thought in a distracted way about getting rid of my cable TV because I watched so little of it. Over time, I looked at all of the different streaming options available, but no one service provided all of the few channels that were important to me. I looked into antennas but whether mounted inside or outside (which I suspect my landlord would say “no” to), you had to be under a certain number of miles away from the tower to get the signal. Here I am in Tumbleweed Town that has the basics (groceries, pharmacies, gas), and I’m supposed to know how close I am to any of the broadcasting towers???
I finally decided I’d just cut off cable TV, but I wanted to keep my internet with that company. In the end, the best deal I could get saved me around $50 a month to be without TV. Fortunately, I had already discovered that the news station I like is an independent station, and I can see the news forecasts live through an app on my phone. And, if I really need visual stimulation, I can always watch Amazon Prime movies on my laptop.
The only time I ‘think’ about TV is when I’m eating a meal that makes it difficult for me to hold my Kindle and eat at the same time. I suspect I may be a tad unhappy when I can’t watch football games or have them on in the background while I’m doing something else. However, it occurred to me several years ago that my personal choice to watch the game or not watch the game will not affect the outcome of the game, and I just check online for scoring updates and realize that highlights of great plays will be shown with the news during their sports section.
It’s been about 6 weeks now, and I haven’t even been watching movies I’ve saved to watch on Amazon Prime. In the beginning, I thought this would be a temporary choice, but it feels, at least for now, that it could be a permanent choice! Besides which, if I ever decide to read and understand the instructions in the manual for using its DVD player, that will work for me as well.
Saving money by giving up something that costs you money doesn’t have to be so bad!
Ramblings and Ruminations 