Time for this week’s Thursday Things:
1. Marshmallow Sauce – Gosh that looks heavenly
Bon Appetit featured this sauce in their July issue within a story about ice cream and cold treats for kids this summer. Ice cream, sprinkles, sauces, and raw egg whites. In the marshmallow sauce, for kids.
1 large egg white, corn syrup, powdered sugar, vanilla; beaten together
2. Katie brought it to my attention that although Fritos may have a bad rap, they only contain 3 ingredients:
corn
corn oil
salt
And they have a pretty decent profile. I mean, it’s hard to mess up something with only 3 ingredients.
I’ll take that as an excuse to cook with Fritos more often.
You know, because Fritos are the next health food.
Scott loved the Corn Chip-Crusted Southwestern Salmon Cakes with Creamy Lemon Chili Sauce
3. Norton Identity Safe – With increasingly complicated password rules on so many different websites, it’s impossible to keep them all straight.
I sometimes lock myself out of sites because I have too many “failed attempts” with my password or password and username combination that doesn’t match.
Then I have to call the company, prove it’s really really me with the blood of my first born, and then 90 minutes later I can login and pay my cable bill.
Download Norton Identity Safe free – I downloaded it but haven’t played around with it yet
4. A two-part series (that’s two years old but bears repeating) from LA Weekly here and here on Words to Avoid when writing about food.
Included on their words-to-avoid lists:
foodie
delicious
gourmet
decadent
natural
food porn <— yes, avoid
Overall, I loved the lists but sometimes something really is delicious and I am as guilty as the next person of using the D word. I guess I’ll call it yummy next time. Kidding.
5. Not sure how I feel about this Misono Child’s Mini Knife
“Get your kids in the kitchen with their very own high-quality but safe Misono Child’s Mini-Knife. With a 50/50 balance it is suitable for right or left-handed chefs. It is sharp enough to cut through most foods, but has a smaller, more rounded blade that is more suited to the small hands of a child.”
A knife is still, well, a knife. Whether it’s smaller, or less sharp than other knives, it’s still a knife. Obviously kids need supervision when using anything from scissors to knives, but so far around here, at age 5, we’re sticking to spoons and forks.
6. My new storage cabinet has changed my outlook on life and my ahhhh, zen and tranquility quotient is sky high every time I look at it.
I find myself just blissfully staring at it and all the happy organization on the shelves. I’m in love with a cabinet. I’ll stop now.
7. Jessica of The Novice Chef wrote an awesome post about blogging from putting the time in to blogging to camera lenses to conferences to working with companies, she covered it and then some.
8. I wrote a 5-part blogging series that covers much of what Jessica said, and I’ll shamelessly link it up:
Blogging 101
Blogging 102
Blogging 103
Blogging 104
Blogging 105
9. Celery. Don’t throw away the leave – 6 uses for celery leaves
My issue is what to do with the actual celery. I had to buy celery for 1 recipe and used precisely half of one stalk. 12 more to go. Sure it was only $2.49 but what do you make with it other than ants on a log or use it as the base of a hearty fall soup. Because it’s not really soup season.
And no, I cannot juice it or put it in smoothies. It overpowers everything it touches for me. Sort of like cantaloupe (which I hate). If cantaloupe is used in a fruit salad, the whole salad tastes like it and is “contaminated”. Same with celery; I do like it, to a point and am all for creative uses but I just don’t know what those are.
10. Thanks for the Healthy Surprise Snack Box Giveaway entries
What are your Thursday Things?
Feel free to link up anything noteworthy you’ve made, done, seen, bought, or is especially fabulous.
Any thoughts about what to make with celery, if you have memories of how old you were when you started using kitchen knives, or if you eat raw eggs or think they’re safe for kids?
I’m at a loss with celery other than ants on a log and a base for soup, sauteed with onions. But I hate onions.
I have no idea how old I was when I started using knives, I know by age 8 or so because that was the age I would come from school, make brownies using a packet of Jif brownie mix, and would cut my almost-raw brownies with a knife. Guess I’ve eaten plenty of almost-raw eggs with my childhood knife skills.
In other countries, people don’t seem to freak out as much about raw eggs as we do in America. Orange Julius, some homemade Caesar dressings, mayonnaise, homemade ice cream or custards, and Hollandaise sauces may be made with raw eggs and people eat them. And the French eat unpasteurized soft cheese and the Japanese eat raw fish and the species has survived.
I used to drink orange julius’ with raw eggs as a kid all the time. We made them in home-economics class in seventh grade in a blender with raw eggs. Can you imagine making food in a school these days with raw eggs? Kids aren’t even allowed to bring in cupcakes or birthday cake anymore for their birthdays. Between the gluten, sugar and frosting, frosting has been replaced with fruit cups. And nothing with eggs, raw or cooked.
Huh, never knew that about fritos! I do love me some fritos when I’m feeling snacky (aka ALWAYS) and craving salt. Now I can enjoy them even more for their simplicity, even if they are fried in that oil ;)
I really like celery but who would have thought that the corn chips would be good for you?
well not awful vs. “good for you” is how I like to think of them :)
Averie! I’ve realized that I haven’t actually COMMENTED here in the longest time (although I read relentlessly), so I thought I would drop a line and say hello. ;) By the by, your new favorite posts widget looks absolutely spectacular! Those sorts of things take soooo much time, but it look amazing. Happy Thursday!
I just put them up yesterday & thanks for noticing! The first few took me forever! But I got faster and now I can rotate them and have fun..but you’re right timesucks (as I commented on your post about your new header!)
I’m half Japanese and actually, as a child, I would eat raw eggs with rice. It’s quite common in Japan (only I did it here in the states). Nothing has happened to me! I think people are a little too freaked out when it comes to eating “raw” foods. I mean, we eat mayo, some countries eat tartar, sushi, and etc. I even saw one family on the show, “Wife Swap,” who ate raw meat every day! (They were sure the apocalypse was coming and wanted to be prepared..although…can’t you just strike a match?) Anyway, they tried fried chicken for the first time and got sick. They also went to a doctor and they were perfectly healthy, even more so than average folks! Amazing!
Interesting stories – the fried chicken and the fried eggs w/ rice as a child!
What about making a chicken or egg salad? That’s what I do with all my leftover chicken. I use avocado instead of mayo and a bit of mustard. I’ not big fan of mayo, but boy do I love the avocado and mustard! Anyway, celery is a must for chicken salad.
That marshmallow sauce looks AMAZING! Yum.
The knife thing makes me nervous, but I remember hearing Jamie Oliver talk once about how he had his kids in the kitchen since they were old enough to walk. He’d hand them a knife and teach them how to be a sous chef. He thinks that a lot of obesity occurs because no ones in the kitchen unless it’s to open a box or bag. If the parents don’t teach kids how to appreciate cooking, they won’t be into it. But the knife thing…still makes me so nervous!
I totally want to do a Thursday things post :) At the top of my list would include those Tweezerman splinter tweezers you recommended. I bought them from Amazon and they are rocking my world right now. How funny that a pair of tweezers can do that!
YES!! I have the MAC tweezers that are super super fine point like the Tweezerman’s and I love them…so much!
Ooo that Marshmallow Sauce does look heavenly!! I’m going to have to give that a try.
and please keep me posted if you do!
I am always surprised when the stats of packaged goods are that good but I’m happy to learn I could grab a bag of Frito’s without concern of what I’m putting into my body. More brands need to go ahead and simplify their foods!
as a commenter above you said, the “baked” & healthy chips seem much more “engineered” than good old fashioned Fritos!
I made a peppermint marshmallow sauce around Christmas last year that I devoured!! And with celery, we eat a lot of it plain with ranch dressing. Not gourmet by any means, but it makes a great snack!
Ranch never lets me down!
Oh dear, where do I start? OK, the words to-avoid. Personally, I don’t care of what they say about it, because if I try something incredibly good, I would go with the flow of my emotions at that moment and time to describe it, and if the first word that comes out is “delicious”, then let it be. Actually, that article reminds me of another era, when many words were censored, the communism era, but now it’s on food writing?!
Celery. Just give it all to me, I’ll find where to use it, I love leaves and always hunt for celery with more leaves. I found, that Asian stores sell the whole stalks and leaves, for happy me… :)
Raw eggs. Living in both Europe and US, I found out that here, in US, people are oversanitised from the birth. And that is not healthy, it blocks the immune system, giving the false message to it. People are surrounded by a protective bubble, but when anything from the outside did get into the body, the immune system doesn’t know what to do. Another issue here is where those eggs are coming from. What good can come from the chickens, raised without sun on a cramped farms, where they can’t even spread their wings?
We wash our hands with a real soaps (no sanitizers, no antibacterial), and buy eggs from a local family, whose chickens are happy in the sun all day long. Happy chicken lay happy and healthy eggs… :) Sorry for such a long comment…
love the long comment, don’t apologize!
“people are oversanitised from the birth. And that is not healthy, it blocks the immune system, giving the false message to it…” – my naturopath and many, many holistic and natural folks, websites, scholars, etc all say the same thing. I agree with everything you said!
You made me feel better :) I visited my friend today, and she made your vegan coconut truffles, it was delicious, I ate like five of it! Now I need to find the recipe and make it myself. :)
I don’t have a recipe by that name, per se…I have lots of truffles, lots of vegan things, and lots of coconut things…hmmmmm, wonder what they were?
Start with this post and LMK which one they turn out to be!
https://www.loveveggiesandyoga.com/2010/01/ball-recipes.html
I think your new cabinet looks sooooo pretty will all the props, and if I only had space I would get the exact same thing! Last week I ate some celery “stuffed” with pimiento cheese. (Here’s my recipe for pimiento cheese: https://www.confessionsofachocoholic.com/cheese/pimiento-cheese)
girl I LOVE pimento cheese and used to eat it all the time when I lived in the Carolinas. Haven’t had it in years….yours looks great!
Frito pie! Have you ever had that? We had one in Santa Fe last year – it’s essentially a snack bag of Fritos, side of the bag split open and loaded with chili on top of the chips. Semi-gross yet delicious ;)
Sounds like a half-recipe for Seven Layer Dip or something similar :) Just top that off with chili, sour cream, guac, black beans, etc and you’re fully there :)
Now I want Fritos.
great post Averie! wow that’s so crazy to think about making orange Julius at school! i think it’s so sad about not being able to bring cupcakes for your birthday! and i’ve even heard of “peanut free” schools — i don’t know what i would have done without my pb&j at lunch — it was a staple! haha but i completely understand, food allergies are nothing to shake a stick at
Oh and there was talk of it being peanut-free because one little girl had a peanut allergy but that seems to have changed and pb & j is allowed again. But yeah, it’s crazy. Air-popped popcorn (plain) is considered a birthday “treat”.
I have heard that if you wash the outside of the egg shell before cracking it open it greatly diminishes the chances of the egg getting contaminated. The marshmallow sauce reminds me of meringue that sometimes gets used for those hard little icing flowers you see on cakes.
Children are still working on their dexterity through their first several years in elementary school. I would wait to have a child handle a knife (unless you are physically holding their hands) until maybe the end of 2nd or 3rd grade.
I like to eat celery with peanut butter and a banana! I stick the entire banana onto the peanut butter drenched celery (sometimes I use 2 pieces of celery so I can get extra peanut butter into my mouth). I wrap it in a paper towel and roll it down as I go so not to get peanut butter all over the place.
interesting info about the egg washing…makes sense though.
fun banana/pb/celery idea!