Mary Anne Carter
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Category Archives: Cooking
Mar 11 2012

My Own Coffee Blend

by Mary Anne

A few years ago I caught myself drinking a lot of coffee during the day – especially at work. For one thing, the coffee at work is free. And for another, I do not smoke and never take smoke breaks like so many others do. But sometimes you need to get up from your desk, walk around and clear out the cobwebs. So I would find myself walking to the break room and getting a cup of coffee every few hours. Before I knew it, I was drinking 6-8 large mugs of coffee every day and the caffeine was starting to keep me awake at night.

I decided to cut back on the coffee and switch to water or a flavored water while at work. If I was going to cut back to just one cup of coffee, it was going to have to be GOOD coffee. So I bought a bag of ground Columbian beans from Starbucks.

But that is too strong for my taste. I finally figured out how to make my own personal blend of coffee to make from home. I take a small canister and fill it halfway with Starbucks Columbian coffee, and then fill the canister the rest of the way with Folgers brand Columbian coffee. When I mix them together, the coffee is not too strong and it retains the special taste of Columbian beans.

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Mar 5 2012

Nutrition means a lot

by Mary Anne

My family does not eat as well as it should. 

I have a really hard time getting my family to eat the right foods. 

I only have one son that is interested in eating right, and he is living on his own now.  So I am here at home struggling with trying to get the rest of my family to eat right and stay healthy.  It seems to be a losing battle.

I cook healthy and tasty meals, but apparently no one wants to eat healthy tasty meals.  I get discouraged from cooking so much food and sitting down at the table by myself to eat. At least it is easy to get fresh fruits locally so I can grab some fruit to snack on without having to cook a large portion of anything. The only drawback to that is I have found that after I eat fresh fruit I feel hungrier than I did before I ate it. So then I try to have some quick protein – one of those Baby Bel cheeses. I really like them a lot, but I keep hearing from a lot of people that cheese is not a healthy food to eat. In fact I have one nephew that insists that cheese is really bad for you. I don’t understand how it can be really bad for you unless you eat a lot of it.

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Mar 4 2012

Cottage memories

by Mary Anne

Last autumn when we were closing up the family vacation cottage for the winter I noticed that two of the Adirondack chairs were on their last legs. I really don’t think that we are going to be able to use them anymore, so I put them on the burn pile. Doing that made me feel a little bit melancholy; those chairs have lasted a very long time. They are older than I am! I have pictures of my grandparents sitting in those chairs when I was just a little kid! I feel like I’m throwing family away!

It’s really nice that our family has agreed to keep the cottage in the family for as long as we have been able to keep it. There are lots of good memories associated with summers there. Many crab feasts have been served on the sturdy wood picnic tables on the side porch. My favorite picnic table is the one that has the tree growing up through the middle of it. The tree even goes through the porch roof!

Many ghost stories have been told around the camp fires while the children roasted marshmallows on their sticks and then took the marshmallows to the adults that were sitting nearby on the park benches for the adults to squish them between the graham crackers and Hershey’s chocolate bars pieces. I hope that future generations of our family will enjoy the cottage as much as we have.

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Feb 21 2012

Modern marvels in the kitchen

by Mary Anne

I can recall visiting my grandparents on their farm when I was a young child.   Seems to me that the only kitchen appliances they had were a range, an electric toaster, and a refrigerator/freezer.  Their smaller appliances were an electric mixer and a blender.  

My grandmother seemed to spend most of her day in the kitchen, cooking the meals and canning fruits and vegetables while my grandfather tended the animals and crops. 

Seems to me that’s all anyone that I knew had in the way of kitchen appliances.  If you wanted coffee, it was percolated in a pot on the stove-top.  If you wanted to open a can, you used a manual can opener.   The day’s garbage was fed to the pets, or thrown in the garbage can.

I look around my kitchen today and see my range, refrigerator/freezer, two microwave ovens, a bread machine, an electric coffeepot, a food processor, three slow-cookers, a George Forman-type grill, an automatic dishwasher, a hands-free battery operated can opener, a blender, an electric mixer, an electric waffle maker, and a toaster oven.  (Note:  some of these are tucked away in kitchen cupboards.)  I COULD have, but don’t want, a trash compactor and a garbage disposal. 

I’m really glad that technological advances have provided for all of these conveniences.  I don’t think I would have the time or energy to live the way my grandparents did!

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Feb 12 2012

So much fun

by Mary Anne

The red hatters group that I belong to has a wine and chocolate party every February. Our “queen” has done some research on which wines taste best with what chocolate. We start out with dry red wines and dark chocolate. She reads an article about how dark chocolate is made, where it is made, the history of it, and the health benefits. Then she talks about how it is best paired with certain red wines. Then we sample a little bit of both. Red wine gives me a headache, so I try not to drink very much of that.

Dark chocolate may be healthy for you to eat, but I have not become accustomed to the bitterness of it. I much prefer semi-sweet or milk chocolate. Of course we progress through the different types of chocolates and wines, until we reach my favorite – a sweet dessert wine with white chocolate. I understand that white chocolate is really made from almonds, and not the cocoa bean, but that’s Okay with me – I like it the best. By the end of the sampling party, several of the ladies are really glad that they live next door to the queen so they can walk home! As for me, I usually don’t drink more than a sip or two of the samples so I’m fine to drive home. I’m really just there for the chocolate!

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