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Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Recipe Wednesday! Zesty Citrus...Slow Cooker Marmalade + Lemon Butter Cake

Hiya Folks! These are my kind of recipes - just a few ingredients, simple, classic and DELICIOUS! Just mix, cook and enjoy...wonderful smells to warm up your kitchen, and a taste of fresh citrus in season...what's not to like?


SLOW COOKER ORANGE MARMALADE

Ingredients:

4 large navel oranges
2 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 cup water

Directions:

Trim off the stem and navel ends of each orange.
Cut it in half and slice either by hand or in the food processor fitted with the 4mm blade into 1/8″ slices.
Place oranges, sugar and water in the crock pot.
Try to push the oranges down so they are covered as much as possible.
Cover and set on high and cook for 8 hours.
Remove the cover and set to low and cook uncovered for another 2-3 hours until the syrup is thick.
Spoon into jars and refrigerate.
Perfect on English muffins!

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LEMON BUTTER CAKE

Ingredients:

1 lb. salted butter
4 cups sugar
12 eggs
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 ounce bottle of lemon extract

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 F.
Cream the butter and sugar together, then add in a single egg at a time, making sure to mix well after each one. Gradually add the flour. Mix in the lemon extract last and then pour into a large Bundt pan, greased and floured.

Bake for an hour or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Allow the cake to cool thoroughly before eating. To dress it up, drizzle with a glaze made of powdered sugar thinned with a little milk and vanilla...and sprinkle with fresh lemon zest!

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"When you squeeze an orange, orange juice comes out - because that's what's inside. When you are squeezed, what comes out is what is inside."
~Wayne Dyer

"There is no blue without yellow and without orange."
~Vincent Van Gogh

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Happy FEBRUARY! Time to plant! TURN that Phone Book into little seed pots


It's that time of year again you walk out your front door and there at your feet is a bag with a heavy phone book in it. Many people just toss them out but instead do something awesome with it.. make little seed pots!!!

"Ingredients"
(What you need:)

~ 1 phone book
~ 1 short and fat shot glass (if you want to make different sized pots you can do shot glass sized, wine bottle sized, etc)

"Directions"
(What you do:)

~ Start by taking a sheet of phone book, fold it in half.
~ Wrap it tightly around your shot glass leaving an overhang.
~ Fold in the overhang around the bottom of the glass, creating a bottom.
~ Press the shot glass onto a hard surface.
~ Slowly pull up glass leaving a little pot.
~ Fill with potting mix and plant seed.
~ Keep moist, ad wait for it to grow!
~ When ready to plant into the garden, plant the whole thing. (it will decompose)

*TIP* I use a dab of white glue if it looks like it won't stay together, or if
I use 2 thicknesses of paper.