Thursday, November 26, 2009
Monday, November 16, 2009
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Cranberry Chutney
Description:
Many years ago a container of Boston Market's Cranberry Chutney was in the fridge and I pulled it out when making some corn bread. What the heck, I added it to the batter and wow, what a great addition. I had to make my own for future uses and love it. It can be used for so many recipes. Add it to pancakes or waffles, use for a cobbler, serve over vanilla ice cream, added to a bbq sauce, add to stuffing and even serve over chicken, pork or turkey slices. It's even great on turkey sandwiches.
Ingredients:
Recipe for a basic version
1 bag of cranberries
1/2 cup of sugar
1/3 cup of brown sugar
1/2 cup of orange juice
1 cup of rough chopped walnuts
1/4 tsp of salt
1/4 tsp of fresh grated cinnamon
Directions:
Put all the ingredients into a sauce pan, bring to a boil while stirring. Once the sugar melts reduce heat and simmer till mixture reduces to a consistancy you like.
Enjoy, IC
Many years ago a container of Boston Market's Cranberry Chutney was in the fridge and I pulled it out when making some corn bread. What the heck, I added it to the batter and wow, what a great addition. I had to make my own for future uses and love it. It can be used for so many recipes. Add it to pancakes or waffles, use for a cobbler, serve over vanilla ice cream, added to a bbq sauce, add to stuffing and even serve over chicken, pork or turkey slices. It's even great on turkey sandwiches.
Ingredients:
Recipe for a basic version
1 bag of cranberries
1/2 cup of sugar
1/3 cup of brown sugar
1/2 cup of orange juice
1 cup of rough chopped walnuts
1/4 tsp of salt
1/4 tsp of fresh grated cinnamon
Directions:
Put all the ingredients into a sauce pan, bring to a boil while stirring. Once the sugar melts reduce heat and simmer till mixture reduces to a consistancy you like.
Enjoy, IC
Saturday, November 14, 2009
A Garage Cleaning
About 7 years ago I through the Union Hall volunteered for a job called Christmas in April. The job was to assist the elderly with construction work needed on their homes.
I pulled up to the job on a Saturday morning with 2 fellow carpenters. Out of 100's of volunteers we were the only ones on this job. 50 other people were on a painting job with our famous X Mayor/ Governor, James E McGreevey whom had set this program up. The painting job was a Photo shoot.
We got out of our trucks and the job we were given was to install a garage door. Hah, It was a 2 car garage so another door had to be picked up.
We introduced ourselves to the elderly lady we were to do the job for. We went to open the garage and a 30 something year old son living there told us that there may be a few things in our way. We would have to go through the house. The other to fellows went inside to access the garage and I started to look at the old doors. They had never been painted. The house hadn't been very well maintained either. The side jambs of the doors were water rotted right through.
The 2 fellows I was with came back out of the house telling me that there was a problem. There was so much crap and garbage inside the garage they couldn't get to either door...
OK, I go to my truck, grab an extension chord, Saw Zall, heavy duty blade and set myself up, cut door #1 right down the middle. The bottom panel basically disintegrated.We were in. What we were in was beyond belief. I think a thousand Vics had cleaned there garages and shipped the stuff to this one.
Nothing had ever been thrown out at this place. Including garbage. We made a call and through channels of at that time Mayor, James E McGreevey, a garbage truck was sent out special just for this job.
My 2 fellow carpenters and myself started to haul the garbage out. The Mother and her 30 something year old son watched. Another son that lived there showed up to watch too. He said that they had a couple old cars in there too. We had a glimpse of 1 but had no idea that there was 2. At some point a mention of a missing cat that had upset the elderly mother had been mentioned too.
We filled one garbage truck and it had to leave to dump and return. Filling the second, a pile of news papers was being removed. The pile must have been stacked and fallen over at one time. Under the last few bundles being removed we found the missing cat. Mummified. One of the guys picked the stiff corpse up by the tail, shook it head first at the lady and said, "We found your cat".
We literally jammed the garbage into garbage truck load #2. Even with the compression compactor on the truck we thought we would need one more trip but we got it all in there.
Yes, there were 2 cars in the garage, By old I was say late 60-70 models. Of course they couldn't be moved and sat in the way of working on the doors.
The garage door replacement . To start, we ended up rebuilding the entire front of the garage. The old framing had rotted along the bottom of the entire wall. We installed 2 new doors and then were asked to install openers on them. Happy happy joy joy specially with the 2 cars sitting in the way.
We didn't finish the job until almost 9pm.
Now helping someone in need to me should be a feel good project. Should be. We did the job, asked for nothing in return. Not a one of the 3 of us that did the job lived in the area. I had an hours drive myself to get there. What ticked me off, This elderly lady had 3 sons living there. All 3 sons were of a younger age than myself, 2 of those sons watched us work almost the entire day and not a 1 lifted a finger to help. We even bought our own lunches while they watched us eat. they ordered out for themselves. The project was completed, the material used was donated through donations and the Home Depot, As we were leaving the residences of the home were asking who would tow the cars from the garage.
I pulled up to the job on a Saturday morning with 2 fellow carpenters. Out of 100's of volunteers we were the only ones on this job. 50 other people were on a painting job with our famous X Mayor/ Governor, James E McGreevey whom had set this program up. The painting job was a Photo shoot.
We got out of our trucks and the job we were given was to install a garage door. Hah, It was a 2 car garage so another door had to be picked up.
We introduced ourselves to the elderly lady we were to do the job for. We went to open the garage and a 30 something year old son living there told us that there may be a few things in our way. We would have to go through the house. The other to fellows went inside to access the garage and I started to look at the old doors. They had never been painted. The house hadn't been very well maintained either. The side jambs of the doors were water rotted right through.
The 2 fellows I was with came back out of the house telling me that there was a problem. There was so much crap and garbage inside the garage they couldn't get to either door...
OK, I go to my truck, grab an extension chord, Saw Zall, heavy duty blade and set myself up, cut door #1 right down the middle. The bottom panel basically disintegrated.We were in. What we were in was beyond belief. I think a thousand Vics had cleaned there garages and shipped the stuff to this one.
Nothing had ever been thrown out at this place. Including garbage. We made a call and through channels of at that time Mayor, James E McGreevey, a garbage truck was sent out special just for this job.
My 2 fellow carpenters and myself started to haul the garbage out. The Mother and her 30 something year old son watched. Another son that lived there showed up to watch too. He said that they had a couple old cars in there too. We had a glimpse of 1 but had no idea that there was 2. At some point a mention of a missing cat that had upset the elderly mother had been mentioned too.
We filled one garbage truck and it had to leave to dump and return. Filling the second, a pile of news papers was being removed. The pile must have been stacked and fallen over at one time. Under the last few bundles being removed we found the missing cat. Mummified. One of the guys picked the stiff corpse up by the tail, shook it head first at the lady and said, "We found your cat".
We literally jammed the garbage into garbage truck load #2. Even with the compression compactor on the truck we thought we would need one more trip but we got it all in there.
Yes, there were 2 cars in the garage, By old I was say late 60-70 models. Of course they couldn't be moved and sat in the way of working on the doors.
The garage door replacement . To start, we ended up rebuilding the entire front of the garage. The old framing had rotted along the bottom of the entire wall. We installed 2 new doors and then were asked to install openers on them. Happy happy joy joy specially with the 2 cars sitting in the way.
We didn't finish the job until almost 9pm.
Now helping someone in need to me should be a feel good project. Should be. We did the job, asked for nothing in return. Not a one of the 3 of us that did the job lived in the area. I had an hours drive myself to get there. What ticked me off, This elderly lady had 3 sons living there. All 3 sons were of a younger age than myself, 2 of those sons watched us work almost the entire day and not a 1 lifted a finger to help. We even bought our own lunches while they watched us eat. they ordered out for themselves. The project was completed, the material used was donated through donations and the Home Depot, As we were leaving the residences of the home were asking who would tow the cars from the garage.
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