10 May 2011

DIY Ideas for breaking your Cane Sugar addiction

From: EarthEats

Sugar, coffee, bananas, chocolate. Some of the hardest things to find suitable workarounds for if you’re trying to live a locavore lifestyle.

Finding local cane sugar is nearly impossible if you don’t live in Hawaii or the continental Southeast — and even then, the raw product is typically shipped to a processing plant thousands of miles away before distribution.

But there are options. If you want to keep your “home, sweet home” sweet AND close to home, a local-food columnist suggests a DIY option:

Set aside a section of your garden for sugar beets and boil them down for a homemade sweetener!

Making Beet Sugar

(adapted from: Grandpappy’s Homemade Sugar Recipe)

Carefully wash and scrub beets, remove greens.
Finely slice, dice or shred beets into a large pot.
Add just enough water to cover the beets.
Cook beets over medium heat until tender (about an hour).
Drain the beets (retain the water! this is what you will use to make the sugar), you can eat the cooked beets, use them in other recipes or can them.
Simmer the beet sugar water over low-medium heat, stirring frequently until it becomes a thick syrup, roughly the consistency of honey.
Transfer the syrup to a storage container. As it cools, it will begin to crystallize.
As the sugar crystallizes, periodically remove it from the container and crush it into sugar crystals.

Substituting Honey And Maple Syrup

You can also use maple syrup or honey in many recipes.

To substitute honey for sugar, eHow provides a few guidelines:

Up to one cup, honey can be substituted for sugar in equal amounts.
Over one cup, use about 2/3-3/4 cup of honey for every cup of sugar.

They also recommend reducing the amount of liquid in your recipe, adding a little baking soda to counter honey’s acidity and reducing the cooking temperature a bit.

For maple syrup, similar rules of thumb apply: use about 3/4 cup maple syrup in the place of each cup of sugar and reduce the amount of liquid in your recipe by about 3 tablespoons per cup of maple syrup added.

Both honey and maple syrup also make healthier, more local additions to coffee, tea and other beverages.

Read More:

The Sweet Success of DIY and Organic Sugar (The Daily Green)
Grandpappy’s Homemade Sugar Recipe (grandpappy.info)
How to Substitute Honey For Sugar in a Recipe (eHow)

3 May 2011

When it Sucks to be Single

I enjoy being single most of the time. I can do what I want when I want without answering to anyone. If I want to go to Cape Breton and backpack for a week, I can. Or if I spend all my savings on a trip across Europe, it's my money.

But being single sucks when you're sick. I started feeling nauseous, getting chills yesterday and a horrible headache began this morning. I texted my roommate to let him know that I wasn't able to keep up my share of the chores and why. He was good with it and is leaving me be to get better on my own.

It would be so nice if I was in a relationship and my man brought me soup or something just because.

Ok, I know, I'm being a big suck right now. I don't necessarily want someone around (especially if I'm contagious) but it makes me feel so much better when they show they're thinking of me and wanting me to feel better. Pout :(

Thanks for listening, I'm going to make herbal tea and crawl back into bed now...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dghir9oCmKQ Cold as it Gets / Patty Griffin