Clever Ideas Worth Knowing

[Ray S S]

When bringing home a bunch of bananas from the store, instead of leaving them connected at the stem,
disconnect them and they won't over-ripen so fast.

Store your opened chunks of cheese in aluminum foil. It will stay fresh much longer and not mold.

Peppers with 3 bumps on the bottom are sweeter and better for eating. Peppers with 4 bumps on the
bottom are firmer and better for cooking.

Add a teaspoon of water when frying ground beef. It will help pull the grease from the meat while cooking.

To really make scrambled eggs or omelets rich add a couple of spoonfuls of sour cream, cream cheese,
or heavy cream in and then beat them up.

For a cool brownie treat, make brownies as directed. Melt Andes mints in double broiler and pour over
warm brownies. Let set for a wonderful minty frosting.

Add garlic immediately to a recipe if you want a light taste of garlic, and at the end of the recipe if you
want a stronger taste of garlic.

Leftover Snickers bars from Halloween make a delicious dessert. Simply chop them up with the food
chopper. Peel, core and slice a few apples. Place them in a baking dish and sprinkle the chopped candy
bars over the apples. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes!!! Serve alone or with vanilla ice cream.

Heat up leftover pizza in a nonstick skillet on top of the stove, set heat to med-low and heat till warm.
This keeps the crust crispy. No soggy micro pizza.

Easy Deviled Eggs
Put cooked egg yolk in a zip lock bag. Seal, mash until they are all broken up. Add the remainder of
ingredients, reseal, keep mashing it up, mixing thoroughly, cut the tip of the baggie, squeeze mixture
into egg. Just throw baggie away when done. Easy clean-up.

Expanding Frosting

When you buy a container of cake frosting from the store, whip it with your mixer for a few minutes.
You can double it in size. You get to frost more cake/cupcakes with the same amount. You also
eat less sugar and calories per serving.

Reheating Refrigerated Bread
To warm biscuits, pancakes, or muffins that were refrigerated, place them in a microwave with a cup of
water. The increased moisture will keep the food moist and help it reheat faster.

Newspaper weeds away
Start putting in your plants, work the nutrients in your soil. Wet newspapers, put layers around the plants,
overlapping as you go, cover with mulch and forget about weeds. Weeds will get through some gardening
plastic, but they will not get through wet newspapers.

Broken Glass
Use a wet cotton ball or Q-tip to pick up the small shards of glass you can't see easily.

No More Mosquitoes
Place a dryer sheet in your pocket. It will keep the mosquitoes away.

 

[spartacus53]

Here are a few little tips for you around brown paper bags. I may just keep adding here.

1- Have any stale Italian Bread? Stick in the paper bag, wet the bag well and place in a 350 oven for a few minutes. Just like fresh baked.

2- Windshield wipers streaking? No problem, just grab a brown paper bag and rub up and down each blade. It will clean and sharpen them. You will eventually have to get new blades, but you can delay this by a few months with this method.

3- When washing windows, use old newspaper to dry them and get them squeaky clean, no streaks

 

[Ray S S]

That is good, Tee, maybe you can let us know later if it works

Hey Spart. that sounds like a pretty slick trick with the bread and a good addition to the post.
I'll have to try your other trick too if I remember it. Right now both vehicles have good wipers.
Thanks for sharing

Ray

 

[Bum Luck]

- If cream is too rich for your scrambled eggs, try milk; they are a lot lighter.

- Don't know what to do with your bath soap wears down to a sliver? Stick it to the top of a new bar instead of throwing it away.

- If you don't want to go through the hassle of the water and oven for dried out bread, you can put it in the microwave for about 15 or 20 seconds instead. This won't work if it's too dried out though.

- Tired of dried out pork chops? "Fry" them in water instead; they're a lot less tough and more juicy. Better yet, cook them with kraut. Add dill seeds.

- For Fluffy Mashed Potatoes, add a little baking powder when you mash them; and keep them hot through the mashing process. I use a potato ricer - it's a whole lot easier.

Darn, I'm getting hungry.........

 

[Ray S S]

Bum Luck that milk sounds better to me than the other stuff. And that one of the soap, we have always done
that. Let the small soap set in the hot water for a bit until it is flexible and lather the two up good together
and they will stick when allowed to dry good.
Thank you for your additions here.

Ray

 

[onfire]

When washing windows use 2 drops of Dawn dish washing detergent to spray bottle fill with distilled water then spray windshield wash much cheaper then store brand. If you can get blue surgical rags they leave no lint. newspapers sometimes leaves oil on them.

 

[Dano Sverige]

They made a whole book full of neat tricks for vinegar...but i've just woken up and can't be bothered searching right now!

 

[boogeyman]

When washing windows use 2 drops of Dawn dish washing detergent to spray bottle fill with distilled water then spray windshield wash much cheaper then store brand. If you can get blue surgical rags they leave no lint. newspapers sometimes leaves oil on them.

Grandpa used newspaper soaked in vinegar to clean the windshield & house windows. Worked great with no streaks! He said it was the ink reacting with the vinegar.

Fluffy omletes? As said above use cream, use the blender. Blend on high until the eggs double in volume.

 

[stefen]

I'm going to try placing a dryer sheet in my pocket...seem to always have a problem with mosquitos in my pockets

 

[Ray S S]

That is good Stefen. I hope it works, I am definitely going to try that out, too, this summer. Right now we
are under a foot of snow that all came down since yesterday afternoon. No mosquitoes for a while. LOl.
Ray

 

[onfire]

Then why not fill your pockets with snow RAY?

 

[Ray S S]

Too cold,, then too wet.... LOL.

Ray

 

[Zephyr]

dryer sheets

Keep one in your pocket in the winter to help reduce static electricity shocks.

To close a box of dry spaghetti for later, close the flaps flat and bend the top lengthwise into a 'V'. Then push the short sides inward to 'lock' it into place. (Beats using tape....)

 

[hypoman]

Another good use for brown paper bags is if you have still have unripened tomatoes that still need a few days on the vine....but the frost is coming, put them inside and a brown paper bag and put them in a dark somewhat cool place and in a couple of days you will have ripe tomatoes!

Also, I've posted this before but if you have a problem with an over boiling pot, and a lid is not working, put a wooden spoon across the top of the pot, it will not overflow anymore! For big pots.....use two spoons.

 

[spartacus53]

They made a whole book full of neat tricks for vinegar...but i've just woken up and can't be bothered searching right now!

Having the book is a great thing... Now all you have to do is learn to read... I still get all my books with all pictures

 

[WindHarvester]

They made a whole book full of neat tricks for vinegar...but i've just woken up and can't be bothered searching right now!

We have the book and it is about a 1/4 inch thinck, I think it is loaned out right now though.

Great tips folks!

 

[Ray S S]

Yup. Lots of good tips added here. Thanks

Spart, those picture books are good as long as you are old enough to understand what you are
looking at.

 

[stefen]

They made a whole book full of neat tricks for vinegar...but i've just woken up and can't be bothered searching right now!

Having the book is a great thing... Now all you have to do is learn to read... I still get all my books with all pictures

When going out to dinner, you probably prefer Denny's because of the pictures...just point and grunt

 

[Ray S S]

Hey, One nice thing about is that while looking for something to eat, you go on a
sight-seeing tour.