Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Sweet Sour Chicken

For those of you like me, you don't think about dinner until it's too late to thaw anything. Hey! There's' hope for us. I found a recipe that requires frozen chicken (you pick either tenderloins or thighs), a can of chunk pineapple in its own juice, a bunch of coarsely chopped sweet peppers or use a large green one. First chop the peppers into bite size chunks. Dump your 1 pound mass of frozen chicken into a crockpot, add the can of pineapple, juice and all, and then the peppers. Start on Low for an hour, then crank it up to High if you are now past noon. If it's still morning, continue to cook on Low as long as you have 6-8 hours. I don't. After about 4 hours, carefully remove the chicken pieces and cut them up into bite sizes. You don't really have to do this, but it helps cooking them. Back in the crockpot. Make a slurry of cornstarch and water to add to the crockpot. If you want more of a sweet-sour taste, add ¼ cup of apple cider vinegar, 2 T brown sugar and ¼ cup water.
Hubster will want some soy sauce, so I'll put enough in for him to taste it. It'll provide the salt. Otherwise, salt and pepper as you please.
Serve over rice - brown or white-your choice.
I love sweet peppers and always have them on hand. I purposely look for recipes to put them in. Let me know if you have a fav.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Vintage Kenmore 158/1410, Singer 301 & Scones

My little darling that arrived needed some parts, a lot of TLC and some hard core wiggling. I don't think anyone has cared for or used this machine much. I cleaned her thoroughly, pulled out a lot of gunk. Oiled her up and did a trial test run. She's very quiet now, stitches a beautiful stitch but didn't know how to zigzag. So I moved the stitch width lever, tried each stitch and wiggled the needle bar. Once enough TriFlow was running thru its parts, it finally began to zig zag and do its stitches. I sewed 2 items with it today. It runs like a champ. One more vintage machine, a neglected one, out of our dumps. One more problem, the feed dog lever doesn't want to move, but we're working on that. It'll probably free up tomorrow. Letting it soak overnight with some TriFlow.
Will be cleaning and oiling my Singer 301 tomorrow. It's been sitting and needs to be run. Don't need it to freeze up due to neglect. This is a really fine sewing machine. If you ever want to own a vintage Singer, this one should be on your list.
It is a slant foot machine but don't let that discourage you. Many attachments, feet, etc. are readily available. Love the way it stitches. So it'll sew up a mini quilt I'm working on. A 9-patch 1800's style. Can't hardly wait to get started.
Tomorrow morning's menu: luscious scones with cranberries and almonds
With coffee, of course! Well, maybe an egg to be healthy. I heard you won't get hungry and will lose weight if you eat something sweet with protein :-) Does this count?

Friday, January 10, 2014

New Vintage Sewing Machines

Sadness rules here! I did a bad thing and ordered a couple of sewing machines that needed to be shipped. Neither arrived as they should. Both are relatively heavy darlings. One wasn't packed very well and we lost its case. Machine is great. She's called "Princess"
Number 2 is a Kenmore 158.1410 and I was intrigued by this machine because of it's heavy duty motor, its compactness, and it's very unusual throat plate. It is pictured with its two spool pins. It arrived with the broken off spool pins in its case along with the one red felt piece. Why it was shipped to me with this problem, I don't know. I can fix it with some trouble, but geez--who needs this.
I'm dealing with the people who did the shipping. All will be resolved soon. Meanwhile both will get a good bath, oiled and lubricated where applicable. Then we'll do some crazy stitching. They will be my lovelies.