Simply Norma – Page 105

Simple Homemade Blueberry Muffins

These muffins are easy to make. Make sure you grease your muffin tin well or use tin liners or the muffins will stick.

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter (1 stick unsalted) room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs (room temperature)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup finely ground yellow cornmeal
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup milk
2 1/2 cups blueberries (fresh or frozen – thawed if frozen)

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees
Grease a muffin tin or use paper liners
In an electric mixer, cream the butter then add the sugar and mix
Add the eggs one at a time and beat well
Add baking powder and mix well
Add vanilla extract and lemon zest. Mix well
In another medium sized bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal, salt, cinnamon and stir with a fork
Add half of the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients in the electric mixer
Add half the milk and stir well
Add the remaining dry mixture to the wet mixture and stir well but be careful not to over-mix or the muffins will come out tough
Add the remaining milk and stir
Fold in the blueberries
Spoon the batter into the muffin tin
Bake in center of oven until muffins are golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean — approximately 25-30 minutes.
Cool muffins in the pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes then remove them from the tin

Unfortunately, I can’t remember where I saw this recipe as I’ve been using it for quite a few years now.

New Cure for the Common Cold?

Pills (image courtesy of Microsoft Images)

I was recently sent an article found in Wikinews regarding a new drug that could “treat virtually all viral infections.”

“The new drug, known as DRACOÂ (double-stranded RNA activated caspase oligomerizer), is able to discriminate between healthy cells and those infected by viruses.” And “it signals the infected cells to die.”

Now, I don’t know if the medical world has really come across a cure or not but I wonder if somehow we could find a way to use the same principle in life, i.e. discriminate between healthy people and those “infected” by bad manners, contagious diseases or the person who is hard to get along with. And, if they could “die” in the spiritual sense, that would be great too.

Truth be told though, sometimes I feel like I’m one of the infected people who needs to “die.”

Spain and the Pope

A recent article in the New York Times made me pause in the middle of my stride in life.

The Vatican in Rome — The Vatican (Microsoft Images)

The article, titled Catholic Clergy Protest Pope’s Visit and Its Price Tag, stated that the Catholic Church was getting ready for a lavish $72 million celebration in Madrid. $72 million dollars. The country hopes to recoup part of that money from the many visitors that attend the event. Unfortunately, as in the past, the people who are upset about the lavishness of this celebration know that they will never know the true cost of this event.

At first, I too was appalled at the amount being spent for a visit by the Pope, especially in the times that we live in with people dying in Somalia, the U.S. having 1 in 5 children living in poverty, etc.

But then I glance inwards. I am not as frugal as I should be. I still head to a coffeehouse for a good cup of hot chocolate and pastry. Yes, I do contribute in helping with spreading the Word of Jesus throughout the world and with local food banks.

But I could do more. We could always do more.

So, although I agree with the priests who are protesting the amount of money spent on this event, I believe the world right around me needs some correction also.

Insurance

I’m just wondering … do people get life insurance just for the sake of getting life insurance? If a person’s mortgage is paid, they are healthy, they have no children at home … would they get insurance so that someone else can have “fun” when they die?

Do people who are in their 60’s or later really do this?

Just wondering …

Rainy Days & Mondays

One of my favorite songs is sung by Karen Carpenter. It’s called Rainy Days & Mondays.

Karen died early in life — she was only 33. She had an eating disorder called anorexia nervosa. Statistics state that 5-10% of anorexics die within 10 years of contracting the disease. Only 1 in 10 people seek treatment.

Other “stars” who have had this disease include Joan River, Princess Di and Nadia Comaneci to name a few.

Humans are strange sometimes. Even though they know they have a problem, they fail to seek help and the consequences are sometimes dire.

Part of the the lyrics say “what I’ve got they used to call the blues, nothing is really wrong, feeling like I don’t below, walking around, some kind of lonely clown…”

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=clown&ctt=1#ai:MP900314102|mt:0| — Clown (Microsoft Images)

If only clowns would take their costumes off —

Sarpino’s Pizza

We’ve been very fortunate in finding good pizza places since we’ve moved to Minnesota.

We had the pizza from Sarpino’s in Oakdale delivered at night and they were able to find us (even in our forested neighborhood) with no problem.

The pizza was absolutely delicious! Quick service, great pizza — we’d order from here again.

Electrolux Electric Range

After we moved into our new house the end of April, I wrote a blogÂ about our new appliances.

Now, I’d like to update you on the electrolux electric range.

The range and oven both have the wave-touch feature. Wave (with a touch) your hand on the top area of the stovetop and it turns on. The display and keys are easy to read.

The oven works fairly well on bake but one has to adjust the time for the convection oven as it bakes quite quickly.

I have two main problems with this range. The range has a ceramic glass cooktop and we have to be careful what type of pot we use. We had used a flat bottom Wok type frying pan with an aluminum bottom. It should have been fine according to the range manual but when moved on the cooktop, we were left with scratches. One has to be very careful with moving pots on this cooktop.

The second problem is cleaning the cooktop. I use the cooktop cleaner by Magic called Cooktop Magic along with either a dry microfiber cloth or paper cloths. The cleaner works fine but any spills that aren’t cleaned up right away take a long time to remove. I average 20 minutes or more to clean this cooktop — sometimes 30-40 minutes. Ugghhh …

This range is fairly new so we aren’t planning on getting rid of it soon. If I had money just sitting around doing nothing, I would buy a new gas range. Too bad I can’t just “wave” a new gas range into existence.

[amazon_link id=”B001FA1O9K” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ] Magic Complete Cooktop Cream, 16 Ounce (Pack of 6) [/amazon_link]

Butterflies

Sitting on our deck, I noticed 2 butterflies flitting around. They were rather unusual looking. Black and white. I had never seen anything like them. They were huge compared to the ones I’ve seen before.

I wonder if it’s a black swallowtail??? I took a picture of it but the butterfly wasn’t close enough for me to capture it well. See if you can find it in the photo I took.

Nature has so many different varieties of creatures. We have seen so few of them and know so little about them. The phrase “stop and smell the roses” is very appropriate — especially for me, now that I live in the “forest.”

Smash Fast Food

I recently went to a new fast food place called Smash in Woodbury, Minnesota.

It was actually pretty good. I tried their basic hamburger with the usual fixings. The hamburger was very moist yet not undone. And, the french fries were delicious.

Much better than McDonalds, Wendy’s, Burger King or even Kidd Valley in Seattle.

2011-07-31 16.45.09 — Smash Sweet Potato Fries

I didn’t have the sweet potato fries but my friend said they were good — and he’s a good french fry tester.

Family Reunion Hors d’oeuvres

At our recent family reunion, our son made very simple hors d’oeuvres using loaves of baguette bread.

Pea and Goat Cheese, Mint — Pea, Mint and Goat Cheese Spread

Nectarine, tomatoe, red onion basil — Tomato, red onion, nectarine and basil spread

We didn’t forget the “usual” — deviled eggs.

I wonder why they are called deviled eggs???

One of our guests brought a bouquet of flowers for our table. A very nice touch!