Mystery Solved!

A while back, I asked for help identifying these two cookie cutters. I had picked them up in a rummage sale and had no idea what they could be. The best guess Lorrie and I could come up with was a cob of corn and a bat.



Well, now the mystery is solved. I was up in Green Bay over Mother's Day and stopped by my aunt's to pick up her cookie cutters and cookbooks. She was downsizing to a new apartment. I started going through them when I had a 'Holy, um, cow' moment once I saw this:



A full set of the mystery cookie cutters still in the package! So it turns out the corn cob-looking one is a basket and the bat one is a chick with it's wings spread. And hey, there is a rabbit in the set too.

Trouble Free Cake Mix

I was in TJ Maxx the other day looking for some cupcake decorations and I saw this pan:


It caught my eye because I've almost purchased pans that allow you to make the cookies-on-a-stick and this was something along those lines. This was unique because of the shape and it showed other cookies beyond sugar cookies. The picture above is the back of the box. It shows three recipes: crispy rice treats, a protein bar, and trouble free cake mix. Nevermind the whole concept of a protein bar on a stick (you know, for those fussy, hard to please, scrawny children), I'm looking for a good trouble free cake mix recipe. So I go for a closer look and see this:



"1 Box cake mix - any flavor"  Well, there ya go. I wish I would have seen this pan sooner, I could have saved all that money on cookbooks...



Sorry about the photos. They were taken on my camera phone while the store's staff was giving me a variety of looks from puzzlement to annoyance.

What the heck are these?

I'm supposed to be working on my post about what we did for Halloween but its rather large so its taking a while. In the meantime, here's a quick post I've been meaning to do.



A while back I was at a rummage sale where the couple were literally selling everything and I bought a box of cookie cutters. I didn't have a good number of them and they were in really good condition. But in with all of them were two that I couldn't identify what they were supposed to be. We have some guesses: weird bat, corn, lamb's face. Nothing for sure. So I'm putting this out there. What are these two cutters? I have them shown two ways in hope somebody can identify them. They appear to be part of a Easter/spring set or possibly just from the same manufacturer. Here is a group shot.


Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

NordicWare Stadium Pan

New from NordicWare is the Platinum Series Cast Aluminum StadiumBundt pan. Perfect for that football get together or race day celebration. 9 cup capacity, cast aluminum, non-stick surface, limited lifetime warranty. Very cool!

Kitchen Scales Reviewed

Cooking For Engineers has a very good post discussing kitchen scales. I find there are a couple of benefits to using a scale to measure ingredients. Measuring flour by weight is much easier than by using a measuring cup, you don't have to worry about consistent packing. Same is true with something like brown sugar. Ingredients like shortening are also easier to weigh than use water displacement or even trying to use a dry measure cup. Ease of measuring leads to repeatability, which is nice when I make the same recipe for sugar cookies or frosting I can become more consistent. The more variables you can control, the better you can do when it comes to baking.

I wish I would have found this post before I purchased my scale. Don't get me wrong, I like my scale and it works fine. But this post is very informative and explains everything you should take into account when you are looking for a scale.

The scale I own is the Salter6055. It has all of the options that Cooking For Engineers recommends and is in the similar price range.