Well folks, Santa is back at the North Pole for another year, I hope he was good to you!

Wow! 2004. A brand new year as the old hits the dust. Happy New Year everyone!

I pondered the year as I sat in my rocking chair and watched the swirling snow drifting around the yard.

2003 was an exciting year — Bread & Molasses launched!

Grammie had two weddings in 2003, a granddaughter and a grandson. Also three new babies joined the family, and a daughter and her hubby celebrated 25 years of marriage.

It was also a sad year, with the death of a brother-in-law and a sister-in-law.

My mind continued to wander, as I set my bread I got to thinking about when the children were young how they would trade my homemade bread with the neighbours for store bread.

How Saturday morning was sock matching day. We would sit in a circle and dump the bag of socks in the middle of the circle. One child would pick out all the blue socks, another the red, brown, and so on until we had them all matched.

I imagine other Grammies must allow their minds to wander like this as they look back at the years gone by . . . care to share your wanderings?

Well now, what can we start the New Year with? A New Year’s resolution? Nah! Never keep them anyway ;-) 

With so much good food over the holiday I’m not sure if anyone is interested in recipes, but maybe something to do with that leftover turkey.

Turkey freezes great. Pack it in individual sandwich bags, just enough for what you will need it for various uses, and then put it in freezer.

I clear the meat off the bones to make sandwiches, casseroles, stir fry, salads, hot turkey sandwiches, pies or just on a plate with leftover dressing and cranberries.

I also make use of the bones by boiling them down to make soup. The juice is good for stir-fry or to cook rice in for Chinese food, and is great for hot turkey sandwiches. Also, my family love the turkey pies I make using the broth and left over turkey, peas and carrots.

I also put broth in small bowls and freeze, not forgetting to mark on the bowl what is in it. I use a small piece of paper and stick it on the bowl with scotch tape, as I have various foods I freeze.

Winter is a great time for homemade beans. When I bake beans I do up two pounds at a time and divide them up into little dishes to freeze. They freeze great. You can also do chilli this way. Make up a big batch, just pop in the microwave to thaw and presto! Supper is ready.

We had a couple of great storms the past few weeks that washed lobster and bar clams inshore. Seems a shame to see the live lobsters die on the shore.

Lobsters don’t freeze well though, not too bad for a chowder maybe.

Seafood (Just haddock makes a nice chowder too)
Celery
Onions
Carrots
Potatoes

All veggies chopped small.

Put all veggies in a large pot and add a little water, simmer until near cooked. Add crab, lobster, scallops, bar clams, regular clams, shrimp, and any of the juice. Use any or all of these, whatever you have.

Simmer until scallops are cooked, just a few minutes. Add can milk and butter or margarine. Don’t let it boil, just turn to very low heat and let it simmer. If you like a thicker chowder you can make a white sauce and add it, but don’t let the chowder boil — milk will curdle.

2 tbsp. butter or margarine
2 tbsp. Flour
Salt
Milk

In a pot on the stove melt butter. Add the flour to melted butter. Stir in milk. Stir and cook until thickened.

If you want more sauce just fool around with the recipe, adding more of everything. Be careful not to let this stick to the bottom of the pot. Stir continually.

If you accidentally over-salt a dish while it's still cooking, drop in a peeled potato and it will absorb the excess salt for an instant "fix-me-up."

Here’s a little hint to darken your gravy if it is too light. In a small tinfoil pan place 2 tbsp. white sugar. Turn the element to high and let the sugar burn black. (Makes a lot of smoke, but clears quickly.) After sugar is burnt, quickly remove from stove and add about ½ cup water or more. Scrape the bottom of the pan and then pour into a bottle. Add some of this to your juice before adding flour to make gravy. Put as much as you need until desired colour. There is no taste to this, so it doesn’t change the taste of your gravy. I use this method often for any kind of gravy that I want darkened.

Don't throw out all that leftover wine. Freeze it into ice cubes for future use in casseroles and sauces.

Don’t walk in the shadow of another’s fear . . .

"By changing the inner attitudes of our minds, we can change the outer aspects of our lives."  --William James (1842 - 1910)

Until next time remember, I made it especially for you.