Hard-boiled eggs are one of the few foods that everyone in my house agrees are absolutely delicious. I happen to think it’s because I am a master in the kitchen. Meaning I have the ability to follow directions, watch water boil, and set a timer accurately. Go me.
How do I boil an egg?
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Hard Boiled Eggs
- Place egg(s) in saucepan.
- Fill saucepan with COOL water to about 1/2 inch above egg(s).
- Place saucepan on stove burner and turn heat to HIGH.
- When water boils, reduce heat to MEDIUM.
- Set timer for TEN (10) minutes.
- When timer goes off, remove saucepan from heat, pour out hot water, and replace with COOL water. Leave in sink or sit on a cool burner.
- Let egg(s) sit in cool water bath for 5-10 minutes.
- Peel and enjoy.
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Wanna be fancy? Anna the Red shows you how to make your hard-boiled eggs heart shaped. All you need is a milk carton, a chopstick, and two rubber bands.
I. TOTALLY. HEART. THAT.
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(Flickr credit)
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How do I organize 18 years worth of family photos?
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Photo Boxes
Photo boxes are quicker, easier, and less expensive than photo albums. Prettier on a shelf, too.
FREE TIP: Don’t wait 18 years to put your photos chronological order. Trust me on this.
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Back in January, I mentioned something on my Facebook wall about making Baked Potato Soup, and several of my friends or fans or followers or what-have-you commented and/or emailed me asking for the recipe, and, because I like to keep my word even if it takes me eight weeks to two years, I am giving you that recipe today.
How do I make potato soup?
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Baked Potato Soup, Aunt Patty Style
Prep Time: 1.5 hours Cook Time: 45 minutes Difficulty: Medium Serves: 6
Ingredients
4 pounds of Russet potatoes (5 or 6 big ones)
2/3 cup butter (for best flavor, I recommend real butter, not margarine)
2/3 cup flour
6 cups milk (whole milk is best, otherwise soup takes FOREVER to thicken)
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
4 green onions (scallions)
12 slices bacon
1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
8 ounces sour cream
Preparation
Bake potatoes and let cool. Once cooled, cut each lengthwise and scoop out pulp. Fry bacon on stovetop, using a skillet or griddle, until very crispy. Set potato pulp and bacon aside.
Chop green onions.
In stockpot (5 or 6 quart will work), melt butter over low heat. Slowly add flour, stirring constantly and until smooth.
Increase heat to medium and gradually add milk. Continue stirring until thick and bubbly (be patient, it takes a little while).
Stir in potato pulp, salt and pepper. Add 2 tablespoons of the green onions, 1/2 cup of the bacon, and 1 cup of the shredded cheddar cheese. Set aside remainder of those for garnish.
Stir in sour cream and cook until thoroughly heated, stirring frequently.
Serve in bowls and garnish with remaining bacon, onion, and cheese.
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Just think, if I were The Pioneer Woman, I would have pretty pictures of the ingredients and the process to show you. Of course, if I were The Pioneer Woman, I would also have eleventeen thrillion readers a month, a bestselling cookbook, and a movie deal with Columbia Pictures, but I’m not bitter because I have a DELICIOUS! BAKED POTATO SOUP RECIPE! And now so do you.
WE WIN.
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(Flickr credit)
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Note: This is the second post in a series on how to start a blog.
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Welcome back!
Hopefully after reading last Wednesday’s post, you were confident that you were ready to start your own blog, and had a good idea where to go to do that. Did you create one?
If you did, you probably enthusiastically wrote your first post and, with maybe a little headrush, clicked that Publish button. And, then, you were ready to tell the world how to find your little corner of the blogosphere, to start giving out your blog’s web address. That’s when you noticed that your www. had an extra little word in the middle. That your site name was something like yourcleverblogtitle.blogspot.com or yourcleverblogtitle.tumblr.com or yourcleverblogtitle.posterous.com.
How annoying.
But, in the past, you have read a lot of other blogs, and you don’t remember seeing any with those extra words added to them. You want your domain to be yourcleverblogtitle.com like everyone else’s. You need a domain name.
How do I get a domain name?
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Well, there are a hundreds, probably thousands, of entities that sell domain names. They are known as domain registrars. And they are easy to find. Just Google “domain names” and watch pages upon pages of search results pop up. A few of them include:
- Yahoo! – I’m listing them first since I personally have used them for many domain purchases and have had no problems. If you are a new customer, your first year will only cost you $3.95. The downside is that, after the first year, Yahoo! domain prices increase and are at the high end of the spectrum, as much as $34.95. But, if you’re trying to get started on the cheap, you can always take advantage of the $3.95 offer and then switch registrars when the year is up – which is a fairly painless process.
- Go Daddy – Arguably the most popular domain registrar, a dot com (or dot net, etc.) from them will set you back $11.99 (plus ICANN fee of 18 cents) per year.
- Domain.com – Another fan favorite, you can purchase your own domain name from Domain.com for $10.29 (plus ICANN fee of 18 cents) per year.
What’s in a Name? Dot Com, Dot Net, Dot Confusion
So, you came up with a clever blog title and went to a domain registrar to buy it, only to discover that the dot com version already belonged to someone else. Can you just register the dot net or dot org address instead? The short answer is yes, you can. Should you? That’s a topic of much debate amongst professional bloggers and internet experts. Many feel that your best bet is to come up with a name that has a dot com available, instead of registering an extension (that’s the techy term for the .com / .net / .org part of the web address) other than dot com. Ultimately, you have the be the one to decide what to do.
ProBlogger has an excellent article about naming your blog. Scroll down a bit for the section called “Dot What?” – it’s specific to the debate about extensions that I mentioned.
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Alrighty, now you have some basic information on how to customize your blog’s website address. Leave me a note in the comments, or send me an email with your new domain name. I’ll come by and say “hi.”
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Enough about me.
Not your mommy's blogger.
Wife and mother. Web designer and developer. WordPress fanatic. Has probably seen the movie Grease more times than you. (Formerly known as Crash Test Mommy.) Read a lot more about Jenny Motley here.pinterest is the new black.
Problem: Keeping track of all your internet fab finds. Solution: Pinterest. Read the whole story.
