Some Things Your Mother Should Have Taught You
1. Take your bananas apart when you get home from the store. If you leave them connected at the stem, they ripen faster.
2. Store your opened chunks of cheese in aluminum foil. It will stay fresh much longer and not mold!
3. Peppers with 3 bumps on the bottom are sweeter and better for
eating. Peppers with 4 bumps on the bottom are firmer and better for
cooking.
4. Add a teaspoon of water when frying ground beef. It will help pull the grease away from the meat while cooking.
5. To really make scrambled eggs or omelets rich add a couple of
spoonfuls of sour cream, cream cheese, or heavy cream in and then beat
them up.
6. For a cool brownie treat, make brownies as
directed. Melt Andes mints in double broiler and pour over warm
brownies. Let set for a wonderful minty frosting.
7. Add garlic
immediately to a recipe if you want a light taste of garlic and at the
end of the recipe if your want a stronger taste of garlic.
8.
Leftover snickers bars from Halloween make a delicious dessert. Simply
chop them up with the food chopper. Peel, core and slice a few apples.
Place them in a baking dish and sprinkle the chopped candy bars over the
apples. Bake at 350 for 15 minutes!!! Serve alone or with vanilla ice
cream. Yummm!
9. Reheat Pizza
Heat up leftover pizza in a
nonstick skillet on top of the stove, set heat to med-low and heat till
warm. This keeps the crust crispy. No soggy micro pizza. I saw this on
the cooking channel and it really works.
10. Easy Deviled Eggs
Put cooked egg yolks in a zip lock bag. Seal, mash till they are all
broken up. Add remainder of ingredients, reseal, keep mashing it up
mixing thoroughly, cut the tip of the baggy, squeeze mixture into egg.
Just throw bag away when done easy clean up.
11. Expanding Frosting
When you buy a container of cake frosting from the store, whip it with
your mixer for a few minutes. You can double it in size. You get to
frost more cake/cupcakes with the same amount. You also eat less sugar
and calories per serving.
12. Reheating refrigerated bread
To warm biscuits, pancakes, or muffins that were refrigerated, place
them in a microwave with a cup of water. The increased moisture will
keep the food moist and help it reheat faster.
13. Newspaper block weeds
Start putting in your plants, work the nutrients in your soil. Wet
newspapers, put layers around the plants overlapping as you go. Cover
with mulch and forget about weeds. Weeds will get through some gardening
plastic they will not get through wet newspapers.
14. Broken Glass
Use a wet cotton ball or Q-tip to pick up the small shards of glass you can't see easily.
15. No More Mosquitoes
Place a dryer sheet in your pocket. It will keep the mosquitoes away.
16. Squirrel Away!
To keep squirrels from eating your plants, sprinkle your plants with
cayenne pepper. The cayenne pepper doesn't hurt the plant and the
squirrels won't come near it.
17. Flexible vacuum
To get
something out of a heat register or under the fridge add an empty paper
towel roll or empty gift wrap roll to your vacuum. It can be bent or
flattened to get in narrow openings.
18. Reducing Static Cling
Pin a small safety pin to the seam of your slip and you will not have a
clingy skirt or dress. Same thing works with slacks that cling when
wearing panty hose. Place pin in seam of slacks and ... guess what! ...
static is gone.
19. Measuring Cups
Before you pour sticky
substances into a measuring cup, fill with hot water. Dump out the hot
water, but don't dry cup. Next, add your ingredient, such as peanut
butter, and watch how easily it comes right out. (Or spray the measuring
cup or spoon with Pam before using)
20. Foggy Windshield
Hate foggy windshields? Buy a chalkboard eraser and keep it in the glove
box of your car When the windows fog, rub with the eraser! Works better
than a cloth!
21. Re-opening envelopes
If you seal an
envelope and then realize you forgot to include something inside, just
place your sealed envelope in the freezer for an hour or two. Viola! It
unseals easily.
22. Hair Conditioner
Use your hair conditioner
to shave your legs. It's cheaper than shaving cream and leaves your legs
really smooth. It's also a great way to use up the conditioner you
bought but didn't like when you tried it in your hair.
23. Goodbye Fruit Flies
To get rid of pesky fruit flies, take a small glass, fill it 1/2' with
Apple Cider Vinegar and 2 drops of dish washing liquid; mix well. You
will find those flies drawn to the cup and gone forever!
24. Get Rid of Ants
Put small piles of cornmeal where you see ants. They eat it, take it
'home,' can't digest it so it kills them. It may take a week or so,
especially if it rains, but it works and you don't have the worry about
pets or small children being harmed!
25. Dryer Filter
Even
if you are very diligent about cleaning the lint filter in your dryer it
still may be causing you a problem. If you use dryer sheets a waxy
build up could be accumulating on the filter causing your dryer to over
heat. The solution to this is to clean your filter with with a
toothbrush and hot soapy water every 6 months.