Onion Soup

There is no such thing as too much artisan bread!

For bits and pieces of bread gone stale or left-overs, however, here is a delicious and fast recipe for French onion soup:

Take chunks of bread and put them in oven-proof bowls. Top with melting cheese such as mozzarella.
Saute slices of onions in butter until translucent. Add 4 cups of water for each 2-3 large onions. Add beef bouillon or Minor's beef base as directed on the container for making broth. Add a dash of Worcestershire sauce and a dash of Sweet Vermouth (bigger dashes for more than 4 cups of broth).
Put the bowls under a broiler to melt the cheese and toast the bread. Pour the onion soup over the cheesy toast. Voila! Be careful removing the hot bowls from the oven!

This recipe is courtesy of Brian Margolis, who served me a bowl with about 4 different types of bread in it, including parts of an English muffin and a Kaiser roll. There may have been a few left-over cheeses in it also. This soup tastes better than any you'll get in a restaurant.
The soup can also be kept for a few days in the fridge, and when poured over freshly toasted cheese croutons, who's to know they are getting left-over left-overs??

For those of you swamped in their home-made artisan breads.......you know where I live!

Blogging

The blogs are very interesting, and often humorous. So I am doing a practical blog which does not involve hours in the kitchen, late nites being creative with a sewing machine, snowboarding, or (god forbid!) raising a baby in China. Although, I would very much like an ayi for myself. Would an ayi pick up after me? Clean my house? Fix my meals?



Okay... Are you "clueless" about:



1) Scale on your bay trees? Those little buggers live under the leaves (mostly) and secrete very sticky stuff all over your plant, carpet, windowsills, and windows. Now I only tried this before new growth appeared, so I'll update this after the new growth "hardens off" a bit.
Put rubbing alcohol into a spray bottle. Put your bay tree outside and mist it with the alcohol on and under all the leaves and stems. Then, dump buckets of slightly warm water over it and try to rinse off all surfaces of the leaves. Bingo! Scale mostly dies and your plant is healthy.
This works much faster than the suggested method, which is to dab each individual bug with a Q-tip dipped in alcohol. Optional: use a hose to rinse. Mine weren't turned on when I did this on the first warm day in February.

2) Tent caterpillars in your dwarf trees? Spray forcefully with rubbing alcohol and DO NOT RINSE! Repeat (3x did the trick for me). Totally got rid of those wormy things.

3) Too much artisan bread accumulating in your freezer, or going stale on the shelf? Onions sprouting green growth? Stay tuned for my next blog! Any questions you want addressed in my "clueless" blog? Use "comments"