And The Winner Is...

Thank you to all the people who added me to their blogroll and readers!  I'm excited to get some great ideas and feedback from readers here about all the things we all enjoy - cooking, knitting, gardening, arts and crafts, and so on and so forth.

The winner of the $25 gift card to Williams-Sonoma is As American as Apple Pie!

Thanks to everyone and stay tuned for fresh new posts coming out of the oven soon!

The Psychotic Hobbyist Relaunch!

I've moved all my posts from my old location and will now have recipes, knitting projects, gardening, and so on and so forth all here so I can have the entire list of my blogs in ONE SPOT! Yippee!

So, to remind you about this one over here and to start diverting the traffic where it is supposed to be, I'm having a giveaway. And it's not something I got paid or I'm regifting, no sir, I'm paying money out of my own pocket to give you something super cool. Because I want to build up this location to start some dialogue with other bakers, gardeners, knitters and crafters. It's what keeps me sane during the school year!

What you can win: a $25 gift card for Williams-Sonoma (because everyone has to eat, but not everyone has all the other hobbies)

How to enter:

• Leave a comment on any post (besides this one), a recent dated post or a newer one, it doesn't matter. In transferring the posts, they are now commentless. So go comment on a post (not this one, go exploring...). I added the topics list on the sidebar if you only want to look at knitting posts or sewing posts, etc. Leaving a comment gains you 1 entry.
  
• Add this blog to your feed reader. Leave a comment on this post saying you did, gain 1 entry.
• Add this blog to your blogroll. Leave a comment on this post saying you did, gain 1 entry.
• Mention this blog in a post on your own site, leave a comment saying you did, gain 1 entry.

This giveaway will end August 14th, 12PM Central time.

Also, if you have a hobby type blog yourself and want to swap links, let me know, I am building up my blogroll here too.

Thanks for stopping by, hope YOU win the $25 from Williams-Sonoma! Good luck!

Salami Salad

I'm always on the lookout for a unique salad. Especially when asked to take things to church for suppers and things like that, the same old same old simply won't do. So, this bread salad was perfect. And when I showed up at the church salad luncheon it was served at, my MIL informed me it was already gone and was the first thing to run out. Not bad!

Toasted-Bread Salad with Salami

1 loaf Italian bread, halved lengthwise and toasted

1 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling

salt and pepper

4 large tomatoes, chopped

1 English cucumber, quartered lengthwise and chopped

4 ounces deli-sliced salami, cut into thin strips

1 cup fresh basil leaves, torn

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

1) In a large colander over a bowl or the sink, drizzle 1/2 cup water over the toasted bread to saturate. Squeeze the bread with your hands to remove any excess liquid, then crumble into bite-size pieces. Transfer to a large serving bowl and drizzle with 1/2 cup olive oil; season to taste with salt and pepper.

2) Add the tomatoes, cucumber and salami to the bread and toss to combine. Add the basil and drizzle the red wine vinegar and remaining 1/2 cup olive oil on top. Toss and season to taste with salt, pepper and more olive oil.

Recipe from Rachael Ray magazine site

Coconut Shrimp

Dude.

I love shrimp. So, I find a lot of main dish recipes, appetizers, salads and anything else I can to use shrimp. Even though I hate peeling them but then you know they’re good and fresh.

Coconut Shrimp

1 egg

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

2/3 cup beer (I used an NA lager)

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

2 cups flaked coconut

24 shrimp

3 cups oil for frying

1) In medium bowl, combine egg, 1/2 cup flour, beer and baking powder. Place 1/4 cup flour and coconut in two separate bowls.

2) Hold shrimp by tail, and dredge in flour, shaking off excess flour. Dip in egg/beer batter; allow excess to drip off. Roll shrimp in coconut, and place on a baking sheet lined with wax paper. Refrigerate for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, heat oil to 350 degrees.

3) Fry shrimp in batches; cook turning once, for 2 to 3 minutes, or until golden brown. Using tongs, remove shrimp to paper towels to drain. Serve warm with your favorite dipping sauce.

Original recipe found here - it’s got 5 stars on Allrecipes!!

Give Me a Big Challah!

Last year, I had a personal goal of mastering a variety of soups.  This year, it’s the year of kick ass bread.  I think I can do it, but there is a little more science involved with bread, so there’s not always a guarantee that everything will turn out OK.  So, imagine my glee when my first attempt at challah bread turned out lovely.  I followed the recipe out of my 2007 The Best of America’s Test Kitchen cookbook, which you can’t access on their site without a membership, but I did find the same recipe here if you would like to make your house smell divinely of fresh baked challah bread.  You can let me know how it goes…

Scrapbook Layout

One of the nice thing about hobbies, is that sometimes other people can’t do them and they want you to do it instead. For money! Woot!

I have been making 9×9 scrapbooks for baby gifts and will start work on the 4th one, for hire, in the next week or so. I create 32 pages of baby’s first year moments, do delivery room and newborn photos to get the album started for the new parents, and do layouts leaving room for them to add photos at a later date of those special milestones.

Here is a page I did in a book I just completed of mom and dad with their new baby boy on a page. The nice thing about the 9×9 size, you can do a couple photos on the page or one larger one, they are quite fun!

World's Softest Baby Blanket

My BIL and SIL just had their 3rd girl at Christmas. Making a baby blanket for her was how I spent November and part of December. I cast on 110 (give or take, can’t remember now) and just did straight knitting of each color before the skein ran out. I used 2 skeins of each and, hold on to your hats, it’s pajama yarn and was the SOFTEST blanket in the history of babies, I kid you not!