HOUSEHOLD TIPS NOT FOUND IN WOMAN'S WEEKLY

[Marilyn]

My first Mother-in-Law ( dead now, bless her), taught me a stove top recipe cooked over the lowest heat. Onions in the bottom with a bit of butter. Lamb Chops in a layer on top. Sliced Carrots and Potatoes on top of that. Sliced Cabbage in a thick layer on top. Pour in a cup of stock, seasoned with salt and pepper and a dash of Worcestershire. Put 2 knobs of butter on top, a layer of foil under the lid and jam the lid on. Cook over the lowest heat for 2 hours.
Fabulous!
( though I haven't eaten Lamb for almost 30 years now!)

[Stanley]

That's almost identical to Dorothy's recipe for the braised steak Maz. The foil to seal the lid gives a slight pressure cooker effect. In the old days they used a strip of pastry as a seal and part of the instructions was not to lift the lid on any account, keep the flavours in there.
You've reminded me of the fact I haven't used my pressure cooker for a long time. I shall use the minimal liquid method and low heat on some mutton chops and veggies and see how that goes. The cooker has a trivet in the bottom so that will be an advantage.
So today's tip is have a bit of an experiment every now and then!

[Marilyn]

If cooking low for long periods on the stove top, you need a heavy based saucepan of course. Her instruction were the same...leave it be and don't touch it. Worked every time and never stuck to the bottom.
I think it would work just as well with Beef ( you could throw a tin of tomatoes in as the liquid).

[Stanley]

See 'What did you have for tea?' Maz. I slipped up but it tastes great and I shall rescue it!
Today's tip is about moss. I have lovely stone flags in the front garden, the one immediately in front of the door is 4ft by 3ft and six inches thick with a lovely smooth finish. The others are high quality as well but they have a fault. At this time of the year they grow a coat of extremely slippery algae or moss and in wet weather they can be lethally slippy. I scattered finely powdered washing soda on them (and the wall tops) yesterday and this morning after the rain all they need is a good scrub with the stiff yard brush and they will be clean and safe for another year.

[Stanley]

Unlike Maz I like garlic in my cooking but I hate the faff of getting the cloves out of the corm! I cut the whole corm in two across the cloves and float them cut side up on the top of the stew in the slow cooker. They soften and you can easily squeeze the flesh out of the skins..... Tip of the day!

[Big Kev]

That's why I use a garlic press, peeling individual cloves of garlic is a right pain...

[Stanley]

That does it as well Kev but I have never had one.
If, like me, you occasionally slip up and put to much salt or other condiment in a savoury dish, a dose of dessicated coconut and a quick simmer will save it. Coconut seems to absorb the excess.

[Stanley]

I'll admit that window cleaning is not my strongest point! However I always bear in mind the answer a candidate for Oxford University gave when asked to demonstrate a progression of words. He said "The windows of this examination room were once transparent, they are now translucent and if not cleaned soon they will be opaque." So we reach a point where I have to act. I have cleaned the kitchen window inside and out, a good move! Life is more cheerful now that I have a clear view.

[Marilyn]

We do our windows regularly, but they are due again...

[Stanley]

Good for you Maz.
Today's tip is.... When you are in the grip of forces that you can't control (like the present political situation) ignore it and concentrate on the things you can control. Like looking after your health and cleaning the windows!

[Marilyn]

Just letting you know. I did not clean my windows today...

[Stanley]

You are forgiven Maz!
If the weather is bad in the UK, reflect on the fact that we are safe from the natural disasters which are a normal part of life in countries that have 'better weather' than us! (At the moment I'm watching the wildfires in California which has a 'perfect climate'.)

[Stanley]

If, like me, you are one of Nature's 'larks' and rise early, consider yourself fortunate. Recent research says we are healthier for it. See this LINK for a possible connection between early rising and cancer risks in women.

[LizG]

Just letting you know. I did not clean my windows today...

Neither did I Maz. I'm going to wait until 2 weeks before Christmas to do ours; that's when our parties start. I need to get rid of the kamakazi bird marks on the window, not to mention the mess the mudlarks make throwing themselves at the windows every morning.

[Stanley]

Mine just suffer from normal grime.... One thing as well that always bugs me is that when they refurbished this row of houses some years ago they sand blasted them and the masking of the windows was not good so there are areas on the outside that are lightly frosted and can never be clear. I just have to live with it!

[Stanley]

Susan and I were talking about window-cleaning yesterday and she told me that her fortnightly visit cleaner was brilliant but he has one fault.... He tells Susan when the insides are dirty and nags her to clean them. I leave it to you to decide if this is a good thing!

[Marilyn]

He is a man who takes pride in his work...I she doesn't clean the inside it makes his work look bad.
( but fortnightly is a bit much. How do her windows get dirty in a fortnight? Or hasn't she cleaned the insides in that fortnight?)

[Wendyf]

My windows get remarkably grimy to say we are up on the top of a hill and miles from anywhere. In winter I put it down to the wood burner but it's the same in summer! Ours only get done when visitors are expected (or twice a year if no visitors )and I can persuade Colin to do the job.

[Tizer]

Since we moved to our present house we find more dust settles on surfaces than did in the old house. We haven't got an obvious explanation. Perhaps it's because this house is in town and the other was out in the countryside?

[Stanley]

I think a lot of it is due to road traffic. Also, in areas of high rainfall dust is washed out of the atmosphere by the rain and when it hits your windows it leaves some there. Dry climates perhaps win out in that respect.

[Tizer]

A few years ago there was talk of `harvesting' the dust from the roadside because it had a high concentration of the more valuable and rare metals coming from the traffic. I haven't heard anything more about it.

[Stanley]

When I was doing Ellenroad I had an interesting conversation with the Chief Chemist at a works in Cockermouth. He asked me what we did with the flue dust from Ellenroad and I told him it was used as landfill on the site. He said that coal flue dust contains the highest concentration of Germanium known, far richer than the ore that was mined to produce it. As it was in such demand it is very valuable. Think how much we have thrown away! Too late now of course....
So today's tip is try to recycle your flue dust!

[Tizer]

The Cornish mine spoil heaps were recycled at various times as people recognised the value of some of the components in the waste. Arsenic is an example. Also, local people would scavenge the heaps for small amounts of metal ore. Later on collectors like me scavenged on them for mineral specimens!
The oddest story I've heard related to this involves the gold rush in the US. There was a place were the miners encountered a lot of fool's gold, iron pyrite, which was always annoying when you were hoping for gold. They had to dig it out to get at the gold so they threw much of it on the waste heaps and used some to pave the track leading to the town. Years later a scientist analysed the stuff and found it wasn't iron pyrite but one of the few chemical compounds formed by gold, gold telluride, and the gold could be recovered from it. You can imagine them stampeding back to the mine dumps and tearing up the track!

[Stanley]

A firm came in many years ago and reprocessed the spoil heaps at the local lead mines at Cononley Tiz. Same reasoning I think. I love that story about the gold telluride!
The modern equivalent is of course household waste. I wonder if they will be reprocessing the waste dumps in years to come?

[Cathy]

Oh what a horrible thought.