First day of fall, and . . . a tiny giveaway

So, you all know my giveaways are teeny-tiny, and few and far between. My apologies, but it is what it is.

I have a lot of shopping venues that I know many of you are not fortunate to have. I understand that. And it must be frustrating, at times, to read of a good deal I get n something, especially foods from the wholesaler (Cash & Carry). Well . . .

With the change of seasons, I'm already thinking and cooking with more of the sweet spices, like cinnamon, cloves, allspice, cardamom, nutmeg and ginger. Some spices are especially nice to have in whole form, for their appearance as well as flavor.

Whole cinnamon sticks were on sale last week at Cash & Carry. So, I bought an extra canister to send to one of you.

The postal limitation is to the continental U.S. (48 states). My coin purse isn't all that full, at the present, and postage goes sky-high when sending items outside of the 48 states.  I'm sorry about that.

So, if you're in the lower 48 (or you have an address I can send this to in the lower 48), and would like a canister of whole cinnamon sticks, just leave a comment, below.

I want to get this out to one of you quickly, so we'll end the entries at midnight PDT, Sept. 28.


In addition, if you'd like about a half-cup of whole cloves, I'll gladly add those to the package. Just so you know, these whole cloves would come out of my own canister (bought and opened a couple of months ago), not commercially sealed in a package, but poured out into a ziploc freezer bag. I can be a bit of a germ-a-phobe, so I understand if you would not want cloves from someone else's package. But I have plenty, more than I'll use in a year or two. If you didn't want to cook with them, they could also be used to make a pomander, or added to simmering spices.

So, that's about it for today. My daughters are on a 1-week break in between work and classes, so we're heading out for a girls-day.

You know this, right?

You can use leftover cooked grains (like rice and oatmeal) in muffins or other quick breads, by running them through a blender or food processor along with other liquid. Then add to your batter as part of the liquid portion.

A week ago, Sunday, I made a large batch of cranberry-almond-apple oatmeal, for breakfast. There were leftovers, which I worked on myself all week long. By Friday afternoon, I realized that I'd better use what was left, before it developed mold.

So, I ran it through the blender along with part of the milk for the muffins that I was making.

Voila -- Ginger-Pear muffins (with the blended oatmeal as my secret ingredient!).

In the past, I've also used plain, cooked rice, this way, in muffins, and seasoned rice pureed with milk, as liquid in savory biscuits. A plain or sweetened, cooked grain will work in banana bread, as the small amount of milk usually called for, or, as liquid in a coffee cake.

It works very well, and the oatmeal or rice is practically undetectable (with the exception of an odd piece of nut, here and there, when using a grain cooked with chopped nuts). This trick works best in a muffin or bread which is going to have a small amount of texture, anyway, such as my Ginger-Pear muffins, with the chunks of pears baked in, or, in the case of using cooked, brown rice, adding to a batter for a wholegrain muffin.