When life gives you apricots...

This is an old post but is only just now being published. I apologize for the delay.

My boss has an apricot tree. It's getting a little out of hand.

He's using 2x4s to keep the branches from breaking. This is the most delicious problem I've ever heard of.

He was more than happy to bring me a bag of apricots, and I was more than happy to take them.

After scarfing a few (and trying not to get the juices everywhere), I did some quick chopping — just enough to remove the pits, but not the skins. I threw the quartered apricots into a saucepan, added white sugar, cornstarch (for thickening), and a little bit of cinnamon. Then I brought the mix to a boil, stirring and scraping a lot to make sure all that sugar didn't burn on the bottom.

When it had thickened, I removed it from the stove top and let it site to cool a little bit.

In a bowl I started the cobbler crust with all the good stuff: sugar, flour, butter, and cinnamon. (And baking powder to make it rise.) Yum.

I am fancy and used a pastry cutter to slice the butter into the flour mixture until it was crumby (but not blended like cookie dough). There is a fine art to crusts like this that I have neither mastered, nor am able to describe, but you're aiming for a mixture that isn't entirely one piece, but doesn't have a lot of flour dust floating around either. That is, you should be able to see where the butter hasn't combined with the flour (ie, there are cubes of butter hanging around), but most of the flour should stick to the butter.

I believe I've totally confused you. Carry on, and let's pretend like that last paragraph didn't happen.

With the cobbler crust crumbed, I added milk and mixed it all together. Now the crust was gooey and gross. And delicious.

The thickened apricots (and sugar) went into the bottom of a nine inch cake pan. Then they were joined by the crust, which I dropped in pieces rather unceremoniously on top. (Be assured, this is what you are meant to do.)

I covered the entire thing in a pleasant glaze of sugar because I hate my waistline and want to give people I know diabetes. Then I stuck it in the oven and the entire house smelled like yumminess.

The final result was a deliciously tart cobbler. The crust rose a little and spread across the entire pan, despite having gaps in it before baking. I took it to work and my coworkers scarfed it all down. A good team effort between my boss and myself, no?

You can find the recipe from Betty Crocker here. Just replace the peaches with apricots and you're ready to go!

Baking soda bonanza

Friends, I am a fiend for cleaning things so long as they're in the public view. I do not keep my bedroom tidy. It looks like the bedroom of a six-year-old boy with a mild case of ADHD. But my kitchen, living room, and dining room I like to keep clean in case the president comes over. (It could happen, you don't know it won't.)

Recently I moved into the most adorable little apartment. It has hardwood floors. It has the most adorable little built-ins where we store our alcohol like classy, employed folk. It has a fireplace. It has a pantry with a hook in it from which you are meant to hang an apron. I died the first time I saw it. And now that I am dead, it is my heaven.

However, since I'm renting, there are a few things wrong because people don't feel the need to invest in maintenance while they live there. Tragically, this comes at the cost of the adorable bronze cabinet pulls in the kitchen. So I resolved to clean them.

The answer isn't 409 (85% of problems are solvable with 409) or Windex (my other standard cleaner). The answer is baking soda, salt, water, and scrubbing. Just look at this:

I feel like a serious blogger right now, recommending a home remedy like this, but look at the difference. Look at it. It's insanity. The one on the right is sticky and blackened by years of disregard, and the one on the left is clean. It's even a little shiny.

Here's how I did it: I dumped a bunch of baking soda into a bowl and stirred in some larger salt to help as an abrasive. Then I added just enough water to make a paste, et voila: homemade cleaner.

The brown/black stuff is what came off the pulls. Ewwwwwwww.

I unscrewed the cabinet pulls from the doors and scrubbed away, just covering them in the paste and the rubbing with my fingers, rinsing when I was done. I probably took about 5 minutes per pull, and I wasn't even scrubbing that hard.

So there you go, ladies and gentlemen. I've been converted to the cult of baking soda. You may consider this my first proselytization.