Martha Stewart Vs. Me
- Martha's Way: Stuff a miniature marshmallow in the bottom of a sugar cone to prevent ice cream drips
My Way: Just suck the ice cream out of the bottom of the cone, for Pete's sake! You are probably lying on the couch with your feet up eating it anyway.
- Martha's Way: Use a meat baster to "squeeze" your pancake batter onto the hot griddle and you'll get perfectly shaped pancakes every time.
My Way: Buy the precooked kind you nuke in the microwave for 30 seconds. The hard part is getting them out of the plastic bag.
- Martha's Way: To keep potatoes from budding, place an apple in the bag with the potatoes.
My Way: Buy Hungry Jack mashed potato mix and keep it in the pantry for up to a year.
- Martha's Way: To prevent egg shells from cracking, add a pinch of salt to the water before hard boiling.
My Way: Who cares if they crack, aren't you going to take the shells off anyway?
- Martha's Way: To get the most juice out of fresh lemons, bring them to room temperature and roll them under your palm against the kitchen counter before squeezing.
My Way: Sleep with the lemons in between the mattress and box springs.
- Martha's Way: To easily remove burnt-on food from your skillet, simply add a drop or two of dish soap and enough water to cover bottom of pan, and bring to a boil on stovetop.
My Way: Eat at Chili's every night and avoid cooking.
- Martha's Way: Spray your Tupperware with nonstick cooking spray before pouring in tomato based sauces and there won't be any stains.
My Way: Feed your garbage disposal and there won't be any leftovers.
- Martha's Way: When a cake recipe calls for flouring the baking pan, use a bit of the dry cake mix instead and there won't be any white mess on the outside of the cake.
My Way: Go to the bakery. They'll even decorate it for you.
- Martha's Way: If you accidentally over salt a dish while it's still cooking, drop in a peeled potato and it will absorb the excess salt for an instant "fix me up."
My Way: If you over salt a dish while you are cooking, that's too damn bad. My motto: I made it and you will eat it and I don't care how bad it tastes.
- Martha's Way: Wrap celery in aluminum foil when putting in the refrigerator and it will keep for weeks.
My Way: Celery? Never heard of the stuff.
- Martha's Way: Brush some beaten egg white over pie crust before baking to yield a beautiful glossy finish.
My Way: The Mrs. Smith frozen pie directions do not include brushing egg whites over the crust and so I don't do it.
- Martha's Way: Place a slice of apple in hardened brown sugar to soften it.
My Way: Brown sugar is supposed to be "soft?"
- Martha's Way: When boiling corn on the cob, add a pinch of sugar to help bring out the corn's natural sweetness.
My Way: The only kind of corn I buy comes in a can.
- Martha's Way: To determine whether an egg is fresh, immerse it in a pan of cool, salted water. If it sinks, it is fresh, but if it rises to the surface, throw it away.
My Way: Just use the egg anyway. If you feel bad later, you will know it wasn't fresh.
- Martha's Way: Cure for headaches: Take a lime, cut it in half and rub it on your forehead. The throbbing will go away.
My Way: Martha, dear, the only reason this works is because you can't rub a lime on your forehead without getting lime juice in your eye, and then the problem isn't the headache anymore, it is because you are now blind.
- Martha's Way: Don't throw out all that leftover wine. Freeze into ice cubes for future use in casseroles and sauces.
My Way: Leftover wine?
- Martha's Way: If you have a problem opening jars, try using latex dishwashing gloves. They give a non slip grip that makes opening jars easy.
My Way: Go ask the very cute neighbor to do it.
- Martha's Way: Potatoes will take food stains off your fingers. Just slice and rub raw potato on the stains and rinse with water.
My Way: Mashed potatoes will now be replacing the anti-bacterial soap in the handy dispenser next to my sink.
- Martha's Way: Now look what you can do with Alka Seltzer.
- Clean a toilet: Drop in two Alka-Seltzer tablets, wait twenty minutes, brush and flush. The citric acid and effervescent action clean vitreous china.
- Clean a vase: To remove a stain from the bottom of a glass vase or cruet, fill with water and drop in two Alka-Seltzer tablets.
- Polish jewelry: Drop two Alka-Seltzer tablets into a glass of water and immerse the jewelry for two minutes.
- Clean a thermos bottle: Fill the bottle with water, drop in four Alka-Seltzer tablets, and let soak for an hour (or longer, if necessary).
My Way: Put your jewelry, vases, and thermos in the toilet. Add some Alka-Seltzer and you have solved a whole bunch of problems at once.
Submitted By: Dale Liszka
Jul 13, 2001 13:37