Group items tagged

Every week, we try to spend a little time in the kitchen, fostering our love for baking. Lately, The Daily Kool family has become obsessed with baking the perfect brownie. You know which one we're talking about...moist and extravagant truffle-like brownies that have a crackly top, yet are tender with slightly chewy edges. Yum. A perfect edge is the pride and joy of any brownie baker, yet is often unattainable with a standard brownie baking pan.

From gingerbread houses and spiced apple muffins to Christmas cupcakes, this charming book is packed full of recipes that will fill your kitchen with the mouth-watering smells of Christmas baking. Just follow the simple steps to bake scrumptious Christmas cakes and cookies, perfect to give as gifts or to eat right away.

Periodically, areas in The Daily Kool home fall victim to the chaos of a busy life filled with activity, children and pets. Okay, are you ready? We confess that sometimes, we are just too busy (or too tired) to clean. There, it's out. Whew! Don't get us wrong...it's not we spend our time living in squalor. But, at some point, just about every room of our house has seen a period of what we consider unmitigated disaster...except, the kitchen. We are absolutely fastidious when it comes to the appearance of our kitchen...this is our domain, the room held in highest regard. We keep every crevice absolutely pristine, so imagine our surprise, when we realized we were missing the boat with our garbage disposal. Our garbage disposal is like any other...it's a magnet for dirty, greasy build-up and offensive odor. Sure, we'd been using the Plink garbage disposal cleaner and deodorizer tablets every few days, but we really weren't getting down into the nitty gritty of our disposal's grossness. Plink smells great, but its effects are very short lived...plus, it seems to be more of a deodorizer than a cleaner. We've tried it all...baking soda w/vinegar, ice, even citrus peel...all okay, but not exceptional. We really use our garbage disposal a lot, so it was definitely time for a more effective solution. Enter the Fuller Brush foaming garbage disposal cleaner.

Here in Florida, we have been experiencing consistent afternoon thunderstorms for the past couple of weeks, wreaking havoc on otherwise perfect temperatures for swimming...yep, it's summer all right. It's not easy keeping kids entertained in lousy weather, especially when you are trying to conserve costs in today's economy. After hours of playing family games, dancing to music and baking brownies, we decided to bite the bullet and splurge for a family outing at the movies. You guessed it...we took our children to see the new Disney Pixar movie Up.

What better way to celebrate the end of our National Ice Cream Month week-long feature than with cake? Or should we say cupcakes? The Daily Kool family is headed out to a friend's house for dinner together tonight...of course, we're in charge of the dessert (we have a bit of a reputation). Since there's going to be a pretty large group of kids at the house, we thought it might be fun to do something a little different for them.

Many of you may know about our beloved pooch Pepper from PoodlePicks. It may surprise you to know that he has been, by far, the most challenging dog we've ever had. At almost eight years old, he still suffers from separation anxiety. We've never had to baby-proof our house with the kids, but to this day, we do have to Pepper-proof. Before we leave the house, we have to go through the routine of closing every door, completely cleaning off the dining room table, locking the pantry and strategically putting up gates to block off the kitchen and the stairs. Heaven forbid we accidentally skip anything...we will undoubtedly come home with garbage all over the kitchen (he figured out how to open the can), empty bags of baking chocolates strewn across the floor (he breaks into the pantry and zooms right in on them), or even smelly feces on the stairs. Of course, he only does these things when we're not home...when we are, he's a perfect angel. So tell us...who's trained who here? This situation is completely our fault, of course. When Pepper was a puppy, we were told that we should purchase a dog crate for him. But where on earth would we put a large, ugly and obtrusive wire crate in our small home?

The Daily Kool kitchen is pretty small. It's one of those longer, narrower styles that doesn't exactly lend itself to more than one person at a time. Bottom line....we always seem to be running out of room, especially when we are cooking and preparing for company. Oh, how we wish our kitchen was large enough to have a big, beautiful island in the center of it!

One of the most wonderful things about the summer is the abundance of fresh Bing cherries. Dark and sweet, this cherry is one of our all-time favorite fruits. We've been known to go through bushels of them in a sitting. Another funny story about our older brother growing up (we've told a few of them!)...our grandmother somehow convinced him that if he ever swallowed a pit, a real cherry tree would grow in his tummy. Talk about traumatizing a child...gotta love it, especially as a younger (and often tortured) sibling! Hence, our poor brother, though he loved them, hardly ever ate cherries for fear of what would happen...what a wuss!

Nothing says summer quite like an ice cream cone. Some of our best childhood memories include strolling down the boardwalk by the beach with our parents, eating ice cream cones while watching the ocean waves crash against the shore. We could never quite understand how anyone could dishonor the sanctity of ice cream by eating it out of a cup. Good thing we've never quite grown up...as adults, we still love our ice cream cones, even when the sticky mess drips down the side of our arms. Waffle cones help us stay a bit cleaner...not that we care much. We just love them because they are so darned yummy!

Every year, the summer is filled with picnics, barbecues and other casual gatherings for The Daily Kool family. Most of these get-togethers are pot-luck events where everyone brings a dish for the guests to share. Needless to say, tables are always filled with a ton deviled eggs, fruit platters, sandwiches and cupcakes galore. So much for shedding those last few (okay, or forty) pounds...sigh. Since most of us tend to bring homemade items as opposed to pre-made trays, we are always looking for convenient travel caddies to hold our food.