Clever and Useful TipsDon't take your bananas apart when you get home from the store.
If you leave them connected at the stem, they ripen faster.
Store your opened chunks of cheese in aluminum foil. It will stay fresh much longer and not mold!
Peppers with 3 bumps on the bottom are sweeter and better for eating. Peppers with 4 bumps on the bottom are firmer and better for cooking.
To really make scrambled eggs or omelets rich add a couple of spoonfuls of sour cream, cream cheese, or heavy cream. For a lighter scrambled egg, add water instead.
Add garlic immediately to a recipe if you want a light taste of garlic and at the end of the recipe if your want a stronger taste of garlic.
Heat up leftover pizza in a nonstick skillet on top of the stove, set heat to med-low and heat till warm. This keeps the crust crispy. No soggy micro pizza.
When you buy a container of cake frosting from the store, whip it with your mixer for a few minutes. You can double it in size. You get to frost more cake/cupcakes with the same amount. You also eat less sugar and calories per serving.
To warm biscuits, pancakes, or muffins that were refrigerated,
place them in a microwave with a cup of water. The increased moisture will keep the food moist and help it reheat faster.
When you start putting in your plants, work nutrients in your soil and use wet newspapers to keep out the weeds! Put layers around the plants, overlapping as you go and the cover with mulch. Weeds will get through some gardening plastics but they will not get through wet newspapers.
Place a dryer sheet in your pocket. It will keep the mosquitoes away.
To keep squirrels and rabbits from eating your plants, sprinkle your plants with cayenne pepper. The cayenne pepper doesn't hurt the plant and the critters won't come near it.
To get something out of a heat register or under the fridge add an empty paper towel roll or empty gift wrap roll to your vacuum. It can be bent or flattened to get in narrow openings.
Before you pour sticky substances into a measuring cup, fill it with hot water. Dump out the hot water, but don't dry the cup. Next, add your ingredient, such as peanut butter, and watch how easily it comes right out.
Buy a chalkboard eraser and keep it in the glove box of your car.
When the windows fog, rub with the eraser! Works better than a cloth!
If you seal an envelope and then realize you forgot to include something inside, just place your sealed envelope in the freezer for an hour or two. Viola! It unseals easily.
Put small piles of cornmeal where you see ants. They eat it, take it 'home,' can't digest it so it kills them. It may take a week or so, especially if it rains, but it works and you don't have the worry about pets or small children being harmed!
Want to learn how to save energy and keep your clothes dryer working better? Go over to the dryer and pulled out the lint filter. It may look clean, I always clean the lint from the filter after every load clothes, but take it to the sink and run hot water over it. The lint filter is made of a mesh material .. I'm sure you know what your dryer's lint filter looks like. If the hot water just sits on top of the mesh it isn't clean! Dryer sheets cause a film over that mesh that's what burns out the heating unit. You can't SEE the film, but it's there.
It's what is in the dryer sheets to make your clothes soft and static free ... that nice fragrance too. You know how they can feel waxy when you take them out of the box ... well this stuff builds up on your clothes and on your lint screen. This is also what causes dryer units to potentially burn your house down with it! The best way to keep your dryer working for a very longtime (and to keep your electric bill lower) is to take that filter out and wash it with hot soapy water and an old toothbrush (or other brush) at least every six months. It makes the life of the dryer at least twice as long!
How about that!?! Learn something new everyday!
Just call me Suzy Homemaker!
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