In which she must be a faery

[zeborah]

Because my skin can't bear the touch of iron. I break out in itchy bumps that ooze pus. This is annoying as it seriously cuts down on the number of my few bits of jewelery (and my prettiest hair thing) I can wear.

In other news, should I apply for a job in Kazakhstan? I think I won't, but so tempting. I just wish they had the salary range up there so I could prove to myself that I couldn't afford to keep paying my mortgage on it. The fact that Kazakh is agglutinative and has seven cases and I know from Mongolian that vowel harmony is not as fun in practice as in theory and I rather suspect that the evidentiary verb ending system is most probably the same, though it'd still be cool to try -- is, you see, not helping.

(It does help that I had a good week at work.)

I have patches of snow in my garden that are very nearly a week old.

I have a doubly static kitty. She's curled in the sun not going anywhere, and her fur crackles if I try to stroke her.

I have an iPad borrowed from work to work on for work purposes, so can testify that Angry Birds is astoundingly addictive.

And I have a need of recipes that make use of stale bread. So far I can:

1. dice and freeze for croutons
2. toast (but I don't eat much toast - oh wait, it could be the best excuse ever for spaghetti on toast. Guess what I'm having for lunch in ten seconds time?)
3. dice and mix with all the leftovers and some milk in a casserole dish. This turned out surprisingly good considering the diversity of the leftovers, but not so good that I'm likely to make it on a regular basis.

The bread doesn't go stale that quickly, it's just I'm only one person. Actually it's remarkably long-living. If it was store-bread I'd joke about preservatives, but I made it myself so I've no idea why it takes a week to be properly stale and never goes mouldy. I keep it wrapped in a teatowel on top of the fridge (so the cat can't get at it) -- this is the extent of my bread-preservation efforts.

Comments

[brooksmoses]

French toast is also best made with stale bread. As is bread pudding, which is vaguely the same idea in being bread soaked in eggy/custardy stuff and cooked.

You can also make bread crumbs for baking purposes, but probably you do not need anywhere near that many bread crumbs.

[zeborah]

I feel these things will all be in my future.

(My Mum makes a fish casserole with breadcrumbs on top. There's also [fruit] crumble - usually I use flour and sugar and butter, but I've got a friend who starts it with breadcrumbs, so I could always try that too.)

[rumpelsnorcack]

I asked my husband the ex-chef and he said breadcrumbs as well but he also said it's a good thickener for soup. You 'crumb it up' first and then add it at the very end.

[(Anonymous)]

I know a couple of people who are from Kazakhstan, and on the basis of what they tell me I can advise against it. Also, you're much more likely to have to learn Russian than to get the opportunity to learn proper Kazakh.

(Also, I second French toast. You could also slice and freeze the bread when it's fresh, and thaw as much as you need.)

[irinarempt.pip.verisignlabs.com]

Argh, that was me. Slip of the finger.

[ex_heleninwales860]

That's what I do. Or more precisely, I bake a loaf in the bread machine and when it's cooled I cut it in half. I put one half in the bread bin for immediate use and cut one slice off the other half and freeze it, together with the rest of the half. This is so that when I get the frozen bread out, I can prize off the pre-sliced slice and use that right away, either by defrosting in the microwave or by toasting it. Trying to cut a slice off a frozen loaf does not work. I know, I have tried!

This is all much simpler to do than to describe, but I evolved this method because I don't eat bread fast enough to use up a whole loaf before it goes stale or, in this warm clammy weather, moudly.

[zeborah]

I imagine (based on Wikipedia and a movie I watched the other night) that it's in many ways similar to Mongolia. This helps me because after three weeks of Mongolia I was in severe "Argh, tired of keeping an eye out *everywhere* for pickpockets!" culture shock, and also because I really really doubt the salary would be enough to send much home for the mortgage. I could likely get over the culture shock, but I like my house. And my cat for that matter.

(The job ad did appear to give Russian and Kazakh equal footing - but there was a "More info" page that was in Russian, so you're likely right there too.)

I mostly don't freeze the bread because there's rarely much spare space in the freezer. Every now and then I try to rearrange stuff...

[ajk]

Bread naturally keeps well if it is stored right. Of course, the details depend quite a bit on the recipe and on ambient conditions.

Presliced bread (which our supermarket bread mostly is) tends to go stale fast. Refrigerating bread is usually a bad idea, and so is wrapping warm bread in plastic. Beyond that, it depends.

My problem with bread is that I eat too much of it if I have any at hand. Thus, I haven't been baking recently and I try to avoid buying bread. And thus I have no ideas to contribute on using stale bread :)

[(Anonymous)]

I have some interesting bread pudding recipes if you like. Bread crumbs work really well in making meatballs. I am sorry to hear about the hand problems; I hope things settle down for you soon, and big hugs for you and Boots.