Thursday, August 24, 2023

The Way They Like It (Six Sentence Story), Good Fences, Sammy’s Poetry Day and Brian’s Thankful Thursday

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"Here, pass me the vanilla extract, please."


"Vanilla?  For banana pudding, you don't use banana extract?"


"Nope, I only made that mistake once, they complained it didn't taste right, it has to be a vanilla pudding with bananas giving it the banana flavor."


"They like what they like, don't they."


"You got it, and they aren't shy about letting you know, either."



Linking up with Denise at Girlie On The Edge Blog, where she hosts Six Sentence Stories, and the cue is Extract.      



Our Favorite Banana Pudding Recipe


1 c (240ml) sugar (or less if you don't like it super sweet)

4 T (60 ml) cornstarch

1/2 t (2ml) salt

2 c (480ml) whole milk

2 c (480ml) whole whipping cream

1 stick (120ml) butter

1 t (5ml) vanilla flavoring

bananas 

vanilla wafer cookies (two bags because you will want to snack on some, or use some to keep kitchen snoops busy) 

fresh grated nutmeg


Note:  you can make this with any flavoring you like, and if you want chocolate pudding, use the full cup of sugar and 3 squares of baking chocolate.  Also, if  you have lots of people wanting to eat, double the recipe.


Mix the dry ingredients in the bottom of a heavy pot and pour in the cold milk and cream, and stir to get the cornstarch to dissolve.  Drop in the butter and vanilla (or other flavoring, and chocolate if you want chocolate pudding) and put over medium low heat.


Here's the hard part -- use a spoon to stir pretty constantly so the butter (and chocolate if using it) gets incorporated and keep stirring until it gets thick enough to be pudding.  This generally takes until your arm feels like it's going to fall off, so about an hour, maybe longer if it's being uncooperative.  (I've been known to get tired and speed the process a little by increasing the heat a smidge, but be very, very careful to stir constantly if you do and if it starts to stick on the bottom at all, turn the heat down immediately.)


Once it is thick, let it cool while you layer cookies and sliced bananas in a pan.  Spoon half of the pudding over the cookies/bananas, then do another layer, and top it all with fresh grated nutmeg and some crushed up cookies for looks.


Stick it in the fridge to set and then stand back when the appetites come.




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While Good Fences Around the World seems to have gone the way of the dodo bird, i still enjoy looking for and posting interesting fences, so i will!






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It's Angel Sammy's Poetry Day This week's image and my poem:    





I came abroad to learn about art,

now I can't say what is the best part,

taking in so much beauty each day

or watching artists paint as if it's child's play!



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Brian of Brian's Home hosts the Thankful Thursday Blog Hop.   It's time to share something for which i am thankful.  


Today i am thankful the employee at the shelter yesterday noticed right away one of the kittens in intake wasn't doing well (i hadn't gotten to the intake cages yet).  It had spay surgery Monday and was bleeding internally, she rushed it to the vet and it's going to be all right.






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Today is:


Birthday of Osiris -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)


Festival for Luna -- Ancient Roman Calendar


Festival of Mania -- Ancient Roman Calendar (to placate the Manes, a day when the Mundus, the portal to the afterlife, is open and the dead are free to roam)


Flag Day -- Liberia


Flitting Appreciation Day -- another "holiday" with no particular reason except that someone who enjoys flitting around wanted to celebrate it


Gangara Fire Festival -- Atago Shrine, Ikeda City, Japan


Independence Day -- Ukraine(1991)


International Day Against Intolerance, Discrimination and Violence Based on Musical Preference, Lifestyle, and Dress Code -- sponsored by the Romanian Humanist Association and the Sophie Lancaster Foundation


International Strange Music Day -- as declared by strange musician and composer Patrick Grant


Knife Day -- internet generated, but how would we cook without them?  today remember how much you do each day with a good kitchen knife.


National Flag Day -- Liberia


National Peach Pie Day


National Waffle Day -- Cornelius Swarthout patented the first waffle iron in the US on this day in 1869, so it is sometimes noted as National Waffle Iron Day


Pluto Demotion Day 


St. Bartholomew's Day (Patron of bookbinders, butchers, cobblers, Florentine cheese merchants, Florentine salt merchants, leather workers,plasterers, shoemakers, tanners, trappers, whiteners; Armenia; Borgo Tossignano, Italy; Boves, Italy; Carpineto dell Nora, Italy; Civitella in Val di Chiana, Italy; Frankfurt am Main, Germany; Gambatesa, Italy; Gharghur, Malta; Lipari, Sicily, Italy; Maastricht, Netherlands; Magalang, Philippines; Plzen, Czech Republic; Potosí, Bolivia; Salzano, Italy; Trino, Italy; against nervous diseases, neurological diseases, and twitching) related observance

     Schaferlauf -- Markgroeningen, Germany (Festival to honor St. Bartholomew, Patron of Herdsmen, on this day or the weekend after; includes traditional barefoot race by children of active shepherds and water carrying contests; also now has a music festival)

     Wayzgoose -- a traditional day for master printers to throw an end-of-summer party for his workmen


St. Owen of Rouen's Day (Patron of the deaf; against deafness)


Vesuvius Day -- anniversary of 79CE eruption which destroyed Pompeii, Stabiae, and Herculaneum


Waratambar -- New Ireland Province, Papua New Guinea (a native thanksgiving)


William Wilberforce Day -- Wilberforce University, Wilberforce, OH, US (birth anniversary of founder, in 1759)



Birthday's Today:


Rupert Grint, 1988

Chad Michael Murray, 1981

Marlee Matlin, 1965

Reggie Miller, 1965

Cal Ripken, Jr., 1962

Craig Kilborn, 1962

Steve Guttenberg, 1958

Stephen Fry, 1957

Oscar Hijuelos, 1951

Michael Richards, 1950

Gregory Bruce Jarvis, 1944

Mason Williams, 1938

Yasser Arafat, 1929

Hal Smith, 1916

Jorge Luis Borges, 1899

Duke Paoa Kahanamoku, 1890

Daniel Gooch, 1816

William Wilberforce, 1759



Debuting/Premiering Today:


"The Facts of Life"(TV), 1979



Today in History:


The eruption of Mt. Vesuvius buries Pompeii and Herculaneum, 15,000 die, 79

The Visigoths under Aleric begin to pillage Rome, 410

King John of England, a/k/a Humpty Dumpty for having to issue the first Magna Carta, marries Isabella of Angoileme, 1200

Six thousand Jews are killed in Mainz after being blamed for the bubonic plague, 1349

The printing of the Gutenberg Bible is completed, 1456

The first English convoy lands at Surat, India, 1608

Calcutta, India is founded, 1690

British troops invade Washington, D.C. and burn down the White House and several other buildings, 1814

Charles Darwin is asked to travel on HMS Beagle, 1831

The Panic of 1857 begins, touching off one of the most severe economic crises in US history (Which just goes to show you, the more things change, the more they stay the same), 1857

Cornelius Swarthout patents the waffle iron, 1869

The Wolseley Expedition reaches Manitoba to end the Red River 

Rebellion, 1870

Captain Matthew Webb became first person to swim English Channel, 1875

Thomas Edison patents the motion picture camera, 1891

Workers start pouring concrete for the Panama Canal, 1909

Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly non-stop across the North American continent, 1932

The treaty creating NATO goes into effect, 1949

France explodes its first hydrogen bomb, thus becoming the world's fifth nuclear power, 1968

Voyager 2 (launched 1977) reaches Neptune, 1989

Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, 1991

The first RFID human implantation is tested in the UK, 1998

Argon fluorohydride, the first Argon compound ever known, is discovered at the University of Helsinki, 2000

The International Astronomical Union (IAU) redefines the term "planet" such that Pluto is considered a Dwarf Planet, 2006

The 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s 'I Have A Dream' speech is commemorated in the U.S., 2013

Astronomers announce the discovery of an earth-like planet named Proxima b orbiting star Proxima Centauri, 2016

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro orders the army to help contain fires in the Amazon after widespread environmental destruction, wildlife loss and international criticism, 2019

US adventurer Victor Vescovo is the first person to visit the deepest point of every ocean when he reaches Molloy Hole, in the Arctic, 2019

British-Belgian teen Mack Rutherford, age 17, becomes the youngest person to fly solo around the world, landing at Sofia, Bulgaria, after a five-month journey across 52 countries, 2022

20 comments:

  1. That pudding can take up to an hour?? I have a much simpler recipe which only has milk, vanilla extract, sugar, cornstarch (cornflour) and cocoa if you are making choc pudding. Takes about 8 minutes. Vanilla extract is optional for the chocolate version. A couple of drops of yellow food colouring can be added to the vanilla version.
    I like the image and poem.

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  2. Your pudding sounds like hard work.
    Love your poem and am so glad that the kitten will be ok.

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  3. What a fence. Reminds me of when I used to live in Lexington Kentucky with all the horses. Crazy storm up here today and so far have almost 3 in of rain and it's not over yet.

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  4. What could be better than a welcome horse when you pull up to a home? Funny fence!

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  5. Your pudding sounds like my waffles, Lots of hard work, dirty cutlery and time, and LOTS of good taste.
    I like your poem, and I mourn the degraded Pluto, poor planet-no-more.

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  6. I think Pluto should be designated a planet again. That was not a good decision, I don't think. Your recipe sounds delicious- but I could never stand there an hour stirring without stopping. But it sounds delicious!

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  7. Excellent! (Full Disclosure: started a Cafe Six centered on your saying something about vanilla extract to the tall, thin man.)

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  8. I like the sound of the pudding, even though it takes a long time to prepare!

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  9. Oh so glad the little kitty is doing well ~ great story ~ neat fence photos ~ pudding sounds delish ~ thanks,
    Xo

    Wishing you good heath, laughter and love in your days,
    A ShutterBug Explores,
    aka (A Creative Harbor)

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  10. This looks like a winning recipe. I'll have to try it. I screen shot it and put it in my recipes file.

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  11. The best banana puddings are made with vanilla pudding, that is a fact!

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  12. Now my mouth's watering! I do believe that is Montmatre in Paris! Where better to learn about art?

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  13. stoppin bye witha soooper quik Hi, had a moe mint oh free wi fi,
    make sure to eat sum perch pizza pie, timez up now, sew oh kay..BYE ‼️🐟💚

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  14. thecontemplativecat, here.
    Banana and vanilla wafers could have some nuts, for us 1950s era.I like this:Flitting Appreciation Day -- **another "holiday" with no particular reason except that someone who enjoys flitting around wanted to celebrate it **.
    . Flitting here in our retired really retired would be first amusing, then some kind person would help him.

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  15. Oh Banana Pudding, yum! That was a cute poem and a most wonderful thankful and we're happy the wee kitten will be okay. Thanks for joining our Thankful Thursday Blog Hop!

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  16. Ha! It's vanilla all the way, its flavor makes so many dishes that aren't necessarily "vanilla"

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  17. When it comes to established dessert "food" recipes, it's best not to mess with the tried and true. Which, sounds like very hard work!
    Glad to hear baby kitten will be alright!

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  18. Love the poem.....it captures the feeling I had when I first walked into one of the squares in Montmartre and was surrounded by so much TALENT!

    Hugs, Pam

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  19. Oooh! Definitely going to try that recipe!

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