Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Sleeping Boy

Back to our regularly scheduled programming . . .

These days, John naps on a comforter on the floor surrounded by my pregnancy pillow. That way I can nurse him to sleep and sneak away easily so the days of repeatedly trying to trick him into transitioning into the crib are over. I'd rather spend 10 minutes getting him down than 30 or more! Here is my sweet, snoozing babe:



Domestic Matters: So, did everybody know about the wonders of parchment paper except me? I have parchment paper in the house because the occasional recipe calls for its use as a tool. Last night I baked chocolate chip cookies and decided to try using parchment paper to line the baking sheets. The cookies formed beautifully. When I removed them from the oven, I simply slid the entire sheet of parchment onto my cooling racks, so the hot cookies were not mangled by my trying to remove them with a spatula, nor did they cool on the cookie sheet such that they adhered to it. When the cookies were cool, I pulled them off the parchment paper easily: not one crumb got stuck. I crumpled up the parchment paper and threw it away. I didn't have to scrub baked-on cookies from the baking sheets or cooling racks. They were totally clean, so I just put them away. Why doesn't everybody always use parchment paper when baking? It seems like a miracle to me! Is it releasing poisonous toxins into my cookies? Is it extremely expensive? Does it never biodegrade? Or does everybody use parchment paper and I'm just the last one to know?

8 comments:

  1. Oh Katherine! I thought I was the only one who did that!! Charlie is such a needy one :O) though, since school is in session, I've put him in his crib to cry for a few minutes, that way i can get things done!

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  2. Aww...look how beautiful he is!

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  3. oh, and the parchment paper! it not only is a clean up saver, it also seems to help with even baking! i use it for biscuits and such, too.

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  4. I have used parchment in the past for various tasks. I cannot remember what for at the moment, lol. I do like it, but don't use it much and I've never used it to bake cookies. I use a baking stone. In fact, I use stoneware for most of my oven baking.

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  5. I use it too! Just this morning I baked a butternut squash on parchment paper. I also use silicon baking sheets to line my cookie trays. I think parchment paper is a little expensive but not terribly so. I think you could reuse a sheet too if it was clean and not scorched. Maybe?

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  6. Shelly: No, you're not the only one! It's okay for a 9-month-old baby to be "needy." I don't even think it should be called "needy" at that age! :D

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  7. Courtney: Oh, butternut squash sounds so good! I think I'll cook some next week.

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  8. Yeah, I don't mean *needy* like "get away from me, kid!!", but just that out of all my kids, he's the only one that i've *ever* had to do that with. Being pulled in so many directions it's really hard to take that time to nurse him to sleep every afternoon. I enjoy it when i have the time, actually! at any rate, we're transitioning out of that :O( He's getting so big.

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