Randy Ingle » Food

It’s going to be a long winter

Randy — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 15:22:59 +0000

It seems that every other day it is either freezing rain or snowing out! I’ve been keeping very busy plowing and sanding. Not getting enough sleep at night, but manage to catch a few cat naps in my truck from time to time. Thank goodness for coffee! I have a few business clients that are mom and pop variety stores and the let me come in and fill my thermos for free. They are nice people and show their appreciation every time I show up. They know that I’m usually in a hurry to go take care of other clients lots and dooryards so when they see me out there plowing and sanding they come out to the truck and take my thermos from me into the store and fix my coffee for me and bring it back out to me before I’m ready to leave. They know that when I have time I’ll stop by and chat when the weather is better and that I’ll be in there ordering food and buying lottery tickets.

Still trying

Randy — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 00:38:40 +0000

Well, I’m still trying to get that insulated sports bottle down pat. I’ve been putting boiling hot water in it about ten minutes before I’m going to put my hot drink in it. I was trying to put hot chocolate in it, but that just wasn’t working. The directions on the hot chocolate say to use hot, not boiling, water in it. If I do that the hot chocolate in the sports bottle is not kept hot for very long at all! So I’ve switched to hot apple cider or some version of a sugar free flavored drink mix and actually let it boil and then pour the hot water out of the sports bottle and pour the hot drink in.

Then I put the bottle inside one of those foam “can cozy” things for extra insulation. I don’t even try to drink it for about an hour because it really IS too hot then – but it keeps my hands warm! After about an hour it is still pretty hot – a good “drinking temperature.” An hour after that, forget it, it is room temperature. But that’s OK because I like the apple cider and/or fruity drink hot or cold. So I’ve managed to make it “tolerable” but I would not recommend it to my friends to buy one - it just doesn’t work as well as I had hoped.

Part-Time?

Randy — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:41:53 +0000

Written by my friend Lino Brown

The securitychoice installers came over today to install a new home security system in our home. I was surprised how quickly everything got done. I took the afternoon off of work so that I could let them in, but they were literally done within the hour. Because I already had the afternoon off, I decided to just stay at home and take the day for myself. I went to the grocery store early for the week and started to cook a great dinner. I got to watch some talk shows that I never get to see because I am a work and loved every minute of it. I also got all of my laundry done and bills paid. It is amazing what you can get accomplished when you leave work early. My kids were shocked that we didn’t have to run to the store and that great dinner was already made when I picked them up from school. I think that I may consider working part-time! I really got so much done in those short four hours that I lose at work everyday!

Insulated steel sports bottle

Randy — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 15:54:07 +0000

A few weeks ago I was informed by several people that the plastic sports bottle that I always drink out of is bad for my health. The well meaning people were very insistent that it leached dangerous chemicals into my drink and that I could die from cancer from it down the road. They told me that I could buy insulated stainless steel sports bottles over the Internet, so I went online and found a company that sells insulated stainless steel sports bottles. I ordered a couple of them, thinking I’d give a few out as gifts as Christmas gifts. That was really the only way I could justify the exorbitant shipping fee! It cost me almost as much money to ship one as it did to ship three!

Anyway, they arrived in the mail on Saturday and I gave one a try today. It was a cold day so I decided to pour some hot chocolate in it this morning before I left for work. There was a big warning sticker on the box that the bottle came in, warning that the hot liquid would stay “just as hot” for several hours. Well an hour later my “hot chocolate” was only room temperature chocolate milk. I guess I’ll try it again tomorrow with pre-warming the bottle with hot water before pouring the hot chocolate in it, and I’ll make sure the hot chocolate is a lot hotter going into the bottle. I’d hate to think that I’d wasted my money on a bottle that won’t keep my hot chocolate hot for at least an hour!

Bought a new windshield

Randy — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 15:14:02 +0000

The local Harley shop was having a big open house celebration this past weekend, so I decided to go to the event and check it out. There was a live broadcast being done by a local radio station, lots of free food and sodas, and they were having discounts on just about everything in the store. I ended up buying a new detachable windshield for my Harley. I was impressed with how easily it can be installed and removed. I installed it right there at the shop – they let me borrow the tools to do it. It was funny because all I needed was an allen wrench! Anyway, when I drove home I noticed that with the new windshield on the bike, I wasn’t feeling the wind hitting me, so I was driving faster than I thought! It will take a while to adjust to that!

Hubs is the best

Randy — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 01:50:23 +0000

Guest post written by my buddy Aldo Mays

My husband got me www.Direc.tv satellite for our wedding gift and it’s been the best thing ever. After a long hard day at the office I love nothing more than to come on home, open up a great bottle of red wine and chill out in front of an old Clark Gable movie with him on the couch. Even the dog seems to like the relaxing time!

It’s just a great way for me to unwind and not have to think of anything and I know my husband appreciates it more than he lets on. We get all these great movie channels like AMC where they often show old movies during the day and at night and I often have my pick of a lot of the things I’ve been wanting to see at theaters and never got around to. It was the best wedding gift we got, if you ask me, and I say that even knowing we got some 400-thread count sheets from my husband’s mother! That’s a lot to say!

Corn syrup

Randy — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 12:17:19 +0000

I’ve been noticing some commercials on the television lately where the point of the commercial is to get consumers to rethink the attitude that high fructose corn syrup is bad for you. In recent years high fructose corn syrup has been broadly considered bad for the consumer, linking it to diabetes and obesity. I’ve never believed that it is any worse for you than regular table sugar. And yes, regular sugar can also lead to diabetes and obesity – if too much is consumed! So the point is that we all have to be responsible for our own health and not eat too much of anything! High fructose corn syrup is not the enemy!

A place for everything

Randy — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 21:13:00 +0000

I can remember visiting my grandmother when I was a child and she would try to find ways to keep me busy and entertained. She always tried to make it educational in some way too! For example, she had several different kitchen spice racks in her old farmhouse. She had one small wall spice rack right within arm’s reach of her stove, and a larger built in spice rack in a cabinet over by her preparation center island.

What she would do, with the spice racks (and me) is take all of the spice bottles and cans out of the racks and throw out the spices that she said were too old. Then she would have me take a marker and write that day’s date on some new bottles and cans that she bought and put them back in the racks, in alphabetical order. And of course all of the ones that were going to be kept got cleaned as well. We would have fun while making sure that they were in alphabetical order, by singing the alphabet song while we worked.

Afterwards she would let me have a cup of warmed spiced cider, asking me to help her get the spices ready for the mulling, and letting me put the spices back away again.

The new tiny Almond Joy pieces

Randy — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 00:59:37 +0000

My wife just brought in a small bowl of Almond Joy pieces for me to sample. She asked me if I thought that the different pices of three colors had different tastes. I told her that I thought the blue pieces tasted like coconut, the brown like chocolate,and the white like almonds. But if we bite into them only half-way they all look the same inside. What do YOU think?

In the spirit of Almond Joy, I found this Youtube video of an old Almond Joy/Mounds commercial. I remember the jingle well!

No Jack?

Randy — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 23:35:39 +0000

There was a short notice on the evening news about Jack in the Box closing a lot of stores. I didn’t get to hear the whole report. Does anyone know if the Jack in the Box stores in Texas will be staying open?