Hello It's "Helouise's Housekeeping Hints" Time Again

   Cleaning our my dear Mother's house last week after her passing, I found a book I apparently liked as a child as I had lovingly scribbled on the inside of this red and yellow treasure. I had not seen this book since I was very little, and it drew up an immediate smile to my face as I remembered our kitchen with the radio on and my Mother happily holding this book reading it to me.
   Heloise's Housekeeping Hints was published in 1962. Born in 1961, I most likely wrote my version of script handwriting in it around 1964. Very different America back then. Women were mostly at home as homemakers. Women were in charge of the household budgets. Cash budgets. No credit cards. Women were in charge of the weekly grocery bill, as in the cash they were given by their husbands, to spend on groceries for the week. T he cash they had at hand was it, the end of the spending. Stick to your list, my Mother always said. She did not throw away anything and she wasted nothing. We've all heard the expression: "Waste not, want not." Well it is true, and Heloise is here to help!
  
  
So, here are some of Heloise's helpful household hints to save a few calories and maybe a few bucks:

• When frying hamburgers, do not grease the skillet. Just sprinkle a bit of salt on the bottom of the pan and place the unsalted hamburger patties on top. The burgers will fry in their own juice.
• Salt in a frying pan will also keep meat from spattering. Nothing worse than bacon when it pops and you get burnt!
• Any recipe (cake waffles, pancakes) which calls for eggs is made better by separating the yoke from the white and adding them into the mix separately. This process makes the batter lighter and with more air bubbles.
• If your waffle recipe calls for 1 egg, try 2 eggs and separate their whites from their yokes and add separately. Your waffles will be as light as a cloud.
• Leftover potatoes of any type can be mashed and made into delicious "potato patties" for breakfast the next morning. One may also add a chopped onion and an egg. Mix, mash, mold your patties, salt and pepper if you wish, and fry up with a pat of butter. Yum!   
• To make most vegetables and lettuce last longer in the fridge, wrap produce in paper towels and place in a zip lock bag, but make sure to let all the air out and place zip lock bags in the produce bin in the fridge if you have one. Replace paper towels after 2-3 days, and most vegetables will last up to one week, or maybe more. Also, chop them as you go. Keeping produce intact helps them last longer.
• If you have leftover carrots and potatoes, and don't know what to do with them, boil, then mash them all together to make orange colored mashed potatoes. Your kids will love the color and the new flavor!
• Parsley, chives, spring onions, and carrots, which you can grow in your garden for little cost, can be washed, trimmed, dried in a towel, wrapped in foil and frozen to be later added to tomato soup and served with croutons you can make with day old (or older) bread.
• To rid your nails and your wooden cutting board of bacteria and a seafood or fish smell, rub them with the remainder of a lemon or lime. The acid from the lemon or lime is the trick!
• To make gravy without lumps, mix 2 tablespoons of flour with 1 cup of cold water, then add to the pan juices and stir gravy.

Try growing a garden this summer. Help your household budget, give the kids a chore to weed and water the garden, and get back to nature to enjoy the freshest lettuce and vegetables you have ever tasted, for months and months! Enjoy!