If you’ve noticed that your baked foods are overcooked or undercooked—and you’ve followed the instructions to the letter—you need an oven thermometer.
Just like a piano needs tuning, an oven needs to be calibrated to the correct temperature.
While calibration is set at the factory, ovens easily lose their calibration over time and will run at a higher or lower temperature than the dial indicates. You’ll know you’ve got a problem when your cookies are overbaked or the roast is raw.
But you can stave off disaster with an oven thermometer.
Oven thermometers are inexpensive, starting at just $10.00. This top-rated digital oven thermometer—it even beeps when the heat falls out of your set temperature—is less than $20.00.
This oven thermometer ensures that you bake and roast to perfection. Photo courtesy Maverick Thermometers.
Unlike tuning your piano, you can re-calibrate your oven yourself. There are many instructions online. Start with the website of your oven’s manufacturer.
Even after calibration, rely on your oven thermometer to produce the results you deserve.
Here’s to perfectly cooked turkey and success baking the most delicate cakes!
Teatulia teas are organic, sustainably packaged, and help their Bangladesh community. Photo by River Soma | THE NIBBLE.
Teatulía produces the best organic tea bags we’ve tried to date.
Why is the tea so flavorful?
The tea leaves are very fresh: There’s no middleman who buys and warehouses the tea, then sells it to marketers who package and brand it.
The brews are so strong that we’ve gotten three mug-sized infusions from each bag. Try that with most tea bags.
And the flavor is so rich that we enjoy each variety straight, without milk or sugar. Promise to at least take a sip of these delicious teas before adding in anything else.
Along with the selection of black, green, herbal and white teas, there are also several ayurvedic teas. These are blended with herbs that have been used to maintain health and cure disorders for more than 5,000 years.
Teatulía is an admirable employer, too. Read why—and learn more about these fine organic teas—in the full review.
There’s a plethora of lactose-free milk options in supermarkets, since more and more Americans are being diagnosed with lactose intolerance. (If you have digestive upsets after consuming milk products, take this quiz, then see your healthcare provider.)
But what about yogurt, kefir and sour cream? Conventional supermarkets don’t carry lactose-free versions.
Fortunately, natural food stores are more obliging. We discovered a lactose-free, low fat yogurt and kefir line from Green Valley, and it’s delicious by any standard. You won’t notice any difference between this and regular yogurt and kefir.
Made from organic ingredients, these lactose-free dairy foods let us enjoy all we want with no negative effects. Packed with protein, calcium and a proprietary blend of ten live & active cultures, they’re a great find.
Delicious lactose-free yogurt and kefir. Photo courtesy Green Valley Organics.
The line is certified kosher by K-ORC, The Orthodox Rabbinical Council of San Francisco.
The low fat yogurt is available in 6-ounce cups of Blueberry, Honey, Plain, Strawberry and Vanilla flavors, and 24-ounce containers of Honey and Plain. The kefir flavors include Blueberry-Pom-Açaí and Plain. Sour cream is packaged in 12-ounce containers.
An organic apple orchard. Photo by Patrick Hajzler.
Earth Day celebrates the Earth’s natural environment. Earth Day takes place on April 22nd, but all of April is Earth Month. Think of the small steps you can take to help save the planet. Start with these earth-saving supermarket tips from the Bulk is Green Council.
Buy only the food that you need. There are so many tempting new items and ingredients, and large sizes are more of a bargain. If you’re not going to use something, don’t buy it. It will likely go bad or expire and add to the household waste. Save the landfill.
Bring your own reusable bags and containers to the store. Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s and some supermarket chains (Albertson’s and Safeway, to name two) give you a nickel for bringing your own bags (and they sell reusable bags). It’s not the nickel savings that’s important, though; it’s the landfill savings. If you’ve forgotten to BYOB, opt for paper, not plastic. If you walk back and forth to the neighborhood store, use a backpack to carry groceries.
Keep a small fold-up shopping bag, the size of a wallet, in your purse or coat pocket. It’s very useful for small purchases—a quart of milk, toothpaste or a few items where the only option is a plastic bag. Chain drugstores seem to offer only plastic.
Reuse plastic containers. Bring them to the bulk foods section or the deli counter. Just remind the counterperson to deduct the weight of your container.
Buy natural and organic foods whenever possible. They’re often not significantly more expensive. Not only are pesticides and synthetic chemicals used in conventional foods bad for you, but they’re also bad for the environment. Tainted runoff from conventional farms washes into rivers and lakes, which contaminates the water supply and threatens wildlife.
Earth Month is all about awareness. We’ve tucked a fold-up shopping bag into our purse, have a Sodastream (a soda and club soda maker to eliminate bottle and can waste – the regular and diet flavors are outstanding), and are planning to make more changes, one week at a time.
