Golden Spice Pancakes

Thanks to everyone for your notes of concern. After three days without heat and two without any power at all, we finally got our electricity turned on at 8:00 last night--just in time to save our tropical fish, who were not looking so good. Getting the electrical panel fixed wasn't a problem, but dealing with the overworked building permit office and the bureaucracy-bound power company was a nightmare. It took a day and a half after everything was fixed to get them to come out and turn the power back on. The whole ordeal is almost enough to make me want to run away to the woods and build my own solar power generator.

Fortunately, in the days leading up to our power outage I was able to get a little cooking done. On Sunday morning, I made these fluffy, lightly spiced pancakes, based on the Basic Pancakes recipe in Bryanna Clark Grogan's The (Almost) No Fat Cookbook. Someone recently asked in the comments if there were any fat-free vegan cookbooks, and the answer is a resounding Yes. For years, (Almost) No Fat and another Bryanna book, 20 Minutes to Dinner, were my fat-free bibles. Her recipes have just the right balance of healthiness and deliciousness, something mine can only aspire to. As far as I'm concerned, she will always be the queen of low-fat vegan cooking.

Golden Spice Pancakes
(printer-friendly version)

For these pancakes, I've added freshly grated orange peel to ramp up the fresh orange taste and spiced the batter lightly with cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. I prefer the spice to be just an accent to the orange, not overwhelming, so if you want really spicy pancakes, you'll have to add more.

1 cup unbleached flour
1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour (I used white whole wheat; ww pastry flour is another good option)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1 pinch ground cloves
1 teaspoon orange rind (freshly grated orange peel)
1 1/2 cups orange juice
1/4 cup golden raisins (optional)

Spray a non-stick frying pan or griddle lightly with canola oil, and begin heating it on medium-high. Meanwhile, mix all the dry ingredients (flours through cloves) and add the rind, juice, and raisins to a well in the center. Mix briefly, just until combined (a few lumps are okay).

When the skillet is hot, drop the batter by quarter-cupfuls and cook until the tops are beginning to bubble. Turn and cook a couple more minutes until the underside is golden and the inside is cooked. Serve immediately.

Makes about 10 pancakes. Each one contains 121 Calories (kcal); trace Total Fat; (2% calories from fat); 4g Protein; 27g Carbohydrate; 0mg Cholesterol; 269mg Sodium; 2g Fiber.

Without raisins: 109 Calories (kcal); trace Total Fat; (2% calories from fat); 4g Protein; 24g Carbohydrate; 0mg Cholesterol; 268mg Sodium; 2g Fiber.

From:http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/

Business Lead Generation

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Check out their website today to see how The Lead Dogs can increase your business sales figures.

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Terry Didcott
Make Money Blog

From:http://makeblogmoney.com/

MOGO Wireless Boosts Cell Phone Signal

MOGO Wireless launched a series of cellphone signal boosting products at CES, the coolest of which simply plugs into your car accessory adapter to end those dropped calls while driving. (using your Bluetooth hands-free handset of course)

MOGO's plug-and-talk products includes a business/home office product that works in conjunction with a laptop (USB port), as well as a mobile product that works from an automotive 12 volt power supply to amplify signal strength up to 10 times. Considering USB is only 5V, I'm surprised the USB model can amplify signals up to 10x.

Anyway, the MOGO is compatible with all service providers operating on 800 and 1900 MHZ including AT&T, Inc., Sprint, T-Mobile, Alltel and Verizon Wireless, and is also compatible with Bluetooth devices. The MOGO Personal Mobile Cell Tower is installed by plugging the adapter into a car power supply or by plugging the USB adapter into a laptop, depending on the product purchased. Importantly, it can be used by multiple users at the same time. So you carload of teenager kids can each gab away on their cellphones. On second though, maybe a cellphone jammer is in order?

Once plugged in, the tower recognizes your mobile phone and its protocol, and begins boosting your bars so you can get a cell signal in the weakest cell signal areas. My house only gets 1 bar, so I may have to try one of these.

You can buy these cellphone boosting products at selected Best Buy stores, travel centers such as TravelCenters of America, direct mail catalogs such as Hammacher Schlemmer, and through major cellular distributors such as Aries Manufacturing and DBL Distributing. MOGO is currently shipping to key accounts and product is available with a MSRP of $149.

Features:
-Optional 12V to 110 adaptor accessory or SOHO bundled package allows the mobile user to achieve upgraded performance in a personal space environment at home or in office
-Increases signal bars/strength on mobile phone by more than 200 percent for most users / 50 dB system gain to increase mobile phone range (normally 2 bars)
-Wireless system. No wired connection to mobile phone
-Reduces dropped calls
-Improves call quality/clarity
-Extends cellular range for both voice and data (speeds laptop connection when using a wireless data card)
-Operates with multiple phones simultaneously
-All-inclusive package with dual-band amplifier, magnet mount antenna with RF cable, and usage instructions
-Compatible with all cellular service providers and technology works with both cellular and PCS users (except Nextel)
-Compatible with all wireless data cards and Bluetooth devices
Tags: Bluetooth, cellphone, cellphone boosting, cell signal, MOGO Personal Mobile Cell Tower, wireless

From:http://blog.tmcnet.com/

Giz Explains: Quick Guide to Samsung’s CES Goodies [Giz Explains]

Samsung just dropped almost 20 items on us at CES, but not all of em are worth your time. Here’s a quick and dirty guide to some of the stuff worth knowing about, but not quite worth shoving down your throat with a full post.

• TVs: Series 7 high end plasma. Improved video processing makes this monster, available in 50, 58 and 63-inches, as well as with four HDMI ports, the cream of Samsungs HDTV offerings. Series 4 and 5 are the entry level plasma varieties, but are worthy of your attention thanks to their 3D displaying abilities, not to mention HDMI and USB 2.0 inputs. LCD-wise, Series 4 and 5 LCDs will also be dropping in various sizes, which will be capable of full 1080p, but given some of the smaller screen sizes, we aren’t so sure that is a big deal. If you are looking to save a pretty penny, but still want a large screen, the Series 6 and 7 rear projection models should do just the trick.

• Blu-ray and HDTV: The BP-U5500 combines the best of both HD DVD and Blu-ray, with its dual playback capabilities. At under $600, it may be promising for diehard HD DVD fans that see the imminent demise of their format on the horizon.

• Complete Theater Systems and Standard DVD. Samsung are launching a new Home Theater in a Box (HTIB) range, the 2.1-channel HT-X710 and 5.1-channel HT-X715, will offer wireless speaker systems, polished styling and 1080p upconversion. The more compact, Soundbar HT-X810 will be a smaller package with Bluetooth for streaming audio. The big daddy will be the HT-BD2, with 7.1 speakers and Blu-ray 1080p playback.

• The best of the rest. Samsung will be adding Bluetooth functionality to their P2 and T10 MP3 players. They also have a HD camcorder in the pipes, the SC-HMX20C will shoot 1080p straight onto its 8GB flash memory.

From:http://www.intechnews.com/

Roasted Pecans

Welcome new readers! If you're visiting this blog for the first time, either because of the mention in Vegetarian Times or because of the Food Blog Awards, you may be wondering, "What's a blog about 'fat-free' cooking doing with a post about pecans, which are almost all fat?" The truth is that the recipes on this blog are not really fat-free; what they are free of, for the most part, is refined oils (olive oil, canola oil, etc.), margarine (and butter, of course), shortening, and other "man-made," processed fats. Around the holidays I sometimes make exceptions to this rule, but even then I try to reduce the fat whenever possible. I try to keep the fat below 15% of the total calories in the dish, and when I exceed that, I label the recipe "higher-fat." I've never featured a recipe that's almost 100% fat--until now.

A long time ago, a friend's mother told me how she made the delicious roasted pecans she'd served at a party: You melt butter in a skillet, add the pecans, sauté them until they're fragrant, and sprinkle them with salt before cooling. For years that's how I made them, using high-quality margarine instead of butter. It's a treat so irresistible that it's possible for me to consume huge amounts of fat just by nibbling as I cook (each ounce contains over 21 grams of fat). This year I wanted to give roasted pecans as Christmas presents, and I got to thinking that there must be a way to roast them without the margarine and have them taste just as good.

I started doing some research, and I found a little-known trick to making pecans taste sweeter: Soaking and rinsing the shelled nuts in lukewarm water before roasting removes the tannins and pieces of corky material that can cause pecans to taste bitter. I was intrigued and decided to give it a try. The results were amazing! The pecans not only taste sweeter, but they seem to retain their moistness better during roasting, resulting in plumper roasted nuts.

While experimenting, I tried this technique two ways. One batch I roasted without added fat; to the other I added some margarine right at the end. Though the batch with the margarine did taste a little richer, mainly it tasted saltier because the margarine helps the salt adhere better. Both batches were delicious, and I doubt that most people would notice the missing margarine. I'm including the instructions for both methods, so you can do your own testing at home.

From:http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/

Types of Flour

Generally we have a notion that we have only few types of flours, but my friends you were wrong, we have over 16 types of flours used for different types of products and food items. I'm today going to list down most of the flours. Flours are used based on what kind of product is required. Suppose for a bread we require a blend of hard and soft wheats in right proportions.

1. All purpose flour:- White flour a blend of soft and hard wheats. suitable for most home baked products, including bread cakes and quick breads.

2. Arrowroot flour:- this is not a strictly flour but has very similar properties to corn flour. it can be used as thickening of desserts and fruits sauses.

3. Buckwheat flour:- Available in health food stores. Adds a full bodied, earthy flavour, so it is used mixed with wheat flour for bread. Also used to make Russian blinis.

4. Barley flour:- This is made from pearl barley. Barley flour has a mild, slightly sweet, earthy flavour, and gives breads soft, almost cake like texture due to its very low gluten content. to make bread, barley flour must be combined with refined flour.

5. Chickenpea flour:- This is very fine Indian flour is also called the gram flour or besan. It is used to make bread and for making onion and vegetable fritters.

6. Cornflour/cornstarch:- The fine white powder is made by grinding the white heart of the corn kernel. it is most commonly used as a thickening agent for sauces soups and gravies.

7. Jowar flour:-jowar grains over most parts of southern India. This flour ground from the petty pale yellow grains is a creamy white coloured flour. It is mainly used for making indian breads.

8. Maize meal:- this is made from the cooked whole grain which is ground into flour and commonly used to make classic mexican flat bread, tortilla.

9. Millet flour:- This flour has a sweet flavour and a slightly guity texture. It tends to give breads a dry, crumby texture. so you may need to add extra fat. If using it to make bread boast the gluten content by using at least 75% wheat flour.


10) Pasta Flour:- Flour made from durum wheat, the hardest wheat grown, make sturdy dough, and is thus the choice for commercially produced dried pasta.

11) Rice Flour:- Available in most supermarkets. It gives a lightly sweet flavour to bread. low in gluten( it is a protien found in the bread), so we use no mare than one part rice flour to four parts wheat flour in a bread recipie.

12) Rye Flour:- Available in supermarkets health food stores in medium and dark varieties. Both flours produce breads with full bogy slightly sour flavour. rye Flour is fragile so knead gently. For best results use one part wheat flour to 2 parts medium rye flour and one part wheat flour to 2 parts dark rye flour.

13) Self rising:- An all purpose flour with leavning and salt flour added. It is used for recipies where baking powder would be added, but not for yeastrecipies such as bread.

14) Semolina:- This high gluten flour is made from the endosperm of durum wheat before it is fully milled into a coarse granular texture or fine flour.

15) Soya flour:- This is finely ground, high protien flour made from soyabean. it is used as a thickener in a wide range of sauses and soups. As it has a strong flavour, it is often mixed with other flours such as wheat flour to make bread and pastries

16) Whole Wheat Flour:- Whole wheat flour or 100% extraction flour is made using the whole wheqat grain including the bran and wheat germ. Most flour today bis milled between steel rollers. Stone ground flour is made in traditional way, ground between 2 stones, which is a slower process and consiquently the flour is considered to have a better flavour. used alone, the flour produces a heavy compact dry bread. Whole wheat flour can be used for whole meal pastry, either by itself or mixed with a proportion of white flour for a lighter result.

From:http://foodbeverage-blog.blogspot.com/

Mortgage

If you have a 2nd mortgage on your home, you are one of the millions of people in a very large pool. In the “old days” a person with a second mortgage was considered financially unstable. Fortunately that perception has disappeared.

The reason you have a 2nd mortgage depends on your circumstances at the time you utilized your right to borrow against your property. Let’s say however your circumstances have changed and you want to lower your payments or get a mortgage more in tune with your current needs.

As with all mortgages, shop around. Look at the rates quoted in your local paper, by your bank and/or credit union and on the Internet. Once you find a rate you think is right for you, look at the terms and conditions of that particular loan program. Those things called terms and conditions are the things that cause the problems.
For example, you may wish to have a traditional second mortgage. That is one under which you can borrow up to a certain percentage of your equity with the payments a certain amount for a certain period of time.
Generally speaking, second mortgages will be for 15 or 20 years and the monthly payment will be amortized over that time frame. This means at the end of the time period, you will have paid the mortgage in full.

Sometimes though, this traditional mortgage is adulterated in some manner. The payment period may be calculated on a 30 year basis rather than the 15 or 20 year term noted in the mortgage document.

This means your payments will not pay the mortgage in full during the 15 or 20 year term. The principal balance remaining will have to be paid in a balloon payment in order for the mortgage to be considered paid in full.

As an example, consider a $20,000 second mortgage that is amortized to pay only $15,000 of the $20,000. That means $5,000 will be due and payable at the end of the term. You will have to pay the $5,000 or get a loan for that amount.

This is an excellent example of why you have to understand the terms and conditions of the loan. A balloon payment is one way to keep payments low but it is another thing to have to come up with the money to pay one.

Another loan that is not a second mortgage in the true sense of the term is a home equity line of credit loan. It is referred to as a HELOC.

Like a true second mortgage, it sets a maximum loan amount on the sum total of the first and the second loan. Generally this amount is between 75% and 85% of the appraised value of the property.

It differs from a true second in that it is an open-ended line of credit that you can draw money against at any time. This type of loan usually carries an application fee and an annual fee. You also are not charged any other fees or interest against the loan until you use it.

For example, if you have a HELOC for $100,000 but only borrow $10,000 against it, you will be charged interest on only the $10,000 you borrowed and not the whole amount. This makes it easier for people to get the exact amount of money they want or need and not have to over borrow.

The commonality in all second mortgages is the same as it is in first mortgages. Understand the terms and conditions of the loan. If you don’t know or aren’t sure about a point, ask questions until you are satisfied with the answer.

From:http://www.bankaholic.com/

DirecTV Screws Fast Forward

DirecTV, my satellite TV provider, recently changed the firmware on my two DirecTV Plus DVR boxes and totally hosed the ability to fast forward easily. I noticed this on my upstairs receiver about 2 weeks ago. Basically, with the DirecTV Plus DVD receiver you can press the Fast Forward button up to 3 times to fast forward (2x, 3x, 4x). The problem is the damn Fast Forward Correction. If I have it on high-speed fast forward 4x, and then click Play where I want it to stop, the Fast Forward Correction rewinds the video to where it "thinks" I wanted to stop. It winds up rewinding so far back, sometimes it even rewinds to a point in the video that is BEFORE where I initiated the fast forward. What the heck?

I try again, the same thing happens, and I wind up going BACKWARDS in time, not forward. I thought my receiver was on the fritz so I rebooted it, but no nice. A few days later I went downstairs to watch TV and the wacky fast forward bug was happening on that receiver as well. I pretty much have to use 2x or 3x fast-forward now since 4x is useless. I suppose I could use the 4x FFW, but I'd have to overshoot whatever TV program I am watching, which goes against every fiber of my fast forward finger. My finger - make that thumb - has years of training in the old method.

DirecTV "espouses" this feature on their website when they write, "Fast-forwarded too far? Fast Forward Correction takes you to where you really wanted to stop". Yeah, right. Can I sue for false advertising? Losing the ability to FFW is really starting to tick me off.

Now in theory, the Fast Forward Correction is a great idea. After all, with the video fast forwarding so fast, it is impossible to stop exactly at the point where you see a scene where you want to stop. However, since I've used DirecTV for awhile, so I'm pretty nimble at pressing the Play button at the right time. I might overshoot the video a little, but then I just press the Back button (left arrow) which rewinds a few seconds (8s I believe) at a time. Yes, I know I can press the Skip button (right arrow) which will FFW 30s at a time. But it doesn't instantly "skip" or jump 30s - it actually fasts forwards through the video at about 2x speed. So using the skip button isn't an option to quickly FFW through several commercials. Fast forwarding at high speed is the best option on DirecTV receivers.

Further, I'm pretty good at guessing exactly when I want to stop even before seeing the scene on the TV. For instance, say I'm watching The Biggest Loser and it cuts to commercial. I press the Fast Forward button quickly 3 times to reach warp 4x fast forward speed, I wait about 5.5s and hit Play and I'm usually right where the commercials end. If I undershoot I press the Skip button (30s forward) and if I overshoot, I press Back (8s rewind).

There was always a slight rewind auto-correction but DirecTV must have really cranked up the dial on the latest firmware download. Last time I checked, TiVo PVRs allow users to manually select the exact number of seconds for autocorrection, but unfortunately, DirecTV and TiVo parted ways in 2005 and DirecTV developed their own PVR. Alas, DirecTV has "locked" most of the customizable features, such as autocorrection in their DVR boxes.

There is a glimmer of hope however, with Ars Technica reporting that Liberty Media, the new owners of DirecTV, are big fans of TiVo and have been collaborating with TiVo. Maybe I'll be able to trade in my current DVR/PVR sometime in 2008 for a TiVo model. Then it will truly be a Happy New Year!

From:http://blog.tmcnet.com/