Roasted Salty Pecans
We made it though the night of terror with no buildings being torn apart. By the sounds of the wind howling it would not have surprised me one bit.
With a day of laundry it made good sense to do a bit in the kitchen as well. Not the most favorite room in the house when Dennis has no idea of what he could be hungry for. I had decided last night that I was hungry for some salted roasted pecans. Filling up a two cup vessel with pecan halves to the brim, adding strong salt water, the soaking process began. This morning the pecans were turned out on a paper towel to do a bit of air drying. They didn’t look very appetizing in their swollen state and the color was a pasty tan. Putting them on a piece of parchment paper, I gave them a swift spray of Pam, followed by a light dusting of table salt. The oven was set at 325 degrees. In 45 minutes, I could smell the aroma of the roasting pecans. Checking on them they were just the perfect deep dark brown. It’s a close call between them being perfect or needing a bit more time. Naturally, I had to taste as the time went on. When they are at their best is when you go to crush them, they shatter. They will get stored in a plastic container ready when needed. Dennis likes a few crushed and put on top of ice cream. Dennis would like anything that is put on ice cream. Me . . . I like a few of them as a snack. I do better with salty snacks than sweet.
With that being said, the oven was hot so why not put in a batch of brownies. Yup . . . Betty Crocker to the rescue. Mom always made hot ovens do double duty. To make Dennis’ day, he helped whip up some peanut butter frosting for the top of the brownies. Man, oh man . . . it had been a long time since something baked came out of the oven.
A bit of time was spent in the sewing studio. Dennis and WD-40 worked magic on the works within the belly of Santa. The motor that turns Santa at the waist and moves one of the arms is in the worst possible place. The motor may well have been one of the first things built upon Santa’s spine and the fiberglass body was then put in place. It seems to have helped with the movement. For us, we would never leave the Santa plugged in and left turning for any length of time. It is nice to be able to enjoy the movement once in awhile. While some of the WD-40 continues to drip at will on paper, we called it a day and shut down the lights until another day. Each step needs to be done thoughtfully as there are no do-overs.
I am contemplating supper and Dennis is getting a generous amount of the roasted pecans crushed for his after-supper treat.