I am SO in love with Amazon. Really. Remember how I was whining and sniveling a couple of days ago because my amazing food processor wasn't due to arrive until this coming Monday? That's because, as always, I selected the free shipping option. Which takes longer, of course. Except when Amazon does something totally cool -- like upgrading my shipping to Priority Mail. The food processor arrived at the post office YESTERDAY and I didn't even know it!
Fortunately, grandson Albert came over with great-grandson Archimedes and they went to the post office to pick up my mail. I knew the TimTams I'd ordered were in but that's the only package I was expecting. Albert and Archimedes came back with the TimTams and assorted mail and then Albert dumped my favorite short person in my lap and said, "You have to watch him while I go back for your KitchenAid."
"You're expletive deleting me!" I said (without deleting the expletive).
"Nope," he grinned. He was as tickled as I am. So I got a brief-but-delightful play date with Archimedes as an extra bonus to the wonders this day has produced and then Albert helped me unpack the Beast. (That dude is heavy, Coffee Mates!)
Didn't take me long to read through the User's Manual and it certainly didn't take much time to wash and dry all the components and set the Beast up in his place of honor by the sink. In fact, that's why the food pusher is not in the feed tube in the photo above. It's in the drainer in the sink. Don't worry. If you've seen one food pusher, you've seen 'em all.
It has long been my firm belief that when one has a new toy, one should play with it. For my first act, I shredded some cheddar cheese. Zap-whiz! Zap-whiz! Oh! What a blast this iz! And just like that, I had a bowl full of shredded cheese. Dumped it in another bowl, rinsed out the processor work bowl and whupped up a batch of bread dough. (Which included that shredded cheddar and some jalapenos.) Amazingly enough, the dough was ready in something like two minutes. It took longer than that to gather all the ingredients!
Now, the bread machine kneaded the dough for a good long time and the results were always excellent. Then I tried mixing bread dough in the stand mixer. That took -- I dunno -- 5 to 7 minutes, I guess. And the bread came out just as good as that mixed in the bread machine. I thought that was fairly amazing and was afraid it would be asking way too much to expect anything that good with only 2 minutes in the processor.
Well. I'm here to tell you, out of that batch of dough, I made two Epis for Albert and Holly and I made myself two small round loaves. The above photo shows one of the latter after slicing. Folks, that bread is as good as any I've ever made and, by darn, I've made some excellent bread. (With the machines doing all the hard work, of course.) I had to go over and fondle the Beast just a little bit to let him know I appreciated the fact that quality did not suffer from the application of speed.
But my adventures were not over for the day. No, indeedy. See above? That is NOT peanut butter. That is
freshly made cashew butter. I just happened to have 2 cups of salted cashews and that seemed like an excellent way to break in the mini bowl that sits inside the big bowl with its own little multi-purpose blade. I had never tasted cashew butter before but I'm definitely a fan now. All I added to it was some olive oil and then turned the Beast loose and let him run until the consistency was right.
What can I say? I got to play with The Short Person, Amazon treated me extra nice, KitchenAid puts out superb toys for goddesses and, oh yeah . . . my brother called and they'll arrive here sometime tomorrow. My cup runneth over and I will moppeth not because I want to wade-eth through it.
Some of you who drop in here for virtual coffee have also shared that beverage with our Canadian friend Wilma, also known as Jade Angel. (See "Wilma's Word" in my blog list in the sidebar.) I was shocked and saddened to learn her dearly loved husband Tim passed away suddenly this last Thursday. She asked me to let you know, just in case you hadn't stopped in there lately. Here is the link for Wilma's beautiful tribute post. There is also a link there to Tim's obituary.
