When I saw the Grab-Its for the first time, I dreamed up all sorts of foods I could use them for. I love nachos, even just plain ones, so here are my Grab-Its with simple nachos and homemade guacamole.

I went to a pot luck Christmas party last month and someone brought something called a California Roll Bake. It was basically a CA roll topped with furikake and baked in a casserole, and then you spoon it into squares of seaweed instead of rolling it into sushi. It sounded amazing, but I didn't have money to buy CA roll ingredients, so I just made a spam musubi version. Delicious!

This one came today, and it has a small chip and flea bites along one side of the lid. I guess I won't be buying this stuff online anymore. It's not worth the risk since they are expensive to ship to me and to return if something is wrong.

The seller was very nice and gave me a generous refund to make up for the oversight, so I feel ok about the purchase. But it's still disappointing, and again I'm not sure if I can use these lids since they are damaged. I don't want any exploding Pyrex in my home =(

A grilled cheese and chicken sandwich plus very NOT delicious Santa Fe Style soup by Progresso. I actually prefer TJ's soups, but I think I picked this one up when I was sick and making a quick stop at Safeway.

I was so excited to find a somewhat inexpensive 5 quart casserole in the Spice o' Life pattern. When I emailed the seller, she said the piece did not have cracks, chips or stains. But when I received the piece today, it had a small chip in the lid and a long stain on the handle. The stain might be removable, but I can't do anything about the chip. It's small and I could see how she missed it, but I've heard that once your glass piece has a chip in it, you can't use it anymore.

I'm not sure if this is true, but I may be in the market for a new lid =/ I've emailed the seller, so we'll see what she says. Other than those 2 things, the set is in good shape. I've been looking in my cookbook that I mentioned for a recipe to try out the larger casserole.

Also, I picked up these small plates from the local thrift store yesterday for $3 total. I was going to sell them, but they are stained pretty good, so I'll just keep them.

*Update* The seller gave me a partial refund, so I feel ok about it now.

Also, my Sidekicks came in and they are perfect. It's like they were never even used. They are a lot smaller than I was imagining, but I realized that I never actually read the measurements. Whoops. Oh well, they are still awesome. Now if only my toaster oven were big enough to fit them.

Every now and then, I find myself thinking about our trip to Hawaii in September 2011. I had never been, and it was an amazing vacation. On our first full day there, we drove literally the entire way around the island and along the Road to Hana. We made stops in towns and I picked up a bag of candied coconut and a mini loaf of coconut pineapple bread at a spot with a couple of stores and a restaurant that served fried fish and fresh guava. I cut small slices of that loaf every morning for an after-breakfast treat, so the bread lasted us more than half our stay. I was really sad when the last piece was gone.

In my search for a recipe to try out my new Corningware Spice of Life loaf pan, I stumbled upon this Phyllis Coconut Bread recipe and was intrigued that the writer seemed to be referring to the same bread that we had in Maui. I went with the traditional way and did not brown the butter or toast the coconut, but I'm sure I will be making it again, so I'll try it other ways as well. In fact, I will pretty likely try to adjust the recipe for white whole wheat flour, though I haven't had much success with other recipes.

I bought a 14oz bag of sweetened (per the comments on the site) flaked coconut and did not use the entire bag, even though it is less than what is called for in the recipe. A full cup went into the batter, but I didn't add a ton on the top because I didn't remember my loaf being totally covered in coconut when we had it in Hawaii. Also, I didn't know how many pounds my loaf pan is, so I just filled it to the brim. That was probably a bad idea because it took forever (1 hour 30 minutes) to finish baking. Next time I might grease the pan with oil so the crust doesn't get so brown.

This recipe turned out great. Not exactly how I remember, but that's ok. It's still a really tasty piece of Hawaii when I start to miss it again.

Next up will probably be this Chocolate Marble Bread, which looks pretty challenging. Or Fresh Mango Bread, sans the raisins. Or this Better Than Starbucks Lemon Loaf.

Bought this baby on eBay and it came only 3 days after I paid. It has a few more signs of love than I would have liked, but they are all cosmetic and on the outside. I'm sure I would have done as much damage just storing or washing it anyway. These little things are expensive and shipping prices always seem so inflated. Why are my habits so expensive?

Found this little gem at a thrift store for $3. It matches the 3 quart casserole dish I found at a local thrift store (though I can't remember which one) and the loaf pan I bought online. I got super lucky with my sugar container today. I also saw a matching ~4" skillet that I was going to buy, but I changed my mind since it was so small. My rule for collecting pieces from this set is that I can only buy the things I will actually use to cook.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I'm going to track down some Grab-Its, but I'm hoping to score some of those locally too, since they are expensive with shipping. The Grab-Its seem to be difficult to find with lids especially, so finding several to make a set will take a while. I will probably also buy a 5 quart casserole and maybe one of those square 8"x8" pans I've seen.

My mom bought me this Blueberry Hill Casseroles & One Dish Meals cookbook for Christmas. I actually stopped buying cookbooks because I usually only use one or two recipes out of them, but this cookbook has a ton of recipes that I want to try. Today I made the Firehouse Chili Con Carne recipe (p114), which is excellent. I added a little salt, jalapeños, and omitted the chipotle because I didn't have any.

As an added bonus, I got to use my sort of vintage 3 quart Corningware Spice of Life casserole, which fit the recipe perfectly. I got lucky finding this piece at a local thrift store. This was my first time cooking with any Corningware, and it is amazing. I would have normally used my non-stick Calphalon casserole, but I'm trying to get away from the non-stick stuff and wanted to try out my Corningware; I'm glad I did. I've ordered a couple other cooking pieces and also found the Corningware Grab-Its, which I decided to hunt down.

My brother is staying with us for the holidays, and he suggested that we use the grill as much as possible while he is here. Genius! I marinated some fish last night, DH slapped it on the grill and I made some quick and cheesy mashed potatoes. I used this Grilled Fish Steaks recipe that was simple but tasty despite my not having basil. Next time I will use more lemon juice though.

I made my usual carrot cake recipe with white whole wheat flour. The texture changed a bit and the cake is not as moist as usual, but otherwise the flavor is excellent. Next time I will try adding more yogurt to the batter...

I find reviews to be both incredibly useful and ridiculous. Most of the time, especially when aggregated with other opinions, reviews are helpful, and I often use them to help me choose electronics, kitchen appliances, sellers to use on Etsy and eBay, and restaurants.

But I have a few problems with reviews. Here are my top review pet peeves, in no particular order.

1. RTFM
A lot of times people will give a product a negative review when they didn't read the manual. I can think of several instances wherein I read a review for a product that I own in which the reviewer complained that the item did not do [some task]; in reality I knew that the product actually could do those things. If a reviewer doesn't read the manual and use the item correctly, of course it won't work. Along the same lines, don't give a product a bad review because you didn't read the dimensions.

2. Reviews = Rants
When people spend their hard earned cash, they are probably excited about their purchase and want it to live up to their hopes and dreams for it. When this doesn't happen, whether from user error or poor design, they can get upset or even livid. Oftentimes, the first reaction is to hop on Amazon and give the product a scathing review, written in blind fury at having spent "$xxx.xx for this piece of crap that is now just taking up space in the garage." A rare few are actually able to step back and think what might have happened to cause this. And sometimes, the product actually does just suck that much. But when reviewers just rave about how much the product sucks, it doesn't help potential future buyers.

3. Unrelated Complaints
Some of the least helpful reviews I've read are the ones that review a vendor rather than a product. These are inappropriate. Poor service is not related to the product and should not be included on a product page. Put reviews where they belong. This gets a little fuzzy when you get into the books and movies category because you can rate both the story, the features, the specific edition, etc. For example, what sort of rating is appropriate for the blu-ray release of Star Wars when the original trilogy as was released in theaters is not included? The movies are classics and would get 5 stars, but that particular release does not.

4. Nondescript
One great disservice a customer can do for a vendor is giving a negative or neutral rating without describing what caused the experience to be deserving of such a low rating. These blank reviews do not help the vendor improve nor do they help future buyers decide whether or not they want to risk purchasing from this seller. If you have a negative experience with a seller, first try to work it out. If that doesn't happen after a reasonable effort, then take a minute to calm down if necessary and then rationally explain what the seller did or didn't do to make your experience unpleasant.

5. Unreasonable Docking
I read a review about a dive bar in which the reviewer complained that it was a dive bar. I've read restaurant reviews that praised the food, but gave the restaurant only one star because the service was horrible. I agree that good service goes a long way in a restaurant, but so does the food. If you had a disgusting meal with great service, you wouldn't return any sooner than if you had an excellent meal with terrible service. Be appropriate when you give stars. They are totally meaningless when you get down to it, but an average is made from those stars that affects how other people view that place. In some cases, you may be reviewing a mom-n-pop shop who can be put out of business by a bad reputation. Especially if the place recently opened, give it another shot. I will usually give restaurants at least two tries unless they made me deathly ill.

In the end, I always take reviews with a grain of salt and carefully consider the source. No offense to the older crowd, but if an 80yo can't get the printer to work properly, I'm more inclined to side with the printer on this one.

After several trips to Mrs. Fields cookies in several different malls, I finally asked why no one had butter toffee cookies anymore. Turns out they discontinued my favorite Mrs. Fields cookie. So I went on a search to find a good copycat. This recipe on Food.com is the one I thought looked best of the few that I found.

I chilled the dough for about an hour as the recipe suggested. The recipe calls for salted but I only have unsalted, so I followed this advice and added 1/4 teaspoon of salt to my dry ingredients. I also conducted a little experiment with my cookie sheets and greasing options. I tried a half sheet pan with parchment paper, a half sheet pan with butter, and one of those Wilton air cookie sheets. I didn't notice a difference in flavor or texture between the different pans, but toffee is sticky stuff, so for these cookies, I'll use the parchment paper.

They turned out amazing! Even better than Mrs. Fields.

My tomatoes are still pushing out fruit. I don't know what kind of bugs these are, but they freak me out a little. Since we are already so late in the year, I trimmed off a bunch of blossoms from my tomato plant so it can focus on the fruit. I don't think I will try tomatoes again next year. I do plan to try my hand at lettuce when the weather is consistently cool.

When DH and I bought a new dining table, I moved the old one into our bedroom to use as a desk. While the desk served its purpose just fine, it took up a lot more space in the bedroom than I liked; eventually I grew tired of it being in the way and looking awkward. For weeks I searched on and off for a real wood desk (because I didn't like the fact that 100% of our furniture was from Ikea) that was a good price and was small enough to fit neatly in the space available between the dresser and the wall.

Over the weeks I had been looking, I found several desks that fit the bill, but they all ended up not working out for various reasons. I gave up the search for a while and went on vacation for 9 days. We returned home on a Friday, and school started the following Monday. Saturday I realized that I still didn't have a proper desk, so I checked craigslist again and stumbled upon an ad for a wonderful vintage typewriter desk that had been posted 6 days earlier. Though the measurements weren't listed, it looked to be the perfect size. I emailed excitedly, hoping that it was still available after such a long time on craigslist. It was!

We scheduled to pick up the following morning, and before we left, I already had a response about the old dining table I had posted on craigslist the night before. I let her know that we wouldn't be home till the afternoon and that I would let her know. When we went to pick up the desk, I talked the seller into bringing the price down $20, and we discovered that it didn't fit in our car. We borrowed an SUV from DH's parents and enlisted some friends to help move it since it was too heavy for me. That took all morning, so we all went to lunch together, which we wanted to do anyway to thank them for watching the cats while we were gone.

I emailed the buyer for the table to let her know we were available and promptly fell asleep. When I woke up, I saw that I had an email from her and panicked, thinking that I'd missed her and she was no longer interested (this has happened to me before). But after I sent her an apology asking if she was still interested, I noticed that she had only sent her response 10 minutes before I saw it. I emailed again with my address, and she was at our door less than an hour later.

I am so pleased that everything worked out well. Though the desk shows some love, it is full of personality. I someday may refinish it, but the condition of the desk is actually quite nice. I put my typewriter in the space provided because it was getting dusty being on display all the time. The desk has holes for securing the typewriter to the platform, but the screws on my typewriter are too small. I just let the typewriter rest against the back surface since it's not too heavy. When the light is better, I'll get a picture of the underside of the desk. The mechanism to bring out the typewriter is so nifty.

The desk has a small plaque on it that says "F.W. Wentworth & Co, San Francisco" on it. Though I'm no expert, I've never heard of this brand, and the only meaningful result from googling was an ebook entitled "Lawrence A Oxley. Architect and engineer (Volume v.62-63 (July-Dec. 1920))" which an address listed for the company. Is this desk really from 1920?