Hubby's been using the 5-minute/day recipe recently posted in Mother Earth News for the past couple weeks and loves it. Takes up a fairly big chunk of my fridge, but I get bread almost daily, so I can cope with that. Even our friend Eain started doing it at his house - pulls a lump of dough out of the fridge to warm up while he showers in the morning, bakes it while he's having breakfast/doing his pre-work computer routine, and then takes a fresh baked loaf with him to the office. They offer suggestions about whole wheat and other varieties of bread.http://www.motherearthnews.com/Real-Food/Artisan-Bread-In-Five-Minutes-A-Day.aspx...

*I* remember those flavor packets with instant oatmeal! In fact, swirling stuff in oatmeal is one of the biggest ways I use the gallons of jam I preserve every year. Honey also makes for an easy locally available topping/seasoning, rather than the brown sugar I grew up with. I also use fruit preserves as an ice cream topping (ice cream being one of those foods we've yet to be able to "give up", really, and since I'm not making my own dairy yet, making it at home would still feel like "cheating"). Boiling oatmeal with some dried fruit also makes for tastier oatmeal - used to do this all the time with raisins, but I'm betting it would work with darn near everything.Just last night I made some pudding to help cope with the milk starting to turn. Tossing it in breads is also a good way to handle it. The cooking helps re-pasteurize it and any flavor shift isn't as noticeable. Dried fruits (usually soaked/rehydrated first) also make for tasty, tasty breads in these months when our bodies are inclined to pack on the calories - the men in this house have been baking at least a [small] loaf of bread a day lately. It's been HEAVENLY - bread with butter. Bread with honey. Bread with fruit preserves...This being my first year working on this stuff, and a low yield ear with homegrowns, I've not had much time to practice, really. But vintageflapper's "buy no groceries" challenge for December is still in effect here - still buying mostly just dairy/non-comestibles at the moment - the pantry never seems to get any emptier! I'm guessing it's because I'm getting better at figuring out how to use things up. I am getting low on meat, though, and since we're definitely omnivores here, that'll start creeping back into the shopping list....

Congratulations on the new grandson!!!

Jordanne - cena's issue looks like the one I mentioned just a few days ago at http://www.freedomgardens.org/forum.php?c=topic&op=index&cid=26&tid=4541It's an intermittent problem for me, so I can see where reproducing it would be tough.I also have several journal posts already created, so I don't see the "You don't have a journal started" link she mentions to induce the 400 error....