Morning adventures

Tis the last day of March. It's going out like a lamb today: nice and sunny and forecast to be about 80 degrees. I've got myself and Holly in shorts, but Alex refused shorts and dressed in long sleeves.

Here's Holly with a flashlight.

Alex picking out a movie.

I happened to glance at the window, and was startled to see this through the blinds.

Closer examination revealed this.

That's not something you see every day.

Anyway, this morning I made blueberry/banana muffins to tempt the munchkins, who are still suffering from sick tummies after their flu.

Blueberry-banana muffins

3/4ths cup milk
1/4th cup oil
1 egg
1 overripe mashed banana
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
1 cup blueberries

Whisk together milk, oil, and egg. Beat in banana. Add flour, sugar, salt and baking powder, stir just until blended. Fold in blueberries. Bake in greased or papered muffin tins for 20-25 minutes at 400 degrees.

The recipe didn't call for a banana, but I had a stinky black one sitting on the counter, and I was determined to use it in SOMETHING. The muffins came out very flavorful and sweet. Unfortunately the munchkins disdained the blueberries in them on principle. We're in that picky stage where neither of them wants to eat, and they don't feel good, so they don't want to eat because of that, either.

I've been trying to make crockpot yogurt like Little Bit of Life did, but when I got to the stage where you add plain yogurt as a starter, I didn't really have enough plain yogurt. I added it anyway and let it sit overnight. This morning it's still the consistency of milk, but the longer it stands, the more it's starting to taste like yogurt.

I turned the crockpot back on for 20 minutes, then turned it off, just to keep it a little bit warm. Making yogurt is like a giant petri dish, anyway, and petri dishes have to stay at about body temperature.

It's certainly growing some kind of culture, because this morning at 6:30, it still tasted like milk, whereas at 8:30 it tasted like yogurt and has more and more thick chunks in it. I'm just going to leave it covered and check it periodically. If nothing else, I can use it to fortify smoothies.

Later: Finally made it into a vanilla smoothie at 10, so this was after 14 hours of sitting covered. I ladled two cups into the blender, added half a cup of sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla extract. Best. Vanilla. Yogurt. Drink. Ever.

The rest has been relegated to the fridge, because I don't want it to start separating, which is what I read happens eventually.

Note from later: Turns out my yogurt stayed runny because my crockpot didn't stay hot enough for long enough. Found this out after a lot of research.