Innkeeper secrets revealed! – Wrap up

Welcome to the final installment of my series, in which I wrap up more of my hard won wisdom in learning how to be more efficient, well-prepared and welcoming for guests. All of this information is transferable to your home kitchen, and hopefully will give you more time to relax and enjoy your friends and family, and the reason for the season.

If you have missed the other posts in the series, you can find them here, here, here and here. Make sure to visit, as there are wonderful ideas and tips to be found. And I have a gift for you today: a free PDF that includes all of these great ideas along with the recipes that just made our guests dream about our hearty, homemade breakfasts and afternoon treats!

Let’s get cooking today with some final tips on preparation, an often overlooked, but very important area!

Preparation tips for success

Read the recipe completely through before beginning. I know this sounds like a no-brainer, but I have been caught too many times without all the ingredients, without the time to finish the recipe or without the necessary equipment. Just take the time to read the recipe through.

Gather ingredients. When I cook, I put all the ingredients to one side of my shelf. I will read through the recipe again, and see how and in what order the ingredients are mixed. I will do all the preparation I can: mix and whisk the dry ingredients, break eggs into a bowl, measure and mix spices into small bowls, cut up, pre-cook, etc. In the world of commercial baking this is known as Mise En Place. In plain English, it means having all your ducks in a row, ready to waddle in one right after the other. As I use each ingredient, I either put it away or move it to the other side, signifying that it has been used. This is extremely useful also to keep from leaving out an essential ingredient. There is nothing as frustrating as being in the middle of a recipe and discovering you can’t finish it, or having it fail because you weren’t prepared for the next step that was time sensitive.

How to line a baking dish with foil for bar cookies. Start with a piece of Reynolds brand Release aluminum foil that is about 4″ longer than you need. Turn your baking dish upside down on the counter. Lay the foil, release side down, over the bottom of the dish. Press the foil firmly over the sides and corners, leaving about 2″ extended at either long end. Lift foil off dish, turn pan over and place shaped foil into dish. The coated Release side needs to be facing up. The foil should fit quite nicely into your dish. You will use the extensions later to lift the baked good out of the dish in one big piece, after it has cooled. You can then wrap it for the freezer, and your pan will require minimum cleanup.

Lining a baking dish with Pansavers: If you are cooking casseroles, release foil is good, but Pansavers are amazing. Commercial kitchens use them extensively to get every last bit of food out of the pan and especially to help make cleanup an absolute breeze. At pennies apiece, they are well worth the cost, especially if you split the box with a friend.

Weigh your ingredients. I never saw the point of owning a scale to weigh ingredients until I was shown the difference it made in baking.  Consider me a changed woman! Too much or too little flour, for instance, can really change the quality of your baked good. So if you are looking to make your baking more consistent, I highly recommend a quality scale. The scale is also handy if you want to be more careful about how much you are eating, not that anyone would need to lose weight after the holidays…

Finding joy in the kitchen. In the preparation of meals for loved ones, you are helped greatly along by having the right tools for the job. As you are able to within your budget, replace your equipment with quality pieces that will last for many, many years. The recommendations I have made in each post of this series will give you lots of great places to start.

Remember at the beginning of this series, I asked:

You might be asking yourself why, on a blog dedicated to helping moms build stronger and more satisfying relationships, is Miss Too Darn Happy going to be revealing innkeeper secrets?

And I answered:

My wish for you this season is to be better prepared so that you will have the time to slow down and enjoy what is truly important to you, to be well rested enough to make decisions that work for you. To that end, I will be offering a series on breakfast and treat preparation that I think will absolutely delight you with its simple yet significant ideas that will help you feel calm and organized in the kitchen, whether for your pull-out-all-the-stops Christmas brunch, a special family weekend breakfast, or tasty and homemade warm from the oven treats for those unexpected guests.

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I hope you find great value in this information, and that it encourages you to prepare for joyful gatherings around your kitchen table. I pray it helps you to be more confident about reaching out and having both friends and yet-to-be friends over for a meal, or just for coffee and treats. After all, it is about building and maintaining relationships, about reaching out to folks, about sharing conversation and laughter in your kitchen, the heart of your home.

Thank you for joining me this week, and I pray you are able to truly slow down and enjoy the peace of this Christmas season.

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And now, here it is! The link for the Free PDF download of Innkeeper Secrets Revealed! You can’t buy it in a store or on the internet. But, you can  get it–FREE–by subscribing to my general email updates and occasional-when I write it-newsletter by filling out the form in the sidebar to the right, in the Too Darn Happy News area under my smiling face. The link to the PDF will be delivered right away to your inbox, so you can start planning and cooking as quick as a wink!

Note- This PDF is no longer available here on my site when you subscribe. However, if you would like the download, shoot me an email to let me know you have subscribed, and you can have it in addition to my current free offer!