Heartsease

I bought some of those kind as well and they seal just fine. After I took them out of the boiling water bath they started "pinging" within minutes. All twelve pinged within five minutes.

Thank you ma'am. I wiped the jars off and put them in the pantry for a two week rest *G*, if they don't set by then I am going to make some lovely syrup for farmers market. LA

Greetings all, In all the years I have been preserving I have never screwed up two batches of jelly in one day. I made a wild strawberry and mulberry combo and added granulated pectin to it. The recipe I had does not call for lemon juice. The sugar was 4.5 cups to 3.5 cups of juice. It tastes great but one batch won't jell and you could walk on the other one. Any ideas? does pectin ever get old?

I think most of the best pie crust in the world is made by little old redneck ladies who have a back forty down in the river bottom and a waiting list for their pies at every church supper. Butter gives a good flavor but the flakiest crust comes from good lard. When I am making a pie that needs the butter flavor to do it justice I make my crust using lard then chill it and brush the crust with melted butter then sugar it real good before I put my filling in. I would suggest buying lard from a amish family that has a good rep as it will have better flavor as a rule over reg store bought. Processing is not always a good thing. Instead of lemon juice we grew up using vinegar. I think it gives a flakier crust but don't know enough chemistry to say for sure it does over lemon juice. Course this is all coming from the resident red neck so ymmv. LA

Your sugar showpeices were simply beautiful!!!!!!!!! and the banana pearl cake caused me to lust in my little black heart. You earned every bit of the grade you recived, wonderful work sir. LA

As has been mentioned it sounds like your royal needs to be "wetter" . I won't promise you that this my way is fool proof but it does work and is considerably less stressful. I take whatever I am using for a mold and I cover it very, very tightly with Saran wrap. Tape the Saran securely then pipe onto it and over pipe it with either a smaller tube or the same one. When it is dry very gently turn the bowl/mold over and remove the tape and peel the Saran carefully away from the cage. Usually this works like a charm. LA

Tom's "your weekends screwed" encounter cracked me up, that is priceless. We shop pretty much twice monthly so we always have a pretty good size haul. We shop so many different stores because only that store carries such and such we don't get a lot of flack. I do have to admit to being one who looks at other peoples carts and if I see someting interesting I ask about it. I don't ever remember anyone being offended or crappy about it. We have met many nice people that way. The nicest comment I have had made in a checkout was that they wish they lived at our house as our cart was zero junque food and they knew we had to cook really great meals to not have any. Of course I have no shame in general, I will ask people about almost anything. One house in particular that we drive by regularly looks lopsided, I mean seriously listing to port. New house that is less than ten years old. It drove me crazy and people talked bout this house being off kilter so I knew it wasn't just me. I drove past it for months and finally couldn't take it any longer. The girls had friends with us and the kids were raving about the crooked house and that my friends was the straw that broke the camels back. I whizzed right into their driveway, parked, walked up to the door and knocked. When the owner opened the door I explained that I knew she would think I was totally nuts but I couldn't take not knowing any longer and asked her is your house really that off kilter. Her eyes got huge then she lost it completely, had tears running down her face. Told me I was the first person who had ever had the guts to ask them about thier house. They had heard people talk about their house when they were out and about but no one had ever asked. They gave me a tour, we drank ice tea, sat on the deck and talked herbs, found out she had gone to school with my BIL and that their architect had a warped sense of humor and designed the one end of the house to look as if the house were indeed sinking into the ground. Lovely couple of hours and my kids and their friends decided I got coolest mom of the year award. After that scoping a grocery cart is nothing! LA