Category Archives: Home

dessert, Hardware Store Life, Home, June, pound cake, southern cooking, southern living, Summer

Pound Cake, A Southern Staple

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Southern Living 101:

Front porch swings, and rocking chairs with a slight breeze blowing.. can’t you smell the fried chicken cooking inside, the aroma of homemade biscuits, a glass of sweet tea in hand or a cup of fresh squeezed lemonade and let’s add a warm slice of pound cake…. Just another Southern Summer loading in 2023.

WCH Recommends: These 2 Rocking chairs are an amazing way to rock the summer away and enjoy the breeze.

My Thoughts about Southern Pound Cake:

1. Pound cake can probably be found at family celebrations & holiday gatherings especially if they are potluck type gatherings.

2. You will always find at least one pound cake at church picnics or potlucks in the South… after all, it’s an essential Southern staple!

3. Pound cakes are a central part of any good dessert table.

4. Pound cakes are either a grand mystery of baking to some and to others.. well, they seem to navigate any pound cake recipe like a pro.

5. Pound Cakes can be baked different pans… Bundt, loaf pan, or a tube pan AND Most Southern cooks have a definite preference on which they use regularly to bake a pound cake.

WCH Recommends: Tube pans and cast iron loaf pans are great baking standard pans for baking all goodies this summer.

A Trip Back Into Time Regarding Pound Cake:

Pound cake is exactly what you think it is. It’s a fairly simplistic looking dessert. The origin is quite literally what it sounds like… the first pound cakes were made with one pound of flour, eggs, butter, and sugar! In today’s recipe equivalent… 3 1/3 cups of flour, 8-9 eggs, 4 sticks of butter and 2 cups of sugar. When you begin to think about that, most traditional pound cake ratios are slightly different today!

My favorite Pound cake recipe uses 6 large eggs

I didn’t realize until recently, that the first recipe for pound cake appeared in 1796 in the American Cookery Cookbook and Pound Cake Recipe was rooted in Northern European cuisine… Europeans measurements were by weight, hence, a pound of butter, flour, sugar. I couldn’t even begin to imagine how to stir and create a fluffy pound of butter with only using a wooden spoon😳!

Strange Things about Pound Cake:

Personally, the strangest reaction I ever witnessed about a freshly baked pound cake, I encountered a few years ago. I had made a pound cake to share with the staff at the hardware store and as we prepared to slice the cake, a former employee shouted out, “let me go find some honey or molasses to go with the cake to cut the dryness of the pound cake”. I was stunned. What on earth was this person’s perspective concerning pound cake??? I realized that they had potentially NEVER eaten a pound cake that wasn’t dry. To never have eaten an amazing piece of pound cake… moist on the inside yet with a crust on the outside.

Comfort Food 101:

Comfort Foods tend to be hearty, homey, and let’s just face it, good for your soul. The mental boost that your favorite comfort food creates, can restore your equilibrium.

As far as dessert goes, Cream Cheese Pound Cake is a family favorite comfort food. My Mom regularly makes this one for us when we visit, so frequently that my niece named Mom’s pound cake, “Nanny Cake”. The name has stuck. We all call Mom’s Cream Cheese Pound Cake, “Nanny Cake.” Now that’s truly Comfort Food 101!

My Personal Tips for Baking A Pound Cake:

1. Grease pan with Crisco /flour dusting mixture instead of using a baking spray. I have never had a great success with using a baking spray. For making a chocolate pound cake, dust with a mixture of flour and cocoa powder.

2. I always preheat my oven… before I begin to mix ingredients. One of my cake cookbooks recommends that you preheat 30 minutes before baking. This allows your oven to fully come up to temperature and allows for even baking of cake layers… I would bet that would extent to a pound cake as well! (Note: Some pound cake recipes are cold oven pound cakes and you are asked to not preheat oven)

3. Use the oven light and your nose! If it smells like it is almost done then it probably is … the oven light keeps you from peeking inside and provides a nice visual . Each time you open the oven door your temperature drops about 25 degrees and adds to the chances of your cake falling.

4. Use a cake tester after baking time elapses to check for complete baking doneness.

5. Pound cake recipes calling for a tube pan won’t always fit in a Bundt pan. (Tube pans have higher sides and will hold more, while Bundt pans are more shallow and fluted.)

6. When unsure of size of your cake pan, use a measuring cup to fill the cake pan with water to determine the pan’s capacity.

7. Read entire recipe and make sure you have all ingredients ready before beginning! Gather ingredients prior to mixing. It’s important not to overmix pound cake ingredients.

8. Bring cold ingredients to room temperature before baking… items like… eggs, butter, cream cheese, milk.

Happy Summer Baking Y’all!

flowers, Hardware Store Life, Home, memories, Mother’s Day, Natural World, southern living, Spring, Summer

Flower Power

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“The Earth Laughs in Flowers”

The garden centers in May see a frenzy of activity. The Spring season has brought enough warmth and heat to keep those blooms beautiful. Do you find yourself buying the same annuals or planting the same flower seeds each year??? At the hardware store, our flower seeds are selling quickly as well as potting soil.

WCH Recommends: Using a composting soil builder along with a great potting soil mix creates a fantastic base for growing plants and flowers.
WCH Recommends: Zinnias bloomed all summer long with butterflies abounding! Stop by to pick up some seeds now for blooms later this summer.

I began to think about this the other day, my personal connections to flowers and what I plant is deeply rooted… linked to my personal life experiences and memories of those who I love and those who are no longer with us.

Hydrangeas are a favorite flower memory. I have a large snowball hydrangea that I planted several years ago based around my childhood home. These beautiful blooms here are from my granny’s garden.

I have a few favorites that I love to plant each year. The striking colors, the scents, the aesthetics, and durability(long lasting nature) of the plant definitely impacts my purchasing decisions. But, many of the reasons why I pick the same type of flowers each year is due to my associated memories with these flowers.. past celebrations, or memories of strolling through family gardens.

Aunt Mary and Pat always had their window boxes full of red geraniums every year. I always try to have a couple of red geraniums each year.

If you and I did a walk through in my garden areas at my home, it would be a definite literal story of sharing plants.. who gave them to me to transplant, or maybe the why I chose the blooming beauty for my garden and the personal connection to each flower. My question to you today, do you relate and link flowers that you plant to your cherished loved ones too?

My mom always had beautiful roses at home. I love this ketchup/mustard variety in my front garden area. Many of the varieties I have chosen are as a result of our conversations about the care of rose, heartiness of the variety.
WCH Recommends: If you have roses, this is a great product to use!

My final thought to share with you today, flowers hold power… not only the outward beauty for your home, hope, resilience to bloom even in difficult circumstances.., and cherished memories of those you love. Let’s get planting!

Cleaning House, Hardware Store Life, high touch surfaces, Home, Shop Local, Spring, spring cleaning

Can’t Touch This…

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Did that opening title have you think about the classic song 🎵 from MC Hammer??? This blog post isn’t intended to discuss music today BUT to get y’all thinking about those surfaces in your home that you DON’T need to touch before you disinfect.

Can you easily identify the “high-touch surfaces” in your home? Do a quick visual survey of your surroundings inside your home.

After complying this list of Top 10 “high-touch” surfaces I can quickly see which areas I should give extra attention to within this picture. I have a more “intentional cleaning focus” now when I’m cleaning. Cleaning and disinfecting will be much easier and will help keep my family healthy. But still is takes a bit of work. 🤪

Whoever does the cleaning in your home is likely to catch several of these “high-touch surfaces” on a day to day basis. I hope that these tips for finding “high-touch” areas will be useful.

Spring is less than 30 days away now and it may have you thinking about a good healthy dose of cleaning. So let’s begin with a few basics below.

Spring in full bloom

What are “high-touch surfaces”??? These are the surfaces in your home that receive the most direct daily contact with your family. High-touch surfaces are the areas where dirt, dust, and germs if left unchecked, will thrive. High-touch surfaces should be regularly cleaned and disinfected daily.

Your hands may not ever be this dirty.. mine from gardening, but germs can build up and make your family sick. Don’t forget to disinfect your sink handles!

When I use the term disinfect, here’s the gist of what happens when you do that…to disinfect is using a chemical cleaner to remove viruses and bacteria.

Now the quick breakdown of TEN high-touch surfaces, to disinfect inside your home. These TEN areas are based upon my own personal experience as a mom AND also as one who actively works in and participates in the hardware life. I’ll be curious to know if you found several of your “high-touch” surfaces in your quick surroundings survey of your own home, are you a novice or a pro??? Or maybe somewhere in between???

Top Ten Hardware Life High-Touch Surfaces

1. Think about Small and large appliances (ex. coffee pot, microwave, refrigerator) that are frequently used by each member of the family each day. Don’t forget about things like a can opener, or even the knife block!

Your coffee pot may not be a “high-touch surface” for your family, but it is at my house. Think about the appliances you use everyday and make sure you disinfect them regularly.
In my kitchen, the refrigerator is definitely a high use appliance. Fingerprints on the door.., etc BUT don’t forget to disinfect the ice and water area too!

2. Door knobs and light switches, & even your house keys!

Your keys go with you all day long to all different places. Give them a good wipe down.

3. The Kitchen Sink. Yes, it is definite.. a highly used kitchen item and don’t forget to clean the faucet handles.

4. The Countertop. This is where food gets cooked & consumed… often my counter gets scattered with keys, phones, and mail. Our kitchen counter is a drop zone of sorts. Yikes! Keys and cellphones are also high-touch! 😳

At our house the kitchen countertops are often wiped down multiple times a day 😳.

5. The Bathroom. Clean and disinfect fixtures, sinks, toilet seat, and toilet handle.

6. Remote control for tv, cell phones, iPads, game controllers.

Use an alcohol based cleaner OR spray the disinfectant directly onto a paper towel and then wipe. Allow time for drying.

7. Kitchen chairs and table. If you use it daily, then clean it often. Think about where your family meals occur everyday and clean and disinfect often.

8. Toys and play areas for your children. Kids play hard all day, and make sure to clean toys that are often used by your child everyday and disinfect often.

9. The Pantry. Think about the door knob, and other touchable areas outside/ inside (if you and have kids, or grandkids, they use it frequently throughout the day)

My pantry doors are opened numerous times in one day!

10. The Laundry Room. Wipe down your appliances AND clean your laundry basket! A laundry basket holds all of your dirty clothes AND clean clothes. Wipe them down often. I have separate baskets for clean and dirty clothes but, I regularly clean all of my laundry baskets.

This laundry basket is used solely for clean clothes to take out of dryer and putting away laundry. Cookie photo bombed my picture😎 .
Here’s a look at a full and very dirty laundry basket in my house… so yes, I do have to regularly clean and disinfect these often! Your laundry may not be as dirty as mine. My plumber gets pretty dirty. But using a good disinfectant to clean touchable surfaces definitely will help keep your family healthy.

Now that you have my top ten list, what should you use to disinfect effectively?

Here are a few tips that you can use for cleaning “high-touch” areas. A more detailed guide can be found with CDC recommendations on cleaning those frequently used areas in your home and workplace. The internet is a plethora of information on the subject.

The Hardware Life Daily Cleaning Tips

1. Begin with a clean surface. Clean area first by removing any visible dirt or dust. I keep a good multi-surface spray handy for quick cleanups.

I often use a Meyers Clean Day multi surface spray for cleaning. Wilkes County Hardware has a vast selection of cleaning and disinfectant products that should be able to meet your daily cleaning needs.

2. Use gloves … a pair of disposable gloves might work best especially when disinfecting surfaces. Throw away once you finish cleaning.

3. Pick Easy disinfectant choices… Clorox or Lysol wipes. These will do the job quickly and easily.

5. Read the label on your disinfectant carefully. Do you need to rinse after application? Allow for drying time.

4. The Multi surface Cleaner… Keep a good multi-surface spray handy for quick cleanups. I keep one upstairs and have at least one multi surface spray available for cleaning in the downstairs areas my home.

Lastly, let’s evaluate some “germy“ cleaning utensils and those you might not think to clean.

1. The Sponge.. if you use a sponge to clean, let your nose to guide in your decision to keep or throw out. Your nose knows! If the sponge smells, then it is time to stop by our hardware store and pick up a new one.

2. The kitchen brush- if you have one of these brushes to scrub surfaces in your kitchen, sanitizing it is a must! Put it in the dishwasher after each use.

3. The toilet brush. It should be disinfected weekly or after each use. Rinse well after cleaning toilet, apply a disinfectant spray and allow to dry before replacing into toilet brush cover. Some experts say to replace your toilet brush every 6 months.

4. The plunger. Clean and disinfect after each use and allow to dry.

Sink and toilet plungers are readily available at Wilkes County Hardware

5. The bucket. If you carry your cleaning essentials inside your bucket as you clean at home, don’t forget to regularly disinfect your bucket.

6. The Mop. Let your nose be the guide again! If it smells, it is time for a new one. Regardless of the type of mop you use, the mop should be clean and disinfected. Your floors will be as clean as your mop. Some recommendations are to replace your mop every 3 months depending on the style of your mop.

I found this quote as I was working on this blog post, “our house is clean enough to be healthy, but dirty enough to be happy”. This reigns true in our house. Things are never perfect … shoes are often in the floor, keys are on the kitchen counter, blankets are thrown about on the couch, and two sweet pups roam absolutely everywhere. But it is HOME! I clean intentionally now that I’m more aware of surfaces that require an bit of extra “love and work”. Deep cleaning occurs when I can get to it. Whether you are a novice or a pro at finding all the frequently used areas of your home, home should always be a place a of comfort and joy. Happy Spring Cleaning Y’all!

Cookie and Joy
End of Year Reflection, family, Hardware Store Life, Home, memories, rescue pups, southern cooking, southern living

2022 Memories and Favorite Photos

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It’s hard to believe that 2022 is almost in the books! Sharing a few moments with y’all from our hardware life from this year in the form of pictorial memories and a few of my photo favorites.

We welcomed Cookie into our home in January. She was found abandoned at a local car wash, very thin and wet. The top pictures depict her thin size when she was found/first came home. On December 26th, 2022 she weighed in at the vet at 21 pounds…. She is definitely living the good life now.
Beautiful blooms in January 2022
January snow 2022
Hardware show in Orlando, back in person! Richard & Steve Foster
The freight elevator from a unique perspective, top down view … yes, it still works and we use it frequently
Afternoon Sun gleams in from the front windows
Spring Feature… thanks for sharing y’all
Friday morning friends 😊, a diverse group who gather together as they can on Friday mornings, to discuss business, and have a bit fun too.
Graduation 2022! Very proud of our son who has gained not only his high school diploma but his two year degree at WCC.
Spring Storm clouds
New Bern boats all aglow at night. Richard & I took a few days away to celebrate our anniversary in New Bern. What a beautiful town!
Cutie pie Joy enjoying life
August morning Fogs… did you keep count???
A photo collection of the fire at Smithey’s across the street. Very thankful for our amazing community of firefighters, police, who kept the fire/area under control.
September morning sunrise
Wet return for the Brushy Mountain Apple Festival in 2022
A very popular new t-shirt available at WCH this Fall. Thank y’all!
Amazing fall colors this year
The first annual Spooktacular was a tremendous success! So many people came out for this event this year. We hope to make it bigger and better next year!
November brings leaves 🍁 falling everywhere
Lighting up the night with Christmas lights… Light Up Downtown North Wilkesboro
Our view has dramatically changed with our neighbor gone, capturing this beautiful sunset after the time change in November
Mistletoe spotted in the height of a tree. My parents neighborhood has a ton of trees with mistletoe everywhere.
December… the festive month with Christmas trees and more!

As the book closes on 2022, I’m personally noting the ebb and flow of the year is often marked with highs and lows. The perspective and reflection of 2022 should be the focus on the blessings in life.

Wishing you and your family a blessed 2023. We await the new chapters in 2023 to see what blessings will mark the highlights of each of the 12 new chapters. Happy New Year to all!

Do you celebrate New Year’s with a traditional meal each year??? Pork chops, black eyed peas, cheese grits, cabbage and cornbread was on our menu for 2022 .
Christmas, classic movies, Hardware Store Life, Home, recipe, winter

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

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December 21st, Winter Solstice… no snow today but the cold temperatures are coming by the end of this week! Brrr 🥶

Today marks the first day of the winter season. Soup and stew season has already begun at our house and is a regular feature in our weekly menu.

There is simply nothing better than a hot bowl of soup and a melted, gooey grilled cheese to take the winter chill off after a long day at the hardware store.

Christmas is almost here… a wonderful time of the year!

During the Christmas season, I love to curl up on the couch and enjoy my favorite Christmas classic movies. This past weekend I stumbled upon a recipe from one of my favorite vintage movies, It Happened on 5th Avenue(1947).

Thankful for TCM and my small collection of Christmas classics that I have on DVD

Richard & I have watched this movie countless number of times, but as our conversation took a turn about the stew featured in the movie, I decided to do a quick internet search to find out more about the intriguing dish. Slumgullion Stew, an Irish stew, mentioned in the 5th Avenue movie, was easy enough to find a few different variations of the recipe. I settled on my favorite and then decided to give it a try and see if it will make the cut on our menu board for our family favorites.

It looks like I’ll be adding Slumgullion Stew to our menu board favorites soon!

One of the central characters in the movie, Mike, enters the room and instantly smells the fragrance of Slumgullion Stew cooking in the kitchen, which transports him to a memory of a better time in his life. This stew scene will ultimately mark the beginning of change for him.

Upon further reflection, many of those old, classic black and white movies have the theme of transformation for the main character in the movie. An iconic example is, It’s a Wonderful Life(1946). The central actor, George Bailey is transformed into a more appreciative person by the end of the movie.

Many of our Christmas favorites we have on DVD

Regardless if you love those old movies or not, I’ve decided to share my version of Slumgullion Stew with y’all today. I believe the original intention with the recipe/movie version is to use what you have. I did conclude that one unique feature of the stew is black eyed peas and pasta from my research.

A full crockpot of Slumgullion

There are different versions of Slumgullion are out there when you check the internet, but I’m sharing my take on the original movie stew pictured on the big screen.

Recipe for Slumgullion Stew

⁃ 1 to 2 lbs. of stew beef (cooked)

I used my leftovers from earlier in week

⁃ 2 cans of black eyed peas

⁃ Cubed carrots (add as many as you like)

⁃ Potato chunks (I added approximately 3-4 red potatoes)

⁃ 1 15 oz. can tomato sauce

⁃ 1 32 oz. Beef broth

⁃ 1 beef bullion cube with 1 cup water

⁃ Salt and pepper to taste

⁃ 1 tsp. Italian seasoning

⁃ 1 bay leaf

⁃ Pasta (macaroni noodles would be the traditional favorite)

⁃ Add all ingredients into a large crock pot for simmer on low for 8 hours or until vegetables are tender. Add pasta hour before serving.

Slumgullion, holds an earthy flavor profile

Special note: The recipe I found online added cabbage, and chopped red peppers. I opted to leave them out. The consistency of my final stew was soup like, which is what I intended since I added the pasta into the recipe. For a thicker stew like consistency add a flour roux.

Lastly, sharing my Classic Christmas Movies Favorites… in no particular order

1. White Christmas (1954)

2. It Happened on 5th Avenue (1947)

3. Going My Way (1944)

4. Shop Around the Corner (1940)

5. Bishop’s Wife (1948)

6. Holiday Inn (1942)

7. Christmas in Connecticut (1945)

8. Remember the Night (1940)

9. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

10. Holiday Affair (1949)

11. The Thin Man (1934)

Wishing everyone a fantastic holiday season and hoping that you will enjoy the most wonderful time of the year whether it is spent trying new recipes, establishing new Christmas traditions, gathering with friends and family, or even watching a few new classic Christmas movies .