apple cider vinegarette

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
3 Tbsp minced red onion
2 tsp Dijon mustard
2 tsp maple syrup
1/2 cup extra virgin oliveoil

Place all ingredients except the oil in a Quick Shake container and shake. Add oil through pouring spout and shake again. Toss salad with just enough dressing to coat lightly.

Enjoy!

(i borrowed this recipe from tupperware talk - another tuplog you might want to check out)

for us control freaks

i was google searching for pictures of unorganized cupboards for a post about getting organized. as it turns out, when you search "tupperware organization" or "tupperware disorganization" the only photos of unorganized cupboards and pantries are ones without tupperware. all the rest are these beautiful modular-mated spaces.

the most interesting post i found though was on this blog: tupperware talk. this is her fridge:

WOAH! that is a LOT of fridgesmarts. and her quote is, "I love the organization and control I have in managing my produce." that is awesome.

but in all seriousness, i don't know about you but my husband and i have wasted a lot of vegetables and fruit in our time. it's cheaper to buy peppers in bulk for example (like a bag of peppers or carrots), but by the time i get to the last few carrots or peppers, they're all wrinkled and bendy. or sometimes i buy broccoli, eat it for dinner one night and then can't stomach it again for a couple days. by the time i get around to wanting broccoli again with my meal, it's gone all brownish on the top. i hate that.

tupperware fridgesmarts eliminate all that waste. when i began adding up the money i was saving in my week to week grocery shop using my fridgesmarts (plus don't forget the lifetime guarantee) - they are well worth the investment.

i also use my fridgesmarts for cheese. i don't think we've had moldy cheese since we started using them.

how fridgesmarts work is they have these rippled bottoms so that as condensation accumulates from the vegetables or fruit (or cheese) it sits in the ripples, not touching the veggies. there are also two vents on the side of the container. some produce needs more air than other produce. on the side of the fridgesmart, there is a list of which foods need two vents open, only one vent open, or no vents open.

so if one of your new years resolutions is to be a little more green or thrifty - fridgesmarts can help you achieve that resolution. and don't forget - just for having a party with sales of $150 or more, the medium fridgesmart is all yours for free!

mid-january flyer

a great way to shop for tupperware deals is keeping track of the current flyers. the flyers always have wicked deals - not just for party hosts but also for party guests. i can't get the flyer to open for me on the tupperware site but here's the link to the current host promotion. and this site has the other current deals from the flyer. it has been extended until january 15th.

from the 9th to the 15th, there's going to be a second flyer - double the flyer deals! modular mates go on sale for 40% off in that flyer and that sale goes until february 12th. check back around the 9th for the new flyer.

perks...

i have a friend who gets together with her small group girls every few months and has a tupperware party. they take turns being the hostess and getting the free stuff. so it's a bunch of friends eating snacks and looking at tupperware. this was where i went to my first party and it was great. so if you're thinking that you might like to have a party, here are the perks...for my first tupperware party hostess of the year, she will not only get her free gift for dating a party and the free medium fridgesmart container for $150 in sales at the party - she'll get a free quick shake container ($20 value)! a quick shake just for being the first party of the year! the quick shake is awesome - for example: making salad dressing (and storing it) or protein shakes as my husband would vouch for. don't forget that 10 - 20% of your party sales go towards your own tupperware. besides buying from the flyer specials, being a host is really the best way to get your tupperware.

don't forget these specials going on during this time: double the hostess credit until jan.15!!, brushes, one-touch cannisters until the jan.8, and 40% off modular mates starting jan.9th. so far, my earliest party is booked for late january. you can get in for the bonus free quick shake!

email me at rebeccashulba@gmail.com

tupperware classics

in the late 70s, my mom got herself a set of One Touch Cannisters to store her flour, sugar, and such. today, those cannisters are still her go to containers when she's baking. and they will be forever because tupperware has a lifetime guarantee. did you know this already? that if you ever have a piece of tupperware that breaks, cracks, or discolours even, you can give it to any consultant and they will get you a new one for free. not even any paperwork needs to be done. what a concept. this stuff is an investment that won't let your kitchen down.

but back to the topic at hand: One Touch Cannister Sets. get your two cups of flour out then set the lid on and seal it with "one touch" in the center of the seal. it's a great system. today, we don't have the yellow option like they did in the 70s but we have white with blue or red seals. and would you believe that from january 2nd - 8th, the One Touch Cannister set of 4 is going to be available for hosts for $12.50!!! yes, if your party sales add up to $550 or more (and an average party sells about $500), you can get these for $12.50! so gather some keeners and let them know that they too can purchase a One Touch Cannister set for 50% off - $29.50. and yes, while this is an awesome deal, you'll have to try to keep it under wraps that you have gotten an even better deal.

free gifts...and turkey

this past weekend, i attempted christmas dinner at my house with some friends. and what is christmas dinner without turkey? (well, i guess it's a ham dinner...or a roast duck dinner...) and i bought a 19 pound turkey. for 9 of us. needless to say, we had leftovers. i'm pretty ecstatic about them. when you never ever make your own turkey, you never ever have the amount of turkey leftovers that you want. and now i do.

i piled the turkey that was carved up on the dinnertable into one large tupperware crystal wave dish and then i cleaned every bit of turkey off the carcass and put it in my new sheerly elegant bowl. i have big plans for soup...umm...or maybe just throwing all that turkey into my heat and serve and putting it into the freezer for another day...

anyways, i realized as i was laying in bed last night (i haven't been sleeping well) that both of those tupperware containers were FREE GIFTS at tupperware parties that i had hosted. free. just for hosting (and having at least $150 in sales...which is a given at a tupperware party). not only do you get host credits (which is a percentage of your party's total sales as well as one or two half-price items) but you also get stuff for free. it's a pretty great deal.

until february 12th, your free gift for having $150 in sales is a medium fridgesmart container (capacity of 7 cups/1.7 L). fridgesmart containers extend the life and taste of your fruits and vegetables by weeks. they're amazing. if you have not heard a personal testimonial to fridgesmarts from someone, you don't know what you're missing. it will have to be a whole other post. watch for that soon. but medium fridgemart - FREE! until feb. 12th.

leak proof - guaranteed

this is a picture of two women at a tupperware party back in the day, throwing a container filled with water. i love this picture. and if you'd like to recreate this impressive moment at your tupperware party, i can make that happen. how? all round tupperware seals are virtually liquid tight. round is the key - all edges are equidistant from the center.

as a teacher, i have seen dozens of lunch kits covered in yogurt or apple sauce due to poor containers. yuck. not fun to clean, let me tell you. i personally have had many a leak in my own lunch bags. (especially during that cereal phase i went through - old spilled milk is not a good smell) leak proof...for life. how can you go wrong?

my favourite round-seal containers to throw carelessly around are the snack cup set. perfect for yogurt or perhaps sweet potato baby food. these get tossed into my diaper bag daily now that

my assistant has started eating food. 4 of these for $16. worth every penny.

do you have a favourite round seal tupperware container?

brush envy

i guess you could probably guess that if i don't cook, bake, and am a little messy, i probably don't do a lot of dishes either...well, you're right. my husband and i have made sure to only rent basement suites that have dishwashers in order to keep our marriage together. and the dishwasher that was here when we moved into our house has probably never seen so much action. that being said, there is the odd time that it makes more sense to just handwash a pot. and so enters the brush.

do you have a dish brush? ours is from ikea. because it's so rarely used, it usually sits around in our sink getting junk poured over it. once in awhile, i run it under boiling water in hopes that that will disinfect it but after awhile, these brushes must be pretty gross under a microscope. i need a new one.

just in time - to kick off the new year, tupperware is having a variety of week to week promos and one of the promos is a set of four tumbler brushes. i cannot for the life of me get the photo to work here on my blog but let me tell you - these are THE perfect dish brush. it's like someone has taken a regular dish brush and bent the top of it back so that the bristles can get in the corners of all your tupperware containers (or whatever you're washing)! they have a notch in the top so that they can hang to dry. AND each one is a different colour - you could colour code them for different jobs. you know, keep the blue one in the bathroom to scrub the grout even. i love it.

they're not always available so this is the time! from dec. 26 - january 15, since you'll be hosting a party during that time to get your DOUBLE HOST CREDITS, you can get this set of 4 brushes for only $7.50! 50% off. i can't wait for mine to come in the mail.

(and let's say, on the off chance you weren't having a party before jan.15th but you are thinking you'd like these brushes anyways - you can always click on "view complete profile" over there to the right and send me an email to order them. and that's the same with all tupperware products - if you just want to put in an order [say...a set of those modular mates for 40% off from jan 9th to feb 12th] just let me know. happy shopping! www.tupperware.ca)

frozen spaghetti?

last night i whipped up a fast recipe for dinner: chickpeas and pasta. it's an easy one to have the ingredients on hand and it only took me about 15 - 20min.

4 teaspoons olive oil

1 red bell pepper

5 - 6 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 tbsp. finely chopped rosemary

2 tbsp. chopped flat-leaf parsley

Pinch crushed red pepper flakes

1 14oz. can diced tomatoes

1 16oz. can chickpeas, rinsed and drained (aka. garbanzo beans)

Freshly ground pepper, to taste

2 cups cooked ditalini or macaroni

1/4 cup parmesan cheese

heat oil. saute bell pepper and all spices for 5 minutes. add tomatoes and bring to boil. reduce heat and simmer for 10 min. add chickpease and pepper. cook stirring ocasionally until heated through. stir in cooked pasta and cheese.

if you read my last post, you know i rarely follow the recipe properly. this works better with

dinner dishes than baking and for this recipe, i changed it a lot:

no garlic (it stays with me way too long)

dried herbs instead of fresh

no red pepper flakes on hand

can of stewed tomatoes instead of diced

a 19oz can of chickpeas

no pepper

spaghetti noodles

it still tasted great. it's a nice no-meat option that's still high in protein. serves 4.

when a meal serves more than 2, i often put it in a couple tupperwares for lunches the next day however, tonight i put the leftovers in my smallest heat and serve and stuck it in my freezer.

yes, spaghetti freezes and reheats great. the heat and serve containers are perfect for freezing and reheating food because they have a raised bump in the center of the base. this keeps your casserole or ground beef from getting that hard, frozen center when you're thawing it in the microwave. and that little pink circle on top vents the steam so that you don't have to take the lid off and get tomato spatter all over the inside of your microwave. nice.

on hand for another night.

"i'd whip up some cookies but my sugar is a rock"

sure, i'm not a baker. but i am a wife. i'm a wife with a husband who has excited fits over other people's baking to the point of embarrassment. sometimes it's like the guy had never had a cookie ever in his life when my mom pulls out her homemade peanutbutter cookies. it's enough to make a non-baker try her hand at baking every once in a blue moon. like, how hard could it be?

when you rarely bake, you have to go out and buy all your ingredients every time. you bought that brown sugar a couple months ago, used a cup, then let it turn to stone in the bag you bought it in. sure, when i tell people this, they want to tell me a trick to softening brown sugar with bread or an apple but when baking inspiration hits, there's no time for such tricks.

well one evening, i had friends coming over in the evening. i thought to myself, "why don't i whip up a batch of cookies?" and i began to scour my one cookbook for a cookie recipe with ingredients i had. chocolate chip. because i had started many a recipe without checking first to see if i had everything, i eyeballed my pantry - bag of brown sugar? check. bag of chocolate chips? check. flour? check. i looked ready.

i started to mix. 1 cup of flour. i pulled out that bag of flour - it was whole wheat. shoot! where was the white flour? oh yeah, i now remember using that up a few months ago. oh well - it's still flour. add brown sugar. i picked up the bulk bag. stone. hmm... i tried shaving off chunks and after having no success i thought, "what's wrong with white sugar?" and added it to the bowl. things started going a little smoother until it was time for the chocolate chips. i reached for the bag in the pantry only to discover eight chips in it. my husband, desperate for sweets, had slowly eaten the entire bag handful by handful since the last time i'd attempted chocolate chip cookies a couple years earlier. i had some dried cranberries. they're sweet. into the bowl.

i pulled these albino cookies out of the oven as our friends were making their way in. the cookies looked terrible. after a test bite, turned out they didn't taste so great either. i put them on a plate and put them on the table anyways. my husband ate them, happy to see something resembling cookies. no one else did. and that was the last time i made cookies until i stocked my pantry with modular mates.

i now have soft brown sugar, lots of flour, and chocolate chips. i no longer have the bulk bags strewn around in my pantry either which makes it much more organized.

the modular mates are on sale beginning december 26th and on into january - 40% OFF! this is the time to begin your pantry organization. it can be your new years resolution. i bought my super oval modular mate sets with my host credit at my first tupperware party (yes, not on sale - haha.) hosting a party makes you money and from december 26 - january 15th, if you host a party, you get DOUBLE the host credits. that can buy you a lot of modular mates.

oh tupperware...you got me

last spring, i attended my first tupperware party. i had to admit to not owning any real tupperware. i listened to the consultant talk about the product and the enthusiastic agreement from the group of women at the party. and i bought a load of tupperware.

then i got my tupperware. and i used my tupperware. and i was hooked. three more parties and one baby later, i became a tupperware consultant myself. because if i am going to rave about how wonderful tupperware is anyways, why wouldn't i help make it easier to get?

and so begins a blog about tupperware. this isn't stuff that just looks pretty in the catalogue. if it's in your house, it will get used. and if you're not convinced, follow along to see tupperware in my day to day. get some recipes, see some photos, check out the regular flyers and sales going on...a running commentary of the reasons i thought this stuff was great enough to want to sell. tupperware i am.

my assistant