Ask Mavis – All Your Burning Questions Answered

It’s that time again. You ask, and I pretend to know things and answer your burning questions. It really is so much fun to open my inbox and see the wide variety of questions you guys have. Reminds me that my readers are so diverse and pretty dang awesome. So keep those questions coming and I’ll keep racking my brain for answers. As always, please pipe up if you have any input or are knowledgeable when it comes to any of the following questions:

Hi Mavis, My neighbor just brought over a small box full of quince for me to use. Do you have any quince recipes? I’ve never even seen a quince before. I was thinking of making cobbler out of them. What do you think?

~ Suzanne

Quince are tricky, because they have such a distinct flavor. While they look kind of similar to a pear, they certainly don’t taste like one. They are pretty tart raw, so to make them edible, they need to be cooked. They are often used in jams and jellies and as an additive to other dishes. The word marmalade actually comes from the Portuguese word for quince, because a marmalade was originally just a quince jam. Who knew, right? So they would make a good addition to an apple cobbler, but probably wouldn’t taste that great alone in that recipe. Anyone out there have a great quince recipe for Suzanne?

I haven’t used Amazon Prime or Ebates yet, but am wondering if a person has a Prime membership, can they still use Ebates in conjunction with the membership when they make their purchases? If the purchases on Amazon are paid for with gift cards, does Ebates still count that as a qualifying purchase? Also, can coupons from newspapers and online, such as for groceries, be used on Amazon? Or do the coupons have to be from Amazon only? Thank you so much for your site, it has been so helpful to me in the last several months!

~Michelle

Lets’ start with Ebates. Ebates is so awesome because simply by signing up and clicking on Amazon through Ebates, you earn cash back while shopping. Once you click over, you can use Amazon any which way you choose. That means you will get Ebates credit for every purchase you make on Amazon. You can still use your Prime benefits and pay any which way you choose, ie. gift cards, etc.  Pretty awesome, right?

As far as coupons on Amazon are concerned, you can only use Amazon Coupons. But their coupons tend to be amazing, so it all works out in the end!

Mavis, I have to ask: are these baking and cooking posts ones you prepared before the move? I know you don’t have a full kitchen yet so that’s what I assume you’ve done.

~Athena

They are. Sometimes I go on baking frenzies, but I can’t post 12 muffin recipes in one day. So I schedule them out. These recipes lately have been particularly hard to read, because they remind me how much I miss my stove! I keep reminding myself I’ll have one again soon, and will be able to bake up new recipes in no time.

Will you please tell us the story of whatever happened to your chickens? I’m guessing that in the sale of your house they had to go away. It seems that they were a close part of your family and had to be a hard thing. Will they be returning to your new home?

~ Nicole

Our new neighborhood does not allow chickens, so we gave all of them, and the Eglu {their lifetime home} to Chino the Handyman’s best friend and his family. They have 4 young kiddos, and just purchased their dream “mini farm.” I miss them, but it helps knowing they are going to a good home and most importantly, they will be loved.