Sunday afternoon, while it was bitter cold outside, I tackled some indoor tasks:

First, I cleaned the rusted lid of my big cast iron dutch oven.  The rust was pretty bad, so I ended up using two different methods to get it all.  I had stored the pan in my shed, for use on the occasional camping trip.  Then the shed ceiling sprung a leak, and guess what was sitting under the leak.  Anyway, the two methods worked great.  I loved the potato and salt method.  For less severe rust, this would be ideal.

Some of the worst rust spots called for something more, so I then tried this baking soda paste scrub.  That finished the job.

So then I needed to re-season the pan and lid, which meant I’d be using the oven most of the afternoon.  It was a good day for a hot oven.

In the end the restored lid looked like this.  Tada!  I should have taken a ‘before’ shot.  No, it’s better that I didn’t.  Trust me, it was bad. 

While the dutch oven was seasoning, I made some homemade dishwasher detergent tablets, which I had been wanting to try for some time.  They were easy to make, with four simple ingredients from the grocery store–epsom salt, borax, washing soda, and lemon juice.  I now used the tablets on two loads of dishes, and can give the recipe a thumbs-up.  The dishes look clean and bright, with no residue.  I do have to put vinegar in the rinse dispenser, but that’s the case here regardless of what detergent I use.  The tablets smell great, too.

My tablets look like this.  The ones in the instructions looked smoother, which makes me think I should add a bit more lemon juice next time.   

Then I mixed up a batch of bread using the no-knead method.  I love making bread.  It rose the rest of the day, and then I baked it the following morning.

The dough looked like this in the morning, before I punched it down and shaped it into a ball.

Here is the finished loaf.  It is bigger than it looks in the picture.  

Yes, that is the newly-restored dutch oven.  I’d been using a smaller one for this recipe, but with the bigger one cleaned up, I wanted to test it out.  I like the result.

The holiday running streak continues.  We were treated to a warmer sunny day yesterday; great for a late-afternoon run.