Every Monday morning, unsubscribe to a mailing list.

We should come up with a week of exercises, like:

Monday - unsubscribe to a mailing list
Tuesday - organize one drawer
Wednesday - find an article of clothing to donate
Thursday - digitize (part of) a file folder.
Friday - throw away one item

Still waiting on the purging impulse to return.
Was making trips to the dumpster. Don was proud of me.
Then came the flood.
I envy those who can follow a schedule like what jon has proposed, but not enough to try
to try to follow it.

How about reverse decluttering helping with decluttering?

I’d like to buy a meat grinder. Nothing fancy or antique, just something to grind bacon/sausage in to ground beef to make a proper Midwest hamburger. The kind that clamps to a counter would be perfect.

I know someone who has a few of them and talks about decluttering, so…

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:
How about reverse decluttering helping with decluttering?

I’d like to buy a meat grinder. Nothing fancy or antique, just something to grind bacon/sausage in to ground beef to make a proper Midwest hamburger. The kind that clamps to a counter would be perfect.

I know someone who has a few of them and talks about decluttering, so…

You talkin' to me?

I think PJ has one or two as well.

We have one of these. It belonged to my 97 year old neighbor. When she moved to assisted living, I rescued it from her basement...with instructions and original box...







JFK had one, too, but his was a number 2 (larger) and ours is a number 1:

https://www.nps.gov/articles/0...sal-food-chopper.htm

quote:

The Universal Food Chopper was first sold by L.F. &C. in 1897, and proved to be so popular that the company still offered it in its catalog over sixty years later. It was marketed as a device that not only ground meat, but also processed vegetables. In a 1955 address to an audience in Connecticut the company's then chairman of the board remarked that, with the introduction of the Universal Food Chopper to American kitchens in the late 1800s, "Odds and ends could be turned into hashes and casseroles with ease..."

That Universal model says its a food chopper rather than a grinder. I've never tried chopping/grinding anything in it, so I don't know what stuff looks like coming out of it.

And this one was my Mom's. Only one blade, for a medium coarse grind. I'm sure other blades can be purchased if you want a finer grind:

I’ve looked up the Universal #1 and it looks to have been quite a revelation when it was introduced. Very popular from 1897 to 1955. It’s still popular with vintage foodies and easy to find parts for.

But it really is a chopper and if I look really close at the instructions you can only use it for meat that’s been cooked. It might have been what my parents used to make hash out of leftover roast. A cool thing to have for sure, but food processors do about the same thing with less effort.

Assuming you’re interested in selling your Mom’s, can you grind raw meat with it?

Either or both are free to a good home.

I hadn't looked at the instructions for the Universal previously, so the bit about grinding cooked foods was news to me, too.

Mom only used the Sargent to grind leftover meatloaf or soup meat. She'd mix the ground up meat with some cooked onion and used it as a filling for savory crepes called nalesnikai. She never ground raw meat in the grinder, but that's because she bought that at the grocery store pre-ground, not because the machine isn't suited for it.

Mom's grinder is the same design as the attachment that I have for my KitchenAid stand mixer. We use the KitchenAid every few days to grind chicken for the dog's food, and I've ground all sorts of other raw meats in it..

Next batch of dog food, I'll try grinding some of the raw chicken in each of the manual grinders just to see what comes out. Raffi won't mind....

Look what I found! A cookbook for the Universal. The internet is so cool....

https://archive.org/details/Th...ode/2up?view=theater

There's a recipe for Veal Loaf on page 17 that uses raw veal, and for Deutsche Beefsteaks on page 22 that seems to use raw beef. Sounds like raw meat isn't an issue, but I'll see what happens with the chicken.

edit: Another find. Detailed tutorial, with pics...

https://craftrevue.com/food-chopper/

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:
We should come up with a week of exercises, like:

Monday - unsubscribe to a mailing list
Tuesday - organize one drawer
Wednesday - find an article of clothing to donate
Thursday - digitize (part of) a file folder.
Friday - throw away one item

The best decluttering advice I ever received was to put a cardboard box on the floor of your clothes closet. Every time you look at something and realize you probably should get rid of it because it doesn’t fit/you don’t like it/you haven’t worn it in more than a year, toss it in the box. When the box is full donate it. I’ve found it makes a huge difference for me because I don’t wait and make decluttering my closet a big chore. It also feels a little less permanent since you can, in theory, go through the box before you actually donate it. I started tossing things in with that in mind, though I’ve never actually rescued anything from the box once it’s in there.

I like that idea, Dol. I also follow the general rule of thumb, "if I forgot I owned it, it needs to be donated."

quote:

Originally posted by wtg:

Next batch of dog food, I'll try grinding some of the raw chicken in each of the manual grinders just to see what comes out. Raffi won't mind....

Actually, I’d like to play with both of them. I’ll pay shipping, of course, and an IOU to send you something cool. PM me an address and I’ll send you a check. (Does anyone do that any more?) or Zelle, PayPal or Venmo…. We are nothing if not modern here in NE Ohio

On the decluttering front, I’ve found three crates full of vacuum attachments. I’ve always owned several vacuums but I only moved a couple of them - regular shop vac, big 2.5” shop vac, Sharon’s nice house vac and a beat up Hoover I used for the Jobsite vac. It lives in the basement.

I went on a Dyson kick for a while - buying thrift store Balls and Animals, overhauling them and trying them as Jobsite vacs. Who doesn’t want to vacuum with an Animal? They were all miserable failures - far too much maintenance and an inability do digest drywall dust. I donated them back to where they came from. I tried other brands too, and the Sharp/Panasonic twins worked Best but the geriatric Hoover outlasted them all.

So what I’m left with are dozens of hose attachments, none of which fit anything I currently own. I went through them and threw everything that doesn’t fit in to the donate box. It’s just stupid how many different hose sizes there are. I’ll bet I had 10 crevice attachments that don’t fit anything I currently own. It irritates me that I hauled them 2700 miles so I can get rid of them.

My point is that my house is still filled with things I can’t use. More work needs to be done.

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:

quote:

Originally posted by wtg:

Next batch of dog food, I'll try grinding some of the raw chicken in each of the manual grinders just to see what comes out. Raffi won't mind....

Actually, I’d like to play with both of them. I’ll pay shipping, of course, and an IOU to send you something cool. PM me an address and I’ll send you a check. (Does anyone do that any more?) or Zelle, PayPal or Venmo…. We are nothing if not modern here in NE Ohio

See PM.

Looks like replacement parts (like new or different blades, if you decide you need them) may not be too hard to find.

https://www.texastastes.com/p105.htm

I'm guessing there are tons of other sources, too...