November 2011 - Frugalbits

Graham Cracker Caramel Nut Cookies - Doris Cheung

Meet The #1 Cookie For Cookie Exchange

November 29, 2011/2 Comments/in Easy + Quick = Delicious, Entertaining, FOOD, Food & Drink, HOLIDAY, Holiday, Recipes, View All Food Stories /by Editor

Made in minutes, these graham cracker caramel nut cookies are ridiculously delicious. Share them with friends and they’ll want the recipe—guaranteed!

SLAM DUNK | The next time you are asked to bring cookies to a book club, meet-up or exchange, try making the ones pictured here. After their taste, which is amazing, the fabulous thing about these caramel-covered slabs is their pan-generational appeal: sophisticated enough to seduce discriminating adults and gooey-good enough to reel in the children.

3 Cult Classic Places To Eat In San Francisco

November 28, 2011/0 Comments/in FOOD, Food & Drink, Go Here Now, TRAVEL, View All Food Stories, View All Travel Stories /by Editor

Where you absolutely must go for breakfast, lunch and dinner the next time you visit the City by the Bay.

TRAVEL ADVISORY | With so many fabulous restaurants to choose from, San Francisco can be frustrating for tourists who travel to eat. I visit every November, and each time I go I try new places—but first I schedule a return meal at my three favourite eateries. Each one is a bone fide cult classic, and not one need be stratospherically expensive. Read more

Cheesecakes in Jars - My Baking Addiction

Awesome Ways To Put Weck Jars To Work

November 23, 2011/1 Comment/in BUY THIS. MAKE THAT., FOOD, Food & Drink, Tools & Techniques, View All Food Stories /by Editor

You needn’t be an ace with a canner to find awesome ways to put gorgeous Weck jars to work.

BEAUTIFUL & EASY | “Now this is a full-circle moment,” said my friend Anne, pointing to the Weck canning jars prominently displayed in the chi-chi San Francisco kitchen shop we cruised through last week. “I was so happy to get away from these things when I moved here from Germany and to discover canning jars with screw-top lids. They’re much easier and more convenient to use.” Read more

An Attractive Way To Cover Over Ugly Tiles

November 21, 2011/0 Comments/in Home & Garden /by Editor

Pebble Tile is a shockingly easy and highly attractive way to cover over ugly old fireplace tiles.

DO IT YOURSELF | Before I moved back into my 1920s home, I had a lovely tenant with impeccable taste who lived there for several years. When she asked if she could repaint, I gladly gave her and her decorator the go ahead, and they mostly did a great job respecting the original design.

My heart sank though when I discovered that she had also painted the tiles on the fireplace surround and hearth. The results looked cheap and more than a little tacky. I was prepared for major expense and a big mess to replace the tiles. Read more

Secrets Of The Stars: Luciano Guibbilei

November 19, 2011/0 Comments/in Home & Garden /by Editor

The gardens of international superstar Luciano Guibbilei are filled with great ideas both for people who love to work in gardens and for people who just love to look at them.

FREE & AMAZING | I’ve collected lots of garden design books over the years, and one of my all-time favourites is a 1971 black and white photo essay on Villa Gamberaia. I’ve never visited this surprisingly sculptural 17th century garden in Florence, and although I’d love to see it, I feel like Hungarian architect Balthazar Korab’s photographs already capture Gamberaia’s startlingly dramatic moods and educate me in ways no single visit ever could.

I pulled Korab’s book from the shelf recently when I realized that several of his photos had been used in Luciano Giubbilei’s 2010 picture book The Gardens of Luciano Giubbilei. Giubbilei, a garden design rock star in England who will be giving a FREE LECTURE in Vancouver on November 19, traces his passion for the style of gardens he makes to a stint in the trenches at Gamberaia and a gift of Korab’s book. Read more

Canada’s Full Of Gilt (.Com)—And Loving It!

November 16, 2011/0 Comments/in CANADIAN CONTENT, Fashion & Beauty, Shops & Shopping, View All Fashion Stories /by Editor

The website that pioneered members-only time-limited shopping now ships to Canada. Woo Hoo!

SHOPPING AROUND | With its crazy good deals on coveted designer products like the Hunter boots pictured here, Gilt used to be one of my favourite online shopping destinations.

But then the trouble of getting my purchases home—Gilt only shipped within the United States—eventually got to me. Besides, we Canadians finally got our own flash shopping sites (CLICK HERE for our story). Still, I’d wistfully check Gilt every so often if only for inspiration. Read more

Choosing A Hedge: Which One + Why

November 14, 2011/0 Comments/in Home & Garden /by Editor

Hedging is one of the most versatile and cost-effective green materials you can use to carve up a garden.

MONEY WELL SPENT | Carving up the garden into outdoor rooms has been so popular over the past 20 years that some designers believe it’s time to retire the idea, but I think it still has value, especially for a small plot where a wide-open design has the potential to be anticlimactic. Garden rooms create opportunities for mysterious and surprising moments, and walls made of hedging material are the easiest, least expensive and most natural way to fashion these kinds of spaces. Read more

How To Shop Your Closet And Get Results

November 10, 2011/0 Comments/in FASHION, Organizing, Shops & Shopping, Styling Tips, View All Fashion Stories /by Editor

Here’s how to shop your own closet to find more than a few new outfits you never knew you had—results guaranteed!

WASTE NOT | The whole notion of “shopping your closet” makes perfectly good sense—in theory. Who wouldn’t want to expand their wardrobe by mixing and matching their existing separates in new and unexpected ways. Who wouldn’t want to put their little-used shoes, bags, scarves and jewels back into heavy (and more creative) rotation. Read more

Is Bleach Superbad For The Environment? You?

November 9, 2011/6 Comments/in BUY THIS. MAKE THAT., Cleaning & Maintenance, Goods & Services, HOME, View All Home Stories /by Editor

Is common household bleach a threat to the environment? Can it kill you?

BACK TO BASICS | Call me a freak, but putting on rubber gloves and plunging my hands into my own toilet bowls to clean them with a scrubbing sponge doesn’t bother me at all. What does bother me is that no matter what cleaning products I use, the bowls of my newish toilets look dirty again in days. Frustrated by the ineffectiveness of Vim, Ajax, Lysol et al., I turned to cheap, common household bleach. Read more

Newsmap: A Cool Way To View Google News

November 8, 2011/0 Comments/in Culture & Leisure /by Editor

There are other ways to stay on top of trending topics besides Twitter. This clever, free application lets you see which news stories are getting the most attention worldwide.

FREE & USEFUL | Top 10 Trending Topics is a feature on the Twitter website that lists in order of importance whatever subject matter—from hard news to twaddle—is most on the minds of tweeters at any given nanosecond in the Twitterverse.

Newsmap is an application that tracks trending topics, too. It employs a hierarchy of colour blocks to highlight the currently hottest stories on the websites of legitimate news outlets in 15 countries. This free service is news you can view, and although it isn’t interactive the way Twitter’s Trending Topics is, it can be addictive if you’re any kind of a news junkie at all. Read more