Ctrl+V Thread

[Raiden]

[22:14:44] * +Chibi-Akai prepares to lose to Conia
[22:14:44] Good to be prepared
That came out too perfect :x

^Just Jecka and I synching minds for a moment. XD

[Jecka]

pills


...umm? :V

[miakakiri]

I want to try Project Search because my friends went and had fun.
I want to polish my skills and tallents while helping others.
I want to meet new people and help them feel better. I like to make people laugh, and laughter is the best medicine.

Erm.... working with my brother on something...

[ranshinkawaii]

I don't know about you, but for me, saying that the black propaganda is effective insults the intelligence of the students.

-- Just something I retweeted after the election results for our University Student Council was posted.

[miakakiri]

{censored}

Er... something I typed into the wrong box and didn't want to retype. (personal info)

[Callid]

Ã¥

I considered replacing ạ in my transcription with this, but decided not to, as it might cause confusion for ů.

[miakakiri]

Spoiler:

Today's recipe for Make-Ahead French Toast comes from About.com. (Link will take you

directly to the recipe.)
This isn't our usual fare, but it is baked, and this was a slightly crazy week for Archi and myself,

which threw Ruth and the others for a bit of a loop as well.
"French toast sounds interesting," Ruth remarked. "I don't think I've done that before. What is it?

And why is it called 'French'?"
I blinked, a little surprised at the question. "Um, I'm not really sure. No one seems to know if it's

actually a French recipe, and it's got several different names in various languages. The French

themselves tend to call it 'pain perdu' which means something like 'lost bread'. It seems to have been

invented originally to use up stale bread without it tasting stale."
"Reclaiming stale bread?" Ruth asked, sounding intrigued. "That sounds like a good recipe to know. May

we try it?"
"Sure!" I agreed. "It works best with extra-thick cut bread, or dried out or stale bread. Probably

work even better with thick-cut half-stale bread."
"All your bread is wrapped up in 'plastic', though," Ruth pointed out.
I smiled. "If I pull some bread out of its plastic and stick it in the oven, I can dry it out a little

fairly quickly." Sticking it in the oven keeps anything from getting at it, but still lets it dry. If

you really want to speed things up, put the oven on very low heat, about 200°F/95°C.
So, with our dried bread prepped, let's get started!


(01 ingredients)
Here we have nearly everything we need for the Make-Ahead French toast. I say 'mostly everything'

because the bread is still in the oven drying--if you use fresh bread with this recipe it'll get

really soggy and want to fall apart.
Ruth has the cinnamon and is standing on the brown sugar. Hi-chan has woven herself between the cream

and vanilla to make sure Black has the eggs well in hand. One of the eggs rolled in front of the

nutmeg and hit Red in the wing as he was wrangling the measuring spoons and measuring cup. "Hey!" Red

objected. "Watch where you're rolling those!"
"It escaped, sorry!" Black apologizes. "Why are you putting things in the baking dish anyway? Don't we

need that to mix stuff in?"
"Oh yeah," Red answers sheepishly, picking the measuring spoons back up. "I forgot." Everyone starts

laughing.
"Well, it isn't like there's much counter space to put things on anyway," I reassure the small dragon.
It's probably a good thing the plastic wrap didn't get brought over--there's no space for it! Of

course, we've also forgotten the whisk.

(02 egg play)
Once everything is pulled back out of the baking dish, Black perches herself on one handle to

supervise while the others wrangle the four eggs.

(03 crack eggs)
Ruth hands me each egg, and I carefully crack them into the dish. Black finds the spread-pattern

intriguing.

(04 beat eggs)
Ruth likes the whisk best for beating eggs. Make sure the yolks are broken and mixed in quite well

with the whites.

(05 cream)
Hi-chan adds 1/2 cup (118mL) of cream. You can use milk instead (same amounts), I just wanted to use

up some of the cream.

(06 brown sugar)
Black happily adds 1/4 cup packed brown sugar (60g). She giggles as it lands with a soft plop

beneath the measuring cup. Everyone else seems more interested in watching the spread pattern of the

cream.

(07 vanilla)
Red takes charge of the measuring spoon to add 2 teaspoons of vanilla. This gives a nice touch of

flavor to the French toast. "Oh, that's neat," Red remarks, watching the pattern the vanilla makes in

the milk as it spreads out.

(08 cinnamon)
Red also insists on being the one to add the cinnamon, and neatly dumps in 1/4 teaspoon. Spices can be

adjusted to taste. Archi and I both like cinnamon, so that quarter-teaspoon was a touch bit heaping.

(09 nutmeg)
"Oops," says Hi-chan as she loses control of the 1/4 teaspoon measure. "I didn't mean to add the

spoon."
"Hi-chan!" Red objects, upset. "You were only supposed to add the nutmeg!"
"Sorry... I'll fish it out."
"No fish!" Red yelps. "Just nutmeg! And no spoon either!"
Hi-chan gives Red a confused look for a moment. "What fish? I'll get the spoon out. The nutmeg is in

already at least, and there isn't anything else we need that measuring spoon for."
"Fortunately," I agree, grabbing the spoon before Hi-chan has a chance to. "And the spoon washes

easily enough, Red, calm down." He continues pouting.

(10 salt)
Ruth sets the whisk down long enough to add a pinch of salt. He really likes the whisk!

(11 mix)
The salt was the last of the ingredients that go in the 'batter', so Ruth takes up the whisk again to

mix everything together. Make sure it's all mixed in well so you get a consistent colour throughout,

or you'll wind up with patchy French toast that won't taste quite right. The picture was taken just as

Ruth finished mixing.

(12 bread)
I pulled the partly-dried out bread from the oven, and the dragons immediately pounced on the chance

to inspect it. "It isn't a thick cut," I explain, "but this should work well enough."
"Dry bread!" Black observes as she hops up on the end piece.
"So this is the kind of bread you use for 'French toast'?" Ruth asks, watching the others make a close

inspection. "It looks like normal bread."
"That's sort of the point, Ruth," I explain. "Actually, you can make French toast with any kind of

bread you want. This bread just caught my eye in the bakery section of the grocery store. Any

slightly-dried bread will make decent French toast. I've heard of making it with cinnamon-raisin

bread, which would give a really rich and very cinnamon flavor to it."
"Ooo, that sounds yummy," Hi-chan agrees. "Maybe we should try that sometime at home, Ruth!"
Ruth nods. "I'd have to scale the recipe up significantly, but it could be a good thing to add to the

menu."
"It's made of dried-out bread," Red says, still trying to wrap his head around the idea. "This is

definitely dry bread. Ruth usually throws away the dried-out bread. Mom saves it to feed to birds."
"You could probably feed half the birds in Draconaria City with the dried-out bread from Baked Treasure," Ruth remarks. "I'd rather let other people have a chance to feed the birds."

(13 soak)
Four slices is all I can get to fit into the baking dish I have. Hi-chan is having fun making sure the

bread is decently submerged on one side. Red has decided he doesn't care to risk dipping his wing in

the egg mixture, and Black is trying to decide if she wants to jump down or not.

(14 timer)
The bread needs to soak on this side for about 3 to 5 minutes, so Red sets a timer to make sure we

don't forget to flip it.

(15 flip)
The timer went off, so now Ruth is flipping each piece of bread over, so that the other side can soak.

(16 all flipped)
Everyone is looking at the flipped bread, which is now coated with the egg-mixture. Wait, where's

Ruth? Oh, he went to get the plastic wrap.

(17 cover)
Black holds one edge of the plastic wrap down while the others stretch it over the baking dish and cut

it. With the soaking bread thus covered, it's time to stick it in the fridge. Since this is 'Make-

Ahead', the idea is to make it up the night before so that it can be baked up for breakfast in the

morning with very little prep.
That's it for today! The next part will start in the morning...


You didn't really think I'd cut the post off there, did you? Of course not. From here on out, it's the

Next Morning.

(18 preheat)
Black sets the oven for 375°F (190°C). It needs a bit of time to heat up while we get

everything ready.

(19 uncover)
Peel the plastic wrap off the baking dish and toss it out, as its job is done. Everyone is taking a

moment to look at the soaked bread. "It doesn't look dry at all now," Red remarks.
"No it doesn't," I tell him. "That's the point. Now we bake it."

(20 line pan)
Everyone pitches in to line a cookie sheet with aluminium foil. Once they're all out of the way, I

spray it with non-stick cooking spray. You do need the non-stick spray, or you'll end up with foil

stuck to the finished French toast. I'm all for getting plenty of minerals, but that's not the way to

do it! If you don't have non-stick spray, use a little bit of oil, butter, or margarine to coat the

foil, creating a thin barrier that keeps the egg-mixture from attaching itself to the foil.

(21 place bread)
Use a pancake turner or other spatula to pick the bread up from the baking dish and place it on the

prepared pan. This is the point at which bread that isn't dried enough will fall apart the most. Soggy

bread can be rescued, but it's easier to just prevent the problem from occurring by using dried-out

bread. Make sure to place the slices of bread a bit apart on the sheet, so that they don't stick

themselves together when baked. You want about a half inch (1cm) or more between slices.

(22 into oven)
Once the oven is preheated, Ruth puts the pan of egg-mix-soaked bread in. Don't worry if some of the

egg-mixture has leaked out of the bread, that's normal. It's also why you don't shove the bread all

together on the pan.

(23 set timer)
Black sets the timer for 10 minutes. Like pancakes, the French toast will need to be flipped halfway

through cooking. Each side gets 10 minutes.

(24 flip over)
Everyone gathers to watch Ruth flip the half-cooked bread over. (Black blends into the top of the

stove slightly, as it matches her colouring.) This is where you'll find out if you used enough non-

stick.
Now they go back in the oven for 10 more minutes!

(25 all done)
After the second 10 minute stint in the oven, our French toast is ready to eat! Let's plate it up!

(26 maple yum!)
Mm, French Toast! You can top it with quite a number of different things. Jam, marmalade, powdered

sugar, or various types of syrup. My home is in sugaring country, so we tend to top it with pure maple

syrup from a local sugar-house. Dig in, everyone! Oh, wait, let Ruth cut you a piece first.

Squished for length. Dragons' Bakery post text.

[Jecka]

/msg NickServ IDENTIFY

on IRC because I'm too lazy to type it myself :V

[miakakiri]

Spoiler:

Making Irish soda bread at home

With all this said, all you need to know about soda bread is that it's really easy and quick to make. The urge to be resisted is to do more stuff to it than necessary... since this is usually what keeps it from coming out right the first few times. Once you've mastered the basic mixture and technique, though, you can have a fresh hot loaf of soda bread (or a foursome of soda farls) within an hour of starting.

Here's the basic recipe for white soda bread. All these measures are approximate. The flour's volume and liquid-absorptive capabilities, in particular, will vary depending on the local humidity.

450 g / 1 lb / 3 1/2 cups flour (either cake flour or all-purpose)
1 teaspoon sugar (optional: you can absolutely omit this if you prefer sugar free soda bread)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
Between 200-300 ml / 8-10 fluid ounces buttermilk, sour / soured milk, or plain ("sweet") milk, to mix
Buttermilk is usually the preferred mixing liquid: its acidity helps activate the bicarbonate of soda, releasing the carbon dioxide bubbles that make the bread rise. (If you prefer to make soda bread without buttermilk, there's no reason you can't, though the recipe works better with it. The flavor will be slightly different than when buttermilk is used, but the difference isn't enough to outrage local Irish sensibilities, so don't be overly concerned. See below for more details.)

If you want to use buttermilk but can't get it where you live, there are a couple of things you can do:

You can make old-fashioned non-cultured buttermilk from scratch, by churning cream -- this method also gives you a nice lump of your own fresh, sweet butter at the same time.
You can also produce a kind of fake buttermilk for baking purposes. See our page on how to make the "buttermilk plant".
You can artificially sour some plain milk by adding a teaspoon of vinegar or lemon juice to 2 cups of milk and waiting 15 minutes or so for it to sour.
"Sour milk" or "soured milk" isn't milk that's gone bad, but a traditional Irish cultured milk that uses buttermilk as a starter. (Probably it evolved as a way to stretch small amounts of buttermilk a lot further. The original Irish name for it is bainne clabhair, "clabbered milk", or "bonnyclabber" as it's rendered in Lallans and other Scots-based dialects.) To make it, you allow regular milk to warm to room temperature, stir a few tablespoons of buttermilk into it, put it in a scalded container, wrap this in a towel, and leave it in some peaceful spot at about 75 degrees F for 24 hours.  The flavor isn't quite as tart as buttermilk, but there's enough acid to make the bicarb react correctly.

If you want to use plain ("sweet") milk instead of buttermilk, go right ahead, but make sure to add 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder to the recipe.


First things first: decide which kind of soda bread to make

If you're making farl, find your heaviest griddle or non-sloping-sided frying pan (cast iron is best), and put it on to preheat at a low-medium heat. (You're going to have to experiment with settings. Farl should take about 20 minutes per side to get a slight toasty brown.) If you've decided to make cake, find a baking sheet and preheat the oven to 450°. Full preheating is vital for soda bread.


Combining the ingredients: the basic technique


Sift the dry ingredients together at least once or twice to make sure the bicarbonate of soda is evenly distributed. Put the sifted dry ingredients in a good big bowl (you want stirring room) and make a well in the center. Pour about three-quarters of the buttermilk or sour milk or whatever in, and start stirring. You are trying to achieve a dough that is raggy and very soft, but the lumps and rags of it should look dryish and "floury", while still being extremely squishy if you poke them. Add more liquid sparingly if you think you need it. (You may need more or less according to conditions: local humidity and temperature, the absorptiveness of the flour you're using, etc.)

Blend quickly (but not too energetically!) until the whole mass of dough has become this raggy consistency. Then turn the contents of the bowl out immediately onto a lightly floured board or work surface, and start to knead.


The chief concern here is speed: the chemical reaction of the bicarb with the buttermilk started as soon as they met, and you want to get the bread into the oven while the reaction is still running on "high". Don't overknead! You do not want the traditional "smooth, elastic" ball of dough you would expect with a yeast bread. You simply want one that contains almost everything that went into the bowl, in one mostly cohesive lump. You should not spend more than half a minute or so kneading... the less time, the better. Fifteen seconds may well be enough, because you don't want to develop the gluten in the flour at all. If you do, you'll get a tough loaf. So don't overdo it! Don't be concerned if the dough is somewhat sticky: flour your hands, and the dough, and keep going as quickly as you can. There is a whole spectrum of "wetness" for soda bread dough in which it's possible to produce perfectly good results: farl in particular sometimes rises better if the dough is initially wet enough to be actively sticky. You may have to experiment a few times to come to recognize the right texture of dough.


How to shape the soda bread if you're making cake

For cake, flatten the lump of dough to a slightly domed circle or flat hemisphere about 6-8 inches in diameter, and put it on the baking sheet (which should be dusted lightly with flour first). Then use a very sharp knife to cut a cross right across the circle. The cuts should go about halfway down through the sides of the circle of dough, so that the loaf will "flower" properly.


Baking cake-style soda bread

Put the cake's baking sheet into the preheated oven. Handle it lightly and don't jar it: the CO2 bubbles in the dough are vulnerable at this point of the process.

Let the bread alone, and don't peek at it! It should bake for 45 minutes at 400-450° F. (One of our Irish neighbors suggests you give it the first 10 minutes at 450°, then decrease to 400°. Also, if you have a fan oven, use temperatures 10° lower or so, as fan ovens have a tendency to run hot.) At the end of 45 minutes, pick up the loaf and tap the bottom. A hollow-ish sound means it's done. For a very crunchy crust, put on a rack to cool. For a softer crust, as above, wrap the cake in a clean dishcloth as soon as it comes out of the oven.

Squashed because oh-holy-crap that is long. ~_~* I copied a whole recipe and instructions so that I could print it out easily, without printing the whole web page.

[Nix]

Spoiler:

Failed to import appliance C:/AndroidVM/androVM_vbox86tp_4.1.1_r6.1-20130222-gapps-houdini-flash.ova.

Machine settings file 'C:\Users\Beatrice\VirtualBox VMs\androVM_vbox86tp_4.1.1_r6.1-20130222-gapps-houdini-flash\androVM_vbox86tp_4.1.1_r6.1-20130222-gapps-houdini-flash.vbox' already exists.

Result Code: VBOX_E_FILE_ERROR (0x80BB0004)
Component: Machine
Interface: IMachine {22781af3-1c96-4126-9edf-67a020e0e858}

Aha.. hahahaha.

[Callid]

/msg NickServ IDENTIFY

on IRC because I'm too lazy to type it myself :V

On most clients, you abbreviate that to "/ns identify"

[Jecka]

/msg NickServ IDENTIFY

on IRC because I'm too lazy to type it myself :V

On most clients, you abbreviate that to "/ns identify"

I do that occasionally too, but I've been using "/nickserv" longer than "/ns" and I tend to stick with what I learned first.

[Nix]

http://i.imgur.com/tvwQC.gif

Oh snap

[miakakiri]

Spoiler:

[h1]Kudou Shinichi/Edogawa Conan[/h1]
[chartype]Canon Private Investgator[/chartype]
[avatar]1 100x100 icon of your character here.[/avatar]
Alias: Edogawa Conan
Age: 17 (APTX to 7) born on May 4
Era: Present
Gender: Male
Ethnicity: Japanese
Languages Known: Japanese (native), English (fluent)
Occupation: Student
Play-by: Oguri Shun & Fujisaki Nao
Personal Belongings:

• voice-changer bowtie
• super-kick shoes
• tracking glasses
• Shonen Tantei Dan badge
• 2 cell phones (Conan's and Shinichi's)
• notebook and pen
• turbo skateboard
• handkerchief (common item)

[h1]Abilities[/h1]
Eidetic memory: can recall pretty much anything he has seen/heard. (Slightly more detailed that just 'photographic' memory.)
Deduction: a very good detective.
Sharp eye: notices tiny details he can connect to events in order to unravel a case.


[personality positive="accomplished, adaptable, articulate, brave, confident, determined, focused, informed, intelligent, knowledgeable, logical, mature, noble, observant, private, rational, serious, smart, thoughtful" negative="arrogant, bossy, cocky, dramatic, eccentric, egotistic, elusive, impatient, impulsive, insecure, jealous, lonely, moody, obsessive, paranoid, sarcastic, vulnerable"][/personality]
   
[h1]History[/h1]
Shinichi grew up in Beika, attending Teitan Elementary, Middle, and High schools. His parents moved away while he was in middle school and he has lived alone for the past 3-4 years. His best friend (and not-so-secret crush) is Mouri Ran.
He is an ardent fan of mysteries in practically any form, and idolizes Sherlock Holmes in particular, much to the annoyance of Ran when he won't shut up about Holmes. This has, however, contributed to his ability as a detective, and he regularly consults on cases for Inspector Megure of Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, though it's at least as likely that he'll trip over a case on his own as that he'll be called in for assistance after the case begins.
One such 'tripped-over' case occurs on the day he and Ran go to Tropical Land. Shinichi solves the case quite readily, but is still curious about two suspicious-looking men clad entirely in black who had nothing to do with the case. He follows one of them down an alley and observes a blackmail transaction taking place. Unfortunately, the other black-clad man spots Shinichi and knocks him out before force-feeding him an untested poison and leaving him to die.
The poison, however, doesn't work as 'advertised' and Shinichi wakes up in the body of his child self. He manages to get home, but can't get the gate open to go in. His neighbor, Professor Agasa, happens by and it takes a bit for Shinichi to convince the old man that he is who he says he is, but finally Agasa believes him. Shinichi has just finished explaining what happened to him when Ran comes by, worried because Shinichi hasn't called to let her know he got home safely. Agasa has made it exceptionally clear that Shinichi needs to hide who he is, because if those men find out he's not dead, they'll come back to finish the job, and kill anyone who knows as well. So to protect Ran, he needs a disguise. He finds his dad's spare glasses in a desk drawer and pops the lenses out before putting them on, just in time. Ran insists on an introduction, and presses him for a name. Backed up against the towering shelves of mystery novels in his home's library, Shinichi reads "Edogawa Conan" off book spines, and it becomes his alias.
Agasa asks Ran if she'll take care of Conan for a while, and she readily agrees, though Shinichi initially objects. Agasa's reasoning is sound, though: Ran's father is a detective, which will make the perfect cover for Shinichi to investigate the men in black who did this to him.
(Do I need to run through most of the manga, or is this enough?)

[sample]Conan walked about a meter or so behind the girls, half-listening to their conversation. Sensei had been asking again about 'joining' the Shonen Tantei's 'club'. She'd given them a puzzle to solve, just the five of them. It hadn't taken him long to work it out, though he'd kept quiet to see if the others could get it on their own. Ayumi, Genta, and Mitsuhiko were still working on it when they'd gone their separate ways after school. Gent had been arguing that they should all stay until they'd solved it, but Ayumi and Mitsuhiko both had commitments after school, and Haibara hadn't been interested to begin with. The larger boy was sulking with they left.
"Jirokichi-ojisan found another jewel," he heard Sonoko say, though he missed the rest of the conversation as he was no longer paying attention.
A new jewel, huh? Shinichi thought, smiling. That'll mean another challenge to KID. He'll invite occhan to help catch KID, and even if Jirokichi-ojisan doesn't, Sonoko will invite Ran to watch, and I can tag along either way and help. A KID heist was, for the most part, good clean fun. The thief never hurt anyone--at least not directly--and would show up to clear his name if someone used it for harm. He was an interesting puzzle with a lot less blood.[/sample]

[h1]Puppeteer[/h1]
Your Name: Miaka
Age: 29
Gender:  Female
Contact Details: PM me here, please.
Time Zone:  Eastern US (GMT-5)
How'd you find us?:  There was a post on 'Many Cases One Truth' LJ community that this RP group was looking for players.

Saving an application I hadn't quite finished.

[cinnamoroll]

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll30 ... nClose.jpg

Playing picture scavanger ^^