Disclosure: I received ICBINB coupons, a Flip cam, and a gift card to create this video and pay for groceries.

I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter contacted me recently to ask if I’d like to visit a local farmers market to gather items for a lunch party with friends afterwards—created with recipes using ICBINB, or course. I turn down a lot of PR offers, but this sounded like fun, and I had a tub of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter in my fridge already, so I do actually use their product. I also tend to be a recluse, so I thought this would be a good way to force myself outside and see what Chapel Hill has to offer.

There are several farmers markets near me. The Carrboro Farmers Market seemed to be the most popular one, but I heard parking was a mess. So I decided to go to the South Estes Market instead since it’s held in a mall parking lot with plenty of spaces. It was also on the way between my place [...]

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I regret to inform you that my bread machine is dead.

These are the shattered remains of the plastic doohickey that spins the thingamajig on the bottom of the bread pan. The technical language is confusing, I know, but needless to say there will be no kneading done by my Sunbeam breadmaker until I get a replacement part. I choose to believe the plastic broke due to poor construction and had nothing to do with the big rock of brown sugar I dumped in the pan as part of the recipe.

I had emptied all the ingredients in the pan and was starting to make a phone call when the breadmaker went into the kneading cycle and made a startling “thur-ump, thur-ump” sound. After I investigated and discovered the broken plastic, I had no choice but to actually hand knead my dough. And then I put it in a greased pan to rise. And then I baked it. It was very Little House on the Prairie.

But it turned out great. It didn’t rise as much as [...]

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