This isn’t a funny post. This isn’t going to make you giggle or snort or laugh. This also isn’t a sad post. This won’t make you cry. This post? Something completely different. It’s a post about hamburger buns. Who doesn’t love a good hamburger? Or, better yet, a good juicy CHEESEburger? Nobody! That’s who! Unless you’re a vegetarian and if that’s the case, well, I’m real sorry. Real sorry you’re gonna miss out on this most delicious experience.

I usually buy the pack of eight hamburger buns that are on sale for a dollar. I know. I’m cheap and I’m stingy and I really need to change my ways. But if I’m going to run around buying a new refrigerator every time my old one gets dirty then I have to skimp somewhere, right? Turns out that I can make my own hamburger buns that TASTE BETTER and COST LESS than those (cheap, sad, pathetic) store bought ones. You should try it too.

You probably have all the ingredients in your kitchen RIGHT THIS MINUTE. So what are you waiting for?

Sugar, all-purpose OR bread flour (I used a mixture of all purpose and wheat, but didn’t get a picture of the wheat. I forgot, okay? And bread flour would be better, but I was out. GIVE ME A BREAK.), milk, butter, eggs, salt, and active dry yeast. You’ve got all that, right? And if you’ve got some garlic powder get that out too. Halfway through making these I thought to myself “You know, I’ll bet these would be FANTASTIC with some garlic powder tossed in!” I do that a lot. It’s a sickness.

Now that you’ve got all your ingredients out and lined up, let’s get baking. Grab the bowl for your KitchenAid, or if you’re one of those sad little people that don’t yet own a KitchenAid, just grab a regular bowl. And I’m not hatin’. I was one of those sad little people up until a few months ago.

The first thing we need to do is warm up our milk. You’ll need 1 and 1/4 cups of milk heated until its warm, but not hot. If it’s too hot you’ll kill the yeast and that would be mean. If it’s too cold your yeast will just sit there and wonder what the heck your problem is and never get around to doing whatever it is that yeast is supposed to do. Stick your finger in there and test it. Just don’t forget to wash that finger first, okay?

Now dump the warm milk in your bowl along with 1 and 1/4 teaspoons of active dry yeast. If you have a packet of yeast like I did, do NOT dump in the whole thing. Measure it, man. Measure it.

Now we’re going to let our yeast “bloom.” Don’t ask me why they call it that. There will be no flowers sprouting from this bowl.

Leave it be for about ten minutes and you’ll be ready to add the rest of your ingredients. The yeast will cover the top of the milk and turn it a nice yeasty brown shade. Or something. I really don’t know what color “yeasty brown” is, but it sounds good, so let’s just go with it.

Crack your egg into a small dish and beat it.

I’m just showing off my ability to crack eggs with one hand here. Pretty cool, right? Beat your egg with a fork and then add it to your bowl of milk and yeast.

You’ll also add in 1/4 cup of sugar (this will make the buns fairly sweet, if you prefer you can use less sugar), 2 tablespoons of softened butter and a couple pinches of kosher salt. You could also use regular table salt, but I’m out. In fact, I’ve been out for about three weeks now. My husband keeps begging me to buy him some “regular damn salt,” but I’m forgetful. Besides, kosher salt makes me feel fancy.

This is the part where I decided that these would be fabulous with some garlic powder thrown in. I added about 2 tablespoons. You can add more or less (or none!) depending on how much you like garlic. You could also add in dried minced onion and turn these into onion rolls. Unfortunately I married a man who doesn’t like onion. I know. It was a mistake, but I don’t believe in divorce so I’m trying to tough it out.

Now we’re going to start mixing this together. Using your dough hook on your KitchenAid (or just use your hands), start mixing it on slow. Slowly add in 3 and 3/4 cups of flour. I used 2 cups white flour and 1 and 3/4 cup wheat. You do what you want. Make ‘em your own, man. I don’t mind.

After your dough is kneaded into submission you’ll transfer it to an oiled bowl to rise until doubled. Your dough should be sticky when you touch it, but not glopping off on your fingers. You want to feel some resistance when you pull your fingers away, but the dough shouldn’t come too, ya know?

Put your ball of dough into an oiled bowl and roll it all around to coat the dough. Cover the bowl with a clean towel and leave it to rise until doubled, about an hour. If you’re like me you’ll put the bowl in your oven. I think it rises faster in there. This may or may not be true, but thats what I choose to believe, okay?

See that? That’s doubled. I think. I’m real bad with math. Either way, I’m tired of waiting and it’s nearly time for lunch. Let’s make some dang hamburger buns. Ready for the fun to start?

Punch your dough. Punch it hard. Just once. Don’t go beating it up, just punch it once to show it whose boss. Now that your dough knows who is in charge, we’ll make us some hamburger buns.

Normal people would probably flour their counter top a bit and roll this dough out before they let it rise. They would roll it out, cut it, and THEN let it rise. I’m not normal, but if you are, you go ahead and do just that. Roll it to about 3/4 of an inch thick, grab a biscuit cutter (yeah, I don’t have one of those either.) and cut your buns out. Put ‘em on a greased pan, let them rise for about an hour and then pop ‘em in a 350 degree oven.

If you are NOT normal then you’ll understand what I mean when I say that I avoid flouring my counter tops at all costs. It’s messy and it puts me in a bad mood. I just broke chunks of dough off, shaped them into a ball and flattened them out a bit with the palm of my hand. It’s not perfect, but it works.

Pop your buns into your pre-heated 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes. They should get nice and brown and crusty. Crusty. That just doesn’t sound good, does it? But, when it comes to buns, crusty is good. Trust me.

And would ya quit inspecting my oven? It’s not clean, okay? I know it’s not clean, you know it’s not clean, everyone knows that my oven is not clean. Let’s just move on.

Ooh, look! The buns are done! And it’s about time, too.

Now you’re ready to eat! Hope you’ve got a cheeseburger nearby. I loaded mine up with ketchup, mustard, lettuce and tomato. My husband? He put peanut butter on his. And while he was doing that I was reminding myself that I don’t believe in divorce, I don’t believe in divorce, I don’t…

I’m sorry. What was I saying? Something about cheeseburgers and divorce. I’m afraid I got distracted by that big beautiful burger up there.

My buns came out pretty dense, but I liked them that way. (Get your mind outta the gutter.) If you prefer a lighter, airier bun then you should definitely stick with bread flour. If you like your bun to be pretty darn substantial then go right ahead and be like me. I’m a pretty cool girl in case you didn’t know.

Now get outta here and make yourself a cheeseburger. You deserve it after listening to me ramble on for so long.

Homemade Hamburger Buns

• 1 1/4 cups milk (around 80 degrees F)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 2 tablespoons butter, softened
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 3 pinches of salt
• 3 3/4 cups bread flour
• 1 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
• garlic powder, to taste
• oil for oiling the bowl

Heat the milk to around 80 degrees, add yeast. Let mixture rest about 10 minutes. Add sugar, salt, butter, beaten egg and garlic powder (optional). Knead with hands or using a dough hook on a stand mixer until dough is soft and smooth. Oil a bowl and roll the dough to coat all sides with oil. Let rise until doubled, about an hour. Punch dough down, break off pieces into whatever size bun you would prefer. A bit larger than an egg will give you a standard size bun. Shape your dough pieces into balls and flatten into discs. Let rise another 30 minutes and bake in a 350 degree oven for 15 minutes or until done. Slice and enjoy!

So today I had the honor of being chosen as the coolest blogger ever, the prettiest girl in the blogosphere, and An Iowa Mom’s favoritest blogger. Er, no, that’s not quite right. But, An Iowa Mom did feature me in her Pay It Forward Friday meme she’s got going on. What the hell is Pay It Forward Friday you ask? Click here to find out.

My job now is to Pay It Forward cuz, duh, it’s Friday. Here goes:

• Title Of Blog I Would Like To Feature Is: Dirty Little Secret
• URL To That Blog: http://www.jerseygirl89.wordpress.com
• I Like This Blog Because: Jersey Girl is funny. And real. And real funny. I dunno. I just like her, okay?
• Here Is A Post I Enjoyed: This post is not like something I would normally link to but here it is. It’s not a giggly, snort soda out of your nose kind of post which is the kind of posts I usually love. This post is a make me shake my fist in the air and scream YOU TELL ‘EM SISTA! kinda post. And really, any post that makes me remove my hands from the keyboard to shake my fist HAS TO BE GOOD, right?

For more Pay It Forward Friday players, head over to An Iowa Mom!

Cleatus: What’s up with the fridge? Stuff doesn’t seem that cold.

Me: I know. It’s been like that a couple days. I ate a piece of warm cheese today. It was icky.

Cleatus: Great. Just great.

Opening the fridge and freezer doors, listening, touching weird parts of the fridge that I didn’t know existed…

Cleatus: The fan isn’t blowing. God damn it.

Me: Oh, thank God. This thing is so dirty. Let’s just get a new one. I hate cleaning out fridges.

Cleatus: sighing and walking away

Me: happily surfing the internet for new refrigerators

So most of my day is currently spent sitting around and staring at the walls. Which sucks, because my walls are fairly dirty and looking at the dirt all day makes me feel bad about myself. Instead of staring at the walls sometimes I’ll choose to play on the internet (Stumble Upon is my new lover) and sometimes I watch Grey’s Anatomy and, yes, sometimes I even watch Days of Our Lives. All of these things that I do involve sitting and my ass is getting tired of that.

I’m fat and lazy is my point. And I’m tired of it.

I joined a gym yesterday. With Cleatus. We both joined. The kids even joined although the only thing they are allowed to do is be babysat in the “Kidz Club” which, seriously, I’d have a little more faith in their babysitting capabilities if they spelled “Kidz Club” with an “s” instead of a “z”, but whatever, I’m perfectly happy leaving my children with mediocre babysitterz in exchange for a nice long workout where I can burn calories and build muscles and oh, who am I kidding? I just go sit on the bench in the locker room and read a book in the peace and quiet while my children are looked after by high school kid who can’t even spell the word kids. (I actually did work out yesterday, but it was my first time. I had to work out! Today? I plan on just reading the book.) (Oh, I’m just joking. I’ll work out. Promise.)

I went yesterday for the first time and I’m going AGAIN today. Two days in a row! It’s like I’m some athletic person who cares about their health or something. It’s also like I told Cleatus that if I lost 15 pounds then I was going to buy myself THE MOST BESTEST GYM BAG EVAH.

Kate Spade? I love you.

Cleatus was working nights last night, so while he was at work I emailed him the link for the bag. That didn’t take long and I was bored so I started doing a bit more shopping. I found a swing for our backyard that we need. If by need you mean REALLY WANT. I emailed him that link as well. Then I found a new desk for and I emailed him the link for that. Then I sent him an email informing him that Toys R Us had Nintendo DS games buy two get one free and should I get Eeyore some? And then? Then I priced airline tickets for our trip to Colorado for his cousin’s wedding this fall and saw that the ticket prices had DOUBLED since the last time I checked. So I sent him an email saying “Oh, sorry, ticket prices have doubled, can not afford!” I didn’t realize until he called me from work to say something along the lines of “I am not motherfucking Santa Clause” that I had just sent him links to all these things I wanted to buy and then told him SORRY, CAN’T GO TO THE FAMILY WEDDING, TOO EXPENSIVE! I’m such a winner wife. He loves me.

Oh, and good news, the tickets didn’t actually double. It just turns out that if you price the tickets through the actual airline they are twice as much as they are through priceline or orbitz. So, it looks like I get my wish list and he still gets to visit family. But if it came right down to it? I think we both knew who would get what and his family? Well, they could maybe see him next year. Unless I needed some new shoes or something.

My husband is so far out of the blog world that you wouldn’t even believe it. I mean, really. I, lover of all blogs, am his wife. I talk about people from blogs like they were, you know, REAL PEOPLE or something. I myself write a blog (this one, even!). I talk about ads and stats and design and comments and wordpress and all those bloggy things that we bloggers like to talk about. Still. HE DOESN’T GET IT.

He doesn’t read my blog, he doesn’t read your blog, he doesn’t BLOG. Some might say he thinks blogging is dumb, but I won’t say that, because I’m married to him and have promised to love him through sickness and health, and yes, even through differences of opinion. That means staying married when someone thinks blogging is dumb.

The point of all this is to say that Cleatus DOESN’T GET IT. He has no interest in blogging and has no idea about any of it. Which is why I was EXTRA HURT when he insulted me yesterday. And you. HE INSULTED US ALL. Because, you see, he may not know anything about blogging, but he knows EXACTLY how to offend us bloggers.

We were driving down the road and I called him a dickhead (this happens quite often if you were curious) and that led to a discussion about whether or not I was calling him the head of a dick or a dick for a head. He believes that it a head for a dick, but I explained that the majority of you commented on that post and insisted that it was the head of a dick. Brace yourselves for his response.

In a very snide and hateful tone he replied “I don’t really think that a bunch of MOMMY BLOGGERS know that much about insults. If you want to know the correct way to curse ask a SAILOR not a MOMMY BLOGGER.”

Oh, no he din’t. But, he did. He really did.

I obviously don’t mind the term mommy blogger (see my tag line) but I know that some bloggers who happen to be mothers take offense to that term. And that was my husband’s goal. To offend. THE BASTARD.

Go ahead y’all. Rip him to shreds in the comment section. He deserves it.

Bring it, you mommy bloggers.