HELOISE Peanut brittle made a hit with her family

Dear Heloise: You once ran a recipe for making Easy Peanut Brittle in the Washington Post. My kids and I made it, and it was a huge hit. I've misplaced the recipe -- can you print it again? Barbara F., via e-mail
Yes, I can, and this microwave version is lots easier than the stove-top method.
You'll need:
1 cup of granulated sugar
1/2 cup of light corn syrup
11/2 cups of raw (skin on) peanuts
1/8 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1 teaspoon of butter
1 teaspoon of baking soda
Mix the sugar, light corn syrup, peanuts and salt in a large, covered microwave-safe dish and stir well. Microwave on high for 8 minutes, stirring halfway through the cooking time.
Add butter and vanilla, mix well and microwave on high again for 2 more minutes. FYI: Keep in mind that cooking times might vary, depending on the wattage of your microwave.
After cooking, remove and add the baking soda. Stir well until mixture becomes foamy and light in color. Immediately pour onto wax paper and use a metal knife (plastic will melt) to spread the mixture to about 1/4 inch thick. Important: Wear oven mitts when cooking and handling this mixture -- it is very hot!
Let sit until completely cooled. Remove wax paper and break into pieces. Store in an airtight container. Yields about 1 pound. Heloise
Important note: Peanut brittle should be made on a "dry" day -- humidity tends to make peanut brittle set up sticky.
Dear Heloise: Here is a fun and fast way to clean strawberries:
Take a plastic drinking straw and push it up through the bottom of the berry. It pops out the white cone and the greenery.
It's a nice way to have a whole strawberry, and even kids like to do it. Joann Hughes, Niles
Dear Heloise: If you run out of clips to close chip bags, you can take one clip and use it on two chip bags together. It saves other clips to use for something else.
This also works for salad bags and other bags as well. Kelsey, Sherwood, Ark.
Dear Heloise: Our refrigerator is always full to overflowing.
Thinking about this, I thought that if all containers were square or rectangular, space would be more available. Maybe someone out there would be able to figure this out and see if it would actually save space. Norm W., via e-mail
Dear Heloise: If you like to keep your wine cold after pouring but don't like the watered-down version you get by using ice cubes, place seedless white and red grapes in a self-sealing plastic bag and freeze them. Then you can plop a few of them in your wine.
It looks nice and helps keep the wine chilled. Nancy Rauber, via e-mail
XSend a money-saving or timesaving hint to Heloise, P.O. Box 795000, San Antonio, Texas 78279-5000, or you can fax it to (210) HELOISE or e-mail it to Heloise@Heloise.com. I can't answer your letter personally but will use the best hints received in my column.
King Features Syndicate