The chives survived the winter, first shoots ready to cut.
This year’s spinach crop is up, also table-ready.
And the first batch of home-made ice cream is in the freezer.
There has to be some reward for eating all that spinach!
Oh, that ugly little bit of dietary anti-heaven is making the news again! Fasting diets. Recommended as a way of life, this approach can, in the short term, make a person hangry.
More than two years ago, the hubs and I watched a BBC program on fasting diets. Very well done, seemed to make scientific sense even though we’re not scientists. So we decided to give 5-2 fasting a try. Eat normally five days a week, eat a very-low-calorie diet two days a week. We picked Monday and Thursday.
Stuck with it for about a year and a half, then all heck broke loose in our lives and that plan went by the wayside. The very-low-cal days became lower-than-usual-cal days. Cake was occasionally allowed.
With fasting back in our faces on the news, last week we decided to get back to it. I forgot how miserable fasting days are. Every minute has to be booked or all I’m thinking is Food, Food, Fooooooooddddd!
My hair stylist is on an unrelated diet, and she was extolling the virtues of jicama. Anything low cal to quell the hangries.
I’m not holding out much hope, but let’s see how the day goes.
A few months ago, I bought this. Several weeks went by before I opened it.
That’s when I discovered all is not what it appears to be.
This is what’s inside.
Doesn’t look like cloves. Doesn’t smell like cloves. Doesn’t taste like cloves.
Since we can say with surety what this isn’t, a second-rate parlor game around here is guessing what it is: When there’s a lull in the evening’s conversation, out comes this little gem, conveniently stored on the counter.
By now I’ve asked pretty much the full contingent of people likely to stop by, thus the game is drawing to close. Only the neighbors kids think this game has legs. The best guess is that Tone’s was cleaning out the pipes, as it were, and this is some sort of savory sludge.
Time to season the compost bin. Even though we’ve not determined what this is, it has provided a reliable source of lively conjecture and a few laughs. I shall miss this little guessing game.
Thank goodness cooking doesn’t require a license. Based on recent performance, mine surely would have been revoked. Over the past week I’ve made a half dozen thoughtless errors from not having key ingredients on hand to messing up ingredients (wrong amount, added at the wrong time, etc.) to this unfortunate boilover. Emergency grocery store runs mid-recipe are almost commonplace. Sigh.
What’s with the distraction? Well, I’m in the midst of the third or fourth dozen “What am I doing with my life?” phase, and cooking is thinking time for me.
Phew. I better snap out of this before one of these distracted moments requires a call to the fire department!
I have determined to make rye bread. A post on Facebook inspired and terrified me, so it’s off to crazy foodville once again.
The FB post’s claim is demystification — sort of like sitting in an astrophysics class demystifies the universe: Not really, but the explanation was presented to you.
A more personal analogy is knitting/sewing/almost any kind of handwork — the most recent attempt being tatting. See interesting, intriguing, complicated pattern. Glance through it and realize I can either already do or have a reasonable expectation of being able to do all required steps. Then dive in and hope for success.
Oh, and I accidentally bought caraway seed twice (see International House of Cabbage, fermentation) and have to use it up. And the hubs really likes rye bread. There’s a starter to make and lots of rising to happen; that often means an early morning rise for me. Here’s to another kitchen adventure!
First came the sound – clicka, clicka, clicka, grrrrr, creeeeeeak. Then closing was a cross-your-fingers moment. Time to have the garage door opener checked.
Yesterday the fine fellow said he’d arrive between 10 a.m. and noon. By 11:30, well, we were crazy hungry. We got an early wake-up cold-nose from the big dog, so breakfast had been consumed ahead of the usual schedule. Surely we could get in a quick lunch before the service guy arrived. . .
The black bean burgers (yes, those again) were nicely defrosted and warmed when the doorbell rang. Of course.
Sigh. The hubs frowned because lunch would be delayed and cold. Seems he had a touch of the hangries. I smiled because just a few microwave seconds and lunch would be toasty again. Had the doorbell chimed two minutes later, the sandwiches would have been assembled (see International House of Cabbage, Asian slaw) and gotten soggy before we got to them.
It’s all in how you look at things.
An uncomfortable rite of spring happened last Saturday. A wayward bird ended up in the firebox of the woodburning stove. Citrus, the big orange tabby, alerted us with his rapt attention to the stove’s glass door. The well-practiced sequence of events: Close all interior doors (pets safely away from the action), draw all the blinds, prop open the back door, and, after a little cool air has flowed in, open the stove door.
Blessedly, thankfully, this little peep popped out, bounced around the floor for a minute, then, catching the breeze, turned to the bright opening and quietly flew out.
We’ve learned to let this almost-annual event unfold on its own. No attempting to grab the bird, no shooing the little peep to the door. Just stand back and let the bird find freedom.
Kind of a reminder from the universe to lay the best path, and then let events play out. Sometimes the best thing is to take it in and look for the small joys.
The other bird? Part of tight-budget living is taking advantage of sales. In November, that’s turkey, so an extra bird or two goes in the freezer. A few months later, a turkey dinner again sounds delicious, and moving the large frozen bird(s) to get anything out of the freezer becomes tedious to the point of aggravation.
So the other bird in this story became a holiday meal. And I took a moment to be grateful for the experiences, enjoying the unfolding of my life.
Let’s celebrate St. Patrick’s Day! The week after! Because cabbage was $.29/lb – perfect for our rice-and-beans budget! And now I have to do something with it! *
How about Asian slaw?!
It’s easy and quick!
See! Yum! We can eat it on Mexican black bean burgers! Healthy!
And sauerkraut! Because I bought that Kickstarter KrautSource home fermentation thingie!
This takes a week, maybe 10 days!
And we can watch it ferment!
* I promise not to use exclamation points in the next three posts. Just trying to get myself as excited about making stuff with cabbage as I was about buying it at a low price.
In the relatively recent past, IBM’s uber-computer Watson devised recipes, churning out food combinations with the potential for finding interesting flavor mixes. Cognitive cooking is the term.
Where’s the joy of discovery in that? Making the best use of ingredients for wise resource allocation, I’m in. But adding another layer between person and dinner doesn’t ring true to me.
That’s why this dinner is a special delight. The hubs amalgamated a bunch of leftovers into a casserole. Here’s the result:
And here’s the unlikely recipe: Half a fennel bulb, a few potatoes, some fresh mozzarella, half a pound of Italian sausage (cooked and crumbled), and an onion. Cut/slice as desired. Layer in an oven-proof dish. Cover and bake at 375F for 30 minutes. Then 30 minutes more. Then uncovered to brown for a final 10 minutes.
A.maz.ing. Would never have thought of it. May I be so bold as to say Lynn Rossetto Kasper would approve. Splendid indeed.
My Commonplace Blog 
Recent Comments