"Malaphor"

I have learned a new word.
(I have never told a dear friend that one of her favorite expressions, "you just watch, he'll fold like a ten cent cookie" doesn't seem to mean anything. Not that I've ever eaten a ten cent cookie. Although Save-A-Lot has some terrific crunchy, buttery chocolate chip cookies right now that work out to about that....)
(But since they're self-proclaimedly "crunchy" they, um.... won't fold.)

Your Cooking Tip For the Day

If you are not much of a cook and would like to oonch it up a notch, (not take a course/score exotic ingredients/master new techniques, in other words you'd like to be better without too much effort,) and if you're a fan of saving money, I'm going to do you a solid.
Buy a can of tomato paste. If you're in the US this should set you back less than a half buck.

The problem with tomato past is that while very useful, and is expressly called for in many recipes, it's mostly called for in small amounts, and then the rest of the can, even if you transfer it to another container, sits in the refrigerator until it turns brown and you throw it away.

Open the can now, while you're not making anything, and put the contents, (use a scraper to get into the corners,) into a freezer bag, (a quart zip lock should do.)
Flatten it, press out as much air as you can and freeze it.
Anytime you're cooking or heating almost any[savory]thing with more than 3 ingredients, break off a teaspoon-sized piece and add it. (Thaw if necessary, say, in hummus.)
It is compatible with a huge range of spice and flavoring palates, (is that the right "palate"?) and adds an often undefinable richness and depth to many foods.

If you don't believe me, add some to a chocolate cake batter some time.

You're welcome.

"To Drive the Cold Winter Away....."

By which I mean, to feel cozy at the prospect of the mercury dipping below 70°.

But even so, sipping mulled wine and gazing happily at our Don't-You-Dare-Take-It-Down-Before-February-2 Tree feels like Yules of Yore, (meaning, not of my Youth, but of Years Yet... oh, shut up.)

But I do like spiced wine and I do like the glittering bead garlands of the tree and I do like the over-populated creche scene, (a heathen in-law looked at it and said, wow, that supposed to be Jerusalem or the east Village, or what...? Magnanimous at this festive time, I forgive him and pity him his ignorance.)

Not much time left to savor the victual delights of the season.
One last bit of "fancy" cheese - is there much tastier than Sartori's Bellavitano? I should like to know about it if there is!
Thank God for Aldi, it's the only way I'd ever have such a treat in my house, (we were almost banned from Whole Foods after Himself consumed pretty much the entire contents of a "dome" of samples once. I was made very aware of the... frugality? of my holiday larder by the aforementioned in-law. The prospect of Himself losing insurance coverage will no doubt preclude us ever again entertaining the guy in a manner he finds acceptable - if that isn't the very definition of Silver Linings I don't know what is!)

My Mother... she may have been the only person I know who also enjoyed mulled wine. And she liked cheeses as much as I. Her last Christmas is a memory that will continue to haunt and delight me.
"Lo, how a..."

I don't care what the US liturgical calendar says....

...a Blessed Epiphany!
(And I feast on this Friday...black forest ham, Mancahgocidre, fruitcake and eclairs)

Improving My Culinary Skills

Okay, not my skills, just my knowledge.

For the first time in my life I have both the time, the money and the place (wait - "both" is wrong, there are THREE things . I fell as if i am in a Monty Python sketch about the Spanish Inquisition. I digress,) to work on versions of foods I've always enjoyed but often have to forgo because most people and/or manufacturers, use substances to which I am allergic in their production.


My knowledge is expanding and so am I.
Other than beans, (Boston Baked,  cassoulet, chilis, hummuses.... 'zat the plural?) and even some bean recipes, all of my projects seem to be high fat, high sugar, or both.
Mayonnaise.
Cream Cake.
Frozen custards.
Caramels.

Life is good.


And Those Intewebs are a treasure for someone leading such a sybaritic life.


I am crazy for this  guy, David Lebovitz  is interesting, helpful, crazy skilled and learned in his field - but WHAT IS WITH HIS WEBSITE?????


My computer hates it, my SIL's tablet hates it, Himself's computer hates it - is it the graphics? is it the ads?


Any way, I'll just have to keep slogging thru.


How I suffer...

Capsule Wardrobes, What the Hell?

It took me a while, but I finally came to tems with Pinterest.
I started out annoyed by looking for recipes, (how am I gonna use up that scrag end of a pork tenderloin and some tomatoes that are going soft and a nectarine? oh, and B won't eat chunks of onion and E is gluten -free this week and R is dieting), thinking I'd found one when what I'd actually found was a link to a link to someone being all chatty and sharing 25 pictures of the process of greasing a pan, and then at the bottom of the page, "click this link for the complete recipe!" where it was with a sales pitch for something.

But okay, I get it, and I eventually signed on.

But now I am inundated with suggestions from my "friends" (apparently, everyone whose email addy I have ever had,) and I swear, 95% of them are about so-called "capsule wardrobes."

DO  YOU  MEAN  TO  TELL  ME  THAT  THERE  ARE  ADULT  WOMEN  WHO  DON'T  KNOW  THAT  THEY  CAN  WEAR  A  WHITE  T-SHIRT  PAIRED  WITH  BLUE  JEANS  AND ALSO  LATER  IN  THE  WEEK  PAIRED WITH  A  BLACK  PENCIL  SKIRT  UNLESS THEY RECEIVE  OUTSIDE,  PERHAPS  PROFESSIONAL (buy this book for only 19.95!)  GUIDANCE???????

Corn Allergy Recipe -"Boston" "Baked" Black Beans

This isn't ordinarily the helpful hints/recipes/YouveBeenDoingThisWrongYouWholeLife! kind of blog, but I improvised a food prep that might be worth.

I like canned baked beans, or did when I was a child, but can't eat them due to my food allergy, as they virtually all have corn starch, or corn syrup, or distilled vinegar, (which is all made from corn in this country.)
I'm also lazy, and am not likely to make them from scratch, (dried beans are such a crap shoot, as to whether they will ever soften and if so, after how long,) or leave the oven on for as long as necessary.
I suppose between the sugar and the fat these aren't particularly healthy, but don't the black beans count for something?

1 medium onion, diced
1 Tbsp gritty bacon grease (you know, not pure white, but with some of the pan "cracklings," or whatever they are called)
1 Tbsp tomato paste 
1 tsp apple cider vinegar 
S & P to taste 
Dash of cloves 
Dash of cumin 
Dash of cinnamon 
1/4 c. molasses 
1/4 c. Brown sugar 
2 cans of black beans, drained (and rinsed if they are very starchy) 
I cooked onion in the bacon grease first, but I suspect I could have just stirred it all together in the slow cooker at the same time.
I cooked it on high (very small, weak slow cooker,) for 4 hours, you can give it a stir half way through if you are feeling so inclined

Bathroom Wars and Snack Crackers

So I just discover a really tasty cracker to which I am not allergic.

Then I discover that they are, to put it mildly, dear, (and the expensive box is tiny.)
THEN I discover someone else offers something similar.

But only one store around here seems to carry them.

Oh well...
Anyone know any copy-cat recipe for the Blue Diamond?

Food Fairy Tales and Menus Misspeakings

I'm not exactly a gourmand; I'm a careless cook, I have low tastes, and I don't eat out all that much, (both impecunious AND a tightwad.)

But none of this is a surprise to me - and not just because I'm in state.
I have a food allergy with which to deal, and for years I've been lied to both deliberately and accidentally, by commercial establishments, friends and family members, (and that's not even counting the enormous array of food ingredients that the average person should not be expected to know is made from or would contain corn, e.g. distilled vinegar, pre-shredded cheese, Irish whisky.)

But I fear a great deal of this is brought upon trend-following diners and food snobs by themselves, desperate to be on the cutting edge, and ignorant or unheeding of easily verifiable truths just as long as they laid out enough cash for whatever it is they are ingesting.
One relative assured me a prepared dish contained nothing to which I was allergic, she'd "read the label." What she meant, I discovered that evening when my face ballooned to comical proportions, was not that she had read the ingredient list, but that she had read it was clearly marked as a product of "W#0LE FOODS," and it was only cheap places that I shopped where one needed to worry about them "putting chemicals in their food", right?
(Never mind that the entire physical world is made of "chemicals", a point her Ivy League education had failed to teach her.)
Anyway, caveant emptores, et comestores...

The restaurant’s chalkboard makes claims as you enter from the valet parking lot. At the hostess stand, a cheery board reads, “Welcome to local, farm-fresh XXXX.”
Brown butcher paper tops tables and lettuces grow along a wooden wall. In a small market case, I see canned goods from here and produce from somewhere. Check the small print: blackberries from Mexico and blueberries from California.

With the tagline “Local, simple and honest,” XXXX was among the first wave of farm-to-table restaurants in [the area] to make the assertion “we use local products whenever possible.” I’ve reviewed the food. My own words are right there on their website: “local, thoughtful and, most importantly, delicious.”
But I’ve been had, from the snapper down to the beef...
This is a story we are all being fed. A story about overalls, rich soil and John Deere tractors scattering broods of busy chickens. A story about healthy animals living happy lives, heirloom tomatoes hanging heavy and earnest artisans rolling wheels of cheese into aging caves nearby.
More often than not, those things are fairy tales....

If you eat food, you are being lied to every day.
The food supply chain is so vast and so complicated. It has yielded extra-virgin olive oil that is actually colored sunflower oil, Parmesan cheese bulked up with wood pulp, and a horsemeat scandal that, for a while, rendered Ikea outings Swedish meatball-free.
Everywhere you look, you see the claims: “sustainable,” “naturally raised,” “organic,” “non-GMO,” “fair trade,” “responsibly grown.” Restaurants have reached new levels of hyperbole.

Soylent????? What Were They Thinking With That Name?

Odd thing pop up on my Facebook page - today there was an ad, or at least a press release, for a nutritional powder or drink, (not a supplement, this stuff is theoretically complete,) a "simple, healthy, affordable food...in convenient ready-to-drink 400 kcal. bottles."

I understand the appeal of your Instant Breakfasts, your Ensures... but really, its manufacturer calling it Soylent leaves me agog.

To whom is it intended to appeal?

Those who purchase brain-shaped Jello molds?

 

 

Those who only a few years ago comprised the market for gummy boogers?

Of Waffles and Coincidence and the Hand of God

So.
Been looking for a pizzelle iron, for cheap, (because while I enjoy eating them, I may find I don't particularly like making them, and if I bought one retail, even on sale, there would be thirty-some bucks wasted, and I couldn't bear throwing it out, so it would take up space in my kitchen  WHICH  IS  AT  A  PREMIUM  for ever and ever and ever.)

Monday I had some items for the St Vincent De Paul Food Bank, and after I dropped them off, I dropped myself in to the thrift store, (it's a good time of year for NWT clothes, household goods, etc., as snowbirds decide impulse purchases are not worth packing up and transporting.)

There was a perfect, tiny electric waffle iron, which I thought might just do, for $5.

So, looking up recipes, today, what do I learn?

The Annunciation, or "Lady Day, to the Swedes, ("Vårfrudagen,") which was, because March 25 fell in Holy Week, unwontedly celebrated on April 4, this past Monday, is also, jokingly, "Waffle Day," ("Våffeldagen.")

Clearly, the Blessed Mother wants me to have waffle cookies.

Of course, she would! She loves us all and wants us to be happy!

Contemplating and Confronting Contradiction, the Triduum, and My Own Unrighteousness

It sometimes seems to Himself that every conversation I have with him contains some form of correction or contradiction.
I know this, because he has said so. (I could counter that I'm not getting credit for all the times he says something patently absurd  or factually wrong, but um... fuel on the fire.)

But it is true that I am a contrarian.

A shameful proportion of all of my impulses to write here, or to tweet, or to retweet, or to post in comboxes are in an effort to "fix" some error, or fantasy, or misapprehension.
(Seriously, what's all the fuss about the Oxford comma, what purpose did it serve there? Use it when it's needed, says I. I digress.)
Showing contempt, carping, complaining, critiquing - this is what I do.

I literally only opened this window because I have some culinary obligation for the coming feast, was about to look for a recipe and was confronted with some absurd assertions regarding substitution of ingredients.

In what universe is cinnamon a suitable replacement for cardamom?????

I see myself, (and it is a fearful prospect,)  turning into my great aunt, who could launch a twenty minute rant on virtually anything.
Really.
I was once trapped in a car with her for a half hour ride home while she riffed on the temerity of whoever ran the concessions at the airport at which she had just been met, to stock his chewing gum rack with the variety of wares with which he had chosen to do so,
Another digression.

I have decided to fast from contradiction, in print, pixel or parley from sundown today, until dawn Sunday.
Please pray for me.
(But until then, Katie bar the door.)

I am a HERETIC!

Okay, I'm just gonna come out and say it:
My people hail from Bandon, and I like mayonnaise on corned beef.

LIke Christmass, Pi Day Deserves Not Only an Octave, But Perhaps the 12 Day of Pi(e)

Had little time for cooking yesterday, but had what I thought was pie in the freezer, took it out to thaw, opened it 'round about 7:00 pm for an evening snack with a glass of shiraz to wash down my diphenhydramine, and wouldn't you know?
It was breakfast casserole.
No pie for Pi Day, alas!
However, earlier in the day I had come across this, so I may make a hand pie later today.

Jo and Sue's Single Serving Pie Crust:

I think I figured out why I am so in love with single serving recipes.

I had a bit of an epiphany whilst standing in front of my toaster oven.

Remember the Easy-Bake oven?

That's what it's like making these little treats in the toaster oven. Single serving recipes in the toaster oven/microwave/oven are like Easy-Bake treats for adults.

Plus...by making only one little servings you can't eat more than that. I mean...if I bake a whole pie then I can eat a whole pie. Not that I have....noooooooo no no......never. If I only make a mini pie then I can only eat a mini pie - which, as it turns out - is far healthier for me.

Here is the rundown on this tasty little number:

(According to Fitday)

Crust only: Calories - 165, 11.7 fat, 12 carb, 1.8 protein.

Crust and filling: Calories - 199, 11.8 fat, 22 carb, 1.9 protein.

I think I have some strawberries.
You may be skeptical that someone who obviously spends so much time reading the not-strictly-necessary online truly has "little time for cooking."
I have two words for .... how many?....  29 words for you -

Your call is very important to us. Please remain on the line for the next available associate. Calls will be answered in the order in which they were received.

Thank you so much, insurance companies, government, banks... it is very flattering to know that the time of Little Ol' Me is important to the likes of Big O'l You,

Gee, If It Were an Inter-Denominational Service, the Lutherans Could Have Brought "Bars"

A funeral in Italy for the gentleman who invented the Moka, basically.... an elegant coffee pot.



Elegant enough for liturgical use? exemplifying "noble simplicity?"

Honestly, I don't know.
It wasn't to be funny, and it was meaningful to the family.
The Church now permits cremation, as long as it is not done to disparage belief in the Resurrection of the Body, and a container with sentimental significance to the family or the deceased is deemed appropriate by most people for the  grounds  remains.

Mmmmm.... bars.

I'd not heard that term, 'til Himself told me tales of touring small towns in the upper Midwest and parts of Canada, and the immense hospitality of the people.
But the concept is more than familiar to me. (I've subbed with Lutheran church choirs. There's this magic thing with butter and graham crackers.....)

Alas, I am Polish/Irish/Norman/Austrian-American Catholic, and I only bake anything of that sort at Christmass time.

Gettin' It Out Of My System, Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia....

....Alleluia.
My Sunday School Kids buried it on Sunday.

I discovered some of them, (naturally, the ones who made the most mockery of the various square-note "alleluias" we looked at,) can really sing.
Hmmm... Stabat Mater?

Now, I just need a paczki, (which I won't actually have, don't know where to find them,) and one last cheeseburger before the Great Fast.

I'm not sure I could give up cheese... should I try? I see a period of discernment in my future....

I Don't Care What the Calendar Says...

... not the one over my desk, not the one in the sacristy.
TOMORROW, (not this past Sunday,) is Epiphany.

And even that is not the end of the season! Yet there were the Magi and the sheep all lying in boxes at church, the trees, gone, the garland in a pile in the cloister to be mulched, the strings of  lights wound 'round their holders.

Look, even by the current liturgical calendar, the Christmas season does not end till the Baptism of the Lord.

I don't give a fig, I am celebrating until the Presentation. ( Not a fig, but I'd give a date or a blueberry -- there is a fruitcake macerating even now as we speak, been soaking up the brandy for nearly two months! and tomorrow we shall indulge...)

Aldi Hits Another Home Run

I love Aldi.

Love, love, love.

Probably no longer available, but this year in the run-up to the Holydays, and the concurrent Baking Season, they had Espresso Morsels.

Omiwerd, are they good. Fantastic in cookies or brownies, or probably anything else where you might otherwise use chocolate chips.
If you're lucky a store near you might have some stragglers left, RUN and buy them!

 

PLEASE bring them back next year, or rather this year, but towards the end, you know what I mean.

PLEASE, Aldi!

The Rites of Winter

Why didn't Stravinsky or Orff write something for us?

Old people.
Shouldn't we have something vigorous and sensual and beautiful?
I digress.
Christmas approacheth, and being firmly in the lazy camp, I am happy to decry the glossing over of Advent in favor of the Buying Season. CHRISTMAS LASTS 40 DAYS AFTER CHRISTMAS DAY.

But...

.. and it's a big "but"...
... some things simply must be done ahead of time if they are to be done at all..

Thus, the Rites of (Late Autumn, but let's call if) Winter!
I shall be on the road when I should be pouring brandy and rum and deliciousness over a fruitcake, so I have baked one today and doused it with the only rich alcohol to hand, (except a birthday single malt scotch of Himself's, which tastes and smells like fabric softener to me and does not enter into the equation,) cream sherry.

I am very eager to see how it turns out.

You know, I always feel sorry for people who hate fruitcake - they never tasted my Mother's.
Her Christmas baking, and trying to reflect in some small measure, the same, - after Mass and Family, it is IT for me.

Coquamo, ergo sum (christiana.) 

I realized I need to make it tonight if it was to be done, so I used what was to hand - dried blueberries feature prominently, as do almonds, pecans would have been my choice, if I had more of them, and dang it!!!! no raisins!
Bu my Mother actually hated raisins, even golden ones, (my fave,) so it's more fitting that I used only dates.
And she hated coffee, but I use a bit of strong brew in the recipe I've settled on after a few years, so that can be a little tribute to my Father, who enjoyed a cup of joe.
And now that I think of it, he was a near-teetotaller, and twice a year, anniversary and New Year's Eve, sipped a half a glass of sherry, so there you are.

Lord Jesus, we approach Your coming as man -- Christmass, quickly come!