What Are "Salad Days" Anyway?

Some things are just stupid easy. You know, things you almost have to be stupid to be able to do.

I'm talking about recipes (again). I have a few that I either found or made up that make a dish that is totally delish, but that require so little thought or effort to prepare, it's like cheating.

I fell in love with grape tomatoes the minute I saw them. They're tasty and they're cuter than regular cherry tomatoes. At least I think so. Trouble is around here they go on sale where you have to buy two containers and I sometimes can't eat them fast enough. Sharing is one option. Long lasting salads is another.

I don't know where I got the idea for this salad or if I just made it up. But it's really good, with or without the vodka, and it lasts a long time. I think the dressing preserves the tomatoes. I mean, hey, they're soaking in BOOZE! Stupid!

Grape Tomato Salad

Slice one container of grape tomatoes in half on the diagonal (looks prettier).
Slice a medium sweet onion thinly. Cut it in half first so the slices will be bite sized.

Toss these together in a bowl with a good splash of balsamic or wine vinegar, hefty pinches of salt and pepper, basil and oregano and any other herbs of your choice, and a good glug of olive oil. Optional, add a splash of vodka just for fun. You can add a tiny bit of sugar for a little extra sweetness. Let this marinate overnight in the fridge and serve cold or at room temperature.

I take this with me in a plastic container with a tight fitting lid. It's tasty with a sandwich or just about anything and the sweetness of the balsamic vinegar complements the sweetness of the tomatoes. The vodka is just cuz' I like it.

Here's another salad that was inspired by seeing Alice Waters on a cooking show with Julia Child. They included sliced raw mushrooms in their salad but I left them out because I don't like them. I also altered the recipe radically because I did not write it down and by now I make it quite different from the way I first saw it. If you like fennel, you will like this. And it stays fresh and crunchy for a long time. Just as easy, but you need an extra piece of equipment for this one.

Fennel Onion Salad

Shred paper thin with a mandolin or food processor one bulb of fennel and one good sized sweet onion. Optional - add carrots also sliced paper thin, and sliced mushrooms.

Whisk in a bowl balsamic or wine vinegar, salt and pepper, a dab of spicy mustard and a squeeze of lemon or lime juice (or even orange or grapefruit). Add hefty pinches of herbs of your choice (herbes de Provence would be good) and some ground cumin. A little good quality olive oil and that's it. Add the sliced veg, toss well and serve.

I don't have a mandolin although I would like one. Instead I have this silly thing that came free with something I bought from a catalog. You must have seen one somewhere. It's a long, narrow plastic box, about 3 1/2 by 10 inches. It has a top that will accept an assortment of slicing blades. The one I use most often is the regular slicer (sometimes I use the grater for grating a lot of cheese). This slicing blade makes slices of carrot, fennel, onion and potato that you can almost read through.

When you're done, you just pile all the blades back into the box and pop on the top. It was free and it works. What's not to like?

Anyway, I like these two salads because I can practically make them in my sleep and except for the mandolin, I only have to wash a knife and a bowl. And if I make them in the plastic storage bowl, I don't even have to wash that until the salad is gone.

Easy. Stupid easy!

Quotable Quotes; in the category Wait . . . What?

“We became vegetarian. But that didn't last very long, because, um, I don't like vegetables. Or salad, nothing like that!”
Dakota Fanning

I Scream, You Scream, You Know Where This Is Going, Right?

Like most fads, recipes make the rounds. Foods and recipes come in and go out of style, recipes are traded, and old, passe recipes come back in style years later, like the Martini, for instance.

Or take a look at one of those "church lady" type cookbooks, the kind where everybody contributes their favorite recipes for Layered Nacho Salad or Cream Cheese & Clam Dip, or Cookies Made From A Cake Mix. Depending on when the cookbook was put together, and the ages of the recipe contributors, you will find recipes for Veggies & Dill Dip, Sweet Pickles Made From Dill Pickles, Hummos & Pita Chips or Cream Cheese Brownies.

Have you ever seen a recipe for Amish Friendship Bread? Popular during the 1970s, a friend would give you a Cool Whip container full of bubbly, yeasty goo and the instructions to keep the starter going and a recipe to bake the bread. Amish Friendship Bread was a sort of coffee cake with cinnamon crumb topping (as I recall) and was quite good.

One of the catches was that you had to "double" the starter you received and give the extra to another friend. This generated a round of starter swapping, similar to what occurs when a friend invites you to a Tupperware party. Every guest ends up having their own party and you end up attending a dozen parties and buying enough Tupperware to become a Tupperware saleswoman yourself. It's fun, but soon the novelty wears off and the responsibility of keeping that "starter" going gets to be too much and eventually, it is allowed to die.

No problem, cookbooks and websites abound with the recipe. Unless you are superstitious, it's not problem to whip up your own starter. And while you are at it, give the extra to a friend and start a new round of Friendship Bread!

One recipe I remember, that became quite popular and then faded away, was for "ice cream". What made it unusual was that you did not need an ice cream maker nor did you need to cook and chill a concoction containing cream, eggs, vanilla and other expensive ingredients. Basically, jam was mixed with buttermilk and frozen to make a dish reminiscent of frozen yogurt, or Frogurt, as it was often called, and which was also gaining popularity at the time. The bonus was, if you used low fat buttermilk this was a low fat recipe!

The recipe ran in a popular women's magazine and in my recollection, I and my friends traded the recipe and announced our successes or failures using different kinds of jam. If I recall correctly, I probably only made this once or possibly twice. But it was good. And it couldn't be easier!

If you have an ice cream maker, the kind that requires a mixing bowl to be left in your freezer, or the kind that requires ice and rock salt, or the kind that costs hundreds of dollars and requires neither, go ahead and give this recipe a try.

And if you don't have any sort of ice cream maker, try it anyway. All you need is a little room in your freezer for the container of ice cream. It won't be there very long because if it's good, you'll eat it all up and if it's not, you'll toss it. Give it a try!

Strawberry Buttermilk Ice Cream
Serves: 8

2 cups nonfat buttermilk
1 1/2 cups strawberry jam

Stir buttermilk and strawberry jam together until well combined and pour into a freezer proof pan or bowl. Freeze firm, removing from the freezer to scrape with a spoon every 15 or 20 minutes. You may cut up pieces of frozen mixture and place in chilled mixer bowl, whip with electric mixer until fluffy, and return mixture to freezer pan until firm. Or, freeze in an ice cream freezer according to manufacturers directions. Try other jam flavors.

Quotable Quotes; In the category I'll Have Some Anyway.

"The Frogurt is also cursed . . . That's bad."

From The Simpson's Treehouse of Terror III; Clown Without Pity

Don't Laugh!

I bought this "thing" from a sewing catalog - it's a piece of interfacing that you are supposed to iron onto a long strip of material (or one that you pieced together from scraps). The interfacing is marked out in sections so that all you do is iron it on, attach straps and Velcro, fold according to the markings and sew around the edges. When you turn it right side out it magically becomes a little pouch for your cell phone with an extra pocket for change, your licence, etc. and a long strap.

So being me, I decided before I used up the interfacing I would trace it onto a paper pattern so I could continue to make pouches after the interfacing was gone. All I would have to do is use a piece of regular interfacing and transfer the markings to it. Easy? Simple? Don't bet on it!

I decided to use two layers of lightweight material since I did not have any extra interfacing laying around (and I didn't feel like digging through piles of stashed scraps and fabrics to find some).

I decided to embroider a design on the material first and followed my homemade pattern for the placement of the embroidered design. Who knew the placement would be off just enough to throw my carefully placed design way off kilter?

I decided to use a button loop and button instead of Velcro. Who knew the placement would be off just enough to leave the loop off center and the button INSIDE the finished pouch!

Because I used two layers of material (I thought it would be the same as one layer of fabric and one layer of interfacing) the thing was so bulky that I couldn't turn it right side out without tearing out the side seam.

Once I had the thing turned right side out the button loop was off center, the button was inside the pocket, the flap was too loose to close anyway and for some reason, the shoulder strap wound up sewn INSIDE the finished pouch. Too bad, this had the potential of being a really cute little thingy. I had plans to make several for gifts.

Actually, like most things, I could see the cause of my errors as I went along and I think I can fix them all. I just have to get over the waste of the time and material and get in the mood to try again. This time I will definitely use interfacing and will probably even use the preprinted piece that came with the kit. Then if that works I'll know it was just "beginner's luck" that caused my first failure.

Anyway, you probably will NOT be getting a personalized cell phone pouch for your birthday. But keep your eyes open - - - maybe around Christmas? Who knows?

Quotable Quotes; in the category Not AGAIN, I just FIXED that!

As ye sew, so shall ye rip. ~Author Unknown

Coke Is It!

There is a story that occasionally makes the rounds of Internet and has probably landed in your email from time to time. It claims that Coca Cola is so highly acidic that it has been used for everything from removing rust from chrome, corrosion from battery terminals and stains from toilets.

Believe.

Bill and I are incurable pack rats. I am thoroughly convinced we suffer from the hoarding disorder. I offer the following as proof.

There was a time when Coke (and Squirt, and Vernor's and Root Beer) was on sale for real cheap - like a case for less than $4. We would buy it like it was going out of style. Then after awhile we either got tired of it or "forgot" it was there. At any rate, it went undrunk and remained stacked under the laundry tubs in the basement.

Eventually, we noticed that some of the cans had leaked. Not sure if they were punctured or if the seal at the pop-top had failed. But we found half filled cans and leakage on the floor under the laundry tubs. One glance told us that the beverage was far past its prime. Time to throw out the old coke.

Bill decided to empty the cans into the laundry tub on laundry day so that the water from the washing machine would wash the sticky residue down the drain. He spent quite some time emptying cans until he got tired or until he got a blister on his thumb (we had bought a LOT of soda). It worked like a charm and the only mess to clean up was the one under the laundry tubs.

Well, there was still quite a bit of old soda yet to dispose of and Bill decided yesterday was the day. I told him I was ready to do laundry and he proceeded to empty cans of soda into the laundry tub. He piled the empties in a laundry basket, lined with a heavy duty plastic bag. When the basket was full Bill asked me to unfold the plastic bag and pull it up high so he could add more cans to the bag.

Then he showed me something interesting. Many of the cans had reacted with the acidic soda they contained. The soda had eaten right through the aluminum cans and leaked all over. I can't tell you how long this took, but I can tell you it was an awesome sight, and an awesome phenomenon to ponder.

Behold the power or Coke. I don't know if it will rot your stomach, remove road tar or clean your car battery. But I do know that it will eat right through the can in which it is packaged.

Not that I intend to stop drinking it. Coke is still my favorite soft drink. And did you know, you can buy Kosher Coke or Coke bottled in Mexico that is still made with cane sugar (nowadays soda is sweetened with high fructose corn syrup, like everything else). Some people claim they can taste the difference. I'm afraid all those years of drinking this corrosive beverage may have eroded my taste buds. Just tastes like Coke to me. But it might be worth a try if you have a sensitive palate. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

And remember, things go better with Coke 'cuz it's the real thing, so have a Coke and a smile!

Quotable Quotes; In the category No, Wait, That's Not Quite What I Meant.

"It is like comparing champagne with cognac. No-with Coca-Cola."
Opera Diva Maria Callas

'Bout Time For A New Post

Sorry 'bout that. I thought it was still Mardi Gras!

But seriously, I have been so busy I have not had time to update. This one will be quick.

What have I been doing? Trying to knit 2 socks at the same time on circular knitting needles.

Non-knitters won't know what I'm talking about, nor will they likely care. But anyone who has ever knit (or contemplated knitting) a pair of socks will have at least an inkling.

Apparently there has been a quiet movement afoot (pun definitely intended) in the world of sock knitters. Apparently many knitters find double pointed needles, the usual means of knitting socks, mittens or other small, tubular, seamless items, difficult to work with. Apparently many knitters find it bothersome, once they have completed the first sock or mitten, to have to turn around and knit another one to match. Apparently this has become quite a big deal. Or maybe they are just looking for new worlds to conquer, Alexander the Great notwithstanding.

For your enjoyment, here is an illustration from Lewis Carroll's Through The Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. It is by John Tenniel, the quintessential Alice illustrator, and purportedly shows a sheep knitting on multiple needles. Throughout the chapter, the sheep continues to add more and more needles causing Alice to ponder how she can knit with so many. From Chapter V, Wool and Water.

At any rate, a number of books, articles and websites have sprung up on the topic of knitting small tubular seamless items on circular needles rather than on a set of 4 or 5 double pointed needles. One faction prefers the use of two circular needles while another advocates the use of a single long needle and the employment of the "magic loop".

I really can't say much about these techniques in any way that would allow you to envision them. There are a number of web sites that have excellent pictures and good instructions (although better than pictures, which only speak a thousand words, is a real live person showing you how. Suddenly, few words are needed). Try googling "socks circular needles" for the web sites that show this technique if you're interested or otherwise have too much time.

The upshot is I have tried knitting small tubes with one and with two circular needles and I favor the two needle method. Not that I have any real problem with the set of double pointed needles, unless maybe minor irritation at having to knit a second sock. The trouble seems to be that the second is not exactly identical to the first, perhaps having a few extra stitches or a few missing rows. I guess there's something about striving for exactness (let's not say perfection) that prompts such efforts.

I now have a pair of experimental socks hanging from my pair of circular needles. I have been working on them about a week and have knitted about 3 inches on each one. I can see already that it's going to take a bit longer to knit two socks than it would to knit one at a time. It may even take longer to knit two socks at once than it would to knit two socks one at a time. But even I can see that once those buggers are finished, they will be finished and I won't have to go back and knit a mate for an orphan sock - they'll be born as twins. I can wear them home!

Quotable quotes; In the category Honey, hand me that long skinny thing there.

"A #6 aluminum needle has been known to furnish an excellent emergency shearpin for an outboard motor." Elizabeth Zimmerman, Knitter/Author Extraordinaire

Mardi Gras!

Today is mardi gras.

I never celebrated this particular event as a kid and is seems it's not widely celebrated "up north" where I live. But a few years ago some friends became involved in a "krewe" whose main purpose was to promote the celebration of mardi gras and to throw a blast of a mardi gras party each year.

The first year I went to that party I was asked to come as a guest and video-tape the set-up and the main events of the party so the krewe could have a record of their event. I was an invited guest again for the next couple years and always had a blast at this party. They serve lots of jambalaya, dirty rice and corn bread and the hurricanes (rum punch) flow freely. The music is a gas and the costumes, formal wear and masks make it a great party. Plus the group is filled with really great people.

Consequently, I love mardi gras beads, masks, and music. Today, I am tuned in to WWOZ and am listening to mardi gras tunes, wearing my beads, and have decorated my cubicle with impromptu masks. I wish I knew where I could score a piece of King cake (actually, the cafeteria probably has some as they are serving a mardi gras buffet lunch today).

Tomorrow marks the beginning of the Lenten season and the end of fun, carnival, excess, sweets and partying. So for today I say to you all "Laissez les bon temps roulez"!!!

Quotable quotes; In the category Why? Because we like to!

"On Mardi Gras we dance 'cause we want to"! All on Mardi Gras Day: Episodes in the History of New Orleans Carnival,
by Reid Mitchell

Roast Beef

We had roast beef this week. A rare enough occurrence given that I'm not really fond of rare beef and apparently rare is the only way to cook roast beef. But they had the "Boston Roast" on sale and this is usually a small roast easily consumed by two. The cookbooks say this cut is meant to be pot-roasted (braised in liquid) but while it can be tough when roasted, we have usually had good luck with roasting. It was over 4 pounds. Just big enough for roast beef one night and leftovers for a couple meals.

Roasting beef couldn't be easier. Bring the meat to room temperature by letting it sit out for an hour or so. Heat the oven to a blasting 550 f. Put the roast in the oven in a pan with no rack, no liquid, no nothing and immediately turn the heat down to 350 and let it go for about 20 - 30 minutes per pound (the longer time if it's been rolled and tied) for medium, a little less for rare.

Let the roast stand, covered loosely with foil, for 10 minutes or so before carving to let the juices settle and there you are. I get the outside cuts as they are generally less rare than the later slices, which Bill adores.

You can mix about 1/4 cup flour with salt and pepper and your favorite herbs and rub the roast with this, before cooking, for a crusty exterior. You can slice potatoes, onions and carrots and scatter them in the pan. You can pour some beer or wine in the pan to help those veg cook a little (or parboil them first) and to help the pan drippings along.

If you want Yorkshire Pudding with your roast, and who doesn't, here's how. Mix an egg with about a cup each of milk and flour with a pinch of salt. Whisk until lump free. Then let it sit there while the roast cooks and whisk it a couple more times. It should resemble a thin pancake batter, a little thicker than for crepes.

When you take the roast out to rest, turn the oven up to 450 and if there's not a lot of grease in the pan add a little oil, butter, margarine or bacon fat. Let it get ripping hot and then pour the batter in all at once. Put it back in the oven for about 10 - 20 minutes, then turn the heat back down to 350 and let it cook until done, brown and shiny, about 10 - 20 minutes more. It will puff up and get a shiny crust and is delicious cut or torn into serving pieces and served with the beef and veg.

I know some people make gravy to accompany roast beef but mom never did this and so I don't either. I just pour any of the pan drippings over the meat and let it go at that. Roast beef and Yorkshire Pudding is great with brussels sprouts or cauliflower. Serve tea after the meal for a very English touch.

I like to use the leftovers to make roast beef hash, roast beef sandwiches or fake Stroganoff. Chill the leftover meat and then slice it as thin as you can get it for sandwiches or Stroganoff. Use the bits and chunks for hash.

Hash - chop the beef and any leftover veg fairly fine. Heat some oil or bacon grease in a skillet and add a minced onion if you didn't have any leftover, and then a diced potato. Finally add the chopped beef and veg and heat through. You can let it get pan-crispy if you wish but you probably don't want to cook the beef too long. Salt and pepper, a little cayenne, tobasco or worcestershire sauce and it's ready to serve, with or without an egg.

Sandwiches - Reheat the thinly sliced beef in beef bullion or consomme with any of the juices. You can slice and saute an onion and a red or green pepper first if you wish, and add some herbs and seasonings. Not too much liquid - just enough to keep it moist. Pile the meat and veg onto buns that you have split and toasted and dressed with mayo or mustard and top with some Provolone or Swiss cheese.

Stroganoff - my favorite - Heat a little oil and saute some fresh mushrooms (or use canned) along with a bit of onion or garlic if you like. Add a package of instant beef or brown gravy mix and the water called for on the package. Stir to combine, then add the sliced meat and heat until the gravy has thickened and the meat is heated through. Stir in a few spoonfuls of sour cream and serve over rice or noodles. Couldn't be easier! And as Lucy says, "It's so tasty, too"!

Quotable Quotes; In the category Spread Out!

Mustard's no good without roast beef". Chico Marx, from the film Monkey Business