Musings

This was after I made the coffee, and before we woofed down the delicious Carol-muffins.

Yesterday we had a choice to make: one or two days. Of travel to ATL, that is.

I think we were leaning ever so slightly toward a push of making it a one-day, long-and-into-the-night run. However, the weather and a couple of minor traffic snafus, plus some simple curiosity meant we were not making fast time. But we were having fine, albeit short-term, “local” adventures.

The Guru found us an historic overnight. At a real hotel. As in, the room charge doesn’t include more than coffee. In the room and in the lobby. Other foods, they charge more for.

However, we had a double-load of Carol-love-muffins, which, with the hotel coffee offering made a slamming good breakfast. Youall should be so lucky!

We spent the day in relatively slow-drive mode, mostly avoiding big ol’ I75, taking little side roads, which slowed us less than you think, because our route was shorter/straighter. (Side result: gas mileage improved throughout the day!)

Actual homecoming relatively uneventful, except that you must realize that the best way to clean accumulated weird things from your freezer is not to leave the freezer-drawer-door cracked open while you’re off on vacation, so that everything “down there” melts a wee bit too much for way too long. Yuck. But cleaned up now.

Posted at 10:38 PM | 2 Comments »

With permission, I raided the hunter-gatherer-horticulturalist-gardener neighbors’ potato supply that wintered over, and took two plants of this year’s cilantro. They went into a Columbian version of potato salad, you might say, with the dressing not vinegar and oil based, but instead salsa (more or less). With the fresh cilantro leaves torn and artfully adorning the bowl. Secret ingredient: the whole was augmented with some chèvre soft goat cheese….

Had to add this photo of the corner of the stacked-log playhouse. Have lost track of what’s in there these days. Besides spiders….

Posted at 10:17 PM | 1 Comment »

Out in the wee hours, with the chipmunks and the robins…I found this plastic fence almost glowing in the streetlight. Turns out the English word picket is from the French piquet, meaning pointed stake. Pike, as in the defensive weapon, is a related word. And the fish is so named for its pointy jaw.

The other day we enjoyed pesto from our Genovese basil. Tonight, we feasted on Thai basil added to Thai curry sauce, hauled home from TJ’s.

These are among the quotidian topics at this ranchero. Meanwhile, the country has moved a bit forward with grieving in Charleston, ending the escapees’ travel plans in NY state, and a(nother) Supreme Court ruling I didn’t expect (feeling very cynical about some members of that bunch; yea! for majority rule).

Posted at 7:57 PM | Comments Off on Night moves

For birthday-in-the-family reasons, we ate cake! And celebrated!

Yum!

LTEC = Let them eat cake

Posted at 10:22 PM | 1 Comment »

One benefit of enduring (embracing) the east-to-west time change is that I’m awake pretty darned early. Given that this week the highs are predicted to be in the mid-90s, early is required for endurable (outdoor) exercise. So, I was out well before the sun brought much light to the sky, and all the night-security lights still lit up…even this venerable bar (aka pub).

Posted at 9:43 PM | Comments Off on Pabst everywhere

Feel all warm and fuzzy having a tomato from my own garden finishing ripening on my kitchen window-ledge.

Posted at 9:08 PM | Comments Off on Safe from squirrel-thieves

No, I haven’t tried cullen skink yet. Or haggis. They’re on my to-do (or to-eat) list…. I’m told cullen skink is a haddock and potato soup. I’d call it a chowder variant…. I’m assuming you’ve heard of haggis….

I have tried fish cakes. Three times. They’re small bits of fish mixed into mashed potatoes, then made into cakes that are then deep fried. At least, all three versions I’ve had were done that way. Maybe at home sometimes they’d be pan-fried.

This version is made with cod, and has sorrel bits added for even more flavor. These cakes are served on a bed of asparagus with a wee salad. Yum; meat and potatoes in one dish!

The full Scottish breakfast (toast, tea/coffee not shown) is very similar to the English version. (In fact, shhhh!, I can’t tell them apart.) Some skip the beans. Some have different fried bread options. Some include potatoes in a fried patty, often triangular. Probably, many people have an eew factor over the black pudding (sausage of pig-blood, grain, not sure what else, sliced and I think fried)—but we only had this item offered in northern north-England—not in London.

What I find curious about these breakfasts is the mixture of items…. The broiler-singed tomatoes, for example…they’d be available in pre-hot-house days just in the fall, and not over a long period then. And I think of blood sausage as also harvest food…. And what was the seasonality of mushrooms traditionally? Anyway, when you’re upscale these days, you get all sorts of proteins for breakfast, and a lot of fried on top of that…all together, not super nutritionally. I understand the preferred breakfast used to be kippers. Stinky/strong fish at breakfast time, yum.

This is a Scotch pie. It’s pie crust artfully wrapped around a sausage patty, then baked. It’s about 3 inches across…I guess a variant on the pastie idea.

That’s enough for now; I’m making me hungry!

* S for Scotland.

Posted at 1:37 PM | 1 Comment »

Looks like the insects have found the green tomatoes…is this worse than the squirrels finding them…and carting them off???

Posted at 4:25 PM | Comments Off on Host (or insectarium?)

I made my first basil harvest of 2015, and used the fragrant tops in a mutant pesto. I guess the logic is that it’s not Genovese basil (because it’s not growing there), so I can make not-Genovese pesto…?

Posted at 7:54 PM | Comments Off on Seis de Mayo

By rights, today’s photo should be of the FEL, that is, Fine Experimental Lasagne. Used béchamel sauce, not ricotta. Used roasted eggplant cubes not spinach. Used red peppers not (quantities of) chopped onion.

(Yes!) Yum.

Posted at 9:31 PM | Comments Off on Huge HB success