Because I’ve been distracted by rattlesnake recipes and Fail Blog, here are some snippets to get us back to speed:
- A couple Saturdays ago, Jesse, exhausted from a yard sale, sits on the couch, watching bluegrass on PBS, while I’m in the kitchen making baked ziti while wearing a floral-print apron. The buzzer goes off on the dryer, and I fold clothes while dinner’s in the oven. And I look at the two of us and wonder: are we in our late twenties, or our late sixties? And I don’t care which. What a lovely way to spend an evening.
- Oh, and making hamburgers for dinner one night with a side of homemade, home-fried French fries. Cut-up potatoes, soaked in sugar water, then tossed into a pan of hot lard. Lard, yes! They were the best fries I’ve ever made, perfectly crispy on the outside and still soft inside. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to bake French fries again…or buy frozen.
- Since we’re on the topic of food (still), this Saturday night we went to Boleros for dinner to use our $25 gift certificate. The one catch was we had to spend $35. So, cell phone-calculator in hand—to try and hit as close to $35 as possible—we ordered a chicken quesadilla appetizer with a side of plantains, two entrées (Barbacoa enchiladas for him, Cuban sandwich with side of black beans for me), and followed it up with a fancy coffee drink for me. I thought, surely this is what it feels like to be rich. Our table was overflowing with food. Plates everywhere. More food than we could eat. We took home two boxes of leftovers. (Well, okay, probably if we were rich we wouldn’t have taken the leftovers. Or used the calculator. But still.) We never order appetizers and it’s not unusual to see us ordering water and splitting an entrée. So, an appetizer, two entrées, an extra side, and fancy coffee? Living large.
- On the subject of not-food, it’s freezing here. Last night, we slept with two extra blankets on top of our down comforter, and this morning we were so blissfully comfortable under all those blankets that getting out of bed into a sixty-five-degree room was particularly painful.
- And, I have a cinnamon-scented stick-broom-thing from Publix, thanks to my fantastic mother-in-law.
- Staying out late Friday night at Chili’s with the small group, talking about couponing, health care reform, the perils of renting your house and then leaving the country. Sleeping to eleven the next morning.
- And curling up on the futon with a zombie book, wearing Jesse’s black sweatshirt, both cats snuggling with me, all warm and purring.
8 Comments
Those french fries sound fantastic, as long as you quickly read over the word “lard”.
Hope you enjoy the zombie book. I think it is a very fun read and a pretty good social satire…
Yes, loving it so far! Just not a good book to read when it’s dark and the house is making funny night noises…
Oh, and Kirsten, lard has gotten a bad rap! Foods fried it in actually absorb less fat than foods fried in other oils. Check it out: http://www.slate.com/id/2219314/
Besides, the lard I used was non-hydrogenated and organic. I’d trust it any day over whatever McDonald’s fries their foods in.
Not that I don’t love McDonald’s fries…
All fantastic snippets, but I particularly love that you couldn’t care less if you’re spending time with your husband in your late 20s or late 60s. I like to think that, at some point, I will have a relationship that will feel timeless.
Many thanks to you, Sabrina, for pioneering the snippet format! Your snippets are always wonderful. And I look forward to reading about it when you do find that timeless relationship.
Those french fries do sound amazing! I’m not against lard, I just don’t have any. Do you think the same effect could be reach with butter or possibly saved bacon grease?
Hmm, I’m not sure! Perhaps the bacon grease? Kenny was telling me the other day how to cook scallops, and one thing he said was to clarify the butter so it would get hot enough to properly sear the outside of the scallop. So, perhaps butter would not get hot enough for the fries? I know precious little about frying things, so I am not very much help at all…
My mom sent me the lard from an organic farm somewhere in Pennsylvania. They ship things overnight in ice. There are probably some great farms in Florida that would provide non-hydrogenated lard, if you feel like trying it out!