Proof positive that God has a warped sense of humor

I had such plans for goodies during the Super Bowl. New potatos, with creme fraiche and caviar. Italian meatball sliders. Beer, or red wine, or maybe a Scotch. Quiet Sunday, me and the TV .

And here I sit in St. Joseph Mercy hospital, wired up to a freakin’ heart monitor, because I have apparently decided to have some sort of cardiac arrythmia that made me faint, but won’t repeat itself so the docs can figure out WTF is the matter.

My game night snacks?

• Chocolate covered cherries
• Crunch ‘n Munch
• Pringles
• Diet Coke

Recycling is a Good Thing

M’mm h’mm, I got your steak and eggs, all right. Here’s what you do with that piece of filet (actually, pieces of TWO filets, as neither of us could finish them), leftover garlic mashed potatos, and leftover asparagus (the white stuff is either mashed potatos or bearnaise, not sure which).

I blended the potatos with a little cream and some flour, made patties and fried them. Nuked the steak for 30 secs to take the chill off, and then seared it for about 30 seconds on a side in a hot skillet before slicing it. Nuked the asparagus. Fried an egg. Brunch!

I’ll take steak and eggs like this any day of the week.

Lazy bread

Sucks when your yeast is, well, not yeasting.

I had an urge for yeast bread. You will recall that last weekend, I made sweet potato bread, and complained because it did not rise as I thought it should. Well, today, I was searching for a brioche recipe, because I wanted that eggy, buttery bread. All the brioche recipes I found called for making the sponge, then the dough, then refrigerating it overnight. Screw that noise. I wanted something NOW.

So in the Lee Brothers Southern Cookbook, I found a recipe for Sally Lunn bread. It looked sufficiently brioche-y. Had a stick of butter, three eggs.

Heat the milk, it says, and dissolve the yeast. I heated, no hotter than the specified 105 degrees (I could stick my finger in it; it was warm, but not hot). Dissolve the yeast. Wait 5-10 minutes for it to bubble. I waited. It didn’t bubble. This should have been a clue.

I went ahead on anyway. Bad move.

Dough didn’t rise. Put it in the pan. Dough didn’t rise. Put it in the oven. Dough didn’t rise. Bread is leaden. Has a great taste, though.

So I’m off to the grocery to pick up a few things, among them a new batch of yeast, as the other is now In The Trash.

And I’ll make bread tomorrow, because, like last week’s drain, I am On A Mission.

See you and y’mama ‘n ‘em later. I got things to do.

Ahhhhh. Steak.

As previously mentioned, I went out to dinner last night. Walked in to Pompeii, a neat little place I’d been in several times after work just for a glass of wine, but never for dinner.

“Two for dinner?” the maitre d’/waiter/Lord knows what all else asked. We looked around, saw no one other than us, and allowed that, yes, two for dinner.

“French or Italian?” Seeing our puzzled looks, he explained. “It’s French on this side (gesturing to the dining room to the left of the bar), and Italian on this one.”

H’mmm. That’s a new one. Haven’t dealt with that before.

I’ll cook again eventually….

I guess.

Tonight, I housecleaned, as I have a guest coming tomorrow and wanted the place to look decent. So the spare bedroom actually looks like a spare bedroom now, and not a junk/storage room.

It’s out to dinner tomorrow — I’m thinking either Pompeii or Italian Villa — and then I’ll cook for the weekend. Definitely on the agenda: lamb shanks. I think I’m going to do them with red wine and herbs d’Provence. Great-sounding recipe in Gourmet a while back. (Also on my wish list — the Gourmet Today cookbook.) And I think I shall also make rendang, from the lovely-sounding recipe Mark Bittman has in his Bitten blog this week; I’ve wanted to try it for ages, and his recipe, as do all his recipes, strips it down to its elementals. And Mark has never steered me wrong yet.

Also found what sounds like a WONDERFUL recipe for almond cookies, and I think I may have to try them as well. And some other kind of homemade bread, since my sweet potato bread last week was a dismal failure. I’m thinking brioche.

Givin’ up the ghost tonight. You and y’mama ‘n ‘em stay up if you want to; I’m going to bed.

Ick.

That is a reflection on the state of my stomach, not the state of my cooking. I’ve got the queasies, don’t feel like eating, therefore no point in cooking, and I really don’t even feel like writing about food.

Am also tee-totally irritated because I was expecting a sizeable tax return, planning to make it the seed money for a boat this coming summer, and I find out I’m getting back the sum total of $197. Less the $27.50 I paid Turbo-Tax to prepare the damn thing. So I will spend that getting the damndog spayed this week.

What I need to do is win a thousand dollar gift certificate at the kitchen store, or Bed Bath and Beyond, and go on a shopping spree. That would make me feel better. Even TJ Maxx wouldn’t be bad; I saw a pair of really cute chairs there that I’d love to have four of for my dining room table, and they were only 60 bucks apiece.

The dog just stuck her nose up next to my ear and barked. I may NOT get her spayed this week. I believe it’s probably useless to spay a dead dog, which she is about three centimeters away from being.

My stomach doesn’t even think it could abide a Scotch. This is serious.

I believe I’ll go hibernate. You and y’mama ‘n ‘em have a nice night.

Cooking today what I meant to cook yesterday…

Which means the cleaning doesn’t get done. Oh, well. Hate that. I’ll hit it a lick and a promise one or two nights this week. Maybe.

But I made it to church this morning, and have been cooking both before and since. And it smells some kinda good in here and I am getting seriously hungry.

Bread pudding is better than housecleaning any day.

We started out last night in the crockpot with these:

8 p.m. last night

8 a.m. this morning

1:30 this afternoon.

which became these by noon today. Friends and neighbors, THESE are some caramelized onions. I didn’t put quite enough salt on ‘em, but that can be remedied in whatever I make with them. I am seeing French onion soup one night this week, I swear I am. And I may yet make one more batch of carbonnades a la flamande before the winter’s out.  Three pounds of onions made about four cups, finished. And three pounds just about filled up my crockpot when I started; I could’ve probably squashed a few more in there, but not many.

The day called for it….

Lots of little olives equal two or three big olives, yes? Yes.

So I mixed it.

And it was good.

OK, so it’s too freakin’ cold to enjoy a martini. I’ll buy that. However, some days just call for it, and today was one of ‘em if ever I had one.

Grrrrrr. (Or, plumbing travails, successfully concluded)

UPDATE: FIXED THAT MOTHERFUCKER!

Here, should you ever have to do it yourself, are the steps:

1. Try Liquid Plumr; wait the requisite 30 minutes, follow with hot water. Note that this does not work. Go to bed.
2. Discover, upon awakening, that the sink has at least drained. Reassured, scoop nasty stuff out with handfuls of paper towels, take out trash, begin to scour sink with hot water and note it is not draining.
3. Dip out hot water, and try Drano this time.
4. Take kids to work because the roads are icy. While you are out, buy a plunger.
5. Come back, chase Drano with hot water, and plunge. Come near passing out from fumes. Open door, despite frigid temps.
6. Alternate Drano, Liquid Plumr, and hot water until both products are gone. Resort to E-how.
7. Try vinegar and soda. Use entire box of soda and quart of vinegar. Alternate plunging with boiling water. At least the fumes aren’t giving me a headache.
8. Take trap off. Congratulate self that you remembered to put something underneath to catch overflow.  Note with dismay trap is clean as a whistle from repeated applications of Drano, Liquid Plumr, vinegar, soda and boiling water.
9. Go pick kids up from work. Go by WalMart and buy plumber’s snake.
10. Insert snake until it stops. Try not to look at ugly goo that comes out. Try to decide if it’s stopping because you hit and failed to break up the clog, or whether it won’t go past a bend in the pipe. Because you are impatient, decide it’s the latter.
11. Go back to boiling water, putting stopper in one side of drain and setting a cast-iron dutch oven filled with water on top of it to keep it mostly sealed.
12. Dump boiling water through garbage disposal side, while running disposal. Repeat. Repeat some more. Keep repeating. Pour a drink. Repeat some more.

It’s draining. Slowly, but it’s draining. Triumph feels good.

*********

I have fought since last night with a clogged kitchen sink. I’ve used a bottle of Liquid Plumr, most of a bottle of Drano, a couple of stockpots of boiling water, and am currently letting vinegar and baking soda work on it, to be followed with more boiling water. Next step is to take off the trap and pry the shit out with a coathanger.

This motherfucker has gone and Pissed Me Off. Cooking is suspended until I Defeat This Fucking Sink Clog.

That is all. You and y’mama ‘n ‘em may return to your regularly scheduled programming.

Effing weather

Lovely day. Just lovely. The rain that started last night began to freeze on trees and such before daylight, and has now turned to sleet, with a promise of snow later. Upside — actually two of ‘em — office was closed today, and my PJF order came in anyway. So I got out and picked that up, went by Kroger, filled the car up with gas, and I am prepared to cook my way through this winter storm, provided the power stays on.

Have I mentioned I hate winter? Though it does do nice things for my desire to cook.