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Author: Livia N

Looting and Pillaging – Macy’s going out of business

After staying up until dawn reading Harry Potter fanfiction a few nights last week, by Friday everyone who talked to me was noticing that I was starting to come down with a cold – man, did I sound raspy and sexy.

Sadly, that meant canceling my lovely plans in New York because while I might not have yet been sick, I was pretty sure that a 2.5 hour bus ride, partying until late, and then a 2.5 hour bus ride back, might have put me over the edge.

Instead, I spent some time socializing with the cats I have been sitting on while their owner has been at Pennsic.

And then around 3:30ish on Saturday, I got a call from my mother that one of the department stores at a local mall was closing one of its two locations there – and things were on clearance. So we met up at the mall for some looting and pillaging before dinner.

I found two lovely large bowls, and I went for the one with a pretty color and a slightly sturdier feel. Turns out it’s designed by Calvin Klein – not sure that would have been a factor in its favor, if I had noticed before I bought it. Anyway, here is the lovely thing. $12 My mother has custody of it for now because I’m not sure where to store it. I’ve started thinking that I should start putting together a dowry for myself when I marry a larger house.

And then there were some small dishes that go perfectly with my black bowls from Target. I grabbed 9 little ingredient/dipping sauce and 5 of the little square plates you see in the bottom left of the picture here. The little bowls nestle nicely in the corner of the square plates, and I am having a craving to have people over for small plates… especially now that I have steamer baskets and a hankering for massive quantities of dim sum (I blame Vancouver).

Right – so who wants to enable me some time by coming over for a dinner made out of appetizers?

food front

It has been too hot to cook, so I made soup/stew at night over the weekend and have been making that last.

I had half a cabbage and (what I thought was) a spaghetti squash in my produce drawer, so I came up with a daring plan to try to make another soup/stew with the two of those, some ham, and chicken stock.

When I went to cut up the squash, however, it turned out to be a random asian melon.

It made a rather wonderful breakfast, but it was a surprise.

My life is full of hard choices

PIE vs Harry Potter.

Made from scratch key lime pie in which we tested out two different recipes… versus the new Harry Potter book.

Pie made with some absolutely lovely people who are wonderful people… versus the new Harry Potter book

Pie with people who live in the city versus my pre-paid Harry Potter book out in the suburbs at least 40 minutes away.

what do you think happened?

I totally managed to do both!

There was socializing and talking and baking – with an extra trip to round up enough ingredients for the *two* batches instead of the single one originally planned. We found that the Nigella Lawson one was bizarrely fluffy and that we probably liked the simple recipe printed on the bag of key limes best, but we are reserving final judgment until the pies have had a chance to cool and set in the refrigerator.

Because we ate the pies warm!

Pies came out of the oven about 11:20ish.

There was tasty sampling that was reasonably leisurely so as to fully judge the pies’ merits.

And then there was freakishly fast driving. And I did not get a speeding ticket even though I totally deserved one.

Got to the bookstore at 12:10 to a bunch of people leaving – but there were still a bunch of people buying. My pre-paid receipt was not in the special box, so manager-type person was called over and a list was checked – and I walked out with a copy at 12:20.

And now I need to calm down a bit before getting into the serious business of reading.

Tofu Shirataki

Food experiment: Tofu Shirataki

Yeah, so this was a total shot in the dark as to whether they would be edible, but they were both weird and on sale so they fit my standard requirements for a culinary adventure.

Shirataki noodles are made from a root (often translated on the packaging as yam) and – in this case – tofu. They are packaged wet, kind of like sauerkraut.

Because the packaging warned that they are often parboiled to get rid of the smell (other notes included “distinctive texture”), I drained the packaging liquid and set it to marinate in a spicy cooking sauce. Then, I fried it all up in a pan with eggplant and shredded cabbage.

Right after cooking – fairly tasty, but still not as sexy a texture as proper noodles… they ended up having an almost al dente texture. Maybe I should have parboiled, but I was more worried about the flavor.

After freezing – No. Just no. So the website has a warning not to freeze, but the packaging didn’t, and ew! It turned into thin strips of plastic, I swear! So I am picking those out and dropping them in my trash so I can eat the rest of the goody.