Food – Page 13 – no counterspace

Food on my mind – planning events

First thing I need to organize: bridge this Sunday

I’m taking Saturday off to clean, but it’s supposed to rain. So if I want to get laundry done, it’ll have to be on Friday morning.

Saturday tasks: completely change litterbox, clean bathroom, move chair out of the way and vacuum floor, swipe at dirty spots on kitchen floor, find a space for my exercise clothes that is not on top of the table I use as a buffet for bridge.

remind friends to not mention to my parents: that I have started karate classes, that there are sex offenders living near-ish to my favorite house so far

I’m vaguely flailing in the direction of food to serve for bridge. I am thinking:

sweet potato potato salad, which no one will like, but I want to make anyway
popcorn popped in bacon fat and dressed with cheddar cheese and salt (do you make dipping sauces for popcorn? if so, I’m thinking sour cream with honey and adobo sauce)
maybe a cheese plate
and my mother will bring deviled eggs

Second thing I need to organize: Chocolate Show in NYC – Oct 31

Ticket purchase is through Ticketmaster, so the $28 ticket becomes a $38.20 ticket. It’s $30 at the door, but last time there was an awful line that it was wonderful to be able to mostly skip.

My plan is to get in, eat all the chocolate, take notes, and then abandon anyone else with me to go spend the rest of the weekend with my grandmother. I love you all, but I am behind on my 1 weekend/month plan. I’d like to get to her place no later than 3:30pm.

So who wants to go up from Philadelphia with me? So far I have Merisunshine and Redwizz.

The new location – Metropolitan Pavilion – 125 West 18th Street – New York, NY 10011 – is equidistant between the drop off locations for the Chinatown Bus and the Bolt Bus, it will be slightly easier to navigate to the site from the Bolt Bus.

Possible Bolt Bus times include:

depart PHL	arrive NYC
7:15 AM	9:30 AM
8:00 AM	10:00 AM
9:00 AM	11:00 AM
10:30 AM	12:30 PM
11:00 AM	1:00 PM

ETA: Leaving Philadelphia at 8am!

(And then from the Bolt Bus drop off, walk about 1 block to Penn Station, find the subway entrance for the 1 train, take the train 3 stops south to 18th street & 7th, walk toward 6th – viola!)

All the tickets are around $12 for one way and that day’s $1 fare isn’t until later in the afternoon. So when should we leave?

If anyone’s wondering what the show was like last year, here are my notes from then

Third thing I need to organize: Roman Cooking Workshop – Sunday, October 25th

Apparently, also know as Project Clear Out My Freezer.

I know we’ll be cooking a pork loin. I was very tempted by the cumin, salt, and honey plan of one of the previous workshops. But in the spirit of trying new things, I think I’ll go for the recipe where you brine it with bay leaves.

And then maybe a barley soup recipe that would use up the roast pork leftovers also in my freezer.

And everyone loves a mushroom recipe.

And I’ll look for a couple vegetable recipes.

And maybe brains or organ meats for fun, if I feel like sourcing the innards for it.

Burlington, VT

Okay, Burlington People:

So I’m having trouble getting student coverage at work for the week of vacation. Because instead of starting the first week of September, this school has decided to start classes two days before I had my vacation planned (what do you mean it’s my fault for not checking since the academic calendar is posted three years ahead?). Erm… so I might be trimming my vacation a little.

Here’s the plan. I’m taking off work on Friday. And we are driving up as far as Connecticut and staying the night.

Saturday (9/12), we are driving to Burlington, and I’ll be checking into my swanky B&B. My parents and I will be going out somewhere delicious for dinner, if you have any recommendations and/or want to meet up then. I’m also taking sight seeing suggestions for that day. After dinner (say by 7-8pm-ish), my parents will probably turn into pumpkins, and I’ll be free.

Sunday (9/13) – Sunday brunch with parents is a must. Noon to 5pm, we’ll take a bus tour of close bits of Vermont. 5:30-10:30pm – there are various opening ceremonies and mediocre cocktails parties with the conference. I can go or skip.

Monday (9/14) – I think I want to find somewhere to do fancipants yoga on Monday morning. And my mother and I are free for an excursion. I’m thinking King Arthur Flour over in Norwich (1 hour away, if we don’t get lost). What else is out that way? Want to come with/guide us? And then we have to be back by 5pm because there’s a dinner cruise on the lake at 6pm. It’s my mother’s birthday.

Tuesday (9/15) – will I have had time to hang out with you by then? If so, I’m going to go ahead and book a 9am train back to philly. If not, I’ll spend Tuesday socializing and go home on Wednesday. Let me know so I can adjust train/hotel reservations as necessary.

Other things to do:
Shelburne Museum
Vermont Country Store
Aquarium

random weekend in the middle of the week – Pick Your Own

I had Jury Duty. Only I called the night before and was told they didn’t need me. So did I go to work like a responsible citizen? No! Of course not! I took today off work. Whee!

Plan a: wake up at 6:30am, get on the road by 7:15; get to a pick your own farm in New Jersey by 8am; pick stuff; drive to a pick your own farm in Pennsylvania; pick more stuff (they have late season strawberries!); have lunch with my parents; drive home; pick up two yoga classes that I usually am working during and have never tried these teachers.

How did that work?

Well, I got out of the house more like 8am. Still pretty darn perky.

Got to the PYO farm in New Jersey. I really like this place; it has a huge variety of things to pick. I started off with slips to pick blackberries and blueberries.

blackberries I love blackberries more than any other fruit-type thing. When I was little, we had blackberries growing in our backyard: tight, little fruits full of flavor. And I’m always a bit disappointed by these lush, overflowing things that have been selected as the ideal blackberry. Well, it looks like the breeding of grafting or whatever you need to do to make the big berries, isn’t 100% because I could find more compact berries on the same brambles as the juicier ones. \o/! So I went down a row and back up and had filled my two containers-worth of blackberries. (and then there was a moment of ick, when my feet, wet with the lingering dew of the humid summer morning, hit the sandy driveway… and there was unexpected sandiness of unpleasantness.)

blueberries I caught the trailing end of the blueberry crop, but I’ve always had a fondness for smaller berries, here, too. So it just took a bit more patience to pull a berry here and there until … well, the container wasn’t full, but I was done.

(side note: that’s twice now this week that I have seemed to be overheated without feeling hot at all. I’m a little worried by this development, but I figure summer won’t last too much longer and my body can figure out its issues if I give it time)

So I decided not to pick peaches or white grapes or anything else on offer, but I did buy some peach and nectarine seconds. (and, yes, a doughnut – they were making them on site)

And then I drove straight to my parents’. We went out for lunch. I suggested the little Mexican shack that had opening up fairly close to their place, but my mother said there was a place in town that was better… turned out to be Qdoba (WTF parents?). Apparently, they’ve started doing their regularly because it is right next to the social security office. (awww… old parents) But they were paying, so I only hassled them a little about it.

Gave them some blackberries and drove home and took a nap.

Dubious food – vintage caviar

So I got two small jars of cheap caviar from my mother (*cough*about 5 years ago*cough*) because she hadn’t gotten around to using them (*cough*for about 5 years before that*cough*).

Do you think it’s a fair experiment to open them up and poke at them a bit to see if they are okay?

Needless to say, if there is an expiration date on these, we are way past. But sometimes those are purely hypothetical.

(no, there’s no bulging. Yes, I know to abort the plan if there are funny smells (what is a funny smell when you are talking about fish eggs? Yes, I know to abort if there is a large growth of mold.)

ETA: received following comment;

And, okay, so the glass is dark, but they’ve been packed in water and salt…you know, I’m still saying you should dump them. Salt’s great and all, but if the eggs’ve been packed in it that long then I’m thinking the salt’s had time to dissolve, and regrow around and inside the eggs…either way you’re looking at inedible.

Removed jars from cardboard packaging and saw that one of them had definite green colors going on. Disposed of them, jars unopened.

productive but sleepy

I have been almost as productive as my ideal schedule of me! Wow.

I made it to karate both Monday and Wednesday (though I’m a bit hobbled by it still, and I’m glad I have a while between Wednesday and next Monday for my body to recover).

I made it to yoga Thursday night.

And I’ve cooked everything except the imam bayildi! So there was tasty beef & kohlrabi stir-fry last night, and I made a leftover quiche this morning. That’s what I’ll grab for dinner tonight! Quiche! In my fridge!

So tonight I am swapping fresh roma tomatoes for dried ones and grey yarn for tall storage jars.

Tomorrow, I shall offer up fresh regular tomatoes and fresh basil in exchange for buschetta. Also exchanging vanilla, parsley, and mint for other delicious foodstuffs and socializing.

Sunday, I shall receive ginger beer as an exchange for jam.

YAY food!

Oh, and I also did laundry this morning. Only one load, even though I had two loads’ worth of clothing because that was all I had in currency. But I got the stinky gi washed, and all of my underwear, and a few other things. And all of the mentionables are hanging out on the line to dry.

And I got to work by 9am. (so I had to catch a cab in order to be timely, but I was totally in on time)

I can haz nap nao?

So yoga at 5:30? Mmm… probably not.