2026, Family, Food, home, Uncategorized

Fun!

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Our lives since moving to Minnesota have been pretty noneventful aside from our trip to Kansas City in March. We have spent our time getting to know the community and getting our home to our liking. Not much has been unpleasant, but nothing has been that exciting either. The weather hasn’t been very conducive for outdoor activities.

A couple of weeks ago I ordered three Savoy cabbages through Melissa’s Produce. We grew Savoys in our ND garden. They are lovely cabbage but not available in our local grocery stores.

The ones I ordered were very nice when they arrived, and we refrigerated them right away. This made for an interesting challenge, though, of using up three cabbages in short order.

We cook most everything from scratch as a rule, so cooking a lot of cabbage wasn’t that unusual. I noticed, though, that the recipes we had chosen were really fun to make. Not just pleasant, but fun. I made a huge pot of minestrone. I made a central European pasta dish with cabbage and bratwurst. I made a cabbage, potato, asparagus. and fennel bulb hash. Husband made cabbage and mushrooms, (as well as oatcake biscuits). I love to cook, but I recognized how much fun I was having putting these dishes together, even more fun than usual!

I don’t plan to buy any more Savoy cabbage in the near future. I am kind of cabbaged-out. It reinforced for me, though, the pleasure one can derive from even the most simple activities if you pay attention. Yesterday I made Cuban black beans. Later this week I am making Danish meatloaf (it is made from veal and pork and wrapped in bacon). I expect to have a fun week despite all the rain and staying home. A simple life can be a good life.

What fun activities have you done lately? What are the most fun and least fun things for you to cook? Thoughts about cabbage?

47 thoughts on “Fun!”

  1. It will be fun to see my “sister” Lori today. We’re going out for lunch together.

    I enjoy making Italian sauces and vegetable hash with leftover veggies in my fridge. Just start with olive oil, onions, and garlic, and go from there. Cabbage works in it too.

    I do like cooked cabbage, and I know it’s good for you, but it’s not the first thing I choose.

    OT: this popped into my head this morning when my feet hit the floor. Enjoy!

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    2. Just what I needed to get moving on a cold, wet morning. Maybe I should bake a bit today. Cornbread, simple chocolate cake, scones- we shall see.

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  2. Enjoy cabbage but age has changed that.
    I have spent the last week doing more work than I thought this broken old body could do. I now live in Willmar. Do not have my art to hang on my walls or my grandfather clock. Which will need some repair. Living room/kitchen is otherwise done. Bedroom/office is close to done. I have a lovely view of employee parking lot, far better and quieter than the massive noisy construction project in Mankato. But my eye doctor told me my vision is a lost cause.
    Clyde

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    2. my mom lost one eyes function a couple years ago and the other is myopically tunneling to gone.she gets shots in the eye that keep it going . she hooked up with the society for the blind who have lots of helpful stuff and she got a machine that allows her to put books and newspapers under the reader where it blows them up snd makes the contrasts better so she can see them. its still tough. we still do movies on tuesdays but the darkness of the screen is a much stronger consideration
      sorry to hear your art is gone. i love your art.
      hope wilmer is good for you. i do like the vibe in sw minnesota

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  3. The only thing I associate with Willmar is the State Hospital, where my Great Aunt Emmy was committed by my Great Uncle Willy because he got angry at her for something. He just went to the courthouse and signed commitment papers. She wasn’t even examined by a doctor. She was doing laundry when the Pipestone County Sherriff showed up with the commitment papers. After a few days at the hospital she was discharged as there was nothing wrong with her. Husbands could do that in the 1950’s. She eventually forgave him and moved back home.

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      1. She did forgive him. Then she got angry at all the other family members who were upset with him for what he did.

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  4. I wish I could feel like cooking is fun – I imagine the doing it together is part of it, plus this phrase, Renee, is probably key – ” if you pay attention”. I’m often trying to get it done, be doing something else, instead of just being there with it to enjoy it. Will see if I can change that… thanks.

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  5. Oh, and one of the most fun activities I do is Happy Hour with 3 others, which we haven’t been able to do for several weeks. But Husband and I got to walk a woodland trail Saturday that was fun – hadn’t gotten out there (Prairie Island, Winona) for maybe a year!

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  7. Golf is usually fun for me, especially if I’m playing in a congenial group that get along and laughs a lot.

    Listening to live music is fun. (Thanks Krista for the mention of Connie Evingson and Dan Chouinard performing in Northfield! We went. Excellent show. It was like sitting in their living room, listening to them perform impromptu. And Connie is as great as ever!)

    Going on a long road trip out west, listening to audiobooks, is still fun. I know, you’re asking what’s so fun about driving through ND, SD, or NE? The driving is boring, but the adventure of maybe seeing new sites is fun.

    I enjoy cooking, having done it almost daily in my adulthood, but I find it more “satisfying” than “fun.” Builds self-confidence, self-reliance, etc.

    Most fun to cook is spaghetti sauce because I make a huge batch. So it’s an hour of time to get 12-13 meals from one pot. Nothing comes to mind as least fun because I only make what I want to make. I used to try adventurous gourmet recipes but stopped when I realized they weren’t worth the extra effort.

    I like a good coleslaw but am not a huge cabbage fan.

    Chris in Owatonna

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  8. Have I thought about cabbage? That’s something you don’t hear every day.
    I always remember mom growing it and I’d ‘dust’ it. And yeah, might be a time to start making coleslaw again.

    If cooking something was ‘the least fun’ I don’t think I’d do it.
    When mom moved into senior housing, she was done cooking. And she refused to eat another potato. Said she’d eaten enough potatoes and didn’t like them that well so that was it. Done.

    The most fun? It’s more about being in the right mindset; a drink, music, and just being in my happy place as I do it. I am very impressed how you make everything from scratch. Of course it tastes better, and it’s not always ‘hard’. I’m just not there yet.

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    1. I’m sure it’s possible to not like potatoes, but it is hard for me to imagine. I could eat potatoes every day, as long as there is some butter and salt and pepper at hand.

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  9. Our grandson had a very fun weekend celebration of his 8th birthday with going to a professional soccer game in the Cities and then a visit to the Minnesota Zoo.

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    1. i took my 8 year old granson (birthday wednesday) to the zoo with his brothers on friday and he loves soccer too but hasnt been to the united stadium yet. been to chicago soccer team game but his aunts are better at organizing fun than i am.

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  10. i cook to chill out. i add stuff to take off in one direction or another.
    i buy cabbage on purpose and usually have to find things to do with it.
    slaw first. add it to stews and taters to give them the green angle and lessen my brown tendencies. fun to cook…pasta sauces, bean stuff, breads, i love getting lost in the process once i begin and seeing where it takes me. i scan google recipes for variations on a theme but end up with a custom made finale. least fun … candy where you have to get sugar temps right or its garbage

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  12. i had friends in chicago and they were a kansas farm couple that were wonderful folks. i was a new thing as a vegetarian in their lives and they didnt have a veggie option in their cookbook other than bubble and squeek which was potato and cabbage. i have since modified it to include lots of onions garlic other veggies laying around fake meat particularly impossible sausages or brats or black bean burgers
    colcannon is the same thing from the irish corner of the uk. love the cabbage potato base

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  13. Sadly, a friend of mine became obsessed with collecting Cabbage Patch Kid dolls. She spent thousands of dollars collecting. Nothing I or her family said could intervene. I know that sounds crazy but to her it was a real investment in the toy’s value later on in her life. She died of diabetes related illness before cashing in.
    Sorry for the downer.

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  14. Rise and Shine, Baboons,

    I think about cabbage not at all. I just do not like it much unless it is cole slaw.

    The most fun I have lately is when my art group meets at my house or another friend’s house and we spend the day making things and feasting on the pot luck. We spend all kinds of time talking and laughing. My recent trip to Savannah for the Garden Tour was also all kinds of fun. One of the highlights was the Farmers Market in Forsyth Park. We talked to all the vendors and bought our supper. It was great.

    I usually do not find cooking fun, but I sure do find eating fun. This weekend I made a creamy cheese souffle to use up some of the eggs in the refrigerator. My friend brought a cherry cobbler for dessert, made of cherries she picked from my tree. It was delicious and complete with several pits, a must with sour cherries. That tree started blossoming today, so another crop is on the way.

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  17. Thanks for the birthday greetings and sentiments expressed, I really appreciate them. It has been a busy day, with emails, phone calls, and visits; a lot more socializing than I’m accustomed to, so I’m pooped. But I love that people from near and far have reached out to let me know that for a brief moment I was on their mind today.

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  19. I’ve been battling spring allergies, which limits opportunities for fun. But playing with Charlotte every day is fun; she’s become quite the feline athlete as she bats her paper balls. Playing hide and seek with my grandson this weekend was fun. Husband and I watched a movie together for the first time in a while, and that was fun (the movie was Conclave, very good). We’re in the very early stages of planning a summer road trip, which can be fun, with more fun in a few months to look forward to.

    Cooking for me is mostly fun and relaxing. It would be hard to pick one thing I like best, but I love making pizza, any kind of bread or baked goods, holiday cooking and baking; I could go on. Canning isn’t fun, but the results are worth the pain: homemade pickles, salsa, and jam.

    We eat cabbage occasionally, not nearly often enough for Husband. Coleslaw in summer and creamed cabbage in the winter.

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  20. I love cabbage! It’s such a versatile vegetable. In soups and stews, fried and roasted, raw in slaw and salads, and even caramelized. I love good cabbage rolls, but I admit they’re more trouble than I’m able or willing to go through now, so they’re all in my past, but I’m glad that they were.

    I wouldn’t categorize cooking as fun, unless you’re cooking with someone. My good friend, Helen, is one of my favorite cooking partners, and my late friend, Anne, was another one it was a total delight to be in the kitchen with. I will say, though, that I enjoyed cooking when I did; there is something really satisfying in preparing a tasty and nourishing meal.

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  21. The last time I ate cabbage was last Friday. It was in an egg roll from a food truck I visited while I was at the Art In Bloom event at the art institute.

    I love cabbage – it is forgiving of those of us who don’t use things up very promptly. It will wait for me till I am ready to cook it.

    I have posted this before, I am pretty sure….I have a fondness for poems about food.

    Corned Beef and Cabbage

    I can see her in the kitchen,
    Cooking up, for the hundredth time,
    A little something from her
    Limited Midwestern repertoire.
    Cigarette going in the ashtray,
    The red wine pulsing in its glass,
    A warning light meaning
    Everything was simmering
    Just below the steel lid
    Of her smile, as she boiled
    The beef into submission,
    Chopped her way
    Through the vegetable kingdom
    With the broken-handled knife
    I use tonight, feeling her
    Anger rising from the dark
    Chambers of the head
    Of cabbage I slice through,
    Missing her, wanting
    To chew things over
    With my mother again.

    – George Bilgere

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  22. I realized something this eve – part of the fun of cooking for more than myself used to be that it would be appreciated in some way. Unfortunately, that is now beyond Husband – for one thing his taste buds aren’t working well at this point. It’s usually a chore for him to eat, but to his credit he pretty much finished what I put in front of him. There’s just no joy in it for him.

    Maybe it’s time to invite someone else over to dinner!

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