I looked up at the television yesterday to see a bit of a cooking show in which famous folks (mostly chefs) weigh in on their favorites. This particular dish was some kind of dumpling and there was a close up shot of somebody’s hand using chopsticks to pick up the dumpling. I know enough about this kind of stuff to know that the chances that it was the hand of the particular chef were nil. Most likely a hand model. Yes, there are such things although I’m wondering if there is a subgenre of the hand modeling subgenre for chopsticks use.
When I was in college, my freshman year roommate was from Japan – Yoshiko. We had a pretty good year. She bought a wonderful stereo half way through and she also taught me to use chopsticks and food that you eat with chopsticks. There was no Chinese/Korean/Thai/Japanese food in my house growing up. In fact, the first time I had any Chinse food in my life was that year in college.
These days, we have a ton of chopsticks at our house. For many years, every time I found chopsticks on sale or that were interesting, I’d pick them up. At last count, there are about 70. And the sad thing is that I’m the only one who uses them. When YA was little, I bought a set of cheater chopsticks but she wasn’t very interested and as she got older, she absolutely refused. Occasionally if I serve Chinese, a guest may attempt them but usually they eventually fall back onto forks and spoons.
I’m not sure why I like chopsticks so much – I use them sometimes even if it’s a food you wouldn’t associate with them.
Do you own chopsticks? Do you have a favorite dish to go with them?
Over the years I’ve tried a lot of different food plans. Whenever I hear of someone talking about how good they feel on some particular diet, I get curious. I’ve even tried raw a couple of times; the second time I lasted the longest – four days. Tried the zone for a bit. The Mediterranean is pretty close to our regular habit, although as vegetarians, we pass on the occasional fish/meat.
The keto diet was the one that I toyed with for quite some time before giving it a shot. I have two good friends who swear by it. I loaded up on a few keto carb substitutes and I made it three weeks. But I didn’t feel better. In fact if you factor in how much I was thinking about carbs, dreaming about carbs, crying about carbs, I was much worse.
So it probably won’t surprise anybody that every now and then I let my delight in carbs get the better of me. Every month or so YA asks if Great Harvest is making Derby Cookies; they are her favorites. She is also very fond of the various cheese breads that Great Harvest makes. When she looked at the March newsletter, she was happy that the Derby cookies were on the docket as well as the gouda garlic bread. Since she was traveling and I was in party prep, I made the bakery run on Saturday (that’s when they do the gouda bread). I thought that ordering ahead would help, but it didn’t. In addition to YA’s bread and cookies, I left the bakery with a White Cinnamon Chip loaf and an Apple Caramel loaf (mostly apple, not much caramel – a perfect ration for me).
This is a lot of bread, even for me. YA will take care of the gouda and probably most of the cookies. Guess I’ll just have to suffer through my two loaves. Sigh.
Anything that occasionally just makes you lose control?
Most people probably don’t feel this way, but all the prep going into a big party is actually a gift to myself. The confluence of making lists, organizing, cooking and then being with the people of my life makes a big party a perfect experience for me. I’m pretty sure that if there was such a thing as a glow-meter, I’d be off the scales during my gatherings.
I often get asked what guests should bring to one of my parties. If you’ve done this, you’ve gotten my standard answers. “Bring yourself.” “Bring your appetite.” Occasionally I will tell someone if they have a particular beverage that they can’t live without, they might bring that.
It’s a testament to how our society has changed that everyone goes under the assumption that every party is potluck and you have to pony up. A friend who has never been able to come to my Pi Day festivities (but has always stopped by the next day for tea and leftovers) showed up with a strawberry rhubarb pie. She was a little worried and left it sitting on the dining room buffet but it was just fine and I put it out. But it is a bit like bringing coals to Newcastle when you bring pie to my Pi Day. LOL.
Folks brought flowers (all of which are doing nicely and safe from the cat) and, of course, wine. My people do seem to be wine people. Lots of empties into the recycling after the party was over!
And for those who aren’t local or couldn’t make it, here is a list of this year’s pies: Blueberry, Dutch Apple, Peaches & Cream, Macadamia Coconut Caramel, Crack, Chocolate Chip/PB Whoopies, Banofi, Pear Croustade, Key Lime and Butterfinger Cream. Oh, and let’s not forget the Strawberry Rhubarb!
Do you have a go-to dish that you take to potlucks?
With YA out of town, I’m in my “eat what’s here and don’t shop” mode. I actually enjoy this part of YA traveling. (Not as crazy about being in charge of Guinevere’s early morning and late night trips outside, but I’ll live.)
This week there have been quite a few leftovers in the fridge – more than usual. Since I also worry about food going bad, I decided that I would have dinner for breakfast. I’ve done breakfast for dinner many times in my life but except for a handful of cold pizza starts to a day, I’ve never actually heated up what I think of as dinner food and had it as the first meal in the morning.
I heated up some rice with carrots and parsnips and had it alongside some brie and applesauce. It was very nice and now I’m thinking I should switch things up more often. The only hitch was the feeling that I needed dessert afterwards!
Do you have any foods that you wouldn’t normally eat for breakfast?
When I find something I really like at a restaurant, it’s really really hard for me to choose something else the next time. Even if it looks good. Black Coffee & Waffle in St. Paul has several waffle options that look wonderful to me. As I’m driving over there I’m thinking to myself that I should try something new (besides the almond butter, fresh fruit & granola waffle) and then I never do. Same with the olive pimento veggie burger at The Tipsy Steer. In what I consider a personal victory, on Sunday I actually got the crumb cake at Black Walnut Bakery. I’ve looked at it several times but always end up ordering the bear claw, which Black Walnut makes with puff pastry, pastry cream and raspberry jam. The crumb cake also had raspberry and was wonderful, but if I’m honest, I also bought a bear claw (just in case) and had it yesterday!
Quirk #2
Most of my adult life, I’ve done without a dishwasher. Either I just didn’t have one or for many many years in my current house, it just didn’t work. Now that we have a nice dishwasher that YA insisted on when we had the kitchen remodeled, I end up putting the clean dishes away about 80% of the time. It’s not a horrible job – only takes about 5 minutes, but I’m finding that afterwards, I resist putting any dirty dishes in for a bit. As if it needs to sit empty for a day or so before I start loading it up again. Like it needs to rest and recharge? Maybe it needs a spa day?
These days I rarely stop at coffee shops. Mostly I’m just too cheap when I can make my own coffee or tea at home for a fraction of the cost. But every couple of months, YA and I will make a stop at a Caribou if we are out and about.
In early days, when there was a Caribou two blocks from house, I will admit I was more of a regular. But in keeping with my “like it cheaper” gene, I purchased myself a mug that I could use whenever I stopped by. Saved a bit of money and saved yet another coffee cup in the trash. Even though this mug is close to 25 years old, it’s in pristine shape – it doesn’t get used that often and I wash it by hand instead of throwing it in the dishwasher. When we lost our little Caribou (first the big Lyndale closing and then the Minnehaha Creek bridge re-build), my use of my mug plummeted.
When I dragged it out to the car with me yesterday, it was probably the first time in a year that it had gotten any use. The young man behind the counter was astonished to see it. He picked it up, turned it around, looked at the bottom then called over co-workers to look at it. The big draw turned out to be the logo, which apparently was “updated” back in 2010. If you had asked me, I would not have been able to tell you what the new logo looks like:
Guess I’m just oblivious. But it turned out OK… they were all so enamored of my antique mug that they gave me my decaf for free!
Do you have a favorite cup/mug for your coffee or tea?
And we thought it was cold during the last cold spell.
Not much happening on the farm this week. The sun is sure getting stronger, and the chickens stand on the south side of the shed, in the sun, out of the wind, against the white steel, and they don’t venture much further. They even laid a few eggs.
I’m having a hard time feeling motivated lately. Every now and then I get to a point where I feel like the Earth is going to fall into the sun, so what’s the point anyway.
Sigh.
And then I get up and go do something.
It could be the political climate, it could be the cold weather, it could just be the same old routine day after day. Have you noticed? Even though there’s a lot going on, and every day is different, the routine is still the same.
And coffee. Evidently, I’m a coffee drinker now. One day I bought a bag of coffee. Wait, back up—Why didn’t this group tell me there was different flavors of coffee?? I spent a day researching coffee flavors, and then I was determined not to buy a coffee maker because I wasn’t sure how committed I was to all this, so I tried various methods of making coffee without a coffee maker, and I researched egg coffee, and reusing the grounds, and strainers and filters, and I spilled a lot, and I made too many cups, bowls, and pans dirty… and then about the fourth day I bought a $10 coffee maker at Menards.
Sigh.
And a bag of small bag of Highland Grog coffee.
Sigh.
When we say we had “one cup”, are we actually referring to the volume measurement of one liquid cup? Because my travel mug is roughly two cups, and if I have two in a day, am I having four cups of coffee or two? This morning I made about three circles in the kitchen trying to figure out what I was doing first or next. I just haven’t gotten this whole coffee making process figured out yet.
Sigh.
There’s a spot in the yard where I get a real good echo off the barn and chicken coop. I stood there one day and yelled ‘Hello!’ a dozen times. I’d get two good echo’s off that and it was kinda fun and I enjoyed myself.
Out in the shed, I’ve gotten a cabinet mounted, and I’m working on the bolt storage shelves.
I saw a truck from a concrete company on the road the other day. I took a photo of it at the stoplight and was able to contact them for an estimate on adding more concrete in the shed. $13,000 for a flat slab 25’x50’. Well, that’s not a ton of money. I mean, it’s still $13K, but that’s hardly anything! Oh, it’s not going to happen this summer. I’ve said before, just because crop prices are up one year, doesn’t mean we should go crazy buying stuff, because you’d still have to make that payment next year. That’s how this whole shop project started: crop prices were really good in 2022 and I felt like I had money and I signed a contract for concrete in 2023 and began my shop. Here we are in 2025 and I’m still paying off the shop.
People may be curious about the agricultural environment in this administration…well, there’s lots of speculation. Prices are holding steady for the most part for corn and soybeans. They vary a few cents up and down every day based on talk of a trade deal with China, or good weather in Argentina. And I’ll say again, it’s such a global market, tariffs will send a price down, but bad weather in Brazil will bring it back up. It’s kinda crazy. I have a little corn in storage at the elevator, I put it there last fall, knowing I always need cash come spring, and hoping the price will have gone up enough to offset what I’m paying for storage of it. $0.06 / bushel / month. So, maybe today I win, and tomorrow I’ll lose. I’ll need the money either way.
This weekend at the college is the physics department club doing their demonstration show fundraiser. They physics kids are nerds as much as the theater kids are. They’re a good group though, and even though the show hasn’t changed too much in the 15 years I’ve been doing this, the audience kids seem to like it.
Sitcoms have never been my favorite form of entertainment. A few exceptions over the years, but for the most part they seem silly and overblown to me. Truly, what person on the planet would actually do this:
Then every now and then…
I was meeting a friend at Whole Foods for lunch (they have a great salad bar and hot bar along with tables and chairs, so it’s a great place for two folks with food restrictions to have a fun meal together). My friend texted me that she was running about five minutes late so I decided to hang out in the produce section near the front door while I waited.
And then it happened. A woman took a corner a little too tightly with her cart and rammed into the lovingly stacked display of avocados. They didn’t all come tumbling down (like they would have on tv) but it was still a waterfall of green as them fell. She was mortified and sank to her knees, trying to corral the wayward fruits. Three Whole Foods employees appeared out of nowhere and they had the avocados re-stacked in less than a minute. It was very impressive. The photo above is after everything was back in order.
Although I never video tape anything, I did have a small wish that I could have gotten the fall and the re-assembly on film.
Maybe I should give sit-coms more leeway!
If we were casting for sitcom roles today, who would you like to be cast as?
We have been at our son’s home since Friday, and the cold weather has made for a great deal of family time. Son, Daughter in Law, Daughter, Husband, me, and Grandson are all here together. There has been lots of time playing Uno, putting together jigsaw puzzles, doing art projects with grandson, cooking big meals, watching the first two How To Train Your Dragon movies, playing with the Westie and the cat and sleeping late.
I have been a nervous wreck since before we drove here on Friday. The cold frightens me more than it used to. I have developed great anxiety anticipating driving in this cold weather, mainly surrounding the van breaking down in the middle of nowhere and then freezing to death. We were supposed to go to see my 93 year old aunt yesterday in Watertown, SD, about 40 miles north of Brookings, and I was so relieved when she phoned in the morning to say she had a cough and a fever and we shouldn’t come. Husband has been going out to start the van at intervals and even drove it into town yesterday, so he is keeping the engine warm.
This cold weather is unprecedented in my experience, and I am really worried about the trip home on Tuesday. The subzero windchills aren’t supposed to let up until Wednesday, and I might try to convince Husband to stay another day and leave on Wednesday. We have lots of blankets in the event of a breakdown. The van is working well, but you never know!
What do you have in your winter survival kit in your vehicle? How are you coping with the cold? What are your favorite indoor family activities?
I apologize for two food related posts in a row, but the current obscenely cold weather and the even more obscene political news have caused me and Husband to stay home, insulate ourselves, and cook.
We are typically very busy in the kitchen, but since December we have gone pretty wild. Two weekends ago we made a number entrees including Hungarian pot roast, baked salmon, sheet pan gnocchi with peppers and sausages, a baked risotto, and red beans and rice. The latter recipe came from a New Orleans native with the wonderful name of Pableaux Johnson. None of it has gone to waste, I should add.
We usually cook most things from scratch, and now that includes beans. I have ordered a number of dried beans from Rancho Gordo. Husband notes he is feeling better since we started with the beans, and misses it when we don’t have beans on the menu. We have also dived deep into traditional foods of northern Spain. Supper last night was leftover Fabada, a Spanish white bean stew with chorizo, ham hock, and blood sausage. It is delicious.
I realize that we turn to cooking like this to feel safe and to have some sense of control. I find the extreme cold to be terribly frightening. A couple of nights ago the wind chill was -43. Kyrill our terrier ran off the deck in pursuit of a bunny and didn’t come right back as he usually does. Husband went out to get him, and found him paralyzed with cold in the snow on the side of the house. He had only been out a minute or less. He got some left over pot roast in his kibble that night.
How are you coping with the weather and the political mess we are in? What are some of your favorite world cuisines? Thoughts on dried beans?
Trail Baboon 