1. I once had a fairly long period of time in my life starting a little over 40 years ago when I regularly soaked and cooked beans of several varieties and turned them into refried beans, soups, chili, enchiladas, and other dishes I enjoyed a lot.
When I made baked beans for our 4th of July dinner, I used a combination of canned beans and dry beans, soaked and cooked.
An old thrill came back. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed working with dry beans and I'm ready to return to an old and nearly forgotten pleasure.
2. When I fixed those baked beans, I ended up with a container of cooked/canned beans I didn't need for the baked ones.
Today, I decided to make chili and I thought of my dad.
Had he been in the kitchen today and had he seen me cut up a ribeye steak into chunks for chili, he would have growled, "That's a good way to ruin a good steak."
Respectfully, I disagree. I also disagreed when he claimed that Aunt Lila "ruined a good steak" when she used sirloin steak to make Swiss steak.
My answer to Dad: "It's a good way to improve a batch of Swiss steak or a pot of chili."
And it was.
I cooked up a simple chili, not an award winning creative one, seasoned with cumin, paprika, and chili powder and every bite I took that had a chunk of ribeye steak in it was heavenly.
By the way, so was the bacon I included in this chili.
Now my question is: can I manage to fix myself something like a chili omelet? Or will it be more like a chili scramble?
Either way, chili + eggs = awesome in my funny little world of enjoying food!
3. The first copy I bought a few months ago of Jess Walter's book Beautiful Ruins got wet and the water moderately warped the second half of the book.
It's probably dumb, but I prefer reading undamaged books.
So I ordered a new copy of Beautiful Ruins from Better World Books.
It arrived today.
I needed a few things from Yoke's and before going to the store, I drove to the Kellogg City Park's gazebo because Christy knew that it used to have a little library (a place where a person can donate and also take books home for free).
The gazebo's little library is there, so I donated the moderately damaged Beautiful Ruins and noted that the little library was almost empty. Right now, Debbie and I have decided to keep books in the house. Several weeks ago, I unloaded the several boxes I had packed to donate to Better World Books and returned them to our shelves.
Now, however, if I decide to move a book (or books) along, I'll make a donation at the little library at the gazebo.
No comments:
Post a Comment