ruminations

Here are the flowers Suzy sent Mom in the hospital in Alameda;

Random reactions to Suzy's earlier blogs. Bill eating your about-to-be-tossed chicken stir-fry reminds me of once when Ted told me he'd finished up the beef in the fridge here. "What beef?" "It was in the back of the fridge." He lived, but after that I had to be careful what I left in there and for how long. Before going away on a trip and leaving Charlie here I always check carefully, too.

What is Texas two-step slaw? I have some cabbage I need to use forthwith. Do you have a good recipe for crab cakes? I love them but have never tried to make them. I once had a really good fish cake recipe, wherein some of the fish was blended up with other stuff and some was in chunks, but I've lost it. A newspaper item.

I have mixed feelings about Nora Ephron, but I must admit that I liked Heartburn. How could I not like a book that includes recipes? I've read about the new one, and will probably read it too. I liked your recipe for landfill surprise. We could have made quite a nice one out of Mom's fridge last Saturday. I keep up with fridge and freezer stuff, particularly in the summer, since there has to be room in the freezers for the new food (Mom and Marty get a fair amount of year-old-but-still-fine frozen vegetables), and the fresh stuff from the garden has to be kept under control, if only to guarantee space for new things. The fridge slips away some in the winter, though.

On Sunday I made (for noon dinner, an undying Sunday tradition in this house) a small pork roast, mashed potatoes, beets, and cooked cabbage. Yesterday I made a recipe out of the Star Tribune (Mom's paper) that was chicken breasts marinated in a blended mix of shallots, ginger, jalapeños, a little brown sugar, soy sauce, turmeric, coriander, oil and a little water. After a few hours of marinating, the breasts are gently sautéed. Then one is to make a glaze by boiling down half a cup of passion fruit juice. All I could find was passion/citrus drink (with a lot of water added), so I boiled down a cup of that to a syrup. Flung this on the breasts, served with sticky rice and a cucumber/jalapeno/peanut salad. The last of the season's cukes. It was all quite good. Took no prisoners, except for a few cukes. (In case it's not obvious, "took no prisoners" is my expression for "no leftovers.") Also made a tarte Tatin which was pretty good. Forgot to send some with Charlie to Mom's this morning, alas. Still have a fair number of apples left, and they're a kind that doesn't keep, Harrelsons.

I'm still trying to get on top of housecleaning. Got the downstairs bath yesterday, finally. I prefer to do big vacuuming on a sunny day (much easier to see), but we used up our sunny day planting garlic. Now it's misty, foggy and rainy (as it was yesterday, as well), but I'm just going to have to do it. Charlie has been spending a lot of time painting. He's painting the siding (one coat on the back, two coats on the front) before he puts it up. It's a huge job, particularly because each piece of cedar needs to be sanded on the front before painting. And the temperature is an issue, too. The primer coat is oil-based and requires 24 hours of temperatures above 45, not so easy to come by right now. He painted all day yesterday (in the garage), because we had a 24-hour window that included a warm night last night. Now a burst of Canadian air will put an end to that for a while. He can put the final coat on in the basement (water-based) because it doesn't have too much odor, but the oil paint is terrible. I got woozy every time I went into the garage yesterday, but it doesn't bother him too much. Don't know what the project for today is. If I put it off long enough he'll vacuum, and he does a much, much better job than I do. He puts on the brush and the crevice tool and gets the corners. I just want to be rid of the major dust and dirt.

Only one student visit this week (Wednesday); snow is predicted, but not much. Woodbury, which is not terribly far (an hour) and well traveled. I don't have to leave early, so it shouldn't be too bad. I am curious to know how Red is going to perform in snow. My last front-wheel drive, the '81 Omni, had very good traction. And if I really have to go somewhere in the snow, both of our pickups have 4-wheel drive. Charlie is also very nice about driving me places I absolutely have to go in the snow.

Oh, and as for reading. Do you know the books of Carolyn See?