Kristen – Page 29 – Food Follies

What’s in the Fridge?

I call it ‘leftover casserole’ or ‘goulash’. Other people might call it ‘cleaning out the fridge’ – LOL. I took the bowl of John’s remaining homemade tomato sauce, chopped up the three large meatballs, added what was left of a jar of four cheese pasta sauce, plus what was left of a jar of ground beef pasta sauce, plus a nice flavoring of parmesan cheese, and mixed it all up together in a casserole dish. Then I added some cooked penne pasta (had this been a real goulash, such as from my childhood, it would have been wide egg noodles, but what are you gonna do), mixed, sprinkled more parmesan cheese on top for decoration, and popped it in the oven.

I can smell it now – mmmmmmm. There’s NOTHING like a house filled with the smell of cooking. If all of those companies that make air fresheners could duplicate that smell, they’d be five times as successful. (Of course, I also think that if they could make a cologne that smelled like freshly baked bread, interpersonal relations would probably reach an all time high. *grin*)

Nothing Like A Merlot

John and I finally cracked open a bottle of wine that he got last year at work for the holidays: A local wine, Pietra Santa, from the Cienega (See-YEN-eh-guh) Valley; a 1998 Merlot. The first sip packed a punch in the back of the throat, but the taste was very pleasant and slightly…. musky, in the good way that Merlots tend to be.

I’d definitely recommend this wine, and think it would probably go well with a steak dinner, provided the steak was cooked without a lot of added flavorings or marinades – don’t need too many flavors jumping around together when you’ve already got the wine going too. (Oh, and steak fries would be good also. We actually just had some potato chips with it, as it was after dinner, but it was an excellent combo, if not overly genteel – LOL!)

Also, drinking wine after 7 p.m. here has the added benefit of making our hands and feet feel a bit warmer tonight as well, of course. *grin*

An Onion Of Any Other Name

I’m a big fan of white sauce garlic chicken pizza, but if you’re going to put onions on it, they should be chopped green onions, or really carmelized, translucent, diced white or yellow onions, but not strips of raw, sliced onion that are only cooked with the baking of the pizza itself. It’s all about texture. Okay, texture and expectation, but mainly texture. I just think the large, crunchy onion strips are a bit too much contrast when you bite into a slice and get that instead of a well-blended melange. On the plus side, this same pizza really did TASTE fantastic and had one of THE BEST crusts I’ve had in YEARS – the perfect crispness and thickness. And you can’t put a price on good company either.

White Chocolate Raspberry

We’ve been sampling the various store brand yogurts over the last few months. Albertson’s and Safeway’s seemed pretty good, but we found that Nob Hill’s “Sunnyside Farms” brand was a bit too sweet for our taste buds, at least in their berry flavors. However, just a few moments ago I had a “White Chocolate Raspberry” flavor yogurt and it was REALLY delicious! It was very creamy, with a subtle white chocolate smoothness and flavor and a ‘tint’ of raspberry. It wasn’t too sweet at all – in fact, I’d go back just for this one flavor – LOL. Oh, yes, and hardly ‘yogurty tangy’ at all – almost tasted like pudding, if pudding had live bacteria swimming in it – LOL.

"No Cell Phone" Area & Walnut Strike – Not Related

I think this is a fantastic idea. Just like with the smoking and no-smoking areas within a restaurant, you’ll get a little spill over, but it’d be really nice to be justified to ask someone to step away with their cell phone conversation. (Just the other day I was waiting for John to come out of a store, and I listened to a woman’s entire cell phone conversation, in which she gave out her address and phone number! HELLO??!??) If cell phone companies really wanted to make people happy (and restaurant people especially) they’d develop a microphone where you can talk low and whisper and still have it be completely easy to hear on the other end, without picking up any background noise. If I’m going to overhear people talking while I’m eating my chicken burrito platter, I want to hear BOTH ends of the conversation and they better only be in the next booth – LOL.

In other foodish news, this article reminds me of the Seinfeld episode with Kramer being on strike at the bagel place. Life imitating art imitating life.

Inconceivable

We were the only ones in the fast-food type restaurant, and the clump of kids that came in had to sit in the booth right behind us. Not only that, there were about eight of them and only four of them could fit into the booth, so the rest of them pulled up chairs. One kid pulled up a chair and was sitting RIGHT NEXT to my booth seat, so close that, in fact, he had to move when we got up to leave. And they were loud, in a regular kid kind of way, so that John and I couldn’t even have a conversation, at least, not one that this group wouldn’t also hear.

I probably should have said something. At least, “Would you mind moving up a little so you’re not sitting with US?” but I think I was just a bit stunned. As a solution, I quickly finished up what I was eating (which had ceased to be an enjoyable experience) and we left.

I suppose it could simply be a cultural/familial thing. I was raised to believe that being considerate not to intrude on other people was a nice thing. (As a kid, I also would have wanted a table we could all fit at, and one as far from other people as possible. Go figure.) Other people seem to believe that being close together is a sign of niceness, rather than ‘distance’. Overall, I think the best thing for any of us is probably to be aware that there are differences, and not assume either way, but to just PAY ATTENTION. [This has been a public service announcement/rant. You may now continue with your regularly scheduled program.]

Not REALLY A Consolation Prize

Given the choice, I’d choose the soup anyway. But probably not canned – LOL – John’s getting really good at homemade soups! Oh, John…….! *grin*

More Contest Craziness

How would you like to be known by a quote like this one: “I’m on top of the world right now, because everyone’s going to know that I can shove more than three burgers in my mouth!” This guy doesn’t seem to mind – LOL. On the other hand, at least he wasn’t the person who tried to drink an entire bottle of ketchup – *shudder*

Not Your Father’s Philly Cheesesteak

$100 Philly Cheesesteak? “Served with a small bottle of champagne, Barclay Prime’s cheesesteak is made of sliced Kobe beef, melted Taleggio cheese, shaved truffles, sauteed foie gras, caramelized onions and heirloom shaved tomatoes on a homemade brioche roll brushed with truffle butter and squirted with homemade mustard.” Sure, it’s an interesting advertising gimmick, but… “You shouldn’t mess with the Philadelphia cheesesteak,” groused Samuel Lehrer, who was eating takeout Chinese several blocks from Barclay Prime. “Let it alone.” *grin*

Season to taste?

It’s perfectly natural that what your body needs is reflected in what tastes good to you, but it’s still pretty cool when you experience it in action. For the last few days, I’ve been really craving salt, as I think my body was low on this resource. I was out a lot in the strong California sun, but the air was chilly, so I didn’t realize as much what was happening as I might have if it was HOT out. For instance, I was horking down Lay’s potato chips like they were going out of style, but they didn’t taste at ALL salty to me, and my lips never began to shrivel. (And John assures me that the Lay’s taste as they usually do to him, so that’s my ‘proof’ that it’s not the chips themselves.) Usually I eat a handful and have had enough, but not today. I also had a grilled cheese sandwich, and the (salt involved) cheese just really hit the spot.

On the flip side, I haven’t had much interest in sweets at ALL, which is wrong, especially when one has a tin full of chocolates less than an arm’s length away – heh. Even yesterday, what sweets I did have were oddly unsatisfying.

In the general sense, I still find it odd when people insist that, say, a soup is too salty or too bland, without having any clue that it’s THEM or that objectivity isn’t actually POSSIBLE with food, and that it’s not necessarily the cook’s shortcoming, but their own body’s.