So...whats for dinner?

Hello again everyone,

Oh Sandy that does not look good

Eric, I sometimes freeze stock in muffin trays and then pop them out put into ziplock bags for when I need a small amount for something. You just know that it's going to be great when you get that jelly consistency.

SpecialK, I too like a fridge cheesecake, my two favourites are a super tangy, lip puckering, lemon one, or a Baileys Irish cream one.

Oh Sandy, fingers crossed for you!

Lacey, you are one busy woman! I think the wedding is going to be wonderful. A lot to plan though.

Cooking around here had been pretty un -exciting. If it were just me, I would be eating Minus style. My cough has pretty much gone, but my voice is still not completely normal. I'm beginning to think it may not get any better. Hope I'm wrong. I promise I'll get back to talking about food soon.

So far the new dishwasher has done an excellent job. It's so quiet you barely know it's on and the dishes really are sparkling. Fingers crossed there too.

Dad has had a bit of a setback. Nothing life threatening but certainly life style threatening. We see a specialist Monday so I'll know more then. It's a problem with his shoulder.

Good to hear from you Freya. Hope you are managing things.

Charleston. I love it. I've eaten my way around the world, but Charleston is my favorite. We drive down every year to get shrimp for the freezer. I live outside of Charlotte NC so it's not far.

OK, y'all need to stop talking about donuts. You know how influenced by others food choices I am!

Savannah is actually my favourite but Charleston is second. So much good food to be had in that ares!

Cliff, how close do you live to Coffeyville and Dearing? I've twice done a weeklong artist residency for the Coffeyville Humanities Project and remember that King's Coffee in Dearing has great espresso drinks and meringue pies to die…no, make that KILL for. Used to drive to Bartlesville for great BBQ.

The project manager talked me down off the ledge this morning. He had freaked out when he saw the photos, because he didn’t see anything like that in the full bight midday sunlight plus the kitchen lighting. But he talked to the crew leader, who said that the crease is a joint between the original and repaired part of the ceiling—because of the lighting, he too thought everything was even contour-and-color-wise and therefore finished. I’ve been assured that is NOT water damage, new or pre-existing. They’re coming tomorrow to inspect, level the contour, and add a new coat of paint to that area of the ceiling to make it match the rest of the ceiling; and that I won’t have to relocate anything—they will cover and tarp. But I’m still gonna re-caulk the bathtub!

Chi, would it be worth getting a plumber out to check the tub plumbing?

Oh, the extra 1/4 inch space in the jars must have been the right thing to do. All 11 jar lids went "plink" as the vacuum formed. :-)

minus - the glass of wine description made me laugh, you and I could eat together happily! I'm a grazer more than a consumer of balanced meals even though I cook them often. To make the fridge Cheesecake you combine 3 large pkgs of softened cream cheese with 1 c sugar and beat in the mixer at pretty high speed until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture is fluffy. Slowly add 2 c heavy cream and when it is incorporated add 1 t vanilla and then whip at high speed until very light - like the heavy cream has whipped. In a large springform pan put a wall of cake ladyfingers (the soft ones) around the edge and a floor, filling the gaps with torn lady finger. Put 1/3 of the filling on, a layer of ladyfingers, repeat twice, ending with filling. Chill for 15 mins and top with cherry pie filling. Chill overnight. If topping with fresh fruit do that after the overnight chill, just before serving. To serve, take the side of the springform off but leave the cake on the springform bottom.

Special, that is how my mom makes her cheesecake except she doesn't put it in a springform pan

Most remoulade I've had was made with Creole mustard, egg yolk (or mayo), horseradish and a little cayenne. When I lived in the PNW, crab Louis was made with Thousand Island dressing.

Please forgive the typos--am typing on my iPad in a hotel (Bob has an early reading day at Advocate Christ tomorrow and wanted me to stay over with him--a horrendous 2-1/2 hr drive in rush hour and rain). Had apps In the exec. lounge: beef & mushrooms en croute, roast beef bruschetta, and Greek salad skewers. Then to dinner at Cooper's Hawk Winery, where Bob had a large kale salad with a salmon filet and I had seafood bisque and ahi tuna sashimi with a sriracha-black sesame seed vinaigrette.

Weather is ugly. Temp dove to 34 before rebounding into the low 40s with the rain. Will get up to about 50 tomorrow with scattered storms (we'll miss the violent ones) changing to snow overnight--3" Sat. Then 40 Sunday, with more rain in the evening. All next week will be "wintry mix." Mr. Kim who owns the hardware store around the corner is doing the happy dance, because maybe now he'll finally sell some shovels and salt.

Tomorrow night we will hunker down with our download of "Moonlight" and borrowedAcademy-voter DVD copy of "Fences." Maybe we can find a showing of "Lion" Sat. night if Bob gets home early enough and it's not snowing too hard. He is obsessed with winning the Oscar quiz at the party we're attending Sunday night at Cellars.

That's right Special. My mom always used a baking pan to put it in. Came out very easy. Think I will make a cheesecake for dessert for Easter. Haven't made one in a while

Thanks Freya. I had to look up Maltesers. Sounds like they're sort of like our old fashioned Malted Milk Balls. Interesting that there are are slightly different ingredients in different countries. In Canada and the US they have corn syrup. Not so in England, Ireland, New Zealand and Australia. See below from Wiki. I'll have to look for them in the stores.

In January 2017, Maltesers officially became available in the United States for the first time

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltesers

Hunting for my spring form pan. Dinner was spaghetti with meat sauce. Enough for tonight.

Cold weather is returning this weekend. Will make a beef stew.

Speaking of Aussie food favorites, I couldn’t find Vegemite but Marmite is sorta passable. However, no restaurants or pastry shops here make Pavlovas. Will probably need to go Down Under to try one—Australia & NZ are on my travel bucket list (as are Maui and AK’s Inside Passage).

Oh, Freya, I hope you can make that trip! We just got a brochure from Viking Ocean Cruises for a Med-to-Baltic cruise that starts in Barcelona and ends in Stockholm—just about every port including St. Petersburg. Bummer is that it's 22 days long, and the only way Bob can take that much time off is if he wins the lottery and pays into his practice's operating account an amount equal to the revenue he'd have generated had he been working instead of on holiday. (He had to take a cut to his monthly draw equal to all the operating expenses of his practice during the time he lost recovering from a botched colonoscopy, hospitalizations and two surgeries back in 2015). With us, the cost of the travel—even Business Class—is not the dealbreaker: it's how much money he and his office would lose by his taking time off. I wish he'd retire, but he wants to keep practicing until he's incapacitated. Hoping against hope that one of his hospitals would buy his practice. We'd see a cut in income, but he'd have sane hours and defined sick and vacation time. (Not to mention no malpractice insurance premiums to pay, no worries about not making payroll and either having to take a cut or dip into our own money). My PCP and MO both are employed by their respective hospital systems, and get to live like normal people. I envy those in rational and civilized countries that have effective and thorough national health systems…but I envy the physicians employed by them, and their families, even more.

As to Vegemite, maybe cancer centers could import a bunch of it to give out to chemo patients, the way they currently hand out boxes of LemonHeads hard candies. A couple of years ago, an Aussie-emigre folksinger friend of mine (we had roomed together at a festival and a conference) hosted a showcase room at a regional Folk Alliance conference—and refreshments were Foster’s Lager and Vegemite mini-sandwiches. The latter were surprisingly good.

Yesterday it was 70°, tonight 35. I decided to make some vegetable beef soup using up odds and ends in the veggie bin - a leek, a couple of ears of corn, a few green beans, carrots, a small piece of cabbage, etc. I had a small piece of chuck roast in the freezer and a few beef bones that I made the stock from. We ate the soup with a baguette - very satisfying. Plus we'll have lunches for a couple of days. I'll take some to dad Monday which will make him happy. I also made a small blackberry cobbler that's a tad too sweet. I over compensated with the sugar because I had two cartons of blackberries, one of which was deliciously sweet, but the other was puckering! They both had good blackberry flavor though. I really prefer my fruity fillings on the tart side.

Freya, Iceland! How awesome! What kind of foods do they eat (besides fish)?