Friday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $13 breakfast + $30 for 2 bottles wine
Found money - $0.21 (sidewalks, road, stair step)

Saturday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $13 breakfast + $17 groceries + $4.50 cat toy
Found money - $0

So we are unburnt. We've had several nights of rain, thunderstorms, and hail. I was at a potluck last night where several people collected and put hail in the freezer. Not quite sure what purpose saving hail in the freezer serves, but to each his own.

I didn't realize that roasting beef bones would cause such a stir! We got the beef soup bones - mostly joints, with meat and cartilage attached - as part of our 40 lbs of beef. The only part that needs pre-planning was to ask that the bones get chopped into 3 inch pieces. 3 inches is critical for marrow, because if you think of a bone as deviously shaped straw, 3 inches is about the length you can comfortably fish out the marrow from the bone using a knife.

Roasting bones is dead easy. Pull out large heavy metal pan that's a couple of inches deep (need a place for the beef suet to go and it shouldn't be the bottom of the stove), set unfrozen bones on pan, set oven to 350F, no oil, no cover. Marrow is done quickly, when the center pulls away from the bone. Pull it out and spread it on toast. So much for the 1/2 recipe.

But we're not done, I put the marrowless bones and meat back in the oven and keep roasting for 2.5-3 hours. Bone and meat should be deep brown. Pour off the suet (beef fat). If you are into authentic Christmas mincemeat or feeding winter birds, suet's your thing. Put the roasted bones and meat into a pot, add water to barely cover and set on a low heat. Water should simmer lightly for a couple hours more. Strain the solids from the liquid - pick out and retain the meat. Chill the liquid overnight, and scrape off the rest of suet from the top. You should have a brown jelly - the beef stock - and if you made it right its pot roast in a bowl.

If you liked that, perhaps you all will appreciate what I did with the flank steak. Flank steak (cow abs) is a tricky cut - its either best as london broil or fajita (quick sear), or its a long slow braise. I took a first stab at making matahambre - butterflied, stuffed, rolled.

Matahambre (hunger killer)

2 lbs flank steak
4 whole raw carrots, quartered
1 c raw spinach
6 garlic cloves, minced
6 hard boiled eggs, whole and peeled
salt, pepper, water

Butterfly the flank steak, meaning cut the steak along its width to within 3/4 of an inch off the side, forming a hinge. (Hinge should be along the grain of the meat). Open and flatten steak like the pages of a book. Spread plastic wrap over the top of the steak, take a mallet and whack it thin.

You now have a wide, flat piece of meat with the grain going up and down. Salt and pepper the meat on both sides, spread the garlic all along the meat. Spread the spinach throughout. Align the carrots up and down, with the grain), set in three piles. Place hard boiled eggs on top of the carrots.

Tightly roll the flank steak and fillings - and by tight, think sleeping bag into tube tight. When you have your tube, truss it secure with string.

Place flank steak tube in pan, add water to half way up the tube (it sounds like a lot, but I didn't add enough water, so I believe it) Braise the tube, covered, for 2.5 hrs, turning the tube once.

Slice your hunger killer like a jelly roll.

Mine was messy - didn't quite roll it tightly enough - but delicious.

Thursday
Saving log - $2 tip box
Spending log - $1.75 coffee + $.45 apple
Found money - $0.36 (quarter by the parking meter, dime on sidewalk, penny in lobby)

Wednesday
Saving log - $3 tip box
Spending log - $1.75 coffee
Found money - $.03 (sidewalks)

Duck 4 beef will occur Saturday Oct 17.

Got a lot of fresh lima bean pods from sister, along with beets, carrots, potatoes, and a few peppers. I shucked the limas out of the pods, and did this with them:

Lima beans with bacon and garlic

3 c shelled fresh lima beans
3 thick strips bacon
4 garlic cloves, chopped
water, salt

Boil limas in salted water for about 20 minutes. Drain.
Fry the bacon - I like it crispy. Remove bacon from pan, set on paper towel to drain.
Remove all but 2 tbsp bacon fat from pan. Saute garlic in bacon fat for a couple of minutes. Add back the limas to the bacon fat and garlic to heat the limas through. Stir, deglaze the pan - add a bit of water if necessary.
Crumble the bacon over the limas and serve.

Sunday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $3.99 bagel, coffee + $.92 apple
Found money - $.01 (sidewalk) + $0.13 (bus stop) $0.02 (2 different parking lots)

Saturday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $8 Thai herbs and bamboo skewers
Found money - $0

Picked up our beef share yesterday afternoon at the drop site, a parking lot off of Lake City (sounds so illicit!). It was a bit more complicated than grab our bags and go - we had three other players, so it was sort the frozen cuts in the bed of a pickup truck, first divy up what cuts there are a lot of, then horse trade for the unique cuts, then weigh our shares just to get the ballpark. Our share was a couple of pounds shy of 40, so if I wanted to make a stink, I could, but we got a nice mix of stuff, and very tradeable for part 2.

The farmers, based out of Yakima, who were selling us the beef also came with a bit extra - we got a couple of pounds of extra summer sausage which is fresh and delicious, and a couple of pounds of peppers and tomatoes compliments of a couple of the neighboring farms.

Our share all fit in the freezer on top of our refrigerator. I did clean out and eat a bit of the old stuff we had there already to prepare.

After the beef share was divided, all of us decided to have "beef-fest" at lawyer friend's house and make a beef or beef-inspired dish. We thawed out one package of tenderloin and made Thai beef salad. We used what we had for the salad fixings, so instead of a bed of lettuce, which is the "official" recipe, we made a bed of sliced tomatoes, added some thinly sliced red onion, added thai basil, mint, cilantro. DH sliced and skewered the tenderloin, grilled it on site, we laid the grilled skewers on the bed of tomatoes, and dressed the whole thing with lime juice, fish sauce, sugar, garlic, serrano pepper. Yum!

In the next couple of days, I'll inventory exactly what we got - cut, number of packages, pounds, so our duck deal can get off the ground. I think we will be aiming for a pound for pound deal.

At the beef fest last night, one of our dinner guests mentioned that she gets tuna and seafood every year, and is very willing to barter tuna for beef, also on a pound for pound deal. I'm becoming more and more like dad every year. He used to trade beef for pig and chicken etc, too.

Thursday
Saving log - $0 tip box
Spending log - $1.75 coffee + $40 dinner for 2

Wednesday
Saving log - $2 tip box
Spending log - $1.75 coffee + $3 peanuts
Found money - $0

Been a rough three days of eating. Tuesday I helped polish off a lot of angel food cake along with a lot of homemade blueberry plum whiskey compote.

Recipe is straightforward - 1 lb blueberries, 1 lb pitted ripe plums with skins on, 1 c sugar, cook about 15 minutes, add 2 tbsp whiskey, cook 5 min more, cool, store in refrigerator. It forms a sauce, thinner than a jam, although with a bit of pectin it should make for a smashing jam.

Wednesday I went to the baseball game and got logy with a beer, garlic fries, and a bag of peanuts. At least I could only finish 2/3 of the bag and I had to shell the peanuts besides. And tonight we had dinner, appetizers, and drinks with friends. DH bought the beers and fries at the stadium; I bought our dinners tonight.

I also got a bit of a shocker yesterday morning - my gym trainer quit, so it is time to finish off the rest of my time with another. I'm sad, of course, he was a great trainer, but my MO has been that I lose the most amount of weight within the first three months of training. Makes sense if your body gets used to specific exercise - and every trainer has their own favorites that they will try on you. In other words, from the tactical losing weight/gain muscle thing, this is the best thing that could have happened. So if you buy trainer time, three months and then done.

I get twinges in my knee when I climb stairs, and tried one legged squats - that knee felt very challenged.

V.I. is settling in still more - we only had her for five days and her coat has improved by leaps and bounds. She wasn't terrible to pet when we got her, but her coat was rough and dandered. Now, very soft and glossy even at the base of the tail. I don't think improved food would work that fast. I think its because her stress levels have gone down - being the only cat in a quiet environment, she has the time and the desire to clean herself properly.

Tuesday
Saving log - $1 tip box
Spending log - $22 2 baseball tickets
Found money - $0

Monday
Saving log - $0 tip box
Spending log - $20 chiropractor
Found money - $0.01 (Safeway floor)

Yesterday we got the sister's cucumbers, pickling cucumbers, carrots, hot banana peppers, string cheese. Apparently she packed it so tight (her strategy is to stuff the 10$ box) that the original box broke up - the postal service collected everything in a garbage bag, put it in a box, and taped the address from the old box.

Except for one destroyed, squishy cucumber, once everything got a quick rinse it was all right. Carrots (6 inchers - no doubt the ones we planted in June) got sliced lengthwise, laid out in a single layer, doused with a bit of olive oil and salt and roasted at 350F for 20 minutes.

The pickling cucumbers were a challenge - DH doesn't like pickles, and while I like them, I don't love them. I treated the pickling cukes like regular cukes - chopped them into 1/4 in pieces, added salt and let sit 1-2 hours to sweat them, then drain, combine with chopped red onion, chopped banana pepper, two cans of drained garbanzo beans, then dressed with olive oil, lemon juice, parsley.

Its sister's birthday next week, so DH helped me mail off her gift. We tried to pack it properly - no need to add to the USPS's troubles.

Speaking of mail - the one side benefit of the recession is far less mail. No credit offers, few catalogs, only or two neighborhood flyers. For a week or two early this month, it was old times with tons of glossy campaign mail. Now? Nothing yesterday, 2 pieces for DH. I still get most of my stock receipts by mail - while I'm green, I must be light green. I like the idea of not having to remember my password to get my monthly or quarterly info.

Saving log - $0 tip box
Spending log - $3.88 coffee, bagel + $1 donation + $27 groceries

Went back to some semblance of a routine and jogged that 3 miles. I did it in 48 minutes, but I didn't push myself particularly. The end of the jog puts me within a block of a PCC, the local large organic grocery chain (think Seattle version of Whole Foods), and from there I buy an organic apple.

Today I set my apple on the conveyor and the woman ahead of me said, "just an apple? Let me buy it for you." I was going to protest, but the woman asked, "you'd do the same for me, right? Just pass it on." I considered it for a milli-second and realized the universe was trying to do me a favor. "Sure," I said and thanked her.

Outside the PCC, a homeless guy was selling Real Change. I gave him the dollar that I would have used to buy the apple.

Passed it on.

I had a real hankering for a glass of lassi, and had a spare bit of fruit. This time it was a white nectarine. While a nectarine is not very Indian, the lassi was delicious.

Lassi

2 tbsp plain yogurt (I had the Greek stuff)
1 sliced up fruit
1/4 tsp salt
dash pepper (optional, but peppering fruit is pretty Indian)
ice cold water

Combine fruit, yogurt, and salt. Mash fruit into yogurt with a fork or use a blender. As you stir, yogurt will get thinner.

Add ice cold water to the yogurt mixture until the mix is about a milk consistency. Taste and correct for salt - salt brightens the yogurt and fruit flavors.

Pour over ice and enjoy!

Weird, but experimentally demonstrated to be possible.

One glass dog bowl + some water + wire stand + noon sun + wood (eg untreated deck) = fire.

Wednesday
Saving log - $4 tip box
Spending log - $0

Thursday
Saving log - $ tip box
Spending log - $.58 bananas

A couple of days ago, I suggested to DH that he try to bake bread. (He's a margarine & slice of bread snack guy.)

The recipe we've wanted to try is the New York Times no-knead bread recipe. Actually there are several versions of them here and here and here. And if you want to see someone make it, here.

The reason why I asked DH to do it is that he really doesn't do that much cooking - stirfry, roasts w/potatoes, and carbonara. He's not a baker by any means, so if he could do it well the first time, there's no tricks and no tweaking necessary. The main reason, heh heh, is that we buy a fair amount of bread at the grocery store, so perhaps making our own might be a tad cheaper, and we avoid the extra ingredients, like BHA, BHT and whatnot. And the final reason is that BA needs a cooking project.

The loaf he made last night is nearly gone and it turned out spectacularly well. It even works with ancient, over the hill yeast from 2007. DH was a bit concerned before baking because the loaf didn't double in size. I figured if it was that bad, we'd have Passover matzos early!

For my 999th entry, another crock pot recipe

Pork and Sour Cherries

Pork shoulder (2 - 2.5 lbs)
1 cup dried sour cherries
2 onions, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
2 bay leaves
1 14 oz can chopped tomatoes
1 cinnamon stick
1/2 tsp coarse ground pepper
1/2 tsp paprika
Dried parsley (optional)
Soy sauce (optional)
Water, olive oil

Brown the sides of the pork shoulder in a bit of olive oil. Remove the pork shoulder from pan and put it into the crock pot.

Saute the onions, bay leaves, paprika with more olive oil in the same pan that you did the pork - about 5 minutes. Add garlic - saute for 2 minutes more. Add all to the crock pot.

Deglaze the pan with just enough water to deglaze fully, about 1/4 cup of water. Add the water to the crock pot.

Add dried cherries, tomatoes (with water in can), cinnamon stick, pepper, dried parsley to crock pot. Add 2 dashes of soy sauce to crock pot for color.

Cook in crock pot for 4-5 hours on high, 8-9 hours on low. Pork should be tender (bone should be easy to remove) with a brown, rich, spicy sauce. Correct for salt.

Serve over egg noodles.

OMG - I saw a TV ad for Hamburger Helper. Fresh one, not retro. And during prime time, not during the insomnia/informercial times. The 70s are back with noodles and cheese.

I made the Saturday "Dine In" crock pot recipe in the Seattle PI. At least I thought I did. I was going to go in and search for it online, but the web staff hadn't updated it. Of course the PI staff had more important things to do - like updating their resumes.

Anyway, I had to wing it. It was can central, but the results were very tasty.

Beef barley soup

2 medium onion, coarsely chopped
2 large carrot, sliced
1 tbsp chopped garlic
2 bay leaves
olive oil
1 14 oz can diced tomato
1 14 oz can chicken stock
1 14 oz can beef stock
3/4 c barley
2 lb beef stew meat (rump roast works here also)
1/4 c soy sauce

Night before
Saute onion, garlic, bay leaf in olive oil to soften. Save and refrigerate.
Slice carrot. Refrigerate.
Cut stew meat or pot roast into 1 inch cubes. Refrigerate.

Morning of
Put all ingredients into crock pot. Cook on low for 10 hours, or if you are rushed for time, cook on high for 5-7 hours.

Friday
Saving log - $0 tip box
Spending log - $11 lunch

Saturday
Saving log - $40 DRP
Spending log - $7 brunch + $65 groceries

At the grocery store. Shopped for my contributions to the Thanksgiving feast and to take advantage of the frozen corn, pea, and green bean sales. I also picked up one box each of chicken broth and stock. I also picked up some hard cheeses.

I didn't walk this today - I cleaned the kitchen. Clutterfree! It gets me that DH tends to be clueless about cleanup - or rather, he tends to be clueless about the follow-through. He'll wash, but he won't put away, or he'll leave it soaking in the sink. He is the anti-fly lady. I also got rid of the ancient condiments lining the baseboard behind the stove, and moved all the non-condimenty things back there. Condiments get nasty quick over the heat of the stove.

Then I tried the roasted cranberry sauce recipe from Saveur - it is fantastic, and only about 15 minutes of cooking, 1 hr of waiting around. (actually, I'm an inveterate tinkerer, so I've already added my own additions and deletions). I also tried a new sweet potato recipe which was also fantastic. The very opposite end of sweet potatoes with marshmallows, but it uses a lot of butter.

Scored decent chanterelle mushrooms for $5.98/lb. DH hates mushrooms, so I have to hide them if I make a lot of this soup (I can't eat it alone)

Squash mushroom soup

1 butternut squash
1 yellow acorn squash
3/4 lb chanterelle mushroom, wiped of dirt w/paper towel
2 c chicken stock
1 onion, minced
4 garlic cloves, crushed
2 sprigs rosemary
olive oil/butter
water

Optional: whipping cream

Squash-
Preheat oven to 350F. Cut squashes in half, remove seeds, add a pat of butter or bit of olive oil. Roast squashes until soft. Let cool, then reserve squash flesh.

Soup-
Chop mushrooms. Saute mushroom and onion in butter or olive oil until soft. Add garlic, rosemary, saute until soft. Add chicken stock and squash. Simmer until heated through, then take an immersion blender and blend until smooth. Salt and pepper to taste.

To serve, add a tablespoon of whipping cream into the bowl.

Someday, when DH can tolerate mushrooms, I will reserve some of the sauteed mushroom mixture to add back after pureeing. A bit of heat is nice here, also. I love adding a bit of Japanese pepper (chili powder, sesame seed, and dried orange peel).

Squash seeds -
Clean the threads and squash bits away from the seeds. Soak seeds in a salt and water brine for 30 minutes, then drain seeds completely, spread seeds out on a pan, dry roast at 350F for 30 minutes.

Saving log - $2 tip box
Spending log - $17 dim sum lunch + $9 groceries.

Just finishing making stuffed grape leaves for the work potluck tomorrow. The guest of honor is vegetarian, so it didn't seem right to make a meat-stuffed grape leaf. Rice stuffed grape leaves are a bit boring, so I went and got small amounts of various rices - red, purple, saffron, fragrant, regular, wild - along with a little bit of quinoa. Flavoring is onion, garlic, parsley, chopped apricots, salt and pepper. If it makes a decent pilaf, it will make a decent stuffed grape leaf. The final thing I do is to cook the filling, then roll the cooked filling into the grape leaves. Its a lot less nerve racking than stuffing with raw filling - you can just heat the grape leaves through and you don't have to worry about the filling getting done.

What is on my mind, still...beating a dead horse here...is WaMu. Will we soon have the Citigroup Tower? We already have a Wells Fargo Building, so maybe just the WF Tower. Of course we could baffle future descendants by keeping the nickname - what is the WaMu of which you speak? But corporate takeovers are a bit like war - if they take prisoners, they shackle them and change their name.

I'm also thinking about routing numbers. If my WaMu accounts are the antechambers to my saving, and WaMu gets taken over, then my accounts will change their routing numbers. Suddenly I have to keep an eye on my little savings empire.

Lots of August birthdays in my life:

Ordered sister's birthday gift for her birthday next Saturday and will pop her card in the mail on Sunday. I also ordered a little something for myself - a relatively dressy black trenchcoat/ windbreaker.

Potluck tonight for a lawyer friends' partner's birthday. I made fried green tomatoes because I still only have 1 red tomato. Early girl? I have boy-waiting-for -prom-date girl. But it is nice that I have all the ingredients for a potluck dish.

Fried green tomatoes

3-4 lg green tomatoes sliced 1/4 in or so
1.5 c flour
1/2 c cornmeal
1/2 tsp salt and pepper (I like more salt)
milk (made it using dried milk powder)

canola oil

Mix flour, cornmeal, salt, pepper, milk into a heavy batter.

Heat 1/2 of oil in cast iron pan. Dip tomato slices in batter, shake off excess, fry each side until golden brown - about 3 min per side. Drain on paper towels.

Best if warm, but I'm going to check if they microwave all right.

Peri peri shrimp yesterday, creamy crockpot beans today. I'm confused - high end one day, low end the next.

No real recipe here - just a willingness to clean out the counters and use what was in the pantry.

First off, the beans were ones that sister sent me from her garden at the farmette. So while they were dried - they were freshly dried if that makes any sense.

Started soaking the beans at 5pm Saturday. Then at 11pm I drained them and put them in my crockpot with 2 chopped onions, what was left of the peri peri sauce (chile, olive oil, lemon juice, cilantro, parsely, garlic pureed into a smooth paste), excess chopped parsely and cilantro.

Set the crockpot to low at 11:30pm. (Gutsy to sleep with an 80s era crockpot turned on, I know, I know.)

I woke up at 9am to a wonderful smell, but I turned it off because I was going to be out and about. When I came back, I added to the crockpot a jar of simmer sauce from Trader Joe's, and a small can of tomato paste, then cranked the crockpot up again.

They turned out creamy and delicious, a happy accident. We had them with rice, but it would be great by itself or with a tortilla. Hopefully they won't be too musical in my digestive tract tomorrow.

So we were eating breakfast at the Library Cafe this morning when the owner decided to crank up the woodburning stove. DH and I knew what would happen when the owner stuffed it with newspaper. Sure enough - smouldering smoke from the soy ink and it just didn't catch the first time. Or worse, the newspaper would burn just dandy, leaving the wood all nicely unburnt and dry.

We had that problem ourselves with our fireplace when our wood worker friend turned us on to his solution:

Firestarter Recipe 1

old style dixie cups - small, waxy paper kind. NO PLASTIC!
sawdust
candle wax
saucepan you do not care about

Think back to your college days when you were making jello shots. Set up your dixie cups on a tray. Fill dixie cups 1/3 - 1/2 way with sawdust.

Warm the used candle wax gently in the saucepan. When pourable, pour the wax into the dixie cups, filling to 1/2 to 2/3. Let cool.

Don't over fill; the dixie cups stack better if they are underfilled and the rim of the dixie cup is a feature here.

To use, stack the wood as usual. In between the spaces, shove the dixie cups rim side out. Light the rim. We've found that it will take 2, tops 3, dixie cups strategically placed to start a decent fire.

Now since we weren't woodworkers, a dependable sawdust supply was a problem. DH came up with this twist:

Firestarter Recipe 2:

old style dixie cups - small, waxy paper kind. NO PLASTIC!
dryer lint
candle wax
saucepan you do not care about

Just like recipe 1, only put a small bit of dryer lint in the dixie cups instead of the sawdust.

You can make a pilaf out of any cooked grain, not just rice. I love through the bulk bins of grains in the grocery store and picking up some. It does mean that a couple of months later I often have a bit of this and a bit of that, not enough to make a side by itself. Instead of buying more at that moment I collect the bits and make a wacky pilaf. This is one of my favorites that I made for Christmas.

Wacky Pilaf

1 minced onion
1 chopped carrot
2 cups quinoa
1/2 cup kasha (buckwheat groat)
1/2 cup wild rice
1 tbsp butter or olive oil
salt, pepper

Soak the quinoa for about 15 minutes in twice the amount of water (2 cups quinoa means 4 cups water). Swish the grain in the water a bit. This is to remove the grain's bitter, soapy tasting coating.

Boil the wild rice in a small saucepan until slightly underdone, about 20 minutes. Drain. Wild rice should be al dente chewy, not mushy.

Boil the kasha in a small saucepan until done, about 2-3 minutes. Kasha cooks very quickly - when done, drain, rinse with cold water to stop the cooking, drain again.

Drain the soaked, raw quinoa. Its a small grain, you will need a fine mesh colander.

Saute the onion and carrot in the butter or olive oil over medium heat until carrot is soft, about 10 minutes. Add the wet quinoa to the onion and carrot, stir to mix, cover pan with lid, then turn down the heat to low and allow to cook for 5 minutes. Stir after 5 minutes to prevent sticking.

Add kasha and wild rice to the pan, stir to coat. If necessary, add a bit more oil. Quinoa is done when it turns translucent. Salt and pepper to taste, serve warm.

This pilaf microwaves very well. 1 minute and its perfect.

Turkey Salad

1 med onion, minced
2 stalks celery, finely chopped
1/2 cup craisins (sugared, dried cranberries), chopped
9 oz cold turkey, chopped
2 tbsp mayo
1 tbsp red sauce from mango pickle jar (optional)

Mix all ingredients together. Delicious on top of a toasted english muffin.

I love adding the red, salty sauce that the mango pickles come in - a little bit of heat and red color is nice in this.

Saving log - none, haven't been close to the tip box

Spending log (22nd) - $3.25 coffee, bagel
Spending log (23rd) - $3.25 coffee, bagel + $.45 apple + $23 tickets
Spending log (24th) - $3.50 coffee, chocolate croissant + $44 groceries ($4 groceries + $40 as a point of sale ATM)

Had fun for Thanksgiving. Our Duvall guests - who usually are late - didn't arrive at the same time the turkey got done, at least arrived soon enough so that the turkey was still good. We did the traditional - rubbed with kosher salt and sage for 1 hr, wiped salt off, poked skin with rosemary (which we had a lot of), roasted with a tent on it for 4 hrs. Didn't stuff it. Made the turkey, mashed potatoes, dressing, cranberry sauce, roasted brussel sprouts with pecans, and we had a bit of the dessert that I made for the next party. Our guests brought zucchini/cranberry/oat bread, greens (love greens!), a bit of muscovy duck (very dark meat), squash casserole.

Arranged the dining room table in the living room (more space) and used the large coffee table 3 ft away as a buffet for the turkey and dishes. Nothing that scares me more than juggling a lot of dishes with the wine glasses, the centerpiece, and the plates. Just makes everything easier.

I got a lot of raves for the dessert, so to keep me from typing it twice, here is the recipe...

Pear Mango Cranberry Crisp

Filling
3 large bartlett pears
1 12 oz package dried mango ($5 at Uwajimaya)
1/8 bag of cranberries
zest from 1 orange peel
sugar
lemon juice, water

Grind cranberries in a small food processor, put in a bowl, add zest, add 1/2 tbsp sugar.

Soak dried mango in warm water until softened (about 1 hr). Drain completely, chop coarsely

Add a tbsp of lemon juice to 1 quart water in a bowl. Slice unpeeled pears lengthwise into 1/8 inch widths, getting rid of seeds and the woody center stem. Slip pear slices into lemon water.

Crisp
3/4 cup flour
1/2 sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick cold butter
(amounts can be doubled if necessary)

Mix dry ingredients well. Chop cold butter into small pieces, cut butter into the dry ingredients using a fork or a pastry kneader. Don't overwork it - the topping should resemble coarse breadcrumbs.

Drain pear slices and arrange them evenly & lengthwise in an ungreased shallow pan. Sprinkle with sugar (optional-pears and mangos are going to be sweet already). Layer the chopped mango over the pears. Dot with the cranberry mixture. Sprinkle everything with the crisp mixture.

Bake at 350F until fruit is tender, juices are bubbling and crisp is golden brown. What worked for me was baking the crisp at the bottom of third of the oven until the fruit filling was done, then I put the pan over the broiler and broiled the top for about 5 minutes.

Saturday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $13 brunch + $51 groceries

Sunday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $3 bagel, coffee + $30 groceries

I've picked up the holiday grocery shopping pace, first by getting ingredients to make the sides, but also to come up with pre-Thanksgiving meals. I tend to not want to make and eat a lot of poultry the week before so that the thanksgiving dinner's extra tasty.

The Saturday grocery shopping was a bit fraught - the express lane was not busy, so I was waved in even with a shopping cart and a lot more than 10 items. The cashier asked me if could find everything. Well, no, I said, I couldn't find sauerkraut. Aisle 20 in the freezer section - shall I get it? Sure - two jars. The cashier ran off for a minute, and his line filled up. Semi-dirty looks all around. What do you say?...the cashier waved me in!

This grocery is a double decker, with an entrance/parking on the second floor. It also has a cart escalator that moves your cart in tandem with you. Word to the wise with these things - seriously front load the shopping cart. I back loaded the shopping cart, so the front "axel" slipped the chain a bit and the cart began to stutter and chatter. My escalator outran the cart escalator, so I waited until the cart got up eventually.

The ramifications came when DH unpacked. Uh oh - the 6 pack of eggs were destroyed. One egg survived - kinda makes me wonder what that chicken ate! I handed DH the receipt and he got new eggs, not many questions asked.

Last night's supper was pork and sauerkraut in the crockpot - the recipe

Crockpot Pork & Sauerkraut

2 piece pork rib
1 jar sauerkraut

Open jar & open packet of pork (hah hah), put in 1/2 jar of sauerkraut at bottom of crockpot, lay the pork on top, finish by adding rest of sauerkraut. Cover with crockpot lid, set to high if you're going to be there, low if you aren't. Done in about 4 hrs if set on high. Done when you get home if set on low.

I wanted to mention that there is no added water in this recipe. The jar of sauerkraut has water, which you should put in. Also, there's no need to fill the crockpot. This recipe only fills my welcome-to-the-70s ancient crockpot halfway.


And when its done. Cooked pork and sauerkraut over heat makes lots of juice. Apologies that this picture makes the crockpot look different - I needed the flash for the picture.

So first a pic - it disappeared completely during the potluck.


Now the recipe

Goth Potato Salad

2 lb purple fingerling potatoes (nice and small)
1/2 red onion, finely chopped
1/3 jar of sun dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
2 tbsp olive oil from sun dried tomatoes
2 handfuls whole pecans
2 tbsp olive oil
1/2 c pesto
salt, pepper

Clean the skins of purple potatoes. Do not peel, do not poke. Steam potatoes covered, without allowing them to touch the level of boiling, salted water. I set up a colander with the potatoes over the boiling water and put a lid on the top. Potatoes are done when a fork can pierce them.

Allow potatoes to cool, do not splash water on them to cool them down. They will continue to cook a bit. Cut potatoes into bite-sized pieces.

Add chopped onions, sun dried tomatoes, and pecans to potatoes. Add the olive oil from the tomatoes to coat and gently toss.

Mix pesto with 2 tbsp olive oil, thining to a creamy consistency. Add pesto to potatoes, gently toss.

Salt and pepper to taste.

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $10 Denny's breakfast + $28 Trader Joe's

If I can't think of anything to say, I'll go for the recipes. The curry on Wednesday left quite a bit of thick coconut cream, so I semi-frugally used it like this - it also had the advantage of getting rid of a number of jars in the fridge:

Squash soup

1 lb package Trader Joe's squash chunks
1 can chicken stock
2 tbsp red pepper spread + 2 tbsp water to rinse out the jar
1/8 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp brown sugar
1/3 can coconut cream - paste consistency
salt and pepper

Simmer squash chunks and chicken stock in a saucepan, until squash chunks are tender. Add the red pepper, cinnamon. Mash squash chunks in the soup, then puree until smooth. Heat gently, then stir in the coconut cream and brown sugar. Salt and pepper to taste.

I just didn't feel up to getting a squash then carving it up from its hard shell...I figure that avoiding the cost of a trip to the emergency room with a knife stuck in my hand has got to be frugal.

And because I'm on the recipe vibe, I have a foolproof way to cook edamame - soybeans in the pod. Don't make a face, they are terrific, and I feel like I can mindlessly snack on them. Not to mention they are .99/lb.

Edamame

1 lb bag
salted water - 1 tsp salt in water
kosher salt

Boil the salted water - get it rockin' and rollin'. Take the bag from the freezer, open and dump in water. The water will cool and the edamame pods will sink. Watch as the water returns to the boil. When all the edamame pods float, they are ready. Should take about 3 minutes

Dump the pods in a colander, then vigorously shake and flip the pods in the colander. You want the pods dry, but warm for the next step.

Put the edamame pods in a bowl, then sprinkle with kosher salt. You know you've done it right when the little hairs on the pods will catch the kosher salt, but they are dry enough so that salt doesn't melt.

Eating edamame - you don't eat the pod, you use your teeth to squeeze the beans out of the pod. Think sunflower seeds.

Yippee - bags of spinach and carrots were 10/10$. I know that salad bags are unfrugal, but having to only rinse once rather than rinsing over and over to get the sand out of the bunch was worth it to me. (2$)

So far I have been doing okay with two of the resolutions - vegetables/salad as the late night snack and 10 minutes of calisthentics. The other ones, not so much.

My best recent purchase, one that has given me more than 5$ worth of pleasure has been a plastic Zyliss shaker. I've been fooling around with making salad dressings, which have got to be cheaper than buying a bottle. Two recipes:

Tahini lemon dressing

2 tbsp tahini (sesame paste)
lukewarm water
lemon juice
salt, pepper
lemon zest (optional)

Add ingredients to the shaker & shake away. Consistency should be the consistency of half and half.

Oil and vinegar
1 part red/white wine vinegar
3 parts olive oil
salt, garlic powder, pepper

Add ingredients to the shaker & shake away.

Did the usual Saturday, lunch out and grocery shopping. To keep our sanity, DH and I split up. He's pretty aimless where food and grocery is concerned. He loves the beer, junk food and fruit - everything else is up to me.

:eyeroll: If somebody can teach me how to make a cursor eye-roll, I'll be grateful. (Thanks, LuckyRobin!) I've been going through the eyeroll phase lately.

Anyhow, DH requested minestone soup, so while he took the aimless route, I picked up the produce and Italian sausage and found tuna for .50/can. Lately that's been a good price, so I stocked up a bit. I filled two large, heavy grocery bags for $21.

With the snow and ice, it was a great time to make the deluxe version of minestrone soup. This isn't diet food, particularly.

3 Italian sausage, sliced. Love the hot stuff!
2 medium yellow onions, chopped
5 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 stalks celery, finely sliced
2 carrots, sliced in discs
1 qt turkey stock or 2 cans chicken stock
2 14.5 oz cans diced tomato (fresh roma tomatoes)
1 14.5 oz can tomato sauce
1/3 head of cabbage, sliced thinly and chopped (what I had on hand)
1 zucchini, chopped
3 medium white potatoes, diced
1.5 c chickpeas, soaked for at least an hour (lentils work here, too)
green beans - I used frozen
1 head fresh parsley, chopped
1/2 cup orzo pasta
olive oil
parmesian cheese heel
bay leaf, thyme, margoram, salt, pepper
water

Soak chickpeas, then boil until soften. I remove the outer skins; it prevents "colon reverb". Set aside.

In stock pot (I think mine's a 10 qt), add a couple tablespoons olive oil, and saute sliced sausage, onion, garlic, bay leaf, thyme, margoram, celery, carrot until veg is soft and sausage is brown.

Add turkey stock, diced tomato, all the other vegetables, chickpeas, parsley and water to about 3/4 of stock pot. Low simmer for about 1 hr. Taste and correct for salt, seasoning, consistency, etc. If soup is too thick, add water.

Add orzo and parmesian cheese heel. Simmer until orzo is done - about 15 minutes.

Timing is very forgiving, and the vegetables are really whatever you have in whatever form you have them in - fresh and frozen's better than canned.

The cheese heel really makes it for me. When DH and I buy (or are gifted) cheese, we usually save the heel aka the rind aka the cheese closest to the label. Don't put the label in - you lose the gourmet effect.

DH boiled up the turkey bones 2 nights ago, so we have many quarts of rich turkey stock. Its turkey soup(s) for the next few days.

Decided to do it a bit differently, and a bit more frugally. I used the crockpot to make a quart or two of turkey vegetable rice soup. I avoided using the stove, used up several vegetables on their last legs, and used already cooked rice.

1/3 of a crockpot of turkey stock
1 can chicken stock (help get the color right)
dash of kitchen bouquet (also to colorize)
14 oz can diced tomatoes
2/3 red onion, minced
2 celery stalks, chopped
2 carrots, sliced and chopped
turkey breast
frozen corn, pea, green bean (various amounts)
water to fill crockpot
salt, pepper, thyme, dill, parsley, garlic powder to taste.

Cover, set crockpot on high. Wait 3 hours.
I serve with the cooked rice, because I like to keep the broth clear. I just think clear soup keeps better in the refrigerator.

I also wanted to only make a relatively small batch of something, to keep us from mindlessly eating food just to move things along. Often I would make a ton of something to save time (and yep, it saves time), but at the risk DH and I would eat and eat and overeat.

And different iterations of turkey soup will keep us eating turkey soup.

Hope you all had a tasty thanksgiving! DH and I went to Issaquah, the next town east of Bellevue, which is in itself the next town east of Seattle. The invites gave an official start time of 12:00 noon, with a dinner ETA of 4:00pm.

We got there at 1:30pm, and we were the first people there, as usual, so we were put to work clearing, vacuuming and setting up. DH and I are used to this. The one T-day we showed when we knew everyone else would show was the day that they were wondering where we were. And it was our way of getting caught up with the hosts -- a private party as it were.

There was plenty to clear and clean. The father of the hostess had gone into the hospital with cancer, so his living quarters had shrunk, so the excess stuff landed in the house. The hostess and I gave each other a hug in support.

But here's a frugal dilemma. When you find change when you are cleaning at home, its yours. When you find change when you are cleaning a friend's house, whose is it? I gave thirty-five cents to the hostess, who absently gave it back to me. I absently put it in my pocket, so when I got home, I found it again. I guess I got paid for about an hour of work.

The turducken roasting was late, but whew, it was in the oven not the smoker, so that was one gravy making hurdle gone. Gravy making went pretty smoothly - although my judgment was hamstrung by about 3 glasses of wine (helped with the whisking though) and the fact that there was only whole wheat flour.

The workaround was to make a butter/whole wheat flour roux to cook the flour for a good fifteen minutes before adding pan drippings and stock. Duck pan drippings hide the flour flavor pretty well and having a whole stock pot of poultry stock means that anybody can make great gravy then. Host wanted the gravy a bit thicker than I did and thought that flour taste was still there, but those were pretty easy to fix, just keep the heat on a bit longer. Filled 3 gravy boats.

Didn't take any leftovers home, for which my metabolism is grateful.

Spending log - 3$ pumpkin latte & biscotti (gotta pace yourself)

Caught the cold that was going around in a moderate way. The symptoms of this one are congestion and being very, very tired. Stayed home and made a pot of minestone soup for the fluids. The produce in the refrigerator looked pretty unhealthy (I want minestrone, not cream of pencillin) so I conserved my energy and hoofed it three blocks to the Safeway (sigh). - 4.95$

Many Italians would laugh out loud at my soup, but it works. My big trick is to slice hot sausage into discs, then saute them in a bit of olive oil so they turn into little meatballs. Then you add lots of bay leaves, onion, lots of garlic, carrot, stalk of celery, zucchini, any other Italian-esque vegetables, chicken stock, chopped tomatoes, soaked chickpeas, parsely, oregano.

Cough, cough. . Bye.

DH told me about the $5 off any produce coupon after I bought the cheap produce. Normally, I would have used it to buy my ordinary stuff, so today I tried a different tactic - I used the coupon to get fruit I rarely get like white Rainier cherries and an heirloom melon. Total treat for $2.

Joy of Cooking had a recipe for fish cakes that I tried out. I can't ever follow a recipe straight even the first time. Its a quirk of mine.

Basically, the recipe was 1.5 lbs of flaked fish, finely chopped onion, lemon juice, spices (old bay and parsely in the recipe), an egg yolk and 5 tbsp mayo as binders. Form cakes, dredge in breadcrumbs and fry in 2 parts vegetable oil and 1 part butter. Not exactly health food, but darn tasty and a pretty efficient way to hide a small amount of cooked and mashed vegetables. I snuck in three of those leftover little white boiling potatoes.

Cooking is one of the most important frugal skills in my arsenal. Prepared food is always more expensive than the raw ingredients and it sure makes me feel clever when I can hide leftovers in a tasty way. To think I used to joke that the dorm cafeteria used to do the same thing! Except they weren't very clever about it.

I just don't like seeing containers in the refrigerator for more than a couple of days because after that, no one wants to risk taking an exploratory peek or sniff.

Tomorrow is DH's birthday - a restaurant trip tomorrow night. Then in the next couple of days comes salmon salad sandwiches and salmon macaroni salad.

I made two pitchers of gazpacho this afternoon. Gazpacho seems to be the summer recipe for cleaning out the produce section of the refrigerator; minestrone the winter one.

I threw out two heads of romaine and my pound of green beans. That depressed me tremendously, but for my gazpacho I did manage to salvage two half heads of romaine, a few leaves of raditchio (sic), a carrot, green onions, several radishes, and a whole lot of tomatoes, 1 bunch of parsely, 1 bunch of cilantro, grind everything up along with 1 can of chicken stock, 2 cans of tomato sauce (paste tastes metallic--blegh), salt, pepper, lemon juice, hot sauce, 5 garlic cloves, olive oil.

It'll be the all-liquid fiber diet this week.

Seattle this summer has a 'literary latte' deal. Read three books and you get a 4$ Starbucks card, and your name is entered into a drawing. I made it to the library tonight in time to submit my sheet and get the gift card.

Starbucks is not my favorite but it'll be useful for the end-of-the-month drill. I've noticed that the Starbucks card seems to be Seattle alternative currency. You can get one for a prize, as a reward, for recommmending someone for some such. If you look in any Seattleite's wallet, you'll find at least a couple. Too bad there's no easy way to manage the cards. I wish there was an easy way to figure out how much you have on a particular card.

Don't laugh, I made a batch from a recipe that I got from the New York Times food section. I finished my first batch during dinner tonight - I'm taking another batch to the potluck tomorrow...And pearl barley is .49/lb right now.

Scottish tabouli (heh, heh, heh)

1 cup pearl barley
2 cup whole kernel corn (I used frozen - we're not in corn season yet)
2 ripe tomatoes, chopped
4 radichio "rocket" leaves (recipe called for arugula, so I winged it) - shredded and chopped
2 tsp dried parsley

olive oil
lemon juice
salt
pepper

Soak barley for a couple of hours, or overnight. Boil until tender. Drain & cool - this is cold or a room temp salad.
Cook corn according to package directions. Also drain & cool the corn.
Chop your tomato, shred your rocket.

Make a dressing of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper - think tabouli, and also take into account that the barley really sucks up the dressing.

Fluff up the barley, add the cold corn, dress with dressing. Add the parsely, toss, add the tomato, toss, add the rocket, toss. Taste, and correct for seasoning (barley seems to take a lot of salt). Serve at room temperature.

After reading a bit more on the thread "Why ING?" I decided to start a 6 mo CD "escalator" in my ING account. Right now the interest is 5.00%. I expect that the interest rate will go up a bit in the next few months, so I plan to buy 6 6-month CD for 2K around the first of the month. 6 months later, when the first CD matures, I see what's what. All the interest goes into my emergency fund.

It's a little bit different than the ladder, when you construct it so that your CDs mature at once.