Friday Food: A Farewell Feast

Friday 

Short version: Omelet, leftover pasta and pesto, leftover baked beans and rice, carrot sticks

Long version: I divvied out the pasta and beans and rice depending on who likes what the most, and then A. made an omelet to fill everything in. He put parsley, feta cheese, and one last small garlic scape in it, and it was very good.

Saturday

Short version: Hamburger steaks with milk and onion gravy, more pasta and pesto, more rice, frozen corn, leftover cookies

Long version: We had exactly enough Mexican wedding cookies from the previous day's playdate for everyone to have two cookies. How satisfying.

Sunday

Short version: Leftovers in a skillet, cheater's fondue

Long version: A. and eldest were gone, and there was enough of the rice, chopped hamburger steaks, gravy, and corn to fry in a skillet for the three children at home. I had actually saved all of this in a bowl when I was putting away dinner the night before, thinking it would be enough for another meal. The middle son found it when he was investigating for lunch, and when I took it from him, saying it was for dinner, he expressed doubt that there would be enough food.

You doubt your mother, son? Behold, Mom Magic.

I chopped the hamburger steaks, added some more corn plus some milk to the skillet to re-heat everything, and then stirred in grated cheese.

Not only enough, but there were leftovers.

I had a salad with deli ham and provolone in it.

I hadn't made a Sunday dessert. In such times, melted chocolate chips and a bit of coconut oil to make a very fast fondue, with marshmallows for dipping, stand in for a homemade dessert. The kids actually love this, and were very happy to see it. There is something exciting about having your very own (small) bowl of melted chocolate.

And I didn't have to turn on the oven or the stove. Happiness all around.

Monday

Short version: Freezer cottage pie

Long version: This is not at all the sort of food that I want to be eating when it's 80 degrees in the kitchen, but I had a cottage pie in an 8"x8" pan I had frozen last time I made cottage pie. I hadn't used it yet because it wouldn't have been enough for the whole family. It was enough for the four of us at home, though, and it just needed to be heated up in the microwave.

Everyone was sweating while they were eating it, however. Definitely not a hot-weather dish.

Tuesday 

Short version: Baked beans and hamburger, rice, raw cabbage

Long version: I had thawed one two-pound package of ground beef, which isn't really enough for all of us unless I stretch it in some way. I did it this time by adding two cans of pinto beans and then all the things I use to make baked beans to make it all saucy. And then I served it over rice.

Wednesday

Short version: Leftovers, cookies

Long version: I stretched the ground beef so successfully that there was enough of it for the four people who were eating. Enough leftover rice, too.

The cookies were chocolate chip ones I made in the morning. I made straight chocolate chip cookies, with no peanut butter, oats, etc., and of course my children loved them. I don't make them like that much because those are 100% a dessert and I usually try to make cookies that are more like a snack, but every once in awhile they get lucky.

Thursday

Short version: Ground beef and lamb gyros on homemade sourdough pitas, collard green salad, no-bake cheesecake with strawberry-rhubarb sauce

Long version: This was our farewell dinner for our priest's youngest brother, who is going to college next month. He's eaten at our house many times since he started living here in October, but he couldn't choose what he wanted for his last meal with us. So I chose for him.

He can only eat sourdough bread, which is why I made the sourdough pitas. I would have made lamb roast for the gyros, but I'm out, so I used one bag of ground lamb and two packages of ground beef and then spiced it the same way I would a lamb roast (garlic, onion, thyme, cumin, paprika). I also made hummus and yogurt sauce (strained yogurt, lemon juice, garlic, salt, and pepper) and put out lettuce, tomato, pickled onions, and feta cheese for toppings.

I did the actual cooking for this--so the meat and pita bread--the day before. Mostly that was because I was taking the younger three children to the dentist (which takes half the day, given the 200-mile roundtrip drive), but also because I didn't want to have to cook in a hot afternoon kitchen. That sure was a good call. It was still 85 degrees when we sat down to eat, even though I didn't turn on the stove or oven at all.

I wouldn't typically make a collard salad of the sort that I typically eat for guests, but I know these two guests really like collard greens. I also know they like beets, so the salad was finely chopped and manhandled collards in a maple syrup vinaigrette with toasted pecans, pickled beets, pickled onions, and feta cheese. It was really good.

I used this recipe for the cheesecake and made some strawberry-rhubarb sauce for anyone who wanted it. Which was everyone but me, actually.

Refrigerator check:

Stuffed full.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?

Add Salt to Taste

As we look at a weather forecast that features high temperatures in the mid-90s,* I have excavated all the beer salt out of the back of the cabinet in preparation.

We even have one in a whimsical tiny beer bottle package.

We will need the beer salt to keep A. going when he's out working in the heat. He always does. He doesn't mind doing labor when it's in the 90s, but he does mind how awful he feels if he doesn't stay salted. Not just hydrated, but salted.

A couple of weeks ago when he was building a stone wall and weed-eating for a few days, he would consistently get to the afternoon feeling bad, lethargic and headache-y. He had been drinking plenty of water or lemonade, but was still dragging.

And then he realized it was because he didn't have enough salt.

He doesn't really eat when he's working like that, see, so he wasn't getting salt until dinnertime. As soon as he started adding salt to his lemonade, he was fine and could work all afternoon again.

Because he's putting it in lemonade, he prefers the lime beer salt. I don't know how much he puts in his glass, but enough that he can faintly taste it.

When eldest was working on a fencing crew--a notoriously physically-challenging job, and one he did routinely when it was around or over 100 degrees--his boss gave everyone beer salt on their breaks. They just ate it, which is also an option.

However its ingested, if you also need to work outside in high temperatures, make sure to drink enough, but also make sure to get some salt into you**. 

* I know this is not high for many of you, but it's pretty hot for us here. Even if it is a mostly dry heat. 

**This is, of course, already part of hydration drinks like Powerade, but we don't typically have those. Switchel works, too, but A. prefers the salted lemonade.

Snapshots: Double Cookies

I saw something bright red on the driveway that I couldn't identify, and I had to pick it up to examine it pretty closely before I could.

Can you tell what it is?*

The collard greens have recovered themselves sufficiently that I feel I can chance harvesting some for the salads that repel my family so thoroughly.

Featuring Very Pink pickled beets and radishes.

I've been putting off rendering any of the large quantity of suet I have in the freezer, even though I need the tallow for cooking. This requires very low heat, such as a Crockpot, which I don't have. I use my cast-iron Dutch oven, although I don't have a burner that gets quite low enough to keep it rendering without actually simmering. I thought I might put another skillet underneath to distribute some of the heat. A. suggested the griddle pan.

This worked very well. Smart man, that A.

The kids had some friends over on Friday. The little girls were of the opinion that we should have a tea party. I didn't really think summer weather is conducive to tea parties--especially given how much baking I typically do for tea parties--but I did make some cookies.

First Mexican wedding cookies, and then, since I had a bowl and pan dirty already and the oven at heat, I made some very fast chocolate chip/peanut butter cookies.

And last, flowers!

Last week's sunflower arrangements combined.

New table flowers.

And bookcase flowers.

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.

* It was the top of a red mini bell pepper. It looked so much like a flower, though.