Friday Food: Many Fish Cans

Friday 

Short version: Fish patties, mashed potatoes, green salad with vinaigrette

Long version: We had a lot of cans of fishy things hanging around. I buy 12-ounce cans of chunk white tuna; we got a bunch of small cans of chunk light tuna from commodities and the random boxes of food they're started sending home with the kids from school; and I had one old can of salmon in the pantry.

Sounds like fish patties to me!

The many cans I opened. I figure after cleaning up the salmon and draining all the water in these cans, I ended up with around two pounds of canned fish.

My family can eat astounding numbers of these patties, but one boy wasn't feeling well and another had been working all day in the heat and wasn't all that hungry, so we had a couple of leftover patties this time. That rarely happens.

Saturday

Short version: Western wedding food

Long version: The day we went to the ranch wedding and ate ribs and stuff.

Not elegant, but delicious.

Sunday

Short version: Italian sausage, pasta with pesto, radishes, pots de creme

Long version: The basil was trying to flower again and needed trimming, so I made pesto and then built the rest of the meal around that.

Pots de creme because I didn't feel like baking. Again. It's a theme in hot weather. I had just made it a couple of Sundays previous, but no one minded eating it again. Plus, Poppy helped me make it this time and one of her brothers helped me make it last time, so I'm passing down a very important family recipe.

Monday

Short version: Beans and rice with leftovers, canned peaches

Long version: Someone we know incubated a bunch of eggs and ended up with a lot of roosters. She asked us if we'd like them. We can always use home-raised chickens, but this was a LOT of roosters. Eleven, to be exact.

Butchering that many chickens is no fun. Especially when it's hot. Blood and feathers everywhere, the disgusting wet-dog smell of scalded feathers . . . yuck.

Anyway. We did it this day, and then no one was all that enthused about dinner. Certainly not for chicken. Plus, I was exhausted and in no mood to cook.

I made it easy on myself by thawing leftover pinto beans and mixing them with some rice I cooked. I also added the last diced-up link and a half of Italian sausage from the night before.

No vegetables, just canned peaches for a fruit/dessert.

Tuesday

Short version: Bacon cheeseburger sandwiches, cucumbers, ice cream

Long version: I only used one package of ground beef to make burger patties, but I made them as thin as I could and then gave the bigger eaters two patties on their sandwiches. The bacon helped to stretch them. I hadn't made buns, so I just cut the fresh bread I had made the day before.

I had been to Walmart this day, where I bought a gallon of Neopolitan ice cream, more than half of which was eaten after dinner.

Wednesday

Short version: Chicken-fried pork chops and gravy, mashed potatoes, sauerkraut

Long version: It turned out to be lucky that one boy was sick and didn't eat, because I only had five pork chops. Normally, I wouldn't eat one, but since there was an extra one, I had half of that. They sure are good cooked this way.

A. looked at this and asked, "Are we in Indiana?" He was referencing this sandwich, which I have never had, but I'm sure is delicious. And comically large.

Thursday

Short version: Leftover-leftovers with sausage, raw cabbage, ice cream

Long version: I subbed at school all day. Luckily, I had enough for the leftover rice and beans, to which I had already added leftover Italian sausage once to the leftovers, And then I used those leftovers for dinner, with the addition of a tube of Walmart's premium breakfast sausage. 

Low-effort, but filling. In other words, perfect for a work night.

Refrigerator check:

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

Check This Out

Remember when we talked about how Double Stuf Oreos now have as much of the cream filling as regular Oreos used to have in Ye Olden Days? And how many of you agreed with me about that?

Well! Here's an interesting new wrinkle. These are the Walmart brand Twist 'n' Shouts, with double filling. 

Well well well. Would you look at that.

That actually is double the amount of cream filling as the name-brand "Double Stuf" Oreos. 

Nice to know that Walmart, at least, isn't trying to cheat us out of our cream filling in their Twist 'n' Shouts. 

Oreo, take note. You're being outclassed by Walmart.

Snapshots: Ranch Wedding #2

I have gone years without going to a wedding, but now we're in a Wedding Season for sure. There was the giant ranch wedding in June. I'm going to my niece's wedding in Vermont in October. And just last night, we went to another (slightly less giant) ranch wedding.

This one was also for a young lady who works at the school. She married our Superintendent's son, and the wedding was on his family ranch. It was a little over an hour from us. This one was slightly less formal than the one we went to in June. However, given that the dress code is always just varying degrees of formality in Western dress, that mostly meant that it was the women who didn't dress up quite as much. The men still wore their carefully ironed jeans, button-ups, hats, and boots. 

Ironing in progress. Thankfully, the boys can all iron their own clothes now.

The women wore more-casual dresses and cowboy boots instead of heels.

I wore a long denim skirt and espadrille sandals. Boots would have been better, though, because there was no paved surface anywhere to be seen. Anyone foolish enough to wear thin heels would have been in big trouble.

The actual wedding service was on the edge of a river canyon, which required driving a bumpy track from the dirt road we came in on.

The track was very fine dirt, which kicked up a lot of dust and would have turned into an absolute quagmire had it rained at all.

There was no rain in sight, however, just a lot of sun. 

It was about a hundred-yard walk to the service, with no path to be seen.

The service was at 5:30 p.m., when it was still at least 90 degrees, but it was pretty short. I was thankful for this, given that we were all sitting on boards supported by hay bales in full sun.

The service was performed in front of this cross. Note the aisle made of cowhides. 

The bride and groom actually rode up to the aisle on their horses, the bride riding side saddle because of her long dress. This was the most Western wedding ever. But it wasn't performative or anything. This is really just the life these people live.

The service was very nice, and then we all got back in our cars and drove back to the dirt road for the reception. 

Walking to the reception. Another hundred yards or so, no paths to be seen.

This was near the cattle pens, which were close enough to a road that there was electricity. They set up awnings for shade, the band was on a flat-bed trailer, and the dance floor was plywood.

Unusually for a wedding--or any event--the food was ready when we got the reception. After signing the guest book, we all just filed past a food truck and got our dinner. No waiting for speeches or whatever, which was great.

The food was delicious, too. They didn't have a cake, just giant cupcakes, which were also very good.

I discovered when I was dancing with the eldest that they had coated the plywood in flour. This was to make it easier to spin, I guess, but it also made it surprisingly slippery. Once again, I would have been better off in boots. Espadrilles are not made for the two-step.

Anyway. It was a very fun wedding and we all had a good time.

One quick shot of this week's flowers before I go . . .

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.