Friday Food: Salvage Food

Friday 

Short version: Pizzas, green salad with ranch dressing

Long version: Since I had finally gotten to the store that sells the big blocks of asadero cheese, and I was baking bread this day so I had dough on hand, it seemed I was obligated to make pizza. So I did.

One pepperoni, one cheese.

Saturday

Short version: Beans, rice, and ham; carrot sticks; gingersnaps

Long version: A. was at the basketball game with, of course, the basketball player. One of the children home with me wasn't feeling well and didn't want to eat. I was planning on having a salad. So, since I was really only feeding two children, I didn't end up using all the meat I had defrosted.

Instead, I used the ham stock I had made earlier in the day, along with the ham I pulled off the bone, plus the pinto beans I had defrosted, to make dinner for those two children. All I did was saute a diced onion--and save half of the cooked onion for later--add in the ham, beans, and stock, then cook rice in that. When it was all done, I added a bunch of butter and some balsamic vinegar.

Oh, I also used a few frozen tomatoes in the beans. I have a gallon-sized bag of tomatoes from the summer garden that I just froze whole one time when I was too sick or something to roast, puree, and freeze them. I really like having them whole like that, though, because it's very easy to just take a few of them out, run them under warm water for a minute or let them soak, and then squish the insides out of the skins. If you have the space they take up, it's way easier than skinning them fresh and freezing the pulp in ice cube trays or whatever.

The two who got home from the basketball game at 7 p.m. were kind of hungry, so they ate some of the beans and rice. And the one who hadn't been feeling well started to feel better, and he ate some. So it ended up being dinner for everyone in the end.

Sunday

Short version: Pork in gravy, cheddar smoked sausage, hammy rice, green peas, chocolate pudding

Long version: This was the meat I had defrosted the day before. We had both pork and sausage because I wasn't sure the one quart bag of pork loin chunks would be enough for everyone. Also, I had bought this sausage at Walmart awhile ago and figured we should try it out to see if it was worth buying again.

Most people seemed to think it was. Except the one who doesn't much care for sausage. He had the pork. 

I cooked the rice in more of the ham stock. 

This chocolate pudding, except doubled because I had some milk on the verge that needed to be used. And also, my family will eat astonishing quantities of pudding.

Eating in progress.

Monday

Short version: Salvage skillet

Long version: When I was pulling the ham bone out for the stock and so forth a few days earlier, I had taken out a foil-wrapped package from the refrigerator freezer that I thought was a ham bone. It was not. It was a whole cooked meatloaf that I had no memory of freezing. Which meant it had been in there awhile.

It was very dry and slightly not-fresh tasting, but I was not about to throw all that meat away. So I salvaged it by chopping it up fine--no chore, as it was so dry it pretty much just fell apart--fried it in some freshly rendered beef tallow with taco spices, salsa, and some already cooked onion, and then added leftover rice, grated cheddar cheese, and sour cream. I also threw in the last cup or so of beans and rice and some frozen corn.

The corn was the vegetable component. Ahem.

It was not pretty, but it was pretty tasty.

Which more or less sums up my cooking.

Tuesday

Short version: Roasted chicken pieces, baked pasta, frozen peas, peanut butter/chocolate chip cookies

Long version: I had to go to a basketball game at 4:30 p.m., so I made all of this and just left it for everyone else at home. It was one package of chicken leg quarters, separated into thighs and drumsticks, salted, seasoned with olive oil, Italian herb seasoning and garlic powder, and roasted at about 450 degrees until done.

The pasta was a box of penne, mixed with the last half a frozen bag of roasted tomato sauce, some of the ricotta that really needs to be used up now, and shredded asadero cheese. That went in the oven with the chicken for the last half an hour or so.

The peas went in the oven, too, actually. That made it very easy for me to just tell Poppy to have Dad take everything out of the oven at 5 p.m. so they could eat. 

I had made the cookies in the morning. They were pretty much just chocolate chip cookies with a bunch of peanut butter added in place of some of the butter. I love these kinds of cookies, although it is hard to get the chocolate chips to stay in while they're being rolled. The dough is much greasier because of the peanut butter, so it doesn't stick together as well as plain chocolate chip cookie dough. It's fine once they're baked, though.

Wednesday

Short version: All the leftovers, plus eggs

Long version: One half piece of sausage, pork in gravy, the meatloaf/rice skillet, baked pasta, peas, all apportioned out as I saw fit.

And I made a couple of eggs for A. to bulk his up a bit.

Still not photogenic. Still eaten.

 Thursday

Short version: Barbecue meatballs, garlic bread, baked carrots, brownies

Long version: I got all of this prepped before I went to pick up Poppy and her friend--who stayed the night with us--from cheerleading practice. Then, when I got home at 5:15 p.m., I did a car-key hand-off to A., so he could go pick up the basketball player from his practice. I could have dropped the girls off and then gone to get the basketball player, but I had to get all of this food into the oven.

I also made the brownies when I got home, which take literally ten minutes to mix up. Not that we had to have a dessert, but the oven was on anyway, and we did have a guest with us.

It all finished baking around the time A. got home around 6 p.m., so that worked out well.

Refrigerator check:

Good thing A. is going to get hay and groceries today.

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

A Milk Update

Because I can't leave you with yesterday's cliffhanger . . .

Success!

I gambled on trying the tiny store in the village yesterday afternoon rather than driving a long way for a full grocery run, and was rewarded with the last gallon of milk they had. So now we'll be okay until A. goes to the bigger town for his hay run on Friday, which he can combine with a trip to Walmart for all the groceries.

Thus ends this week's milk saga. 

The Milk Situation

I spend more time that your average person plotting about milk. This is a result of both our remote location so far from stores, and the fact that we just go through so much milk. 

We will use five gallons a week of milk, if we have it. Keeping that much milk on hand at all times is very difficult when the nearest store is 60 miles away. And that store doesn't have reliably good milk, either.

Here's the breakdown for our milk supply*.

There is a very tiny kind of convenience store that's about 10 miles away that sometimes has milk. It's good quality, but sometimes it's all been purchased. And often, the store isn't open when it's supposed to be. So that's not a reliable source.

The next-closest store is 60 miles away. They have a good quantity of milk on hand at all times, but it often goes bad quickly, or is actually kind of off when we open it. I'm guessing that's because they're at the end of the supply lines and so the milk has had to travel a long time and be exposed to a lot of loading and unloading temperature changes on a truck. So I avoid buying milk there if I can.

There are a few regular grocery stores within 90 miles that always have milk, but one of them has the same problem of quality as the closer store because it's on the same trucking route. In fact, almost all the stores we go to have some problem with quality and longevity. More often than not, milk starts to separate or just plain taste bad before we get to the end of the four or five gallons we buy at a time.

The absolute best place to buy milk is Walmart. It is always fresh, it rarely goes bad within the week, and it's the cheapest, too. But of course, there is only one Walmart we can get to, and it's 90 miles away. 

Where we buy milk has everything to do with where we need to be for something else, usually a basketball game or a hay run in the winter.

And how much of this I want to stare at to get to it.

So figuring out when and where to buy milk this week looks like this:

We currently have 3/4 of a gallon of milk left. The last gallon of milk we opened from that same grocery run started separating immediately, which means this one will probably not last long. I can probably water it a little bit and make it last two days, but that's about it.

I had been planning to go to Walmart on Thursday and then stop at a basketball game on my way home, since I had to be going that way anyway. But now that basketball game isn't happening.

So.

Will the very small store in the next village over be open today? Will they have milk? If yes and I can get even one gallon of milk, we're good until Friday. The hay place in the big town with the Walmart is open on Fridays, so A. could go get milk then.

I could just go to Walmart this morning, bypassing the small store entirely, but that would be a trip solely to go to the grocery store, which feels like a waste because it's so far.

If I can't get milk at the small store and don't go to Walmart today, we will be out of milk for at least two days. This happens somewhat regularly and it's not the end of the world, but it's annoying.

I know someone is going to say, "Why don't you just get a milk cow?" Because I do not want a milk cow. I know exactly how much work that would be for me, and frankly, this sort of convoluted planning is easier for me than milking every day, sterilizing equipment, making cheese, etc.

Anyway, that's where I am today: Pondering whether I want to drive two hundred miles roundtrip for groceries. Stay tuned.

* I bet you never expected anything so fascintating when you showed up today, right? Right. 

Snapshots: A Selfie and Lambs

First up, a rare selfie from the previous week: 

Might as well take advantage of the clean hospital mirror, I guess.

There were no lasting issues from the metal that got in that son's eye, thank goodness.

Next! Spirit week the week of homecoming does not fill me with spirit, because I am really bad at coming up with outfits and costumes for all the children to wear for every theme day. It's like Halloween for a week straight. It's not my favorite.

But this year I did good! I came up with some really good outfits for dress like a celebrity--one son won by dressing like our UPS guy, who is for sure a celebrity here in our remote county--and Poppy won on the day they were supposed to dress like a first responder or a hero by wearing her brothers' old Army uniform costume.

I don't have any photos of that for you, but I do have this one of a child being an outlaw on a totally random day at our house.

Any day is a good day to be an outlaw. As I recall, I got held up for some cookies.

The older boys were gone on an all-day FFA trip the day before homecoming, so I told them I would iron their clothes for the homecoming dance for them. I strongly dislike ironing, so this was a very generous offer for me. 

I used starch and everything.

I was grumbling to myself as I was ironing, but as I told A., I really shouldn't be complaining that they want to look nice instead of slumping around in sweatpants or something.

All the special-occasion clothing last week, plus all the activities that kept me away from home, made me very grateful to have the clothes dryer so I could get laundry done when I needed to.

I have not, however, abandoned my clotheslines by any means, and I was happy to be able to use them this weekend for the laundry that needed to be done again.

Dry clothes in the setting sun.

Another lamb was born on Friday, just in time for the weather to warm up, thankfully.

The two older and bigger lambs on the left, tiny new lamb on the right.

So far, they're all ewe lambs. We have one more ewe that is still pregnant, and we're hoping for at least one male lamb for the freezer next fall. We shall see.

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.

Friday Food: Homecoming Week

Friday 

Short version: Beans and rice, concession food at the game, leftovers at home

Long version: The cheerleader had a basketball game to cheer at, to which I also brought the younger two boys. They all had some pinto beans with butter and vinegar over leftover rice before we left, and then they all bought their own food at the concession stand at the game. Two had pizza and one had Frito pie, I think.

The remaining child at home had the last of the leftover lamb stew. A. had leftover elk burgers. I had a salad before I left.

Saturday

Short version: Spiral ham, baked potatoes, tomato and cucumber salad with feta

Long version: When ham was on sale for a dollar a pound around Christmas, I bought a few. This was one of them. Since the oven was on to bake the ham, I made baked potatoes.

I was very grateful I made the ham this day, as the rest of the week got very busy. The ham helped. So did canned refried beans and tortillas.

I had half a cucumber to use up, and I had found the good feta at the store I went to the other day, so I used some grape tomatoes to make a salad with those two things. Plus pickled onions. It was good, but nowhere near as good as the same salad I made a few months ago with cucumbers and tomatoes from the garden. Alas for garden produce.

Sunday

Short version: Not-stuffed shells, Italian sausage, peppers and onions, green salad with vinaigrette, pots de creme with cream

Long version: Awhile ago, A. brought home "jumbo" pasta shells and ricotta cheese. I was pretty sure this meant he wanted me to make stuffed shells. Unfortunately, I didn't have any asadero cheese--my mozzarella substitute--until this week, so it had to wait. And then when I went to make them, I found the jumbo shells were not actually that big and looked like they would be impossible to stuff. So I used all the same ingredients to make a baked pasta dish that was kind of like baked ziti. On my sister's recommendation, I didn't pre-boil the shells, instead just adding extra water to the pan with the sauce and dry shells, baking it covered until it was mostly done, then adding the cheese. This worked well. Thanks, sis!

I also made one package of Italian sausage, because the pasta wouldn't have been enough. And I had some peppers that were getting wrinkly, so I threw those in the oven with some onion and olive oil to roast, too.

An Italian-American feast.

I hadn't made pots de creme in a long time. It didn't fit our Italian theme, but as we all know, America is a melting pot. And that means that I, as an American, am free to serve a French (ish) dessert with an Italian (ish) meal.

I was informed by everyone that it was the smoothest pots de creme ever. I don't actually know why it was any different, so I guess I can't re-create it, but I guess it was nice that I got it just right this time.

Monday

Short version: Chicken, bean, and cheese quesadillas, raw tomatoes

Long version: I took the younger two children with me to their brother's basketball scrimmage in the evening, which meant I had about an hour to feed everyone between getting home from work and leaving again. I thought it was an opportune time to use one of the cans of chicken I bought awhile ago for rushed evenings. All I did was mix the drained chicken with salsa and put it in tortillas with cheese and refried beans. A serviceable meal, if far from gourmet. And only nominally homemade, but that's the way this week went.

The tomatoes were something labeled "cocktail tomatoes." I don't know what these are or what sort of cocktail they would be used for. They're small tomatoes on the vine, basically. They were a lot cheaper than the cherry tomatoes, although not as good. Good enough, though.

Tuesday

Short version: Rushed and late casserole, carrot sticks with curry dip, brownies

Long version: I had to sub for a teacher this day, and then I stayed after school to wait for Poppy to finish cheerleading practice. We had the older boys' friend staying with us this night so I could bring the three FFA boys to school for a 5:30 a.m. departure for a wool-judging clinic. Having a guest--and a guest who is a perpetually hungry teenage boy, at that--meant that I was not going to be getting by with quesadillas.

So I got home at 5:15 p.m. and started microwaving potatoes to chop and add to chopped ham, plus butter, the last of some chicken fat and juices, and garlic powder. I browned that under the broiler, and then added a bunch of grated cheddar to melt in. That was the casserole. 

At the same time, I cut up some carrot sticks and put those on the table with some curry dip (sweet curry powder+mayonnaise) for the hungry children. And I made the brownies.

We didn't eat until about 6 p.m., which is pretty late for us, but at least there was enough food. There was even a small serving of the casserole left to be my lunch at work the next day. Yay.

Wednesday

Short version: Lamb steaks, bread and butter, green salad with vinaigrette, bread with jam

Long version: This night we had another child-guest with us, but this was Poppy's friend, so she ate way less than our guest the night before (who happened to be her older brother). The FFA travelers came home hungry, and I luckily had half of a lamb steak left for them.

The bread and jam was the dessert stand-in, since I was working on Tuesday when I had been planning to bake cookies.

Thursday

Short version: Bean and cheese quesadillas, homecoming food

Long version: Crazy day for homecoming. I brought the three non-basketball-playing children home after the pep rally to gather all their required apparel* before going to the basketball player's game at 4 p.m. We were home about half an hour, which was long enough to make the three kids a quesadilla using canned refried beans, cheese, and the "extra grande" flour tortillas A. bought at the store.

They don't even fit in my biggest skillet, but if I fold them over, they mostly do, so I guess that's good enough.

We were at the homecoming festivities all night, so everyone got food at the concession stand, too. Mostly things involving more cheese, like pizza and nachos. Not the healthiest night, but homecoming comes but once a year, I guess.

I had a piece of the quesadilla one child didn't eat, plus some cottage cheese with strawberry jam, before we left at 3:30 p.m. and was so tired when we got home at 10 p.m. from the community dance that I wasn't hungry for anything but my bed. Thank goodness my friend offered to drop the older boys off on her way home from the dance.

Refrigerator check:

Needs some re-stocking.

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

* Poppy needed her cheer uniform plus a dress for her job as the queen's crown-bearer, the eldest son needed nice clothes because he was on the homecoming court, and the basketball player needed nice clothes brought to him for the community dance that evening.

The Bible in Less Than a Year

I decided last year that I would read the Bible. It seemed kind of dumb that as much of a reader as I am, I had never read the whole Bible, arguably the most influential book for all the literature of the following two thousand years. 

I spontaneously started on Ash Wednesday last year, which was in February. I didn't pick that day on purpose; that's just when my Bible was delivered. I ordered a new one because we only had a King James Bible and the Douay-Rheims Bible, neither of which are written in a style I prefer*. I more or less randomly bought something labeled the New Standard Version, Catholic Edition, Anglicized Text Bible. I didn't want a "study" Bible with a million footnotes. I just wanted to read the text.

So I started right at the beginning and just . . . read.

I didn't have a particular number of pages to read a day or anything, though I did have the goal to finish the whole thing in a year. Some days I read a lot. Some days I didn't read it at all. 

I finished last week, so it didn't take me quite a year.

Some random takeaways:

Man, those Old Testament books with all the battles are rough to get through. They're worse than the genealogical lists of names, in my opinion. I did actually read all those names. I found it interesting which names have survived to this day as popular names and which have been abandoned.

My favorite book was the Book of Sirach, which I had never read before. Good advice in that one, and easy to read.

The Book of Sirach in my actual Bible. I did not mark any passages, because I detest reading marked-up books. Too distracting.

It was surprisingly affecting to read all four of the Gospels all together. You know what's coming, but it's still shocking every time.

Also shocking is what Jesus is recorded as having really said. The popular idea of him as some kind of feel-good hippie is so far off from the actual teachings in the Gospels that it's actually funny.

Paul's letters are very, very interesting to read in their entirety. His personality comes through quite clearly.

I liked the version I had, and it was relatively easy to get through. 

So now I'm wondering what I should read next. A. suggested the Catechism of the Catholic Church. That would certainly be a challenge and would probably take another year. Maybe longer.

Have you ever read the Bible? What did you think?

* And of course, the King James Bible isn't Catholic and thus does not include all the books I wanted to read.

Snapshots: The Long-Anticipated Appliance

First, for my mother:

Look, Ma! I have a dryer!

In actual fact, I have had this dryer for some time now. I purchased it a month ago. It was delivered a bit over a week after I bought it. A. was very prompt in setting it up that very day, hooking up the vent and all. Which is when he discovered that the three-prong plug on the dryer was not the same as the three-prong outlet on our wall.

Sigh.

We had some kind of older style of 220-volt three-prong outlet. So he sent me the link to order the proper cord, we waited some more for that to be delivered, and he put it on yesterday.

And then I washed a load of laundry at 4:15 p.m. which was dry before I went to bed. The miracles of the modern age, indeed.

It's too bad I didn't have a (functional) dryer during our last spell of cold weather, during which I was literally hanging up laundry when it was 14 degrees outside. We did, however, have the good old woodstove. And I did figure out how to cook on it.

Some of you might remember the great pleasure I got out of cooking on our woodstove at Blackrock. The woodstove there was literally just a giant cast-iron box, which was perfect for cooking on. The whole thing was like a stove burner. Every part of it was blazing hot at all times. Good for pumping out heat and cooking on. Not so good for keeping small children from branding themselves accidentally. 

The woodstove in this house has a kind of metal grate enclosing the entirety of the firebox. Much better for non-branded children, but not so good for cooking on. The surface of this grate is not hot enough to simmer  a pot of water. Or food.

However! I no longer have tiny children! They can all understand the concept of keeping their bodies away from hot surfaces! And that meant I could lift the top of the safety grate thing to access the firebox itself.

Which is what I did to cook this pot of pinto beans.

Which then went into this chili.

I also kept a covered saucepan of water on there to stay hot, which was handy because our constantly-used electric kettle died right in the middle of this cold snap. We do have a microwave to heat water for tea or A.'s instant coffee, but the children were home for a couple of days doing their schooling online, and when our microwave is running for more than a minute, it messes with the Wi-Fi in most of the house and makes their Zoom meetings drop. 

Not on Zoom, but still using the Wi-Fi to do an online learning program for school.

So when A. went into the kitchen to get more coffee or tea, which is a frequent occurrence on very cold days, he could just use the already-hot water on the stove and microwave it for about thirty seconds to get it to a true boil.

 I also kept an uncovered pan of water on the stove to evaporate and put some much-needed moisture into the very dry air. And, as you can see, to thaw some frozen lamb stock for the coming chili.

I did order another kettle, which arrived a couple of days ago. The one we had was no longer available, so I got one that looked pretty much the same. Unfortunately, it doesn't heat quite as quickly, and also the button is on the handle at the top, rather than a small lever at the bottom. This makes it harder to find in the dark kitchen, which is where I hit the switch before I start getting dressed.

Still boils the water, though. And makes that trippy blue light.

Also related to the stretch of very wintery weather was the lamb carcass. A. slaughtered the last ram lamb some time ago and hung it in the tree out front to age. We were planning on butchering it on the really bad weather day when we would be inside anyway. But when he took it down from the tree in the morning, it was frozen solid. So we had to leave it inside to thaw. Our non-carpeted and relatively warm spots for this were pretty limited, so we put on the floor of the dining room.

I spy with my little eye . . .

Amusingly, every one of the children woke up, came into the dining room, and said not one word about the lamb carcass on the floor. Too accustomed to such things to comment on it, I suppose.

We never got to it that day, though, so we moved it into A.'s office until we could get to it. That room isn't really heated much above freezing, and the lamb had been frozen for the better part of its aging, so we figured it could use some more time to age properly. It did this on top of my washing machine, which is also in A.'s office.

And then I needed to actually use the washing machine, so we moved the carcass again. This time on top of the dog crates that were also in A.'s office. It seemed pretty mean that the dogs were sleeping in these crates literally right under all that delicious meat, but it would also have been mean to leave them outside when it was zero degrees. So they did indeed sleep under the lamb for several nights until we finally got around to cutting it up.

There you have it! My (winter) life, snapshotted.