Day 70 - Ginger and Fish

Baked Fish - pg. 329

Ginger Snaps - pg. 206

I baked halibut steaks! Might not seem like much to you, but I now know how to pan-fry fish in bread crumbs, poach fish, and bake fish. This is a big deal! No more fear of fish! I baked each halibut steak in its own little gratin dish, first salted and then laid on olive oil. I painted the tops with cocktail sauce, the kind you usually put on shrimp. I loved the taste. The sauce put a little zip in the fish and a lot of great color. The fish was served with leftover roasted vegetables and leftover pureed winter heirloom squash. You know: leftover management.

Ginger snaps! Lordy, lordy. These are the best ginger snaps I've ever had. Why? Butter. They're made with butter. Lots of butter. Not to mention that I was plenty generous with the vanilla and the ground ginger. Just rolled the dough into balls, dipped the balls into sugar, and squished the balls with a flat-bottomed glass. And parchment paper! Have I sung the praises of parchment paper? Nothing sticks to the cookie sheets and the cookie sheets need almost no cleaning.

Otherwise, I did my NCHS thing today and cleaned a bit, especially getting ready for my friend Carol's weekend visit. We had some sun today, but not enough. I'm still feeling kinda chilled. But it sure was fun to cook today, especially once I decided WHAT to cook! That becomes a bit more challenging as I get further into the project.

46 recipes completed and more-or-less mastered; 259 challenges to go!

Day 69 - State of the Union

No cooking today, either. We ate take-out while watching Obama's speech. Good speech. He didn't dodge anything, excuse or blame. He inspired. But I'm still waiting for results. Please! Someone!

Spent 3/4s of the day on NCHS work, the rest working on my own finances. But I did find time to set out ingredients for ginger snaps.

And did I mention that a hoard of workmen appeared on our doorstep at 7:45 a.m.? We did get a lot of little things done, but I'm so sick of wrapping up all these nit-picky house details. FINISH THE DAMN HOUSE ALREADY! Then go away. Please.

Day 68 - Polenta Torta Una Vez Mas

Leftovers. No complaints though! Served with a simple tossed green salad.

I've organized and relabeled all our spices and herbs to fit into the base cabinet pull-out drawer next to the cooktop. Another thing I can check off the move-in list. Yippee! (Yes, that means it was raining nearly all day. Again.)

The rest of the day was devoted to North County Humane Society work. A jillion emails. Organized all my paperwork and in-process tasks and projects before I completely lose touch with reality.

Now I will vegetate in front of the tube and quilt. Thank you very much.

Day 67 - Polenta Torta, Version #2

The first time I made this dish, my sauce was way too runny and I wasn't thrilled with the store-bought polenta I used for this application. Soooo, the other day I made a lot of polenta, spreading most of it out in a jelly roll pan. Today I cut that mega-piece of polenta into 3 pieces for the 3 layers of polenta in the torta. I confess that I used bottled tomato sauce from Trader Joe's, although at least it was organic. And I added some cooked hot Italian sausage. The result was just about perfect. I was pleased. So was Randy.

I got a lot accomplished today. Yippee! Some North County Humane Society work. Lots of cleaning, laundry and household chores and projects. A trip to Trader Joe's. Some work on the small quilt I'm finishing. And so on and so forth. A terrific Monday.

Day 66 - No Cooking Today

Just a relaxing day. I brought some pea soup out of the freezer for dinner. That's it.

Except that my friend Laurel gave me a Joy of Cooking 2010 calendar. Too cool! Lots of valuable cooking tips and insights, and a few interesting recipes, too. Thank you, Laurel!

UFO #3 Finished - Abandoned Rotten Bead Project

Yes, an abandoned project still counts. We've been through this before, remember?

I took a class on making a particular type of beaded bead. I never liked what I came up with. I made a practice bead in class. So-so. I made 3 and hung them on a picot neckpiece. Better, but not thrilling. (I gave that necklace to our cruise butler in December to give to his wife.) On the cruise I made another beaded bead and started one more (after numerous tear-outs-and-try-agains).

This afternoon my friend Laurel came over to bead with me. I took out this project and finally said, "Forget it. I don't like 'em. They're a PITA. I'm unhappy with the colors, the results, AND the process. This isn't fun any more." I gleefully proceeded to take apart the in-class practice bead as well as the finished and unfinished beads from the cruise. I tore up the instructions and sent them to the recycling bin. After which I picked up a truly satisfying UnFinished beading prOject, Melanie Doerman's Alien Star Garden bracelet. I LOVE Mel's designs. I spent another hour or 2 happily beading away.

And I'm happy to report that I'm about 1/3 of the way through quilting a small quilt that dates back to (gulp) 1999. You see my point? Gotta finish those UFOs!

Day 66 - Polenta!

Polenta - pg. 94

If you don't recall my earlier brush with polenta (10/28/09), you aren't missing much. Basically, I thought it would be faster to use store-bought polenta-in-a-roll when I was pressed for time to make a polenta torta, but I had to go to a couple stores and a store manager to find the darn stuff. Took longer than if I'd just made it myself. Tonight I took a crack at making it myself. Piece of cake!

I made a double batch. Part went underneath left-over sausage and left-over roasted veggies. Part is spread out on a jelly-roll pan to be used in another crack at polenta torta sometime later this week. Polenta is even easier than risotto which is also easy. Whom knew.

This morning I attended a long and VERY productive meeting of the North County Humane Society/AFAR Board of Directors. What a great group! I'm so proud to be one of them.

And, we had sun! Beautiful golden heat-giving sun. Clear blue skies. Gorgeous.

44 recipes completed; 261 to go

Day 65 - Roasted Vegetable Winter Salad

Went through a pile of emails this morning, getting ready for a NCHS/AFAR Board meeting tomorrow. Whew!

This evening we went to the neighbor's for a pot luck. Now, this is not your ordinary pot luck. These are 6 people, 3 couples, all of whom are cooks and major foodies. The host couple made chili (not your ordinary chili). The other guest couple brought corn bread and dessert. We brought a salad that I made this afternoon. From Martha Stewart's Cooking School. Roasted winter root vegetables on a bed of seasonal greens with Alice's mustard vinaigrette. Sprinkled with spicy toasted pepitas. I roasted mushrooms, carrots, parsnips, turnips, and shallots. Enough for the salad for 6 tonight and leftovers for tomorrow night. The whole meal was just fabulous. And we all are great company if I do say so myself.

One of us, Tom, makes ravioli and will teach me! The universe heard my pleas for help! Sometime soon we will do another pot luck at his house centered around making pasta and ravioli in particular. We'll all bring aprons and pitch in. Yippee! Tom reports that he makes his ravioli pasta Martha Stewart's way using a pasta machine, that it's darn near impossible to roll the stuff out thin enough by hand. No kidding.

(Yes, I do have a pasta machine....)

Lovely evening. Made a terrific new dish, even if it wasn't an Alice. It still fits into Alice's food and cooking philosophies.

Fundamentals

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

The animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours, they move finished and complete, gifted with extension of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren; they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth. -Henry Beston, naturalist and author (1888-1968)

Day 64 - Ravioli

Fresh Pasta: Ravioli - pgs. 89 and 90

Project Runway starts in 4 minutes, so I'll tell you all about the ravioli tomorrow. Let's say I don't see professional pasta-making in my future.

---------------

Well, I guess I'm feeling slightly better about the ravioli experiment now that it's "the morning after." The only thing I can say without hesitation is this: if you're making ravioli do NOT try to roll out the pasta dough by hand. Use a pasta machine, make pasta ribbons as wide as you can, and use those ribbons to make your ravioli. Ravioli pasta needs to be paper thin. You can't get to paper thin with a pastry cloth and rolling pin.

I stuffed mine with seasoned pureed squash. They tasted good, but were way too thick and probably needed to have cooked longer as they were plenty chewy. In Martha Stewart's Cooking School there are instructions for making ravioli using a pasta machine. USE IT, for heaven's sake! Our side dishes were leftover kashi and leftover long-cooked broccoli. I'm not impressed by the kashi, but the leftover broccoli was delicious.

It rained all day here again. I took advantage of the situation to accomplish another move-in task on my to-do list. I got my travel basics all reorganized for our next trip, where ever and when ever that may be. I pride myself on being able to get out the door to travel anywhere on earth in one hour or less. Of course, I usually take much longer. But I can do it in an hour and frequently do, especially for short trips.

Things that pissed me off today: the demise of Air America and the Supreme Court's ruling on corporate and union campaign contributions. I've always said that the primary reason for voting for Democratic presidents is the Supreme Court and this is a classic example. I don't want to hear any conservatives bitching about activist judges. This one takes the cake.

43 recipes attempted; 262 to go

Day 63 - Lots of Rain. Seriously, Lots of Rain

Did I mention that it rained off and on all day today? Mostly on? With high winds at our house? We just left it all to the cats. I went into San Luis Obispo with Randy when he went to work. Dropped him off and swam to Petsmart to get cat food (which we do NOT want to run out of -- ever). Then swam to Bed, Bath & Beyond to spend my Christmas gift card. Mostly on cooking gadgets. I'll let you know about them as I use them. Then I met a friend for lunch and a long talk about rescuing cats, a mutual interest. Then to Barnes & Noble to hang out and read (and a walk around downtown). Picked up Randy from work. We went out for coffee, and then for sushi. And then to a Kronos Quartet performance (we LOVE them!). It's late. I'm tired. Didn't cook today. More rain tomorrow. Sweet dreams.

Day 62 - Long Cooked Broccoli

Long Cooked Broccoli - pg. 294

Haven't we all learned to steam broccoli just until it's bright green, never beyond? So when I saw the title of this recipe in Alice Waters' cookbook, I wondered why Alice and I had been living on different planets all these years. Wuh!???? Wack up the broccoli and cook it for an hour? Beg pardon? Is this the 50s back in Wisconsin when and where I was raised? But, I have pledged to cook everything in TAOSF, so I dove in with abandon.

Basically, you create a near-puree seasoned with salt, garlic, and lemon juice. Then you toss it with cooked pasta. It was pretty good. I served it with kashi made with chicken broth. The kashi has a history itself. It's a box that has been sitting in our pantry for... oh... a very long time. Along with a few others. I probably should have tossed them when we moved, but I'm too cheap. Now I see them all as experiments I'm eager to try, just like all those recipes.

Otherwise? It rained a lot again this morning. My main project for the day was to finish the last organizing of my stuff in my closet. My jewelry. Sounds weird, I know, that it would take half of a day to organize one woman's jewelry, but ya gotta remember that I do beadwork. And I have friends who do beadwork. And a husband who knows that gifts of jewelry are always appropriate and appreciated. And I almost never send old stuff to the thrift shop. In the old house I had necklaces on a rack in my closet and lots of stuff in assorted boxes in dresser drawers and on my dresser. Here? No rack on the wall. No boxes in drawers. No dresser at all. Just shelves. And a nicer collection of boxes. You wouldn't believe how much junk I found in the old boxes. Maybe you would. The rest is all neat and lovely now.

42 recipes completed; 263 to go

Day 61 - LOTS of Cooking Goin' On Here Today!

Shallow-Poached Salmon - pg. 146

Leeks Vinaigrette - pg. 242

Strawberry Shortcake - pg. 365

made with

Cream Biscuits - pg. 275

AND, I made a loaf of bread-machine bread. .... Well, we got the anticipated heavy rain and high winds this morning. And Jim, the appliance repair guy, came to replace the drum on my dryer (this drum is a lot quieter than the first one). Actually, the appliance repair guy only comes to visit our cats. He loves cats. Jim and Nicholas are BFFs. Today, Jim also brought Roxanne and Fanny under his sway.

I did a little work for NCHS (North County Humane Society) and ran a few errands in the early afternoon when the skies were mostly blue and sunny. Then, I cooked like mad. I've never prepared leeks. I've never poached fish. And I don't think I've ever made biscuits from scratch either. I think Bisquick is the closest I've come, and they are NOTHING like Alice's Cream Biscuits which, indeed, are made with a cup of heavy cream. OMG. Can't wait to dive into the assembled short cake later this evening. Fresh strawberries. Local fresh strawberries. From farmers' market.

Yes, I did start that UFO last night. It's finishing a small quilt. Just needs a little "rustic" quilting and the binding put on.

41 recipes completed; 264 to go

Day 60 - Beans & Peas & Resumes

Rain today, which is supposed to go on all week. Yippee! We need it.

A quiet day here at the Knight Hacienda. We went out for breakfast and errands. I did my "ings." (Washing, vacuuming, ironing.) Planned this week's cooking. Went to Trader Joe's for a few groceries and CANDLES, which we will need if the power goes out this week, although I'm betting it won't. I shlogged my way through a stack of resumes in front of the fire with Roxanne W. Furrperson curled up asleep on my lap.

I finished the pea and bean soups. Two containers of pea soup went into the freezer along with 1 of bean soup. The rest of the bean soup was dinner with mandarins and bread. (I had to go to the local version of Whole Foods to find the dried split peas. Apparently they're not sold in regular groceries any more. Who knows what the beans are! Now they're just labeled "small white beans." Yah, I can see that....) I'm happy to report that because of my intense learn-to-cook project, I've really stepped it up a notch or 2 in the pea and bean soup arena. I was so much more aware of what I was doing and why this time. Nice, since I've been throwing these soups together for (gulp) 35+ years.

A nice quiet Sunday.

No UFOs were finished this week, unfortunately, but I have one ready to work on this week. I may even start working on it tonight. Maybe.

Day 59 - Endive and Strawberries

Poached Egg with Curly Endive Salad - pg. 143

Strawberries in Orange Juice - pg. 365

What a day! Always lots to do first thing in the morning, house keeping stuff. Then a trip to farmers' market whether we need anything or not. Just because. My becoming-favorite organic greens seller had a big basket of terrific looking endive, so I got a lot of it. And Dragon Spring Farms was there with their heirloom squashes.

Home quick for lunch then off to the shelter where the Board president and the office manager and I interviewed 5 candidates to replace our departing office manager. What a great group of candidates! I hope we can keep them all with North County Humane Society as volunteers at the very least. Wonderful women, just wonderful.

Then home where I started some cooking. Our soon-to-be next door neighbors stopped by to get a tour of our finished house. I made dinner and afterwards started 2 pots of soup, 1 of split pea and 1 of "small white bean." I have 2 of those very old-fashioned Westbend bean pots that are just perfect for bean and pea soup. These were used before there was such a thing as slow-cookers and crock pots.

The salad was terrific. I beefed it up for an entree by poaching 4 eggs for the 2 of us. Since I used raspberry blush white balsamic vinegar in the dressing instead of red wine vinegar, I omitted the garlic. The baby frisees were so tender and flavorful!

Alice, bless her heart, reminds us that desserts need not be fancy to be wonderful. We are blessed to live in an area where we have fresh local strawberries year around. They may not be at their very best in the dead of winter, but they're still wonderful. The grower told me that a strawberry plant here produces nearly continuously for 3 years before having to be replaced. What's hard on strawberry crops is rain, which we are supposed to have a lot of this week. So this was a good day to buy strawberries. Anyway, I added some fresh mandarin sections and chopped dates to the mix. Quite yummy!

37 recipes accomplished; 268 yet to go

Day 58 - The Disappearing Cat

News? I now have a Facebook page. It's a long story. Basically, I'm dragging myself, kicking and screaming, into the 21st century, having skipped over the late 90s and the 00s. Just don't ask me to Twitter, okay? My thumbs are as old as the rest of me.

So, I generously volunteered to take the "Pet of the Week" from North County Humane Society to Dave Congalton's radio show on KVEC. We do this the 3rd Friday of each month, rotating with several other animal rescue organizations. (Web casts are available on the KVEC web site a few days after air day.) I met Megan there, since Megan actually does the show. But, Dave kindly invited me into the studio, too. Our Cat of the Week was Jasmine, a medium-hair blue (grey) lady with white boots and white whiskers. She is a beautiful cat. The carpet in Dave's studio (floor and wainscoting) is blue (grey), against which Jasmine practically disappears. And then Jasmine disappeared! Into the transmission equipment.

After 15 minutes of the 3 of us, plus the producer so make that 4, crawling around on our hands and knees hunting for the cat, Dave called for anyone within hearing to come to the studio with the correct hex wrench set to remove a panel behind which was the ever-popular Jasmine. We just barely got her out before the next segment started. It was a total circus. Megan, Dave and I truly had to wing it. Jasmine is back at the shelter, no worse for the wear.

I did not cook. Randy and I went to Joebella's for coffee and then Pier 46 for fish sandwiches. I need an advil....

Day 57 - Busy, Busy Day

Whew! From a regular meeting of the Central Coast Weavers to picking up medication for Maizie Jane Valentine (her Radiocat treatment overshot it; she has gone from being hyperthyroid to being hypothyroid) to attending a monthly mixer of the Templeton Chamber of Commerce on behalf of North County Humane Society, with numerous errands and side-trips and stops in between--- that was my day. Did I cook? No. Think about cooking? No. Did I eat a lot of good snacks? Yes. Aussie Bites from Costco and Pier 46 Seafood's little ahi tacos were the best. Ahhhh, it was a very good day.

Day 56 - Noodles and Chard

Spaghettini with Oil and Garlic - pg. 92

Wilted Chard with Onion - pg. 309

I picked off 2 of the easy recipes tonight since I was out running errands all day. The chard dish was really good. I made the pasta with Trader Joe's lemon pepper papparadella which is flavorful and lovely.

I made another loaf of bread-machine bread this evening, but also today bought a 6-quart enameled cast-iron pot to try Jim Lahey's slow-rise bread method which I THINK ... and HOPE ... will give me the rustic loaf I really want to make.

My most interesting moment today was lunch with my friend Wendy who has significant expertise in the governance of non-profits. We talked non-profits, food, and cats and dogs. Wendy is a terrific woman, just terrific. I love her company.

And I found 3 really good Wilton baking sheets at Ross Dress-for-Less. They are smallish, but have handles on both ends. I think they will be absolutely ideal for oven roasting vegetables.

And ya-da, ya-da, ya-da.

35 recipes completed; 270 recipes yet to cook

Day 55 - Leftover Management

I have no idea how Julie Powell managed all the FOOD she produced! She made nearly 2 recipes a day for a year. She fed only herself and her husband most days. WHAT did she do with all that FOOD?!? I had plans to cook today, but opening the frig ... it was all about leftovers, leftovers, leftovers. Leftover carrots. Leftover parsnips. Leftover risotto. Leftover Canadian bacon. Leftover bacon. Leftover tapenade. Leftover cilantro. Leftover polenta. Leftover pork chops. You get the picture. A little leftover management was in order. For lunch I had a leftover pork chop and leftover polenta. For dinner I reheated the last of the leftover asparagus and lemon risotto. I set out some leftover crackers and leftover goat cheese. I dressed a green salad with leftover vinaigrette.

The green salad was interesting. Organic baby spinach, arugula, and spicy mustard, with some curly parsley. I threw in some clementine segments, and coarsely chopped dates and pecans. It was delicious. Clearly, we do NOT need no stinkin' lettuce!

Here's a chuckle. I am a luddite to the core. The last on the planet to get a cell phone, for example, and then only because my architect made me when we started this house. Fifty bucks a month and it goes for DAYS without being used incoming or outgoing. Do you see links on this blog? No. I don't know how. Do you see photos on this blog? No. I knew how once, but I forgot. And so on. Well, after last night's information-sharing among North County Humane Society board members, I am emerging as the resident computer geek.

I volunteered to post kitty ads on Craig's List. I volunteered to set up a Facebook page for North County Humane Society. Which means I've had to start one of my own for practice. I volunteered to lead the effort to get NCHS on You Tube. Oh brother, Learn By Doing at it's finest or at its worst, I'm not sure which. We'll find out!

Day 54 - Nothing New

Nothing new today. I house-fraued most of the day. Cleaning. Laundry. Then the old and new Boards of Directors of North County Humane Society met here to bring the new Board up to speed about on-going projects and current directions. It was a great meeting. These are really fine people who are doing a lot of wonderful work. I'm proud to be on the new Board.