Category: Writer

Myth: Old people are stick-in-the-muds and don’t go anywhere because they are crotchety homebodies.

Truth: Old people would love to go everywhere all the time, but old people are probably living on a fixed income and don’t go anywhere because they can’t afford to.

Myth: Old people are hypochondriacs and go to the doctor for every little thing because they love the attention.

Truth: Old people go to the doctor a lot because there’s always something going wrong. Everything hurts on an old person and is giving out. Old people were the picture of health when they were young, and they never saw this coming.

Myth: Old people are lazy and don’t like to exercise.

Truth: Old people would love to exercise if exercise didn’t hurt for days afterwards. Aches and pains that might have taken a couple days to dissipate when they were young now take days and days to get back to “normal”.  Whatever “normal” is. Normal is different now.

Myth: Old people are more cautious than young people because they’ve lost their joie de vivre and are now conservative party poopers.

Truth: Old people may have lost their joie de vivre but it isn’t because of what you might think. Old people are more cautious than young people because they’ve realized that it isn’t worth the risk whatever “it” may be. Remember the song by Peggy Lee, “Is that all there is”? Old people have realized this was a true song. It’s going to be a disappointment.

Myth: The Golden Years are a wonderful time of life

Truth: The Golden Years is an idea made up by a young person. There’s nothing golden about it. If anything, it’s the Gray Years. “No matter how bad things get, remember these sage words: You’re old, you sag, get over it.” — Sophia from The Golden Girls TV show

Myth: Sex is better when you’re old.

Truth: This is also something made up by a young person, probably a young doctor or a young journalist. The truth is in old age something is always not working so unless you’re into drugs and surgical procedures you need to come up with other ways of intimate pleasure.

Myth: There’s no or very little age discrimination in hiring practices concerning old people.

Truth: Age discrimination is alive and well in hiring practices of old people. Old people can apply all they want to American jobs but the certainty of getting them is all but certain even if the old person is eminently qualified. Usually they say, “We found a more qualified person.” This is code for “You’re too old.”

Myth: People have respect for the wisdom that is acquired by age.

Truth: Nobody cares what old people know or what their wisdom can provide. Young people think they know it all and the last thing they want is for some old person to tell them anything. Old people know this is true because when they were young, they didn’t want some old person telling them anything even if it made sense. Especially if it made sense.

Miscellaneous Truths: Getting up to pee many times in the night is common. Leg pains from taking medicine is common. No amount of Botox can get rid of all the wrinkles. Eating anything and everything in any amount is a thing of the past because now there’s acid reflux. Fallen arches are common but there’s the Good Feet Store if you can afford it. Forgetfulness is common and they’d like you to think this means you’re on the verge of getting Alzheimer’s.

Youth was a time of gaining things. Old age is a time of letting things go.

Continue reading “What Your Parents Didn’t Tell You About Old Age” →

The boys had been hang gliding that day. This was years ago but it seems like only yesterday. I was their chase driver and I liked it. I liked being behind the wheel of the SUV alone with my thoughts and looking out at the landscape as it went by. There was that feeling of freedom somewhat anchored by a purpose. This is my ideal life. I like freedom coupled with a sense of purpose. When purpose becomes uncoupled, I’m like a boat on the water with nothing but freedom, no anchor and drifting.

Everyone had a good day. The boys had flown far and landed unscathed. I had been able to pick up the two I was assigned to without difficulty or getting lost. We were back at the camp site that was called Tuttle Creek which I said was famous for all the tuttles. You know, box tuttles, painted tuttles, desert tuttles. Tuttle Creek was right there adjacent to the famous Alabama Hills. In the old westerns the Alabama Hills were the on-location scene with Whitney Portal as the backdrop and I can see why. They were a very interesting rock formation.

It was the fourth of July and we wanted to see some fireworks. So, after dinner we piled in the SUV to see if Independence was doing anything. They were. We joined the citizens of Independence on the shoulder of Highway 395 and waited. Highway 395 follows the eastern flank of the Sierra Nevada and you can get a good look at Whitney Portal as you drive 395 through Lone Pine. Independence is a little farther south on 395 and usually has a fair amount of traffic but tonight there was none or very little and we waited in the gathering dusk for the show to begin.

And soon it did. A flat bed wagon pulled in and was set up with chairs for the dignitaries of Independence and the master of ceremonies. The flat bed was off to one side of a large empty sagebrush field north of town. Some one over there was in charge of the fireworks but we couldn’t see who. Eventually we heard the PA system crackle to life. It was dark now, around 9 pm.

“Welcome to the 30^th annual Independence California Fourth of July Celebration!”, he said. “Let’s begin by singing our National Anthem.” We all rose to our feet as the PA played a rousing band version and we sang. When we finished singing…

The announcer announced: “For our first display we have something from Ace Hardware on Main street.”

A minute goes by…

Ka-boom!

We all ooo-ed and ahh-ed.

Each fireworks was announced in succession. Apparently, the city had no budget of their own. Every fireworks was paid for by a local business.

“This display comes to you from the law offices of Harvey Smith.”

A minute goes by…

Ka-boom!

“Our next display is courtesy of Eastern Sierra Ice Cream Company.”

A minute goes by…

Ka-boom!

But now we have a sage brush fire that is started by embers falling into the field! Ah-rooooooooo! Here comes the Independence Fire and Water truck roaring down the highway. It two wheels it into the field, slams on the brakes, the driver jumps out, grabs the hose and begins to pour water on the fire.

We get a bird’s eye view of this from our SUV, and it is all quite entertaining.

Fire out. We go back to the MC.

“Our next display comes to you courtesy of Inyo County Water Department.”

A minute goes by…

Kaboom!

We only had 3 more fires (what a successful night!) and three more fire truck sorties to the rescue. Such is life in a small town on the eastern slopes of the Sierra Nevada.

Make Pico de Gallo!

Pico De Gallo is a Mexican salsa that’s loaded with all the things that are growing well in my garden. Pico de Gallo, by the way, (translates to “beak of the rooster”. Don’t ask me why they call it that. They also call a food item wrapped with a tortilla “burritos” (little burros), and deep-fried pastries “churros” (sheep). It’s a colorful language and culture.

The things that don’t grow well in my garden aren’t ingredients in Pico de Gallo. (eggplant, green beans, okra, potatoes). Last year I grew a lot of native crops, but I wound up not using them so I’m not growing them this year even though they grew very well. (black eyed beans, buckwheat, sorghum, amaranth). Now I’m branching out to things that I like to eat. And I’m having trouble with the birds. They eat everything that isn’t a Pico de Gallo ingredient. And guess what? The birds are winning! Things that the birds don’t seem to like are the things that go into Pico de Gallo. (tomatoes, onions, jalapenos, cilantro). They are growing well and I’m sure it’s a southwestern thing. If I had a lime tree, I would have all the ingredients. Pico De Gallo is excellent over tacos, burritos, nachos, or served with chips. You can make up a batch in about 5 minutes.

Pico de Gallo salsa

Ingredients

    1 lb Roma tomatoes, (3-4 medium), diced

    1/2 medium onion, (1 cup chopped)

    1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and finely minced

    1/2 cup cilantro, chopped

    2 Tbsp lime juice, from 1 lime

    1/2 tsp salt, or to taste

    1/8 tsp black pepper  

Instructions

In a medium bowl, add diced tomatoes, onion, jalapeno pepper and chopped cilantro. Stir in 2 Tbsp lime juice and lightly season with salt and pepper, or season to taste. Enjoy right away or cover and refrigerate overnight.

I grew my own fava beans this past winter because I’d never eaten a fava bean and I was mighty curious. I planted the fava beans in the fall expecting them to bloom and get seed pods before winter fully set in. In the beginning they grew well, and they flowered. They have quite a pretty flower resembling a sweet pea. Then winter set it and it set in with a vengeance. Well, a vengeance by Arizona standards. Here’s how winter sets in with a vengeance in Arizona: it went below 32 degrees for days on end. So, I put up a makeshift greenhouse to protect my favas from the cold and it worked. But then it didn’t work. It got too cold for too long. Eventually the tops of the plants went black and withered so I chopped off the black parts and waited to see what would happen. There were still some of the green plants left low to the ground. I did not have much hope.

And then…

It started to warm up and the plants started coming back! They re-bloomed and seeds pods started to grow and last week I harvested. A miracle! My tough little favas. I love them so.

So, I looked around for a recipe that intrigued me, and I found one on Jamie Oliver that is the bomb! I modified it some because I didn’t have all his ingredients. I didn’t have the feta cheese he suggested so I used parmesan. I also didn’t have sourdough, so I used a baguette. I didn’t have fresh rosemary, so I used dried. I was too lazy to make his dressing, so I just added tomatoes to a balsamic vinaigrette I already had.

Here’s my version.

Try it. You’ll like it. You can leave off the chianti and liver.

Fava Bean and Peas on Toast

About ½ cup good homemade balsamic vinaigrette dressing

2 spring onions

4 ripe cherry tomatoes

EVOO

Bunch of fresh mint

1-2 cups broad beans (frozen or fresh) (if you haven’t grown your own most Mexican markets have fresh)

¼ to ½ cup peas (frozen or fresh)

2-4 slices of bread (sourdough or baguette sliced in half lengthwise as to be toastable)

Clove of garlic

Rosemary (1 sprig of fresh or a ½ teaspoon of dried)

Parmesan or Feta cheese

Chop the cherry tomatoes into your balsamic dressing. Let set at room temp to marinate. You can add a bit of fresh lemon juice for piquancy.

Pick the mint leaves off the mint stalks, set aside, and tie the stalks with a string. If you’re lazy like me just add the mint stalks to a pan of boiling water and blanch the prepared fava beans for a minute.

Fava Bean preparation

OK, I admit it. Fava beans aren’t the easiest in the world to prepare but they’re not the hardest either and they’re so worth it, I think. If using fresh pick some plump pods, trim them and remove the green outer husk to get to the big seeds inside. I discovered how to get the outer husk off the big seeds by accident. I was going to just blanche the big seeds and freeze them for later and then I looked and saw that the big seeds were wrinkling. Whoops! The outer husk almost slides right off and there inside are the most delectable little green interiors. Once you have about a couple cups, put your bean interiors in a pan of water and boil for a minute to blanch.

Fava beans blanched and unpeeled on left. Fava beans blanched and peeled on right.

After the minute, using a slotted spoon, scoop out the blanched beans and put ¼ to ½ cup of frozen peas in the mint water and blanch them, too. Add the blanched beans to the dressing and then drain the peas and add them to the dressing, as well. Finely slice the mint leaves and add to the dressing/bean/pea/tomato mixture. Toss well to combine. Toast the bread and take a garlic clove, cut it in half and rub it all over the toasted bread. Sprinkle with a little sea salt and a little good olive oil. Pile the beans on and shave parmesan or sprinkle feta over.

For a little extra oomph, you can sprinkle extra chopped mint, a drizzle of lemon juice and chopped green part of green onion.

(I’m making a departure from Joy of Cooking because Marlene requested this recipe. Have fun, Marlene, and everybody else!)

I love 2 kinds of donuts: buttermilk bars and old fashioned. None other really. And even these two I don’t like with a ton of extra sugar all over them. I definitely don’t like them with any doo-dads like sprinkles. Marty is the opposite. The more sprinkles and doo-dads the better. To each his own I say. He’s also okay with store bought donuts. I used to be but somewhere along the line they started using a mix that makes all donuts taste the same. Store bought donuts also have a weird mouth feel, an icky waxy coating at the roof of my mouth.

So, when I saw this recipe, I thought OMG I’m going to make them, and I hope they turn out really well. They did! I learned a thing or two and I’m passing my learning on to you. Maybe you will make them and enjoy them as much as I did.

Tips

Use whatever sugar you have on hand. I used equal parts granulated and brown sugar, but you can also use all of either one and they’ll be good too. But no guarantees. I can guarantee my recipe LOL.

Be generous with flour. This dough will be very sticky, almost like a very thick batter. More on that later. Don’t be afraid to flour your hands and equipment generously to prevent sticking.

If you have a fish spatula or a spider to transfer the dough to the oil. I used a slotted spoon.

Don’t worry about how they look. They’re meant to be tasty. Not perfectly shaped.

Buttermilk Bar Donuts

If you make the whole batch, you will get somewhere around 30 bars.

Donut Ingredients

4 T (1/4 C) unsalted butter

3-1/2 C cake flour (use cake flour. It has less gluten in it for a lighter finished product) + more for dusting.

2-3/4 t baking powder

¼ t baking soda

1-1/2 t kosher salt (kosher is just salt. No anti-caking ingredients or even dextrose/sugar)

¾ t ground nutmeg

½ C packed light brown sugar

½ C granulated sugar

1 large egg

3 large egg yolks

¾ C buttermilk

About 2 quarts vegetable oil (I used canola) for deep frying

Vanilla Glaze Ingredients

2 C powdered sugar, sifted if lumpy.

1 T vanilla extract

¼ C boiling water

Bars

Place unsalted butter in a small microwave safe bowl. Microwave on high until melted. Set aside.

Place the cake flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and nutmeg in medium bowl and whisk to combine.

Place the melted butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar and vanilla in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. I didn’t have a paddle, so I used the wire whip attachment. I had to scrape the sides of the bowl frequently. Or you can use a hand mixer or electric mixer. Beat on medium until fluffy, about 2 minutes.

Reduce speed to low and add whole egg and the yolks one at a time. Scrape bowl as needed. Add buttermilk and mix until combined.

Add dry ingredients all at once and mix by hand until combined. The dough will be quite sticky. Mine was the consistency of very thick batter. If yours is this way I would suggest adding a bit more flour to make it a sticky dough instead of a very thick batter. I found later on that the very thick batter made it hard to scoop into the oil. Use your common sense. It should not be dry whatsoever. Refrigerate at least one hour or overnight. It will still be sticky but will firm up considerably.

Line 2 baking sheets with parchment. Heavily flour a work surface and your hands with cake flour. Transfer half the dough to your work surface. Sprinkle with more flour. Pat into a 3 x 24-inch rectangle about ½ inch thick. Add more flour if you need to. You will brush off the extra flour later.

Using a floured bench scraper or big knife, cut the rectangle into 1-1/2-inch-wide bars. I wound up cutting mine in half again and I’m glad I did because my dough turned out to be hard to scoop up. The smaller size made it easier. Again, common sense. Press down in middle of each bar with knife or scraper. Not cut. Just press. This gives it the distinctive buttermilk bar look. This didn’t really work well for me. Maybe it will work better for you. I didn’t care. They still tasted great.

Using a brush lightly brush off excess flour. Using the scraper transfer each bar to the baking sheet, flipping it over so indentation is down. Brush off excess flour on that side. Refrigerate again.

Fill large Dutch oven or heavy bottom pot with oil. At least 2 inches of oil. Heat to medium high heat until 350 degrees or a bit above because the temp will drop when you fry the bars.  I have a digital thermometer. I don’t have a fry daddy or anything like that. Getting the oil the right temperature is essential.

Fry in batches of 4-5. Don’t crowd the pot. Use slotted spoon, fish ladle or spider to carefully transfer the bars in. Fry about 1 minute per side until they are golden brown. Transfer to wire rack. Let cool to room temperature before glazing. If the oil is the right temperature you will be surprised how little oil is used.

Glaze

Put powdered sugar in bowl with the vanilla and boiling water. Whisk until shiny smooth and lump free. Dip a donut into the glaze halfway. Return to rack.

Done!

I feel an affinity for New Orleans even though I have never been there. It’s the French in me, I guess. My dad and his wife Terri used to go there and get shrimp right off the shrimp boats. Maybe they met the original Bubba Gump. Maybe not. It remains that I like New Orleans and that’s good enough for me.

I’ve always wanted to try a Muffuletta sandwich. I’ve had Po’ Boys before. The Po Boy I had was an oyster Po Boy and it came from the venerable Spenger’s fish market and restaurant in Berkeley, California one fine summer/fall/winter/spring day. I say it this way because the weather in Berkeley is roughly the same all the time so it’s hard to differentiate between the seasons. Also, Spenger’s is no longer there, having closed years ago. Anyway, that Po Boy made me sick to my stomach. Maybe it was too greasy. The oysters, after all, are deep fried. This made me sad because I really wanted to love it and the first couple bites I did love. Much to my chagrin, I could not finish it.

I was hoping that my first muffuletta wouldn’t affect me in the same way and it didn’t, but I can’t really say that I loved it very much. It was too salty. The ingredients are all salty to begin with.

BUT…. If you love olives, this is the sando for you! It starts with a very easy to make olive salad.

Olive Salad Ingredients

¾ c pimento stuffed olives

3-4 small, pickled onions

¼ c pitted kalamata olives

4/4 c Italian giardiniera

2 large pepperoncini

2 T capers

1 medium clove garlic, chopped

1 t dried oregano

Ground pepper to taste (5-6 grinds of the pepper grinder should do it)

2 t lemon juice

2 T olive oil

Drain your ingredients and put everything in a food processor. Pulse until coarsely chopped. Won’t take but a minute.

Build your sando.

Halve a sesame seed Italian roll and scoop out the insides. Pile on mozzarella, provolone, salami and /or mortadella and capicola and the olive salad. Top with the other half of the roll and smoosh it all down. You can eat it immediately or wrap it tightly, refrigerate and eat later. Alternatively you can squash it under a brick. Ain’t that a kick? The olive salad keeps in the fridge in a jar.

First Sandwich: Ham with Swiss cheese and Chow-Chow on Red Fife sourdough bread

Chow-chow (also known as Mustard Pickle)

This Joy of Cooking original first appeared in the 1931 edition and I’m sorry, but I couldn’t make this recipe as instructed because I would have wound up with way too much! The Joy recipe makes 10 pints! I also didn’t want to can it. I just want to try it so I only made enough that would keep in the fridge until I used it up. I made other modifications, too, out of necessity. I used salad cucumbers because I couldn’t find pickling cucumbers in the store, and I used a small amount of regular yellow onion because I couldn’t find fresh pearl onions.  I had to use the greenest tomatoes I could find because I could not find flat out green tomatoes. Later on in this season I’ll have plenty but right now my tomato plants are still in their infancy. To reduce the volume, I used my “vast cooking experience” to figure out the proportions (ha ha) and it actually worked out pretty well. Chow chow tastes like Bread and Butter pickles (which I love).

This seems like a complicated recipe but it’s not. You prepare vegetables, a sauce and then you mix it all together. That’s really all there is to it. My version makes about 2 pints.

Cucumber Prep

Wash 2 thin unpeeled salad cucumbers well and remove a thin slice from each end then slice crosswise ¼ inch thick. (I scored them with a fork and then sliced them with a mandolin. I was hoping that the scoring would make the skin less tough, and it does)

Stir together 2 cups cold water and 2 T pickling salt until the salt is dissolved.

Pour the salty water over the cucumbers in a large bowl. Place something on the cucumbers to keep them submerged and refrigerate for a few hours.

Sauce

For the sauce, combine and stir until the sugar is dissolved:

1 cup cider vinegar

1 cup sugar

Whisk together in a medium bowl until smooth:

1 T all-purpose flour

1 T dry mustard

1 heaping t turmeric

1 heaping t celery seed

Slowly whisk about a 1/2 C vinegar/sugar mixture into the flour mixture. Whisk until smooth.

Bring the remaining vinegar/sugar mixture to a simmer in a large saucepan over low heat. Slowly whisk in the flour mixture. Do this a little at a time. I dipped my whisk into the flour/vinegar/sugar mixture. Cook, whisking constantly, until smooth and simmering. Don’t let it get too thick. Hold off before it thickens into a paste. Remove from heat, cover and reserve.

Remaining Vegetable Prep

Core or trim and dice:

1 firm green tomato (I couldn’t find green so I used the greenest tomato in the store.)

1 green bell pepper

You should have about a cup or so. Combine the tomatoes and bell pepper in a large saucepan with:

½ cup cauliflower cut into bite size pieces.

Blanch all of this for 1 minute in boiling water, peel, and then add to the vegetables:

¼ c pearl onions (If you can’t find pearl onions used about a T of regular yellow onion.

Drain the vegetables and then the cucumber thoroughly. Add the cucumbers to the vegetables and stir together well.

Mix

Stir the mustard sauce into the hot vegetables. Season with pickling salt to taste if it needs it.

Cool the mixture, pack into a jar, and refrigerate.

Second Sandwich: Ham with Cream Cheese and Apple Chutney on Red Fife sourdough bread

This apple chutney is so good I’ve been adding it to my curried cauliflower dinner or my sauteed kale dinner.

Apple Chutney

Wash the fruit (and peppers, if using).

Combine in a large saucepan:

1 peeled lemon, seeded and chopped.

1 garlic clove, chopped.

5 cups chopped peeled firm apples.

2-1/4 c packed brown sugar.

1-1/2 c raisins

¼ c chopped peeled fresh ginger

1-1/2 t canning salt

¼ t ground red pepper

2 c cider vinegar

(2 red bell peppers, chopped)

Simmer, stirring frequently for at least 2 hours or until sauce has thickened. Pack the hot chutney into hot pint jars leaving 1/ inch headspace. Process for 15 minutes. (or refrigerate and eat it up within a week of two. It goes well on just about anything!)

Next week: I’m making sourdough bread with Khorasan wheat flour.

You might remember the movie Julie and Julia where the main character decided to work her way through Mastering the Art of French Cooking making each and every recipe from the beginning of the book to the end. For me the movie was a mildly diverting bit of entertainment. I liked the parts played by Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci as Paul and Julia Child and chuckled at Streep’s portrayal of Julia’s rough start at the Cordon Bleu.

I’ve toyed with the idea of doing the same thing but stopped myself because, honestly, Julia’s recipes aren’t a great fit for us in our household. Number 1 reason: Marty probably wouldn’t eat even half of the recipes. He’s a meat and potatoes guy and I’m not exaggerating. I mean, sincerely meat and potatoes and that’s it. His food color palette is white and brown with yellow as an accent. For example: a plain dry hamburger, nothing on it but meat and cheddar cheese – the yellow).

For fun I’m going to cook my way through whatever chapter of Joy of Cooking and whatever recipes in those chapters that appeal to me.  I’m not as gung-ho as Julie. I get to choose what I want!

Chapter One: Sandwiches, Wraps, and Pizza

Two Roast Beef Sandwiches

Sandwich #1: Beef with romaine lettuce, sliced Beefsteak tomatoes, stone ground mustard and mayonnaise. The simple recipe: layer all ingredients on the bread of your choice. Add chips of any kind on the side.

I’m making these two sandwiches with my homemade no knead sourdough bread made with a heritage wheat known as Red Fife. It will be a combination of Red Fife and ordinary unbleached bread flour. Red Fife, to me, is a heavier grain as compared to, say Sonora white (which is a whole grain and not a refined product as the name implies) is lighter ,and produces a lighter finished bread. I’m glad I cut the red fife with white flour. It would have been very heavy if I hadn’t.

Red Fife no knead sourdough

3 cups flour (1-1/2 c red fife and 1-1/2 c unbleached bread flour)

1-1/4 t salt

¼ t active dry yeast

1-1/2 to 1-3/4 c cool water

Coarse cornmeal for dusting the pot.

A 3-quart cast iron pot with metal lid (enamel is ok. Must be sturdy.)

Combine all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Mix thoroughly. Add 1-1/2 c water and stir. Add remaining water as needed until you have a thoroughly mixed, wet, sticky mass of dough. This dough will not be like any other bread. It will be much wetter and not form a ball. Cover bowl with wax paper or plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature for 12 to 18 hours. I’m not picky about how long I let it sit. I, for sure, let it sit the 12 hours but sometimes I let it sit for longer than 18.

After the hours have passed, your dough should be spotted with bubbles and more than doubled in size. It might have an alcohol smell to it but don’t mind that. It will burn off in baking. This is just a bit of sourdough fermentation.

Dust a clean surface with bread flour and using your fingers or scrapers scrape the dough loose from sides of bowl and turn onto surface in one piece. The dough will be loose and sticky. Don’t add any more flour. Just dust the top lightly with flour and cover with a clean cloth that doesn’t shed fiber. Linen or smooth cotton is good. Let dough rise another 1 – 2 hours.

About 30 minutes before the second rise is done, place a cast iron pot without the lid on the rack in the lower third of oven. I use a 3-quart Creuset enamel iron pot that has a metal knob.  I replaced the wooden one with a metal one because the wooden one blackened and threatened to burn. Heat to 475 degrees.

Once oven has reached 475 degrees remove the pot using heavy duty potholders and sprinkle a teaspoon of cornmeal in the bottom. Uncover the dough and using scrapers or your hands shape the dough into kind of a ball and then lift carefully, plop the dough ball into the pot. Don’t worry about the shape. It will form itself.

Cover with the lid and bake for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes uncover and bake for an additional 15 minutes until loaf is brown but not burned. Remove from the pot by turning it over. It should come right out. Cool on a rack for a minimum of an hour. This is the hard part for Marty. He wants to cut into it right away and I’ve chastised him every time because if you cut into it while it’s still really hot it will not cut properly. It must lose some moisture. He hates this waiting part. Hot bread with butter is good so I sympathize but the cooling time completes the process. Look at it as an exercise in the delaying of gratification.

Sandwich #2: Beef with red onion marmalade and thousand island dressing – Layer roast beef on the bread of your choice slathered with onion marmalade and thousand island dressing.

Red Onion marmalade recipe

I really liked the idea of onion marmalade.  My friend Lynn makes the most outstanding onion confit at Thanksgiving so this it right up that alley. But when I made this and tasted it I was not sure I was going to like it on a sandwich. It had a decidedly onion flavor and was a little bit sharp. Much to my delight and surprise the finished sandwich was outstanding so I was very happy. I wanted to eat two!

Combine in a medium non-reactive saucepan over low heat:

3-1/2 large red onions, halved and cut into ¼ inch thick slices

1/3 c dry red wine

1/3 c red wine vinegar

¼ c packed light brown sugar

¼ c mild honey

Cook, stirring until sugar is dissolved, then simmer, stirring often, the until consistency of marmalade, about 30 minutes.

Stir in

1 T orange juice

1 T lemon juice

Continue to cook, stirring, until juices are absorbed. Let cool. Cover and refrigerate for up to 3 weeks. Serve at room temperature.

These soda crackers are about as easy to make as they can be and taste a whole lot better than store-bought.

When I was a kid back in the days of the dinosaur we ate soda crackers by the barrel full and they were always the Saltine brand. We would joke at my younger brother who would crumble crackers into his Campbell’s Tomato soup. “Rol!”, we’d say, “Are you having a little tomato soup with your crackers?” because he invariably crunched up a whole tube. I have to admit they made the soup taste a lot better. When my mom made homemade chili my dad would sit there with a package of saltines and as he ate he would swipe a bit of butter on the saltine and eat it with the chili.

Now, however, I’m a dyed-in-the-wool make it your-selfer so the other day when we had chili but no crackers I decided to make my own. How hard can it be I says to myself? Just so ya know I am not a cracker new-bie. I am an experienced cracker maker. But for some reason, that is lost to the ages, I have never made soda crackers. The crackers I made before were always whole meal and they always turned out all right if not a bit chewy and hard tack-like. This time I really wanted that soda cracker taste that you get when using white flour.

This recipe is from my mother’s well-worn 1950’s era Joy of Cooking cookbook. It was bequeathed to me when she passed away and it’s full of notes and almost, but not quite, falling apart. I’m taking care of it so I can pass it to my daughter.

Soda Crackers

About 100 crackers (ed. note: depending how thin you roll them out)

Combine in a medium bowl:

Combine in a small bowl:

Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and beat with a wooden spoon until smooth. If the dough is sticky, beat in a little more flour. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 5 minutes. (Or mix and knead the dough in a heavy-duty stand mixer fitted with a dough hook. This is what I did.) Place the dough in a greased bowl and turn once to coat. Cover and refrigerate at least 1 hour, or overnight. (I let mine stand a couple hours.) Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Grease 2 large baking sheets. (I used parchment paper.) On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into an approximate 18 x 6 inch rectangle. Fold into thirds, as if you were folding a business letter, and roll out again into a rectangle of the same size. Cut into squares or shapes. (I used a floured pizza cutter wheel.) Prick your little cracker shapes all over with a fork, and transfer to the baking sheets. Put them close together but not touching. Sprinkle with salt (or poppy, sesame seeds, caraway seeds or a combination of all.) Bake until crisp and lightly browned around the edges, 10 to 20 minutes, depending on the thickness of the dough. Cool on wire racks.

Ed Note: I did have some leftover but they weren’t as good the next day. They must have absorbed a little moisture because they weren’t crisp anymore. Maybe a couple minutes in a hot oven would have crisped them up again.

(Image is from New England Today Food. We ate all our crackers before I even thought of taking a picture.)

Me and Grogu. I feel like I’m just getting started, like Grogu and I’ve got powers, but they’re not fully developed. Ever feel like that? Yeah, I can now say I’m 72 years old. As of today, October 13th. That seems like a lot of numbers but compared to, say, a Galapagos tortoise I’m still a baby. Maybe middle aged, at least.

Yet, I don’t feel like a baby and I guess that’s a good thing. Hmmm, maybe not. Let me think about that. OK. I thought and I’ve decided that the jury’s still out so I’ll get back to you on that. In the meantime I’m trying to ring out every last drop of life that I can while I still have the chance. It’s not so easy because the hum drum of life demands attention, so we have an uneasy truce. Ok, I’ll do errands or the rehab project for you and then can we go to explore the planet? Fair trade?

Yesterday we explored and happened upon a rare treasure. We drove over to the Chiricahua Mountains to see where Johnny Ringo, the famous outlaw from Tombstone days, was buried. The legend has it that he, aged 32, went up on Turkey Creek, sat down under an old oak tree, put a Colt .45 to his temple and pulled the trigger. Nobody knows exactly why he did it but there was scuttlebutt that he had threatened suicide many times before he actually did it. People lots younger have ended their lives so it seems plausible. He was seated in the crotch of the old Oak tree, and he couldn’t have picked a prettier spot.

After we paid our respects, we decided to drive farther up Turkey Creek Road. It was a pretty good gravel road, which is rare in Arizona when you get off the pavement, and as we proceeded it was looking more and more like California terrain. Deer bounded out in front of us, and we crossed four one lane bridges. Turkey Creek was flowing full of water coming from who knows where in this arid land. I must admit I do miss many things about California, so it was nice to see how the area resembled California so much.

Looks very much like California to me.

Look closely and you’ll see a deer smack dab in the middle on the fence line. You’ll see its ears first.

Turkey Creek is full of water which is weird in this dry landscape. There must be springs farther up.

*******

Today Marty is giving me a nice little present of not having to cook! I cook 2 meals every day. We don’t cook breakfast. That’s cereal or coffee or toast. But for lunch and dinner, I get tired of same old same old or having to come up with a new dish. Getting a break on my birthday is a nice present.

What does a birthday mean? I think it means almost nothing. It’s just the march of time as measured on a calendar, and does it seem to you that time is speeding up as we get older? There’s the old saying, “Once you get over-the-hill to the other side, you speed up”. This seems very true to me.

So, as they said in Lord of the Rings, (and I paraphrase) it only matters what you do with the time you are given.

What are we going to do today?