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Too kind, you are. My husband put a croissant in the freezer for 15-20 minutes and that was enough time to make it firm up for easy slicing! He thanks you.

a) thank you, they are and b) no, we sure don't.

You’ve given me ideas here, although my panini press doesn’t open flat.

I’ve been remiss. I used the poaching broth from the previous nights meal to make another episode of things in bowls. This has wombok, thin egg noodles, leftover shredded chicken, baby bok choy, green onions and chilli crisp. My kitchen MO is sometimes like this; research intensely on YouTube and Instagram taking a little bit from each reel, then march into the kitchen armed and dangerous. This was a slow roasted boneless leg of lamb sitting on a bed of onion and garlic, heavily seasoned, rosemary strewn and white wine doused. After 3 hours at 150°C it rested while I smashed the gravy into submission using a stick blender. The veg cooked on the top shelf for about 90 minutes. Served with cucumber salad, because I always need green. Then another episode of “things in a bowl” with the addictive cabbage salad. It’s very simple, cabbage cut largish, washed and dried, rubbed with salt and chicken powder, strewn with minced garlic, crushed toasted sesame seeds and drizzled with sesame oil. A bit of leftover lamb and veggies to go with, but seriously, the cabbage is the star of this episode. And, the reason for that relatively light dinner, was this monster for lunch at the local pub.

Lamb keema with peas: Cinnamon stick, bay leaves, green coriander, turmeric, garlic, ginger, and onion for flavors. Simmered the lamb with crushed tomato and yogurt, finished with lemon juice, chile serrano, and basil (sub for nonexistent cilantro). Rice with black coriander, cloves, and a bay leaf, topped with chives.

I hope they ship to Kansas lol. But seriously I hope somewhere near you has that delicious looking treat.

Nope. You're not ignorant--you're teaching us things!

I thought you'd get it....

@ShelbyThis is the place I've passed by a million times but never tried. That will have to change soon!

It's chill, grey, and drizzly here. We needed an afternoon hot chocolate. I had regular old Swiss Miss packages and malted milk powder, so whole milk went into the milk cafe frother. Then I thought let's make this a happy hour hot chocolate, some Laird's apple brandy went in at the end. Wow, that a great combo, puts a real twist on the apple/chocolate flavor meld.

Thank you! Improvements could’ve been made, but isn’t that always the case? I ordered the containers a long time ago, and while they are a little large for this usage, they have been too small for other things, so this was a good way to use some up, and I would’ve been sad to ruin the salad by having it get soggy. This would’ve been great info to have! Also, it sounds delicious. Thank you. (Do y’all just cringe at my ignorance, sometimes?) 🥴😜

Blueberry Pie. Again. But the Peruvian berries I'm getting here in Tucson are quite nice and juicy!

As for the Costco croissants...I put them straight into the freezer. I'm the only one who eats them. Frozen they slice easily. Then I add 4 Callebaut callets and nuke them in the microwave. Chocolate filled croissants!

I don't want to say you've outdone yourself here because you outdo yourself every week but I think you outdid yourself here Who wouldn't love that sandwich and salad. And something different from all of the heavy holiday type foods--maybe that isn't an issue but I, for one, would certainly welcome a change. I love the eggs in the chicken salad. And what a nice touch to have the dressing on the side. I know all of the containers are not cheap.

When planning this week’s CFM, I imagined a ladylike chicken salad filled croissant, a side salad, and some dressing, and an undetermined other thing. 🤷‍♀️ Many chicken salad recipes were considered, but I fell back on the kind my southern mama always made. Just like her potato salad and tuna salad, her chicken salad always had hard boiled eggs in it. How many, you ask? However many your heart tells you to use. Chop ‘em all up. This was about 2/3 of the chicken. There was more waiting for shredding and chopping. A lot of chopped celery, diced red onion, sweet pickle relish, mayo, mustard, Tony’s, and an overnight chill later, here is the chicken salad and a few other meal ingredients. Not shown are the bags of pretzels I decided to include. Based on advice from Google, I heated up the Costco croissants in the oven at 325 for five minutes. If I had a giant air fryer, I think they “refresh” better there, but ain’t nobody got time for 8 batches in a regular size air fryer. Google was wrong about slicing the croissants AFTER their trip in the oven. Bread knife didn’t do very well, nor a smaller serrated knife, or other. Who knew this would be where I’d go wrong? My husband ended up using an electric knife. All I’ll say is that sandwiches were made. Salad wise, I went with spinach, feta, toasted pecans, dried cranberries (again?), and honeycrisp apples. The dressing was a vinaigrette made with balsamic vinegar, maple syrup, olive oil, salt & pepper, and a few squeezes of lemon. The dressed salad was SO good! We decided it was best to have the dressing on the side. The plated meal included a snack sized bag of pretzels. The bag was more generous than I’d anticipated, which is nice. The chicken salad croissants were behemoths, not the imagined ladylike ones, and probably hard to eat. I hope they were able to be enjoyed. When we delivered the meals we were happy to see that someone else had filled the freezer, too.

@KennethT "non-cake bread is my little joke. Much of the bread in SE Asia has a texture that resembles cake. It's rare to find bread that has actual bread-like texture and crust." And in China, where it's also cake sweet. I keep telling them but they don't believe me.

First, thanks for the blog...my stomach would be a freakin' mess. Second, does this place satisfy your itch here in NYC? I know they have pork and chicken, as well as beef, and that it is grilled. @donbert was adamant that it wasn't true jerky! It is, as you say, addictive.

With any luck, McDonald's will get back on this right away!

Yeah, my chances of eating a salad increase dramatically if there’s a dressing prepared and greens washed. I’ve been using escarole & radicchio a lot lately because they’ve been looking great at the farmers market but importantly, they’re really sturdy so I can wash enough for a few days, spin dry, and store wrapped a towel. I should branch out and get some other options. Salad du jour was roasted honeynut squash and pear, escarole and radicchio dressed with the house dressing from Good Things, baked goat cheese and pecans.

Don't forget the beef fat!!! You should be frying your eggs with tallow, and then drizzle melted butter on top.

Pseudo chirashi. Wild Alaskan halibut, same sourced salmon, salmon roe, smoked trout roe, avocado pickled ginger, over seasoned sushi rice.

I've ceased scratching my head a long time ago, trying to preserve whatever remaining hair I have. So now I just chuckle...while I listen to the science and get my vaccines. Kennedy Flips Food Pyramid

The next day was our last day before flying home - so this means no diving as you really shouldn't dive 24 hours before flying. This is where the last of bad luck happened. Originally, our flight from Labuan Bajo to Bali was supposed to leave around 1:30 in the afternoon, but that flight was changed to leave around 3:30 which would cause us to miss our connection in Bali to Singapore. So instead, we had to rebook the flight to one that left at 9:50AM. If we had been able to take the original flight, the plan would have been to dive in the morning since we'd be on the surface long before the 24 hours cutoff. One of the reasons we came to Komodo was to see manta rays - they are huge - 10 feet across and gracefully glide through the water and are practically everywhere in Komodo this time of year as it's on their migration path. There are some dive sites where you'd see 10-20 of them lazily circling around.... So, of course, the hotel was able to get permission to go back to the same place we dove the day before that morning, but this time, it was early enough to do 2 dives at slightly different sites in the same area - and, of course, they saw a few manta rays!!!!! Anyway, we didn't hear about this until the boat got back in time for lunch, so in the meantime, we had breakfast: Jasmine tea - finally! I hadn't had any since we were in Labuan Bajo as I like to stay as hydrated as possible when diving so I stay away from caffeine. pineapple and I think this cake was chocolate flavored, but I'm not 100% sure.... The last of the pancakes The last of the poached eggs After breakfast, we decided to take a short hike to the top of the island - the hotel put in a "panoramic viewpoint" which is really a 1 square meter slab of concrete.... View from the panorama After getting back and changing out of our now sweaty clothes, it was time for lunch: Soto ayam for me... Last nasi goreng for a while.... I just asked for the fruit platter but without the watermelon (I'm not a huge fan): Must have lime with dragonfruit!!! My wife's fruit platter:

That sounds like hurricane force winds! Whoa! ETA: Glad the damage was something fixable, even if a royal PITA.