Smithy

Strangely enough, this is usually my reaction to "take my mind off things" but this time around was different. "Easy" was the ticket! And continues to be, for the most part, since we're closed up for travel and have no dining room. One benefit of all the vegetable prep I did for our sadly-delayed travel was that I already had asparagus and red bell peppers ready to go. There were cherry tomatoes too, but they don't need much prep. We also still have a variety of tube steaks (Caprese Chicken sausage made by some artisan I've forgotten; Beef Polish sausage from Kiolbassa company, some others) that are simply made to be cut up into coins and added to some dish. One of my back-pocket-I-don't-need-to-think-how-to-do-it recipes is more or less pasta Alfredo. I'll say "more or less" because the proportions may not always be right, and the additions probably make it Alfredo no longer, but it's easy and we love it. Take a bunch of pasta and cook it. I had elbow macaroni and cavatappi, not enough of either to do a full pot of the stuff, or so I thought. I cooked it in as little water as possible in the deep part of the big pot I've kept out for travel. In the shallower half of the pot I sweated chopped onion (already in the refrigerator), the peppers. When they were soft I added the meat coins, browned them, then added the pasta, butter, cream (half and half, in this case) and grated parmesan. The steps, in case anyone's interested, are to add the butter and toss everything in it to be coated with melted butter, then add the cream (about twice as much by volume as the butter, but who's measuring?) and the parmesan (about the same volume as the cream, but whatever it takes to make a thick sauce). Stir and toss. Add the asparagus when it seems the mixture is only a few minutes from being done. Serve. Enjoy. This was the first night's iteration, as we sat with a broken suspension. I learned something important, too: if there's too much cooked pasta, bung the unused cooked stuff into a container and freeze it. I'm pretty sure we've talked before in other topics about reversionary starches. This qualifies. Henceforth I think I'll PLAN to cook too much pasta so it will be ready to use from the freezer. A few nights later, I used more of that pasta for a different iteration of the Alfredo dish. I'm out of asparagus now, and peppers, and tomatoes (I cut up my remaining Camparis and added them to the second dish). I hope I'll be able to find something in a local grocery store before we start driving again, or the road food pickings will be pretty slim!

Thanks. We should be arriving home at around our normal time, but making a quicker trip of it than usual; as a rule we take 4 - 6 weeks to come home so we have plenty of time to lollygag at other good places to ride our cycles and eat good restaurant food. Medical advice suggested we should do make a quicker trip of it. When it started getting really hot in our camping spot, we decided to head out and take a week (my preference) to two weeks (his). The day we were packed up and ready to leave, I realized on my last walkaround that the trailer suspension looked strange. (Tires rubbing together are NOT a good thing.) Of course this was on a Sunday! We were delayed 3 days while a mobile repairman came out, figured out the problem, ordered the parts, brought them out, realized they were the wrong size despite the parts guy's assurance, then came back with the right parts to get us back on the road. We've now made it as far as Columbus, New Mexico, where the weather isn't much better but we have electricity. The weather to our east is very bad (thunderstorms, hail, rain) so we're staying and resting here a couple of days. I suppose the one good thing about all that delay was that I'd washed, cut and packed a bunch of vegetables for our road trip and then we'd had to cool our heels in place. Those vegetables became the basis of some of the most "complicated" cooking I've done recently. I'll tell about that in the next post.

I love this! What a great silver lining! Thanks for the kind words, and the insights. I hope you continue to recover.

We never expected or intended to be there so long. We finally left yesterday, and these pictures show just how much the sunrise had shifted from its position at the winter solstice. Our campfire ring, which we were so pleased to find unmolested when we arrived last November, was just as pristine when we left...not because we did a fine job of cleaning it up, but because it sat unused and forlorn all season. Wind was a frequent interference. Medical issues were the other. I dislike dropping a narrative abruptly, as I did over a month ago, so I'll do a bit of catching up and wrapping up in the next few days. What happened was, my darling was a guest at a hospital, then a rehab hospital, for nearly a month. During that time I drove back and forth from the Princessmobile to the various facilities watching over him. I took care of the Princessmobile, animals, bills, my own self...checked in here on eGullet and continued hosting duties...but did very little in the way of interesting eating. In fact, you could say my cooking was minimalist and perfunctory. I now understand folks who really want good food, but only a little of it, with minimum fuss and cleanup. @MetsFan5 and her Tovola Smart Oven come to mind. So do folks who participated in the topic @ElsieD started: Help! I've lost my cooking mojo and I want it back! Well, except in my case I was too busy, tired and dispirited to even want it back at the time. Things have turned around since then. I ate a LOT of salads and leftovers. The leftovers were from when my darling was in the hospital and had very little interest in food. I can't say there was much good food to come out of there, although I had an excellent pork chile verde one evening. Even my darling had liked it, but he'd had too little appetite to eat much of it. The rehab hospital, on the other hand, had excellent food at an astonishingly low price. For under $5 I could get a full lunch or dinner, if I wished, while I ate with my darling. i didn't usually want that much, but their green salads were generous and delicious, and their tuna salad was at least as good as anything I could make. I often came home with a clamshell containing the remains of a lunch salad, and ate that for dinner if I hadn't already had enough. One thing I learned at the rehab hospital is that there actually is a bottled dressing that I like. It came in plastic packets in their dining hall, but I discovered I could buy it in a grocery store. Well, it's ALMOST the same thing. I'm a bit surprised and mildly disgruntled at the difference. The bottle needs shaking, and the individual packets don't. I think that's interesting, but haven't really investigated why it is. I also ate, and continue to eat, a LOT of hummus and tabbouli. It took at least one bunch of neglected and thrown away cilantro and parsley before I finally found the mojo to try making the tabbouli, but it's become a staple. Makes a pretty good salad topping,... ...and goes well atop a tortilla chip, with or without hummus. Sometimes this was dinner. The recipes for tabbouli and hummus both come from the cookbook Balaboosta (eG-friendly Amazon.com link), which I bought way back in 2018 and quite forgot until I began looking for tabbouli and hummus recipes from my onboard Kindle collection. I recommend this book. These particular recipes have become my gold standard for the foods in question. My only problem with the tabbouli is that it makes enough for a crowd, and when I'm eating it alone the bulgur gets mushy before I've finished it off. I need to remember to scale down the recipe. During the time we languished in the desert, waiting for my darling to recover enough to travel -- and then waiting for trailer repairs! (but that's another story!) -- I saw the entire bloom-to-seed life cycle of some of our beloved flowers. A few hardy late bloomers like the paloverde trees are just starting to blossom. I don't have any photos of them in their full, frothy yellow glory, but they've been a welcome sight on our road trip. I learned a few things about easy cooking, and will share them in future posts.

I'd think pig would qualify as an omnivore rather than a carnivore, but your material quoted brings up lots of other examples! I had also forgotten about alligator, which definitely qualifies as a carnivore even if not commonly available.

I’ve eaten black bear before and thought it quite good. I’d assumed that bears, being omnivores, wouldn’t fall into the same category as mountain lion, which as far as I know is an obligate carnivore. I’ve learned something today.

I love Hank Shaw's website and tips, and this looks good. I'm surprised, though, at mountain lion! I had some idea that apex predators weren't generally good to eat. Am I wrong about that?

Welcome! It sounds like you'll fit right in! We have a number of other hunters and fisherfolk here, as well as would-be hunters and fisherfolk who love to read about it. It's also good to see more gluten-free folks joining in. I am lucky enough not to need GF food, but a number of our members do -- and my daughter in law is one of them, always on the search for good recipes or substitutes. Given how long you've lurked, you probably have a clear idea of where and how to post -- but if you have questions, feel free to contact a host (I am one) by Personal Messenger. Raspberries and strawberries I know and love, but what are haskaps?

https://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine/2024/04/14

My sister is considering a countertop oven. Based on your experiences, I've told her that the Tovala is worth looking at. Thanks for your reports! Keep them coming, please!

What an interesting question! Truth to tell, I've never tried it so I can't comment (yet). I'll have to try some and see what I've been missing.

I'm afraid our Easter dinner was a bust. My husband has been (badly) under the weather for a couple of months, and it's affected his appetite and my energy. Nonetheless I tried to do a nice pork tenderloin...and did the poor thing a disservice. Milk Street had a schnitzel recipe for pork tenderloin medallions, of all things, and I considered it then rejected the idea. I also saw some delightful-looking recipes for pork curries. But no, in the end I tried adapting an old favorite treatment of pork shoulder. What the heck: nothing ventured, nothing gained. I seasoned the tenderloin, then tried to brown it in a Dutch oven. It didn't brown well, but I was trying not to overcook it. At least I got it started. Then I removed it, browned and partially cooked baby potatoes (cut in half) until they were well on their way. Put the tenderloin pieces back in the pot, slathered the whole thing with Lipton's Recipe Secrets (fka Lipton's Onion Soup mix). Gave it a bit of time steaming, then finished in the oven. As I said, it was a disservice to the pork. See the top half of this collage to see how it turned out to be much more like pulled pork. The potatoes were the star of the show, and we'll be enjoying them! These photos are of the leftovers. They're better warm. The asparagus was pretty good, somewhere in the middle of the good / not so good continuum. Barely cooked, then tossed with toasted alnuts and a browned butter / vinegar sauce. No pictures. So...yes, it was Easter dinner but I'm glad we didn't have guests. Now I'm going to have to figure out how to do pulled pork, to finish up that meat!

I loved this bit:

I'm looking forward to this vicarious trip! It's been years since I was in Healdsburg and surrounds, and even longer since I ate anywhere in San Francisco. Keep it coming, and thanks! Oh...if there's a typical salad dressing with the salads you showed, what is it? I'm thinking of the very first one, with avocado, at Chez Panisse Cafe. ...and I envy you the aroma of citrus blossoms, and the sight of those lovely camellias!

I've never had tupelo honey, so can't comment on that. However, I will note that given your location there should be plenty of unadulterated locally produced honeys: whether from citrus, clover, or other local crops. In my current location it's pretty easy to come by Sonoran Desert honey. Although you're several hundred miles away, I wouldn't be surprised to see it in some of your local stores. And yes, it's mild stuff, with good flavor. Are the farmers' markets up and running in your area yet?