Smithy

I am loving this variety of physicians' ways to end an on-call all-nighter! And I can promise you that when my husband was stuck in hospital (as a patient, not a physician) he'd have been deeply envious of rotuts. 🙂

Tonight I cooked half of a package of Pork and Red Sauce Tamales I'd bought back here. Perhaps I should have taken a closer snap of the package, but I didn't; it's in the upper left corner of this image. The preparation is certainly easy: steam it in a basket for 15 - 20 minutes, or until the interior is 165F. My thermometer registered 189F after 12 minutes, so I pulled them, unwrapped and ate. I really didn't need three! They look small but they were filling. Pretty good, too. I thought the red sauce just a touch hot for my tastes, so toned it down with sour cream. Then it was too calm, so I added some of my salsa. Very good. The "bite" photo in the lower right is the best I could get, but it doesn't do the tamale justice. I think I'd buy these again. Tamales are a pain to make, like chiles rellenos, and I've learned over the years that they're all a mystery package. I've bought some tamales that were almost all masa with little filling. These were a nice balance of masa to filling. I'd been grazing during the day, and had already had a large green salad. Two of these tamales would have been plenty. If I'd eaten the salad at the same time, one tamale would have been enough. Still, that raises the question: what does one usually serve with tamales? How should I enjoy the rest of this package, when I get to it?

This entirely-unexpected package arrived on my doorstep today, in a box from Flowers.com! An old friend just wondered how I'm doing and thought I might need cheering up. We're scheduled for a good long phone call tomorrow, after months of missed connections.

Now that you mention it, I remember going into a Walmart one time and passing a Boy Scout or Cub Scout group with signage, a shopping cart and participating scouts and adults. The idea was to "fill the cart" for the local food shelf. My husband and I bought a bag's worth of non-perishables for the purpose and dropped them in the cart on the way out. I'd forgotten about that. It was years ago, but it was a Walmart so that particular manager was open to the idea at the time.

Another question is how to spread the word. Is there a local online forum (like Nextdoor, for instance) that would be useful for spreading the word? Or put up flyers at strategic locations?

That's funny. When I spent a summer and autumn in England (and other parts of the British Isles) I stayed at my share of B&B's and never encountered it. It was always buttered toast at those lovely breakfasts. But I agree that it's exactly the sort of thing that would ring my chimes after a long night!

@Kerala: it's better to be visitor than victim, but crossness with the universe is justified either way. I hope the situation is quickly resolved. That said, the food doesn't look bad. I have my doubts about that top photo containing "French toast" but maybe that person was a bit confused. The bread was fried and had, what? sugar added? Any cinnamon? My mother used to do something like that and call it "cinnamon toast". It didn't cross into "French toast" territory until egg and milk were included.

Not a dumb question at all! These were baked from semi-thawed. They'd been in the deep freeze since, oh, 2021 or 2022 (! yes, really!) and I'd set the package out to thaw one afternoon, then stuck it in the refrigerator when I realized I wasn't going to bake that day. There were still some ice crystals in the package when I loaded it into the pie shell. The original idea of the experiment had been to see if I could load a pie filling into a pie shell form, freeze it that way, then load it into a pie shell later and cook from frozen. Then, for whatever reason, I ended up freezing a flat and not-round package. The filling was loose enough for me to form it into the pie shape I needed, but it definitely wasn't completely thawed. It was really rather convenient.

They're soft but retain some structure and firmness, much as canned peaches would. I have one last slice of that pie in the refrigerator, so I just pulled back a bit of crust to show you. I think the texture after freezing, then baking, is about the same as if I'd baked the pie with fresh peaches -- but to be honest I could be misremembering.

The peaches and nectarines in local stores (northeastern Minnesota) have come into their own, and I've been pigging out on them. A recent freezer-defrosting adventure turned up a couple of bags of peach pie filling made in advance, with the idea that I simply had to make the pie shell, plop the filling in, and bake. I was quite pleased with the result, discussed here in the Dinner topic. So I bought a bunch of peaches and nectarines, then spent yesterday peeling them, cutting them into chunks, adding ingredients and distributing them into freezer bags. Here's the result: Batches for 2 full-sized pies, 1 half-sized pie, and 4 hand pies. (Sorry the photo is a bit fuzzy.) The good news: this time, I listed the proportions and quantities on the bags. My previous efforts hadn't listed quantities, so I had to guess by taste. The bad news: in rereading the above-linked Dinner post, I see that I'd listed flour in the previous fillings. I forgot all about that. These have peaches, sugar to taste, and lemon. Hmmph. I'll have to make notations to add flour, because I probably won't remember when I get ready to make the pies!

I want to follow up on this post and the preceding discussion. The stock I made In the Instant Pot, using a basket to hold the chicken carcass, was really too insipid. I especially convinced myself of that when I defrosted a chest freezer and noted the deep golden color of earlier stocks. So...should I just pitch this newer stuff? I came close, after using it in some stew and thinking it hadn't been much better than plain water. But then I decided to try reviving it with yet more bones from another rotisserie chicken. This time, I poured all the unused broth into a pot, added the new bones, brought to a boil, then simmered it. For hours. The kitchen smelled wonderful! It's definitely richer and thicker than before, which looked like this: I'm pleased with the "save". It hints at chicken "jello" now.

I broke into another of the packages I bought back here: this time, the Papas Rellenas: mashed potatoes around a beef filling, with a crispy outer coating. I hadn't planned far enough in advance to thaw one of the other treasures i'd purchased. These are to be cooked from frozen. The cookery is easy enough, as you see from the package instructions. I fired up my Cuisinart Steam Oven (which still needs to be cleaned so it actually produces steam) and preheated it, on convection bake mode, to 350F. Then I put in half the box's worth, i.e. two spuddy thingies. I wondered whether it would be enough, but I had already been pecking away at snacks and sandwiches earlier. Besides, I wanted the other half of the package to sit in reserve in case I could think of refinements. Not bad. The coating was indeed crisp, and the mashed potatoes inside the coating tasted good. I think I'd prefer a higher ratio of crisp coating to soft interior, as in mashing them to get a flatter surface. That might not be practical for this packaged food, but gives me ideas about how I might could do it better at home. I found the filling itself rather disappointing. Sure it was ground beef with seasonings, but I thought the onion was overpowering; also, some spice (they don't list cloves or allspice, but it's along those lines) wasn't to my taste. If I'd especially liked the beef filling I might have been disappointed in the ratio of beef filling to potato coating, but as it was I didn't mind. For my tastes, a dab of salsa improved the flavors. Here are some attempts at cutaway photos, to show the interior as well as the exterior. I still have half the box's worth: that is, another package of two. I'll have no trouble eating them later, but I wouldn't bother getting these again. On the other hand, they make a fine template for something to try making from scratch!

@ElsieD - what an absolute delight! I could wish we had something like that nearby, but I'm pleased to read about your pleasures. I never knew John had culinary training.

@FauxPas, what a sweet husband you have! That's a very nice gift.

It does look delicious. So sorry to read that it didn't live up to its looks! Why do you think it fell flat this time?