Smithy

@kayb, thank you for a fascinating view of all that work. By the time I was old enough to pay attention, the canning activity in our family was down to canning fruit and making jellies. I don't know whether my grandmother canned vegetables such as beans or tomatoes in her earlier years, but I'd guess she did. What did you do about canning the less-acidic foods such as green beans? Did you add acid of some sort?

You enabler, you. Soon I'll have a copy too. My grandmother and her people came from the general vicinity of the Ozarks, and I'm sure it influenced her cookery as well as her speech. Dad talked about how she'd make chow chow from the last of the summer's green tomatoes, but he didn't remember what-all went into it.

I don't know when or whether we'll ever get Houston into our travels - certainly we won't be towing our trailer through there for a culinary visit - but if we should downsize our rig, we'll have more flexibility. Please elaborate on your favorites!

This post isn't about Death Valley. Rather, it's about a wonderful thing to do with citrus if you have it: Citrus-Marinated Roasted Chicken is one of my favorite ways to roast chicken, when I have the oranges and lemons. Right now I have plenty. This recipe comes from Fine Cooking, Issue 115, and it's been a family favorite since I first tried it. The marinade consists of orange and lemon juice and zest; garlic; oregano; honey and soy sauce. Tuck the chicken in with slices of lemon and orange. Let them all get cozy for 6 - 12 hours (in truth, I did about 3). Roast: first at high heat, to brown the skin, then at low heat to finish the chicken. The bottom half of this photo shows the beautifully bronzed result. Strain the sauce, defat it, boil it down and serve. If you have two whole chickens and a big enough pan, cut them up and roast them both to ensure plenty of leftovers. I only had chicken thighs, and wish I'd fit more into the pan. My darling liked the sauce not only on the chicken and rice, but also on his salad! The pictures above don't convey the extent of the dinner. Between the sauce in the pot, the chicken, and the salad, there wasn't much room left on the table. The rice cooker is in the other room. Here's the whole spread. The perspective is skewed because of where I had to stand; the sauce pan is NOT bigger than the dinner plates! And now for a change of pace: I know a lot of the country is under storm watch of one sort or another. @Shelby is hoping for snow; @rotuts is hoping that Shelby will come out and shovel his snow; folks in the L.A. Basin are celebrating the rain storms but, in some cases, dodging mudslides or working to avoid traffic accidents. The rain that's been pounding the West Coast has even made it to the interior deserts, and the wildflowers are making the most of it. Here's a bit of color for you. The sky has been pretty, too. This was yesterday's sunset and moonrise:

I have been googling that idea, and you're right - it IS gorgeous. I especially like the philosophical aspect of accepting and accentuating "flaws" as part of the whole. Thank you! None that I see. @andiesenji, may have some ideas. This. I was raised never to underline books, to keep things in as near-new condition as possible. I've decided that the attitude is fine as long as it doesn't interfere with the original purpose of the item in question. Some of my books - those that are old and considered collector's items - are unmarked. Cookbooks have gained character with notes. And if a dish gets broken during use, I'lll be upset but it will still be there in my memory, associated with good times. A friend of mine who lost her husband at much too young an age learned the lesson to Use the Good Stuff whenever possible. "Look at the good china! What was I saving it for?" she raged one evening. (She has gone on to remarry and live a happy new life. As far as I know, she Uses the Good Stuff now.) You are so correct about the law of dish breakage! Making it into an ornament is another good idea that I'd never thought of, and I thank you. Right now I'm leaning toward the kintsugi treatment as a first option to explore. As Kerry suggested above and @caroled has confirmed, this plate will look beautiful with gold veins and patches in it. I'm so glad I didn't throw the pieces away! (The treatment will probably cost more than the plate did, but it will have a whole new story to tell!) OK...has anyone here done kintsugi repair? Any ideas about how I'd go about it, or should I send it to a professional?

That sounds like a worthy idea! I'll do some googling on that.

Thanks for the kind words and encouragement. There were too many small chips - and even some powder, from the very center, to be able to glue it back together. However, I have the chunks with me - wrapped carefully in a paper bag to avoid having sharp corners pierce the garbage bag. I wrapped it all up that way, placed it at the bottom of the garbage bag, and then - the next day - fished it out again. Maybe there's a way to embed the fish portion in some mortar to make a decorative tile.

I managed to overspend, too. A week or so ago I finished Elizabeth Bard's Lunch in Paris: A Love Story, with Recipes, which I had purchased for $2.99 thanks to Toliver's post here. What a delightful book! I decided to see whether Ms. Bard had published more since then, and was pleased to see that she had. Maybe it was because I wasn't wearing my glasses, but it was only after I'd hit the "buy" button that I realized I'd purchased her Picnic in Provence: a Memoir with Recipes for $9.99 instead of the $0.99 I thought I was paying. It wasn't on sale after all. Oh, well. I love a bargain, but I also like the idea of helping support a writer.

Our visit to Death Valley began with a bang. One of the hazards of trailer travel is that things get jostled. Airlines warn passengers to open overhead luggage compartments carefully because "contents may have shifted during flight". The same principle applies in the Princessmobile. As a general rule we remember to open the refrigerator and cabinets gingerly after setting up at a new location. Sometimes we forget, and a measuring cup or plastic canister of cat food jumps out at the unwary door-opener. We've never had breakage, though - until now. How this plate came from the depths of the dish cabinet to the very door so it could jump out at my darling is a mystery. We had gone over a mountain pass - up roughly 4000' and then down nearly 5000'; as we recall, the roads were smooth. We didn't do any serious braking, but the grade must have somehow allowed the plate to roll toward the opening. The first year or two that I had this plate, I stowed it in a cushioned shipping envelope for travel. I stopped because our current arrangement of racks and dish storage seemed too stable for anything from the back to make it to the front. No matter pondering "why" any more; it happened. Stuff happens. It could be worse. I bought this plate in Feb. 2015, at a little antique/junk store near where we'll be camping soon. My darling, thinking it could be replaced and feeling terrible about the damage, offered to buy another - two, in fact! Alas, this particular plate was a one-off: older than I, and a lucky find. I could have left it at home, parked in the china cabinet, but we wouldn't have had the pleasure of using it on the road. We have other good dishes. This just happened to be my favorite, in part because it was unique. So here is my lamentation for a favorite plate. In the grand scheme of things this is trivia, but it was a sad start to our stay there. I'll get back to the travelogue later today, or tomorrow, now that we have a good internet connection again.

I haven't, and I am also resisting, so I'm not answering your question either. However, I am curious about the first sentence quoted above. What were you looking for? In what way were the cruffins you made deficient?

Please tell more about this. I'm a big fan of dill pickles, and might want to try this soup!

I know you said pasta is done and done to exhaustion, but what about mac and cheese balls on a stick? Somewhere - probably here on eGullet - I've seen little balls made of macaroni and cheese that were rolled in breadcrumbs and then deep fried. Not exactly the most healthful option in the world, but poker runs aren't usually about good nutrition. This is a gimmick that, if tasty, would make extra points.

@Jacksoup, I'm glad you're asking questions about the Meyer lemons because I also have a generous lot of them to use up. I'd forgotten about Meyer lemon curd, and the vinaigrette noted above also sounds excellent. Thanks for eliciting those tips! When I have Meyer lemons available and mild fish to go with them, I like to cook them with a very lemony sauce with a bit of mustard. My husband and I invented this dish based on what we could remember from a favorite Egyptian hotel, and named it Roadway Inn Fish in a pun off the New Radwan Hotel. You can see a picture of the dish here. A few posts later is the recipe. I believe you have a bumper crop of other citrus as well? If so, then citrus-marinated roasted chicken might be just the ticket. In fact, I think I'll be doing that in the next week, now that you've reminded me. This post has a link to the Fine Cooking recipe. Here's how it came out that time.

I'm late to the party due to being offline for a week or so, but I want to follow up on this. We've heard recommendations for Sparky's as an outstanding burger place. What do you say, now that you've been there? Is it worth the drive up from Columbus?

Good for her! Thanks for posting that information, and please wish Loretta luck on our behalf, next time you see her!

We could have a lot of fun transliterating our ancestors' language into modern parlance! For now, however, I'd like to know whether the "Irish potatoes" were always of the same type. If so, what general category (if you know)? I don't recall seeing anything other than russets in my grandmother's cookery. I can't know whether that was her choice or a matter of availability in the area to which she'd moved. We never discussed the potato spectrum from waxy to starchy.

I grew up thinking in terms of "potato" vs. "sweet potato". It's interesting that they considered it necessary to distinguish the type either way, so that what I think of as the default "potato" was "Irish potato".

In the end, I have done little holiday baking...but I DID do these today as part of New Year's breakfast. I'm so glad I did! No pictures, but there's another log in the freezer for later.

Chopped up for tenderness, mixed with something else (celery? antipasta bits?) that would work for me. Since @Darienne doesn't do sausage, she might not do pepperoni either. I'm trying to brainstorm something that would appeal to non-sausage eaters. I, however, have added the sausage and puff pastry to my post-Christmas shopping list!

I wonder if the same approach would work for a sweet filling (finely chopped dried fruit, nut paste) or a different savory filling. (What? Nuts with ground turkey? Ideas, anyone?) Can't see why not, but it occurs to me that I have time and opportunity still to get some puff pastry and experiment on more than just the two of us! We also like Jimmy Dean sausage.

I'm afraid I would be out of my depth to suggest choices from your cellar, but I'll point out that your Google Drive document requires access by another Google member, and your approval. Perhaps you could post the document here, so members could see it.

The meals, treats, pastries and ideas here have all been wonderful! I, for the second (or is it third) year running, have not used the dried fruit I bought with which to make stollen or a fruited bread. I suppose it isn't too late for New Year's. When we got to the family gathering, I discovered that my cousin was jonesing for the latest chocolate pudding - a Hershey Special Dark Chocolate mix - so I bought 2 packages and a graham cracker crust, and presented him with a chocolate pie made from the stuff. I took special pains to save a package that clearly says "Made with genetically engineering products" (or maybe "Made with genetic engineering"). He loved it. For the rest of us, I made an eggless chocolate mousse - heavy cream, bittersweet chocolate, sugar, hot water. Each of us had about 1/2 cup serving, and it was a gracious plenty. For today I brought what they requested: bread. I'm really quite proud of it. Sourdough, from a starter I began a month or so ago in Tucson, and using special flour I picked up in Tucson. Not a GMO to be found, as my cousin enjoyed teasing me. (The others appreciated that same point!) We all loved the flavor and texture, and I was pleased with the shaping. I do hope this means I'm actually learning something about bread-baking, rather than dumb luck. Although, when it's a pinch like the holidays, I'd just as soon be lucky as good.

Welcome! When you're home and cooking for yourself, what do you like to cook?

KennethT said it for me.

We used to have a neighbor who did toffee like that. I loved it. Believe me, I'd have noticed if the chocolate were only on one side!