Smithy

They are lupines, but not the same variety. I've learned that there are oodles of varieties of lupines, ranging from the 2' high beauties in Minnesota to the stunted desert lupines where we spend most of the winter. The Texas Bluebonnets are unusual (to me) in their stratified coloring and bunched stalks. And oh, the lupines in the Sierra foothills are gorgeous! Lucky you!

Llano, Texas. Welcome to the Hill Country, just in time for storms. This morning it was dead calm; now there's a thunderstorm overhead. Last night or the night before other parts of the Hill Country experienced baseball-sized hail, but so far we haven't been so 'blessed'. After months of living in a dry climate, the humidity takes some getting used to. The flowers, which were sparse in the Davis Mountains, grow with flashy extravagance here. The bouquet I picked back in New Mexico finally withered and died yesterday, more than a week after I picked them. The blazing star at the top of the photo above only lasted a day, but the desert marigolds and verbena make excellent cut flowers. Those of you who've been following along know that we love Llano for the shops and the Texas 'cue, as well as the park we stay at. It's a delight, after all this time, to have 50A electrical service and water that doesn't require a pump! I used the Instant Pot a couple of days ago to cook more chickpeas for the chickpea salad I discussed above. I don't need to show you another picture of that. In the next few posts I'll show some of the shops, and some of our meals. I don't know whether we'll go get takeout tonight. Depends on the rain, I think.

Welcome! As noted, there are a lot of folks here who cook to accommodate celiac disease. I am lucky enough not to be one, but I'm sure you'll get good guidance. I also probably won't be of much help in the frying department, although I've been learning about how to do it better. 🙂 If you have questions about how the forums work, or where (or whether) to post something, THAT I can help you with, as can any other host. Feel free to ask by PM, or in the Moderation and Policy Discussion forum. I look forward to seeing where your food journey takes you!

Ah, I knew I was going to have to get that book! Now I have. 🙂

I keep meaning to revisit, and maybe contribute to, eG Cook-Off #87: Potato Salad. Then I get distracted, and forget. I might find something we both truly like. If you haven't visited that one, you might consider adding your 2 cents' worth. The truth is my darling grew up with the standard, garden-variety Midwestern potato salad (eggs, sweet pickle, Miracle Whip and of course potatoes, and all of it cold) and that's his comfort food. I never liked the stuff as a kid, and never knew until I was in my 20's or 30's that potato salad could be made any other way! He thinks potato salad with mustard is bold stuff. I like it well enough as long as it hasn't been sweetened with pickle or MW, so we occasionally find a store-bought salad we can agree on. As a rule, he buys his deli potato salad and I make my own when I want it.

"Dressing while warm" isn't something I've fully incorporated into my cooking consciousness yet, but it should. You're right about potato salad, especially Ina Garten's French Potato Salad where I first learned the trick. That's a favorite of mine, although I need to be sure I make only enough for myself. (My darling is of the goopy sweet potato salad persuasion. Our potato salads are safe from each other. 🙃)

That's what freezers and plastic containers are for. 😉 But I get it. I did that, more than once. I'm not sure it ever put me off anything, although I did learn the hard way about refrigeration. (Leaving a pot of corned beef and potatoes out on the counter until I'd finished it, 3 or 4 days later, was not wise. 🙄 )

As I mentioned before, our mountain retreat had NO internet or cell phone connection. I was forced to confront the magazines that, to my shame, have been carried around without inspection for well over a year. This issue had several interesting articles. The one that caught my eye first was about upping one's game with bean salad by dressing the beans while they're warm. For Better Flavor, Microwave Your Chickpeas I know some of you don't like chickpeas, but I suspect the approach would work well with any cooked beans. Here's a photo of the article, with the recipe if you can read it; and here's a link to the recipe itself. For now it's free. Recipe for Turkish Chickpea Salad The first question I came across was one of altitude. We were at 6,000' MSL. I'd already scotched the idea of a potato braise until we were at a more normal (for us) altitude. I didn't have canned chickpeas. How long would it take to cook the dried beans? Would they get hot enough to cook? I suspected so, but wasn't sure. I wasn't willing to run the generator long enough to run the Instant Pot. I settled on an overnight soak for the chickpeas, followed by a good drain and rinse, then a good long simmer. I don't remember how many hours I gave it. The trailer was cool. A simmer atop the stove helped. After the chickpeas had cooked satisfactorily, I hauled out what my darling calls "the lunar lander" to make thin slices of onion. I've normally used this gizmo only as a cheese grater. It worked pretty well on the onion. Was it better than my knife skills for thin slices? Probably not, but I wouldn't hesitate to use it if my knife hand weren't working properly. Finally, it got down to the seasonings. They include Aleppo pepper, sumac, lemon, olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper, ground cumin, fresh parsley, basil, and sun-dried tomatoes. I didn't have fresh basil, so I substituted some of my jarred pesto. I still have a stock of Trader Joe's sun-dried tomatoes in oil. That was easy. Then I came to the cumin. I should explain, by way of background, that I get a *groan* and protest from my darling every time I buy a package of ground cumin. "It doesn't last!" he says. "Get the whole seed and grind it!" Well, I do keep the whole seeds on hand...but sometimes I simply don't want to be bothered with that extra step. Ground cumin is more convenient. Except...except...something was off with this dish. It was good, but something wasn't right. Could it be the cumin? .... Could it really be that last month's ground cumin had already gone stale? ... I don't know the answer to that question yet, but after I made that first salad I broke out a fresh package of cumin, used some of it, and put the rest in the freezer. It'll be interesting to see, in a month or so, whether there's a significant difference between the stuff stored in the freezer and the stuff stored in a bottle at room temperature. As for the Turkish Chickpea Salad itself? A winner! We're already on our second batch. Even my darling, who normally likes things sweeter and a bit more syrupy, thinks this recipe is a keeper.

I'm impressed that some of you are having success with Misfits and/or other delivery services. I still strongly prefer grocery shopping for myself, but if I had mobility problems or needed to stay home for some reason, I'd be looking to this topic for inspiration and guidance. It looks like Misfits is getting the kinks worked out.

I'm glad you brought that up. In fact, when I looked afterward at a couple of hard-copy recipes I had, I saw that they used cream and not coconut milk. I think that would have been closer to the flavor profile I wanted, but I didn't have enough cream. When I was able to get back online and look at JohnT's method linked above, I saw it did use coconut milk and my memory wasn't as bad as I'd feared. So I think either way is fine; it'll just change the flavor a bit.

One of my culinary successes while in those mountains has become a culinary excess. I love Indian food. I love curries -- Indian, Indonesian, Thai -- but still have to refer to cookbooks to make them. Then I get intimidated. I know, Raghavan Iyer (RIP) did his best to take the mystery out of Indian curries. Madhur Jaffrey and Julie Sahni did the same. Still, I open a book and look at all the spices, and get tired thinking about it. Butter chicken, though: heck, that's easy! I can do that in my sleep! So I said to myself. I had chicken thighs taking up space in the freezer. Butter chicken would get rid of a couple cans of tomatoes, and a can of coconut milk, and some ginger that's been traveling along with us. I have a Butter Chicken marinade spice mix my best friends brought me from South Africa. And it was a cool day, so a slow simmer atop the stove seemed a good idea. It also gave me a chance to finish the wild rice / basmati pilaf lurking in the freezer. Yes, it was good. A little sweeter than I'd have liked. Not much like the Cape Malay butter chicken on which @JohnT coached me, several years ago. So much for my being able to cook this dish from memory! But the big thing is, this was a huge recipe. We ate it that night. We ate it the next night. On the third night, I simply couldn't face it again. It sat in the refrigerator until yesterday, roughly a week later. I had half the remainder for lunch yesterday. There's still a good 2 cups' worth, but now it's taking space in a smaller container, in the freezer. Eventually it'll seem like a good idea again.

My mother volunteered at a Boys and Girls club. One holiday season, for something to do, she explained to her charges what a New Year's Resolution was and put them to work thinking about something for themselves for the following year. One little girl wrote, "I will work on my pay-shits". Mom puzzled over that one for a moment, then said, "and now we're going to learn how to spell 'patience'!"

I can believe all that, based both on Life Experience (i.e. seeing how things change with time) and on what I've read. The closest I've come to seeing the charm of El Paso is the Junior League Cookbook, Seasoned with Sun: Recipes from the corner of Texas and Old Mexico (eG-friendly Amazon.com link). Cookbooks are wonderful cultural gateways for me, but I haven't had the opportunity to really experience firsthand what El Paso has to offer. I appreciate your insights.

Well, I'll have to blush -- or laugh -- at the controversy I caused. When I posted my question, my brain did NOT connect the orange-yellow thing (with a vein or a line!) with the white layer underneath. Furthermore, to my eye and on the screen I was using it looked redder, more like persimmon. It was clearly a separate...something...lying atop the white below it. You know those illusions that ask which way the dancer is spinning, or where the light source is? Once you see it properly it's difficult to see the original that your brain processed in error. I can't begin to justify why I didn't realize that was an egg. Sorry for the confusion!

We ran out of bread midway through the week. Well, I ran out of my sourdough bread, and there wasn't enough of his whole wheat bread to last us for the week. No matter, sez I, I'll make bread. Used to do that all the time. Haven't done it in a while, but I have all the stuff. ... ...except I didn't have my notes on how to make pita. That was all online. I'd left that particular set of recipe notes at home.... ... but how hard could it be? I used to do this all the time! I did have my printed notes and recipes from an online course I took from Peter Reinhart (what a lovely teacher), so I selected his recipe for a soft sandwich loaf. I don't have any interim photos. I found it fascinating to see how much water I had to add, and keep adding, a bit at a time until I got the right tactile feel in the dough. That flour was very dry, having spent months in a desert climate. It was very gratifying to add a bit, knead a bit, let it all rest, then check the progress of the dough. Lather, rinse, repeat. It was a good slow-day project. At some point my darling came inside and his eyes lit up. "You gonna make sweet rolls?" Well, I hadn't planned to, but I could easily enough split the batch. I did. It's just as well, too. The rolls came out better than the pita. The trick to pita is usually getting it to puff up and separate, and this topic shows that it can be just as problematic with commercial products as for home cooks. But I used to have it down cold. Well. I don't think I'll try using a cast iron skillet again. I had a tough time controlling the heat and keeping the poor pitas from scorching. Most of them puffed up, though. The other odd thing about these is that they taste vaguely like pancakes! Have I never used this bread recipe for pitas before, or did they pick up something from the cast-iron skillet seasoning? I don't know, but I can't say I'm crazy about the flavor. Still, they worked for sandwiches.

We've changed our scenery, climate and culture completely. I have probably carped about I-10 through El Paso at least twice a year, as I've had to deal with my severe cognitive dissonance regarding that city. My first impression of it ever is born of Marty Robbins' lovely ballad,"El Paso". "Down in the West Texas Town of El Paso."..he sang, and the song makes it clear that he rode to and from the town on a horse. Oh, the small dusty settlement image that evokes! I'm sure he never imagined this: The road engineers and designers have tried to make the roads attractive, and have succeeded to some degree... ...but still, my direct experience with the city is a far cry from Robbins' decades-past romanticism. I mean no disrepect to the city or its citizens, but what I see of this long, narrow city -- winding as it does between mountains and the border -- does not tempt me to find a way to stay. I had packed sandwiches, asparagus and radishes for road food. I left the cheese off of his; it's delicious but also crumbly, so too messy to be eaten one-handed. Eventually we turned off I-10 and headed up into the Davis Mountains, where we stayed for nearly a week. Yes, Texas has mountains. It was quite an adjustment to have no internet or cell phone coverage. Our lifestyle is pretty relaxed already, but the loss of "screen time" meant a lot more time to read hard-copy print, nap, go for hikes, and work on non-electronic projects. I re-learned, although it shouldn't have been a revelation, the value of physical books and magazines. I did have some good cooking experiences. I'll tell about them in separate posts.

Aha! That's what it is. I thought it was an orangey-yellow thing atop some layer of white cheesey stuff. I didn't think about its being an egg, sunny side up, with a very firm yolk. Thanks.

What's your assessment of the texture and taste?

Back when our family used to get together for Christmas, I often ordered one of these to share around. I think we especially loved the apricot and almond fillings. Gosh, that brings back memories! We all loved those kringles!

What do you think that reddish thing is, just below the upper bun? More tomato? Looks almost like persimmon to me...but I hope it isn't.

It's good to know that the chopper is what you want! If you should decide that you would like to acquire some knife skills, or improve them, then I recommend this excellent course from the eGCI (eGullet Culinary Institute) archives: Basic Knife Skills. The associated Q&A is no longer active, but you can still learn from the course. I did. Lots. 🙂 Edited to add: there's also a great course on Knife Maintenance and Sharpening in those archives.

Interesting that with all the caveats they gave it 4 stars. From what you say, and what that review says, this one doesn't tempt me.

I'm with heidih and blue_dolphin: in general I prefer to use my knife because the cleanup is easier. My husband is exactly the opposite because he hasn't cared to hone his knife skills. We have an alligator chopper that he uses for onions and potatoes, like this: It has 2 grid sizes, for fine dice and large dice. (Incidentally, if he's going to be doing both onions and potatoes he does the onions first. The potatoes clean out the grid afterward.) It should be noted that he first has to slice the onion and/or potato into rounds so he can lay each round flat on the grid. We also have an inexpensive egg slicer such as blue_dolphin discussed. Again, it's because my husband prefers using it. That slicerr cleans pretty easily. We also have a Moulinex that I bought on eBay thanks to the Cheese Shredder topic (see here). I like it for shredding cheese and slicing things, but have never tried it on eggs. I think it would be more trouble than it's worth for that usage.

Thanks for that information about the chiles. I hope you can find some good restaurants at Bullhead City, and that some of them make good chiles rellenos (if you like them). Let us know what you find out! I was going to recommend a place in Needles, near the Rio del Sol Inn, for when you started branching out from your new home, but it appears to have gone away. Too bad. Juicy's Riverfront Cafe (I think it was called) was our preferred place for dinner and breakfast when we stopped in Needles and stayed overnight. That was a few years ago, though. I can't find them listed anywhere now, but if you should gt up that way and find them I recommend them. Edited to add: the last Tripadvisor notices I can find for Juicy's are from 2013. I think they must have changed names (and ownership) since then.

@Porthos, I thought the same thing. Maybe I'll paste a smile on mine once in a while. 🙂