Smithy

Lunch today. I really wanted to use my lemon vinaigrette, but forgot to take it out of the refrigerator before going to town, and it's congealed. Instead I'm using the Double-Sesame Dressing I made back here. It's actually pretty good on this salad, better than I remember it being. I still keep forgetting to put ginger into it. Guess what? The Hispanic grocery store in the nearest town doesn't have rice flour! The clerk thought it was a strange request. I don't expect us to be visiting any larger towns during this stay, although they have larger grocery stores. We did our best to stock up on everything before breaking camp so that we wouldn't have to drive much while we're here. So...good ol' Amazon and their lockers to the rescue! My package of Bob's Red Mill White Rice Flour (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) should arrive Friday.

I look forward to reading your tasting notes!

Yeah, I grew up with wooden spoons. My mother's main use for a wooden spoon was for stirring fudge, so there's a very happy memory there (including the delicious process of cleaning it up!!) But even then, I remember the spoon leaving little trails on the bottom of the pot. Getting all the fudge out of the pot and into the platter was a process. I think Mom used a wooden spoon because it could get into the corners of a pot more easily than a spatula. Then again, she might simply have done it that way because HER mother did it that way.

Ah, Dave, thank you! Those shrimp are things of beauty! I still have to get the rice flour, and may have to get vodka unless we have some on board. I may have vermouth. I have reserved a bottle of our good Scottish-style ale (Kilt Lifter) and can probably get more if the rest of the ingredients come available soon. Then, it's Katie bar the door!

Darn! I gave my electric fondue pot to my great-niece, since fondue had gone away at our house!

Thanks for reviving this topic! I think I missed it the first time around. I find that my taste in wooden spoons has changed. Until recently I used unfinished wooden spoons for, say, mixing dough. I had a beautiful one almost as long as my forearm that I think was made of pine. I say "had" because I recently donated it to a garage sale. I've found that my glossy bamboo spoons, that came with a wok set, work much better and aren't as sticky. I've never tried them in the dishwasher, but it's nice to know that they'll survive it.

Fascinating! At this remove I don't remember what brand of tots we were using at any given time, but I'll look for Taterbites or Tater Bites or even TaterBytes (sounds like a computing unit) next time I want to try them. Or maybe I'll try gfweb's version up topic, here. Regardless of which I try, I'll be sure to use the shallow-fry method you pointed out to me, with reinforcement from Toliver fans, a year ago in the posts you linked.

Thanks for that information! I kinda thought Gebhardt sounded familiar, but couldn't place it. I've probably seen some of their offerings in Texas. For sure, now that I'm aware of it, I'll see it jumping off the shelves at me. (Yes, I was speaking of Gebhardt. Tampico is all over the place where we live and shop.)

A friend of mine in Senegal just posted a photo (on Facebook) of reddish-colored fried insects and labeled it "Snack attack!" I asked him what they were and how they tasted. He said he's pretty sure they're grasshoppers. They're crunchy - fried through and through - and served with a dipping sauce. He also said he had to take off part of the back legs because they stuck in the roof of his mouth. Aside from that difficulty, he liked them. They sound to me like a less-processed version of any of the salty crunchy snacks we keep around here: potato chips/crisps; tortilla crisps/chips; Chex Mix. I'll try them sometime, if/when I get the chance.

We've changed the scenery and the trailer orientation. It's much greener here in western Arizona, a couple thousand feet higher and a couple hundred miles east of where we've spent the last few months. The sunrise has to be viewed out our back windows now. It's strange to see city lights again: still distant, but close enough to be distinct. I was disoriented when I got up last night and looked out my window and saw lights where the railyard some miles away has been for the last few months. "Why all those lights at this hour?" I wondered, "was there a derailment?" Then I remembered that we'd moved. Breaking camp was a bit of an adventure. After staying in one place for so long, we'd forgotten exactly where things go and how to fit them together. An observer would have been amused to see us puzzling over how to fold a camp chair enough to go back into its sleeve: with a Ph.D. and M.S. between us, it still took 15 minutes to get it right! At least we could laugh about it. With all that going on, we didn't take time for the usual breakfast. I made sandwiches for our breakfast and lunch, and we ate as the fit took us. After we got settled into our new digs we walked, visited with the camp host, and struggled to stay up past sunset. Neither of us was interested in elaborate dinner preparations: too tired, and not interested in a fuss or much cleanup. This is where the precooked, frozen dinners we make in batches come into play. "Chili it is!" we said. We had found his last batch lacking something -- exactly what, we weren't sure (I blame the tomatoes) but had decided to buy a bunch of fresh spices during this shopping expedition. Among the spices we purchased were a package of "mild chili powder" and a bottle of Gebhardt chili powder. We'd never heard of that brand before, and had decided to try it out. Both chili powders were good. We thought the Tampico blend might be slightly sweeter; I think it's also saltier but can't read the label well enough to be sure. For me, sour cream was the final touch to bring out the good flavors of the chili and the spices. Lesson learned: get rid of the old chili powders in my cabinet! I know the stuff goes stale; I just don't know how quickly.

That's what Dave said, but since he and JAZ had settled on rice flour I thought I'd try that first if possible.

Thanks for that. As I recall, my Bob's Red Mill rice flour (still at home) is granular, not powdery. Given my current travel circumstances, I'll settle for whatever I can find...and Asian isn't in it around here. I'll have a chance to look around tomorrow, I think, at the local Mexican market.

I've never tried that. Does it change the flavor, from what you have noticed? What does it do to the zest?

I thought of M.F.K. Fisher based on what you wrote above. By golly, Adler refers to Fisher's style as a guideline for her own. I just bought the Kindle book.

A Mexican market is not far from our next stop. I'll look there for the rice flour.

I think of myself as an adventuresome eater, but I'd have to be very hungry -- or else up for a strong dare -- to try those mealworms. Maybe if they were fried and sauced...or else boiled and sauced and passed off as vermicelli? I have read that fried grasshoppers can be very good, with the classic "crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside" description. I'd try those, if I were to see them, but as noted above the price point needs to come way down. Here are the scorpion suckers that I dimly remembered and Heidi remembered more clearly. I've already forgotten the price: $3 US?

One final thing, for now: yes, you can freeze the juice. I generally freeze it in largish containers (1 cup, 1 pint) but that can be a mistake unless your labeling is very good. I once mistook a pint of juice for a pint of chicken broth because the label had fallen off. That was a VERY tart pilaf!

@Kim Shook, I've also made this Taste of Home recipe for Lemon Curd Chiffon Pie and been delighted with it. Lemon curd keeps very well, and is wonderful stuff to spread on toast or crackers, or dollop atop another dessert. @JAZ's recipe in one of her Instant Pot Cookbooks is the best and simplest I've ever had. And in the savory direction: don't forget about the Greek soup, avgolemno! Delicious!

@Kim Shook: Lemon Meringue Pie. Lemon Curd. Lemon Curd pie. (Dorie Greenspan has a fabulous recipe, for example.) I'll keep thinking...but don't you love tarts and cakes? And lemon cookies. Edited to add, since nobody has responded to this yet: Here's a link to Dorie's Lemon-Lemon Lemon Cream Recipe.

Getting back to @Mjx's question: I haven't even seen insects for sale in grocery stores, except for novelty candies like chocolate ants. A place I'm going to tomorrow has, or used to have, small scorpions in clear candies for a couple of US dollars. If they're still there and I remember, I'll snap a photo. I'll have to watch more closely in the stores. Perhaps I'm overlooking them.

I had no idea! I do remember that during our last population explosion of "army worms" in northern Minnesota someone was experimenting with making wine out of them. He may even have called it "revenge wine". I read that it was...interesting...but it didn't look like a cottage industry sprung up as a result. What does the black ant wine taste like, liuzhou? Does it have a formic acid kick?

Well, who knew?! Not that we have any room in the refrigerator, but it's interesting to see the updated information. Thanks.

We made our (realio, trulio) last trip to Yuma and purchased our (realio, trulio) last batch of groceries before we move camp. Couldn't find rice flour. I remember this problem some years ago, when I was determined to make Dutch Crunch (aka giraffe, or leopard) bread. Perhaps I was too pressed for time, but I couldn't find it in this well-stocked store. Cornstarch it is. Or will be, in a few days. I bought a fresh container to be sure I'd have enough. And I bought beer! Hey, any port excuse in a storm.

Interesting about the potatoes. Anyone who has been reading this topic for a while knows that my darling LOVES potatoes cubed and crisped, in his version of hash. The thing is, he can't always get them to get crisp in the frying pan. We've attributed it to small variations in the oil:potato:skillet proportions, despite measuring...except...a year or two ago, we stored the potatoes in the same cooler as a bunch of citrus and the potatoes had a noticeably yellow cast. They stubbornly refused to crisp up by his usual methods. We stopped storing potatoes in the same cooler as citrus, but maybe there are other factors at work too.

I feared that might be the case. I'll wait to buy rice flour, or else use corn starch (of which I have plenty). Thanks.