It is dinner time and I dont know what to fix. That happens often in the life of a woman. I play computer games while I try to figure out something to eat. We are just about out of everything and will go to the feria tomorrow to stock up again.
We have two fat little sausages and six skinny and short little ones. They arent the same. Oh, well, they will add variety to the dish because they are different sizes. We have six potatoes that are very shriveled and wrinkled, but they arent spoiled. I will peel two of them and cut them into slices. I will put them in a little later because they dont take very long to soften. Hmmm, onions always help and we have two small ends left over from other meals. Chop them into big pieces and add them to the frying pan where the sausages are already beginning to sizzle. Better cover them so they wont burn, but I do want them to look a little browned. Oh! There are four carrots in the fridge. I will peel two of them and cut them kind of bite-size thin and add them to the pan to steam while I cut four mushrooms into four pieces. Hey! This is beginning to look like a pretty good mix. Where are those tomatoes? I put two of them in whole for about three minutes, then remove them, pull off the skin, cut the tomatoes into small chunks and dump them back into the pan. I threw the skins away, but I dont think that is wasteful. Everything is steamy now because I poured in half a cup of water to keep the sausages from sticking to the pan. Now...what kind of seasoning shall I use? Ahhh, Deverles is just the thing, and I have a tiny piece of a bullion cube left. Well, now I need something green. Look in the cupboard: parsley is shouting at me, so I dump in a tablespoon's worth. Now, this has to cook a few minutes, till the potatoes are soft, and because the table is already set, I will go play computer solitaire while I wait. After two games, I check on the dinner. All the moisture has boiled away and the bottom of the pan is black. I will just pour out the unburned stuff, and try to scrape what I can of that which is stuck. Oh, no! There are some really good sausage pieces stuck. As I try to scraped them off while leaving the stuck part behind, the whole pieces come off. Well, it's done now so I'll just do that to the rest of the stuff. Guess What!!!! Even though it looked pretty bad in the pan and questionable in the serving dish, it tasted really good.
I dont know if I can be brave enough to reproduce Scorch again, but here is the recipe, anyway.
Friday, November 30, 2012
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Scratch
Buy eight Granny Smith apples from the feria on Saturday.
Buy butter, flour, cornstarch, cinnamon, sugar, almond extract, two lemons from Lider
Juice two lemons into large bowl, add one cup water
Peel, core, slice apples into ten slices each, drop into lemon water and coat each slice
Lift apple slices out and into small pot, slowly let simmer with two thirds cup sugar
and one fourth cup lemon-water, for ten minutes, or softened but not mushy
Pour hot apples and juice through strainer into bowl. Set apples aside to cool.
Pour juice back into small pot, add one half cup sugar, one teaspoon almond extract,
one half tsp cinnamon, two Tbs cornstarch in one half cup water. When hot, add
Tbs butter. Stir over medium heat till cornstarch is dissolved. Set aside to cool.
Mix two cups flour and two thirds cup butter till it looks like cornmeal.
Add one fourth cup ice water to flour mix, stir with fork till water is absorbed. Add
enough water to gather up rest of flour mix. Knead in bowl three times.
Break off tennis ball size pieces of dough, roll out in round shape, about eight inches
across.
Place rolled dough into small one cup size baking bowls. Fill with cool apples, pour
cool sauce over apples. Fold overlapping dough up over apples
Bake at 375 to 400 degrees F till tops are lightly browned.
Remove from oven, let cool. Eat. Yummy
This is my made-up recipe from scratch. I forgot to include any of my recipes when packing for my mission.
Mix well: two cups flour
two thirds cup butter
Buy butter, flour, cornstarch, cinnamon, sugar, almond extract, two lemons from Lider
Juice two lemons into large bowl, add one cup water
Peel, core, slice apples into ten slices each, drop into lemon water and coat each slice
Lift apple slices out and into small pot, slowly let simmer with two thirds cup sugar
and one fourth cup lemon-water, for ten minutes, or softened but not mushy
Pour hot apples and juice through strainer into bowl. Set apples aside to cool.
Pour juice back into small pot, add one half cup sugar, one teaspoon almond extract,
one half tsp cinnamon, two Tbs cornstarch in one half cup water. When hot, add
Tbs butter. Stir over medium heat till cornstarch is dissolved. Set aside to cool.
Mix two cups flour and two thirds cup butter till it looks like cornmeal.
Add one fourth cup ice water to flour mix, stir with fork till water is absorbed. Add
enough water to gather up rest of flour mix. Knead in bowl three times.
Break off tennis ball size pieces of dough, roll out in round shape, about eight inches
across.
Place rolled dough into small one cup size baking bowls. Fill with cool apples, pour
cool sauce over apples. Fold overlapping dough up over apples
Bake at 375 to 400 degrees F till tops are lightly browned.
Remove from oven, let cool. Eat. Yummy
This is my made-up recipe from scratch. I forgot to include any of my recipes when packing for my mission.
Mix well: two cups flour
two thirds cup butter
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Accommodation?
When we first arrived in Santiago we were told about earthquakes that happen all the time. We were told that people dont even react to them because they are so frequent. In fact, it isnt even an earthquake till it gets over 7 on the earthquake scale. Everything else is just a temblor.
We were apartment hunting in the first two weeks, and when on the 7th floor looking at a place, I felt a little dizzy. It was "just a temblor". All the little shakes we experienced while living in the hospedaje for three months were "just temblors", even though they shook pretty hard.
Just after a farewell party for a departing senior missionary couple we were standing and talking to someone when again, I felt dizzy. I felt dizzier than I ever had. The pictures started swaying on the walls, we all sat down and looked at each other, then out the window. A construction crane a block away was bouncing up and down. The hospedaje suffered a large crack across a ten foot wall, just over the bank of windows. It was a 7.2 temblor.
There have been lots of temblors that have just wiggled the bed a little, like someone getting up in the middle of the night. We just lie there and ride out the experience. Nothing has ever been displaced in our apartment.
On the end of September, while at work in the office on the 13th floor, we felt the building start to shake a little, but no one reacted. Then it shook harder, then finally the windows began shaking violently. I was a little startled, Jay was very concerned, the people in the office raised their eyebrows. It was a 6.1
For the past week we have been experiencing little temblors which we hardly reacted to. Jay said he didnt even feel them. Then we learned that one was a 4.5, which seems to me to be pretty big. Yesterday at home, at 6:45, the building started shaking,but I was playing games on the computer so didnt pay much attention. It actually felt kind of fun: like being gently rocked. It was a 6.1.
When you experience something often enough you get used to it and it doesnt even register on your mind. When you wear a watch or a ring for the first time, you feel it, but after a while it doesnt register on your mind. That is called accommodation. I think we are accommodating to earthquakes. Excuse me, I mean temblors.
We were apartment hunting in the first two weeks, and when on the 7th floor looking at a place, I felt a little dizzy. It was "just a temblor". All the little shakes we experienced while living in the hospedaje for three months were "just temblors", even though they shook pretty hard.
Just after a farewell party for a departing senior missionary couple we were standing and talking to someone when again, I felt dizzy. I felt dizzier than I ever had. The pictures started swaying on the walls, we all sat down and looked at each other, then out the window. A construction crane a block away was bouncing up and down. The hospedaje suffered a large crack across a ten foot wall, just over the bank of windows. It was a 7.2 temblor.
There have been lots of temblors that have just wiggled the bed a little, like someone getting up in the middle of the night. We just lie there and ride out the experience. Nothing has ever been displaced in our apartment.
On the end of September, while at work in the office on the 13th floor, we felt the building start to shake a little, but no one reacted. Then it shook harder, then finally the windows began shaking violently. I was a little startled, Jay was very concerned, the people in the office raised their eyebrows. It was a 6.1
For the past week we have been experiencing little temblors which we hardly reacted to. Jay said he didnt even feel them. Then we learned that one was a 4.5, which seems to me to be pretty big. Yesterday at home, at 6:45, the building started shaking,but I was playing games on the computer so didnt pay much attention. It actually felt kind of fun: like being gently rocked. It was a 6.1.
When you experience something often enough you get used to it and it doesnt even register on your mind. When you wear a watch or a ring for the first time, you feel it, but after a while it doesnt register on your mind. That is called accommodation. I think we are accommodating to earthquakes. Excuse me, I mean temblors.
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