Category: Food & Drink

Resistance? There’s an app for that

If you’re still on the fence about whether to contact your elected officials about Trump, Musk and other bad actors in Washington, there’s a tool that might make it easier for you. The tool is a free app named 5 Calls.  

I downloaded it a couple of weeks ago and have found it exceptionally helpful. Once you plug in your address, the app identifies your legislators. The home screen lists top issues and provides talking points that articulate the progressive position.

Yes, the app is proudly partisan. And non-profit.

Once you decide what you’re going to say, you click on who you want to call first and the process begins. I arrived for an appointment early last week and thought, oh, I have time to make a few calls. I sat in my car and used the app to contact my legislators about the spending bill.

While I prefer emails, I’ve read calling is more effective. Speaking spontaneously is a challenge, but it got easier when I figured out shorter is better. On my first attempt, I got a voice mail and was cut off after I blathered on too long. Now I just say my name, where I live and then one or two sentences about the issue. I try to remember they’re probably just keeping some sort of log in favor or against, and so that’s really all you have to say.

What I’m eating

Late last year, I made a list of our winter comfort foods, and we’ve been knocking them off one by one. Dale made chile verde last week, and I made flour tortillas to go with. There’s only one more to go – venison meatloaf.

The weather is starting to warm up, although we’re getting another week of cooler temperatures and rain, so there’s still time to finish the job. Tomorrow is the big washout, so I’m thinking venison meatloaf, asparagus and garlic mashed potatoes.

Dale bought some gorgeous artichokes, so I cooked those this morning, and they’re chilling in the fridge. They’re huge, so we’ll just have artichokes for dinner. Occasionally I make aioli but most of the time we just make a dipping sauce from store-bought mayonnaise mixed with some good olive oil.

There’s still coconut cake in the freezer, so, you know, tick tock, tick tock. That might be a tasty breakfast on a cold rainy morning. Oh? Is that tomorrow? What a coincidence.

What I’m watching

My original pledge to reduce spending on Amazon by 50 percent morphed, and it’s pretty close to a complete boycott. I’m no longer watching movies or shows on Amazon. There are plenty of other streaming services to choose from.

We like a bad sci-fi movie on Friday nights with pizza, and we used to order them on Amazon. But I switched to the Classic Sci Fi Movie Channel, and it has been so fun. Attack of the Giant Leeches, Attack of the Crab Monsters, She Demons. Only the finest. Sometimes the sound quality isn’t the best, but we make do.

I’m also burning through season 2 of The Mountain Detective on PBS Passport.  Former policeman Alex Hugo leaves the big city to find peace in the French Alps but ends up confronting violence in paradise. The show is in French with subtitles.

I’ve read it’s filmed on location, and the scenery is breathtaking. Too bad about all that crime!

Alex is Mr. Mountain Man and never leaves home without climbing ropes and all that stuff. When they’re talking about a place they need to go, he might say something like, “that’s a three-day walk.” I sort of love that, and even though I have no interest in climbing, just seeing an older man in good physical condition stomping about the mountains keeps me motivated to do my exercises.

What I’m reading

The library is my friend. My recently completed list includes:

Locked In by Jussi Adler-Olsen. This is the last of the Department Q series featuring Danish detective Carl Mørck. Sometimes finales suck, but this was great, and I absolutely loved the ending.

Pro Bono by Thomas Perry. A young lawyer who specializes in financial crime tries to help a young widow recover money embezzled from her late husband’s accounts. Oh, and the lawyer has a shady past.

The Last Policeman by Ben Winters. Published in 2012, this is the first in a trilogy about a young detective trying to solve crimes even though everyone knows the world will end in six months when an asteroid collides with Earth. It’s not as dark as you would think, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Can’t wait to read the other two.

Guide Me Home by Attica Locke. Another finale to a three-part series featuring Texas Ranger Darren Mathews. I tell myself I don’t want to read about current events in fiction, but it’s actually way better than reading the news. Let’s hear it for the arts!

Darren, who is black, spent most of his career fighting white supremacists and framed a bad guy for murdering a member of the Aryan Brotherhood because he wouldn’t let a black man go to prison for killing him. Now Darren is facing indictment. And plenty of self-loathing. It’s a compelling story.

Fox guarding the henhouse

I’m depressed about Trump, Musk, Vance, et al. Maybe writing about it helps me some, but I wonder if it just amplifies everything. The movers and shakers will make their mark one way or the other, but I still think the answer is for ordinary citizens to do small things you hope will make a difference and then go on and try to live a happy life no matter what.

Easier said than done, that’s for sure. I told myself, just do one thing today and then think about dinner. There’s usually a Law & Order rerun on Mondays. I hear that music, and I just kind of sigh in relief. Dun-dun.

Outrage of the day is Musk trying to get access to the IRS files. I don’t even know why I bothered to write my elected representatives, because it has probably happened by now, but we can only try. I still can’t get through on the phone, so I’m using the email feature on their websites. This is my message to my Democratic senators. As always, feel free to steal anything that resonates with you.

Please do whatever you can to stop Elon Musk from accessing anything, most recently the IRS and our taxpayer records. This is a gross violation of privacy and very frightening to the average American who pays taxes. Musk is unelected and has no right to anything, let alone our personal data. He does billions of dollars’ worth of business with the government, and he’s allowed to look at the finances? We would not let any other defense contractor in the world do that. All that, and Tesla didn’t pay any federal taxes last year, but he’s snooping around trying to stick it to honest citizens? Please stop him.

The next one went to my Republican congressman. He has a thing on his website about how ridiculous it is to think just because Trump hired Elon Musk as an accountant that it’s a threat to democracy.

I read your words about hiring Elon Musk as an accountant, wondering why some people think this is a threat to democracy. Because it is!  We, the people, did not hire or elect Elon Musk to anything. And now he’s trying to get access to the IRS records. Talk about fox guarding the henhouse.

This is a gross violation of privacy and very frightening to the average American who pays taxes. Musk is unelected and has no right to anything, let alone our personal data. He does billions of dollars’ worth of business with the government, and he’s allowed to look at the finances? We would not let any other defense contractor in the world do that. 

From what I’ve read, you are currently on board with the president and his administration violating the rights of average citizens, but I’m still writing because I hope at some point you will reconsider. Please reflect on your elected position and the oath you swore to defend the constitution. I can only believe you had a calling to serve your country, and I thank you for that. I may not like some of the conservative policies you support, but I respect differences of opinion. You can still make a difference and advance your agenda without burning down the house.

I have not spent any money on Amazon since I made a pledge to reduce my spending there by 50 percent. Thanks to your comments, I canceled my Amazon subscription to PBS Masterpiece and made a donation to PBS. Now I have PBS Passport, and you were right. Everything I could ever want is there.

What I’m eating

I’m still quite smitten with my sort of sweet but savory oatmeal. My favorite so far starts with one serving of regular rolled oats. When it comes out of the microwave, I pour it in a bowl and top it with about one tablespoon each of unsweetened coconut, currants and walnuts. Then I drizzle a little olive oil over the top. Oh, and a sprinkle of sea salt.

Tonight Dale’s making grilled Gochujang Burgers with Spicy Slaw from the NY Times. This will be our third time around. Because. It. Is. Delicious. If you can’t get through the firewall, the same recipe is here.

You start with a concoction of gochujang, garlic, rice vinegar, sugar, olive oil and sesame oil. Half of it gets mixed in with ground pork for the burgers and the other half is used for a tangy slaw made with carrots, bean sprouts, cucumbers and scallions. Put that on a toasted buttered bun with maybe a schmear of mayo, and it is heaven.

What I’m watching

Now that I’m on PBS Passport, I’m continuing to watch All Creatures Great and Small. It’s not my normal crime genre, but I just like that show. Another one I’ve started that isn’t on the crime spectrum is Seaside Hotel. It’s in Danish with subtitles and  follows the lives of guests and employees at a North Sea hotel prior to World War II. I haven’t gotten very far, but I like it.

On the crime front, also on PBS Passport, I’m enjoying The Mountain Detective. It’s about a former policeman who leaves the city for the mountains and discovers, guess what? Violence and crime. It’s in French with subtitles.

What I’m reading

I’m not reading much of anything. I think I’m too agitated. Two of my books on hold at the library came in, but it turns out the library is closed for repairs to the HVAC system. Talk about annoyed. I was able to get through to a librarian, who is going to have the books transferred to a nearby library, but that will be Wednesday at the earliest.

There are plenty of books in the house I could read, but I’m just not into them right now. I did finish kind of a fun read called Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn. Four women retired from their jobs as professional assassins and discover someone is trying to kill them. The sequel, Kills Well with Others, is out next month.

All things in moderation

Try as I might, I don’t believe I’m going to complete my reference for resisting the threat against democracy. The blitz is so large in scope, it’s almost impossible to prioritize the issues or resources that will help us confront this monstrosity. My attempts so far seem a bit like pissing in the wind, although I have never actually pissed in the wind. I’m pretty sure Dale has, though.

How many kinds of crazy can you handle at once?

I’ve been reading great opinion pieces on independent media that mostly amount to “outrage of the day.” Not a lot of advice at this point, but I have come to the conclusion social and cultural issues are smoke and mirrors designed to fire us up and keep us divided.

The good guys will be marching in the streets for basic human rights, while the bad guys cloak themselves in righteousness and grab all the money and power. One ring to rule them all.

I honestly don’t know what to do, but my best idea at this point is to follow the money. I’ve never actually called my senators, but tomorrow I’m going to try it and see what happens. I’ll focus on ill-conceived tariffs and Elon Musk gaining access to the treasury system. My message is we elected you to represent us, and this is an attack on Americans. Get your head out of your ass and do something!

I’ll probably say it nicer than that. Maybe it depends on who answers the phone? If anyone even answers. As they used to say in the South when I lived there, I have no earthly idea!

As for outrage of the day, I realized I was also following that path here and at home. I told Dale I’ll stop reading the shitshow news to him, and I’m not going to go on and on about it here, either. I will continue to share what I think is important, but I’m not wired for daily outrage. All things in moderation.

What I’m Eating

Last night was Transylvanian Layered Cabbage, which I described in an earlier post. Sauerkraut, pork, smoked sausage, rice and sour cream. As an accompaniment, I made a no-knead rye bread that was my best ever. There’s a lot of casserole left over, so we’ll skip a day and have another go at it.

Probably one serving will go into our garage chest freezer, which we are defrosting today! It’s not that hard, but Dale and I approach things differently (to say the least). I bundle similar items into giant Ziplocs so you can find them again, but Dale likes to toss things in like logs on a fire.

Arguments will be had.

For breakfast, Dale made scrambled eggs with homemade Mexican-style chorizo and his excellent salsa verde. He eats his eggs on a tortilla like a taco, but I prefer them without. Either way, delicious!

I’ve got some lobster stock thawing out for miso seafood chowder, but that will be mid-week. If we skip a day on the casserole, that means tonight’s dinner is unknown at this time. Maybe we’ll be inspired by something in the freezer. I know there’s some tuna casserole in there. It always sounds yucky, but I make it all from scratch with mushrooms and a bechamel sauce topped with cheddar, and it’s great.

What I’m Watching

I finished season 4 of Astrid. I highly recommend that show on PBS Masterpiece. I started watching season 5 of All Creatures Great and Small, which is a nice respite from all the gruesomeness of life and fiction. Was I hallucinating or did I see there will be a new Lincoln Lawyer season on Netflix?

What I’m Reading

Not for the feint of heart, but I read Resisting the Right by Robert Edwards. He’s an excellent writer to begin with, and the material is meticulously researched. Published before Trump was elected, it’s still quite grim, but it should be a fixture on everyone’s resistance bookshelf. Mr. Edwards also has an enlightening blog, The King’s Necktie.

I’m rather proud of my holds list (and position!) at the library:

  • Locked In by Jussi Adler-Olsen (1)
  • Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix (4)
  • Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten (7)
  • Onyx Storm by Rebecca Yarros (13)

Attention must be paid

Well, now. I said I would pay more attention to what is happening in America because attention must be paid, but this is a bit much. I am, after all, retired and a woman of leisure, but every day the shitshow gets worse, and I can’t in good conscience look away. Somehow, we’ve got to unravel the truth.

What I’ve learned this week is the truth hides in plain sight. I believe it was David in the comments section of my last post who said, “Pay attention to your news source.”  

Case in point. I’ve been reading independent news reports that say on Jan. 28 the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) sent an email to nearly all full-time federal employees offering them an alleged eight month’s severance package to resign by Feb. 6. That’s about 2 million people.

I went into panic mode, wondering how I’m going to get my Social Security if everyone is gone, and my husband said he read about the email, but the buyout was for people who are working from home and refuse to go back to the office.

Oh, only that, well, it’s about time.

Dale’s information source was a Bloomberg article with the headline, “Trump Offers Buyouts to Federal Employees Resisting In-Person Work.”

Kinda sorta. While the email includes a return-to-office requirement, the “deferred resignation” offer is much broader in scope. Some say it’s a simple workforce reduction strategy, and others say the goal is to rid ourselves of a nonpartisan civil service and replace it with party loyalists. The Trump administration seems to have rigged up some sort of con to address pesky legal concerns, but thankfully, there is truth and resistance from all corners.

I had to re-check all my sources to prove to Dale I wasn’t making this up. Even the OPM confirmed the email wasn’t only for those who don’t show up at the office.

Deferred resignation is available to all full-time federal employees except for military personnel of the armed forces, employees of the U.S. Postal Service, those in positions related to immigration enforcement and national security, and those in other positions specifically excluded by your employing agency.

Everyone chooses how they tell a story, me included. No matter who you hear it from, attention must be paid. Sometimes you have to pull back the curtain to figure out what’s really happening. Whether intentional or not, trusted news sources aren’t always trustworthy.

Interestingly, the email’s subject line featured the same wording Elon Musk used when he took over Twitter and tried to fire just about everybody. A Fork in the Road.

Or as I like to call it, A Fork in the Throat.

I’m reading lots of intelligent commentary on America’s turn to the right but still not seeing any clear direction on what average citizens can do to stop it. I’m working on my little handout that might direct people to topic-specific independent news sources and non-profit organizations, so at least we can read about it and maybe give some money to others who are working hard to save our country.

Dinner

And at last we turn to talk of dinner! We’re headed for a cold and rainy spell, so Dale and I are prioritizing the list of delicious “winter” meals to ease our suffering. I’ve been getting my sourdough starter ready so I can bake a boule this weekend. Probably miso seafood chowder to go with.

Dale plans to make a batch of chili. His recipe uses pork and beef but no beans and is from a handout we got at a liquor store 40 years ago – a promotional piece by Marlboro!

Also on the docket is a dish we make called Transylvanian Layered Cabbage. It’s a casserole with layers of sauerkraut, rice, sour cream, ground pork, smoked sausage and bacon. It sounds weird, but it’s oddly fabulous. One of us will make rye bread to go with that.

Slather some butter on that bread and fill up a tankard of beer, and you remember that in spite of it all, life is good!

No big thoughts here

I scheduled my colonoscopy for Jan. 20, which is inauguration day. Sure, I could have watched Donald Trump take the oath of office, but I went with a good old-fashioned colon blow … the extended edition that includes a partially sedated anal probe.

No regrets.

I’m continuing to focus less on what’s actually happening in the world and more on what’s happening in our kitchen. Since I retired, I’ve learned that I’m a happier and calmer person when I quit trying to think the big thoughts and direct my energy into simple things that make life pleasurable. Food is always at the top of the list.

I made some excellent bread in 2024, especially sourdough, but this year I’d like to push a little harder and try some different recipes. Bagels, brioche, you name it. I also want to try making croissants. Not for the feint of heart, as I understand it.

We ate our share of sweets over the holidays, so I’m trying to cut back on sugar. No plans to give it up – I just want to be more mindful. Save it for when it counts! I’ve been eating a lot of oatmeal, which is good. But I’ve been hammering it with brown sugar, which is, shall we say, not my best choice. Does oatmeal even need to be sweet?

I Googled savory oatmeal, and there’s a lot out there with stuff I really don’t want to eat in the morning. I kept it simple and made a batch with just chopped walnuts and a little salt. Very good. Then I tried it with chopped walnuts, currants, olive oil and a dash of sea salt. Yum!

While I might still do the sweeter variety of oatmeal from time to time, I’m enjoying these other options. What about something with sesame oil ? Some toasted seeds?

One of my other breakfast treats is an egg cooked in olive oil. I heat a couple of tablespoons of olive oil into a small nonstick pan and then add an egg as though I’m frying it. But it almost poaches in the pool of oil. When the egg is done, I pour the whole thing – oil and egg – on sourdough toast. It’s so delicious. I’m wondering if it might be good on oatmeal, too.

I’m starting my sourdough tonight, and we’re having that tomorrow with balsamic glazed chicken thighs with burst tomatoes and green beans. I put a bottle of Gewürztraminer in the fridge. People think Gewürz is a sweet wine, but we buy a dry variety from Navarro Vineyards. We love it..

Pizza tonight. A replay of a pizza Dale made for the first time a few weeks ago. He said he was experimenting with new toppings, and it was going to sound weird. Hot Italian sausage, anchovies and red onion. I said, what’s weird about that? It sounds wonderful.

And it was seriously one of the best pizzas he has ever made. The anchovies sort of melt into the sausage, and it’s an umami flavor bomb. A little crunch of the red onion, and a sprinkling of parmesan, and you wonder where this has been all your life.

No big thoughts here, but a toast perhaps?

To you, may your pleasures be simple and your food simply delicious.

Thinking about missiles and dinner

Just prior to my retirement, I was working on a couple of intense communications projects involving missiles and people who love them, and while I love the people who love them, mostly I was bored and thought about dinner.

Retirement freed up my brain to think about dinner without the distractions of incoming missiles. My husband and I spend a good bit of our day thinking about dinner, shopping for dinner, cooking dinner, eating dinner and then talking about it afterward. However, Dale is retired military, so I’m pretty sure he thinks about missiles, too.

Dale and I are both avid cooks, so for us, dinner is a hobby, the highlight of the day. Well, that and happy hour. When we were both working, it was an opportunity to connect after a long day at the office. Now it’s an opportunity to connect after a long day of getting in each other’s way.

Although we’re not overly materialistic, we do like our kitchen stuff, old and new. We still use the dishes we bought at the PX when we got married almost 40 years ago, and we have a handheld mixer from the early 80s. Dale has a vintage Wearever Super Shooter specifically for making cheese straws. Then there’s the yogurt maker, the juicer, the Instant Pot. We converted a downstairs bedroom into the Williams Sonoma annex.

I also like what I call side dishes. Artichoke plates, egg cups. Bar ware. Pasta bowls. My sister makes us beautiful two-sided cloth napkins, my favorite being pizza on one side and garlic on the other.

We sometimes take sides on what to have for dinner, but during the meal itself we may bicker over what we had for dinner on that rainy Saturday in June of 1998. Remember, it didn’t rain until late? No, it was pouring down when I woke up. I’m pretty sure it was a rib-eye. I remember buying it. No, he says, I bought it, I remember it was on sale at Publix. No, it was Harris Teeter. No, they had closed by then.

Eating together unlocks the memories so we can argue about whose version is correct.

I don’t understand sacrificing dinner to climb the ladder at work. I met several high-powered women executives in my career who said they usually ate a bowl of cold cereal for dinner because they worked such long hours. A former boss said she often ate a granola bar in her room during business travel, presumably to win the prize for saving the company money and free up more time for emails.

Now, I get the whole thing about holing up in the room after a day in close quarters with vice presidents and their ilk, but I had different priorities. Bath fizzies! Movies! Room service! I didn’t care if I had to pay for it myself. It was like a fiesta. I enjoyed the time alone, but the best part was coming home, when Dale would make something delicious to celebrate my return.

We make almost everything from scratch and do focus on healthy foods, but we also have lots of not-so-healthy food rituals:

  • Comfort Food Tuesday
  • Full Mexican (Mexican food Friday, Saturday and Sunday night)
  • Meat Weekend (Meat Friday, Saturday and Sunday night)
  • Pizza and Beer Friday

I know there’s plenty of serious stuff going on in the world that probably needs my attention, but as you can see, I’m kind of busy.

Bacon of the Month Club

During the first couple of months after I retired, my husband and I were driving each other nuts, what with me wanting him to eat healthier and live longer and then his raging indifference to my loving intentions. So, I thought, fine, you want to die, let’s get this show on the road, and I gave him “Bacon of the Month Club” for Christmas.

He would receive a monthly shipment of bacon for three months courtesy of Zingerman’s. I would have done the whole year, but that seemed too obvious.

I like bacon, but most of the time, I’m like, no thanks, I’ve already had cancer. Until delicious specialty pork products started arriving at the door, I wasn’t even tempted. But now there was pressure.

The first shipment was a pound of Nueske’s applewood smoked bacon from Wisconsin. The package included a keepsake binder with articles about bacon and the people who make it, “A Pocket Book of Bacon” and a pig magnet for the refrigerator.

Nueske’s was by far the best of the three we sampled. The article in the binder described it as the Platonic ideal of bacon, the one against which all other bacons are measured. And it’s true. I’m not good at describing the positive qualities of bacon after so many years of pig-shaming, other than to say Dale cooked it to perfection, and it was crispy, smoky and succulent.

At first I would only eat one piece, and I said we can never have this more than once a week. Then I said, oh, two pieces won’t kill me, but never, never more than once a week. And then I said, oh, what difference does it make if we eat it twice a week? We’re all going to die anyway.

In hindsight, I can see bacon helped us bond through a challenging transition in our lives. Whatever was going on – me in bed at night, worrying about what happens if the North Koreans bomb us and ruin my retirement and him worrying about me being awake worrying about North Korea.

But then it’s morning, the sun is glorious, the birds are chirping and wait, what is that other sound? Could it be the siren call of bacon?

One morning I took a picture of two simple slices of bacon on a plate and posted it on my Instagram account. I don’t get tons of Instagram traffic, but bacon is my most popular post to date. I look at the number every couple of weeks, and I report to Dale that bacon, of all my posts, is still in the lead. He laughs every time. The picture of me bald after chemotherapy is a heart-tugging second, but it’s not bacon.

We’re adjusting to our new lifestyle. I gave up pestering him about what he eats. Besides, he kind of came around on his own. Our membership in Bacon of the Month Club had expired, and one day he said, you know, that was fun, but we shouldn’t eat so much bacon.

I let him think it was his idea – a trick I learned at work.