Here’s my first film, of Zoe and her PBK, taken just a short while ago. Camera doesn’t do great video (neither do I) and lighting was bright in here but not bright enough, but Jim wanted to teach me how to do it before he goes back to the salt mines tomorrow.
Here it is!
Go buy your dog a Kong and some peanut butter! Dee
Posted in Editorial, Education, Friend Alert
Jim took too long last night buying software, and showed up with two dozen roses, white and pink. I think he thinks he has to make up for the years he walked to work and there were no florists in town.
Early this morning I made three arrangements and, with the alstroemeria I picked up the other day it’s nearly more flowers than we can handle. The roses are gorgeous, opening fast and will be gone before the new year so must be enjoyed now.
For me, having fresh flowers is better than a Christmas tree, at least this year. Next year I may want to place my/our lifelong ornaments on a tree. My parents bought us each an ornament every year, labeled it and when we went away after college we got a box with our ornaments. What a wonderful way to keep memories.
Jim doesn’t have any, but I’ve been garnering two a year since we’ve married, each a different theme. OK, I bought two wooden socks, one blue and one green, the year we met, before marriage, because he was alone and needed a steak and baked potato and ornaments without a tree. Last year it was a Scottish lad and lass, this year a cowboy snowman and reindeer bearing a sheet of cookies.
My childhood ornaments are scattered but there are some with dates and I remember placing them on our tree. I’d love to see them all decorating a real tree.
Couples tell stories they remember, perhaps over and over. I think having an ornament from a certain year might bring up a new memory and topic.
I remember when my sister and I disturbed a beehive, when we recovered mice from the back of the Buick, and when my brother climbed the TV tower and wouldn’t come down. So many more. Time becomes more precious every day. Jim remembers riding Free, a dairy cow, and countless other stories.
So please keep cooking, for family and friends. And hand down your family recipes for traditions to continue. Dee
It took a while for me to find a space in the parking garage while Jim found tickets on Christmas day, but it all worked out. The theater was nearly full so I was in the third row looking up toward the screen, while he got a soda. I now know more about Frank Langella’s face as Nixon than I ever wanted.
Yes, the little ones (others’, not ours) were scattered seeing all their new releases so we opted for an R-rated movie (for language) and something that’s been out for a couple of weeks. Frost/Nixon is worth seeing. The key actors are incredible. Those who prefer car chases and things blowing up, stay away.
I was young and disinterested but not completely clueless during Watergate. When I’d come home from school, Mom was incessantly ironing while watching the Senate hearings. Mom never watched TV during the day. I’ll bet she cleaned and ironed all our curtains more than twice to watch the impeachment hearings. It was a heartfelt moment for me to watch her shake Senator Sam Ervin’s hand a few years later.
All The President’s Men was a primer as to the mechanics of the scandal. That was the “gotcha” phase as a prelude to the “gotcha phrase” of David Frost’s interview but here one may see more of the man. His daughters might not agree. His wife was largely absent in the film, perhaps in his life? I’ve not read the books, nor do I wish to. One can only be a specialist in certain areas.
As I said, I had more important things in my life than politics and living history. Like hanging out with friend Julie who always had an oboe reed in her mouth and marched in the 1972 Nixon Inaugural Parade, playing a flute. Yes, we were the team that TC Williams Titans took down the year before I moved into the neighborhood. Applause for all they did at the time, but all I remember is buses with bars and lots of security whenever TC was in town. That scared me, coming from a small town where people don’t lock cars or doors. But it was unwarranted as nothing ever happened. It was just me going to a big city.
Ironically I ended up in politics, thinking it was policy. I learned a great deal about issues, people and power. The power of the President is penultimate, the opportunity to intimidate visitors is vast yet it seems that certain leaders resorted to the most crass form of insult. LBJ calling in staffers to his bathroom and berating them when he was on the toilet. Nixon trying to put a reporter off guard by asking about his bedroom or whether his shoes are OK for real men.
Not that the reporter seemed to have any better qualities. No, I’m not a movie reporter. I was a kid here during the Vietnam War, Watergate and don’t know much about either except for Walter Cronkite. I remember he tolled the dead every day. We watched his news every evening and believed him, as I don’t believe reporters today. I need at least three sources of print/cable/internet news to even think that anything is true. When Mr. Cronkite said it, it was fact.
Give a try to Frost/Nixon but don’t sit in the third row.
Ten years from now, there will be an expose movie about President Clinton. Just like Watergate, it may focus on one thing. Let’s hope it doesn’t. Nixon had China.
Posted in Editorial
I still have leftover baked chicken breasts and two boiled corn cobs, carrots and chicken broth et al so thought I might use my new French onion soup bowls to make chicken pot pie. I love it with puff pastry on top so picked some up frozen this morning. No, I don’t make puff pastry. My hands melt the butter and I don’t have the patience for six turns and all that rolling.
Yesterday I wanted something different so bought a small commercial ham and coated it with grainy mustard and honey before baking it for an hour. Today, I thought, why not make a quiche with ham, and try to fudge the puff pastry into being a crust?
I rolled out a sheet of pastry, cut it 1″ larger than the base of the very expensive 9″ tart pan that was recently purchased, and laid in the pastry. I cut a sheet of parchment into a round and lined it with “pie weight beans.” Baked for five minutes and the sides receded precipitously. Removed the parchment and beans, docked it, and baked five minutes more and it came out flat as a pancake.
While cooling, the base became flatter but in some places I had less than 1/2 inch for filling, and had spent the baking time making the filling.
So Jim went to the store and bought two frozen pie crusts. Don’t you just love him? I blind-baked one and filled it with leftover ham and Emmenthaler cheese, a few chopped chives, sprinking of Parmigiano Reggiano and my own custard and baked. It was tasty. Leftovers will be even tastier for breakfast. I served it with an endive salad with sherry vinaigrette, which I enjoyed as it provided a counterpoint to the richness of the quiche. Jim didn’t think so. I’d intended the endive for a salad with beets and roasted pecans, where the sweetness of the beets and crunchiness of the pecans would have mitigated the spiciness of the endive. The pastry debacle precluded the time needed for the roasting, cooling and peeling of beets.
For a guy that only knew iceberg lettuce and learned to love Caesar salad, endive is a long and torturous journey. Jim doesn’t like my homemade vinaigrettes and prefers bottled Ranch or Thousand Island dressing. Yes, I have my work cut out for me but years to do it. As for today, I learned lessons about pastry and endive, and us. Thanks, Jim!
Tomorrow I have to learn how to use the new video software. Jim wants me to do short cooking videos, which means my upper kitchen counter can no longer be a repository for mail, receipts et al… That’s the challenge. Keep cooking! Dee
Posted in Editorial, Education, Recipe Ideas
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