The last time I bought ice cream, I bought enough to last us for a few weeks.
Or so I thought.
A week went by and, suddenly, we were down to a few measly mouthfuls of vanilla.
This ice cream is my answer to that crisis….
Archives for September 2014
Purple Plum and Cardamom Skillet Cake
The grocery store on our new side of town has an aisle for “new age” drinks.
I don’t know exactly what they mean by that (the same aisle also has soft drinks and other stuff), but I laugh a little every time I walk past the sign.
There is nothing new-agey about this cake. You might even call it old fashioned.
It’s pretty, but in a humble, wholesome sense — a single layer cake that mixes up quickly and that you can serve straight from the pan.
If your idea of a good cake is more along the lines of a triple layer, pink frosting and luster dust kind of confection (of if you’re into new age cakes, whatever they might be), this sort of cake might never catch your eye.
You probably don’t need me to tell you whose loss that would be.
…
Old Bay Okra
I know plenty of people don’t like okra.
I think it’s the texture that tends to turn people off. When cooked for a long time, okra turns mushy and oozes a mucous-like substance. It’s gooey in the worst possible way.
That’s why okra is used in gumbo, because it acts as a thickener.
But quickly-cooked okra is like another vegetable altogether. It’s not gooey in the slightest.
So if you think you don’t like okra, I would urge you to give it another try….
Settling in
So far, the only casualties of our move have been one shattered serving bowl and a crushed box of pastina, which left teeny, tiny star-shaped pasta all over my canned goods, like so much semolina confetti.
But it took me an entire week to locate the knives (why so long? I have no idea), so we haven’t been eating much in the way of home-cooked food lately. Instead, our meals have consisted of frozen burritos, big wedges of the key lime pie my mother dropped off one afternoon and lots and lots of tomato sandwiches.
Slowly but surely, the kitchen is coming together and I’m looking forward to cooking real meals again, in a space that isn’t full of half-empty cardboard boxes. I’ll be back with a recipe next week.
In the meantime, here’s a peek at a few corners of the Internet I’ve been enjoying lately. I hope you enjoy them too.
~ Who knew cucumber tendrils could be so fascinating?
~ China produces lots of apple juice, but the Chinese aren’t the ones drinking it.
~ Looking forward to this and this.
~ Did you know the Queen Anne’s Lace you see along the roadside can be used as a dried spice?
~ Gems from the New Yorker to read now — while they’re still free. To which I would add Katherine Boo’s look at marriage as a cure for poverty.
~ And lastly, eating “white dirt” in Georgia.