Author: simchajfisher

Happy Friday! Despite some dog drama, this week has gone so much better than last week; hope you are same.

We have a shiny new well pump, and it was even sightly less money than they warned us it would be, and the guys were all very cheerful and understanding about . . . everything. The basement being damp and disgusting, the yard being so overgrown, the ducks being terrible, the dog being their new velcro accessory. As I apologized one last time, I said, “Just tell me this isn’t the worst house you’ve been to” and the guy said, “Ohhhhhh, no.” And that was the greatest gift of all.

There was some contamination, so they had to dump a bunch of chlorine in there, so we were on store-bought water until a few days ago. We’re so spoiled: Our normal tap water is so good, so icy cold and sparkling pure, and it’s great to have it back again. For some reason, getting a bill for thousands of dollars for a well pump hurt so much less than an equally large bill for a car repair. Giant car repairs always fill me with so much dread and shame, whereas the well thing was so obviously just a “shit happens when you own a house” situation. Anyway, we have water. Water! Cheers!

Here’s what we ate this week: 

SATURDAY
Chicken fries, veg and hummus

Just a regular Saturday. We were hoping to go to the county fair, but there were thunderstorms all weekend, and then I thought maybe we could go to Canobie Lake Park instead, but there was bad weather predicted for Salem, as well. I was irrationally despondent over this, and then Damien suggested this year we could try The Big E, which is an All New England state fair, and it’s not until September. There are hardly ever thunderstorms in September! We went there once was our oldest was a baby, and all I remember was the slide where you sit on a burlap sack, and a giant butter sculpture. That’s good enough for me. 

Anyway, we had chicken fingers for dinner, which I’ve never had before. 

They’re kind of embarrassing somehow, like a plastic lobster bib, or having your food blended up in a cup so you don’t have to chew. But they were tasty.

And I managed to avoid serving chips, which is a full-time job some weeks. 

Speaking of which, note the very tired dog in the background. He, too, has a full time job, but we haven’t figured out what it is, yet. But it’s exhausting. He’s so tired! And his week was about to get more exciting. 

SUNDAY
Steak and cheese subs, chips; homemade ice cream

Not really steak, but beef, anyway. I think it was a chuck roast or something, and I sharpened up my knife and cut it as thinly as I could (it was partially frozen, which helped), and then put tons of salt, pepper, garlic powder, and Worcestershire sauce on it. 

First I pan fried up a ton of onions in oil, and then I pan fried up the beef. I toasted a bunch of rolls, and then I spread mine with a little mayo, piled on the beef and onions, and topped it with shards of cheddar cheese, and put it back in the oven for a few minutes.

Pretty frickin good. Pretty, pretty, fricken, fricken good. We were supposed to have fries with this meal, but I forgot to make them. Luckily, we still had chips left over from July 4th, which might cause you to believe that I bought too many chips for July 4th. But such thoughts are fruitless and should be abandoned. 

We did have ice cream! I haven’t made ice cream all summer, and part of the reason is that the last few times I made it, it never froze properly. It was still soupy when it came out of the ice cream machine, and then when I put it into the freezer, it froze solid like a liquid, rather than creamily, if you see what I mean. 

So I tried two things: I froze the bowls for two days, rather than just 24 hours; and I churned in inside a cooler with an ice pack. My kitchen really is pretty hot!

I made two batches, one strawberry and one almond coconut. They both use the basic sweet cream base (eggs, sugar, cream, and milk), and then I added macerated strawberries to one, and almond extract, toasted almonds, and shredded coconut to the other. 

Here is the strawberry ice cream recipe:

which starts with the sweet cream base, and you can just skip the strawberry part and add in other stuff after churning it. (My original plan had been to make chocolate chip, but Somebody Ate The Chocolate Chips, if you can believe it. Even Though I Told Them!) 

The almond coconut one turned out great. It was the tiniest bit soft, but that’s because it needed a few more hours in the freezer. Would have been perfect otherwise. 

The strawberry one was a little uneven in texture, but that’s because . . . . sigh . . . . the fresh strawberries got frozen in the fridge, so I wasn’t able to mash them thoroughly. Our refrigerator has random extra-cold spots, and you never know what’s going to go on in there.

I do think using the cooler made a big difference overall, so I’ll be doing that going forward, even in the winter if there are other appliances warming the room up. One of the things on my wish list this summer is to make szechuan peppercorn ice cream, which absolutely nobody but me wants, and now I think I’ll be able to do it!

MONDAY
Vermonter sandwiches, french fries

High time for a fine sandwich. Sourdough bread or ciabatta, roast chicken or turkey, tart green apple slices, crisp bacon, and thickly-sliced sharp cheddar cheese, with honey mustard dressing. 

Oh, it’s a wonderful sandwich.

I bought a bottle of hot honey from Aldi and made some dressing with that. I was surprised at how spicy it was! It’s also a little bit thinner than regular honey, so the dressing turned out a little drippy. Nice flavor, though. 

We had steak fries to go with the sandwiches. Extremely popular meal. 

TUESDAY
Blueberry chicken salad; mango tart

I don’t usually like serving chicken twice in a row, but something forced my hand, I forget what. Oh, I was planning chili verde, but forgot to buy tomatillos!

So I seasoned the chicken breasts with salt, pepper, and garlic powder, and roasted them, and then served sliced chicken on mixed greens with crumbled feta cheese, blueberries, minced red onion, and toasted walnuts. 

I had red wine vinegar on mine for dressing. I also served crackers. I’ve really been getting into crackers lately. 

For some reason I felt like a salad wasn’t going to be a big enough meal (even with all the nuts and cheese and chicken), and I had four giant mangos rapidly heading toward overripeness, so I decided we needed a mango tart, as well. We don’t usually have dessert during the week, but it’s SUMMER. I can do what I want!

Here is the recipe I used, because I had all the ingredients in the house. I like the way the recipe is written. You can tell she’s actually made it, and she explains why she does certain things, and what will happen if you don’t, which is helpful for me, who tends to think everything is stupid and I can just do it my own way. 

So I made a crust out of animal crackers (I just filled up the food processor with cookies and made it into fine crumbs, then poured in about half a stick of melted butter and whirred that it, and then pressed the mixture into a pie plate. I didn’t think it needed sugar, and I was right)

The recipe called for room temperature egg yolks, and I remembered the trick of quickly warming up eggs by putting them in very warm water for a few minutes. 

A lot of baking recipes don’t truly need room temperature ingredients, but since this was going to be a custardy kind of thing, I figured it would be important. 

This recipe calls for unflavored gelatin, and that should have been my warning sign. There really are very few recipes that used unflavored gelatin where taste is the foremost concern! But I figured, FOUR RIPE MANGOES. This is a can’t-lose situation. So I poured the mixture into the baked crust and then baked the tart. So far, so good. Lovely color. 

Benny collected strawberries, blackberries, and pansy blossoms (which are edible). Then I refrigerated the tart for several hours, and decorated the top.

It held up great when I sliced it. And it tasted like SWEET LIBRARY PASTE. Really, if I hadn’t cut up the mangoes myself, I might not even realize it was a mango dessert. What a disappointment! I don’t think I made any mistakes; I think it’s just not a great recipe. I want to make another mango tart that really lets the mango shine, if anyone has suggestions. Probably something with cream, or condensed milk. Oh well. It was a very pretty pie. 

WEDNESDAY
Pizza

Wednesday we had a little adventure. I had gotten tons and tons of chores and errands out of the way, and suddenly realized we had a free afternoon, so it was a fine time to check out the new dog park! Sonny has ducks and a cat to play with at home, but he very rarely gets to meet other dogs, so we were pretty excited.

Even those of us who had nooooo idea what was going on. 

So we got there and it was great! A huge area, all fenced in, tons of shade, a digging spot, a few spigots and metal bowls so the dogs could drink, plenty of benches, and balls and toys and sticks scattered around.

Dog paradise. Sonny romped and galumphed and sniffed so many butts, and had a lovely time. After about forty minutes, we were thinking about heading home, and then one more dog showed up, and at first everyone got along, and then next thing you know,

[EVERYBODY IS OKAY, SONNY IS OKAY]

there was snarling and screaming and a giant pile of dogs, and woman is shrieking at me, “GET YOUR F*CKING DOG OUT OF HERE.” And I look and the new dog has clamped his jaws onto Sonny’s neck!! and a man is crouching over them trying to pry them apart!! All I can think of to do is pull on Sonny, but I know that will make it worse, so I just stood there with my eyes bugging out, and the woman keeps screaming at me, thinking the aggressive dog is mine, and it keeps snarling like a horrible machine, and Sonny keeps crying like a baby. It was TERRIBLE. The dude finally gets the bad dog off Sonny, and then the people start fighting, because in the melee, the bad dog has bitten the man, as well, and the owners are repeatedly claiming that their dog is “not aggressive.” 

Yes, it was a pit bull. What an amazing coincidence. Never heard of such a thing.

So someone calls the police, and the screaming woman apologizes for the misunderstanding and helps me take pictures of Sonny’s injuries (one big bite on his neck and one on his ear), and the bad dog’s owners agree to pay for any vet or human bills, and then that was a whole other ordeal because the officer and the bitten man had some kind of conflict, and the officer starts loudly explaining to me that dogs are OMINOUS. I get that this is some kind of legal term, but it did not have the effect he was hoping it would have, especially with the stupid reflective sunglasses. So I gave the kids my debit card and told them to go see if they could find an ice cream truck while we sorted it out. 

Sonny is . . . completely fine. His basic attitude was, “Whoa, I heard there was some kind of fight! Did you guys see anything? I didn’t see anything! Gosh!”

But of course we brought him to the vet, and he got some antibiotics and they said it would be better not to have stitches, so it can heal more cleanly. and he’s been getting dog ice cream and lots of leftover chicken, and leftover steak, and pepperoni, and endless snuggles and praise. He still has no idea what happened. He’s like, First . . . I went to the playground, and I played with my friends! And then something happened, and then I turned into the best dog in the world! Everybody says so! Ohh, I gotta get back to that playground.

He is actually on TWO antibiotics, a cream and two pills, because he’s too big for just one. Here he is, brave soldier, freshly home from the vet, clearly very chastened by his experience:

I had always heard that boxers had been bred to have all those loose skin folds so that, if they get attacked, the aggressor will just chomp through their skin and not damage their organs, and now I believe it. He doesn’t have cropped ears, but if he had, that probably would have saved him an ear bite, too. He’s so goofy looking, but it’s a good design. 

Anyway, when we got home from the park, I made some pizzas. Nothing fancy, just one pepperoni, one olive, and one plain. 

And then we watched the 1999 cinematic masterpiece The Mummy with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz. Corrie’s first time. The “I . . . am a librarian” line got her good. 

THURSDAY
Chili verde and rice

Something I haven’t made for a while. I usually just get the bag of assorted hot peppers from the supermarket, rather than picking out individual peppers, and this works fine for me, because I have some kind of pepper blindness and never, ever come home with the peppers I tried to buy. So, might as well let Hannford pick them out for me. 

So you roast them, plus a few quartered onions, plus a bunch of tomatillos, under high heat, turning them once, so they are slightly blistered

then throw them in the food processor along with a head of garlic and a bunch of cilantro

Then you hack up some pork, heavily salt and pepper it, and brown it in oil in batches. 

and then you put it all together in the pot, adding some beer or broth if you like it thinner. Cover it and let it simmer for several hours. 

When it’s done, you can leave the meat in chunks

or you can mash it with a fork or potato masher until it’s shreddy

I had mine over white rice with cilantro, sour cream, and fresh lime juice on top. 

Scrumptious. Quite spicy, but perfect when I stirred in the sour cream. 

This meal is too spicy for most of the kids, and I think they just eat rice with limes. As you can see, I ate mine in bed, so I did not care. 

FRIDAY
Spaghetti

The kids have been asking for NORMAL SPAGHETTI with SAUCE FROM JARS, and they can have it! Damien and I haven’t been on a date in a very long time, so we are going to the movies (The Godfather on the big screen!) and then checking into a bed and breakfast with a gift card, and they can do what they want.

Oh, and the pit bull owner did pay the vet bill, and their dog was up to date on his shots. Apparently it was the first time at the dog park, too. Nothing like a vet bill and a call from animal control to get you a little more grounded about what kind of dog you have! Things could have gone so much worse. The good samaritan’s finger is okay, and I’m sending them a gift card, and Sonny is continuing to live his best life. Right after a nap. 

Oh, I forgot one last thing: The kids made frozen chocolate bananas. In case you’re looking for a quick little snack project. They melted chocolate chips in the microwave and stirred it a little vegetable oil, drizzled it over the peeled bananas, and sprinkled them with rainbow sprinkles and misc.,

and then put them in the freezer for a few hours.

Beautiful they were not, but the kids said they were good.

Okay, phew! That’s the week. Smell ya later. 

Print

Spicy Chili Verde

You can decrease the heat by seeding the peppers, using fewer habañeros, or substituting some milder pepper. It does get less spicy as it cooks, so don't be alarmed if you make the salsa and it's overwhelming!

Ingredients

• 5 lbs pork shoulder
• salt and pepper
• oil for cooking
• 2 cups chicken broth or beer (optional)

For the salsa verde:

• 4 Anaheim peppers
• 2 habañero peppers
• 4 jalapeño peppers
• 4 medium onions
• 12 tomatillos
• 1 head garlic, cloves peeled
• 1 bunch cilantro

For serving:

• lime wedges
• sour cream
• additional cilantro for topping

Instructions

1. Preheat the broiler.

2. Pull the husks and stems off the tomatillos and rinse them. Cut the ends off all the peppers. Grease a large pan and put the tomatillos, peppers, and onions on it. Broil five minutes, turn, and broil five minutes more, until they are slightly charred.

   

3. When they are cool enough to handle, you can at this point remove the seeds from the peppers to decrease the spiciness, if you want.

   

4. Put the tomatillos, peppers, and onions in a food processor or blender with the garlic and cilantro. Purée.

5. In a heavy pot, heat some oil. Salt and pepper the pork chunks and brown them in the oil. You will need to do it in batches so the pork has enough room and browns, rather than simmering.

   

6. When all the meat is browned, return it all to the pot and add the puréed ingredients.

7. Simmer at a low heat for at least three hours until the meat is tender. If you want thinner chili verde, stir in the chicken broth or beer. If you don't want the pork in large chunks, press the meat with the back of a spoon to make it collapse into shreds.

   

8. Spoon the chili verde into bowls, squeeze some lime juice over the top, and top with sour cream and fresh cilantro.

Happy Friday! We are being unusually sociable this morning, and after making arrangements for Benny to have a little pool party, I took Lucy and Irene to their friend’s house. It’s only 25 minutes away, but very rural, and last time I went there, it was dark and foggy. But I COULD NOT FIND MY PHONE, which I depend on utterly to help me get around.

So, intrepidly, I went to Mapquest and printed out instructions just like in the olde days. And just like in the olde days, we couldn’t find any papere, so had to print over paper that already had something on it, and it ran out of inke before it was done, so we had to write the last few turns in with pen.

But, INTREPID, we started out, and after twenty minutes were pretty thoroughly lost. I shifted fairly seamlessly from my standard “really all it takes to get through life is a little confidence” monologue to my “you know, all my life I thought I was dumb because I got lost all the time, but now I know that everybody’s dumb about something, and it’s okay if you aren’t good at anything” monologue, and then modulated to a slightly desperate commentary on “It sure is pretty out here.” But we got there eventually, and I told the kids to go in and give me the high sign so I know it’s the right house. 

They never did, so I left.

I was — it’s hot. I’m not at my best. And no matter what I say to my teen daughters, I am pretty sure I’m stupid. 

Then I got even more lost on the way home, like, really, really lost. And then I found some roads that looked right, but I wasn’t sure which way I was supposed to be going on them. But eventually I went past a ski lodge that I had a very strong memory of being on the right hand side when I went there to pick up a kid with a sprained wrist, and, long story short, that sure was a big loop I made. But I did get home. And then I found my phone.

If anyone asks, this is a story about how Mapquest is subpar.

Here’s what we ate this week!

SATURDAY
Italian sandwiches

Geting ready for the big family independence day party, so I figured just simple sandwiches. Forgot to get sliced meat at Aldi, so I stopped at the deli counter at the second supermarket, and there was an ollllllld man with his olllllllld wife in a Rascal Scooter there, and he kept saying things like, “How’s about a taste of that uhhhhhh say that buffalo chicken?” and the deli guy would fetch the buffalo chicken and put it on the slicer and turn it on and cut a slice and fold it in half and put it on a little plastic square and hand it to the old man, and he would examine it and hand it to his wife, who would carefully unwrap it and, with great dignity, take a small bite, and she would say shakily, “That’s pretty good, but you know Stan I was wondering about the sodium” and the old man would say, “Ohhh, yahhhh, that’s something, the sodium. What about uhhhhh that Krakus ham?”

So I says to myself, I says, I will come back later.

Then I forgot. So I sent Damien out, and he got some meat, and we had sandwiches, and all I can say is, I hope I never turn into one of those ollllllld couples that goes on and on telling pointless stories about —

Hey, have you noticed, this website is free? 

SUNDAY
Cookout!

Sunday was just plain great. Lots of family and friends came, and we had lots of food, and my brother Izzy brought lots of sparklers and fireworks. Kids swam in the pool and splashed in the stream and played in the sandbox and on the swingset and trampoline, everyone had plenty to eat and drink, and it was just lovely. Glow sticks, glowing cups, temporary tattoos, torches and sticky kids. This is my favorite party. Bunch of photos here:

Oh, and we rented a COTTON CANDY MACHINE.

I cannot recommend this highly enough. There was a bit of a learning curve, but once we got it going, it was super easy, and it was delightful.

Much cheaper than I expected, too. Loud as heck, but it made a huge amount of cotton candy with each batch, and we ran it three times. It was a nice way to keep the party going, and just about everybody, of every age, wanted at least some. 

The rest of the menu was: Lots and lots of vegetables with dip and hummus

and several watermelons; wonderful savory baked beans from my sorta sister-in-law Elizabeth, guacamole from my brother Joe, and Damien cooked hot dogs, brats, hamburgers, and chicken thighs on the grill, and we had a mountain of chips, and for dessert, red and blue Jello cups with Kool Whip, and ice cream cups, and then just straight up bags of candy in the dark at the end. 

Ah, what a good party. Somebody found some of those weird black snakes, and we lit them all up at once while everyone chanted “SNAKE! SNAKE! SNAKE! SNAKE!” 

We always seem to have chanting at our parties. 

MONDAY
Cookout leftovers!

So many cookout leftovers. 

This would be a good time to talk about the Jello Hand. I had some leftover Jello after filling up all the cups that would fit in the fridge, so I filled up a glove and, because it had recently been the Fourth of July, called it The Invisible Hand of the Market, which, NO, picky-picky, that doesn’t make any sense. 

Some people might find it hard to figure out how to get a Jello hand such as this to stand up and keep its shape while it gels, but it happens that my almost entirely otherwise useless brain is really good at solving this kind of problem.

So then after the party, we had this Jello hand, and we didn’t know what to do with it, so Corrie ate it. 

and that’s-a my story. 

TUESDAY
Aldi pizza

Tuesday we still had more cookout leftovers in the fridge, but I couldn’t bring myself to serve them again, but I also couldn’t bring myself to cook anything. And that’s what Aldi pizza is for. 

WEDNESDAY
Chicken pesto pasta, bread

Wednesday I went to West Lebanon to have lunch with my friend Jenni, who I’ve been friends with for something like 24 years but have never met in person!

The internet was basically a mistake, except for the part where you make online friends that are absolutely real friends. (And also the part with the maps that tell you where to go.)

Got home and it was SO HOT. It’s been so hot and so humid all week. Not in the 100’s or anything, like some parts, but still pretty freaking hot, and it’s just exhausting, and everything makes you sweaty, and it’s hard to think or do anything. So I did the quickiest shortcut meal I could think of without heating up the kitchen too much, with ingredients on hand, which was: A few pounds of rotini, a bunch of butter, a bunch of shredded parmesan, and a few jars of pesto, and chunks of chicken breast I had cooked in the Instant Pot. 

A decent summer meal. I honestly don’t think it would have tasted better if I had gone through a whole hot ordeal making a cream sauce or whatever. 

THURSDAY
Korean pork ribs, rice, watermelon

An actual recipe! I got a giant rack of pork ribs for like $10, without a solid plan, but found this likely-looking recipe from Glebe Kitchen. Super simple. You just sprinkle the meat with salt, pepper, and garlic powder, and cook it in the oven for an hour or so, until it hits 180 degrees.

Toward the end of cooking, you make a quick gochujang sauce, with garlic and ginger, soy sauce, mirin, rice vinegar, sesame oil, gochujang, and brown sugar. It also calls for fish sauce, which I didn’t have. 

I wanted each rib to have plenty of sauce, so I cut the ribs up first (and that was a bit of a travesty. I think I need a meat cleaver), and then brushed them with sauce

then put it back in the oven for another ten minutes or so, finishing it with the broiler, until they got a little bit blackened in spots, and were sizzling

OH, so good. The sauce was thick and sticky, spicy and a little sweet, and the meat was tender and juicy. Probably could have left it in the oven for another five minutes to really let the glaze get a little thicker, but there were no complaints.

I had made a pot of rice in the Instant Pot and cut up the last remaining watermelon (yes, I bought too many watermelons for the party) and it was an excellent meal.

Briefly considered making Korean-inspired collard greens, because this meal is really callong for something green; but did I mention it’s HOT, and I’m not like other people, and when it’s hot, I don’t want to cook? It’s true. 

Definitely making these ribs again. I was afraid the sauce was going to be too spicy and maybe a little harsh, which is how it tasted when it was just sauce; but once it got cooked onto the meat, it mellowed and was perfect. MANY of us thought it was perfect. 

Many of us had to be cautioned to slow down so as not to accidentally devour our own little fingers, which are not made of Jello. 

FRIDAY
Honestly, probably pizza again

You’ll never guess: It’s hot out. Kids are swimming, dog is panting, cat is stretched out pathetically on the bathroom floor, barely even able to muster the strength to bite anybody’s ankles. Very sad. I think he needs some Aldi pizza. 

Speaking of the cat and dog, this week is the anniversary of the days we brought both these worthy animals home — the cat, a year ago, and the dog, four years ago. 

Look at them now!

They’re both such good boys, and such good friends. 

And you know what else, Damien’s going to pick the kids up from their fun time with friends who live in terra incognita. Because it’s hot.