Apologies for My Absence – & – Better Days Awaite

I am sorry to have missed so many posts from all you lovely folks who read my silly blog. As always, I thank you for so many kind comments. My attention has been focused on a tragic misfortune.

The friend I’ve mentioned several times, Scars, finally convinced his lovely lady (S) to move up from her tiny Texas town. She adored taking care of him and his ailing father. Unfortunately, less than a year later S succumbed to her long suffered epilepsy, and stayed in a coma for over a week. Even after being removed from life support her body continued fighting.

Now she is at rest, though, about an hour after Scars held the phone so S could hear the voice of one final person. His lady had taken care of an ailing matron back home and we believe this gave the ultimate closure necessary.

On the bright side, S’s ordeal healed several estranged relationships. It’s too bad her siblings and adult children didn’t show S adequate respect or affection during her lifetime.

This is the first time carrots worked for us
& we look forward to eating cabbage...

 

Corn designed for container growing...
~fingers crossed~

Pointy leaves give away the cucumber...

Can you believe I managed to confuse my pepper breeds before transplanting? Do you know that young cucumber and pumpkin plants look almost identical? ~rolls eyes~ Four cucumber plants will keep us very busy pickling this summer.-

My First Harvest of the Growing Season

Okay, I suppose a single item doesn’t really constitute a harvest. But this little sugar snap pea tasted delicious. Fingers crossed, I’ll be gathering many more in future.

I find these little blooms pretty but the
intricate transformation engulfing
the one below astonished me.

Can you believe I split that tiny nibble with my husband? Do you enjoy eating any pea variety?

-

My Little Helper

Starting seeds in our basement has been both relaxing and successful. We already had a warming mat to help them propagate as well as other equipment to aid seedlings. The one thing I do not have is a proper potting bench, and my video proves the point.

Do you think I should offer some of my extra little vegetable plants to friends and neighbors? Would you accept such an offer?

-

Another Look at the Bright Side

It’s a sorry fact that my husband has little interest in exercise of any sort. On the bright side, this and his love of food make negotiating easy. For example, he recently agreed to meet family an hour and a half away because it meant tasty German food.

On the flip side, his cute big eyes and adorable whiny mantra almost swayed me to drive him to our car’s oil change appointment. He offered lunch. Much less food orientated, I asked him to sweeten the deal. He asked what I wanted.

I requested a walk. We didn’t even set a place or precise date. Yet suddenly, now he’d resolved to drive himself. So I stayed home and cooked a big pot of stew.

Not an image of mine, but this recipe looks amazing...

Is there anything better than warm soup on cold days? Do you have a favorite comfort food?

-

Every Rose Has its Thorn

I went to the grocery store the other day to snag some relatively inexpensive half gallons of milk. The limit of five has restocked my freezer. That and some fresh produce were my main goals but I couldn’t resist the plethora of flower bouquets marked down following St. Valentine’s Day.

My husband approved my purchase since my birthday was a few days earlier and I asked for nothing special...

They aren’t as fragrant as those I recall from the 1980’s. In addition, a lot of petals landed on the floor while the thorny, dry woody stems made trimming them a chore. While roses are much cheaper now, I’d be angry if my full price bouquet rotted in under a week.

Do you purchase cut flowers? If so, did you know that a slanted knife cut allows the stems better water absorption than a scissor's pinch?
-

Bargain Buys, an Unexpected Neat Find, and the Golden Tooth

I popped into my local grocery chain store to pick up medications from the pharmacy and some food items. Upon entering, I discovered the unbelievable and repeating deal of buy one get two free (!) sleeves of soda. I gave up the stuff for the most part but the occasional can of ginger ale or Doctor Pepper are enjoyable.

Since my journey started at the pharmacy, however, I passed by the clearance shelves. And wow, did I score big. It’s a shame that many party planners passed up overpriced snack items. And I sometimes think many folks don’t realize these shelves exist along the back wall.

I do not care at all about American football
but this seasonal find is awesome.

My neatest find came about due to the fact I was trying to find a cheaper carton of eggs than what we usually purchase. These wheat free wraps are like pillow-soft flour tortillas. I ate two today, wrapping one around bacon and cheese and the other with cold fried chicken and lettuce.

I found these on sale, too;
otherwise, I may have to pass on them.

 

 

As for the golden tooth, it isn’t but should be. My husband’s twenty-one year old root canal failed and has an underlying infection. I figured he would just have it pulled at his advancing age. But I understand it’s about quality of life. Still, the cost of another root canal is around three thousand US dollars. And that’s after the other thousand dollar dental surgery he had on another tooth.

The front of this same grocer had shelves stocked with tasty pistachios at a way higher price...

To be petty and complain from within my happy household, I despair of ever traveling again. And I miss visiting North Carolina’s Outer Banks, a modest trip, really.

Do you make a point of checking clearance items, wherever you shop? And do you find yourself overlooking products new to you while shopping for staples?

A Very Productive Day and a Surprise Family Reunion

The first point is a long overdue post. On January 28th my husband needed a computer part replaced. Knowing this installation might take a few hours we wanted some diversion. I found the perfect place, Jungle Jim’s international market. He appreciated my idea; the man adores different foods.

Not only did driving surface roads prove easy but I discovered a branch of our new Internet service provider therein. My guy’s honorary military discharge grants some small discounts. This latest requiring in-person verification, we expected another road trip until that day.

We also replenished favorite foods. The shrimp chips were too pricey, as were many items. Various dried noodles are a different story. Despite the recommended shelf life, most types don’t spoil for a long while.

We also stocked up on pickled herring. It’s in the German section.

On that note, my brother and I planned a meeting with our spouses at a German style sausage house in Columbus, Ohio last Sunday. The distance is almost perfectly halfway between our residences.

What stores do you frequent? Does your grocer offer international products?

-

Yum

I regret being absent of late and hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season. My brain seems not to have caught up with how much my husband’s health and mobility have improved. Some days I have trouble getting out of bed when my heart and mind should be rejoicing. Please do not feel bad for me, though, as I will get there.

That said, he keeps me entertained with Youtube videos, including one by a darling food blogger named Emmy. I don’t use social media beyond blogging and thus am grateful she covered a recipe for tuna salad shared by actor Mathew McConaughey. As my title proclaims, it’s fantastic (!) to someone who’s not even a huge fan of canned tuna.

The balance of heat, mild sweetness, and crunch proved astounding. I generally dislike raw onion yet didn’t omit it. And, wow, the small amount didn’t upset my stomach one bit. Also, I didn’t try any until it sat overnight; that might have helped mellow the small bits of onion.

In case you’re unaware as I was, the recipe is below. Please let me know if you try it and your resulting opinion.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup mayonnaise, plus more as desire

2 teaspoons white wine vinegar

1 tablespoon lemon juice

2 teaspoons wasabi paste

2 teaspoons Italian dressing

3 tablespoons finely chopped red onion

3 tablespoons finely chopped dill pickles

1/3 cup crispy jalapeño chips (my guy found these on Amazon)

1/4 cup chopped apple

1/2 cup fresh corn kernels (I cooked them along with the peas for two minutes in the microwave and let them cool)

1/2 cup frozen peas

10 ounces quality tuna packed in olive oil, drained (my Albacore tuna came packed in water so I added a drizzle of olive oil)

Directions:

Stir mayonnaise together with vinegar, lemon juice, wasabi, and Italian dressing in a medium bowl until combined.

Add in onion, pickles, jalapeño chips, apple, corn, and peas, and stir.

Fold in the tuna until well combined. Add more mayonnaise if desired.

Serve immediately or refrigerate until ready to serve.

Do you enjoy any canned fish? And isn’t amazing how some foods, like many soups and stews, improve with a day or two refrigerated?

-

Progress – & – Projects

All the kind words left on my almost abandoned blog are much appreciated. My annoying upper respiratory infection is fading every day to the point my husband and I went grocery shopping together. I consider this not only progress in my health but also attitude.

The fact our lives turned around so fast has left my emotional responses behind. We all know many caregivers never see conditions improve and I have unending respect for their forbearance. Thus I also feel shame over some lingering depression.

But his regained interest in food, and thus my cooking and baking adventures, has provided a huge boost. Roasting my homegrown pumpkins, their seeds, and trying my hand at smoking meats and baking various breads, pies, making apple butter, and even turning apple scraps into apple cider vinegar are rewarding busywork. We are even considering a little distillery kit to make my vinegar less watery.

Did you know there is such a thing as Mother of vinegar, and that it’s a symbiotic relationship between beneficial yeast and bacteria? Are you a fan of vinegar in general or specifically?

-

Pumpkins – & – Lucy the Octopus

As our growing season winds down I’m happy to have harvested four Jarrahdale pumpkins. They are more gray than blue but much like those seen at a garden center last autumn. These last three will be indoor décor until winter, when I’ll process them for foodstuffs.

I would be devastated if some prankster smashed these...

 

I’ll make an effort to display them through a front window. Meanwhile, I hope to try growing more colors as shown below. The one problem is having enough space for their vines. My husband joked about buying a patch of farmland and I am starting to think we should look into it.

I could buy 3 packs of seeds for the cost of 1 of these...

Before processing my first one, Terra had to investigate. In other words, she decided to provide an adorable photo bomb.

“I’m all you need for fall decoration, Mom.”

Last but not least, here is a video my husband discovered. If you think octopuses are creepy, feel free to skip. They sure are smart. It’s a true shame most species only live two years.

Does your area provide community garden spaces? Should I see if any neighbors would be willing to invest in some land?

-

Garden Duty

As the title suggests, gardening has kept me busy, both outdoors and in the kitchen. Starting vegetables from seed has proven a huge success and provided the joyous challenge of preservation. It’s also a pleasure sharing with those who often reciprocate in their own way.

(More on neighborlyness later)

My pumpkin plants are doing well. However, it didn’t occur to me that last year’s squash bug infestation would emerge from the same plot for a similar feast. ~shakes head~ The following video shows one silly misadventure.

The yield continues being awesome. There are more tomatoes, peppers, and pumpkins coming to fruit.

I am happy these innards are not stringy...

... as seeds were easily separated for roasting.

I harvested my second blue pumpkin today. It’s being left to cure/dry in our cool cellar.

 

Did you know pumpkins are really difficult to hand process for foodstuff? Do you think I should save all the next for display?

Seriously Silly & Silly Seriousness

When I shared finding a huge bargain on cut flowers, a kind comment from Andrew reminded me my lack of clarity. Each bunch consisted of a single coloration, so my tricolor bouquet would have cost $24 (USD) while I paid one eighth (!) that price. And in addition, Jungle Jim’s market had a sale on white button mushrooms. One of the tasty fungi made me giggle before I sliced, diced, and fried them up.

Putting the butt in button... ~shakes head~ Sorry

Did you know that the common white mushroom I photographed is an immature version of the more expensive crimini and portabello varieties? By the way, dear Mariette, please correct me if I’m wrong. If you are a mushroom culinary aficionado, do you prefer milder or more earthy flavors?

-

Bargain Finds – Flowers and Fungi

I know not everyone enjoys the taste/texture of mushrooms. My husband and I adore all varieties. Shiitakes are a favorite for cooking but tend to be expensive.

Growing in My Yard; I Dare Not Taste It

To our joy, we found shiitakes sold for a reasonable price at the international Jungle Jim’s market in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. Dried versions in a distant aisle were even less expensive by weight. However, we were happy with our fresh, more familiar find in the produce section.

While he ordered lunch at the indoor sandwich shop I went to wash my hands and found a ridiculous markdown on cut flowers. Originally priced at $7.99 (US), these bunches were being offered at 99 cents each. Petals fell off as I trimmed stems and put the flowers in a vase but they remain festive.

They had been painted, of course...

Do you think any average person nowadays could justify spending eight dollars for something so ephemeral? And are your local stores having huge sales on items they can’t sell otherwise?

-

Update on the Vegetable Garden

Having grown so many viable vegetable plants from seed, I am so much more invested than in previous years that I stroll around several times daily. Most discoveries make me happy. Now I’m facing a serious issue.

While my container grown tomatoes are thus far unharmed, the corner patch became infested by tomato hornworms. I spent a good while Wednesday morning pulling off and discarding these repulsive caterpillars. Fat and alien in appearance, they cling to the foliage for all they are worth. And their frightening camouflage would have allowed them to decimate every plant if not for their distinctive droppings.

I’m so glad I can recognize this berry-like poop…

On a bright note, an adult moth became trapped in my pumpkin netting (revenge is sweet). Being smaller than its offspring makes the winged bug no less ugly. Unlike most moths’ elegant tapered thorax, those of Manduca quinquemaculata appear revoltingly bloated up to the sharp pointed end.

It did not have a happy ending...

That evening I used the netting for my pumpkins to cover the neighboring tomato plants, as well. And I’m leaving another bit of netting looped over the trellised EarthBox plantings as an extra precaution.

Much to my dismay I saw more droppings early the next day and had to remove another stomach-churning monster. So I bought a spray bottle of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) Thursday afternoon.

We once purchased a concentrated form, which I looked for at the store to no avail, but it’s for the best. These natural and effective living bacterium do not have a long shelf life. In fact, we still had the concentrate which is doubtless inert after perhaps an entire decade (!), and I’m a bit annoyed that the label didn’t include a production date. My belated research following the same day application also irked me. This ready-to-use product’s label neglected to inform me that sunlight degrades the product.

I should have waited until evening. But I did not use the entire bottle yesterday and emptied it this morning after killing a small caterpillar. Anyway, this article provided other fascinating information. Humans first discovered Bt’s benefits in the early 1900’s and some field crops have been modified to include the gene responsible for the bacterium’s all important crystal protein.

Did you know that modern Bt strains have also become an essential weapon in the battle against West Nile Virus? And since profit drives more research than human welfare, do you think genetically modified foods pose a health risk?

-

The Pumpkin Patch

I have become a very attentive gardener protecting my pumpkin plants with overnight netting. It’s a joy watching fruit set and grow.

Look at these little beauties...

And every day I learn more techniques and benefits of growing this dusky blue heirloom Jarrahdale variety, so named after the Western Australian city known for its original cultivation. I hope no insect pests steal my harvest.

I cannot believe the rapid growth...

Would you ever be interested in having infinite garden space? If so, what all would you grow?

-

Anticipation

My husband and I hope my successful seed starting early this spring pays off. Almost all the tomatoes and peppers look promising.

I remain most excited about my Jarrahdale pumpkins. This blue variety is said to have tasty roasted flesh/seeds besides being decorative.

They did receive damage early on which I now believe almost certainly to have been done by grazing white-tailed deer. Since that discovery I go out in the early evening and cover them with netting which gets removed early the next day (well, as early as I’m willing to tumble out of bed).

Do these stems appear bitten off to you?

On the subject of tumbling, adorable pollinators tumble over one another within each pumpkin blossom (!) and often overnight within the netting. My latest video is below.

I have my fingers crossed that the bitten off stems don’t introduce disease or that insects attack. The season is yet young. Wish me luck.

Aren’t these little bees adorable? Don’t you hope and pray that pollinators facing extinction is vastly exaggerated?

-

Another Duh Moment

I’m having fun with a plant identification app on my phone. It’s called PlantNet and seems to be extremely accurate. Just this morning I decided to take an image of one of my shade tree’s fruits and realized a very silly mistake. It’s not a buckeye tree at all but a common horse chestnut. ~shakes head~ Somehow my memory got twisted around over the decades.

To my surprise, PlantNet also identified this
as the peculiar squirting cucumber...

Then again, I feel somewhat vindicated after stumbling upon this article. Horse chestnut and buckeye trees resemble one another as they’re in the same genus. And there is so much more I’m learning!

Fun facts:

My tree is the red variety, meaning it has rosy flowers versus white. A woman who saw it in the spring of 2023 not only pulled over to inquire about it, she brought her mother over this past April.

And it’s a hybrid between the red buckeye (!) and white chestnut.

The English call the nuts ‘conkers’. And I understand why after being pelted during that very windy day. lol Thank heaven they’re small and quite soft.

A tasty fall treat for deer, the seeds are toxic to most mammals, including horses. Thanks to this article from the UK I learned two things about the name.

One, a fallen leaf creates a horseshoe shaped scar on the twig, complete with what look like nail holes. I’ll have to look for this come autumn.

And before modern veterinary medicine, crushing conkers released a medicinal compound that, while toxic to smaller animals, helped relieve horses suffering a cough.

Last but not least, harvested seeds are supposedly easy to cultivate over winter. I may have to try this if only for fun.

The entire tree gets covered by these...

Weren’t so-called primitive peoples incredibly inventive? Do you think a horse chestnut sapling would make a nice gift?

-

Some Like it Hot, Some Not

After posting my image of Tabasco bottles I realized further back story might be fun, at least for me. ~grin~ And this story goes way back to 1989 when my husband and I met. On an early date he introduced me to Buffalo style chicken wings, beginning my ongoing appreciation of spicy foods.

I could not begin to name all the hot sauces we’ve tasted over the years or even the varieties currently in our refrigerator. Tabasco and Frank’s are two mainstream brands we always stock. Believe me, both the tiny bottles and large will get used. In fact, I carry a miniature with me at all times, a handy way to spice up food on the go. Flaming hot is best avoided otherwise, such as with this sad sight.

 While sorry for the homeowner(s) and wishing no residents were physically harmed, I find beauty in the charred remains. Then again, perhaps the structure was unsafe and firefighters practiced with a controlled burn. One can only hope.

Another fire related memory regards my last employment. Volatile chemicals sometimes flared up, so all the plant and office workers endured random fire drills.

An actual fire chief attended one such event with a funny story. Despite knowing better, he placed aluminum foil wrapped leftover food into a microwave oven. Oops.

That company also scheduled tornado drills. Midwest Ohio is prone to those dangerous events.

Are you familiar with the screenplay "Some Like it Hot"? Does your residence require regular emergency drills?

-

Banana Muffin Win

I made up the batter for my husband’s favorite muffins. Altering the normal instructions in a minor way left them grossly undercooked. But via the title, you can tell they turned out fine with extra oven time.

Do you think refrigerating the batter overnight changed the baking time? Is this single deviation that important?

-

Numerous Flights & My Latest Kitchen Failure

Hearing a raucous sound outside my house, I knew this couldn’t be children on a playground despite the instant comparison. We live a mile or so from the nearest school and temperatures ranged far, far below freezing that day. The volume increased more and more. At last the individual honks could be heard.

The previous day I saw large Canada geese flocks heading south. This has to have been the biggest yet. Those birds no longer migrate from Ohio so they must have had enough of the cold. I don’t blame them.

My latest failure happened in the kitchen. A YouTuber we respect shares store-bought food breakdowns and recipes he deems either budget friendly or healthy. We were excited to try his version of egg foo young. Well, I didn’t detect anything but bland eggs, mushy vegetables, and salt. And the mess… well, you can see for yourself.

The gravy would not thicken with my cornstarch slurry,

then boiled over; other surfaces and pans were equally a mess. Ugh...

I think frozen peas would have been fine but not the cubed carrots. And I should have used a cast iron pan for consistent heat plus more oil for the desired fluffy texture. Some turned out undercooked, others rather burnt, and the mixture lacked enough eggs. Oh, well. Today my husband ate some crappy leftovers, declaring it fine. I’d rather stick to the easily ordered oily restaurant kind. It’s not like we eat this more than a few times per year.

Did you know these Chinese style omelets were created by 1900’s era Cantonese immigrants for American palettes? Are you a fan of any ethnic foods tailored to your regional tastes or do you prefer more authentic cuisine?

-