Leaving on a Jet Plane

ADDENDA:
The last two days I haven't really done anything other than stay inside, watch TV and cook a little. I guess that's depression, which I've allowed myself. Today, off to London and Amsterdam, back next Wednesday night. Give myself a day to recover, then....just do something. I don't know how long it'll take to decide what I want to do next/get a Jay-Oh-Be, but I've mourned long enough.

My internet access will be limited, but I'll take notes and fill y'all in when I get back. My friend Tania's home and town in Gillingham, Kent, has served as a 2nd home for many years, me dropping in 2+ times a year from college until I met B and my parents started passing. All sorts of food rituals....

BREAKFAST: 10am, good pancakes and good bacon, water, hunger 4/5
Experimented with whipped egg whites, the pancakes were nicely fluffy, definitely closer to an ideal.

LUNCH: 3pm, 2 homemade pizzas, fancy lemonade, hunger 4/5
Made dough from scratch again, used 1/4 less water. Dough was stiff, but pliable and workable. Didn't rise much in the oven, gotta get a new recipe. A little too cracker-like, not pizza-like enough. Had an old bottle of lemonade in the fridge, made with cane sugar, drank half of it.

PM WATERING: 5pm, 2 pints water

x

Wednesdays with Betsy

ADDENDA:
I go to England & Amsterdam tomorrow, but Betsy will not be coming with me & friends - she is taking the time to be with her father in Michigan, who is undergoing a bit of a health crisis. So today we are spending together. I spent the day indoors yesterday, too. Even though it's the 2nd day in a row, I'm feeling surprisingly good - I think laying low has avoided me getting sick, and being with B is helping elevate my spirits. There is something to this marriage thing that really works!

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, 2 shortbread cookies, pint water, hunger 3/5
Feel oddly nauseous, but better than yesterday.

LUNCH: noon, 1 superhippy grilled cheese sandwich with raw milk emmenthaller, grilled onion and grass fed butter, bowl of Betsy's homemade split pea soup reheated with extra water, olive oil and a shake of sea salt, pint of water, hunger 4/5
Betsy's soup was really delicious after being un-solidified. Made the restaurant-worthy grilled cheese again, Betsy was also impressed, she had a small one and after eating it said based on the sandwich, think it'll be nearly impossible to give up dairy!

PM SNACK: 3:45pm. last 4 shortbread cookies, pint of water, hunger 4/5
These cookies are the opposite of depression snacks. They make me happy.

PM SNACK: 5pm, 1 wholewheat saltless pretzel, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 7pm, spoonful of peanutbutter, small bowl of organic cornflakes and good milk, hunger 4/5
Getting hungry waiting for dinner.

DINNER: 8:30pm, Ethiopian vegetarian combo, water, hunger 3/5
Dinner out with B, didn't feel like leaving the house but glad I did.

DESSERT: 10pm, chocolate cinnamon soy ice cream, hunger 3/5
Whipped it up quick for B & I, came out good - blending the hell out of it eliminates the powdery feel. Threw in cinnamon, gave it a nice kick. Look forward to serving it to the HVS & co.

A Cookie for What Ails Me

ADDENDA:
When I was food shopping yesterday, I finished collecting my list and decided to find something that would cheer me up. I walked over to the cookie section and found Walker's Scottish Shortbread - I used to wolf this easily-digestible high-calorie fatty cookie when I was travelling cross country by bike, a lot of positive associations with it. However, something to eat while sitting on the couch....eh. I looked at the nutritional information, and noticed it had four ingredients - butter, flour, sugar, salt....hmmmm....I HAVE all those ingredients at home..... it might be more depressing to just buy a box of cookies to snarf, but if I were to snarf cookies that I made myself...

Found a simple recipe online which called for brown sugar, and left out the salt (I thought if I were to snarf a pile of cookies, at least keeping them salt-free would give me some defense against Ilsa's wrath!) After getting to bed around 3:30am, woke at 10:30 feeling ok. After vegetating in front of the TV, started working with the ingredients. Organic whole wheat pastry flour, organic unrefined brown sugar, organic butter. The recipe calls to cream the butter and sugar, had to look that up and wait for the butter to get to the right temperature - three ingredients or not, this is not brain dead work! Mixed in the flour by hand, worked the dough and felt the heat of my hands softening it a bit much, so I rolled it out on my stone counter with my cold metal roller, cut it up onto a baking dish and into the oven.

Twenty minutes later, I had a nice warm pile of comfort while I watched TV all afternoon. Hmmm, I think I may get out of the house tomorrow. Usually eating a bunch of heavy fatty cookies while doing nothing is self-reinforcing depression, but making shortbread cookies for the first time really lifted my spirits. I may cook some more later...

BRUNCH: 1pm, a pile of homemade shortbread cookies, hunger 4/5

PM WATERING: 3pm, 2 pints of tap water

DINNER 1:6pm, half a fully homemade pizza, hunger 4/5
Made dough from scratch following a recipe on line. Unfortunately, I think it meant a DRY measure of water, which would of been about half. After rising 30 minutes, the dough was very liquidy and unworkable. So without rolling or kneading, I poured a portion onto a cookie sheet and put it into the oven. Once it solidified a bit, I took it out, topped it, and put directly on a pizza stone in the oven.

It looked pretty, but taste wise....there was a notable lack of chew - the bite was a bit crumbly. The flavor of the crust was spot-on, but no gluten was developed, making the mouthfeel a bit crumbly and dry. I also used plain fresh cow's milk mozz because no bufalla was available - nt nearly as silky or flavorful.

I shared it with B then attempted a 2nd pie, but it disintegrated in the transfer from untopped to topped. I ended up still hungry...

DINNER 2: 8:15pm, shrimp in garlic sauce with black beans and yellow rice, pint water, hunger 4/5
Ordered in from a local Spanish joint. Big portion. I guess the real usefulness of delivery is to cover when your cooking fails!

Rough Monday

ADDENDA:
My flight to Detroit was cancelled due to weather, it's for the best as yesterday's visit to my family (both living and dead) upstate took more out of me than I thought. Woke at 7, checked the flight and poof, the day is open. Tried to get up and go but after some TV, put myself to bed, felt headachey and tired all over. Felt a lot better when I woke up, but feel a bit restless. Hope my European trip later this weeks goes smoothly.

BREAKFAST: 10am, a little curry sausage and brown rice, seltzer, hunger 4/5
Out of breakfast foods. Went back to sleep for a couple of hours

LUNCH: 2pm, vegetarian dim sum, water, hunger 4/5
Four little dishes. I was hoping to cook lunch but the sleep messed up my schedule

PM WATERING: 4:30pm, pint water

DINNER: 6pm, 2 fish tacos, small green salad, 1 bite of pork chop, water, hunger 2/5
Was going to lay about and be a lump, but Betsy called that she was sitting down with her brother for dinner at Schillers, so I pulled my pants back on and got out of the house.

EVENING SNACKS: 10:30-2am, spoonful of peanut butter, 2 saltless wholewheat pretzels with chocolate hazelnut spread, good yogurt with honey, vanilla and raw nuts, hunger 4/5
Sleepless and restless.

Family

ADDENDA:
Going up to Albany with B today to visit my religious brother and his large family, stopping by my parent's gravesite on the way up. Tomorrow I go to Detroit for a couple of days to spend some time with my father-in-law, then B & I fly out for a week to London & Amersterdam. Haven't slept well the past couple of nights, must be careful as getting sick now would be a disaster.

BREAKFAST: 7am, bacon on sprouted wholewheat, hunger 4/5
Went down to the local diner around the corner at 6:45 for a BLT & homefries, but was still closed. So I cooked up 6 slices of my good organic naturally low-salt bacon and slapped them on 3 pieces of sprouted wholewheat, a triple-layer sandwich that just had 2 components, really brought out the flavor and texture of both without being messed with.

And if I'm going to spend a good part of the day in a kosher household, I better get some bacon in me!

AM SNACK: 10am, everything bagel, hunger 4/5
Noshing in the car.

LUNCH: 2pm, onion bagel with fresh homemade hummus, handful of vegetables, water, hunger 4/5
Had my brother collect all the kosher ingredients, and I made hummus with my nephews and nieces, was very cute.

DINNER: 6pm, french fries, large eggplant parm sandwich, hunger 4/5
At a rest stop in NJ on the way home. I ordered half a sub, but the thing was a full foot long!