Happiness is…

Happiness is learning new ways to cook. When I was growing up, my mum’s dinner plan was a chunk of meat fried into dry leather, boiled peeled potatoes, and two canned veg or, once a week, spaghetti & meatballs with home-canned sauce. Marrow, a watery summer squash, was cooked an hour in true British style. Gradually she added Hungarian goulash; pork chops on scalloped potatoes; beef cooked in tomatoes; Swedish-style pork balls and cooked celery; home-made chicken soup; Chinese-style beef, beans, and rice; and many more fresh veg as the stores began to carry them. Around the time I left for university, she began making stir-fries with a small amount of meat and a lot of fresh vegetables. I’m so proud of her!

Update: I went looking for the Chinese-style recipe on the internet. It’s called Ow Yuk Sung. I found out that Yuk Sung is minced cooked pork on lettuce leaves. I also found a Korean version using oyster sauce & hoisin sauce and served over rice. Here’s a similar recipe using both mushrooms and pork, called Chow Yook Sung. Ours is quite juicy so we line a bowl with rice and serve it in that.

Stove vs. fire alarm

I am cooking meat. I bought chops and roasts on sale Now cooking them to slice, freeze, eat. As soon as I had them in the oven, the fire alarm went off. There’s something wrong with a loud, annoying alarm that is so sensitive it goes off whenever you cook something.

I cancelled the alarm and opened the doors, so the furnace started. I turned down the furnace and opened the kitchen window. I hope that provides the right balance of fresh air and cooking vapours for our sensitive alarm and my delicate hot-house skin.

I am also trying something new: putting a bed of sliced potatoes under the meat to catch drippings, prevent boiling fats from splashing around and, I hope, producing a few servings of delicious potato. AND I’m cooking the pork bones into soup stock.

Finished: three pairs of pork chops with potatoes, labelled and in the freezer; enough roast beef for seven sandwiches sliced, weighed, packaged, labelled and six of them frozen plus four servings of potatoes in beef gravy, three of them frozen. I had pork chops and potatoes for supper and I just turned off the stock to let it cool. I usually go from one week to the next without red meat or much meat at all so this will be a treat.

Wild weather

LotStreetWiz warned me that there’s a tornado warning in Ontario. Actually, there’s a warning upwind of us (where the weather comes from) and a thunderstorm warning where I live. I got all the cats in by waving treats. Now I’m going out to tidy away loose objects that might be blown over or away. Not that I expect a tornado here but we will get wind gusts and we could get downbursts of wind later.

I lit a big fat candle in case the power goes out again.

Later: loose items like lawn chairs are stowed. One of the cats went out again.

We don’t have a tornado warning but now we have a tornado watch (the next level down) and a thunderstorm watch. We’re starting to get thunder, lightning, and rain. The reports from the west talk about golfball-sized and gumball-sized hail. Oh, and my basement still has a puddle from the last storm, the one where we lost power for over four hours.

Our big swim

The granddaughter and I had a good swim on our vacation, a  900-metre round trip to a tiny island. The surface water was warm and the deeper water was refreshing.

I mapped our route to get the distance. We figured about 450 metres, and it seems we were right!

Our swim at Eagle Lake Narrows

Unlike our swim a couple of years ago to the palm-tree island in Nottawasaga Bay, this one was not cold enough for wetsuits. Here’s the map for our 2009 swim in Blue Mountain, which was about 550 m each way and not quite straight.

Marlowe is back!

Home at last

After two weeks we were still calling and listening. This morning we heard a cat meowing outside, and a while later Marlowe came up the cherry tree and in the porch window, meowing, growling, and very cautious about the other cats. But she needn’t have worried: they still defer to her.

She seems fine, in good health and well groomed but skinnier. Her fur smells of hay and several of her claws are shredded. We don’t know where she got to or how she stayed alive, but we’re very glad she’s back.

My next task is to take down forty or so ‘Missing Cat’ posters.

Marlowe is missing!

Lost cat!

.	Tortoiseshell-tabby: cloudy grey & brown Long haired with plumy tail Spayed female
	No collar but microchipped Very friendly and vocal Likes to roam & visit Lst seen July 13 at Pape & Fulton.
	She may be injured or frightened—please check your garage, shed, or under porch. She may be dehydrated—please put out water near hiding places.
	If you have found her or seen her (alive or dead) please let us know.