recipes (sort of)

In fact, it’s the ultimate 1950′s American comfort food. Although minced meat had been around since ancient times, the meat was usually pre-cooked (leftovers). Ground raw meat wasn’t processed and sold until the late 1800′s. Lack of refrigeration and ground meat’s potential for spoilage kept it from catching on.

Manufacturers produced home grinders and coupled them with recipes for ground meat dishes, including meat loaf. There are many, many variations. Some are made with ground beef, some with ground veal, some with a mixture of beef, veal and pork.

I can remember a time, during a spell of high meat prices, when soy protein was part of the mix. Unfortunately for the “meat extender” market in Louisville, Ralston Purina had a big dog food factory with a huge multi-silo storage facility, and the smell of soy meat extender cried, “DOG FOOD” in big stinky letters.

I prefer my Aunt Rose’s method of stretching the meat budget by adding oatmeal and chopped vegetables to the ground beef. Her meat loaf was always perfect. Mine was always greasy, dry on the outside and underdone on the inside. Since my husband doesn’t eat red meat, I’ve given up the quest for a good meat loaf recipe and just order it if I find it at restaurants. Meatless loaf, on the other hand, I do rather well. My mother–ah, my mother does a ROCKIN’ meatloaf. Both of these recipes reside on my now-defunct WEBLAHG.

WRITING PROMPT: Something meant to be appealing is distinctly UNappealing for an unanticipated reason.

MA

Believe it or not, I’ve had a request to post pictures of my eggplant. My eggplant is of absolutely no interest to most people, I’ll admit, but there are certain eggplant connoisseurs and cognoscenti who know a really classic eggplant when they see one. Those select few request private viewings on special occasions, and I oblige them. Sometimes they have to share. I mean an eggplant has its limits, am I right?

On this occasion, Leslie R. Lee asked me to post pictures of my eggplant online. So here it is.

Okay, let’s all drag our minds out of the gutter and get back to reality.

Mr. Hambley brought some of the little tender eggplants I like and stashed them in the car until I showed up, to be sure I got a couple. I took one, washed it, cut off the top and bottom, split it in two, rubbed it with garlic-infused olive oil (Did you see that, Ardis? I said “infused” just like the big-boy chefs!) and sprinkled it with Jane’s Crazy Mixed-Up Salt, which ought to pay me for touting them so much. But they don’t.

I popped those babies onto my indoor grill for about 10 minutes, more or less. This is actually less well-done than we like them. We like them WAY done, so they’re kind of crackly on the outside and mooshy soft on the inside. But that doesn’t look very pretty and this looks all fancy and all.

Along with this, we had broccoli salad. This is raw broccoli, mayonnaise, walnuts and a ready-made mix of dried blueberries, cranberries and cherries. It was most tasty.

WRITING PROMPT: Have a character develop or discover a way to make an unpalatable food delicious.

MA

Wednesday is recipe/food day at MA’s, but today Imma give you three things that don’t need recipes. Are you ready? Here goes.

1.  Soup

Cut up some vegetables. Cut up some meat, if you eat meat. Boil it. Everything else is window dressing. Yeah, put in some salt, herbs, spices, wine, whatever, if you want to, but soup is basically boiled stuff.

2.  Salad

Same thing, only don’t boil it. If you use meat and/or eggs, cook them first. You can use fruit with or instead of veg. You can add cheese and/or olives and/or capers and all kinds of jazz, but salad is basically raw stuff.

3.  Baked beans on toast

Make toast. Open a can of baked beans and heat or don’t heat, as desired. Put the beans on the toast. This is a recipe?

WRITING PROMPT: What do you put in soup? What does your main character put in soup? Your villain?

MA

Yeah, I slept late, so the post is late getting up. Hire a lawyer and sue me.

So anyway, school was canceled Monday because of snow and stuff, and our grandson who lives next door stayed with us while his parents were at work. His mother had made chicken and dumplings for supper the night before (just hold your horses, there’s a point in here somewhere) and she gave us the leftovers because her husband and the grandson don’t like to eat the same thing two days in a row. (!!) So–and here’s the point–Charlie and I ate the leftovers for lunch but what would the grandson eat?

We were out of bread and didn’t have time to bake some, or I would have made him a grilled cheese sandwich. So Charlie says, “We have a can of biscuits. Why don’t you use those?”

As usual, he was saying one thing and I was hearing another. He meant why didn’t I bake the biscuits and use those to make little cheese sandwiches. What I did was this:

Adventure #1

Open a can of biscuits. Separate them and smoosh each one out. Cut lumps of cheese and put a lump in the center of each smooshed biscuit. Fold the biscuit over the cheese and press to seal. Place, seam side down, on greased baking sheet. Bake according to biscuit directions.

Adventure #2

So I went to the grocery yesterday and got some bread and fancied grilled cheese sandwiches for supper, but I also got apples, so I sliced some Gala apples paper thin. Sandwich was: English toasting bread, home-made mayonnaise, Gala apples, baby Swiss cheese. Interesting.

WRITING PROMPT: Write a character who goes outside the box because of a misunderstanding.

MA