Text 4437, 77 rader
Skriven 2013-09-07 23:55:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: trip 126
================
Mike and Jill invited us for dinner, which for some reason many
of our friends do not. The drill is we go at 5, drink until the
food is ready, maybe 6:30, eat for an hour, drink for an hour,
and are back home by 9, slightly tipsy but generally none the
worse for wear, except when the timer for the roast fails to go
off, and we eat overcooked food and so have to drink extra.

I brought Genesee Cream Ale for Annie, who had suddenly recovered
fond memories of the stuff, and Yuengling Black and Tan for me;
this in place of the bottle of wine that one usually brings over
as a house gift, as Mike and Jill don't drink wine, and Annie
won't drink the Genesee Light that Jill offers. We guzzled for
about an hour, noshing on pretty good Lebanon-style bologna,
pepperoni, and cubes of Buffalo-wing-flavored Cheddar (it has been
impressed on them that I like spicy food but perhaps not enough
that I am still quite lactose intolerant).

This time the timers went off, and we had a very nice roasted
chicken sided by Cope's dried corn (reconstituted), mash made with
real butter, and gravy made with real can, but strangely not too
salty. A tasty meal, actually. The chicken looked moist, but I
didn't have any of it - I just ate all the skin.

Dessert was a nice fudgy brownie submerged in Reddi-Wip. I scraped
off the white stuff and ate half the brownie, wrapping the other
half in a napkin for midnight snack.

Mike always likes someone to join him in a glass of Port after
dinner; last time I did so, he poured me an extra large glass, which
tipped the balance between pleasantly woozy and unpleasantly drunk.
This time I passed, and we had an amicable largely political
discussion - he's substantially Tea Partyish, and I'm not, but we
didn't come to blows.

--

Annie found a cooked pork loin in the freezer and asked me to
"Italian" it or "Mexican" it. I said I'd rather "Chinese" it, but
as she had tortillas around, she preferred the Mexicanization. I
added oregano, cumin, onions, garlic, and pepper and restewed it
for about six hours. It tasted okay. She ended up not eating any
of it.

--

I also took the leftover Italian sausage and 4 Dan-cooked burgers,
found tucked into the back of the second fridge, chopped them up
with an onion, and made chili out of them. I undersalted this,
something I don't regularly do, but I finally found my stash of
fake salt, so that was rectifiable. I've had 3 meals out of this
already and have 2 more coming. I really like my chili, and it is
kind of strange that no matter what substitutions I make in my
standard procedure, the end result is pretty much the same.

--

After the Joey's/nail salon adventure, we went across the street
to Tony's, because Annie wanted a flank steak, of which there was
exactly one in the store. On this occasion we also got that enormous
but substantially bland, flat, tasteless, flavor-free cantaloupe of
which I have spoken earlier. I took the flank steak, bias-cut it
into thin sheets, removing the membraneous underneath substance,
marinated it in garlic, soy, and sherry, and made it into pepper
steak with onions. This was quite good, but I made the mistake of
trying to use up a container of rice, and the one that was almost
out was "brown jasmati," which is okay in taste but crummy in
texture (either too hard or too soft, nothing in between, the proof
being that you can make it and there is a point at which some of
the grains are too hard, and others are too soft). Annie keeps 5 or
more different kinds of Rice Select on hand; it's a brand that I do
not favor for various reasons. Anyhow, the pepper steak with onions
was just fine, but I much preferred the leftover membrane flattened
against the fry pan with a spatula and cooked and eaten on its own.

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