Livingthedreamwithdiana.com

What the heck is going on in the states?

$6.99/gal. for regular gas? We are paying about $4/gal. here, and have been for quite some time. But that is just about half of what you are paying in the states. That is crazy.

I did not think I would voice my opinion about such things, but come on; that is ridiculous. Call, or write to your Congressional representative, and tell them to open up the Keystone XL pipeline, and restart pumping American oil, and natural gas. No one can afford such extreme costs.

The cost of your groceries, for one thing, is going to sky rocket, with truckers having to find the money to pay for their gas. Farmers will find it difficult to take their crops to market, etc., and it will just keep getting worse.

Find out who represents your county, and notify them, frequently, that this has got to stop. And tell them to leave Kamala at home; she is ignorant, and insulting. The world is laughing at the US. What a shame.

Stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

We have a new app down here called Justo™.

It is a food delivery app that allows you to place an order online, which is delivered to your door whatever day and time you schedule it. I have used it three times now, and absolutely love it.

Mostly, I order eggs, fresh fruit, and vegetables. The first time I placed an order, I order some different cuts of beef; sirloin steaks, coarsely ground beef, and short ribs. I will never do that again. The steaks were so full of gristle we could hardly chew it.

The second time I used it, I ordered, among other things, a bunch of celery. This is what I got.

I do not remember ever seeing a bunch of celery that large in my entire life. I gave half of it to Liz as I cannot think of enough ways to use all of that in a year. I cut off the tops, then wrapped it in the aluminum foil that you can see. It is supposed to remain fresh, in the fridge, up to three weeks. We shall see.

There is a fairly new chain of stores in the area called meatme ™, which sells mostly meat, obviously. They, too, have an app which one can use to place an order, and either have it delivered, or pick it up in the closest store. We are going to try that in the very near future, as well. There are several stores in fairly close proximity to us, so I believe we will have to go to one of them to pick up our order. We are hoping they have more quality cuts of meat, not just gristle. The prices appear equal to what we are used to paying, and if the meat is of good quality, we do not mind paying for that quality.

I think that is about all I have to relay today. Stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

Today, I spent the better part of two hours cleaning an old(er) keyboard that I wanted to use, now that Ivan has helped me find, and set up my previous MacMini; the last one I used while still in the states.

It was filthy to say the least. Unfortunately, I did not take a photo of it, but I doubt you would have been able to see much of the staining. Now, it is so pretty, clean, and white.

It was fun, actually, taking off all of the individual keys, putting them into the boiled water, with some Dawn dish soap, and cleaning each tab with a clean cloth. I set them out to dry, then replaced each tab to its rightful space on the naked, but clean, keyboard.

I had, fortunately, taken a good photo of said keyboard last night, while completely illuminated, and was able to use that as a guide when repositioning the tabs. I do believe it would have been more than I could have managed, trying to put them all back without a photo. Yikes.

However, as I said, we have the MacMini back up, and running. Now I can print my Google calendar which has all of our bills on it, the payment amounts, on the due dates. I add up the weeks payments, subtract that from our current balance, to get a better idea of how much money we do, or do not have. Always entertaining.

While I pay bills, stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

Every day, it seems, I learn something new.

The other day, I learned a new way to cut up melons. It leaves so much more of the fruit intact that I doubt I will ever cut it like I always did. Let me show you.

Easy peasy. I suppose there are myriad ways to slice melons; this just happens to be the one I saw most recently. Unfortunately it is not as sweet as I was hoping, but the skin was starting to look a bit dimpled and I did not want it to get too ripe.

Stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

Today, Liz, and I made our first pizzas. Ever!

I made the pizza dough this morning, using OO flour, and corn meal. (I have been waiting for an eon to use the corn meal. Not much call for it here.) The OO flour is a high protein flour, which will make a sturdy crust, hopefully. As neither of us has ever done this before, we will have to wait and see how they turn out.

This is what they looked like going into the large, clean oven. The left pizza is for the Garcia’s and is ham, cheese, and pineapple. The right one is for himself, and me, and is homemade sausage, cheese, black garlic.

The sauce is homemade, just this morning; I made it while the dough was rising. (Beats doing the dishes, or folding laundry.) It, too, was very simple; a large can of crushed tomatoes, olive oil, onion, oregano, dried basil, a dash of sugar, and you have pizza sauce. Of course, everyone’s recipes differ, but, as a first attempt, it tastes pretty good. Oh, I forgot, I also added a teaspoon of fish sauce. Why? Because Chef John used anchovy fillets in his but I do not keep fillets; fish sauce is anchovies.

Added bit of fun; I got to use the cheese graters for my Kitchen Aid stand mixer. I have had them for years, but do not remember ever using them. What a shame, too, cuz they work really well, and quickly. I was able to grate the Manchego, and Parmesano-Reggiano in just a minute or two. Going to keep this in the forefront of whatever is left of my memory.

The pizzas should be done in the next few minutes. We, then, have to wait ten or fifteen minutes for them to “set up” before we cut into them. I will try to be patient.

When they come out, and have set, I will add another photo of them. Until then, stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

You read that correctly. Never, ever, will I use that mixture to clean the ovens.

First of all, that is way too much Dawn; it took me an hour to remove all of the soap that collected on the clothes I used. I used up two months of water just rinsing the darn things. It took me an hour and a half to clean out both ovens, after which I had to spray everything down, use a dry microfiber cloth, and wipe off all of the soda residue. It looked like someone had drizzled a film of ash all over the inside, and outside of the ovens. What a mess.

I am really glad that I let 3 hours elapse before typing this post. It is completely different than what I was saying to myself while I was working, and when I finished. I am not sure I could have posted it, in fact, I was that upset.

After that, I am almost persuaded to go back to the ugly, smelly harsh chemical oven cleaner, not that I ever actually clean my ovens. I just, accidentally, let some wild hair get to me, and tried the dish soap, baking soda, and vinagre mixture. Do not do it.

Anyway, enough boohooing. Here is the event as it stands.

Then, I decided I had had enough, and I considered the chore finished. So it was. I went back to the bedroom, moaning, and groaning about the ache in my back, (which ought to be incredible tomorrow,) and sat down for a few minutes. Then, both kettles whistled on the stove, so off I went to finish the dishes.

Both windows are still oven windows with streaks, but I still do not care. One day, quite some time from now, I just might take the above window off, again, and really clean it up. Not right now.

If anyone you know thinks they want to save the planet by using the aforementioned formula, tell them they have my permission, if they care, to use the chemical stuff. Or, better yet, just do not use your oven. Then you will never have to clean it.

Another thought; when was the last time someone came to visit you, at your house, and asked if they could, please, see the inside of your oven? That was, you are correct: exactly never.

So, I am now of the mind that, if someone happens to see the inside of my oven(s), and it, or they, happen to be dirty, it will be because I have chosen to cook delicious meals for my husband and myself. And, if those meals shout out while they are cooking, then, they do. I will be thankful that we have two ovens, and that I know how to use them. (Most folks down here cook on the stove top, rarely using the oven. Difference in cultures, that is all.)

So, peace be in your hearts while you stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

There was a post on Pinterest recently that caught my attention.

It was a recipe for products to clean your oven with harsh chemicals. Of course, I was skeptical, but, finally, tonight, I mixed the ingredients together and applied it to both the large, and the small ovens. I did not take a before photo of the Breville Smart oven, but I did of the large oven. Yikes.

I have baked several loaves of sourdough bread the big oven at 500ºF, and a couple of casseroles. Some of the casserole contents spilled out onto the floor of the oven, causing a bit of black charcoaled residue.

The Breville oven has been used, and abused, over the past 2 years. I weekly bake bacon, bread, casseroles, potatoes, steaks, pork chops, etc., most of which splatter all over the oven. It smokes like a house on fire whenever I cook something in it.

If this cleaning mix cleans the ovens, I am going to use it on the stove top and get rid of the covers I am currently using. They are great, but if I can get the stove top clean, then clean it will stay. How fun.

Until tomorrow, when I clean, again, all of the mixture away, stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.

Post script: I am sorry. Did you ask what the product/mixture was? Well, I will be happy to tell you. It is as follows:

1/2 c. Dish soap, 1 1/2 c. Baking soda, and 1/4 c. White vinagre. Mix them in a medium sized bowl of your choice, then, using a sponge, spread it all over the inside of your dirty oven, and shelves. Close the oven door. Go to bed. Next day, with a damp sponge, wipe it all off, and, with luck, be completely amazed at your beautifully clean oven.

I made spaghetti, with sauce, all from scratch.

Yes, I did! All by myself, too. I did not even listen to one minute of my Outlander book, book number 5 in the series. I spent all of my time concentrating on the tasks before me. They were numerous, I must say.

My goals for today were to make a loaf of whole wheat bread, as I have been, as we had only a few slices left of the last loaf I made. I wanted to make homemade spaghetti noodles, and sauce, using the Italian sausage I made the other day; everything from scratch.

And that is exactly what I did, too! Here are a few photos from my days journey. Hope you enjoy them.

I made the dough for the spaghetti using semolina flour, as it is true pasta flour, and has a very high protein content, making it a strong gluten product. the instructions said it would be a more difficult dough to use, versus a high protein white flour, such as All Purpose flour. As I wanted the “real” experience of pasta making, I opted for the semolina instead. It was very easy to use, once I got past the three minute mark when kneading it.

Then, I got to use my new KitchenAid pasta making attachments to roll our the pasta, then cut it into spaghetti pieces.

And, since this was my first adventure, I got a bit fuddled when I was putting the dough through the cutting piece. What was I going to do with it after I cut it? My husband came to my rescue. He happened into the kitchen, just after the first batch of spaghetti came our of the cutting piece. He put my drying rack together, just in time for me to use it.

As I said, since I have never done this before, I was a bit disorganized. Instead of dusting them in the semolina and hanging them on the rack, I dusted them and placed them, in a curl, on a floured baking sheet. Fortunately, I do not have a photo of that kerfuffle.

Whilst the pasta dough was “sleeping” for 30 minutes, before I began all of the above, I made the dough for another loaf of our new favorite, whole wheat bread. It is absolutely the softest WW dough I have ever had the opportunity to use. The bread is delicious.

Then, while the bread was rising, and the pasta was sleeping, I made the marinara/spaghetti sauce, using, of course, my homemade Italian sausage. Spectacular, I am telling you.

The sauce came together, the spaghetti got rolled out, then cut, then dried for a few minutes, and the bread was put to bake.

I boiled the water for the spaghetti, (which took about 3 minutes to cook), reheated the sauce, took the bread out of the oven, and made a few pieces of garlic toast to go with the meal.

To top it all off, I grated some fresh Parmesano-Reggiano cheese on top of the sauce, and Bob’s your uncle. We did not have any wine, but that was ok. It was only three in the afternoon.

But, I did it! I still cannot believe how much I got done today. Yesterday too. What a week. Soon, I am going to start on Asian cuisines, and see where that takes us. I will try to be patient. Hah!!!

Everyone, stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and protect your loved ones.