Monday, September 29, 2008

Phood Phollies

So...back for the moment to "the trivial round, the common task," as Barbara Pym was fond of quoting (J. Keble). The Dow's dropped 700 points and I need to organize/regroup my thoughts about feeding myself in this economy.

I had a brief respite recently from relentless home-cooking due to a roadtrip, so I found myself when I returned totally out of the groove, to the point where I forgot I was getting groceries delivered the day I returned (a day late) and found them piled, sweating slightly, in front of my door. New groceries didn't help, either, because I had shopped so carefully with such an eye toward cooking/the future, that there was very little I could just...eat. So I pillaged my LU petit ecolier biscuits and moaned about having nothing to eat the rest of the time until I'd occasionally break down and get delivery.

[The ultimate urban delivery idiocy? This past Sat night I broke down and ordered dogs from Portillo's ohhhhhh yeah! only to discover as I got more and more impatient that the delivery time on my receipt was 12 PM not AM...I had ordered dogs for Sunday lunch. Ridiculous.]

I'm back though. I found myself in the very unAmerican position of having no bread at all in the house. 19,000 other starches, but no bread. So I made bread, and am now marinating a flank steak from the very back of the freezer and preparing some lentils for bacon, lentil & potato soup. I feel a little overwhelmed, but determined.

The bread is left: I found the simplest recipe for cornbread I could find, using some of the nice organic cornmeal that's been-let's say--maturing in my freezer forever, plus some buttermilk I bought in the last groceries go-round with an eye toward cornmeal activity. It tastes pretty good, but I think I really need to something to sop it in. Will probably defrost some chicken chili, although I also have a ham steak I've been planning to work into 2-3 meals this week. But I need some soppin'.

Someone I know recently mentioned cooking pasta e fagiole, which seemed so terribly apropos, economy-wise. [Thinking about LaGuardia, I mean; I was trying to picture Richard Daley encouraging us to cook colcannon or soda bread in these trying times.] I love pasta e fagiole...mmmm yum. With white beans and some bacon in the mix if possible. I think this lentil soup will scratch that desire for beany porridge, and the cornbread will be great with it. The steak I will marinate for 24 hrs (marinade is a fun experiment involving vinegars and lime and most of the refrigerator door) then just sear up and use it for whatever--sammchs, with eggs, in tacos. This'll work out. The only real question at the moment is, as ever--can I keep up with the dishes.

1 comment:

Demandra said...

Dishes are the tool of the devil. It just...ug. Hate them, we do.