24 posts tagged “food”

I don't always compost. I usually do a bag when I do a massive cook-up of something, but sometimes I don't. Otherwise, food waste goes in the regular garbage. I recycle just about everything else, even the foil caps from the tops of the milk bottles.  So, my kitchen garbage can is essentially plastic (that is not the appropriate PET number for recycling) and styrofoam food wrappings, carrot peelings, ends of zucchinis and old cat food that Comfort refuses to eat.  In an effort to reduce the amount of plastic in my garbage, I have been trying to use re-useable containers, and aluminum foil.  It sort of happened on accident.  My household is pretty well stocked.  I don't run out of stuff before it's replaced.  I always have toilet paper and if anyone needs packets of pre-moisturized Kleenex, I'm pretty sure I'm cornered the market.  Not quite sure how I ended up with so many, but I swear they've multiplied. 

I was a touch surprised, then, when it seemed that I had run out of ziplock bags.  I still have some of the 3 liter size, but the 1 liter that I used for lots and lots of stuff, I just didn't seem to have anymore.  I didn't remember running out, but they weren't in the cabinet anymore.  I decided to use this (it must have been a Saturday or something) as an opportunity to find alternatives to baggies.  I have had to be more mindful, but it really hasn't been a hardship.  I did, however, find the 1 liter ziplock bags last weekend.  I hadn't put them away.  Ooops.  There they were, on the shelf by the stove top.  Now I'm not sure what to do with them.  I have them, but I'm not using them anymore.  Any ideas?

Following on with my determination to reduce the amount of plastic in my life, I read with interest about Project Kaisei.  According to them, there is a mass of plastic twice the size of Texas floating between the West Coast of the U.S. and Japan.  I'm sure it's there, but they have no photos of it.  They also say that they have a children's book, but they don't offer it for sale anywhere or even give its title.  I am a little skeptical about this organization.  I will look some more, but they're not getting my money, yet.  (One of their stated goals is to remove/recycle all the plastic in this vortex which I think is an excellent, excellent aspiration) 

Here are some links to the Plastic Vortex or North Pacific Gyre (as ever, please take all links with a grain of salt, I do not ever attest to their legitmacy, I try to choose good ones, but even I can be out-snoped):
Cryptic Moth's blog post from 2006
No photos, why? 

My cat loves her new food.  

It's 7:30 and I haven't left the house, yet.  I was supposed to leave 20 minutes ago, BUT because of what happened next, I opted to just wait and take the 9 that would put me on the 8:00 bus to school.
I was fixing my lunch.  Pulled the yogurt out, put the clementine with it, got the bag of rice out of the freezer. Put the black bean, corn, pepper, etc... mix into a baggie and not quite sure what happened, but somehow the remainder of it, probably a good three quarters of a cup that was supposed to be dinner tonight, ended up on the floor.  I didn't drop the container, I just managed to spill it all out on the trolley and floor. 
I was irked and feeling wasteful and not at all in the mood to clean up the mess, but I did.  And moved on, realized I wouldn't make the 7:17 bus.  Continued on with putting all the lunch in a bag and taking it to the hall.  Moved on to breakfast.   Took my iron pill with oj, ate my egg, pulled the oatmeal out of the microwave, grabbed the two spice jars out of the pantry. Poured the cinnamon on, and dumped at least two teaspoons of cayenne pepper instead of ginger on top.  SO, I dumped that and re-made my oatmeal.  I have a sore throat and I'm stuffy. I really just want to go back to bed and start over.  I woke up at three this morning, too.  AND, I'm almost out of the Zanzibari cinnamon that I brought back (I'm not stupid, I bought in bulk when I was there).  I have some cinnamon that I bought at an ethnic food store here, turns out it's made in China.  What a comedown.

but only once I have run out of yogurt.  Yogurt is a far higher priority.  Turns out the Cosmic Joker is at work here.  I got the idea of using up what I've got in my pantry from a blog (do not remember which one).  I mentioned it to a colleague this afternoon and she and another colleague had talked about how they were both doing this when they were chatting after lunch.  I'm sure between the three of us that we will come up with some pretty creative stuff.  This is not so much a lesson in frugality because there are SEVEN (okay, maybe six) weeks between the December paycheck and the January one, but more that I need to use the food I've got.  I don't even want to think about how long some of this stuff has been in the freezer.  Long enough that I will not serve it to guests, that's for sure.  

So, my freezer and pantry are pretty fully stocked.  I have a lot of food in my kitchen and it is time to start using it up.  We go on holiday again in three weeks.  I'm thinking that I can live off my freezer and pantry for at least that long, so this experiment will either run until my Feb break or through my Feb break. 
Grocery items I am allowed to buy:
milk, yogurt (I eat a strawberry yogurt everyday), and onions. 

Even produce and fruit is off the list because I have canned and frozen, but I only have two onions left.  I have less than a bulb of garlic left, but I'm a little curious to see if I can cook as well without it.  I am awfully dependent on garlic, so this is a good chance to try other flavors. 

Sorry it is sideways.  I might or might not try to fix it.  There's a lot of stuff on the top shelf that isn't usually there, but when I shifted stuff due to the white vinegar leak, I never bothered to put it back.
 
If I find that I have truly run out of something, like I use up all the canned and frozen fruit, I can buy more.  This is not an exercise in nutritional deprivation.  I want to use what I've got and experiment a little.

There's a website, blog, really, that I check in to read fairly often.  I started reading it during the writers' strike and have continued.  It's the screenwriter, John August:
Very cleverly named
He wrote the screenplay for Big Fish and a bunch of others.  He recently produced, directed, whatever, his own movie the Nines which was a trippy, little affair well worth a view or three.  You really can't go wrong with Hope Davis. 
Anyways, I was just reading it this morning and I realized that one of the reasons I like it so much is the footnotes.  He uses footnotes ALL THE TIME!  Okay, not every entry, but since I rarely see anyone use footnotes in blogging (I tend to use parentheses, obviously), I find it endearing. 
We are eating our way through the day at school today in lieu of getting together for a meal outside of school (who has time for that right now? I'm out three nights of five this week!)  I made a casserole and felt very Baptist Church Lady bringing my covered dish to school today. 
So, my cat threw up twice on Saturday.  I'm not really sure what to do.  I think it's that she's eating her food too fast, so I'm putting more food in her bowl, so that there's some left and she can graze instead of gorge, but if she's actually ill? I can't bring her home.  My dad doesn't want a cat in the house even if it's healthy, so a possibly sick cat really wouldn't fly (literally, I don't think I could get a vet cert for her).  She seems okay, otherwise, though she did sit in my lap last night even though there were other people in the room.  My poor kitty.  She may be a little nutty and not keen on people other than me, but she's my kind of nutty. 

but that's really to compensate for the piece (small) of Kahlua/Vodka cake, the piece (not quite as small) of cheesecake and the large cups of coffee (plenty of cream and sugar) that I have had since I arrived at work.  I had a really good breakfast, and will eat a really good lunch (lentil soup, whole grain roll, etc), but it's gone really pear-shaped in between.  Can I just say that I'm not eating the pumpkin pie, stroop waffles, mini chocolate muffin, or little spicy cake looking sort of things?

I've posted websites that perk me up or make me laugh here before. 
lolcats is my favorite site for silly cuteness without the saccharine like cuteoverload.
Yesterday, gizmorox raised it to a whole new level.  It's focused.  It's delicious.  It's its very own sugar high.
I give you Cake Wrecks.  And because I love you all so much, I'm showing you the one that made me laugh all evening yesterday.  You can explore the rest of the site at your leisure.
Always double check your phone orders!
It's a combo of beautiful cakes and laugh out loud disasters.  Enjoy!

Having done my wikipedia homework, I can tell you that Jell-O brand products are not in fact vegetarian because they use animal connective tissue for the gelatin.  Interestingly enough, the process eliminates the risk of BCE or Mad Cow, so no Jacob Creutzfeldt for you.  I do not recommend reading the actual article on gelatin because the pie charts alone are kind of gross.  Suffice to say, Jell-O is still good for your hair and nails, but probably not your tendons!  Who knew?!  I really thought that all commercial jello had gone veggie years ago. 
But anything in aspic is yucky.  And they use it a lot over here in catering.  They cover open-face sandwiches in it.  I guess so all the stuff on top doesn't fall off, but ewwww.

or as Gio in Ugly Betty would say, "Heaven from a Cow".

I have long been a fan of the cow.  It is one of my goals to learn how to milk one.  (If anyone knows of a place, please let me know!)  A cow is such a useful creature and worthy of high esteem.  And a good pepper sauce. 

Since breaking my foot (stress fracture, whatever), I have returned to my bovinatarian roots.  The philosophy behind bovinatarianism is simple: if it comes from a cow, is eaten by a cow or would be friends with a cow (think chickens and fluffy lambs), it is a part of the bovinatarian diet.  Gracie told me that if cows knew what seafood and fish were, they would be friends, but I don't think so.  (I admit to enjoying a good tuna, shrimp or caviar dish, but on a day to day basis, they really have no place)  So, I have been drinking milk, eating lots more yogurt and cheese and enjoying double cream whipped up and served with milk chocolate.  Beef has made a comeback (albeit a small one since it's really expensive here) and chicken in creme fraiche and pesto. 

It actually worries me that I have a fracture in my foot.  I don't have any cavities or fillings, the last time I broke an actual bone, I was three.  My bones are good and strong.  Or are they?  Now I kind of want a bone density test.  But until then, I will drink my milk, eat my dairy and (a little bit of) meat and ignore the scale.