Coffee heat rising

The Ultimate Church Potluck Dish

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Sooo…. The instant the sign-up sheet for the end-of-year choir party surfaced, I shot over like a rocket to get my name in first, so as not to be cut off at the pass in my quest to volunteer to bring my favorite amazingly cheap but amazingly delicious dish, potatoes au gratin.

Never sign up for anything when you’re distracted by ambition. My beady little eyes were so blinded by the glory of getting there first that I neglected to consider the venue. This shindig is not taking place at the church, which has a kitchen (two of them, actually) with enough refrigerator space to accommodate the 11th armored division’s mobile mess hall. It’s happening at the choir director’s house.

{sigh} What was I to do with a bubbling, 350-degree panful of potatoes, sauce, and cheese for the two hours in which we are to rehearse and perform before the party starts?

Couldn’t easily take it with me. It would have to be cooked in the church kitchen, which would mean it would be overcooked, since the period between the time we process up the aisle and the time the last note soars out of the organ is over an hour. Also, it would be wildly hot: getting a pan of searing hot potatoes from the stove to my car through a mob of people and from my car to the choir director’s house would be a challenge…to say nothing of figuring out how to keep the pan from melting the synthetic rugs in my car.

Having chewed on this dilemma for a week, I’d about decided to punt with potato salad. Then I flipped open my ancient Beard’s American Cookery, and what should I find but M. Blot’s Recipe for au Gratin Potatoes. This little gem uses precooked potatoes. Not only that, but it turns out to be very easy to prepare—much easier than the traditional lasagna-like layering of potatoes, butter, béchamel sauce, cheese, and crumbs.

And it takes ten minutes flat to warm in a 400-degree oven.

E-mail to the boss: OK to use your oven to heat this thing? Boss to underling: Nooo problem—we have all our ovens at the choir’s disposal.

Though I haven’t tasted this yet, obviously (because the party’s tomorrow), I did prepare it this morning, and it looks delicious. The sauce is splendidly savory.

Here’s my adaptation, enlarged for a crowd:

You need:

6 or 8 boiling potatoes
2 cups milk or 1½ cup milk and ½ cup heavy cream
4 Tbsp butter
4 Tbsp flour
4 egg yolks, beaten
cayenne pepper
salt & pepper to taste
a cup or so of shredded cheddar or Gruyère cheese (I combined Irish cheddar with Jarlsburg)
more butter to oil the pan
buttered breadcrumbs

Wash the potatoes but don’t bother to peel them. Bring a big kettle of water to the boil and place the potatoes in it. Cook over medium-high heat until a knife blade can be inserted easily into one of the larger potatoes.

Meanwhile, grate the cheese and beat the four egg yolks.

When the potatoes are done, drain them in a colander. Allow to cool for a few minutes. At this point, the peels will slip right off—so, when the potatoes are cool enough to touch, remove these with your hands and then slice the potatoes fairly thickly.

Butter an oblong baking dish.

Next, make the béchamel sauce.

How to make the béchamel:

Melt the butter in a saucepan. Add the flour and cook gently, stirring, until the butter foams. Add the milk (or milk + cream) and heat over medium-high heat, stirring frequently and watching, until the sauce thickens. Flavor to taste with cayenne, salt, and pepper. Remove the pan from the heat. With the pan off the heat, stir in the beaten egg yolks.

Now add the grated cheese to the hot sauce and stir well to blend.

All that remains to do is to arrange a layer of about half the sliced, cooked potatoes over the bottom of the baking pan. Spread half of the béchamel-cheese sauce over these, and then layer the rest of the potatoes atop that. Spread the rest of the sauce over the second layer. Finally, top it with buttered bread crumbs.

To cook: heat in a 400-degree oven about ten minutes or until heated through.

Since I expect there’ll be little room in the fridge at 9:00 a.m. and I don’t want anyone stacking stuff on top of the tinfoil-covered pan, I’ll  wrap it in a big plastic bag with several of those cold brick-shaped things, frozen solid. That should keep it cool until it goes in the oven at 11:00.

Voilà! A scrumptious dish guaranteed to turn the best of church ladies green with envy, hand-made by you with almost no hassle.

Yum!

“United We Stand…”

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e-pluribus-unum

Paul Krugman has an interesting and kinda scary article in this morning’s Times. He points out that the biggest threat to our economy right now is not the deficit but the fact that not enough is being done to fight unemployment. Says he, the recent hiring gains have, to date, “brought back fewer than 500,000 of the 8 million jobs lost in the wake of the financial crisis.” In that department, he notes, the Administration is doing way too little.

Eight million jobs gone. Heaven help us!

Krugman says the fairest comparison between our economy and another country’s is not with Greece’s debt-ridden economy but with Japan’s, which has never fully recovered from the deflationary cycle of the 1990s. He lays the blame for Europe’s unrest over national debt issues on the establishment of the euro, whose creation, he observes, “imposed a single currency on economies that weren’t ready for such a move.”

Though you’d never know it by the grocery bills I racked up today, inflation is at a 44-year low, and that is not a good thing. Smart money, fearing deflation will extend the economic slump, is moving out of the stock market and into treasury bonds, perceived as safer than equities.

Come to think of it, this morning my financial manager e-mailed to say they’re moving my investments to a cash position. Let’s hope this time they manage to salvage some of that fund. It hadn’t regained all it lost during the crash, but it had recovered to the point that it might reasonably be expected to support me through old age.

Krugman calls for more aggressive recovery measures, but observes rightly that a new stimulus plan “would have no chance of getting through a Congress that has been spooked by the deficit hawks.”

IMHO, something far more basic is at work here.

America is not going to recover economically as long as we continue on our track toward political schism. That way is the road to ruin. The polarization of our thinking between the extreme right and the extreme left is spinning this country around in circles. Ultimately, it will destroy us. Indeed, I fear that if it continues, within a generation it will lead to uprisings, possibly even civil war.

David Brooks observes, in a column also appearing in today’s Times, that our political center presently “is a feckless shell. It has no governing philosophy. Its paragons seem from the outside opportunistic, like Arlen Specter, or caught in some wishy-washy middle, like Blanche Lincoln. The right and left have organized, but the center hasn’t bothered to. The right and left have media outlets and think tanks, but the centrists are content to complain about polarization and go home. By their genteel passivity, moderates have ceded power to the extremes.”

In a little parable meant to elucidate the thinking of people who subscribe to the Tea Party, Brooks predicts that just throwing the rascals out and replacing them with new demagogues won’t get us far. “[Brooks’s fictional angry voter] is going to be disappointed again. He’s going to find that the outsiders he sent to Washington just screamed at each other at ever higher decibels. He’s going to find that he and voters like him unwittingly created a political culture in which compromise is impermissible, in which institutions are decimated by lone-wolf narcissists who have no interest in or talent for crafting legislation. Nothing will get done.”

Just so. The motto on our currency and on the Great Seal of the United States, E Pluribus Unum—”out of many, one”—resonates with the last great words of Patrick Henry:

“United we stand, divided we fall. Let us not split into factions which must destroy that union upon which our existence hangs.”

We’ve forgotten those words. It behooves us to remember them, before it’s too late.

Where Do All the Shoppers Come From?

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Must be payday, that’s the only explanation.

Out of food and out of about everything else, too, I made a long circuit of the globe by way of refilling the freezer, the fridge, and the pantry.

Started around 10:00 ayem at the Sprouts just down the street. Determined to avoid a run on Safeway, I managed to pick up most of the non-Costco food items: cabbage and celery and ground lamb, and to find the shea butter I went there to track down.

The place was overrun with bluehairs. From the minute I walked in to the minute I walked out, flying phalanxes of elderly women made it their business to park themselves and their shopping carts everywhere I went. If I was already where I needed to be, they’d come up and push me out of their way! Have you ever been in a store where you just could. not. get. AWAY. from some annoying customer? One old gal and her hubby fit that bill today. When I walked in the door, she was parked in the bakery section, smack in the middle of the lane that would allow one to get around said department. She was just standing there: not looking at the merchandise, not doing anything…just standing there. So I find another route around, and the next time I look up, there she is again, with her husband’s cart blocking my way! The two of them homed in on me like heat-seeking missiles! Everywhere I went, there they were…parked smack-dab in the middle of the aisle!

Oh well. Thence, on down the road…

Surfaced at Costco shortly after the store opened. Consumed half the month’s gasoline budget at the tanks and then moved on to the store itself.

What a zoo! It was just jammed. This, in the middle of Friday morning. It must be payday. Or Unemployment Insurance benefit day. Where do all these people come from??? When I hit the parking lot, the coast looked clear—I even got a crip space, a miraculous development, since those are almost always occupied. But during the time I circumnavigated the store, the place filled up.

Which reminds me of another funny Sprouts story: As I’m loading groceries into my car, one of my fellow crips comes along and parks his car smack in the middle of the lane, holding up a line of traffic, and waits for me to move so he can grab my crip space. It’s a 100-degree day, and I know the Costco junket will take a good hour, so I’ve brought along a small cold chest and a bunch of those frozen blue cold brick things to keep the Sprouts produce cool. This requires me to take some time to unpack the bags the check-out lady has tossed together, sort the perishables, and fit them into the cool container. Then I have to pack the rest of the stuff into the plastic bins that keep stuff from flying around the back of my van.

The guy stands there and stands there and stands there. His fellow shoppers stacked up behind him stand there and stand there and stand there. I finally climb into the driver’s seat, change into my distance sunglasses so I can drive without killing or crippling some other motorist, and pull out. He races into the vacant spot. The wacky thing about this is that not twenty feet away was another parking spot that was closer to the door! It wasn’t a crip space, though, so I suppose it didn’t meet his exacting requirements.

LOL! Ain’t human nature grand?

By the time I was ready to leave the Costco, check-out lines were halfway back to the far side of the store. Naturally, I picked the line where the guy who was stocking his sports bar with every spirit in the damn store had parked himself in front. Not only did he have to buy every bottle of booze in the house, he had to send his wife back into the store to pick up something else.

While he gassed on and on and on, I moved to another line, where things didn’t move one whit faster. At least the lady who looked like she was buying only one thing but really was waiting for her companion to show up with a truckload of purchases let me go in front of her. Not that it did much good.

Packed as much frozen and perishable stuff into a cold case as I could. Decided against the run on Target, which is always crowded and often nuts. Moved on to Trader Joe’s.

I swear, I have never seen so many people jammed into one building in my life. Here, it was impossible to get a place to park within walking distance. I gave up and parked in the semi-shade of some trees on the far border of the parking lot. Hiked a quarter-mile to the door. The younger set of greenies shops here, while their parents and grandparents hang out at Sprouts. They have their forebears’ manners: if you’re standing in front of a display trying to find, say, the capers, they weasel in front of you to search for what they want, so you can’t see what’s on the shelves. Two women with children encountered each other and parked their kid-ridden carts side by side, coming and going, in the middle of an aisle, yakking companionably while they blocked the way for all comers. When one lady tried to s-q-u-e-e-e-e-e-e-z-e around them, they just ignored her.

Lines were interminable there, too, but miraculously they opened a new line and I got picked to be first! w00t!

Stopped at a Walgreen’s to pick up couple of the Target things I missed by opting that leg of the junket: rubbing alcohol, doggie tennis balls.

Argha! I spent $214 at Costco and about another $75 at the other stores, consuming almost half this month’s budget in one day. But the freezer and fridge are now stuffed and the car is reloaded with gas. With any luck I won’t have to go out again for another two weeks.

Hope not. I hate shopping!

Hmh. Am I alone in that sentiment?

Nail Protection: A pretty good product

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Acrylic-nails

Over the past few months, my fingernails have slowly slipped into the category of “blighted neighborhood.” But last Easter when I fell, it was like Hurricane Katrina meets Daughter of Snagnail. In addition to dislocating the shoulder, the fall sheared off the nail on my ring finger halfway down the quick, tearing apart the cuticle in the process.

Oh well.

A month and a half later, it’s about healed and the nail has almost grown back out. In the interim, the other nails grew even shaggier than normal, because my arm and hand hurt too much to fool with manicuring them. It was as much as I could do to occasionally massage a little shea butter into my fingers.

Late in life, one’s nails tend to split longitudinally as a natural result of aging. One of my thumbnails cracks as soon as it grows an eighth of an inch past the quick, which is annoying, not to say ugly as pussley. I’ve considered going back to acrylics, but I really don’t like that stuff. In the first place, it wrecks your natural nails—the manicurist has to rough up your nails by filing off the surface. In the second place, nothing that stinks that bad can possibly be good for your health. And in the third place, trotting in every ten days to two weeks for a fill gets expensive.

So I’ve thrashed around looking for something that I could paint on—at home, not at a salon—and have it hold my nails together through repeated dips in water and detergent and through constant batting against a keyboard. Hard as Nails has never performed impressively, to my taste. It’s your basic high-gloss nail polish, no more nor less given to chipping and peeling than any other polish, and certainly not much protection against the vagaries of housework, yardwork, and office work.

However, the outfit that makes Hard as Nails has a new product that seems to work really well: Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Hard as Wraps Nail Gel. This stuff claims to contain “acrylic gel” and nylon. Note that it’s not the same as the stuff  manicurists use to do gel nails—that product should be applied professionally, and it’s even worse on your nails than regular acrylics.

Hard as Wraps goes on the same as nail polish. However, it dries (in about the same time as regular polish) to form a tough, rather thick coating that works almost like filler, a product I haven’t found on the market in years. One coat almost fills the deep vertical groove in my thumbnail. Two coats leave the nail almost smooth, and three coats have protected that nail from splitting for a week. Even though it’s very glossy, I think you could use it as a base coat or as a top coat with your favorite colored polish. I’m leaving it clear, and it looks pretty nice. That’s saying something, given the condition my nails have taken on.

A few caveats:

• It’s harder to remove than regular polish. Don’t think you’re going to wipe it off with a dab of polish remover on a scrap of tissue paper. You’ll need some good cotton balls or pads and plenty of remover, and plan to spend a few minutes at the job.

• Don’t shake the bottle before applying. This will cause the product to bubble as it dries on your nails.

• Remember to let each coat dry well before applying another coat. If one layer is still tacky when a second coat is applied, that also can cause bubbling.

As in applying any polish, less is better than more. Better to apply two or three thin coats than one thick coat. Glopping it on also will lead to bubbling problems, plus it won’t dry as fast.

I’m impressed, though. This Hard as Wraps product actually does protect nails from day-to-day wear and tear, the way the old Hard as Nails promised to do. It’s worth a try.

Image: French Manicure on acrylic nails. ImGz. GNU Free Documentation License.

Ten Ways to Cope with a Budget Shortfall

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Susan-B.-Anthony-Dollar

Argh! I’m busted, disgusted, and can’t be trusted! By yesterday morning, my discretionary budget was $2.26 in the black, with two days to go to the end of the budget cycle. But, having stayed out of grocery stores for a good two weeks, I was running out of food. I had to make a grocery run, leaving me with about a $25 shortfall for the month.

Thank goodness today is the end of this month’s budget cycle. Tomorrow is another day. A major grocery-run day, we might add.

Even after applying $700 from savings to cover the clothes shopping frenzy, I started this month’s budget very thin. Right off the bat, a dentist’s bill sucked $232 from my $800 allowance. That would have been tolerable. But then the air-conditioning guy blindsided me with a $467 bill, blithely doing some work at the downtown house without telling me first what it would cost.

$800 – $232 – $467 = not enough $ to live on for a month!

When you come right down to it, surviving only $25 in the red after the budget was reduced to $101 for a month’s worth of food, gasoline, dog care, and house maintenance is pretty amazing. With a few simple strategies (and some mildly onerous belt-tightening), I managed to get through the month without having to visit the pawn shop.

So, how can you cope when you see a budget shortfall coming your way?

1. Plan way ahead. While you’re in the black, realize that sooner or later a time will come when you’ll miss your budget goal.

• In flush times, stock up on staples and frozen food.

Example: Because my freezer was full of chicken, pork, beef, and fish bought in prior months, at no time this month did I have to buy meat. Pantry shelves also held enough pasta, rice, beans, and canned goods to supplement the frozen meat and veggies.

• Grow a garden. At the very least, have a few herbs and veggies growing in pots.

Example: Even though it’s the tail end of the season, the chard in the backyard has been edible all month. Thanks to the oranges on the trees, I haven’t had to buy juice all winter, and the lemons added to cooking and made salad dressings.

• Build an emergency fund. This should go without saying.

2. Leave the car in the garage. Don’t drive anywhere unless absolutely necessary, and when you do, plan trips to hit several destinations along the way, limiting the number of times you have to go out in the car. This has several benefits:

• Obviously, the less you drive, the less you’ll spend on gas.

• Not driving means staying out of stores. Staying out of stores preserves capital. You discover you can go a lot longer between grocery-store runs than you thought, and that those little repair jobs that might send you to Home Depot can wait for a while.

• If you walk to a grocery store, you can only carry so much home. This will limit your purchases to what you really need.

3. Eat at home. I’ll say that again: Eat at home!

• Never eat in restaurants when you’re short on cash.

• Brown-bag your lunch to work or school.

• Make your own bread to help save on grocery bills. It’s cheaper and tastes a lot better than most grocery-store loaves.

4. Eat well, but eat less. This is a good time to go on a diet.

• Cut portion sizes.

• Prepare dishes that lend themselves to leftovers, such as stews, roasts, and pasta dishes, and then be careful not to pig out the first time they appear on the dinner table.

5. Get off the sauce.

• A bottle of wine or beer is a hole into which to pour empty calories and money.

6. If you smoke, cut back as far as you can without suffering intolerable discomfort.

• A cigarette is a torch with which to set fire to cash.

7. Do without. If you don’t need something right this minute, chances are it can wait until after the budget crisis passes.

• A burned-out lightbulb, an empty bottle of vitamins, a dead triple-A battery can be replaced later.

8. Substitute creatively. If you run out of something you regard as crucial, look around for something that can take its place for awhile.

• Woolite or unscented dish detergent works well as shampoo.

• Ordinary hand cream is the same stuff that’s in expensive face creams.

• Hand soap worked into a thick lather works as well as shaving foam.

• Baking soda works in place of toothpaste.

• Vinegar substitutes nicely for Windex.

• Rice or pasta can take the place of potatoes, to good effect.

9. Return stuff. If you’ve recently bought something that you don’t need to use right away, take it back.

10. Drink water, coffee, or tea, not pop.

• Another good excuse to start a diet! Water is free; home-brewed ice tea  or iced coffee is very cheap. All are better for you than soda pop.