Saturday, September 30, 2017

Saturday Stories 09-30-17

Diane is a "foodie" at heart!  She remembers so many favorite restaurants and meals over her lifetime.  One of the early memories is from her year of working at the main library in her hometown.  Her job was to fetch books from the stacks at the request of the librarians.  It was a fascinating job, being able to look at every single book in the library.  Of course, there wasn't much time during her working hours, but enough to have a read every now and then.  But the memory she cherishes is of a small diner down the street.   It was just a counter and a row of red stools along one side of the room.  No space for anything else.  The owner/chef was an old (or so it seemed to her) guy who was a cook in the Navy, now retired.  One of the things he did she has never forgotten, but discovered that it is a common trick among diner cooks.  Order a warmed Danish and he would plop a lettuce leaf on his grill, top it with the pastry, and cover it with a pot lid.  In a minute or less the pastry would be warm and soft and read to eat.  Amazing then, before microwaves, and still is today.  The best thing about this diner was the pies, made on the premises, early in the morning.  Diane's favorite was the peach pie, when fresh peaches were available.  Such peachy flavor, such flakey pastry, such creamy thick juice holding it together.  Along with a glass of milk it was breakfast or lunch or dinner.  The memory is now sixty years old and it still makes her mouth water.  No other peach pie has ever been so good, even the ones she has made herself. 
 
 
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Friday Feet 09-29-17

Bud, one of the Leakey cats, went over the rainbow bridge several years ago.  But I still have pictures of him in my photo files.  He was a very stand-offish cat, but very graceful.  He did the most amazing stretches.  We never stop missing our pets, even if they aren't actually ours!
 
 
 
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Wednesday, September 27, 2017

Not completely Wordless Wednesday 09-27-17

 
Also - Carol looked online for the recipe for the dessert we had yesterday at Solare.
You can find it on yesterday's blog.
 
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Tuesday, September 26, 2017

Today's Dessert 09-26-17

I showed you Korean dinner last night, tonight I share dessert.  I drove today to San Diego with my friends Carol and Teresa, to see the current exhibits at Visions Art Museum: Contemporary Quilts and Textiles. 
 
Afterward we walked to the other end of the block to have lunch at Solare, an fine Italian restaurant.  This week is Restaurant Week in San Diego so Solare offers a special menu.  Teresa had gnocchi and Carol and I had the salmon with roasted veggies.  We all prefaced this with the delicious salad with baby greens/pears/candied walnuts/ gorgonzola cheese - one of my most favorite salads. 
 
I thought I could look up the dessert menu online, but their site doesn't list desserts.  This one is 60% chocolate with nuts and, I think, dried fruit, topped with a wondrous gelato with bits of nougat in it. 
 
Update.....09-27-17 - Carol looked online for the recipe for the dessert it is called:  
 giada-de-laurentiis/chocolate-dessert-salami
and the URL is: 
 
It does look like salami doesn't it?  Maybe not quite as red. 
It was easily divided because there were three slices of the chocolate "roll".  We shared the gelato and the raspberry puree.  I ate the raspberry.

We thought at first glance that there was whipped cream on top, but discovered it is a tiny meringue.

Closeup to see the bits of nougat in the gelato. M-m-m-m, good.
 
It was a great day with nice temperatures, but 95F back home in Placentia.  We were gone about 7-1/2 hours and poor KoKo stayed home alone.  He was a good boy. 
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Monday, September 25, 2017

Korean Dinner Again 09-25-17

I went with Carol and Dick to the Korean restaurant tonight.  It was packed - on a Monday night at 6pm.  I'm glad we got a table right away.  We were the only Caucasian people there. 
 
I was disappointed in my chicken, one of their special dishes,  This is what it looked like.  The chicken was about the size of a Cornish game hen and the liquid was very bland.  The round dark thing the waitress said is a date.  I haven't tried it yet. 

You can see the size of it a little better here.  It still had it's skin on.
I ate the legs and the wings and brought the rest home to "doctor" for dinner tomorrow night.   They did supply salt/pepper mix for seasoning, it is in the picture below. 
 
Here are some of the side dishes and you can see Carol's chicken dish at the top right.
In the lower right is the dish of salt/pepper for my chicken. 
 
Clockwise from top : Cabbage in "pink sauce", Kimchee, cucumbers in spicy sauce, seaweed with hot red sauce.
 

At the top is Dick's Bimimbop - rice, meat, veggies, a fried egg.
 

Carol and I were served bowls of rice to go with our main course. 
 
When they bring the bill the serve everyone a cup of cold ginger liquid.  It is sort of thick and not at all spicy.  Very good after the assorted strong tastes of the little dishes. 

New Addition to TCQC 09-24-17

The SAQA online auction is continuing through Oct 8.  The second section will be up for bid on Monday.  See:  http://www.saqa.com/auction-view.php?scat=60&s=0

I purchases one quilt this past week and it arrived Priority Mail today - a Sunday!
All the information I have on this quilt is what is on the SAQA auction site.  The label carries only the name of the quilt and the name of the maker, Robin Fischer. 


.  "Circles"  Robin Fischer  2017  12"x12"
Hand dyed cotton with soy wax batik, machine quilted
 
It is nicely quilted in spirals in the circles and around the small motifs. 
A nice addition to the collection. 
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