I slept until almost 8:00 this morning. As soon as I dressed Suzette and I walked ½ mile after which she left for work and I made breakfast. I toasted two pieces of French baguette, spread cream cheese on them and the lay slices of Gravad Lax on one and whitefish on the other plus thin slices of red onion a drank a cup of green tea with breakfast.
I then took a shower and was ready to work by 10:00.
I worked on a pleading with a client until 12:30 and then made lunch.
I had seen the two Italian sweet sausages in the meat drawer and decided to use 1 to make Mapo Dofu a La Buffet King. I admire the way Buffet King make Mapo Dofu because it is a perfect example of efficiency without sacrificing flavor. Instead of stewing ingredients for an hour. The chef at Buffet King dices soft tofu and stir fries it with sausage and chili paste. Super easy and fast. I diced about ½ cup each of onion and yellow squash and garlic and stir fried those ingredients in the wok with some peanut oil. After the vegetables cooked I added the diced sausage and about 1 tsp. of garlic/chili paste. After the sausage turned gray I added about 7 oz. of firm tofu, 1 T. of Chinese Cooking wine, a few dashes of sesame oil, and several slices of ginger root.
In a separate sauce pan I had filled 1/3 full of water I boiled 1 bunch of egg white noodles until tender in about ten minutes.
I drained the noodles to the wok and covered them with the ingredients so the noodle would take on the flavors of the Mapo Dofu.
Soon everything was mixed and I teased out a plate full of noodles and Mapo Dofu. It was delicious. Better than Buffet King because I used less chili sauce and more Chinese Cooking wine.
I worked until 4:30, except at 2:30 I checked the market and found that my portfolio had increased about 1% thanks mainly to a $13.00 increase in Moderna.
Actually this was a great day for my portfolio because today my portfolio doubled in value from the day Willy went to Dublin for graduate school on September6, 2013. This means that my portfolio
experienced an annual compounded increase of approximately 9% during that 6 year and 9 month period.
At 4:30 I started to roast the chicken for dinner. I took it out of the bag and washed it out. Then I went to the garden and picked six or seven sprigs of tarragon. When I returned to the kitchen I trussed the chicken on a Spandex frame and cut a clove of garlic into slices and sliced a lemon.
I slid sprigs of tarragon, and slices of lemon and garlic under the skin of the chicken into the gap down between the breast and the thigh and high on the breast on both sides of the chicken. Then I placed the Spandex trussed chicken into a ceramic baking dish and added 1/3 inch of water and Suzette helped me place the ceramic baking dish into a 400 degree oven for twenty minutes and then Suzette lowered the temperature to 350 degrees and toasted the whole chicken for 90 minutes.
I diced broccoli and squash and placed it in the steamer with water. With ten minutes of cooking time left for the chicken I started the steamer. I checked the fridge for a starch and found Couscous with black beans and heated that for 2:22 in the microwave.
We made a cheese sauce. We first made a roux of flour and butter and after several minutes to allow
the flour to cook I slowly began adding milk as a Suzette stirred. I had grated about 1 cup of Jarlsberg cheese and we added that to the sauce and Suzette stirred the sauce.
Suzette removed the chicken from the oven and I carved the hind quarters off the chicken and separated the leg from the thigh and placed a thigh on each plate. Suzette plated the plates with squash and broccoli and doused them with cheese sauce. I added couscous to my plate.
We had open bottles of Benton Lane 2016 rose and Santa Maria Sauvignon Blanc, so I poured one wine into each glass. Suzette took the rose and I drank the Sauvignon Blanc with ice cubes. We took our wine glasses and plates to the garden where it was cooking a bit and enjoyed dinner as the sun set.
After dinner we drove downtown to see the mural exhibit. We were looking for one by Suzette’s graphic designer. I could only walk from 8th to 1st on central. I asked Suzette to fetch the car and pick me up. She was upset that I would not walk back to the car. When she arrived with the car after about 25 minutes I got in and she turned the corner at 1st and again at Gold to drive west toward home and I spied the mural between 3rd and 4th. Suzette got out and took a picture. When she returned to the car, she said, “I never would have seen the mural if I had not picked you up.” It’s funny how things seem to work out.
Bon Appetit
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