June 24, 2021 Lunch - 2000 Vietnam Dinner - a well dressed roasted chicken with roasted potatoes, steamed cauliflower and broccoli, and Tzatziki
Every day seems meaningful when you are engaged fully in every moment.
Today was one of those days that came close to full engagement.
I slept until 6:30 which is beginning to look like a new world’s record.
I ate a bowl of granola, with milk, yogurt, banana slices and blueberries at 7:00 and watched the market take on another day of big gains on the Dow and lesser moves on the NASDAQ. At 7:30 after Suzette watered some of the plants in the back yard we walked 1.2 mile in the neighborhood. Mi am beginning to feel better as I exercise every day, alternating between walking and biking.
Suzette then went to work and I worked until 9:00, when I drove to Albertson’s. I receive a weekly brochure identifying specials and there were three that got my attention this week. I bought two whole chickens for $.77/lb., a package of country style pork ribs for $1.27/lb. that I will BBQ, and two 1.5 quart containers of Dreyer ice cream for $4.00.
I also bought three rainbow trout and a gallon of milk. I love Albertsons’ fresh trout. I think Albertsons raises its own beautiful trout in Idaho.
I arrived home with the groceries at around 11:00 and rested and showered, shaved, and dressed.
Peter arrived at 1:15 just as I finished making 2 glasses of Vietnamese iced coffee. Peter brought me a No. 31, which is fried egg rolls on rice vermicelli noodles, on top of lettuce, mung bean sprouts, and julienned strips of cucumber. Served with small containers of seasoned fish sauce that are used to moisten and flavor the noodles.
I really enjoyed my lunch.
Peter ordered a dish with a fried chicken; LRG quarter on a bed of seasoned rice accompanied by a container containing orange sauce. “I wanted to try something different”, he said.
I said,”If they can do that dish with a duck leg I would eat there every day.”
Peter reminded me that I even though I have eaten at 2000 Vietnam for years, I have yet never delved very deeply into its menu offerings. Why would I when I love their fried egg rolls and I had in front of me a container full of them.
We finished lunch a few minutes before 2:00. I made Peter another glass of Vietnamese iced coffee, fetched the chocolate wafer cookies, and set up my computer on the TV room table and connected by zoom with the book club group. Our book was Behind the Forever Beautifuls that chronicles life in a Mumbai slum. It was a depressing look at life among the poorest of India’s citizens.
I had been watching the market all morning as it slowly contracted from a very healthy open. After the meeting at around 4:00 I checked my portfolio and found that it had gained .75%. Impressive when compared to the Bitcoin Winter that had taken hold of the Bitcoin market due to the Chinese government’s regulations against Bitcoin miners in China.
My guess is that the announcement today of a bi-partisan agreement in the Senate on a infrastructure bill will power this mini rally in tech and the broader market forward for another few days although more slowly.
My portfolio has risen in value over 4% during the last two weeks, accounting for almost half of this year’s growth. That kind of growth is unsustainable over a longer period of time but exceedingly satisfying.
At 5:00 I meditated for thirty minutes and discovered a closed AC vent during walking meditation. As I opened the vent and felt the rush of cool air in my face I thanked the Buddha for these moments of awareness.
The Roasted Chicken
When I told Suzette my plan to buy a chicken this morning, we discussed roasting a chicken for dinner, so I had thawed one of the chickens I bought today and a bit before 6:00 unwrapped it, rinsed it, dried it, and impaled it on a metal baking frame p. As I set it in a 9 X 9 inch Pyrex baking dish to catch the drippings Suzette arrived and we had a brief discussion about how to flavor the chicken that generally encompassed stuffing rosemary and garlic under the skin and filling the stomach cavity with oregano and lemon juice. We ended up doing all of the above. I went to the garden and picked five or six sprigs of rosemary and three or four long stalks of oregano. When I returned to the kitchen I removed the chicken from the rack and stuffed the oregano stalks inside the stomach cavity and re-impaled the chicken on the rack and placed 1/2 of a lemon in the neck cavity at the top of the rack.
I then slid the rosemary sprigs under the skin of the chicken. Suzette then asked me to mince two cloves of garlic from a garlic bulb she picked in our garden this morning that she mixed with about 3 or 4 oz. of butter and she pushed under the skin of the chicken with the rosemary.
Suzette pre-heated the oven to 450 degrees and in a couple of minutes Suzette poured a cup of water into the bottom of the baking dish and we put the chicken into the oven and baked it at 450 degrees for fifteen to twenty minutes and then reduced the heat to 350 and baked it for an additional forty-five minutes. We should have roasted the chicken at 375 for an hour because it was red and undercooked when we took it out.
We cured that by cooking the leg quarters we intended to eat for dinner in the microwave for a few minutes and returned the rest in the baking dish to the oven with the temp turned off to finish cooking the breast.
Roasted Potatoes
Never wanting to waste a hot oven, I suggested roasting several of the russet and sweet potatoes I bought at El Super on Monday and Suzette concurred. So Suzette fetched three russets and two sweet potatoes and I fetched a 9 X 13 inch baking dish and after she peeled the sweet potatoes, I diced the five potatoes and placed the pieces in the baking dish.
Suzette then tossed the pieces of potato in olive oil and the remaining garlic infused butter, covered the baking dish with aluminum foil and placed the baking dish in the oven beside the chicken.
Suzette’s comment at this point was,”We have already made one of the fishes for tomorrow night. I will sauté the remaining potatoes into home fries for the trout.”
Suzette had picked a bunch of mint and I chopped about 2/3 cup to toss with the roasted potatoes when they come out of the oven.
Tzatziki
I had bought a 32 oz. container of yogurt at Sprouts last Wednesday and three cucumbers for $.99 and a bag of limes at El Super on Monday, so I had everything I needed to make tzatziki.
I peeled two cucumbers and diced them into 1/3 inch cubes and put the cubes in a medium mixing bowl. I then peeled and pressed two cloves of fresh garlic into the bowl and then added about 1 cup of yogurt and the juice of 1 1/2 limes plus 1/2 tsp. salt. I then went to the garden and carefully picked about 1 T. of fresh dill from the tiny plants in one of the raised beds and picked two sprigs of mint and minced those and added them to the Tzatziki. The cool fresh cucumber salad was refreshing, although I added a T. of olive oil too give it a more sauce like texture.
Steamed Vegetables
I de-flowered six or seven flowerets from a head of cauliflower and a head of broccoli, placed them in the steamer basket and filled the steamer with water to just under the basket and placed it on the stove.
Suzette steamed the vegetables when she determined there was about five minutes left of cooking time on the chicken.
At 7:45 we were ready to eat just in time for this week’s episode of Midsomer Mystery. Suzette plated a microwaved chicken leg quarter on each plate and added a spoonful of steamed broccoli and cauliflower and roasted potatoes.
I poured two glasses with Hermann Weimer Salmon Run Riesling and added two ice cubes to each and we spooned Tzatziki onto our plates as Midsomer Mystery began.
Dinner was a huge amount of food, but after the first half of the 1 1/2 hour Suzette suggested dessert. I reminded her that we had bought four French pastries at Chez Mamou yesterday. Her response, “wonderful!”.
I fetched a new bottle of cognac from the basement and started boiling tea water while Suzette cut one chocolate ganache and one almond Frangipani dessert in half and placed half of each on two small plates.
We ate the pastries with sips of cognac and I drank a cup of tea with mine.
My comment was, “This may not be as good as being in France, but it is pretty close.”
After Midsomer Mystery, we watched an episode of a new Danish series about a seaside resort near Hornbaek on the north coast of Zealand north of Copenhagen.
When the Danish show ended at 10:30 we crawled into bed.
The good news is that the pain in my joints has diminished noticeably since I have begun exercising every day and taking turmeric capsules and collagen tablets. There may be light at the end of the tunnel.
Bon Appetit
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