Eating with Bob and Suzette: June 2023

Friday, June 30, 2023

June 29, 2023. lunch - Vietnam 2000 Dinner - Broccoli Couscous with Dirty Rice and BBQ Shrimp.

I ate granola with yogurt, milk, and grapes for breakfast.

I then prepared notes for the Unbearable Lightness of Being and got dressed.

I picked Charlie and Peter up around 11:30 and arrived at Vietnam 2000 at noon. All nine members showed up and said they enjoyed lunch. I ordered No. 30, Marinated and grilled pork and fried egg rolls on vermicelli rice noodles with mung bean sprouts, lettuce and herbs on the bottom.

At 1:00 we drove to my house and gathered around the dining room table and discussed the book. It turned out that many were not impressed by the book and thought it was intellectual gobbledygook gook. I served Campo de Reves Pinot Noir from Anderson Valley and Falerio white from Italy plus grapes, peanuts, and cherries. Both wines were delicious. I particularly liked the Anderson Valley red.

At 3:30 I served Clafoutis with ice cream and whipped cream after the discussion.

Pradip looked at my shell collection and Keith stayed to taste slivovitz.

Walt came by and tasted slivovitz and Suzette arrived around 4:30.

Walt showed his new cloth raised bed shading system that he is marketing to Suzette who wants to build one in Los Lunas and delivered a box of Edible New Mexico magazines.

I lay down after everyone left at 5:00 and napped until Suzette awakened me at 5:45.

She wanted to heat the PPI BBQ Shrimp and Dirty Rice. I asked for the addition of a green vegetable. The only green vegetable we had was broccoli. Suzette suggested grinding some of the broccoli into Couscous sized granularity and sautéing it with the dirty rice and shrimp.

She shelled the shrimp and boiled the shells to yield a richly flavored stock and then food processed and sautéed the Broccoli couscous and then added the dirty rice, while I cut each shrimp into four pieces and added the shrimp to the sauté skillet mixture.

Soon dinner was ready and it was sensational. The flavors of the Cajun BBQ Shrimp were a little lighter and the broccoli added a little lighter lift to the rice it was blended with. The mixture of ingredients into a one dish meal produced bites of shrimp, couscous, and rice that were wonderful in part due to the Union of flavors that were previously sharply independent.

I drank a glass of the bubbly Venetian rose with dinner and Suzette drank a Dos Equis beer.

After dinner we watched a 1998 episode of Midsomer Mystery and then went to bed at 9:30.

I awakened at 12:45 and blogged this entry.

Bon Appetit

Wednesday, June 28, 2023

June 26, 2023 Breakfast - Fried Eggs and a Sausage patty with Strawberry Pancakes. Lunch - Steak Salad. Dinner - Pita Pocket Sandwiches with Quinoa Tabouli and sautéed BBQ Pork

I awakened at 8:00. At 9:00 I sautéed a sausage patty and two eggs and heated two PPI Strawberry pancakes that I garnished with yogurt and apricot preserves.

At 9:30 I walked to Laguna and back. I saw Knute Lee on the way and he seemed to be in poor health. The women around him fetched a chair for him to sit in as I walked by. He may not be fully weight bearing. I walked about .75 miles which is a new record for me and felt better toward the end of the walk as breakfast started providing energy.

I then started making Tabouli, but could not find any Bulgar so substituted quinoa, which I cooked for 35 minutes and had difficulty draining completely so it turned out to be a wet Tabouli. I minced a bunch of parsley, four large green onions, three tomatoes, and 2 1/2 Persian cucumbers and added the juice of a lemon and 1/2 cup of olive oil, salt, and a pressed clove of garlic plus. 2 cups of cooked quinoa.

At noon I picked fresh lettuce from the garden and made a steak salad, by adding the leftover piece of steak diced, a Roma tomato, two slices of Iberico cheese, a pickle, and slices of red onion and green olives to the bowl of fresh lettuce and dressed it with the Cesar dressing.

I also made an open face sandwich of slices of Gravad Lax and red onion on slices of toasted and buttered.baguette.

At 2:00 a watched TV a bit and finished reading the Unbearable lightness of Being.

I then checked my mail and finished my Schedule C for 2022 federal income tax.

The tech sector and the market collapsed today leaving my portfolio down 1.76% in the last two days.

Suzette came home at 5:00 and helped me make Clafoutis for book club.

Then we made dinner, which was simple. Suzette sliced a BBQ pork boneless rib and sautéed it and toasted two pitas. We sliced the pitas in half and filled each half with Tabouli, slices of pork and labni. I also added two dill pickles and a spoonful of red pickled turnips to my plate.

Suzette poured glasses of red wine and we had a lovely dinner and watched Rachel Maddow and then the soccer match between Panama and Costa Rico. Panama has a strong team and has won the first two matches in this year’s Concacaf competition.

Suzette had awaken early this morning so she went to bed at 8:30 and I drank a White Russian and stayed up to blog this entry.

We will make Chicken Liver pate tomorrow

Bon Appetit

June 25, 2023 Lunch - Scrambled Eggs with BBQ Pork and onion. Dinner - BBQ Shrimp with Dirty Rice.

Today was a day of cooking. Besides lunch and dinner we went shopping for alcohol, including two bottles of E and J brandy and Suzette made a batch of maraschino cherries.

I ate a pain chocolate with a glass of hot lemon water for breakfast at 8:00.

Then at noon I diced a piece of BBQ boneless pork and sliced a shallot and Suzette made Scrambled Eggs with BBQ Pork and onion slices with glasses of fresh squeezed orange juice.

After lunch I dressed and we went to Trader Joe’s where we bought 13 bottles of wine to replenish our everyday wines, including one or two bottles of Ferme Julien rose, a Famille Perrin Reserve Cotes du Rhone, a Barbera de Asti red, a Spanish Tempranillo, Pinot Grigio rose, and French Palantir plus a bottle of our favorite cognac Chevalier VS except it is now $22.95 instead of $19.95.

We then drove to Total Wine where we bought the brandy, a bottle of Amole XO cognac for $18.95 and six bottles of wine, including my favorite Italian white for the money, 2 Fidelsio?, 2 Chenin Blancs, a Spanish Rueda, and one more bottle.

We called Smith’s and they had chicken livers so we drove there next and found a Racalette and a wedge of French Affinois cheese in the discount bin. We also bought bottles of baby oil.

After we returned home and put up the groceries, I made a dipping sauce of Mayo, lemon juice and fresh dill and we ate the artichoke I boiled two days ago while we had a long talk with Luke.

After the conversation I diced eight mangos, garlic, 1 1/2 serrano chilis, a shallot and 1 1/2 T. of ginger root while Suzette mixed the liquid for the maraschino cherries and bottled six or seven bottles of maraschino cherries.

Then Suzette gathered and measured the spices, including clove powder, coriander, cumin, cayenne, and turmeric and sautéed the ingredients and spices and added four cups of sugar, 2 cups of raisins and two cups of water and the diced mango and cooked the mixture for two hours to make mango chutney.

The Mango Chutney

While the mango chutney was cooking, she made dirty rice using the Paul Prudhomme recipe and four of the chicken livers with a zucchini instead of a bell pepper, which I liked better.

She then made BBQ Shrimp using Prudhomme’s Louisiana Kitchen Cookbook recipe.

We drank Negra Modelos with the dinner of BBQ Shrimp over dirty rice for a fabulous dinner made extra special because we used the x large shrimp we bought at Costco.

We watched 60 Minutes, Ridley, and Endeavour on PBS and then went to bed.

Bon Appetit

Saturday, June 24, 2023

June 24, 2023 Lunch - Salmon Sashimi with Seared Shrimp. Dinner - Grilled Rib Steak with Spaghetti squash Pancakes and Steamed Asparagus

I awakened at 9:00.

For breakfast we ate slices of the freshly cured Gravad Lax on Kaufman’s bagels with slices of onion and tomato.

We watched the news of Wagner Group’s advance on Moscow and then it’s standing down transfixed until 11:00 when we drove to Home Depot and then El Super.

At El Super we bought a half gallon of fresh squeezed orange juice, a white onion, avocados, cilantro, parsley, mangos, cucumber, Persian cucumbers, yogurt, a 12 pack of Negra Modelo, Roma tomatoesand three bags of cherries that were $1.50 per lb.

I wanted chicken livers to make chicken liver pate, so we drove to Nelson’s Meats on South Coors but they did not have any.

We went home and I sliced the tail section of the salmon fillet Suzette bought at Costco, 1 1/2 Persian cucumbers, I cooked four large heads on shrimp Suzette bought at Costco, and tore the rest of the bibb lettuce and sliced a green onion and avocado and placed them on a plate.

I then mixed wasabi and soy in a dipping bowl and put pickled ginger in another bowl and we drank beer and ate a sashimi lunch.

I then pitted cherries for clafoutis and then for maraschino cherries.

At 5:00 I lay down and slept until 7:30.

When I got up from my nap it was time to make dinner.

Suzette asked me if I wanted grilled potatoes of spaghetti squash pancakes. I said pancakes so Suzette mixed milk, Salt, pepper, and flour with the cooked spaghetti squash she had prepared several days ago.

We put canola oil in a skillet and cooked the squash pancakes just like regular pancakes.

We also steamed asparagus and Suzette grilled a rib steak on the grill.

I went to the basement and found several older bottles, including a 2012 Wellington Grenache that Suzette opened it and poured glasses while I sliced the steak that was cooked to medium rare.

The wine was wonderful. It expressed the clarity of a long cellared red. After dinner I toasted and buttered three small slices of baguette and sliced some brie cheese to eat on them to finish the bottle of wine.

At 8:30;we watched Father Brown and at 9:30, Death in Paradise, that was interrupted by a call from Willy from Bali, with whom we spoke for a while.

Later I ate a bowl of Clafoutis with whipped cream and a snifter of Calvados.

We watched the opening skit of Saturday Night Live and then zsuzette went to bed. I watched a few minutes of a police murder mystery starring Gillian Anderson and then blogged this entry.

We will make mango chutney, maraschino cherries, and clafoutis tomorrow.

Bon Appetit

June 23, 2023 Lunch - Pita Pocket Sandwiches Dinner - Cheese on bread and BBQ

At 4:00 a.m. in the morning I flipped the slices of salmon I started curing at 4:00 p.m. on ThursdayI. I cured the flip side until 8:30 p.m. A 24 to 30 hour cure is pretty standard for my curings. The variable is the tightness of the fit of the slices of salmon in the curing dish and the amount of curing medium. In this curing the fit was rather tight, so the curing proceeded rapidly.

Also the amount of salmon was less than 2 lb., so the traditional amount for curing 3 lb. of salmon was more than sufficient. Also I had more than enough dill weed, so there was decent separation and flow of curing medium between and around the salmon fillets for the curing medium of 1/2 cup of sugar, 2/3 cup of salt, and 1 tsp. of crushed black pepper to reach all the salmon flesh.

There was just enough of the old Gravad Lax left from the last cure for me to generously cover two slices of toasted bagel for breakfast at around 9:30.

I then drafted a deed for a client and began working on my 2022 taxes.

I rested from 2:30 to 3:30 and then made lunch.

I started nibbling on the PPI BBQ pork and enjoyed it so I toasted a pita and cut in half and filled both halves with slices of tomato, BBQ Pork, Tabouli, slices of onion, and labni. I also fetched four dolmas, five cracked green olives, and two dill pickles to fill the plate and create a substantial Middle Eastern meal. I drank water with lunch and after lunch drank a glass of kefir with mint to wash down my lunch.

This was the big meal of the day, like our lunch yesterday of z Vietnamese food at noon was the big meal of the day.

I now understand the logic of the Mediterranean or Indian diet, to get up in the cool of the morning and shop for groceries or pick ingredients. Then after a small breakfast to work or cook until the heat of the day becomes unbearable at 2:00. Then to eat the large meal of the day and then rest until 5:00 or 6:00 when the temperature begins to moderate. Then to work until 7:00 or 8:00 in the evening and finally to eat a smaller meal in the evening. The Spanish have even created a more sophisticated meal plan. After work they meet their friends for conversation over glasses of wine and small nibbles of food (tapas) and then eat a smaller dinner at 9:00 to 10:00 in the evening. This diet is attuned to the heat of their climate.

So when Suzette came home at 4:30 she had not eaten lunch, so she heated a bowl of rice with slices pork smothered in BBQ sauce as what turned out to be her belated lunch and early dinner.

We watched the news until 8:30 when I ate a few bites of cold BBQ pork and a toasted and buttered slice of baguette with Eberico cheese on it with a glass of Vara Tempranillo, sort of a tapa, and then we walked to the Country Club and back.

I have a regime of medication or am recovering from hip surgery to the point that keeps me mostly pain free so I can now begin to build my stamina. It is four blocks to the Country Club. Three months ago I could only walk one block. Now I am reaching the point of being able to walk the entire four blocks without pain. For me that is a level of success. I also am doing a little yoga to loosen the muscles a bit more.

When we returned home from our walk, Suzette went to bed at 9:00 because she had awaken at 6:30 and had a long day of work.

I stayed up reading a New Yorker article on the imprisonment of a Dubai daughter of the Sheik and ate a slice of knaecke brod spread with butter and Boursin cheese spread at 10:00 and went to bed at 11:30.

I awakened at 3:30 a.m. and blogged this blog and watched news of the Wagner forces March to Rostov on Don and what May be the beginning of a major shake up in Russian politics.

Perhaps as the weather is heating up we are adopting a more Mediterranean style of eating that should serve us well in Spain.

The big difference for me is that at sun rise at 5:30 instead of going to work I go back to bed and sleep until 7:00 or 8:00.

Bon Appetit

Thursday, June 22, 2023

June 22, 2023 Lunch - Vietnam 2000 Dinner - Clafoutis

I ate granola with yogurt, milk and grapes for breakfast.

At 11:45 when Suzette returned home we drove to Vietnam 2000.

Suzette ordered rice flour sheets with pork and egg rolls with fish sauce and I ordered banh, patted squares of vermicelli with lettuce leaves, basil, cilantro, a pile of fermented carrots and daikon, cucumber slices, and fish sauce.

Suzette had trouble separating multiple sheets and did not enjoy her dish.

I loved my dish I made lettuce wraps containing either a slice of grilled pork or a piece of egg roll or both with a square of patted vermicelli soaked in fish sauce with a slice of cucumber and cilantro and Thai basil with leaves of iceberg lettuce.

I loved the warm egg roll and pork in the cool lettuce with flavorful soaked vermicelli.

We were both hungry and cleaned our respective plates.

Suzette drank a glass of iced Vietnamese coffee.

Then we went home and I made a glass of Vietnamese coffee with 1/3 of a glass of brewed coffee, 1 T. of condensed milk, and the rest of the glass filled with ice and watched the market close. I was pleased that Amazon and Apple rose a bunch. This led to a .5% gain that allowed my portfolio to get back to within 13.33% of its all time high from being down 37% earlier this year.

When we returned home I worked for a while and clipped several roses and then a basket of fresh dill.

I then made Gravad lax by combining 1/2 cup of sugar, 1 tsp.of crushed black pepper, and 2/3 salt. I then lay dill on all sides of two salmon fillets and spread the mixture on each of the inside and outside sides in a Pyrex baking dish,covered it with Saran and weighed the salmon down with a brick.

I then rested until 6:00 when we planned our trip to Spain until 9:30 when Suzette went to bed.

I looked at more places to stay on the Atlantic coast of Galicia and found a penthouse apartment in Cambados that looked good.

Then I ate a bowl of Clafoutis with a cup of chai and a sip of Calvados and blogged this entry and went to bed at 11:30.

Bon Appetit

Wednesday, June 21, 2023

June 21, 2023 Breakfast - bagel and Gravad Lax with cream cheese, onion slices and capers. Lunch - open face sandwiches. Dinner - Tapas at Crystal and Doug’s house with Albariño

Today was Midsommer, so I had to eat Scandinavian food.

I started out eating Gravad Lax on a bagel with cream cheese, onion slices and capers for breakfast.

Then for lunch around 2:00 I made three open face sandwiches on slices of whole wheat bread; one was tomato slices on basil mayonnaise, one was pickled herring in wine sauce on sour cream and onion slices, and one was Jarlsberg cheese spread with mustard and salami on buttered toast and a green onion. This lunch was like those served at the Hand I Hand Group (Skandia Insurance Group) office where I worked in the summer of 1968 as an exchange student. There was a communal lunch room where the menu was always Danish open faced sandwiches, although the ingredients and arrangements altered occasionally. One of the things about Scandinavian cuisine is that there are traditional combinations of ingredients and traditional sandwiches, such as a slice of pickled beet and fried onions on a slice of roast beef or shrimp with dill mayonnaise or a slice of dill pickle on liver paste or Italian Salad, a lovely combination of vegetables held together by a thick creamy sauce. A typical lunch would be these four sandwiches on the thin slices of the dense Danish rye bread. The office was across Holmans Canal from the old castle and the Seaman’s’ Church. My job was to extend reinsurance premiums in a huge ledger book like Bob Chatchit in Dicken’s A Christmas Story.

That summer I lived at a student living complex called Paul Bergsoe in a small village outside Copenhagen named Sollerod. We celebrated Midsommer by grilling an entire reindeer and drinking lots of beer and Akquavit late into the night because it was still light until 10:00.

I worked on taxes in the afternoon and meditated at 4:15 until 4:45.

Then at 5:00 I napped until Suzette awakened me to go too Crystal and Doug’s at 6:00.

When we arrived we were greeted by three platters of tapas and glasses of Albariño. It was like going to a tapas bar in Spain.

One platter included slices of Spanish Iberico ham, chorizo, salami, and Manchego cheese with fig jam. Another platter contained a roasted head of cauliflower seasoned with spices including some chili and a delicious feta, sour cream and Mayo dip to dip the cauliflower flowerets into. A third platter contained the strawberry on goat cheese crostini Crystal made for the neighborhood cocktail party that I loved. And there was a bread plate filled with toasted slices of baguette and crackers.

It was an amazing spread and the Albariño was one I had not seen before.

I love Albariño and think Crystal and Doug are real wine and food connoisseurs, so I was pleased that they liked Albariño enough to buy a case of it and enjoyed drinking it with tapas, as we like to do.

At 8:30 we were full of tapas, wine and conversation, and said goodnight.

The sun was just setting with a luminous pink sky so we walked around the block to get a view of the sunset.

When we got home we collapsed and Suzette went to bed at 9:15 and I stayed up to blog and read.

It was a lovely Midsommer because I ate some of the Scandinavian foods I love and shared the excitement and foods and wine of our impending trip with friends which was wonderful.

Bon Appetit

June 20, 2023 Lunch - Salad. Dinner - Eggplant in Garlic Sauce with BBQ Pork and Snow Peas

I ate granola with milk and yogurt and grapes for breakfast. Then got dressed and at 9:30 in a light drizzle walked to the Country Club. On my way back I was met by my new client, Sharif, who drove me home and we spent the next 1 1/2 hours drafting an Application for Probate,

When he left a bit before noon, I went t the garden and picked a basket full of lettuce that is just now coming into full growth.

I added a diced tomato, a diced dill pickle, a piece of salami, thin slices of onion, and a slice of prosciutto diced.

I heated the remaining meat pie from Istanbul Cafe and added a scoop of labni and had a wonderful lunch.

I checked the Market and I was even with Thursday after a big drop on Friday and a small drop today thanks mainly to Nvidia.

At 5;00 Suzette came home and started calling stores to find burrata. She finally found it at Whole Foods, so we drove there and bought a container with one 8 oz. ball.

We discussed dinner as we drove and came up with a great menu using ingredients at home. Garlic Eggplant with BBQ Pork and Snow Peas.

I made rice and then peeled and cut an eggplant into 2 to 3 inch strips.

I diced a Pasilla chili and minced three cloves of garlic and about 1 lb. of the BBQ pork we made last night for dinner. While Suzette made the seasoning sauce.with Hoisin, soy, rice vinegar and cornstarch.

She fried the eggplant strips in the wok and then removed them from the wok band drained the grease from them.

She then stir-fried the diced Pasilla chili, garlic, and pork and added the sauce and finally the fried eggplant strips.

Suzette plated the rice and then piled the eggplant on top.

We ate heartily. I drank a glass of French Crayon rose that tastes almost like water it is so light and thus does not interfere with the flavors of the food (Trader Joe’s $6.99).

We then watched a silly movie on Netflix titled Love, Wedding, Repeat, until 9:45 when we went to bed,

Bon Appetit