This is the week that never ends! It just goes on and on, my friends! I do not know this actual song! So won’t you bong bong bong bong bong!
Guys, I’m so tired.
But! Here is what we ate this week, including a New Sandwich:
SATURDAY
Bagel, egg, sausage, and cheese sandwiches
Shopping day, easy peasy supper
SUNDAY
Grilled steak and chimichurri, asparagus, bread, strawberry shortcake
Sunday was Father’s Day, of course, and Damien was actually gone most of the day driving one of the kids to a thing, so I made my best guess at what he would want for dinner. I did okay! A nice batch of chimichurri made in the food processor with curly parsley and Italian parsley, lots of garlic, hot pepper flakes, salt, red wine vinegar, and olive oil.
About an hour before dinner, I salted and peppered the steaks, which Damien offered to grill outside, because they’re yummy that way. When they were just about done, I threw some asparagus on a tray and drizzled it with olive oil and sprinkled on some kosher salt, and broiled it for juuuuust a few minutes.
So we had nice little steaks with chimichurri, snappy asparagus with lemon, and fresh bread and butter. Quite nice.
For dessert, I went with strawberry shortcake, but I decided to try a new cake recipe — one that’s more like those little golden spongecakes you get at the supermarket, rather than actual shortcake. I followed this recipe from Feast and Farm. I doubled it and baked the batter in twelve large ramekins. They turned out great.
They tasted, uh, kind of like Twinkies. No complaints!
So I chopped up a bunch of strawberries and set them to macerate with sugar and a little vanilla, and I whipped up some cream, and we all had what I call a “schlorp ‘n’ blorp” dessert, which means first you schlorp on a scoop of strawberries on, then you blorp some cream on top.
This doesn’t actually require its own category, because I don’t think I make any other schlorp ‘n’ blorp desserts besides strawberry shortcake. Anyway, it was good, and I got to annoy the children, so win-win.
MONDAY
Cemita sandwiches, watermelon
New sandwich! New sandwich to me! This is a Mexican sandwich that you can apparently make with any kind of meat. Chicken breast was on sale, so there you go. Here is the recipe I followed, from Serious Eats.
I cut the breasts in half lengthwise and pounded them flat, and dipped them in egg, then flour, then egg again, then bread crumbs; and then I fried them in a little oil.
Then I salted and peppered the cutlets and served them on soft sesame seed brioche buns. On the bottom was a layer of sliced avocado, then the chicken, then a bunch of string cheese torn into strings, then raw onion rings, then pickled jalapeños, fresh cilantro, and some more cheese, and then a little olive oil.
I was skeptical about this sandwich, especially since I had forgotten to buy some of the things I wanted for it (chipotle chiles in adobo) and I had defaulted to the less-interesting option for a lot of ingredients (cilantro rather than papalo; mozzarella rather than queso oaxaca), and I thought it might be dry.
WELL IT WAS NOT. IT WAS DELICIOUS. It was a tasty, interesting, well-balanced sandwich with everything one could want, and I almost ate my own hand in my hurry to gobble it up. So there! I think I may try {gulp} chicken fried pork next time.
I also chopped up a big watermelon for a side dish. I gave 1/4 of the watermelon to the ducks, and let me tell you, it was a savage spectacle. Juice flying everywhere; bills dripping, black eyes, like a doll’s eyes.
TUESDAY
Spaghetti with sausage sauce
Tuesday was hot and bright and humid, so of course I cooked up some sausage and we had spaghetti with sausage sauce. Hot. Hah. Humid. Huh. Oh well. Food is food.
WEDNESDAY
Porcfest!
The kids at home had corn dogs, but Damien and I drove way up north to cover PorcFest, which does not mean “pork,” but porc as in porcupine, as in libertarians, because like the majestic porcupine they are prickly and,,, eat garbage, I don’t know.
We got there the evening before the event we wanted to cover, which was RFK’s speech, and had a lovely dinner at a restaurant in a nearby town, the Littleton Freehouse. We split an appetizer of baked goat cheese with roasted tomatoes and garlic with rosemary and balsamic reduction with toasted sourdough points,
and then I had a peach and tomato burrata salad with prosciutto.
Both absolutely exquisite. Some will say that this is too much cheese at a single sitting, but to those people, I will say, no it’s not.
THURSDAY
Nachos
Thursday we had some hotel coffee, then turned down several offers of food at the Porcfest, including some incredibly filthy-looking raw oysters being dragged around in a wagon, and a “midsommer meal” courtesy of the New Vinland and Sovereign Love at the Spiritual Village, who had set out some plates of hard boiled eggs, which looked . . . smudged. Somehow I held out until we got to a gas station and then I got some prepackaged hummus and pretzels, and I drank my own drinks, too, which I had brought in from outside. Sorry, everyone is always all “not ALL libertarians,” and yet every single libertarian is someone I would not accept food from, not at midsomer, not at any time, so there you go.
We drove home through some very glorious mountain ranges, and made a quick stop at Clark’s Trading Post to see what the deal was. I’ve been seeing these flyers my whole life, but have never been there.
So we stopped by, and I feel like I still don’t understand. Maybe we’ll go back this summer and actually pay for tickets. A bear show, a water slide, and a train with some guy shooting at you might actually just about hit the spot. Better than all those damn art museums your mother is always dragging you to, oh wait, that’s me. Well, I also like bears.
So we came home and poor Damien, who is a real journalist instead of a fake one like me, had to start writing right away, but EYE made some nachos — first running out to buy some cheese from the convenience store (FOR THIRTEEN DOLLARS) because apparently my nacho planning does not include cheese purchase.
I did write up my whole experience at PorcFest, and I don’t know if the essay is to weird and long to go to print, but if it does, I’ll let you know!
FRIDAY
It was supposed to be pepper and egg sandwiches, but I started dragging stuff out of the fridge, discovered we were almost out of eggs, and almost had a nervous breakdown at the thought of running to the convenience store again, so Damien pointed out there is actually tons of food in the house, and we could just have leftoverpalooza. So that, is what, we did.
This, and a tray of nachos. I just don’t ever know how much food to make, so I make tons and tons every day.
As a former resident of NH, I would be very interested in seeing your essay about porcfest. I’d moved out before most of the libertarians moved in, so I don’t know much about the fest.
Have you made Mexican tortas? They’re a cousin of cemitas: soft French bread roll, thin layer of refried beans, tomato, avocado, sliced white onion, pickled jalapeños or some adobo from a can of chipotles, mayonnaise or butter if you want, and whatever combo of meat/cheese/fried egg strikes your fancy.
Maybe the schlorp’n’blorp category should be for more than just dessert, and you could add items that way. Tex-Mex chicken skillet over rice: a scoop of rice, a schlorp of Tex-Mex chicken/vegetables/cheese (or is it just mine that came out schlorpy when I made it?), then a blorp of sour cream or guac. Or, for breakfast, a biscuit with a schlorp of sausage gravy and…a poached egg blorped on top? That one’s a stretch (and a great big dose of cholesterol), but hey.