Today

This entry is going to be all over the place, so have a seat.
Even though we're eating like we ought to now, I allow us the once-a-week pleasure of having a piece of toast, an egg, and three pieces of bacon for breakfast.  Today was the day.  

I was planning our dinner (at noon) when the oldest grandson showed up.  His visit was fortuitous, since the food I was going to cook needed to be split three ways, rather than two, in order for us to stay within our calorie limits.  

I didn't plan on doing anything but the necessary cooking and chores today.  I was going to read my book.  However, I had a churn half-full of cream, so I made butter.  Bonnie's calf is getting to the point of taking all Bonnie's milk, so I won't have such an excess of cream from now on.  Of course, we are not eating butter by the pound.  I've been putting it in the freezer.  Today I wrapped 1/4- and 1/2-cup amounts to use on popcorn and in recipes.

All I will have to do is open a freezer bag and get out as much as I need.    

When we butchered the little deer Heather shot for us, we ground all of it except for four steaks from the tenderest part of the deer.  I have never liked deer meat unless it's ground and mixed with a lot of ground beef, but Cliff said the steaks should really be good from such a young doe.  I finally got around to fixing those little steaks this week.  I wasn't looking forward to eating them, but I did want to give it a try.  I did a quick Internet search and found THIS.

• "Season the venison steaks with dry meat tenderizer if desired, and melt one tablespoon of butter per steak in the skillet over high heat. Add onion slices to the skillet and fry until wilted. Move them to the side of the skillet and add the steaks.

  Sprinkle salt and pepper over the venison if desired, and fry for thirty seconds before flipping. Continue flipping every thirty seconds until the steaks are done. A meat thermometer can be used to determine the doneness. The steaks will be rare at 120 degrees F and medium at 130 degrees F. Remove the steaks at 125 degrees F because they will rest after cooking, and the temperature will rise by an additional 5 to 10 degrees."

I figured all that onion might cover the venison flavor, and I guess it did: you would not believe how good that meat was!  Cliff absolutely raved about it, and said if somebody gets us a deer next year, the loin will NOT be ground up.  I didn't check degrees or anything like that, just flipped them a few times.
  
Last summer I shared my extra tomatoes and sweet potatoes with someone on Facebook that I hardly knew.  Believe it or not, it's hard to find anybody who will actually go to the trouble of harvesting, canning, and freezing garden produce, but from things Christine said on Facebook, I was sure she would.  I hate for things to go to waste.
Well, recently she acquired a bushel of onions at a good price, and she shared twelve pounds (I think it was) with me.  I diced and froze enough to make more than a gallon when I first got them home, but the tears flowed so freely that I procrastinated about doing the rest.  Today I peeked into the bag of onions and saw that they are starting to sprout.  I knew it was crying time again because, as I said, I hate waste.

Cry I did.  As I went to the living room to get the Kleenex, a stale scrap of knowledge from long ago leaked out of the recesses of my brain.  Didn't I read in Ann Landers when I was in my twenties that if you do the onions next to your kitchen sink and keep a stream of cold water running while you're dicing them, it would help prevent the burning and tears?  
Thank the dear Lord and Ann Landers, it worked!  

I have become disillusioned with teflon in the past few years.  Since getting a dishwasher four years ago, those non-stick pans haven't been lasting long.  Finally I got smart enough to do some research and found out you aren't supposed to wash no-stick pans in a dishwasher.  I'm going back to stainless steel!  

      I have three wonderful, heavy pans my mom gave me:  the above gallon one, a three-quart one, and a skillet.  She paid a fortune for them, but obviously they were worth the money.  However, I wanted something cheaper.  By the way, there is a gallon of skim milk in that pan.  It's sour, and once it clabbers, it will become cottage cheese.  

I shopped Amazon and found some Farberware pans; I ordered a two-quart pan just to see if it was heavy enough to suit me.  I received it today, and indeed, it will do.  Oh, it's only about 1/4 the weight of my mom's pans, but it'll do me just fine.  I tossed a nasty old T-Fal pan in the trash as soon as I saw my new one.  Today I ordered a Farberware double boiler (two pans), and I'm pretty sure that's all I'm going to need around here.  I do intend to keep one T-Fal skillet, and I may buy a small T-Fal pan to use for our oatmeal and Cream of Wheat, simply because those tend to stick.  Other than that, I'm sticking to stainless steel and my cast iron skillets.  

How's this for random?