I don’t get to write on Wednesdays. We get up early, guzzle coffee and gobble down a banana, then head straight into the production kitchen. Afterward, I eat lunch, shower, and get ready to dance with Kathleen for an hour at 3:00 pm, grocery shop, then teach dance classes from 5:45-7:45 pm. By the time we clean and sanitize the training room and I drive home, it’s almost 8:30 pm.
I have something pre-made for dinner so Marty just has to heat it up while I am driving home. After chugging down some wine, eating and STILL washing my dishes by hand (those bastards) it’s 9:30 pm. I’m done. ✔️
Yesterday morning when I was making coffee, I looked outside, and the sunshine was beautiful. Our house faces the East, and we get some beautiful sunrises. I re-arranged my side of the porch the day before and wanted to sit out there and have a cup of coffee and enjoy the sun. 20 minutes wouldn’t make or break the day.
Now my side of the porch is like a cozy little nook. When the couch was facing out to the street I always had to crane my neck to talk to anyone on the other side of the porch. Now I can look across the porch, or if I want to face the street, I sit sideways with my feet up on the couch.
Why did it take me so long to figure out this seating arrangement? Or better yet, why did it take me years to live in the moment and enjoy a little morning coffee and sunshine? The good news is that I figured these things out at the beginning of June and not at the end of the summer.
The guys planning trail rides on their 4 wheelers and dirt bikes.
As I was finishing writing this post, Noah stopped over. It was really nice having the four of us hanging out on the front porch together. I was sitting in my little nook while Marty, Sam, and Noah were sitting on the other side of the porch.
The light rain falling and the sounds of the crickets and peepers reminded me of the days when we used to go camping with our little pop-up camper when the boys were little. Those camping memories are awesome to have, and now we are making new ones right here on the front porch.
Don’t blink…one of my favorite photos of Sammy. ❤️
Yesterday, our son Sam who graduated from nursing school a couple of weeks ago, passed his nursing boards, making him officially an RN. A pretty impressive accomplishment for a 20-year-old; he turns 21 at the end of August.
Last summer, Sam worked in the hospital as an ER tech during the pandemic; he starts in July as an ER nurse in the same hospital. He will continue to run on rescue squad calls as well; he runs on adrenaline.
It’s hard to believe how fast our boys grew up; they say don’t blink, or you will miss it. When they were small, I realize now that I worried too much about small stuff like trying to be the perfect mother, wife, daughter, daughter-in-law, housekeeper, and cook. I was so focused on trying to do everything perfectly; I lost myself along the way. I didn’t enjoy those years as much as I could have or should have.
Marty took my favorite photo of us sleeping in the hospital the day he was born. I love how the sun was pouring through the window; little did I know that I wouldn’t sleep again for a year. LOL
I still want to be a great mom, wife, and business owner but not to the point of being so stressed out sweating the small stuff anymore. For the year that I’ve been living my life on the journey and not the destination, these types of things are crystal clear to me now. Being on the journey has changed my life, now I can finally enjoy my family and have fun with them.
Congratulations Sam! Hard work pays off and we are very proud of him. ☺️
Yesterday we made a quick trip to New Paltz, NY. We were meeting my sister Jennifer there; it’s a good in-between spot to meet with people coming from Jersey. There is a free commuter parking lot literally right off the NY Thruway and a perfect place to meet and leave a vehicle behind so we could ride together into town.
For us it’s a two-hour trip, we travel so much making deliveries, we are used to it. We used to meet our Pennsylvania distributor, The Alpine House in New Paltz, to drop off spätzle, another halfway point from Honesdale, PA. Luckily for us, their drivers deliver their wursts and sausages to Shop-Rite locations in Niskayuna and East Greenbush, NY, only an hour trip for us now.
Me and Jennifer
We met Jen at 10 and walked around the small village of New Paltz. It was good to see people out and about; small coffee shops were booming. We wandered in and out of antique shops and boutiques until we were all starving.
We decided on the Mexican Kitchen, located on Front Street, a cute side street off the main road. The weather turned out to be better than forecasted, so we ate outside, the only seating option at the restaurant.
On our way to the Mexican Kitchen, we spotted a pile of items with a big free sign in front of them. One item was a framed print that I loved. It actually is a well-known piece of art with a Parisian theme. Paris is my favorite place in the world; after everything is truly back to normal, Marty and I plan to go.
Free Art in our bedroom
We had a knowledgeable, attentive, and friendly server. He took care of the tables effortlessly. We weren’t rushed and could really catch up since we haven’t seen each other in person since last July in NJ.
Jennifer is my biological sister on the parental side of my family. She found me two years ago through Ancestry. com. We felt connected immediately and realized we had so much in common. She literally told her daughter Sofia the day before that she always wished she had a sister and found me the next day.
Looking dorky… look at me! OMG, my down jacket is so puffy and unattractive which makes me look like the Michelin Man! Ugh! 😖 I am trying to stand up tall since Jen is so tall and I am so short. LOL
I guess it was the right time for us to find each other; I also have two brothers on that side of my family, aunts, and lots of cousins. It’s super exciting that combined; I have 4 nieces and 1 nephew as well. They are all under 14 years old, so I get to know them while growing up; I love being Aunt Julz.
I’ll write more about Jennifer when she visits us in July, but for now, I wanted to introduce her to you guys. I always wished for siblings when I blew out my birthday candles growing up; those wishes just took 45 years to come to fruition.
Our lunch at Mexican Kitchen was fresh and delicious. Everything, except for their burritos, was gluten-free, including their homemade tortilla chips! We can never eat homemade tortilla chips because they usually are fried in the same fryer as wheat and gluten-based foods. Yay!
The only bummer of the day was someone hit Marty’s side mirror on his truck, his baby, his big green tank. The main road is tight and always bumper to bumper with visitor traffic, but that’s not an excuse to drive like an asshole. Now he has to order two side mirrors, so they match. The truck is a vintage diesel Excursion, so the parts are harder to come by.
The traffic is so bad going through town that they have pedestrian flags to cross the street. Marty thought this was great fun and loved waving the flag at the non-stop traffic so we could cross safely. None of us ever saw or heard of such a thing before. 😂
We said our goodbyes back at the commuter parking lot. Of course, we brought a couple of bags of spätzle for her and her two kids; she said that the kids would be happy. It still makes us smile every time someones tells us our spätzle makes them happy; when it’s my niece and nephew, even better.
Our trip home on the NY Thruway was smooth sailing with very little traffic. Southbound on the Thruway was pretty much bumper-to-bumper slow-moving traffic heading back to New Jersey and downstate NY. Campers, boats, and family-packed vehicles filled the other side of the road. I’m glad we were headed in the opposite direction. Hopefully, they had a good holiday weekend despite the rain up in our neck of the woods, we really need the economy from travelers and visitors, but I’m also glad when they go back home too.
Klaus went on strike and didn’t want to eat his expensive, limited ingredient diet dry kibble anymore. His skin, ears, face, and feet are healed and look fantastic after a long struggle of figuring out what he can eat that won’t set off his allergies again.
We’ve been avoiding poultry and sticking to red meat. Poultry gives some bulldogs issues, so removed it with great results.
After days of turning his nose up to his food and Sam hand feeding him, I decided to try making a super healthy beef stew to mix with the kibble and a pumpkin natural peanut butter mixture to mix in for breakfast.
Last week I bought beef ribs that I braised, making stock at the same time. I repeatedly skimmed all the fat off the top. Then I added carrots, sweet potatoes, green beans, peas, celery, and red kidney beans. I thickened the stew with a potato starch slurry that worked brilliantly. He likes it and gobbles up his kibble again along with his allergy pills hidden in the carrots. 😉
I used some pet-approved herbs like rosemary, basil, and oregano to further flavor the stew. Salt is a no-no, so when I tasted it, I had to remember its dog food. With salt, it would be delicious human food.
I froze a couple of containers of the stew, but he went through what I had in the fridge in less than a week. I have to make bigger pots of stew as this will get old quickly, especially when we are so busy.
Today I made…Burnt Brisket Stew. When I added the sliced brisket to water, it softened up and gave the water a beefy smokey taste. I cut up more of the same veggies as last week and have it simmering on the stove. I added the potato starch slurry and, bam, dinner for Klausie-boy!
Let me tell you that our house smells freakin fantastic. I tasted it, again bland without salt and human spices but very good. I am waiting for Sam to come busting through the back door and ask what’s for dinner when he smells the aroma from the stew.
I feel less wasteful now, and Klaus will reap the harvest of yesterday’s brisket disaster and have some tasty grub.
So when life hands you lemons, you make limoncello, and when life hands you burnt brisket, you make stew!
There is such a huge difference between cooking, baking, grilling, barbecuing, and smoking meats.
Cooking…anyone can cook if you can read a recipe, follow directions, or have a natural instinct what flavors go with what.
Baking is a science of exact measure. That’s where baking sort of loses me, the exact measurements. I rarely measure anything unless I am writing a recipe. I can bake but quite honestly isn’t something I enjoy doing.
Grilling is when you cook smaller cuts of meats, poultry, or vegetables fast and hot. High temperatures sear the outsides of the proteins and quickly cook the insides to your desired temperature or doneness.
Tender cuts of meat that have been marinated, dry-rubbed, or just seasoned with salt and pepper can be cooked in minutes. Steaks, pork tenderloins, chicken breasts or parts, kebabs, or burgers are to name a few.
Barbecuing is the opposite of grilling using tough, big cuts of meats. It is a “clear your schedule” type of cooking method or activity because it takes hours…easily 12+ hours depending on the size of meat. This is where the term; low and slow comes from.
Barbecuing is also considered by some diehards an exact science not with measurements, but with temperature, cuts of meats, what side the piece of meat is from the right or the left, rubs, injections, type of wood, type of smoker, wrapping, and cook time.
Pitmasters keep logs of their cooks and take things very seriously. Every pitmaster has their own techniques, tricks, and secrets. Barbecuing a way of life for people and is the oldest form of cooking.
Smoking is some serious shit. This cooking method doesn’t just take hours; it can take weeks at very low temperatures. Smoking is not for the faint of heart and is not something you can wing.
All winter Marty and I watched different barbecue shows, tutorials, and a bunch of different series on television. We would drool while watching and couldn’t wait to get started as total beginners to the bbq world.
Today we are barbecuing an eight-pound brisket. We are using the simple central Texas seasoning of choice, coarsely ground black pepper, and kosher salt.
I got up at 5:30 am on my own since I was dead asleep at 9 pm last night. I pulled the brisket out of the refrigerator, patted it dry with paper towels, and checked to see if I needed to remove any excess fat. In the photo is the meat side of the brisket, not the fat side.
I sprinkled the brisket from high above with salt and pepper using a shaker container filled with 50/50 salt and pepper. This ratio is different for everyone, but we are using BBQ guru Aaron Franklin’s method.
High above? The higher up you season your food you can get a larger and even coating on the protein. Next, you pat the seasoning into the meat not rub. Dry pat sounds stupid, but basically, that’s what it is.
After I dry rubbed the brisket, I made some coffee and snuggled on the couch with Klaus waiting for Marty to get up. The first thing he did when he came downstairs was light the fire in our ceramic cooker.
Smoky fire until it gets hot enough, then the smoke knocks down. Marty in his pjs not looking too impressed with me before his coffee.
Today we are using hardwood lump charcoal. Marty got the temperature up to 225-degrees and threw the brisket on at 7:20 am. We will keep a close eye on the temperature making sure it doesn’t get too hot. We’ll check on the meat two hours into the cook time to see how things are going.
2 hours & 4 hours
We checked on the brisket after 2 hours, then again at 4 hours into the cook. It needed one more hour before we wrapped it. We decided to let it go for one more hour because the bark wasn’t developed enough, and the meat was still very firm.
We wrapped our brisket in aluminum foil 5 hours into the cook. We set the timer for two more hours. The whole time Marty has been able to keep the heat below 250 degrees.
Time to wrap up the brisket
At 3:40 pm…7 hours into the cook, we tested the brisket’s tenderness by pressing on it. We shut down the smoker and left the brisket to cool down slowly and rest.
While the brisket was cooling, I made a scrumptious Bourbon Barbecue Sauce. I wanted to make a bbq sauce from scratch; we took so much time and care with the brisket, to use a bottled sauce just felt sacrilege.
Bourbon BBQ Sauce
I made corn pudding and spätzle mac and cheese as sides earlier in the day—comfort food for sure on this raw, cold, rainy day. We need food that is easy to reheat this week, so this meal fits the bill nicely. I also quick pickled some red onion to balance all the richness of the meat out.
Resting…
Ugh! Ok, so hold your horses. Before I go any further with this, I want to remind myself and you guys that I will always be honest and authentic on this blog. The brisket sucked! We ruined it, and I am so pissed!
I know all you bbq gurus out there are shaking your head at us. When you fuck up and learn something from it, it becomes a lesson. If you do the same thing again, it’s a stupid mistake. I always learn lessons the hard way. We already know almost everything that went wrong.
First off, the cut of brisket was wrong for bbq. It was only a flat cut without a lot of fat, a brisket that my Jewish friends would use to make for Rosh Hashanah or Passover. It would have been braised with veggies, succulent and juicy, just like the one on the Netflix series, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Midge made.
We obviously kept the meat on the smoker too long before we wrapped it. At first, I wanted to punch out the guys in the videos I watched making their 8 lb briskets. I listened to them and watched closely while making mental notes, but those videos were wrong for our type of smoker and brisket.
Incinerated…
I am a perfectionist, so this makes me aggravated, but I did call this 101 in the title since it was the first time we attempted barbecuing a brisket, so I shouldn’t have gotten as mad as I did. I wanted to throw the meat out and not even bother slicing it or tasting it. Marty likes burnt ends but had to admit this was beyond dry; it was splintered in some areas. Apparently, I was being nothing but negative at the dinner table and acted like an ass, Marty pointed out to me. Imagine that? lol
I cursed while he sliced it; I cursed more when I nibbled on a piece. “It’s not that bad with the bbq sauce you made.” Oh yeah? It was drier than a buckwheat fart. I watched poor Sam try to swallow it and needed to gulp water to wash it down. I don’t eat things that aren’t good, so I picked at the corn pudding and mac and cheese; not really eating much of either. On the bright side, the bourbon bbq sauce was stellar, at least.
Yes, I put ketchup on my mac & cheese, it may just be a Jersey thing.
Next time we try, again we will look for the right cut of brisket appropriate for bbq. We know our ceramic smoker cooks much hotter than we thought, and we can’t go by the thermometer on the smoker. We also know that the heat is under the meat and not above it like other smokers; we have to cook the meat for less time. The seasoning, the 50/50 blend of kosher salt, and coarse pepper were correct.
We got an F today in barbecue brisket. Damn it! I hate really failing, but we learned a lot from today’s lesson.
After we set up at the Troy Waterfront Farmers Market this morning, I went for a walk and took a step way back in time.
Tractor trailers parked in front of the Hudson River.
Sections of downtown Troy, NY, have literally been transformed. HBO is filming a new 10 part movie series called, The Gilded Age.
Julian Fellowes, writer, and creator of Downton Abbey, latest period drama, The Gilded Age, is set in and around New York during the 1880s. The title refers to this time of prosperity in the United States thanks to the industrial boom, and the show will follow the comings and goings of the upper-crust of New York’s high society during that time.
More than 300 people have been on hand transforming the streets of Troy. Crews have turned the paved streets into dirt roads and will soon lay cobblestone “jigsaw puzzles.” Modern signs have been removed, building’s facades changed and landscape brought in.
Storefronts have also taken a step back in time. Some businesses are still open for business behind the scenes; others have been paid to close during the filming.
Locals were able to audition for parts as extras for the series. I never knew the attention to detail they spent on extras.
One woman we know from the market is an extra and sat for 4 hours to have her hair done just to walk down the street. She was then squeezed into a corset and a huge bustled period dress.
Everyone says the HBO crew has been very nice and accommodating while setting the stage for the series, originally scheduled for shooting last year. Covid 19 had other plans.
The filming is in such early stages; there isn’t even a trailer for the series yet. The star-studded cast is here and has started filming this week. Shooting is scheduled through most of June. Christine Baranski, Cynthia Nixon, Amanda Peet, and Morgan Spencer are part of the cast.
For the last two days, the extras all sat in the Troy Music Hall. Everyone sat on one side, then the next day, the other side. The extras were rearranged on the second day for the illusion of a full audience in the music hall. One said they sat for a long time while they shot the same scene 12 times, the actress had trouble pronouncing one word.
Bloomingdales
Walking around the transformed streets early this morning in the rain was almost magical. The storefront window displays and the attention to detail were amazing to see. I could really imagine what life was like back in 1880 in the greatest city in the world, NYC.
I drudged through the dirt-filled streets and was glad I wore my muck boots this morning after seeing the weather forecast.
I felt like I struck gold when I came upon a tent filled with horse-drawn carriages. I was literally all by myself with only one other guy out taking photos out in the streets as well. We commented to each other how cool it was actually to see and experience the set.
It’s pretty weird to see behind the scenes and the many trucks, lights, scaffolding, trailers, and bucket trucks amongst the 1880 scenery.
Inside some of the storefronts, artists were still at work lettering the windows and antiquing the doorways. Others were dressing the window vignettes with period items. I told one of them how amazing it looked; he got a big smile on his face and said, thanks!
I’m not sure I will ever have another opportunity like this again. I was so happy the streets were deserted; having a bunch of other people walking around would have completely spoiled the magic for me.
My nose is red because I am freezing cold!
I went back to our spätzle booth at the market to cold, rainy conditions; everything was soaking wet. It was a long day, but more people came to the market regardless of the weather. I could tell the ones who checked out the movie set, they all had muddy boots and shoes like me.
Two years ago, I tried parsnips for the first time; our chef friend Martin made a parsnip purée as a side dish with steak. It turned out to be the best bite of 2019 for me.
I always thought parsnips were just white carrots. They are related to carrots and parsley. Parsnips are a root vegetable harvested in the fall. They are cream color and shaped like carrots but wider at the top. They have the sweetness like a carrot but a distinct flavor. Parsnips can be eaten raw or boiled, grilled, baked, or fried. They become sweeter when cooked, like a sweet potato.
Soups and stews are some popular ways people prepare parsnips. Others roast them like potatoes or fry them thinly sliced to make chips. I cook mine slowly in butter, cream, milk, garlic, and some salt & pepper. I purée them in the food processor until they are silky smooth.
Using my fancy new $4 Japanese vegetable knife that Marty got at that estate sale last week. It’s a very nice piece of cutlery.
When harvesting parsnips, gloves should be worn since the leaves can irritate the skin. The tops should be cut off and scrubbed well before use. Parsnips are high in vitamins and minerals. They are different, and we love them now that we know how delicious they are.
In Vermont and other parts of the country, we have a problem with poisonous parsnips. The wild parsnip is a tall plant with yellow flowers. Although the roots are edible, the plant’s sap can result in burns.
The burns are actually a reaction between the plant’s sap and your skin. The reaction is triggered by sunlight. It isn’t an immune or allergic response but rather a sun-sensitive skin reaction due to the plant substance. Weird right?
Gross and ugly…sorry for the visuals, but informative.
Our son Noah brushed up against poisonous parsnips while riding on a four-wheeler back in middle school. Before he got home, his left arm and leg were covered in painful second-degree burn blisters. I freaked out! We quickly went online to see what to do.
We gently and carefully bathed the blisters with cool water and used a hydrocortisone cream along with Tylenol. The blisters took a long time to go away and left scars that eventually faded.
Wild parsnips line the roadways here in Vermont. The yellow flowers look like Queen Anne’s lace that is white in color. Wild parsnips are flat on the top, while Queen Anne’s lace is curved. Both are considered invasive plants.
Wild Parsnip
Wild Parsnip
Queen Anne’s lace
Wild parsnips also grow in fields. It is poisonous to livestock; they instinctively know to stay away from it. A rumor I heard a few years ago was that wild parsnips were planted along the roads to prevent wildlife from going into the road. I thought it was genius, but I have since read that some animals like deer nibble the leaves. Oh well, so much for a great idea.
The next time you get the urge to jump out of your car to either pick wildflowers or take a pee, check for wild parsnips. It definitely would not be fun to get burns on your ass or private parts! Can you even imagine? Yikes! 😖
Cooking
Cooked and reduced
When I decided to make parsnips for dinner tonight, I didn’t think I’d be writing about them. Like other blog posts, the words basically formed themselves: I found out that I knew a lot more about parsnips than I thought.
If you’ve never tried parsnips, you honestly should. There are lots of recipes online. Here’s my recipe for parsnip purée. I’m not going to lie, this is not a low-calorie dish, but eaten with lower-fat proteins, it all comes out in the wash. I season mine in the pot while cooking the parsnips since I already know what taste I am going for. Wait until the end, taste the puree, then season to your own taste.
Smooth and silky parsnip purée
Parsnip Purée
1 lb parsnips, peeled and cubed 2 cloves garlic, crushed 1/2 cream 1/2 milk 2 TBSP butter Kosher salt & pepper to taste
Bring the cubed parsnips, garlic, cream, milk, and butter to a boil in a medium saucepan. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer on low until parsnips are soft, 10-15 minutes.
Uncover and cook until the liquid is reduced by half, 5-10 minutes. Keep your eye on it; it can scorch and burn if you aren’t paying attention. Let cool slightly, then carefully purée in a blender or food processor—season with kosher salt and pepper. Serve.
Parsnip purée can be made in advance. Reheat over medium heat, stirring often, until hot.
Great substitute for mashed potatoes!
*** If you are enjoying my recipes and blog, please tell a friend or two. I’d love to increase my number of readers! Once again, if you can, please consider supporting my blog, I am still far away from being able to professionally update and improve my page with things to simplify the content. For example a print button for recipes, and a recipe archive would be so helpful to readers. Every little bit counts and thank you to those who have supported me, you don’t know how much it means to me. 💜
I cook a lot of food, some photo-worthy, some not. Some of my food I actually style for a photo; some just happen. Last night we made burgers on the grill. We also made hot crash baby potatoes along with charred green beans with butter and garlic. After I made my burger, I looked down on my paper plate and thought, “Holy Shit, that is a gorgeous burger!” It tasted as good as it looked. It was simple…a little yellow mustard and raw onion on the bottom grilled bun (GF) with melted American cheese, dill pickles, and Heinz ketchup.
My burger wasn’t stylized or set up to look perfect. I just built the burger quickly, exactly how I like it. It mimics the Quarter Pounder with Cheese from McDonald’s. I haven’t had Mcdonald’s since 2010. Do I miss it? Yes. Am I happy that I can’t eat it? Yes. It used to be easy to pull through a drive-through and order anything my heart pleased, mostly not things that my body should be eating in the long run. If I could eat, gluten McDonald’s would not be one of my top 10 things I would choose for sure.
It depends on what type of burger we are craving is the deciding factor between a smash burger on the flat top or the grill. The toppings are another story. We make blackened bleu cheese burgers or jalapeño cheese-stuffed burgers. Patty melts or thinly smashed double double animal burgers with In and Out sauce. Last night it was classic grilled cheeseburgers with a variety of toppings.
We cook burgers on the grill outside all year long, but there is something about sinking your teeth into a juicy, meaty burger eaten outside on a warm night with your favorite toppings that is better than any fancy meal you can think of. That’s why $18-20 dollar burgers exist on menus in some restaurants.
We grilled pizzas tonight and plan on smoking an eight-pound brisket on Sunday. Tomorrow the forecast calls for 51 degrees and rain; I have some type of stuffed chicken breast in mind with parsnip puree and asparagus. I have prosciutto and provolone cheese plus some fresh baby spinach on hand, so that might go in the stuffing unless I am inspired by something else. I love that the weather dictates my menus, which makes menu planning a little bit easier.
Saturday, we are on the road at 5:30 am and won’t get home for 12 hours from our farmers market and a couple of deliveries afterward; what will we have for dinner that night? I have no clue…yet.
Have fun planning your kick-off to summer holiday weekend menus. Let whatever you feel inspire you, whether it’s hotdogs and hamburgers, bbq chicken, grilled meats and veggies, or a pot of chili. Meals can be eaten on the beach, backyards, state parks, rooftops, or dining rooms.
This year, we can unite with friends and family members to have cookouts, picnics, BBQs, and sit-down dinners. This last year has taught us all to appreciate those around us, the food we have available to us, and the ability to be together again. Who would have thought that a terrible pandemic would bring back the simple things in life?
Unimpressive round of dish drainer Jenga after 4 rounds.
I’m getting tired of playing dish drainer Jenga. This was the fourth game I played yesterday. This round wasn’t nearly as impressive as some of the earlier ones I built.
I had some fleeting hope that the high-end, local appliance store we bought our dishwasher from was not as bad as I thought when the repair guys showed up last Thursday and discovered the hose that mice chewed through.
They said if they didn’t have one in stock, they would order it. They also said it should come in fast, like a day or two at the most. That was last Thursday. After doing shitloads of dishes this past weekend, Marty called the store yesterday, Tuesday, to see if the part came in so he could pick it up and install it himself.
A not-so-nice, ok downright mean, annoyed AF person answered the phone and growled out, “The part’s been ordered!!!” It’s clear this store doesn’t give two shits about us or our dishwasher. A holiday weekend is approaching, and since they only work bankers hours Mon-Friday 9-5, I know that I will be doing a lot more dishes for at least another week.
Marty tried to find the part himself online but could only buy it with the expensive pump included, which we don’t need. Rarely, Marty can’t find something he’s looking for online.
I shout the praises of small, local businesses all the time being one ourselves, but this place gives small businesses a bad name. This is the reason why people prefer to shop at big box stores. I totally get it.
My patience is wearing thin as we are at the mercy of this local, high-end appliance store that has us by the balls. I’ll repeat it…if I knew when we purchased our pricey dishwasher from them and would receive this type of service or none service, should I say, I never would have done it. Bastards!
Sunday night, we went over to our friend Martin’s place, and we usually drink wine. Martin said he just made himself an Old Fashioned and asked if I wanted one.
Did I want one? Come on! I love bourbon and whiskey, so sure. Martin is a chef but has also spent plenty of time bartending as well. I think the two go hand in hand.
I watched how he made his Old Fashioned and took mental notes. He added a small amount of fresh orange juice in his version that he squeezed with his hand. A little sugar & 2 dashes of bitters. He added ice and bourbon, then stirred it. It was delicious!
I duplicated his recipe last night because I wanted to put it into my memory. Ok, who am I kidding? I wanted one. I had a bottle of small-batch bourbon that I just picked up and wanted to try.
My Old Fashioned was also delicious and almost identical to Martin’s. I added a maraschino cherry to mine. My love for maraschino cherries is one of my dirty little secrets.
The Old Fashioned originated from the Whiskey Cocktail that was popular back in the early 1800s. Louisville, Kentucky, claims the Old Fashioned to be invented by a bartender in 1880 at a private social club called The Pendennis Club. Many people disagree with this, but Louisville isn’t giving up this claim to fame.
The original Old Fashioned consisted of a teaspoon of sugar in the bottom of a rocks class. A little water and a couple dashes of bitters were mixed in with a small spoon to dissolve the sugar. Ice was added, and the glass was given to the customer with a bottle of bourbon to pour their own. Can you imagine that today?
Over the years, the drink has had so many variations. The first variations started during and after prohibition. It was said that bartenders started adding muddled fruit, orange, and cherries to help cover up the taste of lousy bourbon available at that time.
The Old Fashioned remained popular and held on with other classics like the Martini & Manhattan for a long time, but took a dive during the second half of the 20th century. Drinks like 7&7, Rum & Coke, Sex on the Beach, Cosmopolitans, Alabama Slammers, B52s, Red Deaths, and Mind Erasers became people’s new favorite cocktails. BTW…they are all very good too!
In the last decade, speakeasy-type drinks have made a massive comeback and are now crafted by bartenders or mixologists. Local, small distilleries making small batches of whiskey, bourbon, rum, and gin is all the rage. At each of our farmer’s markets, at least 8 local distilleries are selling their versions of different types of liquor.
Each bartender or mixologist has their own way of crafting the Old Fashioned. Some use simple syrup; others use maple syrup. Some muddle fruit or set an orange peel on fire and throw it into the glass. Purist will still make or order the classic original version.
I love making, drinking, and appreciating a good cocktail, just like a good bottle of wine. Good doesn’t always mean crazy expensive, world-renowned or fancy; small, local distilleries and wineries can produce it.
People suddenly became aware of where their food was coming from during the pandemic. It became important to many people who wanted local meats, produce, and other products. Knowing where your booze comes from and supporting small local businesses is also a great thing to do.
