Sous Vide Cooking, Anyone? 1/26/19

22 hours of cooking  down, 50 hours more to go

I've been having a blast using  my new Sous Vide machine to turn tough cuts of meat into succulent tender gourmet delights.   Of course there are  one  or two big drawbacks to  the Sous Vide method: It takes a really long time, and lots of patience on the part of the chef for the technique to work its magic.  

This weekends magic trick is  72 hour  short ribs.  Yes, you read that right.  I said the short ribs have to cook for 72 hours. More specifically they are being poached for 72 hours in a water bath at  131.5 F for 72 hours. Bruce can't believe he has to wait 72 hours before  he can eat them.  Fortunately he's sampled the benefits of this method of cooking and is entirely sold  on the trade off of wait time versus umami.

Of course I am not entirely crazy. Delicious or not, 72 hours is a very long time to be cooking just one meal.  I have been purchasing larger size cuts  for the really long cook time recipes, and then repackaging the finished entree into several  smaller portions which can be frozen and  rewarmed for quick to the table future meals.

Ms Kat is becoming a Grumpy Old Lady: 1 ' 19

Ms.  Kat  is getting up there in years  and  showing signs that she is joining Bruce and I  in feeling   the weight of her years.   Her vision never was all that  great, but now she is also losing  her hearing.  Whenever she loses sight of us, she goes into a panic attack and starts screaming at the top of her lungs until one of us catches her attention to tell her we are still right here for her.  In addition  she is has developed a sensitive tummy, and whenever she  becomes  afraid, she starts barfing up her stomach contents.   

We've  both had a lot of appointments this past month which forced us to leave her home alone a lot, and she seemed to be seriously paranoid .  In fact she  has never been left alone for more than 10 hours straight and always has bowls of both wet and dry food and water before we leave. I guess when you can't see or hear well, and can't use a phone to call for help, those 10 hours must seem interminable to a lonely scared  little kitty.  She seems sure every time we go out the front door  that we were about to leave her locked and alone to die of starvation and thirst. 

Her panic attacks were starting to keep us awake at night.  And while Senior house cats are notorious for becoming picky eaters,  we  have become increasingly worried about her not getting enough nutrition, so I headed over to Petco today to see what OTC products they might help.

I found two:

There are several ways to administer digestive medication to a cat,  but after looking at the directions I decided the only one that we were at all likely to get Ms. Kat swallow is  The Homeopet Drops for Feline Digestive Upsets . We  are supposed to be put directly into her mouth before feeding her. Hah!  I'd like to see someone try that. LOL We hid the drops in a very small serving of her favorite wet food. The product doesn't have any detectable smell,  and if it does have a taste,  the portion of food  I'd mixed the drops into was so small that she had consumed it all before she even had time to notice any off taste.  So far so good. Ms Kat has been able to keep her stomach contents to herself and is showing no sign of digestive distress.

Sentry puts out several types of cat calming products.  I chose their 30 day Calming Collar, because Ms Kat is used to wearing a collar; and I thought it would be less stressful that products I'd have to spray on her coat, or shove down her throat.  The thing seem to start soothing  the second I put in on.  No more  panicked meowing,  No more frantic screams in the night as she chases around searching for us.. I'll let y'all know if I am wrong, but  I do believe this is going to work. 

Udon Stir Fry: 1 '19

Yesterday, Bruce and I watched a "Milk Street" TV program on Japanese home cooking.

We loved their recipe for stir-fried  udon with mushrooms, and decided to try making it from memory for dinner tonight. It took a lot of chopping to prep all the ingredients before  cooking, but the stir frying went really fast.

We plated it in large bowls  with a side of  quick pickled fresh radish.  Mmmmmm!  So good!

I can't believe we ate the whole thing.

New Year's Day Walk on the Beach 1 ' 19

 We  were blessed today with clear skies so we were able to continue our tradition of taking a walk on the beach on New Years Day .

It was  perfect  beach walking weather

Temperatures were in the low 70F s and there was a light refreshing breeze 

Other than a couple of other people, 

 

we had almost the entire beach to ourselves

 I said 'almost' because there were a hundreds of terns, skimmers, gulls, pelicans and other shore birds lining the edge of the water awaiting the next incoming tide.

The tide  was lower than either of us could remember it ever being. It felt like we were walking to where the sky met the sea.  It was the perfect start for the new year.

 

Deciding upon a perfect New Year's Resolution: 1 '19

 Its windy and  raining again

which makes it the perfect weather to stay home 

 think about my new years resolutions.

Of course I can always recycle last years.  Quite a few of those resolutions have not been met. Aand some of those were written down for a 2018 goal, but rose to a priority level in 2017, after I'd thought about them for awhile in 2016. 

Then again they'll probably still be waiting for me in 2020

so  I could go easy on myself  by making

my new year's resolution  something  achievable like remembering to write 2019 instead of 2018.

Happy New Year' Day Brunch 1: '19.

Bruce surprised me with  a special New Years Day brunch for us this morning.  He made us a Bacon, Brussels sprouts, and Goat cheese tart.  Oh, sooooo good ...... paired with a mango mimosa... it was to die for.