March in February

The February March is an old record by Lou & Peter Berryman, and the title track has lyrics like:

“I tell you we’re all gettin’ weary of little Siberia
Jeepers enough is enough
I tell you uh-huh I’m okay when it’s 80 in May
But uh-uh when it’s zero and dark”

But that’s what winters used to be like in Wisconsin. This year, instead, we’re having March in February. Last week it went up to the mid-40s two days, and the snow, what’s left of it, is all crusty and dirty, and the night that it did snow a little more, it rained, too, and washed all the snow away. At least we didn’t have to shovel.

Aside from weird weather, I guess it’s been an OK week. I think I am getting into an OK rhythm with this semester’s schedule, not working on Saturdays, and just a little on Sunday, although I’m wondering if that’ll work out ok this Valentine’s Day, Super Bowl weekend, when we also have tickets for a Madison Symphony event on Sunday afternoon.

We had a lot of leftovers for dinner this week. Monday it was chicken potpie. I didn’t take any pictures but it was biscuit-topped version, like the below I made back in 2009. The first night that we ate it, a week ago Friday, I think, the biscuits might have been a little under done, the underneath part touching the filling, but this was cured by the reheating.

Tuesday like usual I started off volunteering stocking the shelves at the food pantry – missing cooking the breakfast but liking the shorter shift.  I met Jane for coffee in the late-ish afternoon, 3:00 – the State St. Colectivo is now open until 6:00PM. We had set it up the week before, getting lonely working in our closed offices and from home. After, we both elected to NOT go back to the office; Jane went home, I went grocery shopping.

Tuesday dinner after I got back from groceries was Tuscan bean soup from Still Life With Menu, that I’d made on Monday night. And dips and dippers, carrots and ranch, and hummus and pretzels and wheat sticks. It was hard squash hummus and TBH I thought it was a really tasty batch, made from roasted-with-thyme-and-olive-oil cubes of squash that I had in the freezer and garlic that I poached in a bit of olive oil. I had it for lunch two days, and hauled it out for dinner, but still had to compost the last of it. I just can’t make hummus unless Rach or my kids or anybody who likes hummus is around to help me eat it, otherwise, no matter how small the batch, it will go bad before I can finish it, because neither Mark nor our AFS current student will eat it. I think the student we had in 2016-17 was the last one who liked hummus. Hippie.

Wednesday we had tamale pie again, not the Fine Cooking one, this one was the last of the chili I’d made the prior Saturday with cornbread made from Jiffy corn muffin mix on top. One of those little boxes is the perfect size for an 8-10 inch pan.

Thursday I had class so I hauled out all the leftovers: pot pie, tamale pie, and chicken and corn tortilla bake, and stuck them in the upstairs oven (my new one is supposed to get delivered the 25th, yay!) on low heat and then we dug in after class.

Friday feeling guilty for all the leftovers, I made spaghetti and turkey meatballs, and garlic toast on slices of that sourdough, and a big salad. The turkey meatballs and sauce were kind of like Julia Turshen’s, from Small Victories. Julia’s have ricotta in the balls, which is a nice idea, gluten-free meatballs, but I like egg and bread crumbs better. And I didn’t have any fresh herbs so used dried. And the last two cartons of my diced tomatoes frozen from last summer. I also thawed out a fennel cream pasta sauce I made last winter. I was going to keep some of the tomato sauce plain, and add the cream sauce to the rest, but in the end the tomatoes cooked down enough that the combo of the plain tomato + cream sauce was just the right amount for half the meatballs (20) and I have the rest of the meatballs in the freezer, waiting to be cooked in some other, future, tomato sauce. Maybe something fresh in summer, mmmmmmmmm, or some of the roasted tomato sauce that’s still in the freezer.

Friday in the morning I made a batch of pumpkin scones, risking the fam’s distaste, with chopped dates and crystalized ginger in them, and a King Arthur spice blend that has some cardamom. They seem to be getting eaten OK, though.

And, oh look, there’s that wooden counter again. Still have it.

I have a bunch of plans for our Super Bowl food spread, little wienies, and Queso Fundido, and ham & cheese buns, as well as jam cookies with hearts instead of stars for the cutouts, and mini-cheesecakes, both of which can be for Valentine’s day, too. I’ll keep you posted on how it comes out.

Oh, and I bought one of the wool 100-days dresses. I don’t think I’ll wear it for 100 days, but it’s a nice addition to my collection of short-ish dresses to wear with leggings. It has a nice pleat detail on the back; see overleaf for the front.