Tag: food

Chicago 2008

It’s not yet 8am CDT and elsaf and I are already up. judiang‘s still a snoozin’. Guess it’s early for her. (Us Eastern time people, however, know it’s a decent “get up” time.)

Elsa and I have, once again, invaded Judi’s place in order to celebrate the Fourth of July properly – with Taste of Chicago and Grant Park fireworks. So yesterday, Elsa drove over from Michigan and I flew in from Ohio. Elsa arrived first (shortly before I boarded my plane), so she & Judi picked me up at the airport. After we left the parking garage, both of our GPS systems (both using Garmin software) told Elsa to go back into another parking garage in order to leave the airport! First Garmin has a deal with the Holland Tunnel, now it has a deal with O’Hare parking? Thankfully, the fellow at the gate believed us when we told him our GPS led us astray. No $2 for you, Garmin!

Once we left that second garage, Garmin behaved herself and got us to Judi’s place with little fuss. (Though Judi had a few suggestions for an easier trek to her place.) Once we got to Judi’s place, I dumped my bags and, although it wasn’t yet 5pm, we walked over to Judi’s favorite Thai place (in reality, a place with lots of types of Asian food) for supper. Turns out I was the only one who’d had lunch that day. (Quiznos at the Columbus airport.)

The place, Ma & I, was a very short walk from Judi’s apartment. And it’s across the street from the Marble Slab Creamery. In the warmer months (like now) they can open up the side wall to the street. So it’s like eating in an outside cafe, but you’re inside. 🙂 Judi and I both ordered pad thai (mine with shrimp, hers with chicken) and Elsa had lad nar. We also ordered some sushi – I got the ebi-Q maki (shrimp roll with cucumber salad, apparently) and the girls ordered sake maki (salmon roll). A very tasty supper all around.

When asked if we wanted dessert, Elsa deferred to Judi while I was trying not to be too obvious with my hand motions pointing to Marble Slab. But Judi had also come to that conclusion – we’d forgo dessert at Ma & I and head across the street for ice cream. Yum!

Marble Slab Creamery is like Cold Stone Creamery in our area. They’ll happily moosh up your ice cream choices with various nut and/or candy thingies. Or you can do as I do and go moosh-free with multiple flavors. They had coconut ice cream! Yay! I’d not had coconut ice cream since I was in Italy. So I got that and a double chocolate ice cream in a cup. Very tasty!

We walked back to Judi’s place while munching away at our ice cream delights. Then we vegged out for awhile, trying to get our various internet appliances onto Judi’s wireless router. (We had a password issue, which I managed to resolve – by typing a new password into her router.) Once we were well rested, however, it was time for the POOL!

We donned bathing suits and towels and things and headed to Judi’s private pool. Well, it’s not a private pool, but there’s rarely ever anyone in it when we’re there. And we were the only ones there most of the hour we were swimming (well, swimming’s too strong a word – playing in the water’s better). The water was very cold, but we all eventually got down to our necks. Some of us quicker than others. (Judi’s of the opinion that I should be a polar bear. Heh. I don’t think so!)

As it started to get dark outside, we finally braved the winds and got out of the pool. The towel felt so nice and warm when we got out. 🙂 We returned to Judi’s apartment and played with Judi’s crappy internet connection, watched BBC America and Food TV, and eventually went to bed. Today, Judi’s internet connection seems to be doing better that it was last night.

Well, Elsa’s just about done in the bathroom, so I guess I should get ready for the day. I believe the plan is going to the Taste for lunch (hopefully before it rains) and then having Elsa cook us a glorious supper. More details later. 🙂

OMGWTFBBQ!

Ah, sitting in the dark in the three season room with my fellow geeks as the Raccoon Family Chorus sings in the background. It doesn’t get much better than this! Oh wait, the geese are adding to the warbling chorus – I guess it does get better. 🙂

Today’s biggest priority was elsaf making her barbecue country spare ribs. We had few other plans for the day, so most of it was spent here at the cottage enjoying the beautiful weather and the wonderful wildlife.

I slept in the 3-season room again last night, this time in dad’s chair. And it was quite a good sleep except for the Raccoon Family Massacre that took place at 3am (well, there wasn’t a massacre, but the sheer amount of screaming that the little suckers did made it sound that way) and the Goose & Gander sing-along around 6 in the morning. Apart from those times, I slept until around 8am.

Although Elsa and I got up at decent times (and even judiang woke up & got up at a reasonable time!) breakfast was a little late due to Elsa being distracted by a nice entry she was writing for DailyKos. But once she was done, she made us French toast and sausage. Mmmmm!

We rested and geeked until around 1pm when it was time for lunch (despite not being all that hungry for it). We picked up a grilling basket at the hardware store in Minster (Elsa needed two for the ribs and the folks only had one) and then went to Casadores in New Bremen. Elsa and I ordered lunch and gave a little to Judi so that she wouldn’t get hungry before suppertime. (She said she wasn’t hungry, but we fed her anyway – we’re cruel that way.) We picked up ice cream for the ala mode to our dessert for supper before we returned to the cottage.

While Judi and I read and rested, Elsa worked on her BBQ ribs and potato salad. The parental units showed up after a bit and brought the Market Day apple pie which I’d received as a free gift for my last order. (I thought it would be perfect for this weekend.) I started baking it right away.

More resting, reading, and chatting and even Elsa had some time to relax after a bit. But suppertime was looming, so I got to work on the fire for the grilling. Then I finished the lunch prep and set the table for supper while Elsa basted and then grilled the ribs.

Supper was wonderful. We all love that Elsa loves to cook. 🙂 She used the broth from the ribs to make a Japanese-inspired soup, which we started with. Then we had the ribs and potato salad. There was leftover foccacia bread and sour dough bread as sides as well. And I cut up the peaches we still had left and served them with a little sugar (and some fruit fresh) with a few blueberries for garnish. It was a lovely supper and photos from it are below the bird photos.

I shooed Elsa and the folks off to sit by the fire while Judi washed dishes and I dried & put them away. She’s a fast dish washer, but it still took us awhile to get everything cleaned up. Then we joined everyone at the fire for chatting and photo-taking. It was quite pleasant.

After a bit, Judi started muttering “pie! PIE!” so it was time to serve the pie. I was very pleased with the pie – when I cut it, it flaked just like an apple pie should. I served it with the ice cream and everyone seemed to enjoy it. Judi gave it a 9 out of 10. I said since it was free, it deserved a 10 out of 10. 🙂

More musing by the fire, and then some singing. We’re not as well-versed in camp songs as my sister or Rachel, so that petered out eventually. But then the baby raccoons started coming out of their tree and came over to see us. Elsa and dad took photos and Elsa’s posted some of the photos to her journal.

The folks headed off home and Judi and I tended the fire a bit longer. But then it was time to come inside and geek, so that’s what we’re doing.


Duckling Formation
Duckling Formation

The little ducklings swim toward the shore in a deceptively random “duckling formation.”
My Two Dads
My Two Dads

2 guys and a gal and their six ducklings. “Uncle Steve” is just like another father to these little ones.
Duck, Duck, Goose
Duck, Duck, Goose

Or in this case, “Goose, Goose, Duck.” It’s shame that, despite hanging out “together,” the geese all sit in the sun together and the ducks all sit in the shade together. So much for integration!
Mmmm, ribs!
Mmmm, ribs!

Elsa’s barbecued country spare ribs and potato salad. Yummy!
Pie!
Pie!

Pie are square. No, pie are round, cake are square!


Super Saturday!

Today was a busy day. And a great day too. After a night of little sleep (turns out the airbed for the cottage now leaks, so I wound up sleeping on the uncomfortable lounge chair in the 3-season room last night), I snoozed a bit on the sofa and got up around 8:15am. elsaf got up then too and started preparing her new electric griddle for making us pancakes for breakfast. After my shower, I nipped off to Wagner’s to get ice for the pop cooler and a shower poof for judiang. I returned around 9 to find our breakfast chef had disappeared mid-prep. (The plates were lovingly decorated with sliced strawberry garnish, but no pancakes were made yet.) Elsa was off in the shower. Heh.

Once she was showered, we woke up Judi with promise of blueberry pancakes and she, too, got all cleaned up for the day. My goal was to be on the road by 10:30am, and we managed it, even with me cleaning up the breakfast dishes. The goal was to head south to the Bookery so Judi could get her Doctor Who magazines, we could have Indian Fud, and watch Indiana Jones (at $7.25 for a matinée – gah! Gimme my $4 matinées from Piqua & Troy.) We accomplished the goal and included a stop at a used bookstore where I bought more Terry Brooks’ Landover novels and a stop at BestBuy where I bought dad the wireless mouse he wanted and decided to get one for myself. I’ll be interested to see if I use it much – I’ve become pretty used to my trackpad on my laptop.

We enjoyed the movie – it’s silly fun with some edge-of-your-seat action and really crappy science. But it played up to its silly science and was an enjoyable 2 hours. (I’ll still prefer the third movie because I loved the interplay between Ford and Connery.) Several of the trailers were entertaining too. I think we all agreed that Hancock will be our 4th of July movie when we’re in Chicago (where I’ll be wishing I was paying that $7.25 matinée price of today).

When we got back to the Lake, our guests for the evening were already here and enjoying nachos with salsa and guacamole. Aunt Becky and Deanna had come up for supper and to play cards. Mom and dad were also here for supper and cards (dad to avoid them, mom to play them). Even my Uncle Dean showed up for supper. I got to work on making the burger patties. Dad had already started a fire, so once the burgers were made, I could start grilling them and the hot dogs. I also grilled the leftover shrimp so that Elsa could have some – indeed, anyone that wanted to try the shrimp was able to. And it was just as delicious today as yesterday. Go shrimp!

My hostess skills are constantly improving thanks to these Memorial Day weekend gatherings. However, I didn’t remember tomato and, to my uncle Dean’s dismay, deviled eggs. However, I doubt that deviled eggs will ever be part of my hostessing repertoire. Never liked the suckers, even though they’re pretty to look at. Thanks to the brownies that Becky brought and the sugar cookies and no bake cookies that I’d bought, we had plenty of sweet stuff. Everyone got their fill and then some.

After supper it was time for some Shanghai Rum. Elsa isn’t much for card playing, but she condescended to join us for the game. She picked up the rudiments to the game quickly, but Judi had smelled victory early on and fought hard for the final win of the game. Becky decided that we’d have to have a rematch later this summer when Judi deigns to visit again. Heh.

Folks headed out once the game was done and Judi cleaned the dishes with me drying them. She’s now slowly downing an amaretto sour while playing World of Warcrack on her laptop. Elsa’s also working on her laptop (and most likely NOT playing World of Warcrack). I’m writing this.

Tomorrow is Relax Day. Our only real task is to make supper – with Elsa making barbecued country ribs and sour cream potato salad. I’ll be baking an apple pie (from frozen) for dessert. Should be another fun & food filled day tomorrow!

Anniversary Celebration

Today was mom & dad’s 40th Anniversary! I wasn’t around 40 years ago when they got married, but I was around today, so I took them out for a nice dinner at the restaurant of their choosing. (Yesterday I gave ’em a dozen roses courtesy of the Lion’s Club selling ’em at school through their Leo Club.)

Mom wanted to try out The Caroline, a new restaurant that’s where Taggart’s used to be (a fairly well-known restaurant in Troy, OH). I like a grand adventure, so I agreed to take ’em there. Although they lost my reservation, it wasn’t really needed and we were seated right away. We got a friendly waitress who did a nice job serving us. For an appetizer we had shrimp cocktail. We all had side salads (I had the Caesar salad), then our main courses came out. Mom got the prime rib, which was the day’s special. It was very juicy and tasty. Dad ordered their house steak (and he got it medium, which was a shock). I ordered their chipotle pork chop with spiced apples – tasty but I should have gotten medium rather than medium well – was just a bit dry. I also had the lyonaisse potatoes as my side – basically fried taters cooked with onions. Then, though we were pretty stuffed, we split their three layer chocolate cake. Very very moist and tasty!

It was a very pleasant evening out and we enjoyed ourselves and our food. Happy 40th Anniversary Mom & Dad! Here’s to 40 more! 🙂

Taste Testing

Today I went out with two ladies from the Alumni Association Executive Committee (of which I am also a member). We had to pick up a few items and order some things for the upcoming banquet. We have an all-school alumni banquet every May honoring the 10 year class, 25 year class, 50 year class, and 75 year class. Any alumni can come and sometimes we get large groups of the 20 year class or some other group in addition to our “honored classes.” It’s actually fun being on the committee, though I’m mostly there as the person who knows Access (the Micro$oft Database program).

One of the main reasons we were out today was to see the caterer’s and try the dishes that we were hoping to serve at the banquet. Our caterer this year (for the second year running) is Christopher’s Restaurant from Kettering (a ‘burb of Dayton). Heh, catering from Kettering – reminds me of a One Foot in the Grave joke. Anyhoo, when we got there, the chefs sat down and talked with us, and served us a nice meal of the items we’d picked. After a starter of salad (with their excellent dill house dressing), we had Chicken Francese and Harvest Pork Tenderloin, both of which were excellent. We also tried their mashed potatoes with leeks and shallots and their California medley. Two of us decided that maybe the medley wasn’t what we wanted for the banquet and so we switched to baby carrots for the actual event. While the head chef was talking with us, he was bragging about their homemade soups. I asked if they made cream of broccoli and he said they did and were serving it that day. He brought me a cup of soup (and my two co-tasters their homemade mushroom bisque) to show off. Very creamy, very tasty. They also decided to show off with their desserts and asked what we wanted. As soon as they said “bread pudding” I knew what I wanted. And this HUGE piece of bread pudding with sauce and ice cream was brought to me. And it was the best bread pudding I’ve had this side of New Orleans. Next time judiang and elsaf come to visit, I’ll see about making the detour south so they can check this place out. The actual restaurant is in a strip mall and doesn’t look all that special, but the food was exemplary. And the folks working there are wonderful. I’m still full from the late lunch (I was expecting a taste, not a meal, and was pleasantly surprised by the quantity of food they offered).

PS: Happy Birthday gregmce!

Happy Pi Day

Since mom & dad had nothing in the house to eat (other than some things in the freezer) they decided we’d go out for lupper (we all slept til noon once we got home, so it was 3pm before we got to eat) at Frisch’s then go to the grocery. And we picked Frisch’s cuz they have nice pie choices. Although we were full after lupper, we ordered the pie to go. Mom and I got coconut cream pie (which turned out to be big ass pieces) and dad got pecan.

When I got back, I cleaned some and eventually mom called around 6:30 – it was time for pie. I returned to their place and we ate our pie and watched TV. A nice denouement to the day’s activities. (So, do the day/month/year countries have Pi Day on April 31?)

Meeting up with friends

My main goal for today was to get course stuff read and, maybe, clean a bit. Then, around noon, I got a phone call from audioboy. He and bex77 were in Ohio and making their way south and then west and wondered if I’d be interested in meeting up for supper when they’d be in the Dayton area. That sounded like a great idea to me, so I said yes and recommended Huber Heights, which is off of I70. They said they’d call back when they were closer so I’d know when to head out.

So I went about my day and was reading a very boring paper on curriculum writing (is there an interesting paper on curriculum writing?) with Linus on my lap when I got another call from them. They were half an hour away or so from the exit, so I headed out to meet them. We agreed to meet at Ruby Tuesday there in Huber. We had a very pleasant supper – it was nice catching up with them again. We wiled away an hour and a half or so while there, but then it was time for them to continue on their road trip. I wished ’em well and headed off to Target looking for something for work. (No luck there, but a second stop at Walmart on the way home was more successful.)

I hope their drive was a smooth one and that things go well for them on this trip. Thanks for the chance to meet up!

Chili Contest ’08

Tonight was the annual Chili Competition that the Fishers put on each year.  There were half the number of folks this year as last, which wound up giving us half the number of chilies as last year.  We had a few out due to conflicting commitments and several out due to illness.  (Mom and dad were in California, for example.)  But despite the smaller numbers, there was plenty of food and fun conversation.

There were only 4 chili soups to try and all of them were good.  I’ve only been to three of these, and in the first two I managed to vote for the chili that won.  This was not the case this year. Indeed, I couldn’t decide between two, but neither of them were the winning chili.  Each year Gary brags that he’ll be the one to win (and often recommends that people just not bring any chili, heh).  And to his surprise and delight, he won!  You go guy!  He even posed for a picture with the trophy (and mock applause in the background.)

As is usually the case when I go to one of the gatherings that they put on, I ate too much.  But I don’t mind – it was all very good food.  And there was bread and salad and brownies and cookies.  Yummy stuff!  I have a happy (though stuffed) tummy.

Today was spent switching my e-mail over from Pegasus to Thunderbird.  *sniff* I’m going to miss Pegasus, but I need Thunderbird for my upcoming PDA purchase.  If I want to avoid having to install Outlook on my PC, I’m going to need Thunderbird and Lightning along with Birdiesync.  And I like what I see in Thunderbird thus far.  (Well, Firefox is my preferred browser, so no surprise there.)

It’s a (TMI) Christmas!

So anyhoo, Friday was our last day of school. And thanks to something I ate during the school day, I wound up having a bout of food poisoning. I was already grumbly in the tummy when I headed for bed, and it got worse from there. I won’t go into much more detail, but I’ll just say this: It’s a Very Very Gassy Christmas!

Anyhoo, I am recuperating quite nicely. The girls (Amy & Rachel) arrived safely last night. We spent a lovely day (well, apart from the TMI above) today. This evening we watched Charade. It’s one of mom & dad’s favorite movies, and yet Amy & I had never seen it. I found it enjoyable, but A&R pronounced it “silly.” Heh, that’s probably why I liked it.

BTW, tomorrow’s Christmas Eve! Woohoo!

Happy Thanksgiving!

For those of you celebrating Thanksgiving today, I wish you & yours a Happy Thanksgiving! Hope that everyone has a Happy Thursday!

My duties for Thanksgiving are over – I have made a cheeseball for tonight’s dinner. (I’ve made two, actually, so one for me, one for the family.) Aunt Becky’s doing the dinner and we’ll be gathering around 5 or so.

I had yesterday off, and spent most of it reorganizing closets and stuff. What started out as a simple project – put my Physics Teacher journals into binders, became rather complicated when I realized I had no place to put the binders. My front closet is now cleaned out and I intend to start work on the den closet in a short while. I’ve also been sorting VHS tapes and floppies and CD-ROMs and stuff. Have had lots of trash thus far!

Linus is currently resting on my arms, which makes typing a bit difficult, but I am thankful to have such lovely kitties to sleep on me and get in my way and help with cleaning (they’ve been having a blast – especially when I found the remote control car last night). I’m thankful for much more than my kitties, but Linus is making himself known, so the kitties get the mention. To paraphrase someone on my friends list – I am thankful for having so much to be thankful for!