I can't believe it's been three days since my latest vintage dinner and I haven't posted the results! Yesterday was kind of a tough day. I was running late in the morning and ended up having to dish my oatmeal and pineapple into a mug and eat it when I got to work. (Not the most relaxing breakfast I've ever had!) I'd forgotten about some lunch plans and needed to get my five walks for the week in - so I went to the park after work. Which made me late getting home and feeling very unmotivated to do anything else. Yep, the routine took a hit yesterday, but I was back in the game when my alarm clock went off this morning. With a new resolution: No internet allowed in the a.m. on a weekday. I love getting online to find out what's going on in the world, but it's definitely a liability when it comes to time.
Here's the 1945 dinner menu I whipped up last Sunday evening:
Browned Potatoes
Asparagus Salad
Enriched Bread
Fresh Fruit Cup, Three
The Browned Potatoes are also called American Fried Potatoes in the cookbook. Potatoes parboiled, then cut in slices and fried on the stovetop in a "very little fat." I boiled mine for too long to start, so they were a little softer than I'd have liked - but still good. The Asparagus for the Salad was boiled, then chilled 'til cold. (Canned asparagus was suggested as an alternative.) The recipe instructed me to cut rings from a green pepper, place four stalks of asparagus through each ring, and serve on a bed of lettuce. The basic French Dressing recipe was dressed up this week with a squirt of Catchup, but it didn't make much of a difference in the taste. You know, I think if there's one thing I step away from when it comes to these menus, it'll be the dressing. I cut the recipe in eighths and still end up having to throw much of it away. I may go ahead and buy a bottled viniagrette that I can get some real use from.
Fresh Fruit Cup, Three was a real puzzle... I finally realized that the cookbook contains three recipes for Fresh Fruit Cup. The author must have been calling for the third version this evening. It was a tropical fruit salad - diced orange, diced pineapple, and sliced banana served in layers in a tall glass with coconut. The one step I'd do without next time? Pouring fruit juice over the whole affair before serving. I used orange juice thinking it'd go nicely with the fruit, but it just made the whole thing soggy.
My vintage dinners on Sunday evening have become a lovely kind of ritual. I still make lots of mistakes, but I guess that's the only way you can learn how to cook. The one thing I'm really proud of is that I've been making myself eat at least one serving of leftovers. (Those of you who have been following along know that I have some issues with leftovers!) I've found that if I nudge myself hard - and eat 'em before they're three days old - I can shelve those phobias about food spoilage.
Unlike my housework last night, my vintage beauty missions were not sacrificed to my mood. And the walks might be paying off. I could be imagining things, but I think I actually felt a little spring in my step today. Fancy that! It's as if my muscles are slowly waking up - fiber by fiber - and remembering what they're there for. I had this strange sensation just in walking around the office at work today. This feeling that I could go a little faster and a little farther. It's been just two weeks since I started exercising. That's only ten walks. If it feels like this at two weeks, can you imagine what it'll feel like at four weeks - and eight weeks?
5 comments:
Isn't it wonderful how, after you begin to add the new routines (such as your walks) they become a normal part of your day and you wonder why you never did it before!
I adore leftovers, in that I plan for them with every meal. Most of them go into hubby's lunch next day and then what is left of that gets ground into a 'loaf' or made into a meat pie etc. You will begin to see how you can economize when you consider leftovers, I know I have really noticed it in my food budget. The fruit cup would have been good with coconut juice, I bet! I love anything coconut.
Your vintage dinner sounds wonderful!
I'm sorry you don't like leftovers. Somethings taste better the second time around.
In our family it has always been the norm to cook too many potatoes. We liked the leftovers, but also if unexpected company showed up there was always enough to feed everyone.
Before we had microwaves leftover baked and boiled potatoes would be fixed as you did. Leftover mashed potatoes were mixed with a tiny bit of milk and an egg, made into patties, and fried until light brown and crisp on the outside.
As long as the food you cook is fresh (as in not on the verge of spoiling) and you immediately refrigerate leftovers, they should keep 3 to 5 days to 7 days. (Fish 3 days, poultry 3 to 5 days, beef 3 to 7 days, smoked/cured ham and bacon 2 weeks. Green salad one day, fruit salad 2 or 3 days, cooked vegetable 3 to 5 days.) Some leftovers freeze well. Forgot that you are a vegetarian. Sorry.
Salad dressing made with vinegar (without egg) should keep for a couple of weeks or even longer. Store it in a glass jar or saved clean plastic salad dressing bottle. Oil and vinegar are both natural preservatives. That doesn't change when they are mixed together. Store in the fridge. Take it out when you start your meal and then shake jar well before serving. (If the oil is still congealed you can zap in the in the microwave for a few seconds, set the bottle in a bowl of hot water or run hot water over the jar.)
There are reasons why we have a phobia on keeping leftover food: One goes back to the days of not having good refrigeration. Another is that the food producers/stores/etc. want us to be wasteful so we buy more (unrealistic expiration dates, is another example). Another is we sometimes aren't sure how fresh the food is when we purchase it. Cooking the food will give it a few more days of life.
Hope this helps.
Keep up the good work. I'm impressed.
50s gal, making habits out of what used to seem the impossible is such an empowering feeling. And we thought we had to break several dozen glass ceilings to feel empowered!
Packrat, thanks so much for the schedule on spoilage... I think my phobias stem from some terrible Dateline or 20/20 type expose where they showed how food begins to rot the minute it's removed from the ground, etc. I've been a little hyper-sensitive about leftovers ever since! I am doing battle with this phobia, though, because I don't like wasting stuff that's still perfectly edible.
I like the idea of turning leftovers into something else with just a little more work than it would take to reheat them. It really mixes up your meals - even when you're eating the same thing two nights in a row.
Vintage Sunday dinners are such a fantastic ritual! So good, I may have to borrow that idea myself ;) I am sitting on heaps of old recipe books. Let me know if you ever need me to hunt down a particular recipe for you. I'll certainly do my best!
Thanks so much, Eve! I may take you up on that... It's still puzzling to me that the cookbook includes dishes on its month-of-menus and sometimes there's no matching recipe to be found.
Post a Comment