The first week of my first vintage beauty mission ends tomorrow night and it's coming along successfully. I've done four of my five 30-minute walks allotted for the week. On Saturday afternoon, I went to a park about a 10-minute drive from my home to workout. We had some unusual rain that morning and it had ended a short time ago, so the park was dead. Usually there are people all over the track; this time, there were only four or five. It was a little creepy! I was nearing the end of my first lap when I heard some raggedy man's cough about 20 feet behind me. Immediately, my mind jumped to all kinds of terrible thoughts. You know the type: "He must be alone." "He's a murderous thug." "He's about to jump me." "Can I make it to my car on time?" "Oh, there's a car pulling into the lot. Wait! Wait, people!"
Of course, this does get me walking faster - and burning more calories. I made it back to my car, leapt inside, locked the doors... and looked up to see a very undaunting dad-ish fellow with a paunch walking by. All that adrenaline for nothing! So after a few minutes, I got back out and took on a second lap. And then a third. Halfway through the third, it started raining again. No sweat. I've got a hoodie. Three-quarters of the way through, the rain turned to hail. Hail! It was like the heavens opening up and throwing every possible excuse I could use to get out of exercising at me!!!
Excuses aside, I did walk for 37 minutes. Not counting the time I spent cowering in my car.
My vintage dinner menu on Sunday evening was pretty tasty. I wasn't feeling good, though, and didn't enjoy the process or the meal quite as much as usual. Here's the menu, straight from 1945:
Stuffed Cabbage Leaves
Tomato Sauce
Buttered Peas
Carrot Sticks
Baked Caramel Custard
The Cabbage Leaves were stuffed with a mixture of sauteed chopped cabbage, onions, parsley, bread crumbs, and spices (yep, that's all the recipe told me - "spices"!). The cookbook instructed me to garnish them with Tomato Sauce, but I was dying to throw them in the oven just at the end with tomato sauce and parmesan. Those are my modern tastebuds wanting to dress things up in a way that might not have been pleasing to the 1940s palate. These dishes I've been cooking have been fairly - well, I'm not sure how to characterize them. I started to say "bland," but that's not exactly right. The flavors have been very true to life. Not a whole lot of fusion goin' on. Then again, maybe it's just that they're missing all the MSG I'm probably injesting in my modern prepared foods every other night of the week!
It's been ages since I shelled peas, but it came back to me pretty quickly. And, boy, do they taste world's apart from their canned cousins. The Carrot Sticks were a nice break from the weekly salads, and the Baked Caramel Custard was delicious. My big mistake was not in the kitchen. I was feeling so crummy by the time dinner was ready that I curled up in the living room and turned on the TV while I ate. What a change for the worse! I can't remember more than a few bites of what I ate. It's as if television completely short-circuited the connection between my meal and my mind. There wasn't that sense of rest or thankfulness that I'm accustomed to when I've sat down at the kitchen table for one of these vintage dinners. Before I realized it, my plate was empty. And that's with a sour stomach! Strangely enough, my manners changed, too. I caught myself at one point shoveling a piece of Stuffed Cabbage into my mouth with the end of a Carrot Stick - without really tasting either. Gee, I wonder how I gained all this weight?
8 comments:
Good for you doing some exercise. I always feel better after a good walk/jog with my dog each day.
That was quite an epiphany about eating in front of the TV. It's hard to just sit and eat when I'm alone (which is most of the time) but it seems to be a different experience than eating in front of the TV or while reading a book. Eating while I listen to the radio is nicer than eating while reading, using the computer or watching TV.
I'm glad you had a nice, safe walk! Whew!
I agree with prairieknitter about eating while listening to the radio, but it depends on what you're listening to. We don't have cable, so we only can watch television online or DVDs, but often Spouse and I put on BBC7 or other non-music radio shows during dinner (we don't listen to much music radio either), which still takes some of the engagement with food out of the equation, but probably less than the full audio-visual experience of television.
I had a similar experience at our track--only I had some young Marine who thought he'd be funny and jump out in front of me. I gave a deep taste of my left shoulder and knocked him on his behind!
I'm very impressed with your schedule! I've been trying to drink that big glass of water each morning but it's been much harder than I thought it'd be!
I'm sorry you had a scare.
Oh, the parmesan cheese on the tomato sauce would have been "legal" addition. This is from the Kraft website: "In 1945, KRAFT GRATED PARMESAN was first introduced to retail in 3 different sizes, a 1 oz. pouch and 1 oz and 3 oz canisters. The original canisters were green and red, rather than our familiar green canisters today."
Hope you are feeling much better.
Hope you are feeling better now!
I also don't enjoy the taste of canned veggies.
Isn't it strange how threatened we have to feel compared to 1940? You would never have felt so threatened. Not to mention there would have have been lots of people back then enjoying the park as tv was not an option. Continue to enjoy your walks.
Amy, I can't say that I feel good during or after exercising yet --- but I do feel good having completed that mission for the day!
prairieknitter and Teru, I usually have the radio playing while I eat my homecooked dinners and NPR always has some sort of interesting topic on tap. The radio is a must at breakfast time. I think I might try putting some '40s music on for my dinners, though. It's more relaxing. In the morning, I'm looking for a catchup on what's going on in the world. Looking to be engaged while I eat. At dinnertime, it's a little different.
Emer, that glass of water when you're half awake is tougher than it sounds! I find myself gulping great breaths of air down with it. Being half-unconscious will do that to you... :)
Packrat, I'm glad to know that the grated parmesan was already around in the '40s! Judging from this cookbook, they were definitely using cheese a little differently then than we do now. (A little less of it, for the most part.) Cheese seems to show up more often as part of the sauce in a casserole-type dish than just a garnish.
Hairball, I am feeling much better this week, thank you!
Jeanne, it stinks feeling unsafe going for a walk. Fortunately, it's very unusual for that park to be so deserted. There are usually tons of people walking the track, so it's a good option for somebody without a workout buddy.
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