The amigos went to Elysian Capitol Hill Brewery for beers tonight.
Mine is a lager, and everyone else got ales (Indian Pale Ales and other Pale Ales).
Ales are hoppier, heavier beers than lagers and pilsners.
Saturday/ not marmelade!
Thursday/ the red dragon 🏴
I picked up my notebook computer today in Redmond— and stopped by the British Pantry store to replenish the South African marmalade and chutney in my own pantry.

Sunday/ Dick’s Drive-in is back 🍔
Tuesday/ more of the stalk
My new trick in the kitchen helps me keep a little more of the asparagus stalks that I like to steam in the pressure cooker.
I use a knife to cut off just an inch or so of the dry bottom of the stalk. (It’s a little hit-and-miss to break off the bottom by hand.)
Then I peel off one or two inches at the bottom with a vegetable peeler.
Now I can eat the whole stalk, without chewing on any tough fibrous skin.
Thursday/ Thai food and beers 🍻
Tuesday/ first attempt: acorn squash
The acorn squash that I had pressure-cooked tonight, came out O.K.— but not great.
Even though I cooked it for a minute longer than my recipe called for (6 instead of 5 mins), it still came out a little tough.
Some recipes say to add butter and cinnamon (or nutmeg) onto the squash as it goes into the cooker, but I elected not to do that.
Saturday/ the baby formula crisis
I know absolutely nothing about babies, but I know a little bit more after reading a report in the NYT about the baby formula shortage in the US.
Babies basically need breast milk or formula until they can start to eat solid food (at 6 months).
Do not dilute formula.
Do not try to make your own formula.
If you are out of options, give your baby pasteurized whole cow’s milk for a brief period of time.
Get advice from a pediatrician if your baby needs a special formula that has become unavailable.

One can will last 6-7 days for a newborn, and maybe as little as 2-3 days for a 6-month old baby.
Friday/ pasta: the stovetop is best
My first attempt at cooking pasta in the Instant Pot® pressure cooker was not a success. (It was off-the-shelf Barilla Protein+ spaghetti).
The Instant Pot instructions that I used, called for a high-pressure cooking time of 2 mins plus 5 mins until releasing the pressure, stir well, and leave in the pot for another 5-10 mins.
Even with doing all of that, the pasta came out cooked unevenly. Aargh. I also felt it had a different texture compared to what I’m used to, by boiling it on the stovetop.

Yeah-yeah, just use a bigger pot, I know. What I do instead is to boil water in my electric kettle, and pour it over the dry pasta in the pot to soften it, so that I can bend it to fit into the bottom of the pot. Then I put the gas on HIGH for 10- 11 mins. As one does with pasta, keep an eye on it, and stir it a little now and then, but it’s still easy-peasy compared to the Instant Pot.
Thursday/ cooking with pressure is a pleasure
I have had my Instant Pot pressure cooker for a week now, and I’m still learning to use it —but I like it a lot.
So far I have cooked regular oats, steel-cut oats, rice, Brussels sprouts, asparagus and sweet potato in it. Asparagus is ready in an instant with an official cooking time of 0 minutes. You put them in, and they’re done. Howzat! 😂
Let me explain. The laws of physics still apply. Even if you put the water and asparagus in the cooker and tell it to cook for 0 minutes, it will still take 5-10 mins to get to the operating temperature and pressure inside. During that time it already cooks the food inside. Something as delicate as asparagus is then cooked already. Voila.


Just as an interesting aside: the triple point of water occurs at 0.01 °C in a near-vacuum. That point at the upper right called the critical point is where water vapor (steam) is warm enough so that no amount of pressure brought to bear on it, will liquefy it.
Wednesday/ of buds and brews
The breakfast Buds I had looked for far and wide, suddenly showed up on the shelf in the QFC on Broadway, and I grabbed four boxes.
Push had come to shove, and I was no longer playing nice by taking only one or two boxes!
And — I returned my ‘black stainless’ coffee maker, and got a slightly different model, after all.


Thursday/ about the ‘black stainless’
My coffeemaker was kaput, and the new one I had ordered, landed on the porch today.

Saturday/ a taste of South Africa
blatjang
/ˈblatjaŋ/, /ˈblatʃaŋ/
noun
A tangy sauce made of dried fruit (usually apricots) and chillies cooked in vinegar; chutney.
Archaic forms: blaatgham, blatcham
Origin: Afrikaans, Malay
It is probable that in late 19th century Afrikaans this word still had two meanings:
1. A. Pannevis’s Afskrif van Lys van Afrikaanse Woorde en Uitdrukkings (1880) defines ‘Bladjang’ as being made of dried chillies and stewed dried apricots in vinegar;
2. H.C.V. Leibbrandt’s Het Kaapsch Hollandsch (1882) lists ‘Balachan’ and ‘Blatchong’, both with the same meaning as the Malay belachan; and the Woordelijst van het Transvaalsch Taaleigen (1890) includes ‘Blatjang’, defined as ‘een zeker gerecht’ (a certain dish).
When you say ‘blatjang’ or ‘chutney’ in South Africa, you really mean ‘Mrs. Ball’s Original Recipe Chutney. It is nonpareil.
The Woodstock, Cape Town factory that first made Mrs. Balls’s chutney, opened in 1917.

Thursday/ animals in LEGO
I ran out to Walmart in Factoria to go look for All Bran Buds today, but no luck. (All the stores here in the city seem to be out of it. Amazon has none, unless you want to pay $10 or $15 per box, from sellers in Canada!).
I almost bought a LEGO set at Walmart, but they lock them up in a display case, and the store assistant was swamped with four other shoppers.

So which is the cutest: the sleek bald eagle, the orca, the toothy crocodile, the angry lion, the macaw parrot (a psittacine; all parrots belong to the order Psittaciformes), the fat giraffe, the brown bear, the sleepy penguin, or the mama kangaroo (a nice touch, that joey squeezed into its pouch)?

Monday/ red pears
I bought some Red Anjou pears at Amazon Fresh. They are not nearly as red as ones I see in pictures online, but that’s OK. They taste fine.
My favorite pear is still the famous bell-shaped Bartlett pears, though.
(Also called Williams’ bon chrétien pear. The origins of this pear is uncertain).
My mom served up for canned Bartlett pears with custard, as a quick dessert.
Thursday/ mini chocolate cones
Last night we had little chocolate cones after our beers and dinner.
The chocolate comes from Ukraine.
(Thanks to Ken & Steve for finding the intriguing chocolates!).


P.S. Happy belated St Patrick’s Day. Three more weeks to go for my green cast, then it all comes off for good.
Thursday/ any way you slice it (works for me)
I recently filled out a crossword clue that said ‘Source of milk for manchego cheese’. Answer: EWE.
As placed my Amazon Fresh order last week, there it was: sliced manchego cheese.
So I added it to my order, just out of curiosity.

(Manchego is a cheese made in the La Mancha region of Spain from the milk of sheep of the Manchega breed. It is aged between 60 days and 2 years -Wikipedia).

It’s a firm cheese with a salty, zesty taste that is not overwhelming.
(As for slicing the tomato: as long as the tomato is still firm, I can pin it down with my right elbow and slice it OK with my clumsy left hand).
Sunday/ got milk? .. sort of

Among the other items I requested was a SLICED loaf of bread, though, which was also not available. He substituted it with an UNSLICED loaf without checking with me. Maybe I will just break chunks off and eat it that way :).
A Sunday night grocery run was not possible, so I had groceries delivered to my house for the first time.
I used my QFC account that I had used for pick-up at the (previous) height of the pandemic.
QFC uses Instacart, which means an Instacart person picks your items in the store, and then drives it out to your house.
I added a generous tip online with my order, and said to just leave my items by the door.
A text message notifies the customer that the items had been delivered.
It all went fine, for the most part.
Still, next time I will try delivery by Amazon Fresh, and see how that goes.
Thursday/ keep calm and carry on
‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ was a slogan on a motivational poster produced by the British government in 1939, to prepare the country for World War II.

Wednesday/ two beers at Two Beers
I had a picture of my vaccine card ready as we stepped into Two Beers Brewing Co. in Seattle’s industrial district, tonight. As of Monday, proof of a coronavirus vaccination —or a negative test— is required at most indoor businesses in King County.
Checking for one’s proof was done at the counter serving the beers, and even then it was very cursory. The place was busy and they seemed a little short on staff, as is the case in most places these days.
