Fridays and more food

I always look forward to Fridays, even now when I'm not working. Things seem to wind down. I never make lunch dates for Friday, preferring to go home with a whole afternoon ahead of me. I usually do part of my grocery shopping--the nuts and bolts part like toilet paper and ketchup and wine--on Friday at a market where I've been shopping for 20-plus years. It used to be Minyard's but now is a City Market, one of only two stores in the chain. The difference shows--wider, cleaner aisles, much fresh produce, and I'm told by others the meat is excellent. A sign inside the front door says Rule #1: The customer is always right. Rule #2: if the customer is wrong, see Rule #1. Every Friday, I buy a half-lb. of tuna salad, eat half that day for lunch and half the next day. The woman at the deli counter sees me coming and starts to dish out the tuna. But today, good as my lunch was, I felt sort of at loose ends, couldn't settle down to much of anything.

So, of course, I cooked for supper, tried a new recipe. Mashed potatoes topped with lightly cooked asparagus, then a fried egg, grated Romano (I happened to have grana on hand) and then a Tbsp. of browned butter poured over the top. It was good--a nice mix of flavors--but I know the egg yolk was supposed to be runny (the way I like them) and soak down into the potato, but mine wasn't--it was cooked through. I figured out later when the directions said put in the pan in sizzling butter, turn off the heat, and let it sit five minutes, I should have moved it off the electric burner--those instructions were probably meant for a gas stove. Oh, how I wish I had a gas stove.

I had invited Jordan and Christian to come for fried chicken--an experiment--Sunday night but they couldn't, so I invited my nighbors for a pasta/tuna dish heavy with anchovies (they're among the few people who will eat anchovies with me). Then Jordan said if I would still have them they'd like to come--well, they won't eat anchovies. I'll have to revamp the menu. I have a call in to her to make sure they won't change their minds again, before I do that.

Meantime, I'm going back to editing the manuscript on my desk that a friend asked me to work on. I think what I'm really doing is avoiding writing. I read a blog by an old friend today who said her writing career took off in the'90s (so did mine) but she didn't know now that she had the fire to write. I left a comment that I certainly knew the feeling. Not quite two weeks ago, the publisher who has had my mystery for so long said she should be able to let me know in two weeks--so I think I'm stalling, even as I prepare myself for rejection. Also ordered some books for a new project I'm considering, another reason to stall. My, how we can fool ourselves. But I read the listserve that specializes in unpublished authors (from Sisters in Crime) and I'm amazed at these women who get rejection after rejection and still make a science out of querying, in spite of a pile of unpublished manuscripts. They have the fire, and I wish I did. I refuse to beileve it's an age-related problem!

A new recipe and a good day

My day started with a chatterbox--Jacob talked nonstop from the time he got up until his parents came to get him at ten. The only brief moment of quiet was when he was absorbed in drawing on paper on my office floor. We read the paper together--that is, he put the section he had over the section I was reading and kept explaining it to me. I gave up and fixed him his "awful waffle." Then a trip to Central Market--I find I have already learned to economize. I spent less than $100 on food this week at two grocery stories, including wine and supplies for two company meals--it helped greatly that friends sent me a lovely fruit basket.
Tonight Jay and Susan came for dinner--Jay and I both read Food & Wine and we had agreed we'd love the pasta recipe with olive oil, tomatoes, capers, and anchovies. It called for black olives, which neither Jay nor I like--and I didn't consult Susan, just left them out. But I did add some squash--from my brother's garden--and a bit of grated grana cheese. Absolutely delicious. I thought you'd have to be careful and only serve this to people who eat anchovies, but you didn't really taste them. Capers do lovely things when they are fried, and you got more caper taste. The squash was a great addition.
Jay (he says I keep forgetting to mentioin he's my handsome neighbor) ended up taking over the cooking. He said after all it was his magazine and his recipe. I had the sauce made when they got here, and we had a glass of wine, then went to cut up fruit and boil pasta--that was when he took over, reminding me to add 1/3 cup pasta water to the recipe, draining the pasta, worrying over the temperature of the sauce, mixing it with the pasta and finally serving it. Susan kept laughing and saying, "Jay, it's not your kitchen," but I was glad to have him do it. I joked and asked if that included dishes but they both did pitch in and scrape dishees and load the dishwasher. So we had a good time, talking mostly about food and cooking.
This is a cooking weekend, and I'm enjoying it. More tomorrow.