APRIL 2019 ...What's Cooking??

I made chicken wings in the oven. The recipe made them crispy and a little charred but I should have taken them out about 30 seconds sooner.  The recipe was good anyway... a keeper.

That's the way I like my chicken.....you'd get no complaints from me!

Thanks Beth. They were good.

That's just the way I like my chicken too Norm. Nothing worse than a flabby skinned chicken.

I am making pizza tonight: 4 cheese for Katie and sausage/pepperoni for Joe. I would like to try making one on the grill sometime.

bethk wrote:That's the way I like my chicken.....you'd get no complaints from me!

I ditto that Beth!

Leftover meatballs, and 1/2 of an egg salad sandwich.

They look great. That's the only way I have ever done chicken wings............. That's the way mom made them when wings were almost free at the butcher shop. Always crispy. Yumm!

Niagara Visitor wrote:They look great.  That's the only way I have ever done chicken wings............. That's the way mom made them when wings were almost free at the butcher shop. Always crispy.  Yumm!

Lore.... Mom used to send us to the Chicken Man, ( as we called him );getting chicken necks and backs for free.
She would make a big pot of spaghetti sauce with them.
Brother and I would not eat the backs or necks, but wow, what a tasty sauce. Mom would strain the chicken, and she and dad would pick and suck the slivers of meat off the bones.
I have not had chicken spaghetti sauce, since 1963.

When Lyn & I were in Orlando on Wednesday we made a stop at Trader Joe's.....Love, Love, LOVE that store!

I got a couple packages of the brown Kamato tomatoes ~ they are SO tasty! They may have a different look but they always taste like a tomato. Dane went to his sister's today so I sent one package to her as a treat. Now I'm wondering WHY I was so generous......I'm using 3 tomatoes sliced for BLT's tonight and that only leaves 3 for another day.

They were $3.49 per package....Don't write and tell them I would have spent more.....actually, I didn't even look at the price. I just knew I wanted them and was going to buy them.

Woven Bacon Tutorial ~ Just because......

Woven bacon (3 slices per) baked between 2 cooling racks:




Removing the top cooling rack that keeps the bacon flat and doesn't let it curl:



Finish crisping on paper towels in the microwave for 30 seconds just before serving:



Making my sandwich....with MIRACLE WHIP and lettuce between each part of my sandwich:



BLT for supper with potato salad!

Those tomatoes and bacon look really good. It will be a while before garden fresh tomatoes are available around here.  Charlie, who never has requests for dinner, had one yesterday. He asked if I could make some day soon, small size Swedish Meatballs with egg noodles.  Someday soon was today.  i stopped making them short when I started running out of room. I broke them smaller before cooking.   

My grandma use to hang her noodles to dry like that....over every chair, table edge and upturned pots.

Me? I just roll and boil instantly....no drying, just dropped into the water or broth a few at a time so they don't clump together.

bethk wrote:My grandma use to hang her noodles to dry like that....over every chair, table edge and upturned pots.  

Me? I just roll and boil instantly....no drying, just dropped into the water or broth a few at a time so they don't clump together.

My grandma used that wooden clothes drying rack that you would unfold.
It was a disaster if it collapsed.

I made more than I planned to use so I am drying them so I can save the rest.  I don't know how many times I have looked at those folding clothes drying racks in antique stores and thought about getting one for noodles.

NormM wrote:I made more than I planned to use so I am drying them so I can save the rest.  I don't know how many times I have looked at those folding clothes drying racks in antique stores and thought about getting one for noodles.

That's a great idea, Norm......UNLESS you think about the fact that some lady used it to dry her undies prior to you hanging noodles on it.

Hahahahahahaha!!!

I thought about how something that old might not be hygienic.  I thought about covering them with paper of maybe even painting them.

Speaking of undies...….

My washer sprung a leak today when I did my first of TWO weekly loads of laundry. And, of course, Dane was at his sister's for a visit. I noticed when I took the clothes out of the washing machine to put into the dryer that my feet were standing on a very wet rug.....

I think I've mentioned I have a Fridigidare stacked unit, a one-piece, apartment sized kind of set. It's actually a full size washing machine and dryer but it's attached and not two pieces sitting one on top of the other. I've not been thrilled with it from day one but it's my own fault for not researching it before shelling out $1,150 for something I don't like. My daughter said I should have returned it but I didn't want to go to the trouble of messing with it. My own fault and now I'm paying the price for my non-diligence of purchase.

So, anyway, the only good thing I did was to purchase the 5-year extended warranty when I bought it in 2016 ~ it's still under warranty. I called Lowe's Service and they set up a time on next Tuesday to have a serviceman come and look at it. I was told the servicing company would call to confirm the appointment. And they had to read some stupid disclaimer that the repairs would be covered UNLESS the unit had been used commercially or if there was intentional customer miss-use. Yeah, yeah, OK...…

So about an hour later I get a call from the service company and some man (with a distinct foreign accent) explains to me they do not have a 2-person team to service my unit and will only come if we un-stack the unit.

WTH???

I tried to be polite and I explained there was no way to remove the dryer from on top of the washing machine because it was A SINGLE ATTACHED UNIT.....COMBINED.....

And again the foreign man told me they could only repair the washing machine if we removed the top unit...…

IDIOT!

I ended up telling him to cancel the call and I would call Lowe's Service back to reschedule with another service contractor.

When I called Lowe's back I got a really nice lady and I told her about the call I had received. She asked if I had the model # and wasn't that a single stacked unit??? Yes, I said, AND if I were to take my screwdriver and start removing the dryer unit I assumed I would void my warranty....

She burst out laughing.

Then she apologized for the incident and asked me to hold so she could call the service contractor back and maybe straighten out the problem. After only about 20 seconds she came back on the line and said, "You know what? I'm just going to cancel that call and schedule you with another serviceman. My name is Linda. IF you have any other problems you call back and ask for ME."

So, I'm still scheduled for a Tuesday repair...….hopefully with someone who knows what they're doing!

I guess we're just too old, Jimmy. We remember when service company employees practiced good customer service. I've had the majority of service personnel do a fine job but the ones i remember are the idiots who don't have a clue.

It upsets me that as soon as I hear a certain accent I become instantly on alert. I've had more than one foreign telemarketer become verbally offensive when I ask them to please put me on their do not call list. Sometimes I answer because, like this evening, I was expecting a call about service on my washer and the caller ID read "800 Service". It was a telemarketer. When he said he was authorized to refund the money I had sent for computer support I simply asked to be put on their do not call list. Then he made an offensive suggestion and I hung up. There's no way to find out what the actual company is so hanging up is the only recourse.

Tina gets calls on her cell ( Verizon ) at 3 and 5 AM. All from foreign countries.
She called verizon and he told her to add them to her blocked list.
He also said, if the calls continue, in 30 days, report them to the FCC,
Like yeah....right...the FCC is really gonna catch them.
I have the same service, and I may get one weird call every 4 or 5 days.

We had the last of the neighborhood breakfasts this morning. By Easter most of the 'snowbirds' will be heading back to their northern homes.

When we go out for a large meal early in the day I try to decide on something a bit lighter for supper. So, chicken stir fry it was! I had the opportunity to clean out most of the random vegetables ~ of course, as usual, I have leftovers......I just can't seem to cook just enough of a stir fry for one meal. Maybe if Dane's not looking on Monday evening I can toss the leftovers from the refrigerator and pretend I'm going to wipe out the shelves.....

It's worth a try! LOL