OMGosh
The Week in Review
We had flooding - was it predicted? Nope! The neighbors should feel great that the old scrap fencing is no longer cluttering their field. It’s all sitting in my front yard.
During the heavy rains, my roof began to leak. The upside is I think I’ve found a new contractor to tackle some projects.
Rimshot (now shortened to Rimmy) is being treated for Giardia along with six other puppies. It’s time consuming to administer meds twice daily, but I hope we have a resolution.
I had a fun lunch with Joan which included an adventure to a “new to me” shop - our get togethers always make it a great day..
The 4th was lowkey, but nice. Brady and Kelly returned from a quick visit with her dad that day. We had the traditional hot dog, beans, macarini salad dinner and ended early due to fatique on their part and the call of a good book on mine.
Memories
I don’t know if it’s the same for others, but food seems to trigger good memories for me. Our July 4th menu is the perfect example.
Hot Dogs: My biological father and I used to go to a famous hot dog place in Oakland every time I visited for their Chicago-style hot dogs. Then, in high school, my friends and I used to go to Hamburger Hamlet. My standard order was “hot dog number six.” My kids grew up knowing that one by name because I made it occasionally.
Baked Beans Jim loved the baked beans his brother’s neighbor made. She generously gave us the list of ingredients so we could fiddle with the amounts and recreate them. Jim took over production, and the family remembers them as “dad’s beans.” They’ve been a family favorite ever since!
Macaroni Salad As much as I disliked Jim’s mother, I have to admit that making her macaroni salad every time we visited after I raved about it once was a lovely thing for her to do. One time at our house, I requested that she make it and allow me to measure the ingredients. I LOVE the stuff.
Pudding Cake Buckle up - this one may be lengthy. Jim’s dad was solo parenting for a week with the three sons. He found a “new” cake mix, and the kids went wild. It was a chocolate pudding cake. The cake mix batter is topped with pudding. During baking, the pudding sinks. The warm popping spills the cake when you serve it by the scoop. They all enjoyed it so much, their dad baked one every night during the week the mom was gone. When she returned, the kids were so excited to share Dad’s “better than anything” cake - she was insulted that he’d received the rave review and banned the cake. Jim shared this story with me, and I did an internet search. The cake mix was no longer made, but their website shared a recipe to duplicate it. He kept the secret and surprised his dad and brothers on a mancation. They were just as thrilled as he was to have it again.