Cooking And Eating....“Dis-moi ce que tu manges, je te dirai ce que tu es”

Some practice at Provincial French soup-making.......many ingredients, and a few technical processes, produce a 'simple' soup with many ingredients, from leftover champagne to sliced mangos, crushed garlic, and whatever 'remains' were on a shelf of the fridge.......The Pot would not hold another spoonful of anything....so, I've got to 'eat down' to make room for all the stuff that I left out......the okra, spinach and tiny white sweet potatoes that I harvested from a planter on the back deck........the preserved lemon slices fell in love with the hot peppers, sweet white corn, pickled ginger and basil pesto with sriracha hot chili peppers and the last of the jalapeno pepper jelly.....

  5am......I awakened from a dream...in which I was a 'contestant' on CHOPPED.......the challenge: a dessert, made from Braunschweiger, Orange Sherbet, Cilantro and Pickled Goat's Ears in Tangerine Brine.......Whew!......I don't even have any goats' ears in my fridge, so I settled for toasted green tomato and onion ciabatta with a thick slice of chub liverwurst and a cup of java with goat's milk......the sun is coming up, and the birds await those toasted ciabatta crumbs that I tossed into the driveway for them......a reason that I have a bagel-toaster with slide out crumb tray.......lucky wrens.....I thought about using the crumbs to make some fried eggplant....but reconsidered...after reading the caloric count for that liverwurst! a line of those huge, black worker ants have already begun to disassemble a chunk of 'liver spread' and, single-file, begun their march to the crack in the driveway that is the entrance to their underground maze......th

  Black Iron Bibibop rush job, this morning......forgetabout the rice.....got to save the rice for practicing sculpturing with 'rice crispy treats'......It's nearing Halloween.......so I bought a bag of trashy marshmallows that were 'half price' at the $1.29 Store......Perhaps, I should have just grabbed a box of Rice Krispies, since I have, as yet, never made them 'from scratch'.....and cooked the delicious jasmine rice for my Bibibop..... and.....for this evening.....Leftovers!......with the addition of some crumbled rusk. peri-peri and mango chutney, oyster sauce and reduced woodsy shiitake mushroom broth....... those meals were small....but, fortunately, there's a rock-salted dark chocolate caramel pie slice in the fridge, 'gifted' to me by a 'dieting' neighbor that was 'afraid' that she'd eat the entire pie if it remained in her house...... and...the 'backup plan' should she have eaten that last piece of pie......

 

After WW1, with millions 'dead or wounded'.....Edith Wharton wrote The Age Of Innocence and Emily Post wrote Etiquette......Watching a few minutes of RBG's 'Formal Funeral'......as pompous as it 'seemed'......I thought of how Diplomacy and Etiquette serve to 'tame' Human's more bestially instinctive combative behavior.... But, where does one 'begin' when the scenario is both highly complex AND was never designed for the common man, to begin with? In this 'picture' of a 'place setting'......are the instruments for courses of hors d'oeuvres, toast points and cream soup?.....and the prerequisite hygienic tools,,,,linen 'lap' napkins, finger bowls and gauze-covered lemon slices? Yet, when animals are aroused, its a combat zone......daggers, unsheathed.....dogs, snarling over 'floor' scraps......ants and rodents, making 'off' to their lairs in the walls....