Kitchen throwdown

OK - let's do something different today here at NAY. Let's forget that on Fridays there used to be funny stuff here about news headlines and shizz, and just turn the tables ENTIRELY and talk about one of my favorite subjects:

FOOD.

You may not believe this, but your Tiff is a pretty darned good cook. Why just last weekend I made banana nut bread and apple cake, from scratch! And people ate them! My word, it was exciting.

Yesterday was the occasion of another culinary triumph at Casa Teef, in that I used a crock pot to good advantage to make the whole house smell good all day and to provide a deelish dinner to the denizens of my domecile. Because even the youngsters liked what came out of said pot, I offer up here the recipe, so that YOU can boldy stride into the kitchen your OWN daggone self and emerge a victorious crock-pot wunderkind.

"Crock pot chuck roast"

1 3-pound chuck roast
1 cup baby carrots
3 stalks celery, chopped
1/2 red onion, chopped
1 cup whilte wine
1 cup water
1/2 cup tomato juice
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
salt
pepper

(My crock pot is actually an oblong slow cooker......if yours is a crock, just stand the roast up and proceed as directed).

In the morning:

1. place frozen roast in slow cooker (y'all, it's fine, trust me)
2. dump in veggies
3. dump in liquids
4. sprinkle with S&P
5. cover tightly and turn on low
6. cook for 10-12 hours

In the evening:

1. walk in house and begin salivating beccause damn, it smells fine in here, just like Grandma's house on Sundays after church
2. pour self a cocktail and tell everybody to get out of the kitchen, because "it's magic time"
3. turn off cooker
4. start some water boiling and preheat the oven to 375, peel and cube a few potatos (and why not try combining sweet with white?), throw 'em in the boiling water
5. uncover roast and remove it to a serving plate using a couple of spatulas (be careful becausae the roast will be like buttah!)
6. stick some biscuits in the oven
7. using an immersion mixer or a blender, whiz up the veggies and liquids into a coulee (fancy-pants cooking term for "whizzed up stiff") to use as gravy
8. turn off potatos, drain, mash
9. take biscuits out of oven
10. serve

Not hard. Not time-consuming, really. I think everything was ready within 40 minutes of me walking through the door.

Nutritionally, it's a reasonably robust meal, because of all the veggies in the gravy and the protein in the meat, and the beta-carotene from the sweet potatos. One could improve on that by adding maybe a salad, but, really, enough is enough, don't you think? We shouldn't like to go overboard and actaully climb the entire food pyramid all in the space of one meal, after all.

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Anybody know anything about raising goats?

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Today, in direct opposition to yesterday, my job does NOT suck. You know why? Because the project that was sapping my will to live was taken away from me.

OH! The gnashing of the teeth and the moaning and wailing that did NOT occur were wondrous NOT to hear! The breast beating that did NOT happen was wonderful NOT to undergo! The joy was palapable, the "yippee!!" was audible, the albatross around my neck and the monkey on my back found new homes, and all was well in Mudville.

Hells, yes, do I feel GOOD today! (anybody else remember that old Coast Soap ad?)

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The boiling oil thing back in the day must have hurt a lot. A lotalotalot. Shoot, I got some super-heated oil on my THUMB this morning and it almost made me cry.

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Or, maybe, sheep? Anybody know anything about raising sheep?

Or chickens?

The best way to lay out a barn?

Anybody?