I’m not really sure how to react to this one. Who knew that old retired clowns are processed and turned into deli meat? What will those Brits think of next?

Some of you may remember an incident last year where we found a mushroom growing in our bathtub. While a bit disturbing and a lot funny, I never held anything against our fine fungi friends. I love shrooms, and they tend to show up a lot of various pasta and risotto dishes in our house. They also used to appear in a spicy Thai soup that we used to make, but some strange chemical reaction between cooked fish sauce and shitake mushrooms caused some violent stomach issues that are best left untold. We’re a little more careful with our mushroom selection and a lot better about keeping our bathtub fungus free, and at this time of the year especially, I love using them.

This pasta dish is so simple to make, and it gets its mushroom flavor from three different sources: fresh oyster mushrooms, rehydrated porcini mushrooms, and black truffle oil. Fresh porcini mushrooms are incredibly expensive, so the most common way to find them is dried. A package of 0.25 oz. of them costs about $3 (which translates to, um, $192/lb.), but even this small amount makes a huge difference. Simply put them in a bowl with hot water, and after about 10 minutes, they’re completely rehydrated. Whatever you do, don’t throw out the water that they’re soaking in. It gets a nice rich brown color and takes on all of that expensive porcini flavor. No need to waste it.

Get a pan nice and hot, add in a good glug of olive oil, and add a couple of handfuls of oyster mushrooms, They mushrooms will soak up a lot of the oil, so be careful they they don’t start sticking. Add a clove of chopped garlic, a pinch of fresh thyme, and salt and pepper. The salt will start to draw the moisture out of the mushrooms, and the flavor of them will begin to concentrate. After the moisture has boiled off, add a splash of white wine to deglaze the pan. Make sure that you scrape up any of the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Add in the chopped porcini mushrooms and some of the porcini water, and let the liquid reduce a bit. In the end, you want the mushrooms to be fully cooked and a nice flavorful sauce for the pasta to soak up. If it needs more flavor, don’t be afraid to add more salt and more of the porcini water. Finally, toss in some chopped parsley and little more fresh thyme.

Get your pasta ready, and add it to the pan with the mushrooms. Toss the pasta with the sauce making sure that every bit of the pasta is covered. A healthy drizzle of good olive oil and a shower of Parmesan, and one more toss, you’re all set. Almost. Nothing gives you the aroma and taste that truffles do. One of the most prized and expensive of all gourmet ingredients, truffles are off limits to most mere mortals. If you happen to have a nice fresh $1000 truffle lying around, feel free to shower your pasta with shavings of it. For the rest of us, the closest we’ll come at home is to use truffle oil. Truffles come in two varieties, white and black, with white being the more expensive of the two. White truffle oil is still incredibly expensive, but at least accessible for those willing to shell out the cash for it. Black truffle oil is much more reasonably priced, and although it can’t compare to the intensity of the white, it will does great things to your home cooked meal. My good buddy Alberto brought me back a bottle of black truffle oil from his visit to Italy, and this was our first opportunity to use it. The key here is restraint. A little goes a very long way, and a little drizzle right at the very end will take this dish to a very different place. A very good place. Maybe if we let things go a little bit around the house, we’ll start getting truffles growing in our bathtub.

• It was a very fun and action-packed birthday weekend for the Lovely Suse. I mean, who else gets a candle on her BBQ? Just look how happy and hungry she is.
• The cake decorator at Stop and Shop needs a little practice. Still, for some reason, this was the tastiest Carvel cake I’ve ever had. Total Carvel count for the month: 2.
• George has gotten very bold of late. He’s managed to build up his jumping skills, and he’s been able to climb up on lots of new things. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been able to figure out how to get down.
• The Lovely Suse’s birthday dinner at Neptune Oyster. It took us about 3 seconds to fall in love with this little nook in the North End, and we had a pretty perfect meal there. Pressed tin ceilings, subway tiles, giant mirrors, penny tile floor, marble bar, limited seating, cozy ambience and a fantastic staff. We started with a half dozen oysters, and then followed up with four different appetizers, our favorite way to eat. Fried oysters and artichokes, homemade cavatelli with clams, crab Louis salad, and braised squid and olives. The perfect amount of food, all of our favorite flavors, and our perfect setting. This immediately enters the “dream restaurant” category for us as one of those places that if we could imagine the kind of place that we’d want to exist, this would be it. I”m pretty sure we’ll be going back there as soon as possible.
• On the way over to dinner, the Lovely Suse almost got run over by a big pile of trash. The bulldozers cleaning up from the Haymarket apparently didn’t see the crowd of people walking through and decided to start pushing boxes of rotten fruit and vegetables and trash on top of them. That was fun.
• An American Apparel store has opened in Harvard Square, and I’ve made a number of visits there while shopping for gifts. They’re claim to fame is that all of their stuff is sweat-shop free, manufactured in the USA, and have rather risque advertising. They make simple basics like t-shirts and underwear and socks, but they may be a little too hip for me. I like what they’re trying to do, and yes, they’re stuff is more expensive because of they’re manufacturing and employment philosophies, and they seem to appeal to people who want to look like they don’t care what they’re wearing, but of course, they do. Otherwise, they’d go shop for their v-neck t-shirts at Walmart or something. And they’re clothes are designed for a very specific body type: ultra-skinny men and women with huge boobs. I mean, they actually sell extra-small sizes for men, and a lot of their small sizes are even too slim for me. I’m not exactly big.
• I’m trying to figure out how many social faux pas occured in the following scenario witnessed in the men’s room at work. A guy is sitting in a stall, doing his business, and shaving. Then, his cell phone rings. He then proceeds to talk loudly on his cell phone about very personal subjects, all the while stinking up the joint.
• This is the time of year when our tivo is filling up with new tv shows that may or may not make it past the first episode. There seems to be lots of potentially good new shows, so it’s tough to figure out which ones to devote some time to. Any recommendations?
• bumper sticker of the week: “Question Consumption”

Sorry for the title. I couldn’t resist. My Mexican obsession continues. In the last 10 days, I think I’ve had approximately 10 meals of Mexican food. Tacos, burritos, arroz con pollo, another burrito, and finally this chicken posole soup. I don’t know what brought this on, but I don’t see any signs of it abating any time soon. Look forward to a winter full of more Mexican recipes.

This soup was inspired by this recipe, cutting a few corners to make it a very fast and easy meal. Some prep work is involved, but if you can get that done ahead of time, you’ll have dinner on the table in no time. Yes, I said dinner. Most people sort of look at me funny when I eat soup as entire meal. What, no bread or salad or a main course with that? Nope. I love soup. As I’ve said before, I used to eat it almost every day for lunch, and a good soup is everything a meal should be: warm, hearty, tasty, filling, and full of variety. I love finding new soup recipes, and I believe this one will be a keeper.

You can go ahead and make your own chicken stock, but I know that’s not going to happen. It’s actually really easy to do, but I know you’re probably just as lazy as I am and would rather just open a carton of chicken broth. That’s fine. It will still be plenty delicious. The other major prep work to be done is to cook your chicken. You can cook it anyway you like and whichever part of the chicken you’d like (but you’d use thighs and legs if you knew what was good for you). I slowly grilled thighs, but you could just as easily roast them or saute them. Once cooled, discard the skin (or feed some to your very happy dog), and then use your hands to shred it into small pieces. The big flavor component of this soup comes from dried ancho chilies. If you don’t have whole dried chilies, powder would work as well. If you have the whole chilies, soak them in boiling water for half an hour until softened, then rip them open, remove the seeds, and dump the chilies into a blender with some of the soaking liquid and some chicken broth. Blend it completely until there are no chili pieces left.

The real cooking begins with browning a couple of sliced onions and a clove of garlic in olive oil. After 8 minutes or so, add the chicken and ancho chili paste. Another few minutes of sauteing and it’s time to add the stock. Bring to a boil, cover, lower the temperature, and let simmer for 15 minutes or so. Add a can of posole, also known as hominy, to the pot, and continue simmering. Another 10 minutes, and you’re done. If the chili heat is too intense, mellow it out with a spoonful of honey and a little water. Get your toppings ready by chopping up some tomatoes, cilantro, scallions, limes, and radishes (look, i found another use for radishes!), spoon some of the soup into each bowl, and let your happy customer customize his or her own bowl. Don’t be afraid to put some freshly fried tortilla strips on top (or, to continue the lazy theme, some store-bought tortilla chips). Before you know it, it’s fiesta time. Maybe I should go register pedrocarpintero.com before it’s too late…

With the days of grilling getting fewer and fewer (Don’t worry. I’ll still grill until the first snow.), it’s time to start cooking indoors. Not that I have a problem with that. Of course, my third favorite cooking technique (following grilling and braising) is also the easiest: roasting. I’m pretty sure that almost anything tastes good after being blasted in the oven until it gets all nice and crispy and golden. Sometimes, even vegetables that can get a little boring after a while take on a whole new life when introduced to the oven. Veggies such as green beans, broccoli, and my personal favorite, cauliflower get completely transformed into something pretty tasty.

A recent evening found us with some of the last of our cherry tomatoes, some fresh beans from the farmer’s market, and a nice pork tenderloin, all aching for some hot oven action. The tenderloin was crusted with garlic, lemon zest, fennel and coriander seeds, seared on the stove top until nice and crusty, and then finished off in a 400 degree oven until just still a little pink in the middle. The tomatoes were tossed with a little olive oil, salt, and pepper, and slid into the same oven until just starting to burst under their own weight. When done, the slightest bit of pressure would send the sweet juices flying, so we had to be careful not to burn our mouths or find our clothes covered with spurting tomato guts. There are still a bunch of tomatoes left on our plants, and feeling guilty letting them go to waste, I’ll have to find something to do with the last of them oven the next week or two. They just keep on coming, but I’m sort of done with tomato season. After a rough start to the season, the plants thrived, grew to about six feet tall, and have given us hundreds of perfect little gems. I think next year we’ll experiment with some different types. I’d love to get some heirlooms growing if possible.

Finally came the green beans. I don’t think I had ever tried roasting them before, but after seeing it on a cooking show, I decided to give it a shot. I tossed them with olive oil, salt, and pepper, and a few sliced shallots. They took much longer than I expected (maybe thirty minutes), but when done, they were a little crispy, a little charred, a little chewy, and had taken on a sort of smokey flavor that I dug. With much of the moisture cooked out of them, they had a surprisingly light feel to them, and the caramelized shallots add some nice sweetness to the dish.

As hard as it is to see the Summer come to an end, I feel good knowing that I have plenty to look forward to in the kitchen. Sure, I’ll miss the farm fresh produce and warm Summer night grilling, but even that gets a little boring after a while. It’s time to fire up the oven and get toasty indoors for a while.

• I don’t want to get into specifics, but let’s just say that George is really becoming a man. And we’re definintely getting him fixed soon.
• Remember those old skool sneaks from last week? Yeah, they didn’t fit. So me being the cheap bastard that I am, I found alternative ones that are the same sort of slip-ons. But these costs me $6. Yes, $6. The Lovely Suse also got $6 sneaks. We may be cheap bastards, but we look good. On a side note, I also recently bought a t-shirt for $2.46, and it’s probably the best fitting t-shirt i’ve ever owned.
• It’s the Lovely Suse’s birthday week. Everyone should get her really nice birthday gifts.
• Jon is another proud member of Sirius nation. Welcome!
• OK, here’s another 80’s movie flashback: Gotcha!, starring a post-Revenge of the Nerds and pre-top Gun Anthony Edwards as a college student playing a campus-wide paintball type game, and eventually gets sucked into the world of Cold War European espionage. I think I’ve seen this flick approximately 748 times.
• I watched The Skulls this weekend as well. That’s another one of those movies that if I catch on TV, I have to watch it. I like all of the stuff in the beginning with the initiation and when they get all of the cash and cool cars. It’s a completely hokey movie, but I can’t help it. I love stuff about secret societies, especially if they star Joshua Jackson and Paul Walker at the peak of their late 90’s power.
• Jeez, and I thought I was obsessed with making pizza. Check out this guy. I mean, that’s a great looking pie, but if you ever catch me walking around the house in a chef’s coat, you have permission to kick me in the nuts.

I’m not really sure where to begin with these little mouthfuls of fun. I’m guessing that most people will simply dismiss them as disgusting after I tell you what they are, but just hear me out. These are stuffed cherry peppers. You could stuff them with all sorts of things, but these happen to be be stuffed with a mix of anchovies, capers, pickles, herbs, and olive oil. Ewwwwww, right? Wrong. They’re delicious and addictive and flavorful and a little sweet and a little spicy and a lot salty and pungent and I don’t care that my stomach isn’t going to be very happy after eating all of these peppers. The original recipe comes from my man J.O., and we tried making them a few years back to great success, and we’ve come up with variations of it to suit our own taste or mood. They’re so simple to make, and go nicely with some grilled meats or fish, in salads, as an hors d`oeuvres (it took me about 4 tries to get the spelling correct), or with a bunch of cheeses and salumi.

The peppers are small cherry peppers, which when eaten raw, are pretty spicy, but after a nice slow cook, give up a lot of their heat and mellow out. To cook them, half them and pull out the seeds and membranes with a spoon. Fill a baking dish with about half an inch of olive oil, pop the peppers into the dish, and then stick them in a 350 degree oven for about half an hour. The peppers will get all soft and pliable and oily, and once cooled, they’re all ready for some stuffing. That oil that you cooked the peppers in? Don’t be afraid to use that. It will be tasty poured over some roasted or grilled meats, or to dip some bread into.

The stuffing, like I said, consists of equal parts of finely chopped anchovies, capers, and pickles, a good handful of chopped parsley, a splash of balsamic vinegar, and enough olive oil to bind the whole thing together. You definitely don’t need to add any salt, but some pepper might not hurt things too much. Take a spoonful of the mixture, and stuff it into the pepper. That’s it. You can pile them up in a jar, cover them with olive oil, and they’ll stay good in the fridge for a good long time. Some people obviously don’t like anchovies and capers and the like, so here’s a variation that we recently experimented with that, dare I say it, was even better than the original. Take a can of good quality olive oil packed tuna, and mix it with a bunch of chopped black olives, some lemon, some parsley and scallions, and some olive oil. Basically, a nice tuna salad recipe that’s a bit less powerful, but no less flavorful than the anchovy based one. A big batch of these lasted about 18 hours in our house, with half of them being eaten at dinner, and the rest being polished off at lunch the following day.

Come on, who’s gonna step up and try to make these? If you do make them and you don’t like them, let me know. I’ll be happy to come over and finish them for you.

Let’s be honest. Despite what the calendar officially says, Summer is over. The kids are back to school, it’s no longer cool to wear white, and I’m not allowed to drink gin and tonics until next May. Still, the season is clinging to the last of it’s bounty, and you can still find great tomatoes, corn, zucchini, and the like. But I’m pretty much done with it all. I can’t fool my brain for too much longer, and my body certainly can feel it (Is it too early to turn the heat on at night? My nipples don’t think so.). So one last hurrah for those last great tomatoes. Don’t let me me catch you making this again until next August.

Panzanella is one of those great peasant dishes that was originally created to use all of the leftovers; old bread, an overflow of tomatoes, basil, etc. Ah, we should all be so lucky to have leftovers like that. It’s so simple to make, you’d be a fool not to try it. You don’t even need old bread to make it. Just take a nice loaf of country bread, slice it in half, brush some olive oil, salt and pepper on it, and then throw it onto a grill. Get it all toasty and golden, and then cut it into bite-sized pieces. Roughly chop your tomatoes, dice some cucumbers, and thinly slice some red onion, and toss them all together. Season with salt and pepper, some good olive oil, and a splash of red wine vinegar. Finally, tear up some basil leaves, and get them into the mix. That’s it. The red onion and cucumbers provide some needed crunch as the tomatoes and bread will tend to get a little mushy as things start to mingle. The bread will absorb all of those great flavors, and everything will just get better with a little time. It’s like a drunken college frat party. At first, everyone is sort of keeping to themselves, but once all of the juices start flowing and mingling, that’s when the real action starts. Give it at least an hour to mix and marinate.

So that’s it. The Fall is upon us, but don’t despair. Despite my love for all things Summer, the eating season never ends around here, and there’s lots of great stuff to look forward to. Just remember: Summer is only nine months away.

• Last Monday’s top ten was the highest traffic day in this site’s history. I think it’s because of the Brewster’s Millions mention. We finished watching it this past weekend, and I was trying to figure out the easiest way to spend $30 million (which if a remake was ever done, I think they’re have to up it to $100 million), and I think I would buy up all of the advertising time on the major networks and show home movies or something. I think you could blow through that cash in a hurry. Just think about how much TV advertising costs and you would have nothing to show for it. You could spend it all by buying 15 commercials during the Super Bowl. Can anyone think of an easier way to spend it? Remember, you can’t have any assets at the end.
• It’s depressing to see the last of the local peaches and the first of the local apples. Don’t get me wrong. I love apples, but I’m just not ready for them yet. I need more summer.
• I think that the older you get and the more “responsibilities” that you have, the less shoe laces you want to deal with. When something or some one needs immediate attention, you don’t have time to tie shoe laces. Last winter, I bought boots that just slip on because I hated having to tie and untie them whenever I was coming in and out of the house. Now, I bought some old skool slip-on sneaks for when I need to take the pup out in the morning or at night. Yes, this is even lazier than Velcro.
• Does watching the Pats game somehow even out the fact that I was sewing while watching it? I had to sew up holes in my jeans, and I felt a little more masculine about it since I was watching football. Go Pats!
• Homemade trail mix: take two. Bye bye to the sunflower seeds and candied ginger. Hello roasted pumpkin seeds, lots more dried cranberries and chocolate chips, and some dried mango.
• I ate my first hot dog in about 10 years. I’ve had bites here and there, but this was the first one I’ve had on my own. It was a nice Fearless Frank from the BBQ at Formaggio and I topped with with mustard, ketchup, relish, and some chopped onions. And let me tell you, it was pretty damn tasty. In a related story, we cooked beef at our house for the first time ever (hello Jared!). Unfortunately, it was for the dog. Have I mentioned that George won’t eat dog food? Yes, we make food for him. The last couple of weeks was ground turkey, pureed carrots, and brown rice. This week we’re trying out ground beef, pureed green beans, and brown rice. The vet OK’ed it, with the addition of a good multivitamin. It’s really sick that we’re sort of OK with the fact that he doesn’t like dog food. Dog food is sort of gross and stinky.
• I’m really looking forward to my first visit to the All Star Sandwich Bar, Chris Schlesinger’s new sandwich joint. I love me a good sandwich.

I’ve learned over the years that some things are best left to the experts. Major automotive repairs, anything involving natural gas hookups, and dental work are jobs that I tend to hire people to do rather than risk the obvious dangers of trying to do them myself. Certain types of cuisine are included in this list, mainly Indian, Chinese, and now, Thai. Indian food is just so complicated with the numerous spices and methods of cooking, and after a few attempts at making it at home, the last of which left the house smelling like curry for three weeks, I’ve been banned from for life. Many Chinese dishes benefit from and are made possible by the high heat cooking of a professional wok, that which just can’t be duplicated at home. Even if all of the ingredients and techniques are correct, it just won’t taste as good without that high-heat cooking. Finally, Thai food, one that we’ve tackled before with some success, uses some pretty unfamiliar and hard to find ingredients, and again uses the wok for many of its dishes.

Fully knowing these limitations, we set out to make the most popular Thai dish of all time, Pad Thai. The recipe seemed pretty straightforward, we had all of the necessary ingredients after a visit to Super88, and we were feeling lucky. The general method seemed to be you stir-fry the garlic, add the shrimp, crack in a couple of unbeaten eggs, add in the softened noodles, stir fry the whole thing, add in the sauce made with tamarind, fish sauce, lime juice, and sugar, add some bean sprouts and scallions, top with crushed peanuts and cilantro and more lime, and you’re done. The sauce along with the eggs coat the noodles and bind the whole thing together. There’s where our problem started. Our first attempt (I was rational enough to make it in two batches, fully expected to screw up the first one) came out like fettuccine Alfredo. The egg and sauce created a creamy gloppy heavy coating for the noodles that bound everything together, making it almost impossible to serve, let alone eat. After a few bites hit our stomachs like a sack of hammers, it became clear that another attempt would be necessary.

After some smart advice from the Lovely Suse, some modifications were made to try to lighten things up a bit. We cooked the garlic and shrimp first and removed them from the wok. Next the pre-beaten egg went in (one egg instead of two this time) and we cooked it until almost fully cooked before adding the noodles and sauce, and then finally the shrimp and vegetables. The result: meh. It was OK. Definitely better than the first, but still nothing compared to our favorite Thai place in the universe, Dok Bua. Dok Bua is a home style authentic place that was once a Thai grocery store with a few tables, but over the past few years has exploded in popularity, pretty much eliminating the groceries and becoming a full-fledged dining destination. Their army of female cooks turn out the food with blazing speed, and when they have their “A Team” on (Yes, we’ve had a few meals where the dishes were just lacking a certain something, so I claimed that they must have had their “B Team” working that night while the “A Team” was resting), it’s pretty hard to beat. Seriously, since first trying it, we haven’t been able to eat Thai food anywhere else. None of those Americanized “Seafood Delight” or “Double Dragon Happiness” dishes are served here. Just the real deal. The servers might even try to steer you away from dishes that are a little too authentic, basically telling you that “white people won’t like it”. With the exception of the bamboo shoot salad that we got once, I’ve never had anything here that I didn’t love. And yes, I know that pad Thai is probably more of an American phenomenon, they make a spectacular one here, and we order it often. It’s so much lighter and more flavorful than any other one I’ve had elsewhere, which made attempting it at home pretty futile.

The moral of the story here is know your limitations in the kitchen. We’ll most likely never attempt to make this dish again, even though the second attempt came out OK. Why make something that’s just OK just for the sake of making it at home? You’re money is better spent letting the experts make it. Why bother trying to recreate the Mona Lisa when you can have Da Vinci paint it for you for less than it would cost you to buy the paint and canvas?

Back when I was a little kid, my favorite thing about having pancakes for breakfast (or dinner, for that matter) was the big letter pancake. My mom or dad would always make a pancake in the shape of the first letter of our names, and it’s a tradition that I’ve continued into adulthood. When pancakes make an appearance at Sunday breakfast, the Lovely Suse always gets a big giant “S” and I make myself a giant “P”. The trick to a pretty pancake is to write the letter backwards so that when you flip it over, the nicely browned side ends up facing forward. My enormous jumbo cookie spatula makes the the flip doable. This past weekend, George got his first “G” Pancake. That’s not an optical illusion. It’s really that big. Yes, it’s practically as big as he is, and he only got to eat a part of it, but he loved it. The tradition continues…

I have some conflicted feelings about Rick Bayless. One one hand, I love his food, his recipes, his in-depth and authentic examination of Mexican food, we had a fantastic meal last year at Frontera Grill, and many of his food philosophies and practices are really admirable. He’s an integral part of the Chicago restaurant scene, and a champion for all things Mexican. On the other hand, he turned into a bit of a sell-out by shilling for Burger King a couple years back, and his tv show, Mexico: One Plate at a Time, is completely unwatchable to me. His delivery is slow and dry, and frankly, he acts and speaks sort of like a creepy new-age touchy-feely yoga instructor. I try to watch, but quickly feel bored and a little icky. Still, no matter how I feel about the him, the man knows his stuff. His newest cookbook, Mexican Everyday is pretty fantastic, and many of the recipes in it will quickly become a big part of our cooking arsenal.

This classic dish of chicken and beans with rice is really simple, and utterly delicious. We had high hopes for it, and after the first bite, we knew that we would be making it again. Very soon. Unlike many Mexican dishes we’ve made in the past which use a number of different spices and flavorings, this one uses only ancho chili powder for seasoning. And that’s all it needed. You begin by browning boneless and skinless chicken thighs that have been seasoned with salt and ancho chili in oil a large pot. After about 4 minutes per side, remove the chicken, leaving as much of the now-ancho-flavored oil as possible. Add a diced medium onion and a couple cloves of chopped garlic and saute in the oil for 5 minutes or so. At this point, add a cup of rice and stir, coating the rice in the lovely onion and garlic and oil and continue to toast it for a few minutes. Season with salt and another teaspoon of the ancho powder. Add 2 cups of chicken broth, bring it to a boil, reduce the heat, and then add the chicken pieces cut into bite-sized chunks, and a can of black beans. Put the cover on the pot, and then stick the whole thing in a 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes. When the rice is cooked through and the liquid has been absorbed, it’s done. At the last minute, stir in a handful of chopped scallions and cilantro, adjust the seasoning if need be, and then serve it up in big bowls, topped with more chopped herbs, queso fresco, and a squeeze of lime. Mmmm, that’s some good eats.

Yes, we’ll be seeing this dish again and again and again, a rare feat in the Carpenter household. Only a few dishes have been raised to the status of weekly no-brainer weekday meal, and it’s a special honor. We thank Mr. Bayless for his contribution to our happy bellies. A few more like this, and maybe I’ll start thinking he’s not so creepy after all.

• Isn’t Labor Day supposed to be about the beach and bbq’s and warm, sunny days? I raked leaves. Where’s my global warming? Our leaves are already changing colors and falling, and our backyard was covered with dead leaves. Although I discovered that running over them with the lawn mower takes care of them nicely. Why have I never done that in the past? I guess the bag fills up too fast or something.
• After George gets a bath, he runs around like a crazy little man, trying to dry himself off by rubbing against anything he can find. It’s funny as hell, but it’s even funnier when we play circus music. Which we do.
• George met Sadie this weekend. Let’s just say that Sadie doesn’t like to play, and George doesn’t like it when other dogs won’t play with him. Oh well. They agree to disagree and just sort of ignore each other. I guess it could be worse.
• Why has no one made a remake of Brewster’s Millions, the classic 80’s movie featuring Richard Pryor and John Candy? In it, Pryor plays a down on his luck minor league pitcher who learns that he’s inherited a fortune from a long lost uncle. However, he can either take $1 million right away, or attempt to claim $300 million by spending $30 million in 30 days. And he’s not allowed to tell anyone about it. We started watching it over the weekend, and it’s just such a great premise for a flick. I just learned that it’s actually based on a novel written in 1902 by George Barr McCutcheon, and has been made into a movie seven times. Still, I’m surprised some one in Hollywood hasn’t made a terrible version of it with Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan or something.
• Some of our zucchini flowers actually have little baby zucchini growing. And I was all ready to pick them all and start frying them up. Just like the just-dug-that-day potatoes that we fried up on Friday night.
• We finally cleaned up our nasty pile of computer cables and wires and got a wireless keyboard and mouse so our desk area actually looks sort of streamlined.
• When you get married, you register for all sorts of good kitchen stuff. The glasses that we registered for weren’t exactly the cheapest thing in the world, and I never really loved them. They were the best that we could find, and they did they trick. Still, they always felt too fragile for my taste, and the fact that we’ve broken a whole bunch of them can attest to that fact. We’ve started replacing them with nice substantial glasses that cost $1.50 apiece, and I love them.
• Carvel cake number one for the Lovely Suse. I think the over/under on number of Carvel cakes eaten by her this month is somewhere around 4.