Food too salty?

Yesterday I made a Yankee style pot roast - you know the kind, a chuck roast browned and

Classic American Comfort Food

simmered, with roasted potatoes, carrots, celery, onion, mushrooms and a rich gravy?  Oh yeah.  I found the recipe online and because of the ingredients used to season the roast, the finished product (mostly the gravy, not the meat) turned out to be very salty.  It was too salty for me, and my Mom couldn't even have tolerated one bite.  But everything else about it was perfect.

A lot of old fashioned cooks probably know this trick -- I was not sure it would work, but I remember someone saying that potatoes soak up salt.  You can salt and salt and salt the little buggers but it just disappears into that starchy potato-ness without much effect.

So I stored the gravy from the roast separately (from the meat and vegetables, after cooking), and tonight I put that into a saucepan and added a peeled and diced russet to it.  The gravy was very thick (almost completely a solid after it cooled), so I also added a little water.  I brought it a boil then simmered it for about 30 minutes.  I added a little more water to keep it fluid, and after thirty minutes or so of cooking and another 30 minutes or so of sitting there resting, I fished the potato chunks out of the gravy with a slotted spoon, leaving as much of the gravy in the sauce pan as possible.  Then I rinsed them with a little bit more water, swished that around amongst the tater chunks, and poured that "gravy-rinse" back into the gravy in the pan.  I then tossed out the potatoes -- along with all that sodium they'd soaked up.  The remaining gravy is perfect -- all that lovely beef flavor intact and not salty at all.

You could use this same idea with other liquid foods that are overly salty, whether accidentally or otherwise.  I was happy to be able to figure out a way to "save" that gravy - it's just not Yankee Pot Roast without it.

Buen Provecho!

Cowboy Canned Supper

Use these...

Back in the olden days, cowboys often had to throw dinner together with whatever they had. Heck, I remember times when all there was, was an old burlap sack and some muddy water to make soup outta (you had to boil that a long time, which by then you might coulda rode inter town fer a steak.)  So this recipe here was for days when the chuck wagon had a bit of a surplus for Cookie to work with.  It ain't much, but it'll make you lose your appetite. 

2 slices bacon, chopped
1/4 cup or so chopped onion
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 garlic bulb, chopped
2 wienies or hot links, etc, sliced thin
1 can pintos
Salt and pepper to taste

Start by frying up the bacon until it is about halfway to crispy.  Then add the vegetables.  You can use others just as easy -- green pepper, or chilies, whatever suits you, but keep it simple.  Simple is better.  Fry those and the hot link slices (add the meat about half-way through) over med-low heat until the onions and celery are tender.  By now, the bacon should be all the way crispy.

Next step is drain off most of the bacon fat, but leave a little bit for flavor.

Dump in the pintos with their sauce and a touch of liquid smoke if you like it, or maybe a dash or two of pepper sauce, and simmer until it cooks down a little.  Salt and pepper to taste and serve it with cornbread or biskits.

This'll serve one hungry, or two skinny. Like I said, you won't be hungry no more after you-ins eat this.

This recipe came from this old guy here... he war ugly, but he wouldn't lie to ya none.

Hallowed Ground

On July 3, 1863, three divisions of Confederate soldiers, about 12,500 men and boys, led by their generals on foot and on horseback, marched for about a mile across the open ground of a Pennsylvania valley, near the town of Gettysburg. 

They concentrated and centered on this patch of ground, on a corner of this wall (just beyond the focal point of this photo) – hidden from view by the aged veterans you see standing here. 

This was perhaps the greatest military blunder ever made by Robert E. Lee.  Nearly 7,000 Confederate troops were killed or wounded in the battle (roughly 56% of the soldiers who marched that day), and about 65% of their officers were casualties.  Union defenders lost 1,500 men.

This place is called “the Angle.” Thousands of Federal defenders awaited them here, standing and crouching behind this low wall.  As the soldiers marched across the valley and came within range of the Union guns, they faced a curtain of cold steel.  Once here, the fighting became hand-to-hand and the Confederate assault appeared for a moment to be succeeding. But almost as quickly, turning as they tried to breach the Union's defenses at this corner, the "charge" broke and the Rebel advance shattered and was turned back in defeat. 

Today, this event is remembered as “Pickett’s Charge,” the high-water mark of the American Confederacy and the climax of the Battle at Gettysburg.  It marked the end of any lasting offensive success by Rebel troops in the Civil War and from this moment on the final Union victory was assured. General Lee led the demoralized remnants of his Army back to Virginia, never to venture in force into Union territory again, in the remaining (almost) two years of the Civil War.

Because of what happened here, on this ground, nearly four million of our fellow Americans were ensured their ultimate freedom, and this nation started a long process of finally fulfilling the promise of its own enshrined ideals, that “all men and women are created equal” and are deserving of freedom, inviolably deserving of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This process is not finished, but continues today.

That pivotal moment happened here, at "the Angle," on July 3, 1863. This is sacred ground. 

On the day this photo was taken, many years later, former adversaries met each other in friendship, stretching their hands to touch each other once again across the wall they had so bloodily contested.  

Humans are such strange creatures.

"The real problem with Americans and their disrespect for Obama—according to a Canadian"

From Quartz today, an article by William Thomas...  (and my feelings exactly)

There was a time not so long ago when Americans, regardless of their political stripes, rallied ’round their president. Once elected, the man who won the White House was no longer viewed as a Republican or Democrat, but the president of the United States. The oath of office was taken, the wagons were circled around the country’s borders, and it was America versus the rest of the world, with the president of all the people at the helm.

 

Suddenly president Barack Obama, with the potential to become an exceptional president, has become the glaring exception to that unwritten, patriotic rule.

Four days before Obama’s inauguration, before he officially took charge of the American government, Rush Limbaugh boasted publicly that he hoped the president would fail. Of course, when the president fails, the country flounders. Wishing harm upon your country in order to further your own narrow political views is selfish, sinister and a tad treasonous as well.

 

Subsequently, during his State of the Union address, which is pretty much a pep rally for America, an unknown congressional representative from South Carolina, later identified as Joe Wilson, stopped the show when he called the president of the United States a liar. The president showed great restraint in ignoring this unprecedented insult and carried on with his speech. Speaker Nancy Pelosi was so stunned by the slur, she forgot to jump to her feet while clapping wildly, 30 or 40 times after that.

 

Last spring, president Obama took his wife Michelle to see a play in New York City and Republicans attacked him over the cost of security for the excursion. The president can’t take his wife out to dinner and a show without being scrutinized by the political opposition? As history has proven, a president in a theater without adequate security is a tragically bad idea. (Remember: “Apart from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?”)

 

At some point, the treatment of president Obama went from offensive to ugly, and then to downright dangerous.

 

The healthcare debate, which looked more like extreme fighting in a mud pit than a national dialogue, revealed a very vulgar side of America. Obama’s face appeared on protest signs, white-faced and blood-mouthed in a satanic clown image. In other tasteless portrayals, people who disagreed with his position distorted his face to look like Hitler, complete with mustache and swastika.

 

Odd that burning the flag makes Americans crazy, but depicting the president as a clown and a maniacal fascist is accepted as part of the new rude America.

 

Maligning the image of the leader of the free world is one thing; putting the president’s life in peril is quite another. More than once, men with guns were videotaped at the healthcare rallies where the president spoke. Again, history shows that letting men with guns get within range of a president has not served America well in the past.

 

And still the “birthers” are out there claiming Barack Obama was not born in the United States, although public documentation proves otherwise. Hawaii is definitely part of the United States, but the Panama Canal Zone where his electoral opponent Senator John McCain was born? Nobody’s sure.

 

Last month, a 44-year-old woman in Buffalo was quite taken by president Obama when she met him in a chicken wing restaurant called Duff’s. Did she say something about a pleasure and an honor to meet the man, or utter encouraging words for the difficult job he is doing? No. Quote: “You’re a hottie with a smokin’ little body.”

 

Lady, that was the president of the United States you were addressing, not one of the Jonas Brothers! He’s your president, for goodness sakes, not the guy driving the Zamboni at “Monster Trucks On Ice.” Maybe next it’ll be, “Take Your President To A Topless Bar Day.”

 

In president Barack Obama, Americans have a charismatic leader with a good and honest heart. Unlike his predecessor, he’s a very intelligent leader. And unlike that president’s predecessor, he’s a highly moral man.

In president Obama, Americans have the real deal, the whole package, and a leader that citizens of almost every country around the world look to with great envy. Given the opportunity, Canadians would trade our leader—hell, most of our leaders—for Obama in a heartbeat.

 

What America has in Obama is a head of state with vitality and insight and youth. Think about it: Barack Obama is a young Nelson Mandela. Mandela was the face of change and charity for all of Africa, but he was too old to make it happen. The great things Obama might do for America and the world could go on for decades after he’s out of office.

America, you know not what you have.

 

The man is being challenged unfairly, characterized with vulgarity and treated with the kind of deep disrespect to which no previous president was subjected. It’s like the day after electing the first black man to be president, thereby electrifying the world with hope and joy, Americans sobered up and decided the bad old days were better.

 

President Obama may fail but it will not be a Richard Nixon default, fraught with larceny and lies. President Obama, given a fair chance, will surely succeed, but his triumph will never come with a Bill Clinton caveat—“if only he’d got control of that zipper.”

Please. Give the man a fair, fighting chance. This incivility toward the leader who won over Americans and gave hope to billions of people around the world that their lives could be enhanced by his example just has to stop.

 

Believe me, when Americans drive by the White House and see a sign on the lawn that reads, “No shirt. No shoes. No service,” they’ll realize this new national rudeness has gone way, way too far.

 

This post originally appeared at Senior Living.

A note by Bob...  I disagree with the author's assertion that this change occurred with President Obama's administration.  It had been developing for quite a few years (and at least a couple of presidents) before that, and to be sure, politics in the USA have always been ugly.  But it surely accelerated and became more venomous with Mr. Obama; racism has come out of the closet and joined with political hatred.  Many people are blinded to the good in the man by their own ignorance. I also disagree with the statement that our last president was not intelligent. He had opinions and policies that many of us found abhorrent, that we feel damaged our nation, and he was often awkward when expressing his thoughts in public forums (which also often made him seem less than intelligent). But these are differences of opinion, and do not necessarily indicate a dearth of intelligence.  While I think he was misguided, I would never say he wasn't "smart," or that he was dishonest. 

The Roundabout in America

Roundabouts have been slow to catch on here in the USA, but they are very common in other parts of the world and they are becoming more common here as well.  This doesn’t, however, keep the average stateside driver from hating them irrationally.  Let me ask you, what's not to like about a traffic interchange that saves taxpayer dollars, saves lives, and keeps traffic moving at the same time?  If drivers in other countries can learn to use them safely, so can you!

How do they save tax dollars?  They typically require less land when they are buying expensive real estate for an intersection, and they don’t require a hugely expensive signal light system – just a few yield signs.  They keep traffic moving because even when busy, everyone can typically keep moving – there is no 45 second wait for a signal to “come around.”  Saving lives is easy, when the only possibilities for wrecks are lane-changing sideswipes and low speed failure to yield conflicts.  The left-turn fatal or serious injury collisions, the red-light-runner t-bones, and the potential head-ons at normal intersections all go away.   

Once you understand how the roundabout is supposed to work, and what the rules are for using them, they become less-intimidating and less stressful to use. If my little essay doesn’t work for you, search online for instructional videos – there’s more than one.  ADOT has one specific to Arizona that is very good, but the rules are basically the same everywhere.  Please note that this discussion is not for the "traffic circles" often used for traffic-calming in neighborhoods or business areas.  Those are different.

The first rule about using a roundabout is you need to know where you are going.  There are signs posted ahead of a roundabout that show you graphically which lane you want for which direction you wish to exit the thing.  Pay attention to those signs if you don’t already know which lane you want – and position yourself in the lane you want.  This may seem elementary, but you and I both know that a vast number of drivers don’t pay attention to anything except their cell phone conversation or even worse, their text messages (don’t let this be you). But typically, you want the right lane entry for a right turn or straight through.  You want the left lane entry for straight through, for left turning and for u-turns.

Then, on arrival at the entry point, prepare your mind to yield, not roll right on in. All roundabouts should require a yield on entry; the vehicles already in it have the right-of-way. You may need to wait a few seconds to yield and then enter the traffic flow in the circle. When you do, enter directly to the lane from which you will exit the roundabout – this is not like a turn at an intersection where you must turn right lane to right lane, or left lane to left lane.  One thing they don’t want you to have to do is to change lanes in the roundabout.

Then just drive on through. Keep in mind the roundabout is not intended to be a high-speed interchange.  Maximum speed is typically 20-25 mph.

One or two more things – if you are driving a long vehicle, pulling a trailer, etc, the center apron is designed to allow you to drive on it.   If you encounter an emergency vehicle in or near a roundabout, you yield to them the same as you would anywhere else – clear the roundabout if you have time to do that, and pull to the right as far as possible, stop and wait there until they have passed the required distance down the road before you resume driving.  If you have to stop IN the roundabout because you weren’t paying attention and they caught you by surprise, pull to the right and stop where you are.

Once you learn to follow these rules, you’ll get used to driving in roundabouts and they won’t stress you out!

Keep the shiny side up!

A Minuteman's Last Post

Having just gone to Boston and once again being enamored of and fired up about the true stories of our revolutionary war, for this year’s Remembrance Day I am posting this story. It is mostly transcribed from another source and is about a real Minuteman.  (see credit at the end)

Did you know that the Minutemen were militia members, but that not all colonial militia members were Minutemen?  The Minutemen were the elite, hand-picked for their dedication, enthusiasm, and their ability to muster at a moment’s notice.  They were our “first responders” of that day, or our original Rapid Deployment Force.  They turned out quickly and held the field (in theory) until the rest of the militia units could form and march.  Gosh, and you thought that idea was something new. 

Anyway, I’ve read the names of some Minuteman leaders, but you rarely read the personal stories of the rank and file, unless they were killed on the day of the battle.  Gordon Lightfoot said a soldier "must be dead to be admired" [Don Quixote]; apparently, this has more than a grain of truth in it. 

So, for Remembrance Day, 2014, I present you:  Mr. Thomas Hill, Esq, of West Cambridge, Massachusetts, a Minuteman, and with thanks to Mr. Thomas Kemp for the original story.

The following is an almost verbatim transcription of an encomium printed in the Massachusetts Spy, Worcester, MA in 1851. I have slightly re-arranged the order of the text for clarity.

A Revolutionary War hero, gone.  Died at his residence in West Cambridge, on Thursday morning (15 July 1851). Thomas Hill, esq, aged 90 years. Mr. Hill was a pensioner. He was in the battle of Concord, and was on Bunker Hill, but not in the engagement.

Thomas Hill…, …the only survivor of a family of seven, then in his fourteenth year, was [also] not under arms on the day of the Concord fight, but…with his father and eldest brother Abraham was of the volunteer minute men who fought at Bunker Hill on the seventeenth of the following June and later in the Eight Years War served two campaigns in the Jerseys and New York. He [was] now 89 years of age.

Thomas Hill was honored, along with four other survivors who were active in the scenes of 1775 [these were all that could be found still alive in 1851*] .  On this occasion, the citizens of the beautiful town of West Cambridge did high honor to one of the least of its quiet native-born townsmen. Thomas Hill, the old soldier, was escorted by a cavalcade of about seventy horsemen, out and home, from West Cambridge to Concord over nearly the precise route of the first instalment of British troops that marched from Boston and fired upon the collected American troops at Lexington, killing eight men, being ordered as ‘damned rebels’ to disperse by the British commander.

First printed, along with explanatory notes, by:
Thomas Jay Kemp | Posted on August 21, 2012 by Thomas Jay Kemp: Thomas Hill—American Revolutionary War Minuteman Hero Gone

Thomas Hill, age 14, didn’t stay at home with the women, the children, and the old folks.  He went out to the battle with the men and braved the fire of the angry and determined Regulars. He not only went, he went with the first of the “shock troops,” the Minutemen. 

So to honor the old soldier, they took his body on parade, accompanied by seventy mounted horsemen, along the same route Paul Revere rode in 1775 and followed that same morning by the British soldiers who initiated the fighting in what we now call our Revolutionary War -- at Lexington Green, and at the Old North Bridge in Concord.  How cool is that?

* In 1851, a soldier who was of fighting age in 1775 would have been about 95 years of age, so there were not many left.  Average life expectancy was much lower 175 years ago than it is today.

Tracy Morgan: ‘I Can’t Believe Walmart Is Blaming Me’ for Crash Injuries

Wal-Mart's driver caused the crash, but Morgan wasn't wearing a seat belt. I wonder how many other people would be just as surprised if something like this happened to them? 

Mr. Morgan called Wal-Mart's argument "despicable."  I don't think so, and neither does the prevailing legal thought in the USA - and probably elsewhere as well.  When you do not do everything reasonable to protect yourself from risk, then the other seemingly culpable party in an injury case may not be held fully responsible.  Depending on where you live, this concept may be memorialized as contributory negligence, or perhaps comparative negligence.  I am told these are two slightly different concepts (along the same lines).  If you do not wear your seat belts, and injuries result in an ensuing collision, the portion of your injuries deemed caused by your failure to wear them will likely be deducted from any claim you might win. Think about it... why would "they" shoulder the complete responsibility when the liability is, in reality, shared?

In my city, about two and a half decades ago, a local police chief and seat belt wearer was driving to a local car wash.  Since it was just a short distance, in his own neighborhood, the Chief did not fasten his seat belt.  He was t-boned by an extremely drunk driver (my characterization) and he suffered a severe, paralyzing back injury, which shortened his life significantly. He lived long enough to sue the drunk driver -- but because his injuries were judged to be about 50% caused by his own failure to wear the belt, the court reduced his award by that amount.  When you think about the costs associated with the treatment of this kind of injury, we're talking about a responsibility of millions of dollars in his case.

These concepts apply to any such liability situation -- failure to wear a helmet in a motorcycle crash, for example, or a case where a collision is a result of failures by both drivers to observe traffic laws -- you run a red light and hit someone who was drunk and speeding, just to name a couple.  A jury might decide 50/50, like in the Chief's case, or maybe 60/40, whatever.  It will vary according to the circumstances.

So if you are not convinced by the overwhelming safety considerations to wear your belts -- at least do it to protect your wallet and your family's future!

Hey... keep the shiny side up, eh?