Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes once again it is I, your popular host, Mani the purebred border collie, here today to bring you a partly me-related post. You may remember me from such posts as “Expletives Deleted”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose.
For good measure, here I am again, a bit later.
You can see I have a lot of Lamb Chops with me on the bed. I share this bedroom with the guy I live with, though sometimes I spend time in my Upstairs Fort, which you can see there, and sometimes I sleep in the chair in the living room. The guy I live with said that some of the other purebred border collies who lived here slept in that same chair. The chair is as old as the couch; about ninety years old.
It’s covered with a worn-out blanket, or something, in case my paws are muddy, which they sometimes are.
Anyway, I think you can see what it’s like outside, here.
The guy I live with doesn’t know what to do. We’re not used to this sort of thing at all.
We had Opera Day again, yesterday. Don Pasquale.
The guy I live with likes opera, obviously; Chess, the purebred border collie who lived here before me, already told the story of how the guy I live with went to the opera once and Princess Grace of Monaco was sitting in the same row as he was.
He wouldn’t be able to sit for that long, these days. He has trouble with his hip, though the doctor hasn’t said he needs a new one. Yet.
One of the things he’s been doing, besides making hundreds of dumplings, is cooking, so I’m instructed to show some pictures of food, just to prove that he doesn’t spend all of his time staring out the window and moaning.
These are Sichuan-style dumplings with chili oil and other things. (True, they’re really supposed to be won tons, but the guy I live with hasn’t made any won tons, yet.)
None of this is what some people would call “hot” food.
This is vegetarian ma po tofu:
And, finally, fried rice. This was a different recipe from his regular one, and the guy I live with almost gagged at the suggestion of adding a whole tablespoon of salt. He didn’t add any salt.
The fried rice recipe also called for lop cheung, Chinese sausages; there’s a frozen pack of them at the back of the freezer, but the guy I live with forgot to thaw them out. He says they’re kind of an acquired taste; sweetish.
He’s been using a relatively new wok with a wooden handle, but this is the wok that’s been here for thirty-five years. It was his wife’s, and is well-seasoned.
It gets cleaned with a traditional wok brush.
It’s better that he’s cooking all the time rather than eating all the time. (I certainly wouldn’t mind eating all the time.) There are no snacks in the house, for him. No cookies, candy, cakes, or pie, either. (I think there’s some ancient Christmas ribbon candy in the pantry, but that’s just for the sake of appearances.)
He spends a lot of time reading about food, too.
I spend a lot of time thinking about food, when I’m not asleep, anyway.
I sleep on the couch, of an evening (I always liked that way of talking), and then when I get peckish, which is often, I come into the kitchen with with my “biscuit stare”.
You can see that the guy I live with hasn’t put away his Sorels. He rarely has a use for them, fortunately, but he wore them a lot when he worked outside, on cold, snowy days. He slips them on to go outside when the bird feeders need to be filled, which is a lot, because the birds are constantly eating, like I’d like to be.
If you didn’t know, biscuits taste best when they delivered to me on the couch.
I know this sounds a bit spoiled, but the guy I live with said that Slipper, a purebred border collie who lived here before me, liked to have his biscuits brought up to him when he was lying in bed. That was spoiled.
I’ve never asked the guy I live with to bring me biscuits in bed. (But it gives me an idea.)
I’ll leave you now, with an elegant picture of me doing the other thing I like to do on the couch, dreaming of biscuits, and warmer weather so we can do some gardening.
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
Are you writing more than you typically do, or am I just noticing it more? You know, Rhody has a similar stare when he wants treats, but I never see it. I do not give him treats. I leave that up to his friends. They give him too many anyway. Rhody has a Lambchop also, but only one. He sometimes puts it in my bunk, as if I want to share. I do not. Perhaps he just does it because I give him no treats.
Maybe I am writing more, because it’s really boring here right now. The highs for the next three days are supposed to be right at or below freezing. This has just been going on and on and on.
Having snow on the ground is a good thing, these days, but having so much of it is tiresome.
When Darla (kitty) got bored, she enjoyed hassling Rhody. She seemed to find that to be quite amusing. Perhaps you could try that with the guy you live with. Just do not tell him that it was my idea.
The guy I live with says I’m underfoot a lot, these days, when he’s cooking. It is a pretty small kitchen, though.
Maybe you should try hiding his keys, and then, while he is panicking and searching for them out of view, placing them someplace very obvious.
You stare out at the snow, longing to be able to get out and about again, while I stare out at the rain. Books, books, books here though I also had to do a little work – the removal of an old built-in press which we will have replaced during this coming week. All excitement! Pfffffffffff!
Having snow on the ground is a good thing, if the alternative is now “fire weather”, but the guy I live with says, and you can see how it was on older posts made in January, that having this much snow isn’t normal. And it’s going to take a long time to go away, where if it snowed in March or April it would be gone fairly quickly.
I did a small bit of work in the garden today, of necessity, and the ground was incredibly soft and muddy, not really suitable for working.
Definitely not gardening weather here. Denver usually gets at least one day of 15C or warmer once a week in the winter, sometimes a lot of warm days in a row, but all the snow, which isn’t normal, is reflecting the sun’s heat, keeping things very cold here.
The high next Monday is predicted to be about -7C.
The guy I live with says the weather people say there’s no end in sight to all this cold weather.
” this is the wok that’s been here for thirty-five years. It was his wife’s, and is well-seasoned”
It’s a “looker”, nice big handles. Do you use Allium tuberosum (Chinese garlic chives) for seasoning it? It’s one of those good weeds to grow.
The old wok doesn’t need any more seasonin, but the new one has been a bit difficult.
The guy I live with has been thinking about trying to grow garlic chives, but it’s so dry here that would probably be a failure like so many other things have been. There are plenty of Asian markets not too far away.
He watched a video in which this guy showed his method of seasoning a wok: burning onions. (No protein, so no sticking to the pan.)
But what interested him most was the suggestion that the burned onions would be saved for something special. Burned Onion Delight or maybe something like that.
Mello Mani an Guy! What a happy bloggie post today!
So much yummy lookin foodabullss Guy….you are a guud cook fore sure!
An Mani did you know BellaSita Mum bringss mee food INN bed….fore reel. An mee treetss are put on mee blankit on THE big bed….
Spoiled? NAWWW….just pampurred 😉
An wee wish wee had yore snow….havin 1 inch iss not alot at all 😦
***nose bopss*** BellaDharma an 🙂 BellaSita Mum
Thanks; the guy I live with said I’m not getting biscuits in bed, though I’m pretty sure he’s brought them to me like that, before. What he says and what he does are sometimes two different things.
One big deal here is that he’s solved his problem of what to have for dinner, at least for a while.
Mew mew mew Hu’manss meow many thingss….
Yore ‘biskit eyess’ are not to bee denied! BellaSita Mum wuud due what efurr you wanted Mani 😉
HURRAH fore sortin out new meelss Guy! Wanna help BellaSita Mum? Mew mew mew…..
If she knows how to make a roux, then, yes, the guy I live with does.
This takes two days and is adapted from a recipe by Justin Wilson.
You need
1 chicken
about 3 bunches of green onions, finely chopped
a bunch of parsley, finely chopped
a cup of dry white wine or 2/3 cup of good dry vermouth (like Noilly Prat)
1 teaspoon of garlic powder
3 carrots, peeled and sliced or chopped
2 cups of frozen green peas
salt to taste
1. Put the chicken, minus the insides if it comes with those, in enough water to cover; bring the water to a boil and then turn down the heat, and simmer until the chicken is cooked.
Remove the chicken, and refigerate it overnight in a covered bowl.
Let the water, which is now broth, cool and then put it in the refrigerator overnight.
2. The next day, skim all the fat from the broth, put it back on the stove, add the green onions, parsley, white wine or vermouth, and about a teaspoon of garlic powder (sprinkle that it so it won’t clump).
3. Simmer that for about half an hour, and then add the carrots.
4. After another half hour, shred the chicken and add that, and the peas.
5. Make a roux with 3 tablespoons of oil and half a cup of flour. Whisk it until all the lumps of flour are gone, then add a little of the broth, stir that in, then add some more, and so on. Then you can pour the whole thing back into the pot with the chicken, and whisk that to remove any lumps.
6. Add salt, if you want.
This goes really well with mashed potatoes, or on toast, and lasts the guy I live with about four nights.
The roux won’t keep things thickened after the first day, or of some is frozen and thawed later, but whatever.
That sounds speck-taculur Mani an Guy!
BellaSita will try that sumtime…..THANX!
You’re welcome.
He says you can make a nice chicken soup that doesn’t require so many steps, too, and some can be frozen for later.
1. Cook a chicken in a pot of water with maybe half an onion (doesn’t need to be peeled), a bay leaf, a pinch of thyme or marjoram, half a teaspoon of salt and a dash of black pepper.
2. Remove the chicken when it’s cooked, cool it enough to remove the breasts, legs, and maybe the wings. Take the meat off the bones and return the carcass to the pot, and cook it for another hour or two. That way you get a nice stock for the soup.
3. Then you can strain the stock, and put the stock into the refrigerator overnight.
4. The next day, defat the stock (that’s why it goes in the refrigerator for a night), put it on the stove, add carrots (not too many or the soup will be really sweet), a chopped onion or some shallots, celery, whatever else you like. When the carrots are tender you put the shredded or chopped chicken back in the pot to heat it up.
You can add rice or noodles, too.
This would last for four dinners, here.
Grate recipe…it iss furry simmylar to BellaSita’ss Nanna’ss recipe!
Mistur Guy you are such a guud cook….. 😉
Mani due you get a peece or two of THE chick-hen?
I don’t get “people food”.
The guy I live with often makes something that will last for three or four days, but there are times when he does like to be cooking every day.
Oh mee hopess mee not offend Guy…..
Mee likess abit of blueberry yogurt or 4 teeny peecess of Babybel Gouda Cheese! That iss all THE peepell food mee getss….
Xcept when mee finsds a bit of chick-hen or beefy on carpet that BellaSita dropped…..mew mew mew…..Issn’t that what Poochiess due Mani??
Well, all the purebred border collies who have lived have gotten “people find” when they were sick.
I got something called Fromager d’Affinois when I had to take pills some years ago. It was really good.
And I get pumpkin for breakfast and dinner.
But no eating off plates, like sued to happen here.
Mew mew mew there used to bee eatin off platess there Mani?
BellaSita Mum meowed a funny story ’bout Grate-Grate Aunty Mingflower. Shee weighed only 7 poundss an was a Siamese as inn mew her own mind.
One nite BellaSita had made a Steak an sum ‘Tatoess an Veggiess….
Shee went innto kitchen for a steak knife an when shee came back, GG-Aunty Mingflower was wrestlin THE steak to THE floor!!!
BellaSita Mum was so shocked that a sirtain Siamese got to have sum guud nomss on THE steak!!! Mew mew mew…… BellaSita did get her steak back….eventually…… 😉
Lol. The guy I liev with had an orange tabby who would steal glazed donuts out of the box.
Glazed donutss!?!?! Mew mew mew mew…..silly Orangey Cat!
Yep. He would take one claw, grab a donut, and slide it out of the box, according to the guy I live with.
That was forty-five years ago.
Mee-yow mee asked BellaSita who were fer fur Kittss 45 yeerss ago an shee meowed a fluffy Auburn Black cat named Silky-Auburn an a cray-cray Foxhound named Rebecca! Mew mew mew….
The guy I live with had two cats, when he met his wife. She wasn’t a “cat person” but was won over quickly.
Mew mew mew it was sorta opposite fore BellaSita Mum. Shee was a Poochie Purrson til shee had her 1st cat. An then shee had a cuppell more Poochiess an then a Kitty girl an has had only Kittiess efurr since Mani 😉
The guy I live with had dogs when he was little, but his sister got him a kitty when he was living in a townhouse. Then he met Cindy, and she learned to like cats, but then she saw a purebred border collie at a nursery, and fell in love with the breed.