Emergency Outdoor Cooking

My wife reminded me that I hadn't done a blog for over a week ... also suggested that I cover something on Outdoor Emergency Cooking. I actually was considering a different name for this post ... "Turd Burgers" ... although it sounds a bit crass, the name came from the appearance of the food ... not the makings or the taste.

It all started when we first moved up on the mountain. We figured we would get a little more snow than those in the valley ... but being so close to the ocean was also a consideration. We woke up morning ... late as I recall ... because the power had gone out. It was also snowing ...

It kept snowing ... and so lightly that our 2x4 railing on the deck accumulated over 14" of snow without falling off. There was even barbed wire with 5" on top ... just consistent, light, fluffy snow.

The problem was that there were too many trees with heavy limbs and they were breaking off rather than shaking off with the help of the wind ... there wasn't any. So we were without power ... along with the other residents up there.




Our neighbor was kind enough to plow out a path for our 4x4's with his bulldozer, but we were left without means to cook ... at least normally, most people would be without means to cook. I have a complete outdoor kitchen that runs on propane ... that works fine as long as it doesn't get too cold.

So we got the BBQ going and upon checking our bread supply, we discovered that there were no hamburger buns available ... BUT an ample supply of Hot Dog buns were in the drawer ... so thus was the creation of our first "Turd Burgers". Basically Hamburgers in the shape of Hot Dogs ... only they lacked the distinctive texture of a wiener.

They were pretty tasty ...

The power was out for 5 days that winter. Thank goodness for wood stoves, propane burners and a covered patio to work with!

Warmest Regards,

Chef Tom


This week we are on OutDoor Cooking - things outside the kitchen & Patio for  The Daily Serving

Catching Pigs ... an email a friend sent to me.

CATCHING PIGS

  There was a chemistry professor in a large college
that had some exchange students in the class. One day
while the class was in the lab, the Prof noticed one
young man, an exchange student, who kept rubbing his
back and stretching as if his back hurt.

The professor asked the young man what was the matter.
The student told him he had a bullet lodged in his back.
  He had been shot while fighting communists in his native country

who were trying to overthrow his country's government and install a new communist regime.

In the midst of his story, he looked at the professor
and asked a strange question He asked:
"Do you know how to catch wild pigs?"

The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the
punch line. The young man said that it was no joke.

"You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in
the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs
find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free
corn.. When they are used to coming every day, you put
a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming.

When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the
corn again and you put up another side of the fence.
They get used to that and start to eat again. You
continue until you have all four sides of the fence up
with a gate in the last side.

The pigs, which are used to the free corn, start to
come through the gate to eat that free corn again.

You then slam the gate on them and catch the whole
herd.. Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom.
They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught.

Soon they go back to eating the free corn .

They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods

for themselves, so they accept their captivity."

The young man then told the professor that is exactly
what he sees happening in America . The government
keeps pushing us toward Communism/Socialism and keeps
spreading the free corn out in the form of programs
such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned
income, , tax exemptions, tobacco subsidies,
dairy subsidies, payments not to plant crops (CRP),
welfare, medicine, drugs, etc. while we continually
lose our freedoms, just a little at a time.

One should always remember two truths:
1) There is no such thing as a free lunch, someone is

paying for it
2) and when you begin to think that having your government

provide for you and make your decisions is ok,  realize that you’ve

also given up the freedom that goes with making your own choices.

If you see that all of this wonderful government 'help' is a problem confronting the future of emocracy in America, you might want to send this to your friends.

If you think the “free ride” is essential to your way of life, then you will probably delete this email.

But God help you when the gate slams shut!

The Joys of Finally Being Moved ...

From the title, I think you can guess that I'm glad that it is completely over. The new people are in the old house and I think I've probably been for the last time ... unless of course there is something I've forgotten.

Now it is a huge victory everyday when I can get rid of a box load of stuff ... as you remember (or if you cared), we moved from 3500 sq ft to 1100 sq ft. HUGE difference in size and storage area.

With 2 garage sales under our belt, numerous visits to the thrift store donation entrance and the sale of a few of our older vehicles ... we can start really getting ourselves organized. I figure I have to physically write it on my list of "To Do's" everyday so I don't become complacent and accept the current status quo with boxes stacked one on top of another.

Today, I actually emptied 8 boxes of bathroom supplies into a new cabinet I purchased ... I love the fact that I'm breaking boxes "DOWN" instead of just emptying and refilling them.

I even did a total inside detail of one of the vans ... complete with returning the seats to their rightful location so someone can actually ride with me! I'm not sure when the last time was when I could see the floor between the front seats due to all the mail, spare parts and items being transferred from one location to another.

Another big thing was my upgrade of a couple computers in the house so no one but myself needs to be on my computer in the office.

Still a long way to go ... but at least it's progress and I finally feel like I can relax and release the feeling of "What still has to be moved."

Back to concentrating on Food and Food topics ... Here was last night's dinner of Ribs!

Warmest Regards,

Chef Tom

Almost out ...

The epic move from the old place to the new continues ... ugh! We are in the cleaning and final stages of removal and trying to find a new place for everything in the newer, smaller dwelling.

One thing is for certain ... Garage sale will be huge with really great deals to move all this un-needed stuff and make room for organization of the new.

We have boxes stacked pretty much everywhere ... I went through quite a few and then we just hauled them empty back up to the old house and filled them again. Somewhat depressing to see the same boxes back in their old stacks needing to be emptied again.

The cool thing is that a friend visited yesterday and while showing him the backyard, he exclaimed that we were sooo lucky!!! I asked why and he walked over to our ground cover plants and scooped up a handful and shoved them in his mouth ... I was somewhat surprised as he munched on the leaves. He told me to try it ... so I did and it was wonderful!

Apparently we have what is called "Miners Lettuce" as ground cover ... just about everywhere. Tastes similar to Spinach and has a light flavorful texture. We will definitely be eating this! We'll be mixing it into our salads ... heck, it could be a salad all by itself.

Laurel suggested we have him back over to show us how to eat the rest of the plants ... of course we also have our share of dandelions in the yard.




Chef Tom Heintz

Chicken Perspectives!

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Individual perspectives on the matter

Woody Allen: 
I mean, it was, it was ... a legal chicken ... It wasn't like it was a blood relative or anything. (And don't believe anything that Mia says about me.)

Aristotle: 
To actualize its potential.

The Dead Sea Scrolls: 

And God came down from the heavens, and He said unto the chicken, "Thou shalt cross the road." And the Chicken crossed the road, and there was much rejoicing.

Pat Buchanan: 
To steal a job from a decent, hard-working American.

Roseanne: 
Urrrrrp. What chicken?

Jack Benny: 
I'm thinking. ... I'm thinking

Buddha: 
If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken nature.

James Cagney: 
It crossed twice. The dirty double-crosser.

Albert Camus: 
It doesn't matter; the chicken's actions have no meaning except to him.

John Cleese: 
This Chicken is no more. It has ceased to function. Bereft of life, it rests in peace. It's a stiff. If it wasn't nailed to the road it'd be pushing up daisies. It's snuffed it. It's metabolic processes are now history. It's bleeding demised. It's rung down the curtain, shuffled off the mortal coil and joined the bleeding Choir Invisible. This is an Ex-Chicken. Ergo, it did not cross the road.

Darwin: 
Chickens, over great periods of time, have been naturally selected in such a way that they are now genetically predisposed to cross roads

James Dean: 
To prove he wasn't chicken.

Emily Dickenson: 
Because it could not stop for death.

Albert Einstein:
Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed the chicken depends upon your frame of reference.

Ralph Waldo Emerson: 
It didn't cross the road; it transcended it.

M.C.Escher: 
That depends on which plane of reality the chicken was on at the time.

Freud: 
The fact that you thought that the chicken crossed the road reveals your underlying sexual insecurity.

Bill Gates: 
To purchase Chicken 2.01a, which will both cross roads and calculate the energy it used. There are bugs, yes, but if you uninstall Traffic 2.0 and Farmer 1.2 it will run. If it freezes at WhiteLine 2.0, we have a patch ...

Dirk Gently (Holistic Detective):
I'm not exactly sure why, but right now I've got a horse in my bathroom.

Grandpa: 
In my day, we didn't ask why the chicken crossed the road. Someone told us that the chicken had crossed the road, and that was good enough for us.

Ernest Hemingway: 
To die. In the rain.

Sherlock Holmes:
Do not concern yourself with the chicken that did cross the road; the answer lies with the chicken that did not cross the road.

Saddam Hussein: 
It is the Mother of all Chickens.

Terry Jones: 
This isn't a chicken license! It's a dog license with the word "Dog" crossed out and "Chicken" written in in crayon.

Carl Jung: 
The confluence of events in the cultural gestalt necessitated that individual chickens cross roads. This brought such occurrences into being.

Immanuel Kant: 
The chicken, being an autonomous being, chose to cross the road of his own free will.

Martin Luther King, Jr.:
I envision a world where all chickens will be free to cross roads without having their motives called into question.

Timothy Leary: 
Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment would let it take.

John Locke: 
Because he was exercising his natural right to liberty.

Machiavelli: 

The point is that the chicken crossed the road. Who cares why? The ends of crossing the road justify whatever motive there was.

Karl Marx: 
It crossed twice. First time, it was a tragedy; second time, a farce.

Chico Marx: 
It couldn't. It was a rubber chicken.

Groucho Marx: 

Chicken? What's all this talk about chicken? Why, I had an uncle who thought he was a chicken. My aunt almost divorced him, but we needed the eggs.

Harpo Marx: 
Honk! Honk! Honk!

Jackie Mason:
Whaddaya want, it should just stand there?

Fox Mulder: 
It was a government conspiracy.

Jack Nicholson: 
'Cause it ***** wanted to. That's the ****** reason.

Nietzsche: 
Because if you gaze too long across the Road, the Road gazes also across you.

Richard M. Nixon: The chicken did not cross the road. I repeat, the chicken did not cross the road.

George Orwell: 
Because the government had fooled him into thinking that he was crossing the road of his own free will, when he was really only serving their interests.

Plato:
For the greater good.

Pyrrho the Skeptic: 
What road?

Colonel Sanders: 
I missed one?

Jean-Paul Sartre: 
In order to act in good faith and be true to itself, the chicken found it necessary to cross the road.

Arnold Schwartznegger:
It vill be back.

Jerry Seinfeld:
Why does anyone cross a road? I mean, why doesn't anyone ever think to ask, "What the heck was this chicken doing walking around all over the place anyway?"

Dr. Seuss: 
Did the chicken cross the road?
Did he cross it with a toad?
Yes the chicken crossed the road,
but why he crossed, I've not been told!

O.J.Simpson:
It didn't. I was playing golf with it at the time.

B.F. Skinner: 
Because the external influences, which had pervaded its sensorium from birth, had caused it to develop in such a fashion that it would tend to cross roads, even while believing these actions to be of its own freewill.

The Sphinx: 
You tell me.

Joseph Stalin: 
I don't care. Catch it. I need its eggs to make my omelet.

Oliver Stone: 
The question is not "Why did the chicken cross the road?" but is rather "Who was crossing the road at the same time whom we overlooked in our haste to observe the chicken crossing?"

Thomas de Torquemada: 
Give me ten minutes with the chicken and I'll find out.

Mae West: 
I invited it to come up and see me sometime.

Oprah Winfrey: 
To avoid mad-chicken disease.

Shiny Objects

Ever find yourself seeking the next Shiny Object that will take care of you for the rest of your life? I swear I must be the Salesman's dream ... everything looks so great and wonderful. I have a tendency to buy everything!

Actually it isn't the salesman fault ... they are just doing their job ... and I really do want their product. I just find that I don't have the time ... or don't take the time to look at it objectively and establish if I can do what is needed to properly give it a chance. Am I doing myself a justice to obligate to a new plan?

In reality, it all comes down to focus. I have this really good friend that has advised me on a number of conquests that I need to focus on one thing and bring it to completion before moving on to the next thing. I keep thinking that if I have multiple items going on at the same time ... I'll be able to have multiple streams of income.

The flaw in my thinking is that I never complete the first before moving on to the next ... or I try to do it all at the same time and only manage to lengthen out the time that it would take to actually bring in the first stream of income.

In the mean time ... I'm having to supplement my income with a job that only takes more of my time and distracts me from my goals. I find myself traveling in vicious circles.

The challenge for all of us is to see what we are striving to achieve ... our goal ... and what it actually takes to arrive in that position. What are we willing to trade to acquire that desired object or lifestyle?

Warmest Regards!



Chef Tom

Back on the Planet!!

I'll bet that some of you have felt that I left the planet ... In some ways that is true! I'm into the science fiction thing and love time-travel, but if there was a way to speed up my moving process, I would be all over that!!!

Last weekend we (my wife and I) along with another couple did the food for a special Mormon Prom Dance. We had 175 kids show up with about 50 adults there to chaperon and provide the staff for the themed event. It was called a "Caribbean Cruise". We provided three courses during the evening ... all with finger type foods. First hour included a fruit tower, veggie trays, roasted veggies with feta cheese and chips and dips ... along with pickles and olives.

The second hour we brought out the hot foods of teryaki meatballs, sweet chili chicken wings and grilled sausages with onions and vidalia onion sauce. We traded the hot foods out with Stuffed Jalapeño poppers and chicken taquitos.

When the third hour came around, we replaced it all with a chocolate fountain with dipping items and a frozen chocolate chip cookie dough mountain. It all went over very well ... the adults were fed separately on pulled pork sandwiches and a pasta salad ... and all the left overs as we pulled them from the kids line.

They had valet parking, photos for each of the kids (5x7) with the option for more ... Fruit Slushies and the decorations were specular.  They even had it set up for the kids to select their own songs from their iphones or ipods ... or from a computer that had the list prepared for them.

Unfortunately, we forgot our camera and the video camera battery was dead! Major bummer ... so we're waiting for those who did have cameras to post some pictures.  I'll get them up as soon as I get them.

Warmest Regards!

Chef Tom