Today was Lasagna day. So, early I was off to the store. My first stop was Gary’s, the local meat market. Having secured the needed ground beef, it was off to Meijers. A quick swing through the dairy section yielded Parmigiano Reggiano, Ricotta and Mozzarilla cheese. Next isle, International foods. Tomato paste and Lasagna noodles. It is there that I spied it; Oven ready Lasagna noodles!!

What a neat concept! Lasagna noodles ready for the oven! Great!! My biggest complaint with making Lasagna is cooking the noodles. And, it is not that I mind cooking the noodles themselves, rather, it is the size of the pot needed to cook the noodles.

Large noodles require a large pot and the large amount of time needed to bring a large amount of water to a boil. And then, after words, cleaning the large pot as it is too large for the dishwasher. But, if I had noodles that were oven ready, the whole pot issue would vanish!

I picked up the box of noodles to check the price. After all, the more that a food is processed, the more it costs. If the cost is too high, I may opt for the inconvience of the pot and conventional noodles. But wait, the cost is the same! 🙂 Oh happy day! Lasagna without the hassle of the large pot. What will they think of next? Sliced bread?

As I am starting to put the noodles into my cart, I hear a noise. It was the sound of dried noodles in a box. If these noodles are oven ready, how come they sound like the regular, dried noodles? Hum. As a matter of fact, as I peak through the little window in the box, they look like the regular dried Lasagna noodles. I would have expected Oven Ready Lasagna noodles to be already cooked as in already to go into the oven as in “oven ready”. Soft and pliable oven ready. But this appears not to be the case.

A quick survey of the box yields a recipe for, you guessed it, Lasagna. As I read through the recipe, it requires the use of 8 oz of oven ready Lasagna noodles with their special “oven ready” Lasagna sauce. Now, the question that enters my mind is what do they mean by oven ready Lasagna sauce? Do you have to use their sauce in order to take advantage of the “oven ready” noodles? Will my favorite, tried and true, sauce work with these noodles or will the noodles come out tough and chewy? Suspecting the worst, I continue reading the box.

There at the bottom it read “cooking instructions”.  Surly this must be something simple as soaking the noodles in boiling water for 15 minutes, much like I do for the dried mushrooms that I get at the asian market. But alas, “bring 4 qts of water to a boil and add the noodles”. Well, it looks like a large pot again or risk tough noodles.:-(

Out of curiosity, I grab a box of conventional Lasagna noodles to compare the difference. Four quarts of boiling water, check. Stir until done, check. Cook time, ah, now there is the difference. Oven ready, 8-10 minutes, conventional, 10-12 minutes.

Somehow, being able to save 2-4 minutes on cook time is really insignificant compared to the amount of time needed to boil the water and clean the pot. I opted for the conventional Lasagna noodles to use with my favorite sauce. As I expected, it took me 15 minutes to bring the water to a boil and 15 minutes to clean the pot afterwards. Perhaps next time I will take the chance and try the oven ready noodles with my non-oven ready sauce. But for now, coventional sauce with conventional noodles.

When I first set up this site, I included a lot of personal information on the site.  But then I was hit with a lot of paranoia about identity theft etc. and so I decided to delete all of it.  I may change my mind after a while and include a bit more information.  We’ll see.

I guess my thinking goes something like this.  People who know us don’t need to know that information as they already know it.  Likewise, people who don’t know us don’t need to know that information as it is useless to them.  The exception would be someone who doesn’t know us but would like our information to create their own identity for illegal purposes.

I figure that I can still talk about personal subjects from time to time.  It is just that I don’t think I need to have all of our vitals permanently posted on our website.  I guess that makes sense.

I have this theory about parking spaces at Meijers (grocery chain); namely, that the closest spaces to the door will fill up first. No duh! The postulet to that is that the closest spaces to the door will empty out first. Now this has some meaning.
Let me explain.

While the amount of time spent shopping will vary from person to person as will as the departure time, there is an industry average as to the amount of time a shopper will spend in the store.

As the first shoppers get the close parking spots, subsequent shoppers arrive and park further and further from the store. But, eventually, the average shop time for the first arrivals is met and they leave the store and their close parking space. Of course, some of the later arrivals may leave earlier than the average shop time predicts. Thus the trick is to asses the fill pattern of the parking lot.

With Meijers, their parking rows are perpendicular to the door and the driveway is between the door and the parking lot. By assessing the parking row second closest to the door, you can determine the likelyhood that there will be a parking spot in the row closest to the door. If there is an open parking spot in the first 10 spaces in the second row, there will not be an opening in the first 15 parking spots in the first row. Likewise, if there is not an openning in the first 10 spaces of the second row, there will be an openning in the first 15 spaces of the first row. Quantum Mechanics!!

I know, I need to get a life!

Today, we are have ribs for dinner. Most people who have had my ribs are impressed with them. While I am not claiming to have the best ribs in the world, I do think that they are in the running. And, I must admit, they are quite good.

First, we boil them for about 30 minutes. After they have cooled, we put on a dry rub of Chinese 5 spice, brown sugar, paprika and other ingredients and let them sit over night in the frig. The rub seems to have a tenderizing effect on them. The next day, we get them out and put them in a round wire rotisserie basket. From there, we put them on the gas grill.

I prefer gas as opposed to charcoal because it is easier to control the cooking temperature and it is a whole lot faster than charcoal. Besides, I don’t have a charcoal grill large enough to handle the rib basket. (I do have a small Weber that I use for cooking steaks.) I add wood chips to the flame to give it a nice smokey flavor and makes up for not using charcoal. When I see the fat bubbling nicely on the ribs, I know that they are ready for the next phase which is the sauce.

The sauce is mainly ketchup, with molasses, soysauce, lemon juice and some Dave’s Insanity. When I apply the sauce, I do it while the basket is turning. I just sort of dribble it slowly until the ribs are all covered. Then I let them cook for about another 5 minutes so that the sauce becomes more of a glaze. Once the glaze is set, we move to the next phase; eating!

With the ribs, we also serve twice baked potatoes along with a green vegetable and a yellow vegetable, a whole grain bread and of course, red wine. Todays selection are fresh green beans, carrots and multigrain rolls. Desert will be cheese cake.

I bought gas today for only $.33 a gallon.  I had a coupon for $2.00 off per gallon, up to 10 gallons.  I needed 10 gallons.  Yes!!  🙂

Today started off with breakfast at the Lowell Micky Ds. drive through.  Even at 9am, Micky Ds is a busy place in Lowell.

Today was rehersal day for the church Christmas program. I will be doing sound for the program.  They wanted me there at 9:30 AM.  I am usually not out of bed at 9:30 AM on a Saturday.  But I did my best and was only 5 minutes late.  As usual, I really didn’t need to be there for the first rehersal, but my being there did provide a comfort level for the staff.

After practice, it was off to the bank and then to Meijers (grocery store).  King crab was on sale for only $5.00 per pound so I bought about 6 lbs.  I know that we will be eating crab at sometime over the holidays.  Having the whole family home for the holidays presents a meal time challenge.

I was noting that there are no Roly Polys near by.  I greatly miss their #30, Basil Chicken Cashew, rollup.  So I attempted to reproduce it on my own.  I assembled the ingredients that I needed and proceeded to make my own #30.  My first attempt was quite good but not excellent.  I will attempt it again but next time I will make it with a Basil Chicken Cashew salad that I found on line.

After two more trips to Meijers, I think that I am done shopping for the day.  Tonight, we will have grilled steaks, salads, baked potato(e)s and sauteed mushrooms.  Time to get cooking.

Well, apparently my blog has decided to launch itself with out my knowledge. I was really planning on making a few more changes before going live, but, oh well.

I kind of have a love/hate relationship with WordPress. It works well. It seems to be very easy to use in the basic wysiwyg mode.  But, it does have its surprises.  However, the price is right (free) so I can’t complain too much.  I need to provide them with constructive feedback.
In the future, I hope to provide some personal information on who we are (vitals).  Unfortunately, the blog went public before I had a chance to finish.  So, what you see is a work in progress.