Made red beans and rice this evening, which is always great, and always tastes slightly different each time because I never measure anything when I cook something I know and sometimes I have a heavy hand on one spice over another. Regardless, it was good, and I always use double the red beans because I prefer them to the rice, anyway. A really good cheap meal to keep in the back of your head in case there is any future unpleasantness. Dried beans are such a ridiculous bargain- can you imagine what someone in the 1600’s would have done for big bags of dried beans for the prices we pay?
I was actually thinking about something related last night while watching Daredevil and feeling peckish. I went and got a pear, ate it, was not sated. Had some strawberries. Not it. Finally ate an apple (Envy, from the store not the orchard), and that either hit the spot or I was too full to think about anything else although I am leaning toward a little of both. Regardless, can you imagine how bonkers that would be to a commoner in any era other than recent history? To have three different types of fruit all out of season ripe and fresh and ready for you to eat? Modern logistics is just fucking crazy. I think if I had to do the military over again I would have gone green to gold when they offered it to me while I was in and then gone Logistics. Fascinating work and man what career options when you get out.
I walked away from the computer, forgot what I was doing, had a snack, watched an episode of Daredevil, and remembered I was writing this post. So I am hitting publish now before I forget.
Jay
Frist
Rib’s marinating, potato salad, salad, cold roast chicken
Not all caps, no emoji’s.
MagdaInBlack
My local grocer has 20 lb bags of jasmine rice for around $24. Just sayin’.
It’s black beans and rice that always hits the spot for me, John.
trollhattan
Hour-forty cycle and hit my first triple-digit temp of the year. Whee!
In three days it’s predicted to rain WTAF? ‘Tis the yoyo season before heat waddles in and tells us to fuck right off until October.
trollhattan
Homer: “Okay Marge, you can stay here, clean up and bring me Duffs.”
Suzanne
I think about fruit logistics, too. I am not that old, and I remember when I was a kid, there were strawberries in the store for maybe a few weeks per year. And my single mom could not afford them too often. Now there are strawberries in the store all year, and they are literally the same price (not inflation-adjusted) as they were when I was a kid. My kids get to try dragonfruit and sun gold kiwi and jicama and white cantaloupe. Not too long ago, even royalty wouldn’t get that.
Sister Golden Bear
Fresh fruits and veggies from the farmers market are one of the things I’ll be especially thankful for loving in CA when the shortages hit due to tariffs on fruits and veggies shipped in from overseas.
cain
I really enjoyed Daredevil. I don’t have Disney and I don’t have an plans to get Disney+ but I would love to see those shows again. Netflix did a great job with that whole set of shows. Just really fabulous work.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Suzanne:
And it gets taken for granted by a lot of people too.
It’s such a shame we live in a time we do, where the middle class alone lives like the kings of the past did, and we refuse to put our vast collective wealth and resources to solving poverty/wealth inequality and such.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Sister Golden Bear:
Sometime in June is when the empty shelves are supposed to start showing up. Just in time for Trump’s birthday military parade. That’ll be a great look for the Administration and the GOP
MCat
This is the first time in history where we can get any food we want anytime we want either in a market, restaurant or DoorDash or Grub Hub. And we take it for granted. I know this is not true for other countries but we’re so fortunate.
Suzanne
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): The other thing that is strange to me is that we’ve gotten so rich, as a society, and even for people with significant resources, some basic needs like housing and education are still so expensive. Yet other things, like processed snack food, have never been more accessible.
Gin & Tonic
@trollhattan: Pouring rain here, so I rode on the stationary at the gym. 20 minutes at a good clip, as I slowly recover from the knee injury. Also did one-legged squats with the TRX straps (on the bad leg, natch.) Feeling good on that, but boy, have I lost a lot on quad extensions and leg presses. I expect three months just to get back to where I was in March.
sentient ai from the future
when do we talk about industrial scale “ripening” using ethylene gas?
BenInNM
Envy apples are my favorite – the perfect combination of sweet, tart, flavorful, and crisp. I don’t remember seeing them years ago so I wonder if they’re a new variety. Growing up on Red “Delicious”, however, the explosion of apple varieties is pretty amazing
MagdaInBlack
@sentient ai from the future: Is that what gets me the tasteless, apple textured, just barely red, tomatoes?
BenInNM
@sentient ai from the future: How about now? I haven’t heard of this before but I can imagine what it might entail. Any details?
Suzanne
@BenInNM: I am a big fan of the Cosmic Crisp. I often eat one with peanut butter for lunch. A surprisingly great meal.
MagdaInBlack
@BenInNM: I never thought much of red or yellow delicious, til we had a place with a small old orchard. Yellow Delicious ripened on the tree became my favorite. And Red, when allowed to ripen naturally, are pretty decent if you like sweet apples, I learned.
Jay
@MagdaInBlack:
Yup. And red unripe apples.
Soprano2
@Gin & Tonic: It’s shocking how fast you can lose muscle tone and strength. My right arm and shoulder are still weaker than my left (the right one is my dominant arm, it used to be stronger than the left one). When my shoulder started hurting I went down in my weights and was careful because I didn’t know if I had torn my rotator cuff. Turns out it was just rotator cuff tendinitis, so I don’t have to baby it. I’m still working my way back to using the 8 lb weights in Jazzercize. It doesn’t sound like much, but with the routines they do it is.
BenInNM
@Suzanne: Yeah, that one’s good too. It’s on sale now at the grocery store I go to and when I find myself grabbing an Envy along with some Cosmic Crisp I know how things stand
YY_Sima Qian
Yikes! The Indo-Pakistani clash is escalating fast. During the previous wars & conflicts, the U.S. & the USSR, & later the U.S. & the PRC, would coordinate to try to try to keep a lid on them. Totally absent now.
MagdaInBlack
@Jay: These trees were OLD. The Mac was so big it formed a canopy I could stand under. When it was in bloom I would stand under it and listen to all the bee’s a buzzin’.
When we made cider with an old school grinder and press, the chickens would gather round to A: get the pressings, and B: catch yellow jackets.
I’m chatty this evening, apparently.
BenInNM
@MagdaInBlack: I could see that – all the ones I had were from the store and so pretty bland. I did like the Yellow better than the Red though
Jay
@BenInNM:
Ethaline gas is a naturally occurring gas, given off by some ripening fruits.
Thing is, the off gas causes other fruits and vedge to “ripen” or rot quickly.
That’s why if you grow your own, you have two root cellars.
In commercial production, they flood the warehouse with ethaline gas to cause unripe fruit and vedge to “red up” and look ripe and tasty.
YY_Sima Qian
Experts focusing on the region are deeply concerned:
mrmoshpotato
@Jay: Late night dinner?
BenInNM
@Jay: Thanks – I take it the emphasis is on the looks as opposed to the actual taste?
MagdaInBlack
@BenInNM: Yup, and they transport better, because they’re not really ripe. True ripe tomatoes don’t travel well.
BigJimSlade
Here’s a little shot (involving our cat) from my afternoon, while listening to Mahler’s 4th on the earbuds:
https://surfwoodroad.com/images/IMG_5338.jpg
BenInNM
When I was a kid my mom did a lot of canning and I grew up in Portland and we could go (forced) out and pick wild strawberries. A big one was the size of your thumb (a child’s thumb). When we finally collected enough she would make jam. It usually only yielded about a pint but that was the most amazing strawberry jam. Talk about fights among kids about who got more of the Wild Strawberry jam!
BenInNM
@MagdaInBlack: I’ve started to get into using more canned and frozen vegetables, especially for cooking, for just that reason. They can be canned/frozen at their peak without worrying about transport or superficial appearance
Jay
@MagdaInBlack:
Back in the day, when the ex and I bought the Elgin Street house, there was a 60-70 year old Golden Delicious tree. It had moss, black rot, dead branches.
So I did what I do, pruned it, killed the black rot, BT’d it, fed it.
The first year after, got 25lbs of nice tart apples.
Next year, 50lbs. Went to Lynn Valley and got an apple corer and peeler.
Soon enough, 200lbs, in the freezer.
In August the invasive Himalayan Blackberries start to come ripe, they are all over the LML, so drive to work with 2 5 gallon buckets, pick after work.
So apple pie, 1/3rd blackberries, the rest apple, into the spring.
Sad thing is, T introduced me to a quick, shortbread pie crust that is the bomb, but by then, the Elgin street house was gone and I was divorced.
BenInNM
@BigJimSlade: Nice kitty – does this mean you can’t move your leg even an infinitesimal amount or the whole order of the universe would be disturbed?
Jay
@mrmoshpotato:
Ribs are 1 day marinade, brown sugar, wosticesterer (sp) sauce, liquid smoke, chilli paste, lime juice.
Day 2 is a slow 3 hour cook at 270F. Then into the fridge overnight to turn all the gristle into “butter”.
Day three, warmed up enough to melt the fat and (yes, you can use the marinade into BBQ sauce, but I don’t), sauce them up and caramelize and reheat under the broiler or the bbq.
Careful handling them as they just fall off the bone.
New Deal democrat
@YY_Sima Qian: Here is a good if scary thread:
https://bsky.app/profile/profsaunders.bsky.social/post/3lorsbivp6k2i
I really don’t see any choice except for the PRC to step up. If for no other reason than they are directly downwind.
I’ve said in the past that T—-p got lucking in 2017 that he inherited an economy that was improving, and he didn’t know enough about where the levers were to disrupt it. This time around the economy is dicey and he knows how to frantically pull on the levers.
The same can be said for global affairs. The world wasn’t great in 2017, but there were no real crises, and T—-p didn’t know how to make it more chaotic. Now there are some real crises, and he has no clue what to do except grift off of it. And he is surrounded by lickspittles who are if anything equally or more clueless.
I will check back for any comments you might make in the morning (my time).
E.T.A.: Here’s another thread:
https://bsky.app/profile/nktpnd.bsky.social/post/3lortebcxic2f
NotMax
Screwy things encountered while in town shopping today.
1) In a parking lot, saw several chickens greedily pecking at a half-eaten (cooked) chicken drumstick someone had tossed on the asphalt. That just ain’t right.
2) In Safeway happened by chance to pass down the aisle which includes a very small kosher items selection. You know those candles in tall, thin glass jars? There they were, with pictures of Jesus on them. Smack on the top shelf, next to boxes of matzos.
NotMax
@BenInNM
Don’t often buy apples but if the urge strikes, the Jazz variety is everything an apple ought to be, IMHO.
For baked apples though, Rome is the variety to look for.
Jay
@NotMax:
Chickens are omnivores.
If you have a garden, ducks are better, they eat the bugs and slugs first everything else later. Chickens, not so much.
NotMax
@Jay
Explains why one so rarely sees a Dodge Omni anymore.
:)
Jay
@Jay:
Forgot a key point.
The ribs need to be tightly sealed, in foil, a pressure cooker, a pot or roaster, so they don’t dry out.
BigJimSlade
@BenInNM: Obviously! Lol, if just quietly say “ok kitty” she knows I’m about to move and starts to get up.
YY_Sima Qian
@New Deal democrat: The PRC has never directly intervened in any Indo-Pakistani conflict, & in any case it has no credibility w/ India (who views the PRC as Pakistan’s patron). In the past, the PRC could coordinate w/ the U.S. to encourage deescalation, each putting pressure on Pakistan & India, respectively. Right now, the Trump Administration is essentially give Modi green light to do as the latter likes, at least until a nuclear exchange becomes a real possibility.
More cynically, the Himalayas will block the vast majority of nuclear fallout, & Xinjiang & Tibet are both very sparsely populated regions, so an Indo-Pakistani nuclear exchange would not affect the PRC nearly as much as it would Nepal, for example.
Things will really get dangerous if ground forces start to engage w/ each other. Right now, both sides are still mobilizing, & using mostly drones w/ some air & ballistic missile strikes.
In the end, I expect the PRC will try to prevent either a Pakistani collapse or a Pakistani escalation to nuclear weapons. That could occur by way of military exercises or demonstrations in the Tibetan Plateau, & possibly resupply of weapons to Pakistan, but not direct military intervention.
The Indian military is incapable of fighting a two front war. Its military build up along the Lines of Actual Control w/ the PRC since 2020, to shore up its position there, was made possible by a decrease in tensions w/ Pakistan since 2019.
Matt McIrvin
@YY_Sima Qian:
Is there any reason to believe it wouldn’t escalate to universal global Armageddon? That’s how most wargame simulations of this kind of thing play out, I thought. Everyone just ends up launching all missiles and everyone dies. China wouldn’t worry about the direct fallout, they’d be worrying about the US annihilating them.
prostratedragon
Chris Geidner reporting:
Gloria DryGarden
@NotMax: Jonathan apples.
For baking, applesauce, and plain eating. They aren’t keepers. They come in season for two weeks in apple season. They are the best: sweet, tart, a bouquet of interesting flavors. Far more interesting than a pink lady. IMO.
prostratedragon
Oh.
eclare
@BigJimSlade:
Comfy kitty!
eclare
@BenInNM:
I buy mostly frozen fruits and veggies, for the reason you mentioned, plus no food waste.
Ramalama
@BigJimSlade: I miss living with cats. Like with apples, I am allergic.
unfair thread!
lowtechcyclist
Good morning, y’all. :-)
Fuji apples have been my go-to for quite a while now, but I’ll have to try some of the other varieties people have been talking about in this thread, to see what I think. Envy, cosmic crisp, jazz. Jazz is the only one I’ve noticed in the stores. When apple season comes around, I’ll have to see what the farmers’ market has.
Around here (southern MD), we have wild raspberries that have a 2-week season from mid-June to the beginning of July usually. Some people call them wineberries. I make a lot of raspberry cobbler in late June. You Pennsylvania folks can look for them in mid to late July.
Geminid
Kann News* posted this item three hours ago:
* Kann News is Israel’s public news corporation.
AM in NC
I had red beans and rice this week too! Kid came over for dinner, and I defrosted the other half of the batch I made a while back. As someone from NOLA, I heartily endorse your recommendation of RB&R.
Fun fact: Red beans and rice is a traditional Monday dish even to this day in the city because Monday was traditionally washing day, and red beans could be put on the stove and left alone for long periods while the washing was being done
ETA: also starting to eat the blueberries on our bushes. Amazing the difference in taste from any store-bought berries.
Matt McIrvin
@prostratedragon:
Like suspension of habeas corpus? (I know, this one isn’t about that…)
YY_Sima Qian
@Matt McIrvin: Not between an Indo-Pakistani exchange. In fact, India would be hesitant to initiate a nuclear exchange w/ Pakistan, precisely out of the fear that expending so much its arsenal would leave it vulnerable to nuclear blackmail from the PRC. Not that the PRC has been prone to engaging in nuclear blackmail, having official “No First Use” & “No Nuclear Use Against Non-Nuclear States” doctrines
The scenarios you referred to concerned US-Soviet exchanges, which would almost inevitably including French & British arsenals, & neither the US nor the USSR (the latter especially) would want the PRC arsenal to rule over the ruins. However, a US-Soviet exchange would be so apocalyptic that the addition of French/British/PRC bombs would only have marginally worse impact.
YY_Sima Qian
@New Deal democrat: BTW, Ankit Panda is very much worth following when it comes to nuclear issues, alongside Jeffrey Lewis & James Acton.