Pearl Harbor Day

For a day that was supposed to live in infamy, you’d be hard pressed to see any evidence of it today.  I’ve seen not a single mention of it on the news or in any of the four news sources I read daily.  So, let me be the one to say, Remember Pearl Harbor!

I had a pretty busy morning; some of it filled with great frustration, the rest not so much.  I had wanted to talk to an agent of Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), who we are taking to Paris later this month, to see about getting seat assignments and a reservation code so that I would be able to get a boarding pass online.  My Internet search pinpointed the SAS office and to my sheer delight and disbelief, it was within walking distance of the apartment.  I brought all of my documentation with me and walked over in the freezing cold to take care of business.  The receptionist took a look at my paper, which has SAS and the address in Russian and just kept shaking her head. Они переехали! (They moved!) Когда? (When?) Два года тому назад. (Two years ago!). 

Wasn’t the Internet supposed to make sure that we always had up the minute information??  Anyway she wrote down the new address but I couldn’t make heads or tails out of it and I decided that would be an adventure for another day.  I headed over to the embassy for some shopping and ran into the woman who is the Community Liaison Person. I introduced myself and she remembered that her assistant had talked with me last week about my doing a wine program for them.  It turns out that she had been a dean of an accounting college before coming here so we had a lot of deanly stuff to discuss.  She is very nice and it is good for me to have a contact at the embassy. 

Fortunately, I had brought my backpack with me since I knew I would be buying heavy things like liquid detergent, frozen foods, milk, canned goods and other goodies.  Have I mentioned that I hate winter, especially cold, god-awful cold, winters?  I go out of the house looking like the Michelin man and every time you go in or out of a building you have to do a Gypsy Rose Lee, but with speed. Hat, gloves, scarves, boots, big socks, it is a pain, and it is doubly painful when you have to put on a full and very heavy backpack!  I finally got it on my back and secured, slipped my “man bag” over my head, got on the winter junk, and stepped outside into a cold drizzle that was glazing the road.  The trip home was slow as I tippy-toed my way over slippery surfaces and slushy pockets of brown snow.  I must say, the best investment I made was to get those snow sneakers; they are divine.

Dinner last night was a red pepper and garlic risotto.  Every time I start to get ready to make a risotto, I can hear Pat Lucas, my neighbor and kitchen muse from Winona.  “Baby cakes,” she would say, “ there are no shortcuts to preparing risotto!”  I chopped up the red pepper into rather small bits, did the same with a head of garlic and started to heat three cups of my turkey broth.  In a big pot, I softened the pepper and garlic with butter and olive oil, making sure nothing turned brown.  When it was just right, I added the rice and cooked it all slowly for about four minutes until each grain of rice was coated with oil.  I turned the heat up and added a half-cup of dry white wine and cooked it until the alcohol had evaporated and then turned off the heat and covered the pan.  I made a shredded beet and chopped tomato salad with spinach and arugula and when that was finished, I started on the risotto for real.

Glistening Risotto

Risotto and Wine

A good risotto should be made with Arborio rice, but I’ve not been able to find that here so I use a good quality long grain rice instead. My stock was very hot but not boiling, and once I had the rice back to temperature I started to add one ladle at a time and would stir and stir until that ladle’s liquid was all absorbed and then do it again and again and again. It takes about twenty minutes to do a risotto for four or six and the time you spend is well worth the effort.  When it was just soft enough I turned off the heat, added some salt and pepper and a half cup of grated Parmesan and stirred a bit more and then served it up on a hot dinner plate and decorated it with a bit more cheese and parsley.  If the picture comes out ok, you should be able to see that each grain of rice glistens, which makes it a beautiful sight to behold, not to mention eat.

I’ve done four loads of laundry today, which is a new record. I had to clean all of the rugs since we’ve been tracking in mud and grit, even though we take our shoes off.  It took three loads to do five little rugs, and oh my, the lint in the dryer!  At least the house is sparkling clean for the next day or two.

Best to all, Cindy and Wm