Cindy promised she was going to take the late bus this morning and I thought, yippee, we could sleep until 6:30 or so. It was not to be. She decided she needed to wash her hair so she was up at 5:50 and I proceeded to fall right back to sleep until 6:15. I got up and made her coffee, got her breakfast, made her sandwiches and lunch items and she was out the door at 7:10 and I was back in bed at 7: 15 where I stayed until 8:30. It’s not that I’m tired but it doesn’t get light until 8:30 and I’ll be damned if I’m going to wander around outside in the dark.
Most of today has been involved with organizing a dinner for tomorrow night. The new director of AAS is here this week with his wife and they are coming here for dinner tomorrow night. I wanted to get everything done today so that we’ll have time to sit and relax tomorrow as opposed to me running around the kitchen doing last minute cooking. I also wanted to get it done now so that when the cleaning lady comes tomorrow, we can keep everything looking fresh and clean.
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| Spaghetti Vongole |
Dinner last night featured spaghetti vongole (clams). It was supposed to look like this, however here in Moscow I have no access to fresh clams in the shell - in fact I don’t even have access to canned whole clams. I did get a few cans of chopped clams from the commissary and I had to make do with them. While the pasta was cooking I sautéed in butter and olive oil some freshly chopped garlic and parsley, seasoned with chili flakes, pepper and salt. When they were nicely cooked I added a quarter cup of white wine and let it cook off the alcohol. I then added a ladle of the cooking water from the pasta and the juice of a half lemon. At the last minute I added the can of clams, with the broth and a pat of butter. I tossed in the drained pasta and let it all get hot before serving it with a sprinkle of cheese and fresh parsley. Before the pasta we had a shaved carrot and arugula salad with whole grain mustard vinaigrette. Here are some photos and you can see that my vongole did not look like the real thing, but it wasn’t half bad.
I’ve written before about the Blue Buckets, a group of people who are fed up with anyone with money or power being able to place a flashing blue light on their car and ignore the rules of the road. There was yet another incident this weekend where this reckless behavior caused more death and injury. I’m going to follow this one to see if the politicians gather round to protect their own.
On a lighter note, or should I say ringtone, here is one that would make J. M Barrie ever so happy!
Finally done with all the cooking for tomorrow and have the kitchen cleaned up and dishes put away. Looks like we’ll be going out for dinner tonight since I’ve not had time to make anything other than tomorrow’s meal. Can’t wait to see where we end up. Wherever we go, you can be sure that we are not going to take a pedestrian overpass or underpass. Just too darned dangerous!
Ciao, Cindy and Wm
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