nothin' like a breakfast starting with sausages from Arroyo Grande Meat Company. CLICK to read YELP's review!
There is a little butcher shop in the Village of Arroyo Grande, California with the grand name of Arroyo Grande Meat Company! If you are drving up the coast of central California it is worth a stop… they even make sandwiches.
I’ve been shopping here when I really need a quality piece of meat and their sausages are superb… or did you already notice that? From making their own corned beef to marinating tri tips ( in beer among other things) there is something for any carnivore. Although I have been coming here for around 30 years or so, there is something I always learn or discover. Yesterday, I asked if he had any rabbit… and he said they always keep a case or two in the back! Outstanding!
Must be the economy, but the ol boys have gotten into marketing and so I bought myself a hat!
The meat under the hat above is a special marinated tri-tip that I further amend for a wonderful stroganoff.
My mother’s 80th birthday was Friday and I was at a loss for what I could do? It’s not that my mother has everything, but she is not really a person who wants or needs more junk in her stage of life… just positive experiences.
As a child of the great depression ( not to be confused with what we are going through today), my mother worked on a farm and the family she lived with loved what Alfred Hitchcock referred to as ‘innards.’ One of the dishes my mother desired was tripe and she had a particular notion as to how it was to be prepared.
Tripe has been prepared forever and great exclamations to its wonders can be traced back to at least ancient Greece! There was even a special process to prepare it that was only lost in the last century, but I found it. In olden times, tripe was placed into an earthen pot and the lid was hermetically sealed with strategically placed bread dough… then it was slowly cooked for a period of 12 to 18 hours. When the lid was finally opened they said the smell was like ambrosia.
I thought that a pressure cooker would be a modern day solution to the clay pot and it worked brilliantly.
Tripe is also supposed to be best in the fall where cattle have changed their feeding habits to fallen apples. I suspect that this is the reason for the addition of Calvados (apple brandy) and many times recipes call for the tripe to be cooked in apple cider. There are a few sacred rules I broke in order to follow a suggestion from the ‘Epicurean’… such as making a tomato based sauce to pour over the cooked tripe.
How did it taste? In my trial run with a piece of tripe alone… I opened the cooker… and it smelled like… hmmm… hot dogs! Well, in the final effort with the infusion of the right sorts of fats, vegetables, wines and spirits… it tasted like a tender piece of beef! The kind of beef that the French say can be eaten with ‘wooden teeth’ ( it melts in your mouth).
First, be careful how much news you watch , all news is designed to be depressing because bad news sells. So I think it is best to limit your exposure , especially if you want to keep your sanity. I am also reminded of the ‘sales truism’ that all people can be motivated by fear and/or greed and we have a lot of that going around. So, the moral is “if you want to be manipulated less, don’t read too much news.”
However, there is a truth about our troubling economy. Our nation is in a period of transition. Unemployment has nearly doubled in my county this past year and we are supposed to be one of the ‘lucky’ counties in California with economic recovery slated for sometime in 2012; however, with major metropolitan areas like Los Angeles viewed darkly until ‘2014 or beyond’ the impact will be here for longer than most will accept.
Obviously, the real secret to staying ahead of the big challenges is to have a job… and the best jobs are those that are likely to be in demand even in tough times. Some young people fall in love with smaller communities and fool themselves into believing they can stay by holding multiple ‘joe jobs’, but having two or three jobs is meaningless if all of them are equally vulnerable to elimination. The young need to go where the better jobs are. If I were to give unsolicited and unwanted advice to any young person, I would tell them:
1) They need to get the better skills needed to help them compete in our new world. This means they need to look honestly at what type of education will have value in the future marketplace.
2) I would caution them that if they didn’t have a great job, the cost of a good party might be beyond their reach. 😉
3) Lastly, I would suggest they look at careers and parts of the county and the world to start their life that they might not have considered before.
4) The world still is for those who can adjust to change and have the courage to move forward whether at 20 or 70.
Look honestly at the world, then you’ll know what to do.
Today lunch, we’re having some sandwiches made with homemade Pastrami and I thought a little soup would be grand. One of my favorites is Split Pea, but not the way you probably have enjoyed it. Our pea Soup is very hearty and a bit more interesting, but well worth the effort.
The history of soups is the proper care and use of leftovers in new recipes. Time is resplendent with stories of famed taverns dishing up one pot soups and stews offering the traveler a consistent and delicious meal made from what ever was at hand. Although we might wince today at the practice, in olden days, these continuously fed pots would be cleaned out only once a year or so.
I love soups and stews made that way.
However, by design, I throw in two cups of our Marinara Sauce as it already contains the pureed ingredients that many folks throw into their extended Pea Soup Recipes ( onions, celery, peppers and , yes, tomato).
I love Corned Beef or Pastrami any day of the year, not just on Saint Paddy’s Day.
Although Corned Beef by itself can be a bit overwhelming to some due to its strong taste, baked in a pie it becomes wonderful! The beef is well balanced in the pie with the inclusion of eggs, cheese, sauteed vegetables, gravy, a buttery spiced crust and a small inclusion of Sherry with the corned beef after cooking and shredding.
