When the hell am I going to learn not to tempt the evil eye?

Earlier this week I posted about the coming of fall and that likely we would see no fires in this neck of the woods this season. Of course this meant that yesterday and today before, temperatures soared to triple digits.

At least today has been cooler.

Eggplant, it's what's for dinner.

I haven't really cooked a thing since last Sunday. (No, reheating things, or microwaving something frozen does not count.) First of all, I haven't been home anything that would resemble a reasonable hour. Second of all, that would have entailed serious cleaning of a number of things within the kitchen. My husband has absolutely no clue of what goes where within the kitchen, nor honestly does he know anything is used for. All my decent cooking implements are hung out of his reach. If they weren't, he would likely be feeding the dog out of one of them. (No, I am seriously not joking. See my next post.)

When I drove into Santa Rosa yesterday, I made a stop at the fruit and vegetable stand that's just a mile our side of the freeway. They've had an absolutely killer crop of organic red skinned apricots, that are among the tastiest things I've ever had. They also had some seriously enormous eggplants, beautifully deep purple, and very heavy. I decided to make eggplant Parmesan tonight.

The recipe I used this not involve frying. Eggplant is an incredibly porous vegetable and when fried it can absorb an incredible amount of oil and along with that, calories I really don't need. I slice the vegetable vertically, not quite half an inch thick, yielding sheets rather than rounds. Each sheet is then dipped in an egg wash, then into seasoned bread crumbs and then on to a silpat covered baking sheet and into a 400° oven for about half an hour, turning each slice once after about 20 minutes. It's then layered into a casserole with a decent tomato sauce, low-fat grated mozzarella, and coarsely grated Parmesan. It will get another half hour in a 350° oven when we're finally ready to have dinner.

One eggplant was enough for one 9 x 13 pan. I have another stowed in the bottom of the refrigerator, to use later this week.

My husband, lover of animals and coffee.

I mentioned in my last post, that if my better cookware isn't hanging out of his reach, I will find my husband feeding the dog out of it directly.

I'm unclear just how long ago this was, it may have been last year or the year before. I was driving off of the property on my way to work, when I noticed a dinner plate sitting on the hillside amidst the ivy. I'm not in the habit of leaving Dansk in my shrubbery. Once I had hit the main road and had cell phone service, I dialed the house.

"Honey?"
"Yes, sweetheart?"
"What is the Dansk dinner plate doing on the hillside? Is it being punished?"
"Do you rermember the cat we heard crying the other night? Well, he was hungry, so I put a plate out with some food for him."
"Ah! Okay. Um, did I miss the wineglass, and the little kitty candelabra? Did you ever think about just opening a can, and leaving that out there for him?"
"Oh, no that didn't dawn on me."

I was about to hang up the phone, when it dawned on me that I needed to tell him to go get the plate and bring it back to the kitchen. This is the man who pours himself a cup of coffee when he's about to take the dog for a walk, and where ever he finishes that coffee, he'll put the cup down. If he remembers, he'll pick the cup back up again on his way back. Note that I said "if he remembers". In the 20 years that we've lived out here in the country, I have found some of our coffee cups as far as a mile down the road from where we live.

Needless to say, he's been trained not to take the Dansk coffee cups when he leaves the house. On the average of every couple of years, I buy a dozen cheap commercial grade coffee cups, for him to carry about with him.