I fucked up

[lydy]

I forgot that today is the Mnstf Pool Party.  It is one of the two (three, if you count Minicon) Big Deal parties of the year.  I have been having unusually bad brain weather, and so keeping track of things like, Today Is a Day I Go to Work has been difficult.  I didn't wake up until 9:30 p.m., and had to shower and red up the media room because Eric and Pamela are sleeping here to night, so I wasn't really ready to put on clothes and leave the house until 10:30 p.m.  By the time I got to the hotel, it would be 11:00 p.m., minimum, and many of my friends will have already left.  So, I've decided to stay at home and drink beer and eat nachos.

I'm really angry about this, but there's no one to be angry _at_.  It was no one's job to remind me, and no one's job to make me make plans, and I forgot, and I didn't make plans, and I haven't seen my Mnstf friends in forever, and I'm just really sad and pissed.

Possibly it will be more than one beer. 

Comments

[lydy]

Narrator Voice: Reader, there was more than one beer.

Oh my!

[lsanderson]

While contemplating beer, I came across Andrew Ducker's link: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/wife-selling-england-beer with another use for beer and an odd Engish custom.

Re: Oh my!

[lydy]

Wow, that is gloriously fucked up! I shall think of it every time a conservative pines for the days of yore when divorce was illegal.

Re: Oh my!

[thewayne]

That is amazing! I'll have to remember that! (not that I drink a lot of beer, nor am I interested in trading off my wife)

[batwrangler]

It's ... um .. ok to be upset and angry and sad that you missed something you were looking forward to, you know? My sympathies.

[lydy]

Thank you.

these things happen

[magenta]

I was hoping you would be there because I wanted to ask for your recipe for meringues that you mentioned in an earlier post.

Re: these things happen

[lydy]

This is the one I used: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/9944/beacon-hill-cookies/

I used walnuts instead of pecans, because that is what I grew up with. I also think that walnuts go better with chocolate than pecans do.

You can just google "Beacon Hill Cookies" and get about a dozen recipes, with or without long essays attached. But the basics are all the same, make a meringue out of egg whites and sugar, fold in melted chocolate and nuts, bake. Really, really easy, if you have a mixer. More of a hassle if you have to beat the whites by hand.

Re: these things happen

[thewayne]

THAT is an interesting recipe! I shall have to try it. I can't think of any recipe that called for adding vinegar to the actual 'this part you eat'.

I use my mixer for everything short of folding stuff together. I once took a cooking class where we were making, among other things, hollandaise, and I was epic fail at it. Gimme mah mixer!

Re: these things happen

[lydy]

I believe that the vinegar helps stabilize the meringue. Some recipes call for cream of tartar. I used cider vinegar, and it worked just fine.

Re: these things happen

[thewayne]

I use tartar to help out, never heard of cider vinegar.  I'll have to try that some time.  I've only had meringue fail once, and I had enough eggs to give it another go, which left me with enough yolks for two days of omelettes!  The only time that I do meringues right now is when I do my chocolate mousse pie.

Re: these things happen

[thewayne]

I made them tonight and they were quite good. The batch yielded a dozen, and we're already down 5. My justification, as if I really needed one, was as a reward for my wife being a good doobie and going to the rescue of a woman at the observatory whose dog got skunked on the first night of a four night shift.

I'll be posting a picture and talking about it in a couple of days. Definitely going to keep this recipe as a regular, but it's going to require some skill development: my folding technique for this recipe SUUUUCKS. And my portioning was terrible.

Re: these things happen

[lydy]

My portioning for the first go was pretty terrible, too. The second round was much more even. My excuse for the first round was that I was experimenting with sizes to see what works best. Answer: pretty much all the sizes were fully cooked and very edible, but some were uglier than others. I do think that eleven or twelve minutes might be better than ten minutes, this last batch seemed just a trifle underdone.

As for folding, I just used a spatula and stirred gently until it was uniform in color. This did not seem to beat out too much of the air. I seem to recall my mother stopping when the batter was still a bit streaky, which may be why I remember higher peaks on the cookies than I achieved on mine. Either way, so delicious. It's like the good parts of a brownie, and only the good parts.

Let me know how further experiments go.

Re: these things happen

[thewayne]

When I bake from online recipes, I add 10 degrees and 2-3 minutes, as I did with this one.  And I had no idea what a 'done' cookie would look like, since I'd never done a meringue cookie before!  We let them sit for about 15 minutes before trying peeling them off the parchment paper, should have given them half an hour as the ones that sat longer peeled no problem.  But they were still slightly under-done, should have taken the bake time to about 14 minutes.  But they tasted marvelous!

Re: these things happen

[magenta]

Thank you! I may try them tonight.

[thewayne]

I am sorry you missed your event, fan gatherings where you get together with old friends are always good.

Out of curiosity, of what do you compose your nachos? I frequently use two kinds of cheese: a base layer of ched with a top layer of Mexican blend and then left-over taco meat. When using taco meat, it gets nuked for a minute before adding on. Then everything goes under the broiler for about 3 minutes, then I turn the oven on 350 for about 5 minutes to make sure the bottom layer gets enough heat.

I don't go for jalapeños as I've never cared for the raw flavor of that particular pepper. Sometimes I'll add salsa to the final product.

[lydy]

We have family recipe that is more of a glop than a nacho, but there you go. Pound of ground beef, about 4 onions, garlic. Fry until meat is done. Add dried chili powders. We use a mix of ancho, guajillo, and arbol, to taste. Also, cumin and oregano. Salt and black pepper, too, now that I think about it. Once the meat is seasoned to taste, add a can of refried beans and a large glop of salsa, and stir. Portion out, freeze.

Assembly: thaw glop, spread on bed of slightly crushed yellow corn tortilla chips. Grate as much cojack cheese as seems wise. Grate just a little more to be safe. Microwave for about a minute and a half.

I garnished mine last night with a ripe avocado that I had almost forgotten about.

[thewayne]

That sounds pretty good.  I'm a lot more structural about building mine, my retentive side coming to the fore.  Avocado or guac is always a good topper for nachos!  I like using the broiler as you get a nice bubbling on the cheese.

[pameladean]

We missed you! I don't think it occurred to anybody that you might have forgotten, and I don't know that trying to wake you up would have been wise even if it had. But it didn't.

P.

[lydy]

On the one hand, I probably needed the sleep. On the other hand, I wish I'd made an informed choice. Oh, well. The avocado, which I had forgotten, was perfectly ripe. so that was nice.

[dreamshark]

Oh, so sad. Missed you. Almost texted to ask if you wanted to try PvP battles at the pool party, now sorry I didn't. You're right, the party was mostly over by 11pm, but there were still about 8 people left when I departed about 1:30.

[lydy]

Damn, I would have really liked some PvP battles. There's a coat in the style store that I really, really want, but you have to medal in Ultra PvP battles.

[dreamshark]

We can do it remotely. Just send me a text when you're in the mood. I never know when you're awake.

[boxofdelights]

That is really frustrating, and

I'm really angry about this, but there's no one to be angry _at_.

may be the most frustrating part.

[lydy]

Mind you, I managed to be angry at a lot of other people, for a short period of time. It just didn't hold up, once considered even vaguely rationally. I hate it when my brain doesn't brain right.