Fortune mag on-line has a story on Dollar General and how after being taken private by the famous (in other words, I've heard of it) private-equity firm Kohlberg, Kravis,Roberts in 2007 was re-offered to the public in 2009; since then, the stock has more than doubled. Well, it's pretty funny that Henry Kravis, whose houses, art collections, wives, and philanthropy have been featured in tony mags over the years, should spot the investment opp in the "new frugality." Fortune mag suggests that the stock may--even after its recent doubling and the improvement to the economy (I hope)--still prove a good investment. Well, it figures that the uber-rich have already made scads and that the regular people, late to the party as usual, may have a few crumbs. MAYBE.
My interest today is more prosaic and appropriate to those of us whose frugality has led to the increase in the vast fortunes of Kravis and his peers: do the various dollar stores offer good value? I am always game for checking out the possibilities for life in the frugal lane. Most things in dollar stores are NOT worth a dollar! Food is often in mini-packages or packages somewhat smaller than the norm. Also true for many health and beauty items.
Dollar General: The one whose stock has soared. Most things are more than a dollar, by the way. The one where I live is so disorganized and dirty that I don't bother. I used to buy big packages of sponges here. I also used to get Alpha Hydrox lotion. UGH.
Dollar Tree. Everything IS a dollar. I wouldn't make a special trip, but it's in my lineup (Rouses, Goodwill, Big Lots). I buy frozen fruit here: 10-16 ounces of frozen fruit for a dollar is a good deal. I've seen Muir Glen tomato sauce here; quart aseptic packages of soymilk and regular milk. Good ingredient sunscreen was here for $1/6 oz. I bought the 8 that remained. You can get 10 crummy toothbrushes for a dollar--good for travel. And toothpaste (no, not the Chinese kind with antifreeze: Aim).
Big Lots. This isn't really a dollar store, but it is responsible for my grocery savings. Lots of organic items from Muir Glen, lots of Italian artisan pasta, lots of aseptic Pacific soups. Most people are buying snack items and cereal, which are usually not that well-priced. How do you know when something is well-priced? When there is a big space where the item used to be. There are many savvy shoppers in my area, some of whom are the dreaded shelf-clearers. If something is a good price, it will not be there for more than a day. I bought 9 packages of Quaker oat groats: 24 oz/90 cents! It was cheaper than regular oatmeal. The groats are denser and so the package was smaller and the pricers were tricked. Two days later--all were gone.
So my basic purchases are organic food, "gourmet items," and generic health and beauty--who cares if you're buying name=brand vaseline? or ibuprofen?
Do you frequent the dollar stores? What do you buy?
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
Monday, 7 June 2010
Unconditional Guarantees: Worth It?
Reading Funny About Money's budget-busting travails with her vacuum-cleaner made me think about guarantees, of the unconditional sort. Funny bought a vacuum from Fry's, which she hates, and replaced it with a vacuum from Costco. I breathed a sigh of relief, because I know that Costco has an unconditional guarantee: if Funny hates THIS vacuum, she will be able to return it. Sadly, Costco does not have a branch in my state.
It occurs to me that perhaps I should try to limit my buying--aside from thrift store purchases, of course--to such stores. It might be worth the extra cost--if there is an extra cost. My late father, an astute consumer and analyzer of marketing and consumer behavior, used to say: You pay a lot for an unconditional guarantee, so you should use it. (Of course, he wasn't talking about ABUSING* it, which some people do.)
I don't buy that much in the regular retail market: my own vacuum, for instance, was a purchased from Goodwill; we bought it as a stopgap when our previous vacuum broke. That was more than 10 years ago. And, unlike Funny, I will never be annoyed with this vacuum, because I NEVER VACUUM. (Mr. FS does this task.) But I have spent a fair bit of time in enraged conversation with stores over defective products: a former car repair shop, Virgin Mobile, and others I will not dredge up from my memory.
Perhaps it's worth buying appliances and the like from Costco (and I think I can do that, even though there is not one in my state), and the various goods from LL Bean, and Lands End simply to reduce future stress. Here are the guarantees of those stores.
Lands End: Guaranteed. Period.
LL Bean: Guaranteed. You have our word.
Costco: We guarantee your satisfaction on every product we sell with a full refund. The following must be returned within 90 days of purchase for a refund: televisions, projectors, computers, cameras, camcorders, iPOD / MP3 players and cellular phones.
*Example of abuse: I saw a woman pick up an LL Bean item at a thrift store and exclaim to her companion, "I can return this and make some money!"
Do you know of any other stores that offer good guarantees? Do you think they are worth the extra cost?
It occurs to me that perhaps I should try to limit my buying--aside from thrift store purchases, of course--to such stores. It might be worth the extra cost--if there is an extra cost. My late father, an astute consumer and analyzer of marketing and consumer behavior, used to say: You pay a lot for an unconditional guarantee, so you should use it. (Of course, he wasn't talking about ABUSING* it, which some people do.)
I don't buy that much in the regular retail market: my own vacuum, for instance, was a purchased from Goodwill; we bought it as a stopgap when our previous vacuum broke. That was more than 10 years ago. And, unlike Funny, I will never be annoyed with this vacuum, because I NEVER VACUUM. (Mr. FS does this task.) But I have spent a fair bit of time in enraged conversation with stores over defective products: a former car repair shop, Virgin Mobile, and others I will not dredge up from my memory.
Perhaps it's worth buying appliances and the like from Costco (and I think I can do that, even though there is not one in my state), and the various goods from LL Bean, and Lands End simply to reduce future stress. Here are the guarantees of those stores.
Lands End: Guaranteed. Period.
LL Bean: Guaranteed. You have our word.
Costco: We guarantee your satisfaction on every product we sell with a full refund. The following must be returned within 90 days of purchase for a refund: televisions, projectors, computers, cameras, camcorders, iPOD / MP3 players and cellular phones.
*Example of abuse: I saw a woman pick up an LL Bean item at a thrift store and exclaim to her companion, "I can return this and make some money!"
Do you know of any other stores that offer good guarantees? Do you think they are worth the extra cost?
Saturday, 5 June 2010
Student Loans and Bankruptcy
This is an issue taken up in today's New York Times. Over the past few years, there have been scads of articles featuring hapless recent grads of expensive private colleges, shocked at their loan burden. Interestingly, several of these students are grads of NYU.
Of course, this is an issue close to my heart, as my children regretfully declined acceptances from private colleges--complete with merit aid--and chose state institutions.
So I was inspired to pen a comment, which I am copying below. I wrote this in the heat of emotion without re-reading, fyi. So no guarantee of completeness or coherence.
I'm of several minds about this. Both my children got into prestigious private colleges--small liberal arts colleges. My husband and I had always dreamed of sending them to Oberlin, Kenyon,Reed, and the like. Yet when it came down to it, each chose a no-cost state institution--even at full-cost the price would have been very low.
Yes, teenagers are naive about money and the burden of interest payments. Yes, parents are complicit in urging the teens to go to a "top college." Yes, colleges have raised tuition in part BECAUSE of the ready availability of loans. And, as we found out last year, some college financial aid officers were receiving kickbacks from "preferred" lenders.
But I believe the laws were changed, in part, because graduates of law schools and med schools were declaring bankruptcy UPON graduation!
So I would suggest that colleges/banks be required--as credit card companies now are--to show what the payments will be down the road. But I also believe that families and students should take more responsibility about their college choices, especially when considering a private college. Tuition at private colleges has gone up at twice the rate of inflation.
Perhaps the ability to discharge student loans in bankruptcy will make the banks wary about lending vast sums of money to naive teenagers.
I think we've all seen the need to teach basic math skills and consumer awareness. I have heard from my own students, "I thought that it was an OK amount of debt because the bank said I could borrow it." Shades of the housing bubble.
What think you, dear readers? I said to Mr. FS--somewhat facetiously--that if we had known the laws would change we could have saved less money for the kids AND encouraged them to go for the prestigious college.
Frugal Note: Since I have copied and pasted this from a comment that will--perhaps--appear on the NYT website, I have created a twofer situation: two comments for the labor of one. This is more commonly known--in extreme couponing circles (of which I am not a part)--as a BOGO: buy one, get one free.
Of course, this is an issue close to my heart, as my children regretfully declined acceptances from private colleges--complete with merit aid--and chose state institutions.
So I was inspired to pen a comment, which I am copying below. I wrote this in the heat of emotion without re-reading, fyi. So no guarantee of completeness or coherence.
I'm of several minds about this. Both my children got into prestigious private colleges--small liberal arts colleges. My husband and I had always dreamed of sending them to Oberlin, Kenyon,Reed, and the like. Yet when it came down to it, each chose a no-cost state institution--even at full-cost the price would have been very low.
Yes, teenagers are naive about money and the burden of interest payments. Yes, parents are complicit in urging the teens to go to a "top college." Yes, colleges have raised tuition in part BECAUSE of the ready availability of loans. And, as we found out last year, some college financial aid officers were receiving kickbacks from "preferred" lenders.
But I believe the laws were changed, in part, because graduates of law schools and med schools were declaring bankruptcy UPON graduation!
So I would suggest that colleges/banks be required--as credit card companies now are--to show what the payments will be down the road. But I also believe that families and students should take more responsibility about their college choices, especially when considering a private college. Tuition at private colleges has gone up at twice the rate of inflation.
Perhaps the ability to discharge student loans in bankruptcy will make the banks wary about lending vast sums of money to naive teenagers.
I think we've all seen the need to teach basic math skills and consumer awareness. I have heard from my own students, "I thought that it was an OK amount of debt because the bank said I could borrow it." Shades of the housing bubble.
What think you, dear readers? I said to Mr. FS--somewhat facetiously--that if we had known the laws would change we could have saved less money for the kids AND encouraged them to go for the prestigious college.
Frugal Note: Since I have copied and pasted this from a comment that will--perhaps--appear on the NYT website, I have created a twofer situation: two comments for the labor of one. This is more commonly known--in extreme couponing circles (of which I am not a part)--as a BOGO: buy one, get one free.
Friday, 4 June 2010
A Wonderful Decluttering and Organizing Tool: Flocked Hangers with Hooks
Another post that sounds like an infomercial. I suppose you all have those flocked hangers, right? The ones that don't let clothes slip off? I was late to the party on these, because they were kind of expensive in their first incarnation: eventually, I bought a set at Bed Bath and Beyond (not a store I like, particularly), then some at Big Lots, and then at Dollar Tree.
These hangers--aside from keeping things from slipping off--supposedly let you get more in your closet because they are "slim" as opposed to "fat" like regular hangers. More closet space may be a mixed blessing. When I moved to the basement as a teenager, my parents (shopaholic mom, packrat dad) took over my closet. Then, when I left for good, they took over the basement closet too. The walk-in bedroom closet in my mother's condo is bigger than all my closets put together. I think that big closets encourage you to fill them up, hence my feeling that they are a mixed blessing.
Still, my current closet is small: I have a single 50 inch hanging rod--for everything. Then I get a share of a 36 inch hanging rod that needs to accommodate all our outerwear.
So usually we have some kind of closet crisis going on, the most recent precipitated by Lucy's return from college and the return of the items she borrowed from me. Plus, anyone who is a teacher knows that your summer vacation is when you do all the tasks you couldn't get around to all year (because you spend your weekends and evenings prepping and/or grading).
On our way to the airport to pick up Frugal Son, we stopped at Bed Bath and Beyond, so I could get another pack of hangers, meant to be split with Lucy M, who has an aversion to tubular hangers. Well! BBB has a new kind of flocked hanger, with a hook, so you can cascade your items.
This is good not only because it gives you more room, but also because, if you cascade with any degree of organization, you will see how many you have of certain things. So: no more black cardigans. No more black tee shirts. I have three nice red tops, but perhaps should only keep the two best.
Many (most?) American women have the problem of buying the same thing over and over. We all vow to be "French-" or "European-" style shoppers, who buy only a few items per year. Somehow, most of us never do it. I'm as bad as the next person. Nay worse, given the example of my parents. If I buy less than my peers, it's probably because I am a total cheapwad, because the selection of acceptable-to-me items at my chosen shopping venues is necessarily limited, and because I have a closet rod of only a little over 4 feet.
OK. Here is the link to the Bed, Bath, and Beyond hangers I bought. If you really want to waste your day, you can watch the little video. I swear I do not have any stock in BBB. But I do wish I had bought Talbots stock when I wrote about it: it was $1.60. I would have almost octupled my investment.
These hangers--aside from keeping things from slipping off--supposedly let you get more in your closet because they are "slim" as opposed to "fat" like regular hangers. More closet space may be a mixed blessing. When I moved to the basement as a teenager, my parents (shopaholic mom, packrat dad) took over my closet. Then, when I left for good, they took over the basement closet too. The walk-in bedroom closet in my mother's condo is bigger than all my closets put together. I think that big closets encourage you to fill them up, hence my feeling that they are a mixed blessing.
Still, my current closet is small: I have a single 50 inch hanging rod--for everything. Then I get a share of a 36 inch hanging rod that needs to accommodate all our outerwear.
So usually we have some kind of closet crisis going on, the most recent precipitated by Lucy's return from college and the return of the items she borrowed from me. Plus, anyone who is a teacher knows that your summer vacation is when you do all the tasks you couldn't get around to all year (because you spend your weekends and evenings prepping and/or grading).
On our way to the airport to pick up Frugal Son, we stopped at Bed Bath and Beyond, so I could get another pack of hangers, meant to be split with Lucy M, who has an aversion to tubular hangers. Well! BBB has a new kind of flocked hanger, with a hook, so you can cascade your items.
This is good not only because it gives you more room, but also because, if you cascade with any degree of organization, you will see how many you have of certain things. So: no more black cardigans. No more black tee shirts. I have three nice red tops, but perhaps should only keep the two best.
Many (most?) American women have the problem of buying the same thing over and over. We all vow to be "French-" or "European-" style shoppers, who buy only a few items per year. Somehow, most of us never do it. I'm as bad as the next person. Nay worse, given the example of my parents. If I buy less than my peers, it's probably because I am a total cheapwad, because the selection of acceptable-to-me items at my chosen shopping venues is necessarily limited, and because I have a closet rod of only a little over 4 feet.
OK. Here is the link to the Bed, Bath, and Beyond hangers I bought. If you really want to waste your day, you can watch the little video. I swear I do not have any stock in BBB. But I do wish I had bought Talbots stock when I wrote about it: it was $1.60. I would have almost octupled my investment.
Thursday, 3 June 2010
College Cooking: Smoothies with Your Immersion Blender
Now that it's June, my little project is taking on some urgency. You've all acquired an immersion blender, right? Smoothies can be made in regular blenders, but the clean up is a pain. With an immersion blender, you can just rinse off the blender and your container. I know that for harried students, even that can be too much sometimes. But yucky blenders are the worst!
Smoothies: These are ridiculously expensive in shops. One hardly needs a recipe: we use yogurt, frozen banana, and whatever other fruit we have that seems promising. A little sugar or honey and you're done.
For the dorm cook, even the simplest concoction comes with roadblocks. What if you don't HAVE a frozen banana (because packing bananas for the freezer is a pain)? What if you don't have fruit? What if you don't have yogurt? Besides, yogurt can get expensive; we make our own chez frugalscholar, but that would be too much for most students.
This morning I conducted an experiment: regular unfrozen banana, handful of frozen blueberries, powdered milk, water, sugar. It was just fine.
Then I tried a trick I read about recently: I put in a handful of regular flaked oatmeal and blended it in. It worked!
So here we have a healthy smoothie with roadblocks minimized.
1. You can use a regular banana.*
2. You can sub powdered milk and water for yogurt.**
3. Fruit is a problem area, because it's heavy to lug home from the store, fragile, and has a short lifespan.*** I suggest adding FROZEN FRUIT to your freezer pantry. The cheapest place in my town is Dollar Tree, where I can get blueberries, peaches, and strawberries. The fruit comes in bags, from which you can take what you want and then re-secure, either with a rubber band, a scrunchie, or a paper clip.
4. The oatmeal is a great add-in because it functions as a thickener, is VERRRRRY healthy, and gets around the problem of "I don't like oatmeal because it's slimy."
*Would it be unethical to snitch a banana from the cafeteria when you eat there? If not, you could use that banana.
**Same as above, except for yogurt. For some reason, I think the banana is OK, but the yogurt is not.
***For a wonderful children's book on mortality through the example of a peach, see
Smoothies: These are ridiculously expensive in shops. One hardly needs a recipe: we use yogurt, frozen banana, and whatever other fruit we have that seems promising. A little sugar or honey and you're done.
For the dorm cook, even the simplest concoction comes with roadblocks. What if you don't HAVE a frozen banana (because packing bananas for the freezer is a pain)? What if you don't have fruit? What if you don't have yogurt? Besides, yogurt can get expensive; we make our own chez frugalscholar, but that would be too much for most students.
This morning I conducted an experiment: regular unfrozen banana, handful of frozen blueberries, powdered milk, water, sugar. It was just fine.
Then I tried a trick I read about recently: I put in a handful of regular flaked oatmeal and blended it in. It worked!
So here we have a healthy smoothie with roadblocks minimized.
1. You can use a regular banana.*
2. You can sub powdered milk and water for yogurt.**
3. Fruit is a problem area, because it's heavy to lug home from the store, fragile, and has a short lifespan.*** I suggest adding FROZEN FRUIT to your freezer pantry. The cheapest place in my town is Dollar Tree, where I can get blueberries, peaches, and strawberries. The fruit comes in bags, from which you can take what you want and then re-secure, either with a rubber band, a scrunchie, or a paper clip.
4. The oatmeal is a great add-in because it functions as a thickener, is VERRRRRY healthy, and gets around the problem of "I don't like oatmeal because it's slimy."
*Would it be unethical to snitch a banana from the cafeteria when you eat there? If not, you could use that banana.
**Same as above, except for yogurt. For some reason, I think the banana is OK, but the yogurt is not.
***For a wonderful children's book on mortality through the example of a peach, see
Wednesday, 2 June 2010
Having Your Fancy Restaurant Meal at Home
I've been mulling over an appropriately frugal topic all day, but have been stymied by the fact that I've been swooning over the meal I produced last night. It's been a long time since I cooked anything that good. And I suppose it was frugal, since, in a restaurant, what I cooked would have cost at least $20.00/person. Probably more.
What I made wasn't all that hard, but you, my far-flung readers, may not be able to get one of the ingredients. You'll know it when I get to it.
My dear children seldom reside chez nous, so when they are at home, I go into a frenzy of cooking. Dear Lucy Marmalade had her beloved shrimp and corn soup for 2 days. Then Frugal Son returned from France and we had a big pot of gumbo (not up to my usual standards, I'm afraid). One day remained, before both kids went off to their jobs as Residence Assistants at the Advance Program, at the site of their beloved high school, Louisiana School of Math, Science, and the Arts.
What to cook for their last night at home, after so few? Also, in spite of the many virtues of the school, the food is pretty bad. I happened to see a small piece of TASSO REDUCED FOR QUICK SALE.
KARMA. I realized that I could make a recipe I jotted down from a library copy of Susan Spicer's cookbook. Spicer, who is now a consultant for the show Treme, and was written about in the Wall Street Journal recently, owns the restaurant Bayona.
Since I jotted the recipe down, I don't have proportions. The dish is shrimp in tasso cream sauce on cheese and pepper grit cakes. Wow! That sounds fancy and too hard for mere mortals. Not so.
First, for the grits, I subbed polenta, which I made in the slow cooker. I mixed in cheddar and canned roasted peppers when it was done (leaving out milk, home-roasted poblanos, etc). I couldn't make the cakes because I goofed and added too much water to the polenta. It was still good.
The tasso cream sauce called for a roux with onion, green onion, celery (none of which I had, so I used leeks), with cream (used evaporated milk instead). Oh-and a little shrimp stock, which I also didn't have, since I was using frozen shrimp. Then I added the strips of the tasso.
Shrimp-frozen I hardly ever use frozen, but there was a price war when a new grocery opened and frozen largish-size shrimp were $3.00/lb. (I know, I know, but we won't be having shrimp much longer [BP], and it won't be cheap, so don't be jealous.)
So--a beautiful pool of polenta, with another beautiful pool of shrimp in sauce, with plain garden greens on the side to ward off the crise de foie that can come from such rich food.
The dinner itself was very pleasant, except that Frugal Son passed out from jet-lag exhaustion right as we were setting the table. His place was taken by a friend of his (who keeps saying we adopted him), who had a similar dish at a fancy restaurant in honor of his college graduation. He said ours was AS GOOD!
We saved a plate for Frugal Son, who staggered in after we finished.
No pics; we ate it all up.
Frugal Point: The food was great, the company was good, Frugal Son's collapse was accommodated, as was the presence of an unexpected guest, the cost was low.
As for Susan Spicer, here's her book:
The recipe I made isn't included in the Search Inside feature, but look how cheaply you can get a used copy ($7.50). I may buy one myself. There are lot of goodies in the book.
Do you cook anything that makes you swoon?
What I made wasn't all that hard, but you, my far-flung readers, may not be able to get one of the ingredients. You'll know it when I get to it.
My dear children seldom reside chez nous, so when they are at home, I go into a frenzy of cooking. Dear Lucy Marmalade had her beloved shrimp and corn soup for 2 days. Then Frugal Son returned from France and we had a big pot of gumbo (not up to my usual standards, I'm afraid). One day remained, before both kids went off to their jobs as Residence Assistants at the Advance Program, at the site of their beloved high school, Louisiana School of Math, Science, and the Arts.
What to cook for their last night at home, after so few? Also, in spite of the many virtues of the school, the food is pretty bad. I happened to see a small piece of TASSO REDUCED FOR QUICK SALE.
KARMA. I realized that I could make a recipe I jotted down from a library copy of Susan Spicer's cookbook. Spicer, who is now a consultant for the show Treme, and was written about in the Wall Street Journal recently, owns the restaurant Bayona.
Since I jotted the recipe down, I don't have proportions. The dish is shrimp in tasso cream sauce on cheese and pepper grit cakes. Wow! That sounds fancy and too hard for mere mortals. Not so.
First, for the grits, I subbed polenta, which I made in the slow cooker. I mixed in cheddar and canned roasted peppers when it was done (leaving out milk, home-roasted poblanos, etc). I couldn't make the cakes because I goofed and added too much water to the polenta. It was still good.
The tasso cream sauce called for a roux with onion, green onion, celery (none of which I had, so I used leeks), with cream (used evaporated milk instead). Oh-and a little shrimp stock, which I also didn't have, since I was using frozen shrimp. Then I added the strips of the tasso.
Shrimp-frozen I hardly ever use frozen, but there was a price war when a new grocery opened and frozen largish-size shrimp were $3.00/lb. (I know, I know, but we won't be having shrimp much longer [BP], and it won't be cheap, so don't be jealous.)
So--a beautiful pool of polenta, with another beautiful pool of shrimp in sauce, with plain garden greens on the side to ward off the crise de foie that can come from such rich food.
The dinner itself was very pleasant, except that Frugal Son passed out from jet-lag exhaustion right as we were setting the table. His place was taken by a friend of his (who keeps saying we adopted him), who had a similar dish at a fancy restaurant in honor of his college graduation. He said ours was AS GOOD!
We saved a plate for Frugal Son, who staggered in after we finished.
No pics; we ate it all up.
Frugal Point: The food was great, the company was good, Frugal Son's collapse was accommodated, as was the presence of an unexpected guest, the cost was low.
As for Susan Spicer, here's her book:
The recipe I made isn't included in the Search Inside feature, but look how cheaply you can get a used copy ($7.50). I may buy one myself. There are lot of goodies in the book.
Do you cook anything that makes you swoon?
Tuesday, 1 June 2010
Frugal College Cooking: My First Rice Cooker Success
I was cruising through Roger Ebert's rice cooker blog the other day and discovered some words of wisdom. He was discussing Asian dishes, and said that, no, you can't make a stir fry, but you can throw a bunch of Asian type stuff in the pot--he specifically mentioned pineapple--and see what you will see.
As I had half a can of pineapple in the fridge, I was inspired to try, especially since I knew the pineapple would be en route to the compost pile pretty soon.
Here's what I put in: about 1 cup of rice, 1 1/2 cups water, small handful of chopped leeks we have in the freezer. A little salt. Turned on the pot.
After a bit, I added 1 chopped pepper from the garden, some of that moldering pineapple, and some of that Asian mini corn that comes in cans. I had an open can of that too, from the clean out the pantry project I've been discussing for several months now. I added a bit of soy sauce and some hoisin too.
The switch flipped to warm, and I had an idea: why not break an egg over it, as in that Korean dish whose name escapes me*. So I did. I flipped the switch on again.
I checked to make sure the white was cooked and hoped the yolk would be runny. Then I bestowed the dish on Lucy M, the reason for all my experimentation. The yolk was runny.
We added some of that neat hot sauce with the rooster on it.
And, Readers, it was good!
Thank you, Mr. Ebert, you are right. The pot knows what to do.
P.S. Lucy said the only part she didn't like was the pineapple.
*The Korean dish is called bibimbap.
P.P. S. I've already linked to this, but will do so again, in case you missed it. My mentor has a cookbook coming out:
As I had half a can of pineapple in the fridge, I was inspired to try, especially since I knew the pineapple would be en route to the compost pile pretty soon.
Here's what I put in: about 1 cup of rice, 1 1/2 cups water, small handful of chopped leeks we have in the freezer. A little salt. Turned on the pot.
After a bit, I added 1 chopped pepper from the garden, some of that moldering pineapple, and some of that Asian mini corn that comes in cans. I had an open can of that too, from the clean out the pantry project I've been discussing for several months now. I added a bit of soy sauce and some hoisin too.
The switch flipped to warm, and I had an idea: why not break an egg over it, as in that Korean dish whose name escapes me*. So I did. I flipped the switch on again.
I checked to make sure the white was cooked and hoped the yolk would be runny. Then I bestowed the dish on Lucy M, the reason for all my experimentation. The yolk was runny.
We added some of that neat hot sauce with the rooster on it.
And, Readers, it was good!
Thank you, Mr. Ebert, you are right. The pot knows what to do.
P.S. Lucy said the only part she didn't like was the pineapple.
*The Korean dish is called bibimbap.
P.P. S. I've already linked to this, but will do so again, in case you missed it. My mentor has a cookbook coming out:
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