current heat wave

It's been hot in the county since Friday with temperatures breaking long standing records some going back to the 1800s. We are very fortunate to live in the micro-climate that gave us more moderate temperatures than cities all around us. On Sunday when I left the house it was a comfortable 75 degrees at noon but by the time I turned inland the temperature immediately started to escalate and by the time I hit San Luis Drive it was 106 degrees. It has been that hot and hotter in SLO Monday and today as well hitting 115 in some places yesterday and 110 today. It's cooling down nicely tonight and looks like the heat wave will break tomorrow.

Bread pudding

For years in Connecticut I made bread pudding for Loaves and Fishes in Hartford. Once a month St. James's in West Hartford prepares and serves lunch for about 150 - 175 people at the soup kitchen. About 20 years ago I noticed that we gave away a couple of cookies for dessert and I volunteered to prepare a bread pudding for them. In the summer time at the previous site, the soup kitchen asked that we not use the ovens as it made the church too hot so I made a chocolate bread pudding which could be served cold or warm from home. Then in the new location this was no longer an issue so from then on we served regular bread pudding with caramel sauce.

The Senior Lunch program at my new church was looking for an idea for dessert so I mentioned bread pudding. The lunch was today and the pudding was a big hit. We are in the middle of a heat wave here and I wasn't sure how a warm dessert would go over. Not to mention that I heated up the house baking the bread pudding this morning. It was a great success with many of the seniors sharing stories of eating bread pudding. Only one person (a Brit of all things) didn't like bread pudding.

Harvest Festival

This weekend was the Harvest Festival. Arroyo Grande is 100 years old this year. This festival is a beautiful local event which showcases so many of the organizations in Arroyo Grande. It has been going on for over 70 years. There is everything from judged bake-offs to dachshund races, adopting rescue dachshunds, bands, food and harvest goods. It was a beautiful weekend with the first longer run of warmer weather.

Hike on Bishops Peak - the Feldman Loop

Last Thursday we went to dinner at P and S's and went on a hike on Bishop's Peak behind their house. This is the view from part way up. If you look very closely you can see their house. It was such a beautiful evening.

Another wedding and other things

Over labor day I flew to Chicago for the second bookend of summer weddings. The first one was the eldest daughter of my younger brother and it was over Memorial Day weekend and this was the second daughter of the same brother and it was over labor day. This time I managed to see almost all the family members. The wedding was another international affair. The first wedding was a Chinese/Cuban one and this was a Chinese/Filipino one. Both weddings were beautifully executed and enjoyable to attend. The food was excellent at both weddings - both were held at Italian restaurants. I like the new tradition of not "wasting" all that money on a wedding cake and just having one for display. The weddings were very unique and beautiful.

Flying is certainly nothing to write home about these days. You have to pay to check your luggage, pay for food, pray you get the seat you selected, pray your bag fits under your seat as the over head bins are chock full and the seats are so tight that there's almost no leg room let alone a place to put your carry-on! Then there is the issue of the traveling morbidly obese. There were 6 MOs on my flight from Chicago to Phoenix. One sat right next to me. I cut him some slack because he had a prosthetic leg. My seats were changed on me for both legs of my journey home. Perhaps because I couldn't check in ahead of time. So I was stuck in the middle on the leg to Phoenix and at the back of the plane for the ride to SLO. The AC was not working properly on the flight to SLO so we left Phoenix at 110 degrees with little air and by the time we reached SLO we were still pretty hot and most of us were pretty sweaty!

While in Chicago I walked around K's neighborhood and was entertained by the ever changing landscape as it went from little Koreatown, to little Mexico town, to little Sarajevo and then to little arabia. The street corners were filled with sidewalk vendors of all kinds - fresh prepared coconuts to men's underwear and everything in between. The weather was beautiful.

We went to Guerney Mills, the largest indoor outlet mall in America. It has an indoor skating rink and a carousel and every outlet you can think of. We shopped almost til we dropped and then I hemmed pants for K while she cooked a delicious dinner.

Another successful senior lunch

In July the church started to host a free lunch for seniors on the last Monday of the month. The church's thrift store is not open on Mondays so those seniors who work at the thrift store can attend if they wish. The first lunch there were about 80 people and it was a big success. Many people commented on how nice it was to be able to get together and socialize at properly set tables with tablecloths, silverware and real china. We had way too much food so they were able to take some food home with them. Some folks made donations and there was more than enough money to put towards the next event.

I volunteered to prepare some of the meal for the next one which was this past Monday. The menu was a mixed salad with chicken and I was asked to prepare the chicken. Costco to the rescue. I bought 25 lbs of chicken breast there and used a combination of their Vidalia onion marinade/dressing and Sweet Baby Ray's barbecue sauce to marinate the chicken. I cut each half breast in half horizontally before marinating. Monday morning it took about 2 hours to cook all the chicken. I tried 3 methods - baking on racks at a high temperature, stove top in a large frying pan and electric skillet. The frying pan/electric skillet worked the best as the chicken caramelized better.

There were about 80 people again at the luncheon and if the chatter level was any indication, it was very successful. There were few leftovers and people cleaned their plates.

The ongoing electric fry pan saga

Since my electric frying pan died a couple of weeks ago, I've been doing lots of research. I visited many stores in search of a new one. I posted on Facebook for suggestions. After reading lots of reviews, I decided to buy the most popular one out there and not spring for the very expensive name brand one Cuisinart(over $150) or the second name brand one Wulfgang Puck nearly $100. I have resigned myself to go with the Presto 6852 and live with it for as long as it lasts. I understand they don't make things like they used to and I am okay with that. So let the potsticker frying begin!