Tasks...

Yesterday was a day when I sought to DO SOMETHING.  It was long and exhausting even though I didn't start on my list until late afternoon.

I awoke to find that Firewood Man finally had time to repair my laundry line.  It had snapped the last time I hung laundry.  I am not sure why.  The line was not even two years old.  But the little doohickies that he used to secure the line have nuts that I couldn't figure out how to open and close without one of those thingamajigs that goes on a drill and covers the nut and spins in on and off.  I think.  Maybe.  But I don't have one of those.  So, I bought new line but had to wait for him to pull the end bits off the old line and put them on the new line.

A repaired laundry line meant two loads of laundry.

My other DO SOMETHING goal had to do with cooking (what a surprise, eh?).  I tried one of the frozen mason jars of the spicy corn chowder and it was rather tasty.  Since I learned that the chowder freezes well, I wanted to make a full batch whilst there is still fresh corn at the grocery store.

Because I was making a full batch this time, I switched to the large stock pot instead of my beloved cast iron dutch oven.  I wasn't sure I would have enough space.  I worried that it wouldn't be as good with the change.  Or that I wouldn't remember exactly how I made it.  But ... well ... it was divine!

You see, when I made the half batch, I used corn from my birthday celebration.  It was leftover and sat around in my refrigerator for five week.  It was fresh when I bought it and I can be a bit caviler about eating things that have aged.  The chowder was so good that I thought nothing of it.

But this chowder!
Man!
Actually fresh corn took the recipe to the stars!!

I had filled eight mason jars and was going to do a ninth, but I kept looking into the pot with longing and ended up having a bowl instead of filling an extra jar (most of my recipes are eight servings).  When I took that first bite, I was so surprised at how much better it tasted.  How much fresher the corn in it tasted.  The bowl was heavenly and I wanted to proceed to the mason jars.  Who needs meals in the freezer? I thought.  Somehow, though, I restrained myself.

My next task was to make more baked oatmeal.

One of my 50th birthday presents to myself was the ability to bake more than 12 muffins at a time because my beloved baked oatmeal recipe yield is 18 muffins and so I have to bake it in two batches, running the oven for an hour.  I wanted a second vintage tin like my grandmother's that I use.  It is a Comet pan.  However, I could only find a set of two 6-muffin tins.  So, technically, I bought myself two additional muffin tins.

This was the first time that I was able to bake the muffins all at once.  Of course, I forgot to put in the blueberries and, well, I forgot how many scoops of oatmeal I had put in half way to putting them in so this batch is less than super tasty, but I do not care.  It only took 30 minutes to bake, and I sort of adore oatmeal so much that a tad dense, a tad plain baked oatmeal is still the tops to me.

It is my hope that, now, running the oven for only 30 minutes, the pans (rather cheap on eBay) will pay for themselves.  Basically, that's a guilt-free self birthday present, eh?

I also made my first ever batch of buttermilk ranch dressing.  I haven't added the recipe yet to my recipe rememberer blog because I am trying to decide if I am totally and completely happy with it or not.  I do really, really, really like it, but I think it needs a bit of lemon juice or something in it.  I am just not sure.  And, frankly, I'm thinking it might take me the entire bottle to decide what I think.

I don't mind.
Tonight, I did some thinking with a small dish of petite carrots.
Tomorrow, I will with some mozzarella sticks.

Today was a whole lot of resting, but I did finish the last of the culinary tasks I had set myself.  The last was to poach some more chicken.  I bought some avocados at the store and wanted to make some chicken bacon avocado melts.  And some guacamole.  And chilorio burras.

If I am going to be so exhausted that hours pass without even managing to pick up a remote to stream something, then I am at least going to have tasty food on hand.  SIGH.