I've mentioned that Kroger Grocery Store has a marked down bin where they place produce. Any bag of produce in the bags on that bin are 99 cents, no matter what is in the bag. Most of the time the produce is perfectly fine. Once in a while there might be one tomato in a bag that has split, or one small dark spot on a head of broccoli. I'm of the ilk that I'll just shave off the dark spot or dispense with the one tomato that's split and use the rest.
Yesterday I hit the bin at the right time. The workers must have just added a bunch to the shelf, as they periodically do during the day. I came away with a bag containing a head of broccoflower, a bag of two pints of cherry tomatoes, a bag of 6 large tomatoes, a bag of two tomatoes and two avocadoes, and a tray of strawberries.
I do feel strongly that I only take what I can actually eat, and not to take all of it. Other people depend on the lower priced produce, too. Whatever I do take, I always use.
The strawberries were not moldy but pretty ripe. I knew I would not be able to eat all of them before they went over. I decided to use half of them in a muffin recipe. I enjoy the pineapple sour cream recipe I make, so I decided to look for a recipe using sour cream with strawberries. Found one! What did we do before Google?
As for baking them, I used half of the flour called for and subbed almond flour. I also found out I didn't have enough butter so I added oil to make up the rest. Substitutions like these usually deflate or even ruin a baking recipe, but I'm by myself here and I'm a "Ach, close enough" kind of cook so... They taste OK, they are just crumbly.
Two cherry tomato trays plus 8 large vine tomatoes were also going to be a lot for me to get through if I ate them individually. A recipe was called for. I can eat cherry tomatoes pretty quickly, and I set two large tomatoes aside to use in salads. The remaining 6 tomatoes I cut up and put in a pan with some thyme, and guess what, I roasted! Not roasted dry, I had no parchment paper or any other way to get the tomatoes above the juices they'd shed while in the oven. But roasting is always good to draw out flavor. I decided to pop them in and use the heat from the oven to roast them as long as other stuff was cooking, and finish the tomatoes into a soup. Flavorful, fresh tomato soup will be great for this rainy day!
It's December 1 and the weather is cooperating with winter, southern style. It's a hard driving rain today with temps hovering at 50 degrees at midday. Tomorrow is supposed to be 74 and sunny. That's kind of a shame because the Comer Christmas Parade is scheduled for today. This is a huge event and it's a really good parade. Along with the parade is a Christmas edition of the Comer Farmer's Market and inside Comer Elementary School (very close by) are Christmas vendors selling gifts, crafts, and food wares. There are floats, school choruses singing, and more.
The parade is scheduled to go on no matter what, rain or shine, but it is a cold, driving rain and a lot of the participants have backed out. So it will probably be less of a joyful day and more of a plodding, soaking commitment. Here are a few pics of past Comer Christmas parades in better weather.
Enjoy your weekend!
1 comment:
Nothing says Southern like a Deere tractor in a parade. :) I'll never forget the time I got to drive an antique Deere in a parade in a tiny little North Carolina town...I grew up in the city, and even though it was a Southern city, I'd never been on a tractor before in my life. It was an honor and a privilege and a lot of fun. :)
As a funny side note, I was with a friend at her family reunion when I was in that tiny little NC town, and her family treated me just like I was the long-long cousin I claimed to be. :D
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