A friend sent me an interesting recipe the other day: boiling an omelet in a Ziploc bag. I like omelets. I happen to think that making an omelet the old-fashioned way isn’t that big a deal. It takes maybe 5 minutes, and gets a pan, a bowl and a plate dirty. But it’s a slow Saturday night, so what the heck. At the very worst, it should be good for some blog fodder, right?

So here we have a little tableau I think I’ll call Still Life With Eggs And Ziploc. This is the assembled ingredients for my little experiment: eggs, a couple of kinds of cheese, salt and pepper (not shown).

No, the pear doesn’t go in the omelet. It’s there to look pretty and balance the plate. OK?

(Note: the thumbnails are smaller than usual, but, as always, click on the pic for the bigger versions in a pop-up.)

The first step in our breakfast-for-dinner adventure is to break the eggs into the Ziploc bag.

The recipe calls for a freezer Ziploc, I assume so that it will stand up during boiling. Poached eggs a la melted plastic. Blech. I decided to follow the suggestion.

Once in the bag, the eggs are shaken and smooshed until basically scrambled. I then added the cheese and some salt and freshly ground pepper.

Because two eggs didn’t look like much in a quart sized Ziploc, I threw in a third egg and smooshed that up with the rest.

I squeezed the air out of the bag and sealed it, and then dropped it into rapidly boiling water. Once the bag was boiling away, I concentrated on cutting up my pear and getting the rest of my little dinner ready.

The recipe states that the bag should be boiled for exactly 13 minutes. Because of the extra egg, my omelet was still gooshy at that point.

I boiled the bag for an extra 3 minutes. That did the trick nicely.

And here is the Ziploc out of its boiling water bath.

The omelet is supposed to slide right out. That didn’t happen. I had to sort of tease it away from the sides of the bag with my fork.

It was mostly the cheese that stuck. I perhaps should have used less cheese, or maybe a different kind of cheese.

And breakfast is served.

Do you think this thing looks like an omelet? More like scrambled eggs, eh? Congealed scrambled eggs.

It didn’t taste too bad. Not really like an omelet, but not horrible. (Let’s face it — it’s the butter that I fry my omelets in that adds that yum factor.) It reminded me of microwaved scrambled eggs.

The recipe suggests that this would be fun at a party, or if you have a bunch of guests for breakfast. You can turn out several omelets at once by boiling them in a big pot. I can see that it would be a lot of fun if you had a bunch of kids around at breakfast who all liked different stuff in their omelets. Each guest should, of course, use a permanent marker to sign their Ziploc.

I’m not sure that I will repeat this particular experiment. I have to admit the clean-up was easy, but I don’t know that the result was really that great.

Mom’s take on Ziploc omelets:

OK. Not really. But I must have been wound up tighter and more concerned about #1 Son than I was letting on, even to myself. Right after he arrived home yesterday morning, I was overcome by sleepiness and couldn’t even keep my eyes open. So I went back to bed. And slept until noon. I can’t remember the last time I did that, but I know it’s been years. Despite that, I went to bed fairly early last night. Vacation is a good thing!

#1 Son wasn’t home for very long before he was off to see his friends and to go to work. He came in very late last night. I probably won’t see much of him. Good thing we have a little enforced togetherness coming up next week to give us a chance to catch up. 😀

Not much knitting yesterday, but I have made some progress on the socks since the pic I snapped a couple of days ago. I do have hope these might be finished by the end of the year, if I don’t get distracted. I’m just about ready to begin the gusset increases. I think I’ll make these “clog socks” and work the twisty faux cable pattern on the heels, too.

Tomorrow we will go over the river and through the woods to grandma’s house (that’s my former in-laws) for Christmas dinner. We didn’t have big plans for Christmas day, so the invitation to come for dinner was a pleasant surprise. It should be fun. (My ex will not be there.) Or at least tasty. Grandma is an excellent cook!

I’m going to make some risotto to bring for #1 Son. Grandma is having ham, and risotto should go well with that should others want to share. I still have to decide what to put in it. (Yes, yes, I hear you out there. I mean besides rice.) I’m thinking veggie stock as a base, or maybe tomato soup… and onion, mushrooms, bell peppers, beans… should be good.

Today I’m feeling much more like a “real person,” and that’s a good thing because I have a bunch of running around to do!

Yesterday #1 Son and I, along with E, my brother J, sister-in-law L and niece Z, attended our traditional yearly visit to The Trail Band Christmas Show at the Aladdin Theater. This will be the ninth year that #1 Son and I have attended this concert, a benefit for Friends Of The Children, and I never get tired of it. If you live in the Portland area or will be visiting next Christmas, please consider attending.

Buy your tickets early.

Unlike me. Usually I buy my tickets as soon as they go on sale. The tickets I buy for J, L and Z are my Christmas present to them. This year I waited to get tickets until L called me one night and mentioned that she thought the tickets were almost gone.

We don’t need to mention the words that came out of my mouth after I hung up the telephone.

If you are paying careful attention, gentle reader, you will note that there are six of us that go. And, strangely enough, we sort of like to sit together. Since the tickets sell out fast, the choices can quickly be reduced to single seats in widely scattered locations.

The next day was spent tracking down tickets. I managed to get the last six ticket for the last show of the last day of the concert series. And, needless to say, they were not the best seats. But the theater is small enough that no seat is truly bad. Unless, like me, you are short and end up sitting behind my son, who has tall hair. I had a wonderful view of the back of #1 Son’s neck through most of the show. Those around me who could see the stage tell me that the view wasn’t bad. The music, as always, was wonderful!

But I digress.

Before the concert, we all had dinner at Salvador Molly’s in Hillsdale. I had a wonderful lamb curry. Those of us who are omnivorous decided I made the best entree choice. Those of us who are vegetarian voted for #1 Son’s stuffed eggplant. For dessert, J and I shared a slab (there is no other word) of pumpkin bread pudding. It was heavenly.

At dinner, J, L and Z presented me with my Christmas present: A BCD clock (that’s Binary Coded Decimal for all you geek-challenged readers out there). It tells the time in BCD using little blue LEDs. For example, the time on the clock in the picture is 07:17:27.

Of course I had to play with it a little bit to figure out how to set it, how to make it a 24-hour clock, etc.

It is now sitting on my desk at work, with the seconds flashing away in little blue dots. People walking by have said: What is that? Is that a clock? Is that a binary clock? Cool!

I work among geeky types.

On Saturday I added printer-friendly versions of the Freebies pages so that the recipes and patterns can be printed out in black and white sans sidebars, etc.

I also finally finished playing Myst V: End Of Ages, which I will review sometime later if I get around to it.

I tell you all of this, gentle reader, to explain why Sock Scarf Two remains unfinished. I only have one stripe repeat plus the ribbing left to do. That’s about 50 short rounds on whopping big needles. That’s it. Then kitchener together. And done.

But I’ve hit The Wall with this project.

You know The Wall. I hit it with every project. It’s the place where I’ve sworn to myself that I will work on no other project until Project X is finished. So I slog on, looking for distractions trying not to get distracted because I would rather be doing almost anything else just love working on Project X. I eventually (usually) get past the wall and love Project X by the time I get to finishing. But sometimes the wall is high and thick and very hard to penetrate.

Sock Scarf Two is the current Project X. I know I’m going to love this object when it’s finished. It’s cute and funny, I love the colors, etc. But right now I hate the sight of it and I’d rather be cleaning the cats’ litter boxes outside naked in the dark and freezing cold with rain dripping down the back of my neck and icicles forming on my nose than to work a round on Sock Scarf Two. I have to force myself to pick up the needles. I’m going to try really hard to get the damn thing wonderful project completed tonight.

Do you ever hit The Wall with your project, knitting or otherwise? How do you motivate yourself to keep going?

As far back as I can remember, my mother baked peppernuts at Christmas.

My mother came from a long line of Irish-American women who married Irish-American men. And, true to form, my father was also of Irish-American descent. My grandma (mamma’s mom) thought outside the envelope and fell in love with a German who had come from the “old country.” (I also married a man of German extract, but, unfortunately, not as happily as Grandma did.) Grandpa really loved the spicy little Christmas cookies that his family had made. And that is how a German Christmas cookie came to be a tradition in an Irish-American household.

I’ve seen many recipes for peppernuts, aka pfefferneuse, over the years, but none like the ones Grandma and Mama used to bake. Most recipes call for the cookies to be rolled in powdered sugar prior to baking or frosted afterwards. Mama would have none of that. No time she said when I asked. And, indeed, even sans sugar and frosting, these cookies are not quick to make.

Mama usually started in September. And she baked thousands of cookies. Thousands. All through the Christmas season there were little bowls of peppernuts scattered around the house. The cookie jar was always full of them. And, best of all (in my opinion) the fridge was full of chilling dough. I can still hear Mama to her resident cookie-dough-monster (me): “Leave my peppernut dough alone!” The cookies are so small that a dozen are barely a handful, and so crunchy and spicy that they will keep for a long time (if hidden from those who would otherwise eat them).

The dough for Peppernuts is very stiff. Grandma always mixed hers by hand (I think she kneaded it ), but Mama used a mixer. She burned several mixer out before I finally bought her a heavy-duty KitchenAid mixer one year for Christmas. The next year, Mama told me, “I love the mixer you gave me. Even peppernut dough hasn’t been able to kill it.”

Mama always included peppernuts in the Christmas boxes sent to far-flung relations. I can vividly remember the first Christmas that I was not able to come home for the holidays. Instead of using styrofoam peanuts as packing around the contents in my “Christmas box,” Mama used baggies full of peppernuts. She knew how to make home come to me when I was absent from it.

M has requested the peppernut recipe, and I have obliged. Follow the link to the recipe. Hopefully M will share! (Are you reading this, M?) If not, I may have to make a batch myself.

You know, I’d have more time to blog if I didn’t spend my Thursday evenings roped to a chair at Tangle Knitting Studios in Lake Oswego and required to work on at least one project while being force-fed wine.

Well… maybe not that much force was actually required… and I did go there with three unfinished projects in my tote bag. Four unfinished projects, actually, when you consider that the tote itself still doesn’t have a lining in it, and thus qualifies as an unfinished object.

(Alice, Zen, Kalani — you need to get a web site up!)

The end result: I have finished the beaded bag! I have about 12″ completed on Tilt! I’m about to start work on the fingerless gloves for #1 Son! I’ve made some small progress on Clapotis #2! And, last but not least, the mystery project is due to be delivered to its recipient on Sunday, and all will be revealed after that! I also plan this weekend to (finally) get the lining in the funky felted tote bag. I’ll pics up of everything soon.

#1 Son’s classes were canceled today due to a power outage at PCC, so we “did lunch.” For the second day in a row I ate at Thai Delicious on Main in Tigard. Right now one of the lunch specials is a pumpkin curry that is, simply, to die for. Anyone within striking distance should get over there and give it a try.

I really love pumpkin and I don’t understand why we in this country don’t seem to see them as good for anything but pie and jack-o-lanterns. I actually love almost all winter squash. OK… I love almost all autumn-type foods, including winter squash. Hearty soup. Stew. Yum!

Saturday afternoon I visited the Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival and had a wonderful time watching all of the demos, petting tons of yarn and fiber, ooo-ing over the exhibits and chatting with all of the animals. There was an angora bunny that bore an incredible resemblance to a white tribble that I really wanted to bring home to use for a foot warmer. But I restrained myself, knowing that it would probably bring out the worst in the fur kids. (Phoebe jealously guards “her” bed.”) I also restrained myself while wandering through the vendor’s area. I didn’t buy anything. The problem was I wanted to buy everything, and I just couldn’t narrow it down. And toward the end of the afternoon, I started feeling sort of blah.

By Saturday evening, I was feeling more than blah. I was feeling sick.

Fortunately, between the time I got home from OFFF and the time I collapsed, I managed to concoct a large veggie stew from tomatoes, winter squash, lima beans, green beans, onion, garlic, carrots, bell peppers, celery, broccoli, corn, miscellaneous herbs and spices, elbow macaroni, and probably a few other things that were lurking in the veggie bin that I can’t remember right now. So I had a nutritious meal available any time that required no more effort than ladling out a bowl’s worth and nuking it in the microwave.

And I learned another pleasure inherent in having a two-driver family. #1 Son could run up to the vet’s on Sunday to pick up cat food and I didn’t have to budge from the semi-prone position that was about all I could manage at the time.

I haven’t read any blogs. I obviously haven’t blogged myself. I did a bit of knitting, but not a lot. I haven’t gotten the latest FO’s added to the gallery. I haven’t progressed any in Myst V. Blech. I hate being sick.

School started for #1 Son this week. He informed me in a quite dignified manner that there was no need for me to wake him up in the morning. “I’ve got it covered, mom,” he said. And he has it covered. I haven’t had to wake him up at all. And that’s such a pleasant departure from “the old days” when I could barely pry him from his bed in time to get to school. What a world of difference the summer has made.