Food and winnowing and breaking news

 On Saturday, I improved my surroundings by winnowing paperwork. At first I thought I'd do files but realized the thing that was annoying me was the overstuffed binder of recipes. It was so full I had trouble finding what I wanted, so that's the sort of task that rewards effort.

Packed with handwritten scraps, pieces from newspapers and old cookbooks, and a metric ton of recipes from my cookbook book club.

 

I took out and reorganized, found some good ideas I'd forgotten, and recycled a lot of pages I'll never use, or tried and didn't need to make again.

The winnowings. Now I have a useful binder and won't be annoyed ahead of searching for a recipe again.

After all this big talk about fancy recipes, I ended up making 

Plums and custard. No need for any directions, it makes itself. The coloring comes from turmeric, great spice, because I don't like food coloring in those little containers.

While I was on a roll I made mayo. Then boiled a couple of eggs, for egg salad. I fancied it up a bit this time, with minced red onion, scallions and fresh chives.

So Sunday lunch looked like this 

Out early Sunday I found a an actual flower, finally 

There are buds all over the zinnias now, so soon there's going to be picking.

Meanwhile out front the pickings though slim, are good. The little blue wildflower, can't remember the name, has started rooting itself in the water.

I finally got around to repotting the ponytail palm, three big ones crowded in one pot. Hot work, I ended up sawing them apart. 

One broke off so the root is in a pot outside and I've set the foliage up in water and we'll see.

The other two are now in a pot each, rather inexpertly done, but it was hot on the deck and it was the best I could do. I'm hoping they'll thrive. Nobody will disturb them, so they have a chance to get settled. At least that's the plan.

And Sunday I texted a message of support to Joe and Kamala. Anyone can 

I have among my phone contacts Joe Biden, White House!!

Ed update: since I wrote this, Biden has left the ticket and endorsed Harris. I texted to say thank you for everything and I'll support the blue ticket. Go Kamala!  Rollercoaster day.

GO KAMALA!   She's already got the endorsements of two presidents, the ufw, many state parties, and she's starting to amass delegates. And massive fund raising via Act Blue in just the few hours since Biden's heroic announcement. She'll have a rough time with media, so smart people are continuing to be very selective in where they get news. Not the mass media.

Happy day everyone, anyway, oh and it was cool enough to get to the mailbox and I found my very useful Senior Freeze, property tax refund, waiting. It's now deposited, thank you, Mr NJ Treasurer.

This freeze on raises in property tax, my housecleaners and good neighbors all keep me going in my home, yay them.

    GO KAMALA! 

Good things happening anyway

 Here's some excellent legislation for my state, which has a long history of failing to fund the transportation sector. In fact previous governors raided the trust fund to finance their own pet projects. This changes now.

Notice where the funding is coming from. Take that, Amazon!

And I wrote a line of encouragement and support to Biden and Harris, and the office acknowledged it

We're good.

On the home front, I was out briefly early morning, and met a baby praying mantis. He must be very young, still transparent. I like having them around to help with mosquitoes. And he's on the hibiscus, so that's welcome in case any insects are planning to eat the new leaves.

Too humid and hot to venture out yesterday, so I set up an afternoon of Lucia, with a glass of rooibos and chamomile sun tea.

Supper was pancakes and plum sauce, the pancakes made with AP and chickpea flour. 

This cooking didn't heat the kitchen up, and there's batter to make more today. 

Happy day, everyone, I'm trying to shed more light than heat today.

Photo AC