rikibeth

I hauled my butt out of bed by around 4:30 this morning, because I realized after posting my salad list that two salads used grape tomatoes, and I didn't have any left because I'd used them up Monday, and had not foreseen needing them before the delivery on Thursday because I hadn't expected an equipment malfunction that hosed all my food. So I had to go to the 24-hour Stop & Shop to buy them if I wanted to do the white bean and artichoke or the cucumber tomato. So I did.

It's really, really entertaining driving before dawn without any GLASSES on. I've got some astigmatism on top of my nearsightedness. Street light stars!

So. Having been inspired by the Angry Chef's latest post to organize my prep better and multi-task more efficiently, I got a LOT of things going when I walked in the door. Flat of eggs boiling for the egg salad. Pot of water for the bowties, and another one for the edamame. Burner #4 was for melting the butter for the muffins.

Blueberry muffins. Extra batter got some mango chunks and became blueberry mango tea bread. Scones (Robert backed them up for me yesterday, yay) and sticky buns and brioche. Yay breakfast. I also put a batch of sour cream coffee cakes together, because the case needed something for the top shelf.

Four cans of plum tomatoes, the tomatoes on baking sheets and into the oven for an hour and a half, so tomato basil soup can happen either later today or tomorrow morning.

A bag of frozen peaches, about a quart of frozen cranberries, one red onion quartered and sliced, three cloves of garlic minced, five sticks cinnamon, some cloves and cumin, and some brown sugar into a pot on the stove, to be chutney for tomorrow.

Soup heating.

The salads weren't as hosed as I thought they were. Even though boss nudges ME about not keeping extra in the fridge if it can POSSIBLY fit in the display container, she hadn't bothered yesterday, but that turned out well in the end, because that meant I had white bean and artichoke and Mediterranean orzo with feta and olives to out out without making them. Boss had also not bothered to make chickpea salad yesterday, so there was a half can already drained and ready for me. Yay. Furthermore, she had made extra of a roasted chicken and asparagus deal, so I could put THAT out.

Tomatoes out of the oven, the last of the bacon in.

So, line up the bowls of pasta, edamame, and chickpeas, and dice red onions into each. Drain the tuna, add it and the peas to the pasta, dress it, it's out. Red peppers, dice them and add them to the edamame and chickpeas. Scallions the same. Dress the edamame salad, it's out. Grate carrots into the chickpeas, add a scoop of raisins, dress it, DONE.

Boss said she was going to build the sandwiches today... Sicilianos (everything sliced, tapenade ready) and, my suggestion, turkey club wraps. She was still messing around with quiches, though. God knows why. THEY didn't need to get done first. She could have made the egg salad instead, but no. Anyway, she said she was going to build them, so I didn't, I plattered up some eggplant mozzarella rounds instead, and then got to work on the pie dough, the way she said she wanted.

The trouble with the deli case was a pinhole leak that had let the refrigerant out, the repair guy said. He charged it up, and I think blew in some sealer-goo, but we were using part of the pastry case for salads.

Backed up three batches (six dozen single crust portions) of pie dough. Explained to the boss that we were NOT going to have very berry pies TODAY, not unless she wanted me to put in really ridiculous hours, because there was a CAKE ORDER that had come in, well, don't know if it was Monday after I left or yesterday, but anyway it was for tomorrow, and Robert wasn't coming in this afternoon because of the ongoing family stuff (court date, this time), so guess who had to build it? That's right... I told her we could have pumpkin today and very berry tomorrow, and it'd just have to do.

I had the pumpkin pies in the oven and was ready to start work on the cake after an 8-hour shift. In other words, I STUCK to what I told her I was going to do for my pacing, and the cake was just an unforeseen extra.

Today I had cake mojo. I torted them evenly and smoothly, with no wasted layers. My soaking syrup didn't crystallize. The raspberry Hero jam went on with next to no crumbs. There was EXACTLY enough raspberry compound left in the jar to flavor the buttercream, and the edge dams went on smoothly. The white chocolate mousse (I hate that mix, but it is faster than mousse from scratch even if I'm really good at that, and I am) set up well, because I was on top of things enough to have it whipping while I worked on pumpkin pies, and it had enough time in the fridge. The sides were decently straight, and it was not NINETY FREAKING DEGREES in the kitchen today, so I got a nice smooth crumb coat on it!

While it was in the fridge setting up, I tidied up, tinted some of the buttercream moss green for decorating, and got the spice rub onto the brisket that I'm going to cook off tomorrow for barbecued brisket sandwiches. Go me.

I finally remembered that the way to smooth the drag marks off the icing was to dip the spatula in hot water. Boss came back from the bank and said it looked gorgeous. Go me.

It got a bead border on the bottom edge, Swiss dot diamonds on the sides, and a leaf border at the top edge. And "Happy Birthday Eddie."

I was still out of there in ten and a half hours, even with the freakin' cake.

I walked around the corner and picked up my glasses, which now that I can see them on my face with actual corrected vision, I don't hate. They follow the line of my eyebrows on the top of the frames, and they're half-rimless, with monofilament holding the lenses in on the bottom half, so they are pretty unobtrusive. I can deal with unobtrusive.

I even had time to go to the post office and mail the Mean Skulls to