What’s on the menu this week? [NOT 29/3/23]

29/3/23 brightersideoflife 14
My expression when confronted by a Smoothie. You should not attempt to feed any dog or me a Smoothie.

Hi, friends!

What have folks been eating lately? Meals starting to change with the weather getting warmer?

I ended up accidentally vegan for my lunches and dinners this week. Chickpea broccoli slaw salads for lunch and a lovely lentil soup for dinner.

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14 Comments

  1. Yet another supermarket has opened near us, this one a Whole Foods manqué but with low, low introductory prices to build their business. As far as I can determine they’re a one-off and not part of a chain.

    Better Half has been going there and brought back something called “New York-Style Asiago Bagels.” These weren’t the ones he got, but I assure you there’s nothing “New York-Style” about a cheese-flavored bagel. Tempting as they sound.

    So what I did was last Friday, for my self-imposed pescatarian Friday tradition and because it’s Lent on top of that, and the weather was miserable, I made baked scallops and grated two of these things to make a crust. Then, I took two more, chopped them into small cubes and drizzled them with a little olive oil, and put them in the oven with the baked scallops for about five minutes. I pulled them out and let them cool so now I had croutons for the salad I was making.

    In both forms they were delicious, but I don’t think I’d want to eat them with lox and a shmear.

    • Asiago bagels are super popular with Panera/St Louis Bread Company customers and have been on the menu for decades. But they’re not boiled so as I understand it from my flyover state, they absolutely are not New York bagels.

      However, they’re great for a fried egg sandwich with that cheesey goodness on top.

      • When I was on the road trip that I talked about earlier today (we were in that suite for three nights, with a couple of lunches and one dinner held off-site, much to the left-behind Faithful Hound’s disappointment) we went to a Panera. I had a tuna sandwich on a roll, not a “New York-Style” asiago bagel, and it was absolutely delicious. Then, a few days later, while in an Uber and returning from yet another medically related appointment, we were driven through the Upper East Side and lo and behold there was a Panera. At the stoplight I said, “Look! A Panera! And look, a dozen huge apartment towers. This is why we have to move to the Upper East Side.”

        “Mattie, do you realize how ridiculous you sound? The Mattie I met who had that shitty walkup downtown and used to tell me to never go above 14th Street except for work and now you want to live in some anonymous condo building on Second Avenue because there’s a Panera?”

        “It’s either this or Boca Raton. Choose your adventure.”

        [In reality I’ll probably be carried out of this apartment feet first, but I hope that won’t be for a few good many years yet.]

          • AND WHAT IS SO SAD ABOUT THAT was that the space used to house a Woolworth’s with a lunch counter that hadn’t been updated since, I don’t know, the 1940s. It all got chopped up in the 1990s at some point. Of course I can’t find a link to confirm this because searches get cluttered up with “Empire State Building” “Woolworth Building” “Tallest Building in the World” crap but I can assure you that you could roam the aisles looking for shoelaces and then sit down at the interlocking S-shaped counter and get the cheeseburger and fries. I will bear witness.

            • Back in the dark ages when I was weekly in NYC, I had many appointments in the Empire State Building. HIGH in the building. Provincial Elliecoo was freaked by the way the entire floor would sway, and clothing I was viewing would slide one way, then the other on the installed pipe racks.

  2. I making easy stuff this week.  Today I am making chicken breasts w/ potatoes & brussel sprouts.  Had some great Hungarian food for lunch today.  We have a great place near us & I need to support it more.  The owner was my wife’s patient but she can’t handle all the paprika.  I LOVE all the paprika!

  3. I’m also not a fan of smoothies. I’d rather just eat fruit.
    I usually eat the same meals over and over but occasionally I’ll see something online that catches my eye and I’ll try it. Recently it was Kani  Salad, shredded carrots, julienned cucumbers, and fake crab with a mayo and sriracha dressing. The “crab” is tasteless and I’d skip it but I like to get a decent amount of protein with each meal. I may just have the veggies with a piece of fish on the side.

    • Unless you’re allergic, unsalted nuts are a good source of protein, although they have some fats in them. Which I bet you and everyone else probably know. I didn’t, until I met my first vegans back in circa 1992 at a dinner party. I was a plus-one, and my date didn’t quite realize what she was getting into either. We brought wine but it wasn’t vegan (who knew in 1992 there was such a thing?) so we had it all to ourselves. It was still a lovely summer evening. The hostess had inherited a spacious three-bedroom rent-controlled apartment from her parents (succession rights) and there was a balcony where some of us went to smoke tobacco (me) and pot (a couple of the others.) I can’t remember what we ate, but I do remember that we all agreed on a few things: 1) Jerry Brown was the only true Democratic candidate in the Presidential race. 2) Bill Clinton was an automatic no because Arkansas and his suspiciously triangulating/Third Way Overton Window-rightward-sliding dog whistles. 3) Sitting President George Bush had to be stopped because of Dan Quayle, his VP. For some reason we all thought he was at death’s doorstep, even though he lived for another quarter of a century. 4) Ross Perot.

      Sorry. More than a little off-tangent.

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