I May Have Neglected To Mention

I've noticed that responsible bloggers (i.e., not I) mention when they're going to be away for a bit. So along those lines, I'm writing from the land of dial-up to say that I'm on vacation this week in the wilds of Southwestern Pennsylvania, where the beauty of the scenery is surpassed only by the inadequacy of the supermarkets. The stories I could tell you. But it would not, one supposes, be kind to inflict nightmares upon you while I'm enjoying a week away from both excessive heat and the office.

I likely will be cooking a reasonable amount this week, but it's less likely that I'll make anything I'd want to report back about. I will, however, pass on a bit of hard-earned (albeit completely obvious) knowledge that I acquired earlier this evening. If your daughter wants the two of you to make gnocchi on the same night that steaks are being grilled, first inquire whether in addition to bringing the steaks with you, you are expected to grill them. Alternatively, if you discover, halfway through making the gnocchi dough, that someone is expecting you to grill steaks, panic. If your grill is out on the driveway, and the water you're boiling the gnocchi in is inside the kitchen, thirty feet away, you're going to need an awful lot of adrenaline to run out and check your steaks and make it back to the kitchen between the time you put the gnocchi in the water and the time they float to the top. Without the panic, you're liable to get absorbed in the gnocchi making, and even the yummiest of gnocchi are unlikely to divert the other diners' attentions from a steak that is black on the outside and nearly raw on the inside.

Not that such a thing has ever happened to me, you understand.