Sprung

~ Patrick O'Grady
The lilacs have been doing the business for the better part of quite some time.

“First day of spring” me bollocks.

The toppling temperature records and soaring pollen counts tell me otherwise.

The Duck! City croaked another mark yesterday with a high of 88°. And our earliest day of 90° or better — May 3, 1947 — looks like an endangered species as well.

This is a small platter of fried spuds to anyone living in Tucson (101°), Phoenix (105°), or Palm Springs (107°). All records, set yesterday. Helluva note when St. Me Day comes with a chaser of heat stroke. If MarkWayne BillyBob JimmyJoe Knucklegobbler and his ICEholes come looking for you in any of those ZIP codes all you need is a parabolic reflector and hey presto! Instant Death Ray.

Speaking of cookery, the hot soups and stews and anything involving the oven have long since been 86ed from the menu here at Chez Dog. Last night we dined on Martha Rose Shulman’s shrimp and mango tacos with a side of rice and green salad. As “spring” scampers into summer, this ol’ dog needs his wok.

19 thoughts on “Sprung”

  1. Our tulips broke soil the last week of February, and the cottonwoods and pear trees think it’s May already.

    And when trees get stressed by not getting enough winter shut-eye, they are more susceptible to disease and bug infestation. Like the pine beetles didn’t already have enough of a head start.

    When you grow flowering plants for the visual appeal, but then you cover them up with beetle-catchers like they’re ornaments on a Christmas tree, makes you question your life choices. Last summer’s war against the Japanese beetle invasion left everyone scarred and angry.

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    1. I fear for the backyard maple. It should never have been here in the first place, and it’s struggled for years. Happily, the pines, ornamental plums, and pistache are holding up nicely. Those pines and a plum provide a lot of our shade.

      We should’ve surrendered more grass when we had the landscaping done. It was a balancing act — available water and desire for some cooling effect — and the water is now front and center. The news on that front, as it is on so many others, is all bad.

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  2. Wasn’t even the Vernal Equinox yet and just about everything in the yard here was in full bloom. Bird houses look occupied, cycling in summer gear. Still waiting for the lilacs to wake up. But really……Weird.

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    2. Ive had this wok now for a few years. It’s my fav kitchen cookware. Don’t remember what I paid but $150 would be worth it if you cook a lot

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      1. I also have a 42 year old hand hammered wok. It was my first Xmas gift from Sandy. But the bottom isn’t flat so it slid all over our flat top stove and wouldn’t heat properly on it. It isn’t going anywhere. But, I am still using the tools that came with it.

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        1. For some reason I don’t do as many stir-fries as I did back in the B-burg. (P’raps because the cleanup on this gas cooktop is a real pain in the keister for someone who is not me.)

          This gong bao chicken recipe from The New York Times is tasty. The prep’ takes a while and a few of the ingredients are mildly exotic and not easy to find in Flyover Country, but it’s worth the trouble … as long as you’re not the one doing the post-feast cleanup.

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          2. Seems likely, Hoss. Herself has been lobbying strenuously for a glasstop electric setup, which I see as the camel’s nose under the tent.

            This will be followed by an assault on the tiled countertops and backsplashes (which, it must be said, was a blindingly stupid choice for anyone who cooks and/or cleans up), the retexturing/repainting of walls and ceiling, new stainless-steel sink, new dishwasher, new electric oven/microwave combo to replace the ancient double-oven setup, etc., et al., and so on and so forth.

            While all this is happening I will be outside, in a tent, preparing meals on the old Coleman two-burner. It will be clearly marked as a no-camels zone.

          3. Gotta love NYT recipes … especially the comments section. Seems to be a running joke. “I made the recipe exactly according to the instructions, except that I substituted pork for chicken, shallots for the garlic, I braised instead of stir frying, and I added sourkraut and BBQ sauce … ”

            I did get a kick out of the instructions for roasting your own peanuts.
            *Place your nuts on an oven tray and roast for 15 to 20 minutes, until fragrant and very slightly golden. (Keep an eye on them, as they are easily burned.) Cool your nuts on a plate, then rub them between your fingertips to loosen their skins. Shake nuts as you blow over them; skins will blow away.*

            Pretty sure I’ll get banned from the kitchen if I try that!

          4. I was roasting my nuts the old-fashioned way today, wrapped in lycra on the ol’ bikey-bikey. Gave ’em a good rinse in warm water as soon as I got home, and happily, the skins stayed on.

  4. My 43 year old wok somehow managed to not make the move to
    abq. However, I had one show up in a subscription service I didn’t know I had. swill get the canned butane burner out and season it up for service. Albuquerque has a great selection of fresh veggies compared to the Pacific Northwet. Just got the patio table and chairs set up, will be dining al fresco for the next few months. A lot of Chicken and Shrimp in the future. Only thing I ‘miss about the northwet is the Alaskan Salmon on the barbie..mi casa has a glass top electric stove that Samsung should be nuked for,, POS and I don’t mean Point of Sale. So cooking of on it is not a joy.

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  5. We left a burner on for a few hours before discovering it. It was on low flame, but still. So, the electric range was a matter of improved indoor air quality and safety. That, plus an oven that also does convection and air frying. Learning curve is steep and still ongoing but always improving. A flat glass top makes cleaning so much easier. Soft Scrub and Windex do the deed in minutes.

    That recipe sounds good, but stirring constantly takes the fry out of stir fry. I use the Martin Yan method of stir, stop and count to ten, stir again. The frying takes place in the bottom of the wok. When you make the sauce, everything moves up on the sides. That’s why nonstick woks don’t work very well. Things won’t stay on the sides.
    I prefer simple recipes without heavy spices. No garlic or hot peppers, just soy, sesame, and fresh ginger. I like to taste individual ingredients. My go to book is “Chinese Cookery” by Rose Cheng and Michele Morris.

    Allergies off the charts today. Neti rinse and benedryl are helping, but I am still hitting the kleenex hard.

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    1. My dad always said I procrastinate too much. I told him, just you wait, just you wait …

      But this year I got a jump on spring allergies like it was nobody’s bizniss. The Venn diagram of who got what in this family looked like a middle schooler with three Mountain Dews in him discovering a SpiroGraph for the first time. I had a 24 hour head cold followed by 24 days of coughing up dark phlegm that clung to the back of my throat, looked like someone built a Mammoth Caves diorama where my uvula was supposed to be . The matriarch got hit with an exhaustion bug that’s going on six weeks. One kid is blasting snot rockets like he’s racing E. Lawn Mulch to Mars, the other one sounds like she’s been smoking for 80 years.

      We know influenza B and strep were running amok in our classrooms. But no one could stick to the script. Everyone was pulling a Miles Davis with their symptom improvisations.

      Must be fun being an urgent care or pediatric nurse these days. “Here ya go, throw this dart at the board and let’s see what is says you have.”

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