Gefilte fish

For those who don't know what gefilte fish is it's kind of like a fish dumpling or a fish ball.  It's made with a combination of whitefish, pike and carp and seasoned. I've heard that other cuisines have things similar to it, but nothing exactly like it. It's a staple at Rosh Hashannah (New Year) and Passover dinners which is why I find myself making it today.

It's not really hard to make as the fishmonger does all the hard work, filleting and grinding the fish.  I do have memories of my mother and grandmother standing around the kitchen table - which was covered with brown paper - the grinder attached to one end - filleting the fish and feeding it through the grinder into a large wooden bowl in which the fish was then chopped  and seasoned.  The memories are lovely but having this work done for me is a big plus in my book.

Nowadays I buy the fish with the bones skin and head packaged separately.  I make broth with the bones, etc., adding an onion, salt and pepper.  While this is being done I dump the fish in a bowl and season it with grated onion (also supplied by the fishmonger), salt, pepper, eggs and matzoh meal and perhaps a bissel (tiny bit) of sugar.  Then I strain the broth, wet my hands and make balls out of the seasoned fish - I drop them into the boiling broth with some sliced carrots and simmer about 1 1/2 hours.  BTW, this is all done in my mother's/grandmother's original pot with her original chopper!

When the fish is done is goes into the fridge with some broth, which hopefully jells, and the carrots to be served later with horseradish - Gold's red.

During this process the entire house smells of cooking fish - I smell of cooking fish -which is not too pleasant.  Maybe this is why I consider it such a chore and only make it twice a year. DH complains about the smell although he likes the finished result .He rushes around offering to open windows and turn on exhaust fans, which, of course, would diminish the memory making properties of the fish.

Now I've got all the recipe memories tucked away in my Passover notebook.

Mets game

We all went to the Mets game on Saturday.  Mark and I made the "kiss cam".  Cool.

Watching Top Gun

Found Top Gun while channel surfing on Sunday night.

Mark, Josh and I first saw the movie when Josh was 4 and we were on vacation in CT.  From that moment on Josh loved all aircraft and wanted to be a fighter pilot. 

He memorized the dialogue, got the soundtrack and when the movie came out for the VCR it was the first movie we bought - for about $25 at the time.

Josh didn't grow up and become a fighter pilot but the movie definitely was a life changing experience - probably  for the whole family.  It's interesting what molds people.

Knitting, etc.

I've been knitting on my toe up magic loop sox - these are for me and made out of corn yarn - sounds weird but that's what it is.  It's terrible what we people who are allergic to wool have to resort to...

 I also took my second/last class on sock knitting and we did a short row heel.  Now all I have to do is straight stockinette until it's long enough.  I do, however, need to get some kind of scale so I'll know how long I can knit the leg.  I have to use just 75 gr of the 150 gr ball.

Then I started a pair of wristlets using a great multicolored yarn I got at the the Vogue knitting show in January.  That should be a good airport/airplane project.

The bathing suit

Well, I had to buy a new bathing suit.  Horrible thought!

First I went to Dillard's and got one of the real expensive ones with the underwires in the bra and all that stuff and went and tried it on.  It was awful!  I would rather appear naked!  At least when you're naked the rolls of flesh kind of smooth out - this suit made me look as if I was made of multiple sausage rings!   Or like the Michelin man.

After that I was going to just give up and sit in the sun wearing shorts and a halter top - or maybe an artfully draped sarong.  However, I decided to go to Steinmart.

I tried on several tankini parts, pretty unstructured and in different sizes, and guess what?  I didn't look too bad.  Plus I had seen the same suit pieces at Dillard's for twice the price!!!

With a black skirted bottom....not too shabby!  To the beach...

Toe up socks

Last week I took a class at my LYS in Tampa, Knit and Knibble.  It taught toe up sock knitting which is good because then I can make the socks longer to cover more of my leg.  This is what is looks like so far - the next class will teach the heel.

Now all I want to learn is how to knit two socks on one circular needle which is really supposed to be the way to go.

Baby blankets

Today I sent out the first two baby blankets to BFF in England who's oldest daughter had twins in October.  It's a simple garter stitch that works up on a diagonal and creates it's own border at the same time.

 

I have three more to make.  They all have to be blue because everyone is having boys!  What's happening with that?