Random Thursday Thoughts

--Less than half of the US is now in the Middle Class. NPR finds this shocking. Reason says, "It's not that big a deal-- there are fewer lower class, and more upper class." It's like the statement of the simple fact that there is a minority which is far over-represented in the prison and jail population. One extreme is to believe that crime is inherent within that subset of the population. The other extreme is to believe and assert that the system is inherently racist.

--Looking at my level of income, number of people in my household, and my level of education, I'm trailing behind.

--Caleb wrote the obligatory piece on our POTUS claiming that the no-fly list should be used to restrict guns from citizens. It actually opens the discussion to some very important questions, though. If we let a regulatory agency with the force of law make regulations that take Constitutional rights away from people, what is the point of having a law, or a legislative process? This has been a question of mine about the actions of the BATFE and the TSA for a long time. Let's embrace the discussion, and thank our Constitutional Scholar POTUS for opening it up.

--In three weeks, Texans who have Concealed Handgun Licenses (CHLs) will have Licenses To Carry Handguns. (LCHs) We in North Texas anticipate lots of calls from pearl-clutchers seeing guns on the hips of citizens in public places, for the first time. I'm actually a big fan of them being concealed, because concealment removes (or at least strongly reduces) the incentive for people to carry guns for the wrong damned reason. It needs to be a tool, not a statement.

--I got tired of Pink Floyd back in college, when I had a morose roommate who would put 6 Pink Floyd albums into the CD changer and set it to Random/Infinite Repeat, and turn the amp up to 11 while he maundered. (Amazingly, that roommate is still one of my best friends.)  So I've not played any Pink Floyd for, oh 18 years. Yesterday, I played "On The Turning Away," and found myself with tears in my eyes.

--It's worth remembering that we as a nation are turning away from helping a lot of refugees, which lot is comprised of over 50% women and girls, and over 30% kids under 11. Because we are afraid.


--We got a nice new Roomba for the house, as an early Christmas gift for ourselves. We immediately named it Consuela. A guy on a local buy/sell/trade page online had an older model Roomba that his grandmother no longer wanted, so I talked him down considerably, and bought it. Within 24 hours, we had two robot minions cleaning our split-level house. I named the older model Rosie, for Rosie The Robot of The Jetsons.  My artistic 13 year-old daughter sketched her image of Consuela and Rosie, which we of course had to put up on our refrigerator:

The kid's got an eye, IMHO. 

-- Both my daughters this year are asking to borrow control of my Amazon account, to buy their Christmas gifts. We've had more boxes and parcels and packages dropped off at the front door of my house in the past year than in the combined total of my life, theretofore. 

--I qualified with the Glock 42 on Monday. That is a REALLY soft-shooting little pocket pistol. I had purchased it with Trijicons on it, and 600 rounds, from a friend. It will make a decent BUG, and I've found online the vest holster that I want to get for it for work. I just don't have the $85 lying around at present, what with all the other expenditures, as of late. Maybe next week. Or after Christmas.  

--Another officer had a Glock 43. That is an interesting pistol to shoot. It's FAR snappier in the recoil than the soft-shooting 42, which is to be expected as it is a 9X19 in basically the same sized gun. I may get one.

--Last night I got the ingredients to make this Alton Brown recipe for eggnog. It's as if they said, "we'll shut down the circulatory system with fat and cholesterol! Wait, we wouldn't want the endocrine system to feel left out! Let's wreck the liver, and the pancreas, all at once, with a pint and a half of liquor, and a pound of sugar!"

--As I have dinner to make, and a board meeting to attend in half an hour, I have successfully avoided going to work out today, by writing this blog. (smirk)

Recipe: Migas

There are recipes that are part of your heritage. Foods that you cannot consider never tasting again, because you grew up eating them, and they are part of the basis by which you define life.

 

Migas is one of those for me.

 

I've never looked at a recipe for Migas, and don't need to; it's as simple as making a PBJ sandwich. As with a PBJ, however, there are plenty of variations to the theme. NONE of them are wrong, so long as you have two basic ingredients in your Migas: scrambled eggs and corn tortillas.

 

When I met the girl from Corpus Christi, TX who was to become my wife, I made Migas one Saturday morning for her, and she said, "That's not Migas!" Somehow it was different from how she remembered it, and 15 years later neither she nor I can recall what that difference was. We learned that we liked each others' variations on the theme, and realized that there was a basic, hearty simplicity to the dish. I learned it from my mother (who hails from Alamagordo, NM, and my father (who grew up in El Paso, TX).

 

Start with a big skillet. I like my big cast iron black skillet, but I just made it five minutes ago with my big no-stick Caphalon skillet that Chris and I just got for our birthdays (Thanks, Dad and Holly!), and it was a cinch.

Migas (Serves 2 heartily):

 

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil. (Any kind.)

5 eggs, fresh and in the shell.

4 or 5 corn tortillas, raw.

1-3 cloves of garlic, or a 1/2 to 1 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder.

1/2 large onion, sliced thin.

2 - 4 jalapeños, sliced.

--Put a couple of tablespoons of oil in. Get it medium-hot, and spread it around the pan.

--Tear up a few corn tortillas into the pan. You can cut 'em into strips, but I generally just tear them into pieces about the size of poker chips. If the eggs are large, tear in another tortilla.

--Stir the tortillas around in the hot oil to get a coating. Salt 'em a little.

--Toss in a little sliced onion.

--Put some garlic in there. I like to squeeze in a couple of cloves.

--Once the onions are cooking and the tortillas have begun to golden and have some crisp to the edges, stir in your eggs. Don't bother mixing them up in a bowl first-- just crack 'em right into the pan on top of your tortillas, oil, onions, and such. It's okay if the eggs start to cook before your start to scramble them-- this is a very heterogeneous dish, and the variance in texture is a Good Thing.

--Finally, as you're scrambling the eggs together, toss a couple of sliced jalapeños in there. Canned or fresh, it doesn't matter.

--When the eggs are fully cooked, turn off the heat. If you want to over-complicate things, this would be a good time to grate a little cheese (cheddar or Monterrey jack-- it doesn't matter) over it to melt. Serve on big plates with hot flour tortillas and a pool of hot picante sauce, preferably with a cup of hot black coffee.

 

But seriously-- you could get by with just the eggs, tortillas, a dash of salt and a dab of oil.

 

Cornbread. It doesn't have to be complicated.

Well, my buddy LawDog is posting recipes, so I'll just post a tried-and-true recipe that we eat about weekly here at Casa G:

No-Flour Cornbread.

INGREDIENTS:
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup stone ground YELLOW cornmeal
1/2 teaspoon (rounded) salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 egg
1 tablespoon shortening

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C). Melt the shortening in one 9 inch round iron skillet in the heating oven. Cast a little loose cornmeal into the bottom of the pan.
2. Stir the cornmeal, salt and baking soda together. Add the egg and buttermilk and mix well.
3. Remove skillet from the oven and pour the batter into the skillet, stirring the melted shortening into the batter.
4. Bake at 450 degrees F (230 degrees C) for 30 to 40 minutes.

Remove from oven when top of cornbread is brown and turn out on to a serving plate. Cut into wedges and serve immediately with real butter.

For double batches (I make 'em in my big cast-iron skillet), reduce the heat slightly and increase the time slightly.