Category: Food & Drink

My first slab pie

Although I don’t make dessert pies often, Dale and I both adore savory pies. There’s one with fresh summer tomatoes and basil with cheddar cheese in a biscuit crust. Oh, and the recipe from an old Gourmet magazine for broccoli and sausage pie with Swiss cheese and a whole wheat crust topped with sesame seeds.

My most important rule for pie making? Never trim the excess crust – just bulk it up so there’s more.

As a crust fanatic, I’ve made my share of winners and losers. I enjoy making pie dough, but there is nothing worse than screwing it up. I’ve done reasonably well since I abandoned fancy and reverted back to my old recipe with Crisco. But I’m all about continuous improvement.

I read about a new cookbook by Cathy Barrow: Pie Squared: Irresistibly Easy Sweet & Savory Slab Pies. At first, it didn’t appeal to me, because slab pies are big, and there’s just two of us. But then I saw the book at the library, and I had nothing to lose by checking it out.

What a unique and well-done book! I curled up on the couch and read it from front to back. She talks about pie crust in ways I have never heard it discussed. She’s an excellent writer, who explains the art of making good pies in easy-to-understand language.

Cathy includes great ideas for substituting ingredients and tips for making it ahead, which simplifies the process … because as you know, I’m retired and quite busy! She also tells you how to freeze it and how to reheat it. Stuff you want to know but cookbook authors rarely tell you.

Oh, and it turns out crust is not just flour and shortening. Recipes include cream cheese crust, caramelized onion crust, rye crust and a host of press-in crusts using crackers, cornbread, potatoes and more. The book is really a crust-lover’s dream. My only complaint is that she says to trim the excess.

Slab pies look huge, but when I saw they were made in ¼ sheet pans, it seemed less daunting. I started with Curried Chicken Pie with All-Butter Crust. The filling includes chicken, cauliflower, carrots and sugar snap peas. This is the first time I made a successful all-butter crust, and it was the first time I put the pie pan on top of a pizza stone in the oven.

I have some things to learn about rolling the dough for this new shape, but is that not a beautiful pie?

Beautiful and delicious. We’re having it again tonight. I assume it’s only a matter of time before I break down and buy the book. If you love pie, I encourage you to explore this book. I learned so much and can’t wait to try another recipe.

Maybe Poblano and Chorizo Slab Pie with a Hash Brown Crust?

Postscript: For second-night dinner, we found ourselves raiding the corners because … well … more crust. Then we had a whole middle to deal with, and that leads to the only downside of these pies. They are big. Even if you freeze the leftovers, it’s more pie than we need.

I’m still going to get the book. The recipes and instructions are fantastic, and I believe I can tinker with quantities to make a smaller round pie or even individual rustic pies, the kind where you just flap the dough over the filling. But if you have more people to feed, go for the slab!

Rainy day tuna

It’s a cold messy rainy day, and I’m thinking about tuna. I got to thinking about tuna because I love tuna and Dale was thinking about potato chips. If you put the two together, it adds up to a chunky tuna salad sandwich with just the right amount of mayonnaise and dill pickles or perhaps a creamy tuna melt with cheddar on sourdough and a side of crispy chips. Crinkles?

Perfect for a rainy day. Unless you’re thinking about tuna casserole.

That’s what I’m thinking about, anyway. I haven’t made it in years, but tuna casserole is on my brain now. I recall egg noodles, cream of mushroom soup, peas and a topping of crushed potato chips. Probably some cheese involved, and that can’t be a bad thing. I never met a cheese I didn’t like.

I looked through some of our old cookbooks and couldn’t find the combination of ingredients that spoke to me. So far, this recipe sounds the best. It’s a bit boujee compared to what I grew up with, but it sounds good to me. I would probably add some peas.

Certainly, there are those among you who do not care for canned tuna and are horrified by the thought of tuna casserole. It’s hard to fathom, but I know everyone has different tastes. I bet a bunch of us still love it.

I’m excited about making tuna casserole … but I don’t know, the tuna melt sounds good. Maybe with corn chips? I’ll probably cook tomorrow, since we are actually going out tonight (a rare occurrence). A new Asian bistro opened up not too far from our house, and it’s getting good reviews. Rain is forecast through the end of the week.

I tell you all this so you have time to send me your tuna tips. Thanks in advance.

Team-building with tamales

Dale and I love tamales and usually buy them fresh at the farmer’s market. However, we’ve been talking about making them ourselves and finally decided to just do this thing.

I like to research everything to death, and Dale flies by the seat of his pants. I pulled out the Diana Kennedy cookbooks and read up on the historic art of tamale making. I studied masa from A to Z, while Dale played computer games and thought about tamales.

He surprised me by sharing he spotted all critical tools and ingredients at the local market I’ve been to once. When did he go? Is this what he does while I’m playing golf? Cruising the markets looking for who knows what?

We were ready to make our trek to the market, when I asked about filling. He unilaterally decided to make a pork filling he’d apparently unearthed on the Internet. I might have liked a vote, consulted with Diana and others, but it sounded good to me, and it was one less thing I had to worry about.

The market delivered as promised. They had pre-prepared masa, husks and even a tamale steamer, which we bought because none of the other 10,000 pots we have would work.

For the filling, Dale braised a pork butt in the oven with not much more than an onion. After it cooled, he shredded it and added his homemade chile sauce. That’s all there was to filling. But then I didn’t make it, and I know chile sauce is messy work involving the rehydration of dried pepper pods. I find it in our freezer already made!

We set up the work station. Dough, soaked husks, filling. We began to prep and realized neither one of us knew how to roll these things. The masa was too thick, so we added a bit of juice from the pork butt to thin it out.

As for rolling, we were in hysterics trying to figure it out. The first one Dale made looked like a monster burrito, and I weighed it just to see. The mother of all tamales weighed in at nine ounces. I wanted to name it El Hefe, but Dale insisted on El Capitan. I mean, wrap it in a pizza and it could be on the menu at Taco Bell.

They got smaller after that, but I never did understand the art of the roll. Dale was better at it than I was. They were looking like tamales, and we were argument-free, when we began to discuss steam time.

Dale’s sources, real or imagined, said 45 minutes. Diana (real) said two to three hours. That’s quite a discrepancy. We pulled out other cookbooks, and yes, it varied from 45 minutes to three hours.  How do you know?

We decided it probably depends on how many are in there and the thickness of the masa. The problem was I did not want to be starving at 8 p.m. waiting another hour because the masa wasn’t cooked.

I thought this would be the big fight, but we got through it without incident, probably because neither one of us was really sure about anything. It’s harder to pick a fight when you have no ground to stand on. We decided to make them early and then reheat when it was time for dinner.

The tamales took about two hours. They were probably too thick, and the rolling technique was inconsistent and weird. However, they were absolutely delicious! We had them two nights in a row and then froze the rest in their husks. A decadent treat we learned in Texas is tamales smothered in chili.

All in all, it was way fun. We laughed a lot because we were so outside our comfort zones. As retirement partners, I highly recommend taking on a joint project of some sort. Something where you have basic skills, but you are stretching them to new limits, so you learn together.

The whole experience reminded me of a team-building exercise from work, except you can use the f-bomb, and we got to kiss at the end.

Dead Milk Walking

Cooking is part of our retirement lifestyle – more affordable and overall a healthier and tastier choice. We make some incredible food, but we’ve also experienced epic failures over the years. There might be one in the refrigerator now. I’ll make Dale taste it and see.

He’s used to it. You know when the date on the milk has expired, but you think it’s probably still good? And you don’t really want to be the one to find out? We call that Dead Milk Walking. Dale’s like the medieval taste tester who determines whether we live or die.

Today it isn’t milk. Although I did have two consecutive batches of yogurt fail. I seem to be on a roll. The culprit is chicken liver pâté I made yesterday for our New Year’s Eve spread at home. I have strong suspicions it will be awful. I don’t even want to taste it.

I gently suggested to Dale he ought to check it out first. I think he’ll do it. If he likes it, I’m in. But if he declares it inedible, the pâté is headed for the garbage disposal. I can live with the occasional cooking failure, but I hate wasting food. Chicken livers were cheap, but that would also be nearly a pound of butter down the drain.

For the record, I don’t like innards, including liver. The exception is pâté. Oh, and leberknödel, a liver dumpling we used to eat in Germany.  I tried to make them once, and they count as an epic failure. I have fond memories of kalbsleberwurst, a veal liver sausage we enjoyed in Germany – especially when spread on hearty German bread. That’s it. No hearts, no gizzards, no tripe, no kidneys.

The pâté was easy enough to make. I rinsed and patted dry the livers, and then cooked them in a pile of butter with shallots, parsley, fresh thyme. Ignited some brandy and added that. A bit of red wine. Simmered it for awhile and then let it cool to room temp. Poured it into the blender and slowly added chunks of butter. I divided it into three little tubs, thinking I would freeze two … if they should survive the taste test.

So, here we are. Decision time. The rest of our feast is store-bought for a change and includes smoked salmon, which we purchased at Whole Foods (Ducktrap Kendall Brook got good reviews). A wee bit of sustainable White Sturgeon caviar from Sterling, a runny brie and a good California Blanc de Blancs Champagne. We have some crackers, and we’ll probably buy a baguette today. I make thin buckwheat pancakes for the caviar.

There’s plenty to eat. We don’t really need the pâté. When I gathered the food up for the photo opportunity, it looked like one of those picture puzzles. Which one doesn’t belong? It smells OK, but it looks nasty.

Our ritual is to spread the treats out on the coffee table using fancy dishes and watch a movie. I haven’t seen midnight in years.

THIS JUST IN: Dale tasted the pâté and declared it excellent! Now that the coast was clear, I followed suit, and I agree — it’s actually delicious. Nice firm texture but still creamy. It should be good on the crackers with a little bite of cornichon on the side.

Happy New Year! May things never be worse than they are.

I still say happy holidays

The Happy Holidays backlash mystifies me. Not everybody celebrates Christmas. I’m not scared.

Complaints about being politically correct don’t hold with me. I believe most PC terms reflect how people want to be addressed or acknowledged. I don’t think of it as being PC to say Happy Hanukkah or Happy Solstice or Happy Kwanzaa or the all-encompassing … Happy Holidays.

If holiday greetings are about spreading love, why can’t we share our kindness and good cheer with people in a way that respects and welcomes their unique experiences? If I know you celebrate Christmas, then by all means, it’s Merry Christmas! But if I don’t know you or I’m aware you have different cultural traditions, I’m either going to acknowledge your celebration or go with Happy Holidays.

We celebrate Christmas at our house but more as a folk festival than anything else. We do not subscribe to religion but sometimes adopt features of the parts we like! And then we make new traditions.

Our Christmas Eve tradition for many years is Dale’s homemade pizza and a movie, preferably a comedy. I’m struggling to find a good one for this evening, so if anybody has ideas that can be streamed from Netflix or Amazon, please share!

Christmas morning we have coffee and open a few presents. We abandoned big loot years ago. Now it’s just one or two things for each other and what the sisters send. And something for the cat! My sister-in-law sent a wrapped gift for Riley, and he knows it’s his. He has been pawing and clawing and sniffing around since it arrived. Catnip, perhaps?

Then we eat leftover pizza and enjoy a cold beer. While the pizza/beer buzz wears off, we putz around and start Christmas dinner, which we typically eat around 5:30 or 6 p.m. We keep it simple. Roast beef, broccoli and mashed potatoes. Dessert varies. This year we are eating homemade plum pudding from last year’s Christmas dinner. It has been wrapped well in the fridge. I tasted it, and it’s still delicious. I’ll make new hard sauce to go with.

As a treat to myself, later this afternoon I will try out my new homemade cannabis bath salts. All my achy breaky parts are screaming this time of year, so I’m hoping for some soothing relief. It was so easy to make using Epsom salt, Himalayan pink salt, baking soda and cannabis-infused coconut oil. I can’t wait to give you a full report on the outcome.

Until then, Happy Holidays! And Merry Christmas!

Brined and spatchcocked

Yes, it’s Thanksgiving, and that’s a newspaper cooking in the oven. Well, drying out. We finally got rain, and a big fat newspaper plump with Black Friday ads arrived on our driveway this morning in a leaky plastic bag.

I used my blow dryer for one section, while Dale opted for the oven at 250 degrees. Dale, otherwise known as Mr. Wizard, says the ignition point of paper is 500 degrees, so we should all be safe. If you should get a wet newspaper, our test revealed the oven is faster.

Oh, and please do not put the newspaper in the microwave! Dale set fire to our microwave one year drying out a wet newspaper, and we believe it’s because there’s metal in the ink. At this point, I may as well tell you there’s a history of Dale and fire.

Dale believes the cat prefers his food at mouse temperature. Dale’s ritual is to take a shower at the end of the day and feed the cat afterward. There was a time when he would set the cooktop burner on low and heat the can for a few minutes just prior to his shower. He’d turn off the heat and then go take his shower while the cat waited impatiently meowing outside the shower door. Once dried and dressed, Dale would return to the kitchen accompanied by a hungry cat and received by perfect mouse-temperature cat food.

Except one time he forgot to turn off the burner. Nothing was on fire when he returned to the kitchen, but it set off the smoke alarm, and the odor of burnt cat food jumped the kitchen and spread viciously throughout the house. Dale opened the windows and turned all fans to high in a feeble attempt to air the place out.

Meanwhile, I’m coming home from work, and I pull into our street only to find a firetruck outside the house and the distinctive odor of burnt cat food oozing its way to the driveway. Fire fighters had arrived and started asking questions. Dale explained he burned the cat’s food heating it to mouse temperature. The fireman said, “Sir, do you mind if we take a look around?” As in, are you fucking nuts?

The house was declared not on fire, but since then, no actual burners are involved in the heating of cat food. He trained our new cat in the shower ritual, but now Dale removes the can from the fridge before taking his shower … just to take the chill off. At serving time, he adds a tablespoon of hot water, which makes for nice gravy anyway. The cat certainly seems to be happy.

Another problem solved.

It’s turkey day, and Dale is in charge of the bird. I don’t recall any fires involving turkey, although we have had incendiary discussions about the best way to cook it. He is a die-hard fan of brining, and this year I made the mistake of sending him a New York Times article about brining being out of fashion. And then just to rub salt in the wound, I told him about my friend, Carole, who spatchcocks her turkey.

Dale, aka Mr. Wizard, said spatchcocking is just a fancy word for butterflying, and there’s nothing new there (other than the possibility of it being golden brown, crispy and delicious). He doesn’t care. He already has a process. And he’s right – I love his brined turkey – but I am also open to new experiences and even mentioned Carole makes her stuffing in a bundt pan. She sent me a picture.

Mr. Wizard said it looked good, for dressing. He said it’s not stuffing if it isn’t stuffed inside the bird. Whatever. After 40 years, I’m used to this. I’ll be making an apple crostata for dessert, along with standard side dishes. I’ve made every kind of pie crust known to mankind over the years, and I’m going back to the first cookbook we ever owned, a recipe that uses Crisco – not butter.

Dale doesn’t challenge my dessert and side dish decisions, so I’ve backed off on the turkey. Besides, we sort of got a new experience at breakfast. Fresh newspaper, brined and spatchcocked.

Happy Thanksgiving!

My coconut year (and the results)

I’ve written about my love of coconut and have incorporated it into my diet – mostly in the form of unsweetened coconut and coconut oil in my homemade granola and Indian soups and stews with full-fat coconut milk. These foods have been a staple of my diet for about a year now.

Although I don’t have a scientific process for examining cause and effect, in that year my cholesterol went up where it should have gone down and down where it should have gone up. My doctor said if it were anyone else, she wouldn’t even comment.

But it is not anyone else, it’s me, and she knows I take this stuff seriously.  She gets that I’m annoyed. I explained the details of my coconut year, and she agreed cutting back would probably bring my numbers back to where I want them. I hadn’t realized coconut was so high in saturated fat. Like 85 percent! Yikes.

Because it would be too simple to blame it on the coconut, during that year I also stopped taking a daily fish oil supplement. That scoundrel Jane Brody of the New York Times reported there doesn’t seem to be evidence fish oil supplements do anything but generate expensive urine. I’m all about cheap pee, so I stopped taking the pills.

As soon as I got my metabolic panel results – back to fish oil for me. The doctor agreed it was a prudent move.

Yogurt is another possible culprit, although I suspect not. I make my own yogurt using whole milk and eat a serving with breakfast nearly every day. Although I haven’t gained weight, one could argue the fat contributes to my cholesterol. I’ve been eating whole milk cheese for years, and my cholesterol was fine.

Nothing I’ve read puts a target on whole milk yogurt. But just for the sport of it, I made a batch of 2 percent, and it’s delicious. The texture is the same although perhaps slightly tarter. I definitely liked the 2 percent better for raita – grated cucumbers in yogurt to accompany spicy curry. For the sake of science, I’ll keep making 2 percent.

She was pleased with my blood sugar, which has remained stable with no medication or treatment. I am pre-diabetic, a condition I attribute to my origins at the bottom of the gene pool. I mean, really? I did not know a thin, active person could be at risk, but there you have it. I’m careful about carbs and sugar, and it appears to be working.

The visit went well, although I had a long list of stuff to go over, and they said I only had a 20-minute appointment. I didn’t know there was such a thing. Apparently, you have to request 40 minutes, and I will do that next time. I admit to being a wee bit manipulative, but we got through my list.

I don’t like my oncologist, and I got a referral to a female oncologist who also specializes in genetic research. I had ovarian and breast cancer and am BRCA1-positive. The other oncologist, a man, was surprised I did not have reconstruction and seemed squeamish about looking at my flat chest. I’m hoping the female doctor will have a better grip on reality.

The other big issue was my vertigo. The doctor agreed vertigo sucks and is referring me to vestibular rehabilitation therapy – some sort of physical therapy for inner ear disorders. I’m looking forward to it!

As I was leaving, she said, “You aren’t exercising outside with this air quality are you?” We’ve experienced days of dreaded red status – unhealthy for anyone – as a result of the fires more than 100 miles away. I said I was planning to play golf the next day, and she said, “Please don’t. This is bad stuff. You work too hard to be healthy to let this get you.”

For once, I listened. I canceled my tee time and am not doing much of anything outside until the air quality improves. In the meantime, I’m not eliminating anything from my diet – including yummy coconut – but I am going to be more careful and lean Mediterranean.

I previously shared my recipe for coconut granola, which I still love, but I’m updating here with olive oil and seeds instead of coconut. I made it yesterday, and it’s delicious.

Donna’s Low-Sugar Granola 

1 ½ cups old-fashioned rolled oats

1 cup mixed raw seeds (hemp, sunflower, sesame, etc.)

1 cup mixed raw nuts, coarsely chopped (cashews, pecans, almonds, walnuts, etc.)

1 tablespoon brown sugar

¼ teaspoon sea salt

1 tablespoon maple syrup

1 egg white, lightly whisked

1/4 cup olive oil

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Line a ½ sheet pan with parchment.

Mix dry ingredients together and add liquids. Taste and add more salt if needed.

Spread mixture in the sheet pan and cook for 20 minutes – stir gently and turn pan half-way through cooking time. It should be golden brown but not too dark – it may need 3-5 minutes more cooking time. Let cool and store in airtight container.

Fragrance, taste and healing

Last night I dreamed I went to Manderley Bethesda again. That’s where my employer was headquartered, so we in the hinterlands often made the pilgrimage to Maryland for training, business meetings and other events.

In my dream, the weather turned bad, and everyone was holed up in the office. The big wheels were secluded in a conference room on the top floor, but I had superpowers and could hear their thoughts, which were actually quite simple.

Look at me. I’m a captain of industry. Riding out the storm at the office, my favorite place. I like it here. I feel comfortable here. I’m important.

In the dream, I could feel their pride coupled with a false sense of sacrifice. Like woe is me, such a burden, even though riding it out at the office with their comrades was exactly what they lived for.

Waking up, I felt grateful to be retired. Although I was ambitious and had a great career, every job disappointed me in the end. Dale and I were talking about winning the lottery, and I said, I don’t care. I mean, yes, more money would be great, but I have what I need. Life is good.

In choosing to jump ship, a lot of my decisions were driven by dinner (as they still are). I just couldn’t get excited about working longer and longer hours so I could come home to a bowl of cold cereal. My goal was to slow down, smell the roses, eat fabulous food and enjoy my time on the planet free from workplace drama.

Although I’m not one of those retire-at-35 people, retiring at 62 was a significant accomplishment. My life now is about reading, writing, playing outside and cooking. Outings with Dale to museums, wineries and such. The occasional road trip.

Today we’re hanging out inside. Smoke from the Northern California fires has blown our way, and unlike captains of industry, we are riding out the air quality at home, my favorite place, where fragrance, taste and healing are priorities.

Dale made a fresh batch of Mexican chorizo, which is a loose pork sausage, heavily spiced but not smoked. This morning for breakfast he browned some in a frying pan and then scrambled it with eggs. Homemade salsa verde to go with.

I started to defrost soup for lunch but then remembered an avocado on its last legs. I sliced it, garnished with fresh walnuts and drizzled a bit of olive oil on top. A sprinkle of sea salt and cracked black pepper. It was so simple and delicious.

Dinner is pan-seared scallops. Dale is in charge of the scallops, while I will cook sides of sautéed Swiss Chard and yellow rice. The rice is based on a Cuban recipe, but I’ve tweaked it a bit. Dale likes chard, but for some reason, he usually resists. I guess because it’s not a potato. But he knew I was pissed about cleaning the house this morning while he did pretty much nothing. All I had to say was how about chard, and he’s like, oh yum, OK!

Saffron, rich with fragrance and taste and revered for its healing powers, is one of the world’s most expensive spices at $3,000 to $9,000 per pound, but you’ll be spending between $5.00 and $7.00 per gram. A little goes a long way.

Instant Pot Yellow Rice

1 cup Basmati rice, rinsed

1 ½ cups chicken stock

A tablespoon or two of butter

A big pinch of saffron

A pinch of Kosher salt

Put everything in the Instant Pot, lock the lid and make sure the pressure valve is closed. Select the rice setting. It should take about 15 minutes. When the cooking is complete, let it sit until everything else is ready and then release the pressure.

Taking big bites

My last post was largely about food, and I bit off more than I can chew. I was loving the idea of going through old cookbooks and magazines and somehow reinventing recipes to share on the blog from time to time.

I started with an old Gourmet magazine, November 1990, and I was blown away by the complexity of the recipes and obscure ingredients. We make a few complicated dishes, but we’ve simplified our cooking and eating over the years. Back in the day, Dale and I used to joke about recipes that started with, “Have your fishmonger …”

The guy at Safeway is as close to a fishmonger as we ever got.

There’s a section of the magazine called, “You Asked for It.” People write in about some specific thing they ate in their travels, and could Gourmet possibly get the recipe? I read this one out loud to Dale:

At the wonderful Hotel Romazzino on Sardinia’s shimmering Costa Smeralda, we had a dish of baked noodles and lobster, covered with pastry, that was almost too good to believe. Was it a dream, Gourmet, or can the recipe be obtained?

We had a good laugh over that one.

Still, the same magazine features Pumpkin Cheesecake with Bourbon Sour Cream Topping, and I have actually made that. Twice! Thinking about making it this year for Thanksgiving.

I’m not dissing the magazine. It gave us many years of pleasure, and I’m still excited to dig in and rediscover nuggets from the past. It’s a good retirement hobby for me, but I doubt I’ll make enough changes to call them my own. I will be lucky to call them edible.

Have no fear. I’ll continue to write about food in some form or fashion because it’s practically all I think about, and it’s important to enjoying life, especially in retirement. But even if a fellow retiree is inclined to cook fancy food, I hardly think they will be stopping by to get tips from me. There are too many great resources already out there.

At first, I felt embarrassed to have presented this grand idea before thinking it through more carefully. But then I thought, that’s what Retirement Confidential is all about – sharing true stories about retirement ups and downs in real time.

My progress on getting over the need to accomplish something was also a wee bit overstated. I mean, it has been less than two weeks since I decided to focus on the little things that make me happy. Although cooking makes me happy, in hindsight, reinventing 40 years of recipes sounds a wee bit driven to me.

As for retirement pursuits, it’s kind of like being a kid trying all the sports until you find one you actually like and are good at. Sometimes you have to take big bites. Go ahead, do it!

Political Postscript

In other news, I’m pleased Democrats took the House. I’m fine with Republicans having a majority in the Senate. In my opinion, democracy is stronger when power is distributed. The stock market seemed to agree, and that’s usually a positive thing for retirees. Overall, I know there is more drama to come, but I feel more hopeful about the future of our country.

Representing team live-to-eat

It has only been a week since I wrote about the nagging feeling that I’m supposed to be accomplishing something in retirement. I vowed to do what feels good and see what happens. I think it’s working!

I made a list of my favorite things:

  • Reading
  • Writing
  • Golf
  • Walking
  • Cooking

I can sort of feel the drive slipping away and am grateful I have the option of retirement. Why not just focus on what makes me happy? Sure, there are work-related activities that give me pleasure and satisfaction, but I must say it feels pretty good to wake up and not worry about what I’m going to achieve in life. Such a heavy load.

My happy list includes cooking, because we love to eat, and we hate eating bad or mediocre food, and we hate spending money on bad or mediocre food. We are both excellent home cooks and have been obsessed with food since our first date. As I started to think more about the role of food in our lives, I added up the cookbooks and food-related publications we’ve collected over 40 years.

I counted 193 books, 14 years of Gourmet magazines, five notebooks of clipped recipes and stacks of miscellaneous publications, including Cook’s Illustrated and Chile Pepper magazines. The bookcase photographed above is just outside the kitchen, but there’s an annex in the guest bedroom upstairs. Oh, and we converted a downstairs bedroom into a walk-in pantry for a second refrigerator and cooking supplies. One of our neighbors said it looked like Williams Sonoma.

As I get older, I’m concerned about using the things we have or getting rid of them. My sister and I both started wearing old jewelry for no good reason other than you can’t take it with you. If you love it, use it, wear it. Same with good china, crystal, special serving pieces. Use them! I’m starting to feel the same way about all these recipes.

Although I love to read cookbooks just for sport, I know there’s a treasure trove of great recipes dating back to the 70s, 80s and 90s. I want to dust them off and see what has been hiding in plain sight. I believe I would find that fulfilling. We enjoy spicy food, so I’m pretty sure we’ll have to jazz up some of these recipes to suit our current tastes. It just sounds like fun to me.

I’ve been reading up on copyright and how to feature the books on my blog and publish recipes – no illusions about being a food blogger – but I definitely want to share the nuggets and write more about how food and cooking enhances retirement lifestyle. Even if you are among those who just view food as fuel, you have to eat. Eat well!

So, there you have it. I’ll continue to file these articles under Food & Drink until I come up with something better. Even that is progress for me – the old Donna would have waited until everything was perfect and perfectly packaged. I’m evolving! I even gave ugly (but delicious) cupcakes to my neighbor. I think about the tantrum I might have thrown 20 years ago over making ugly cupcakes and am grateful to say it’s easier being me these days.

Which team are you on? Eat-to-live or live-to-eat?