much ADO about ... not much

Well, the short version is -- if it weren't for the bacon and onions, the lamb fries wouldn't have tasted like much of anything.

As i anticipated, their flavor (like sweetbreads) depended upon how they were cooked and sauced.  Liver, heart and kidney have a flavor of their own as do well-used-muscle meats.  Less-exercised muscles have less flavor.  Certain glands seem to have even less, and the "mountain oysters" of pre-pubescent animals seem to fall into this category.

We'll be interested to taste lamb fries again if we find them on the menu of some well-regarded restaurant, but won't go out of our way to order and cook them again ourselves.

Other creations of my kitchen have been of more note this week:  i made a batch of tomato ketchup from an "old" twentieth-century recipe which turned out very well, as did a version of bacon jam, and a loaf of Wooo's flax bread.  The mac&cheese recipe from our new Fat Fast Cookbook was also tried and approved -- needs some tabasco or cayenne, though!

It's been another "funny" week.  Some painter/paperers, recommended by our OUTSTANDING carpenter (Mike Schoenlaub of Standard Construction Inc.) have been coming almost daily to relieve me of some of the work of our living-room rehab project, which made our irregular hours even more discombobulated.  The good news, though, is that we're making good progress on the decoration.  The plaster walls are as sound and smooth as they'll ever be, the woodwork is primed and painted, and most of the major wall was papered today.  I removed, cleaned and repaired the lock-mechanisms from both the pocket-doors, and a local locksmith has provided a key to operate them.  We chose and ordered new tile for the hearth and firebox-surround, and identified the perfect carpet for the room (to be ordered when it goes on sale in another ten days).

So altogether, we've been busy in an on-again-off-again sort of way!  My excessive fatigue has passed, though my energy is definitely not all it should be.  I'll be pleased and relieved to have my living room habitable again ... but of course when it's done i'll need to throw a party for our friends and neighbors who have extended their hospitality to US over the past few years!