Simple, Mistakes and a Bop on the Head

Last night I bought beef flap from Whole Foods, intending to make their butcher Don’s maple/rosemary marinade. That should be on the blog, if not, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind its addition.

There was a dearth of maple syrup but I had rosemary so thought of the finish for the classic Tuscan pasta fagiole came to me. Perfume extra virgin olive oil with garlic and herbs. Yes, I learned that in cooking school in Tuscany.

I put a couple tablespoons of olive oil in a small skillet with a sprig of rosemary and several peeled cloves of garlic. Let it go for a few minutes until the rosemary got a bit crisp, not brown. Then I let it all cool to room temperature and marinated a pound of beef flap/skirt steak in it, after taking the leaves off the rosemary I threw all the garlic in as well and seasoned with black pepper. I coated the meat and left it to marinate 1.5 hours.  Then added salt and tossed it on the grill. Yum. I can’t believe I never thought of this before!

Mistakes. I remember a whopper. I bought a Thai bird chile plant at the farmers’ market. It was so pretty. I made my family a turkey chile with corn and added 1/3 of the chile the recipe called for. It was so hot that for days I tried to tame it by throwing everything but the kitchen sink at it, to no avail. Lesson: know your chiles.

And a bop on the head. I awoke yesterday morning and rushed to get dressed by seven and take the dog out. Bathroom, brush teeth, brush hair and put up. I felt a bruise in the middle of my forehead. Mentioned it to my husband because I regularly hit my hip on the counter running to the grill or to serve something, but I would have remembered a knock in the middle of my forehead.

He said he elbowed something at 5:30 in the morning and hoped it wasn’t me. It was. Mystery solved. I’m surprised it hasn’t happened more in the past ten years! Cheers, Dee