Really easy crock pot ham.

I have several excuses for not posting any recipes for a long time, and I was reminded of one of them because of the picture of the ponderous housewife on the left. I got food poisoning from egg salad, and so I hated food for a while, and trusted nothing in my fridge.

Crock pots are hip now. When did this happen? My crock pot came to me as a sad, unwanted appliance when both my parents married new people who had nice crock pots with timers and shit, so I got the 1979 version: one knob and grease stains.

This delicious ham will take you 5 minutes to make (if you are the fastest potato peeler in the galaxy. But potatoes aside, it's really easy).

'Spicy Honey Ham'

Put 3 pound(ish) ham in the crock pot. Peel and cut up a medium onion and 3 sweet potatoes, and arrange those around the ham.

Make a sauce by mixing a 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup pineapple juice, 1/4 cup honey, 2 tablespoons melted butter, and 1 tsp crushed red pepper.

Mix and dump in crock pot.

Low for 7-8 hours, or high for 4 hours.

Tonight, I'm going to cut the butt of the ham into chunks and put it in macaroni and cheese. I love dinner!
I was looking for a picture of ham to put with this recipe, but this steak is patriotic.

Rhubarb, fool.

This is not a recipe for rhubarb fool, though I have made that. I found it too sweet and annoying to make cream with my own sweat and tears. The following method of making rhubarb is much simpler and, in my opinion, better all around. Rhubarb is an ideal vegatable. It grows like mad, and is pretty easy to get. My mom has a wicked recipe for rhubarb cake, but that requires turning on the oven in the summer, which is just not okay. So here's what I've been doing with it:



Take 3-4 stalks of rhubarb and chop it into bite-size chunks, to make about 3 cups.
Combine 3 cups chopped rhubarb in a medium saucepan with 1/4 c. sugar. Let sit for 15 minutes, until the rhubarb has released a good amount of juice.

Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes, until it starts to thicken a little and gets soft. Let cool for two hours (or less if you're anxious and don't care.) You can store it for 2-3 days in the fridge.

Best ways to use it:
-as topping for vanilla ice cream. seriously. tart + sweet = a delcious soupy snack.

-as a base for a crazy fruit salad (I just added mandarin oranges and chomped away. It would be good with blueberries and strawberries, too.)

-as topping on some sort of shortcake or pound cake. or any pastry.

Potted Meat Thrives for 71 Years -- During Both Boom and Bust

Article from Advertising Age, June 16, 2008.

How has a product whose pink color, strange consistency and enviable molecular stability -- which made it fodder for countless jokes and even a Monty Python-inspired musical -- remained relevant as a foodstuff people actually serve to their kids? It's not necessarily the economy, stupid -- a fact that has a lot to do with the role of branding during tough economic times, when, conventional wisdom has it, consumers retreat to less-costly items.

It's a trend explained by the concept of "inferior goods," an economics term that less describes the makeup of a product than its place in consumer-demand theory. They're basically goods or services for which demand increases as income decreases and vice versa. They're staples that are somewhat dispensable in good times but more desirable in bad ones. Commonly cited examples include ramen noodles, bus transit, lipstick (as the New York Times recently postulated) and, often, Spam.

Read the whole article here.

Blueberry Ginger Icebox Pie

hey, so it has been awhile.

Here is a recipe for a delicious, easy, summertime pie. Good for taking to a BBQ if you are invited to one, or good for just eating by yourself while watching TV in your sweltering apartment.



5 cups fresh blueberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/4 cup water
1 tablespoon butter
1 inch ginger, grated
juice of half a lemon
zest of half a lemon
1 10 in graham cracker crust*

+ In a medium saucepan, bring 3 cups blueberries, ginger, lemon juice, zest and sugar to a boil.
+ Meanwhile, whisk together the water and cornstarch
+ After the blueberries come to boil, stir in the cornstarch and cook for 2 minutes
+ Remove from heat and stir in the remaining 2 cups of blueberries and the butter.
+ Pour into the pie crust and refrigerate for 6-8 hours
+ Eat.


*
you can buy a graham cracker crust, or just make it. they're real easy to make

3/4 cup crushed graham crackers
1/8 cup powdered sugar
4 tablespoons melted butter

mix it all together and press into a pie pan. bake at 300 degrees for 10 minutes. let cool.