Tuesday, April 02, 2013

The slime factor


Not too long ago Richard read somewhere that if everyone gave up meat for one meal a week that it would save…. Well, he doesn’t remember now what exactly it would save, but it made quite an impression on him at the time, so we have been experimenting with “Meatless Monday” for about 2 months now.

What is impressing me most about my husband, who will begin another decade of life toward the end of summer, is that he is becoming more open and more adventurous the older he gets. I am very pleased that he is turning into an interesting geezer who is not so stuck in rut that he can’t try something new. What is particularly thrilling to me is that he is now quite willing to try many of the vegetarian meals that I have prepared for myself for lunch for many years and which he wouldn't even taste to see if he liked it. In the margin of the page of one of the recipes from my Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant cookbook, which I use often, and which I had fed him once some years ago to an underwhelming response, I had written “Richard hates this…”

I fed it to him not too long ago, and he quite liked it this time around and said I should make it again.
 
For this Meatless Monday I fixed groundnut stew, a pleasing blend of sweet potato, cabbage, onion, ginger, chopped apple, tomatoes, some spices, and peanut butter… and chopped okra.

Okra. One of those vegetables is that is either liked or not liked... at all.  There is a slime factor with okra. The slime doesn’t bother me, but it bothers him. He will only eat okra if it is dredged in cornmeal and fried in oil.

I thawed the frozen, sliced okra and tried putting it in warm water for a while and then rinsing it in a colander to get the slime off, but there seemed to be a never-ending supply of slime… So I dished out his portion of the meal and added the okra to the rest of it and cooked it a little longer, and dinner was served..

That was really good. Let’s have that again some time…


Success!

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