Tuesday, October 04, 2011

The Roast Beef Story

*Warning: This story contains things vegetarians may not like to think about.*

I wanted beef.
Nothing else, just beef.

So, on Monday I went to the grocery store, and waited in line to ask the butcher for beef.  Unfortunately, I still don't know what the cuts of beef are called.  I pointed to one small chunk of beefy looking product, and said, "I want this."  She asked if I wanted lomo; I said yes, figuring that my option must've been lomo.  Then the lady proceeded on to the next customer...I stood around the butcher area for about 10 minutes, wondering if I had communicated that I actually wanted to buy that piece of beef.  I saw a guy come out of the back freezer with a very large piece of beef...we're talking: bones, fat, meat, the whole thing.  So I watched him cut up some beef.  Eventually I started to realize he was cutting my lomo off of the former cow.  The lady returned and asked me how much lomo I wanted, so I said "one kilo" thinking that was about the size of the little chunk of beef I had pointed at earlier (and wondering why I wasn't just getting the pre-cut chunk; maybe it was display only??)  Well.  It's not the same size.  I walked away with a huge chunk of meat, probably 4 times as much as the little chunk of meat.  I walked away with just over 2 1/2 pounds of beef.

Tuesday I resolved to freeze the HCOM (huge chunk of meat), because I didn't want it to go bad, and I didn't have the time to cook it on Tuesday.

Wednesday I wanted to cook HCOM, but it was still frozen, and I figured it would take quite a while to defrost that thing.  So I got a bowl & put it in the fridge to cook on Thursday.

By the end of Thursday night, I was realizing that HCOM wasn't going to be cooked that day either.  Yet, I still wanted beef.

I actually considered getting up early on Friday to cook HCOM before I was going to be gone about 8 hours.  But those of you that know me, know that getting out of bed for me is pretty difficult--even for HCOM  So, by 10pm Friday night, HCOM was still uncooked and sitting, defrosted, in the refrigerator.

Saturday is actually a story all on its own, with very few of my plans actually occurring.  Including, yes...cooking HCOM.  I went out with a friend in torrential rain (not really exaggerating here, the pictures are on her camera, but you'll see soon enough!) and returned at 1:30.  Hungry, and ready to cook my HCOM!  I was pleasantly surprised that when I plugged my computer in, it finally didn't spark!  (I'm apparently tired, because I didn't notice that the lights I had turned on didn't light up either!)  The neighbor stuck her head in the window, and asked if I'd eaten yet.  I said no, that I was just getting ready to cook.

And I was given the worst news for the day. 
The electricity was out again.

See, I'm still using small electric stove.  And my aging meat was in the fridge, which can't stay very cold without electricity.  And there was no telling when the electricity would be back.  So I figured I may as well take a nap since it was raining and the lights were off.  The neighbor texted about 20 minutes before we were to leave for church last night, and as soon as I started to get ready to leave the house--the electricity came back on.  All I could do was laugh--because if I didn't laugh, I may have cried!  I was still hungry, had possibly fermenting meat in my fridge, and no time to cook it.  I toyed around with the idea of cooking it after I got home--which ended up being 1AM, but our time changed last night, so the "new time" was 2AM.  Obviously, I chose sleep.

Today, Sunday, after church I came home and smelled my HCOM.  It still smelled beefy, so I pulled out the pressure cooker, and cooked my first roast beef on my little electric stove.  And I must admit, it's got a very satisfying taste!

**"Ironically": Selah's song "Through it All" just played as I was finishing this...

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